The Ravens of Death (Tsun-Tsun TzimTzum Book 4)

by Mike Truk

  Neveah’s flew back, her body wracked by jerks and spasms. Her skin was darkening into a black, chitinous exterior, heavily ridged along the shoulders and the back of her arms. It lightened to a metallic crimson with a purple sheen where her leather armor was splitting open.

  “One can make peace with a curse without curing it,” Alusz was saying. “Accepting one’s fate doesn’t mean you conquer it.”

  Neveah arched her spine in agony, threw her head back, and screamed. With taloned fingers she tore away the rest of her clothing, shredding it easily, her wings bursting forth from her shoulders to flare out wide, black and skeletal, leathering and blotting out the coliseum behind her.

  “Did you really think that mortal love could overcome such a potent spell?” Alusz sounded genuinely intrigued. “That you could banish such a demon by ‘accepting’ it? Oh, Noah. This demon was chosen from Lilith’s legions for this purpose alone, and the beings that were gathered to cast that spell were Lilith’s most mighty servants. This moment has been in the making for decades. Nothing you could have done would have forestalled it. Nothing.”

  As before, only Neveah’s face remained unchanged, an island of purity amid her warped and demonic flesh. Her frame once more assumed a combination of the feminine and alien; her breasts enhanced, hips widened, and all encased in smooth, mottled crimson and orange leather. Her ribs had become as pronounced as a starving woman’s; her legs recurved like a wolf’s; her hair thickened into fleshy ropes that hung down to her waist.

  “Goodbye, Noah,” said Alusz, turning to walk back to the dark portal that led below. “I’m taking Valeria back to Ur-Gharab and closing the Fulcrum down. I take comfort from the fact that this will be all over for you quickly.”

  Brielle was yelling something, her burning blade in hand. Little Meow stood helplessly by her side, both of them far above and too removed to be of help.

  Neveah stilled, her coral lips pulled into a frown, her eyes closed. She hovered before me in her dread form.

  “Neveah?” I didn’t dare hope, could barely breathe. “That you in there?”

  She opened her eyes. And my heart leaped, rejoicing. They were Neveah’s eyes still, dark and alive with pain.

  “I’m sorry, Noah,” she whispered. “I can’t… it’s too strong.”

  “No,” I said, flying forward a few yards. “Fight it, Neveah. Fight it!”

  Tears gathered in the corners of her eyes, flowed down her cheeks.

  “I’m sorry,” she said, voice cracked with sorrow. “I’m so sorry, Noah.”

  I hung there, unable to breathe, to think, to react in any way.

  She closed her eyes, and from her palm a black shard emerged, a slender blade that grew and grew. At last she curled her taloned fingers about Morghothilim’s hilt and lowered the blade so that it pointed at my chest.

  With a snap, her eyes opened, and they were as dark and soulless as those of the Nithing-Lord.

  I stared into their depths, seeking some hint of Neveah therein, some sign of her humanity, her indomitable will, her refusal to ever succumb.

  Her coral-pink lips stretched into a wicked smile, and my heart faltered, my hope died.

  There was nothing in her eyes but lust and hunger.

  Neveah was gone.

  And I was left alone with her demon and the Nithing-Lord below me.

  Chapter 21

  Brielle was screaming from atop the wall, Little Meow clutching her arm., both of them too far away to be of help.

  Fighting for calm, I backed away from Neveah, Shard held out low and to my side. Each second was precious. I knew just how fast Neveah could move in this form. The last time I’d fought her had been back on Tagimron, and I’d grown in power since then. But had I grown enough?

  Could I fight her to a standstill? Survive, even just her first onslaught?

  I doubted it.

  Especially if the Nithing-Lord below saw fit to get involved.

  Neveah parted her coral-pink lips and licked the edge of Morghothilim with her lascivious tongue. The blade’s black edge sliced her flesh and a stream of blood inked its length.

  Fighting was a losing proposition. No matter the outcome, to fight Neveah was to lose.

  Then what?

