Nature's Peril - the Complete Edition

by Duncan Pile

  Sabu was on his feet before the rest of them, his gleaming scimitars in his hands as he advanced towards the demon.

  “Stay back, all of you!” he ordered. “This is my fight.”

  “We can’t let you fight it alone!” Taurnil said. His staff was rippling with blue flame, the demon’s proximity agitating its powerful enchantment.

  “Trust me, you’ll just be in my way,” the blademaster said. “We have to buy Emmy time to finish what she’s doing. If I fall, you’ll have your chance Taurnil.”

  The light from the tree seemed to dim as a pall of darkness filtered through the air. Gaspi felt despair rip at his heart and squeeze his lungs. The Darkman’s presence was enough to make him want to curl up and die. Its head swivelled, glowing, blood-red eyes fixing on him immediately. It opened its mouth and roared, a bellow of hatred and triumph that chipped at the edges of his sanity and sent them tumbling away in a gale of feral destruction. It lifted its arms, bony protrusions sliding from its wrists, and sprang into motion. It was so focussed on Gaspi it didn’t even see Sabu coming. The blademaster ran at it, leapt into the air and rammed a foot into its unguarded face. The Darkman’s head snapped back and it took a step backwards to steady itself. It looked at Sabu in angry surprise. The blademaster cocked his head and rotated his wrists, his scimitars flashing in the light of the altar.

  Its eyes narrowing, the demon’s focus shifted from Gaspi to the blademaster. Gaspi felt it happen. The focus of its hate was a palpable thing, and as it left him, his breathing grew a little easier.

  Gaspi’s brain finally caught up with the moment. The chimera! He fumbled in his pockets, looking for the pouch that contained the enchanted figurine. The Darkman rushed at Sabu, fast as lightning and vicious as a winter storm, but the blademaster kept it at bay, using every last ounce of his skill to stay outside of its deadly reach.

  Gaspi’s hand closed on the pouch. He pulled it out and tipped the figurine into his hand. He placed it on the floor in front of him and summoned power.

  “Get back!” he urged the others. If he wasn’t quick Sabu would be a goner. The Darkman lashed out again, but Sabu deflected the blow and stepped out of reach. “I said get back!” Gaspi urged through gritted teeth, and this time everyone moved. He drew even more power, bringing Hephistole’s instructions to mind. He had to put a whole heap of power into it, throwing his will and intent into the summoning, and he had to use a specific command. How did it go now?

  “Mighty Chimera, save me from my enemies,” he enunciated, pouring power into the figurine. It glowed brightly at the influx of power, but nothing else happened. The Darkman attacked again, swift as lightning, and this time it got through Sabu’s defences. The blademaster managed to turn aside the tainted weapons, but the demon stepped in and elbowed him in the face, and Sabu was thrown viciously to the ground. The Darkman stepped forward to finish it, but then Gaspi remembered the command in full:

  “MIGHTY CHIMERA, DEFEND ME FROM MY ENEMIES!” he yelled, power surging from his fingertips and lancing into the figurine, which flared with blinding light. Even the Darkman paused, turning to face the source of the sun-bright glare. It lifted an arm to shield its eyes, mimicking for a surreal moment the people it was trying to kill.

  Magic poured from Gaspi like a torrent, drawn out by the chimera, which swelled in size before his squinting eyes. It grew quickly, rippling muscles bunching beneath silvery, metallic-looking skin. It tossed both its heads as it expanded, lion’s maw snarling and sharp goat horns scything the air in anticipation of battle. Its thick, snake-like tail wove over its body, fangs bared and snapping at the air. A moment later the light faded and the enchantment was complete, releasing the magical beast to do Gaspi’s bidding. It was huge, as tall as the Gunthaak had been, and longer than two horses nose to tail. Gaspi could barely breathe, the air quivering with magic and violence.

  “Kill the Darkman,” he commanded, pointing at the demon, which seemed frozen in indecision. Until the chimera tried to stop it reaching Gaspi, the compulsions that bound the Darkman wouldn’t let it attack it, but neither could it turn its back on such a creature and kill Sabu. But at Gaspi’s command, all restraints were abandoned, and both fabled beast and demon leapt at each other, blades, teeth, claws and horns slashing.

  The ground beneath Gaspi’s feet shuddered at the first colossal clash. Debris fell from above, followed by a drifting cloud of dust. The Darkman tumbled away first, one of the chimera’s horns ripping a great rent just below the demon’s shoulder. Gaspi watched with a clenched jaw, desperately hoping the chimera was powerful enough to finish the Darkman off. But the chimera was injured too, a chuck of flesh sheared off at the shoulder. The severed flesh smoked when it hit the floor and disappeared, and when the chimera leapt at the Darkman again, its movement was impeded by the wound. The Darkman attacked again, serrated weapons spinning at the chimera’s legs, but the creature reared and smashed massive paws down on the Darkman’s shoulders, crushing it against the floor. The ceiling cracked above them at the impact and a stone crashed down to the flagstones, narrowly missing Lydia. Gaspi threw a shield over everyone, and a separate one over Emmy, to protect them from any further falling debris. If the battle took very long, there was a danger the whole ceiling might come down on them.