  And to think this was all a trap - a set-up from the beginning. Alusz had tricked me into bringing Neveah back onto the board, to ensure she’d be here at the end, to be played in exactly this manner.

  My hands were shaking with emotion. Everything was painfully detailed; my vision was super acute, my body alive like never before.

  As if it knew it had precious seconds left before being destroyed.

  The Neveah before me was wholly lost to her demon. There was nothing there to appeal to. I might as well cry out to the Nithing-Lord for compassion.

  But there was another way to connect with Neveah. A way that no demon or Morathi queen could block.

  I summoned my ward, expanding my sphere of platinum power about me, my first instinct being to push it out as far as it’d go. But I checked that impulse and drew it in tight, seeking to mold it to my frame.

  The most advanced users concentrated their wards; they didn’t push them out and stretch them thin.

  I molded the ward about me, or tried to, forming an oval that just encapsulated my frame. I thought of flying toward Brielle and Little Meow, attempting to get close enough before being attacked that we could overlap our wards, but stayed still.

  Sudden flight would precipitate an attack.

  Demon-Neveah was savoring the moment, drinking me in with those ebon eyes. Any second I could steal was of incalculable advantage.

  I closed my eyes and sank into my reservoir. Diving deep, I followed the golden filament to where the burning strands expanded in a radial fashion to the apertures. Intuition guided me. Intuition born of love, of need. Without thinking, without figuring out a plan in advance, I grasped hold of the golden filament and channeled the Source from the heavens above deep into my soul.

  The floodgates opened with the same power that allowed me to direct a massive amount of golden light through Shard. That blessing beyond measure, that flood that I could barely control.

  It poured into me like a scintillating ocean, and then through - I didn’t hold onto it, didn’t seek to build up my reserves, but instead directed that power through the strands that connected me to every one of my companions. I sent that surge of power along the filaments to Imogen’s aperture, to Emma’s, to Brielle’s, to Valeria’s.

  I then sent the greatest wave coursing through Neveah’s, where it slammed into the closed aperture and caused it to snicker-snack wide open.

  I didn’t cut off the flow, allowing more power to descend through me, enervate me, and beautify me. I felt that power sink deeply into Brielle, the last remaining companion on her feet and by my side. She immediately burst forth from her sanctum; her figure was aflame with golden light, her crimson hair a raging mane, her eyes burning with a deep incarnadine hue.

  I didn’t know what I was doing. What the desired result could be. But without recourse, without option, I could only trust in the Source. I could only pray that it would affect the change I needed – that, guided along the filaments of love, it would make the difference in the fight for Neveah’s soul.

  Then, to my everlasting delight, I saw Imogen’s aperture whisk open. She emerged, radiant and pure, her hair whipping about her, eyes burning, her form simplified but alive. Her spirit moved to join Brielle’s, returning from whatever coma she’d been lost to, her presence potent, bolstering my own sense of confidence and delight.

  My ward exploded.

  Deep in my reservoir, grasping the golden filament, I sensed terrible force batter into me, and felt myself fall. But it came from a great remove, as if it were happening to someone else in a different room.

  The urge to open my eyes was overwhelming, but I held on tight to the golden filament, continued to channel that power, seeking to push forth my ward once more.

&nb
sp; Another impact. My entire sanctum shuddered, not in the receiving a blow, but from my near loss of consciousness.

  I had but seconds, I knew. Seconds, before whatever was happening to me out there proved my undoing.

  But I grit my teeth and poured more energy into the radial filaments, and when Emma’s aperture irised open, I couldn’t restrain a cry of victory.

  Emma emerged, her white hair undulating about her, and my god - the power that washed off her was tremendous. Before she’d been slight and unassuming in her spirit form; now she glowed like a white sun, her eyes blank and righteous and absolute, like stars going nova.

  She floated forth, expression grave, arms extended out to her sides. My whole being rippled with emotion, with awe and wonder and delight and the purest love.

  Three.

  Three of the five were present, and I turned to Valeria’s aperture, at the power that was piling up there before its closed portal, willing, needing her to come as well.

  Nothing.

  I was in great pain. I didn’t feel it, locked down here with my fingers wrapped around the golden filament, but knew it, almost clinically. Horrible things were being done to my body. All I had to do was open my eyes and that reality would sweep me away.

  But I wasn’t dead yet.

  I banished the thought, the desire to protect myself, and poured more magic into Anahata and my broken ward. I willed it to push forth once more, taking in the sight of Emma, Brielle, and Imogen, and allowing the love they felt for me, the sublime and endless wonder at being worthy of their love, to fuel the need to defend myself.

  I felt my ward somehow revive, crackling back out around my physical body, and staying death for a few seconds more.

  Neveah, I said, looking at her open aperture. Come to us. Please.

  The aperture remained empty.

  I took a deep, unnecessary breath, and willed more power to burn through me into her sanctum.

  The very fabric of my reservoir was starting to fray, the walls rippling and tearing, the sheer amount of power burning me out. I was a lightbulb passing too much current, and I knew I couldn’t hold it for much longer.

  But for all my faults, for all my weaknesses, there was one thing I’d grown really, really good at: tolerating pain. Pushing myself into the red zone.

  So I ground my teeth, hunched my shoulders, clenched my fingers tighter against the golden filament, and took even more of that infinite ocean into myself. Channeling more than I’d ever done before, my mind sublimated into that glory, my very sense of self-being erased by the Source’s endless wonder. I directed that might at Neveah’s sanctum.

  Dimly, I felt more pain. From a remove, I saw Brielle, Emma, and Imogen fly to me, surround me, and link their hands, forming a protective circle.

  Something clicked within my mind, my soul, and I was able to claw my way back from dissolution. Their love bolstered my very sense of self, and with terrible effort, I pulled my mind, my spirit, back from being dissolved in the Source’s glory.

  And in Neveah’s aperture, I saw movement.

  I saw her appear, her slender human self, black smoke boiling off her at a furious rate, like some deep sea vent fulminating furiously. Her figure was barely visible beneath the sin and Hexenmagic that my power was burning from her skin, from her very soul.

  It was a magic and curse that regenerated as quickly as I destroyed it, that seemed as endless as the Source’s love.

  By the gods, I could tell how much it cost her to move toward me. Each step, each moment an agony that my own transfixion paled in comparison to.

  Head bowed, shoulders heaving, she gripped the edges of her aperture, the substance of her soul endlessly burning away, and pulled herself through.

  The smoke and Hexenmagic was raging off her faster than I could follow, burning out of every pore under the ablution of the Source’s assault. Emma, Imogen, and Brielle were buckling under their own effort to keep me sane, keep my soul coherent; even so, I reached for more magic, for more power, and directed it at Neveah.

  Come to me, I called, willing her to take another step, and then another. Neveah! You can do this!

  And somehow, she did. Her very spirit was fragmenting, burning away with the corruption boiling off her, her form almost invisible under that noxious eruption. Still she took a step. Then a second. Then a third.

  And I felt such pride, such awe, such admiration that my spirit shuddered, feeling like it was flying apart. I wanted to laugh, to cry, to fall to my knees before such strength.

  And some of that must have poured through the filament connecting us.

  Neveah raised her head, inch by shuddering inch, and our eyes locked.

  And in that moment of apotheosis, my spirit reduced to a lambent outline, her own near-lost under her ever-regenerating, ever-burning corruption. A spark flew between us, a spark from that fire we’d lit back on her home world; born of our union, born of the trials we’d undergone together. Our faith in her, in each other.

  Despite it all, despite what was happening in the waking world, despite the pain, the impossible odds, Neveah found it within the depths of her infinitely capacious soul to smile.

  The filament that bonded us both together erupted in gold fire, and my heart felt like it would burst. The channel between us widened from a narrow tunnel to a six-lane motherfucking highway, and the black smoke boiling off her suddenly streamed behind as if she was caught in a hurricane-force wind.

  Neveah straightened. Lowered her shoulders. Lifted her chin.

  The golden fire passed from the filament to her body, racing over her figure to limn her in golden radiance beneath that ever-burning corruption.

  I love you, she whispered.

  I love you, I replied, voice hoarse with wonder.

  Neveah gazed down at her upturned palm. At the Hexenmagic corruption that continued to burn off her like a Kuwaiti oil well on fire. She closed her hands into fists, and the black smoke disappeared, cut off at some primal source. It left Neveah there before me, herself alone, illuminated by our mutual love.

  Alusz was wrong, she said, voice quiet. I’m looking forward to showing her the depth of her mistake.

  I released the golden filament, and around me Imogen, Brielle, and Emma fell away, releasing their Herculean effort to keep me from being destroyed.

  Open your eyes, said Neveah. There’s work to be done.

  I did so.

  I was lying on the arena floor at the bottom of a crater, three or so yards below ground-level. I couldn’t see my ward anywhere around me, though Anahata was drinking deep of my magic, projecting its protective radiance around me.

  Had my ward turned invisible? Was it waiting in a state of potential?

  My body was wrecked. The impact, or impacts - whatever had happened - had shattered me. The pain was such that I couldn’t begin to interpret the mosaic of ruination that I’d become. I was molded across the cracked chunks of rock upon which I’d fallen.

  And above me, Neveah floated, in her demon form.

  But her eyes.

  They were her own once more, dark, and alive with love.

  She descended into the crater, Morghothilim fading from view, to crouch beside me, wings furling behind her back.

  Sliding her taloned hands under my broken body, she lifted me carefully from the wreckage.

  I nearly blacked out, but somehow held on.

  I held on as she flew back up, moving with infinite gentleness, to carry me up into the air, toward the top of the coliseum wall where Imogen, Emma, Brielle, and Little Meow stood awaiting us.

  I caught a glimpse of the Nithing-Lord. It hadn’t moved from its original position, but simply watched us go, turning its head slowly to track our passage.

  Neveah reached the others and came to a halt before Emma, hovering in the air a yard away from her, extending my broken body.

  Emma’s white hair hung about her shoulders, and I saw her irises had also changed. They had lightened to a blue so pale they appeared a
lmost translucent, ringed by a dark rim that gave her gaze an otherworldly appearance.

  She extended both hands over my chest, closed those gorgeous eyes, and power flooded into me.

  No burning, no agony, no pain of a body forced into rapid healing. Instead, I felt again that cool resurgence of strength and health, felt bones knit together, organs grow whole, blood pull away from cavities, and back into my veins. My spine buckled, re-aligning, and my thoughts cleared. In moments I was myself once more.

  “The Source wept,” whispered Little Meow, voice hoarse with wonder. “How did you…?”

  I tapped Manipura to rise out of Neveah’s leathered arms and flew forward to press my lips to Emma’s. She pulled me into a hug so tight it crushed the breath out of me, then released me to step back and lift off the wall as well.

  “Did you know I can fly now?” she asked, lips pulled into a grin.

  Imogen flipped a braid behind her shoulder and also lifted off the wall. “Took you long enough.”

  “Showoffs,” said Brielle, but she couldn’t hide her emotion, couldn’t even pretend to be upset. Her smile said it all, and when Emma extended an arm to her, she stepped into her embrace and allowed her to be lifted into the air.

  “We still have to deal with the Nithing-Lord,” said Neveah, her voice subtly different in her demon form - rich and mature, coiled through with eerie resonances. “Though in this form it shall find in me the greatest challenge of its life.”

  “Valeria,” said Emma. “Where is she?”

  “Below,” I said, turning to regard the dark portal in the wall. “With Alusz.”

  “You must go to her,” said Neveah. “Before Alusz takes her back to Ur-Gharab and closes the portal to Malkuth.”

  “No,” I said. “We have to fight the Nithing-Lord together.”

  “No,” said Imogen. “Neveah’s right. Everything is in the balance. We can take the Nithing-Lord, Noah. You have to rescue Valeria before it’s too late.”

  I cast a glance down at where the Nithing-Lord awaited. Sensing our attention, it at last uncrossed its arms, spreading them out wide as if welcoming our attack, prepared for whatever we could throw its way.