  The demon fell under the chimera’s paws, but the moment it hit the floor it thrust upwards, piercing the chimera’s belly with one of its poison-coated blades, just as a colossal paw crashed down once more onto its midriff. Goat, lion, and demon all roared in pain, and the snake head hissed angrily. The chimera pulled itself off the demon’s blade, retreating as the Darkman rose to its feet, but the demon was moving tentatively. Gaspi figured that if it had ribs, they’d just been smashed to pieces, but the demon was still mobile, and seemed to get more so by the moment. The chimera on the other hand, was suffering badly, perhaps infected by the Darkman’s poison. Certainly, the silvery gleam of its coat appeared to have diminished, shining more dully than it had before.

  Gaspi looked past the embattled titans and saw Emmy, standing by the altar with a beatific expression on her face, utterly oblivious to the violence unfolding around her. “Come on Emmy,” he whispered, willing her to return to the present. If she came around, they could grab the fragments and transport out of there while the chimera held the Darkman at bay. If he transported, it wouldn’t attack Baard or the ogres. Its compulsion would force it to turn around and seek him out, but he’d be far away in Helioport, and that would buy him a couple of weeks. But Emmy didn’t come round; she stayed exactly as she was, lost in some spiritual experience that put them all in grave danger.

  The chimera attacked again, pouncing on the Darkman and tearing into it with all it had. Its horns pierced the demon once more, and when heavy jaws crunched down on its wrists, the Darkman keened in agony. The snake head struck, biting at the demon’s face and, though the Darkman reared and pulled away, it couldn’t escape the chimera’s superior strength. Black blood welled up from a dozen bites, dripping down the demon’s blackened face and falling onto its chest. With a mighty heave of its arm, the Darkman managed to free itself from the lion’s jaws, and when the snake head struck again, it severed it with a single stroke of its bony blade. The snake head fell to the floor and disappeared in an effusion of smoke, and the chimera roared once more, this time in terrible pain.

  The Darkman spun away from the agonised beast, sliding off its piercing horns and falling back several feet. The chimera’s eyes rolled, maddened by pain, and it pounced once more, but the Darkman anticipated it, spinning aside and bringing a bony blade scything down on the goat’s head. Just like the snake head, it was severed with a single blow, landing on the floor with a heavy thud and issuing a pall of smoke as it disappeared.

  Gaspi ground his teeth, seeing his hopes come to nothing before his eyes. The chimera had lost two of its three heads and was moving like a beast about to fall into its death throes, swaying from side to side, giant paws slamming into the ground left and
right as it fought to keep its balance. Stones tumbled from the ceiling every time a paw hit the ground, several of which bounced off Gaspi’s shield and tumbled noisily across the flagstones, leaving long, white scars in their wake. Gaspi glanced up anxiously, willing the ceiling to hold up.

  Blood dripped copiously from the chimera’s severed neck and the stump of its tail, each drop hissing as it hit the floor and disappearing in tiny puffs of smoke. The lion’s head opened its maw and issued a broken roar, swivelling eyes coming into focus on the Darkman. Its head bobbed with every heave of its chest, but it wasn’t quite finished. A growl sounded from its throat as it seemed to find new energy and, with tautly bunched shoulder muscles, it leapt to the attack.

  The Darkman was ready for it, stepping aside and bringing one of its blades down, searching for its neck, but the chimera changed direction at the last moment, shouldering the Darkman in the chest. As the demon fell, it brought a heavy paw down on the flat of one if its tainted blades. With a noise like a mountain cracking, the blade snapped, and the Darkman fell to the floor, convulsing. The chimera stood over its enemy and, seizing its advantage, opened its jaws wide and closed them on the Darkman’s throat. The threat to its life brought the Darkman back to itself and, roaring in fury, it stabbed the chimera over and over with what remained of its broken blade, but nothing could stop the chimera, which tightened its grip on the demon’s throat and crunched down. The Darkman’s eyes widened as death approached, legs and arms scrabbling madly against the floor as it tried to free itself from the chimera’s unbreakable grip. Gaspi’s eyes widened too as his heart was filled with hope. The chimera was winning! The Darkman was going to die!

  All of a sudden the chimera froze. It simply stopped moving, as if turned to stone. Horrified, Gaspi realised what was happening – the magic that animated the creature was finally spent. Substantial flesh turned to smoke before his eyes and drifted up into the air. “Nooo!” he cried, but the demon was already on its feet. It clutched its throat, gasping and choking, but then its breathing steadied and it straightened up. Ever so slowly it turned its head, swivelling round until its baleful eyes found him and it sprung to the attack. Gaspi summoned a force strike, but far too slowly. The demon loomed before him, mouth gaping, eyes wide with hungry anticipation, and then it was gone, swept from sight by a flash of silver. Sabu!

  The blademaster’s gleaming scimitars slicing deeply into the demon’s flesh, distracting it from its prey once again. The demon’s attention fell on the lithe swordsman, and the deadly dance began once more. Gaspi’s heart was in his mouth. After watching the Darkman battle the chimera, he was under no illusions that even Sabu was a match for it. Yes it was wounded but, from the way it moved, not severely enough to make it easy prey.

  Gaspi glanced at Emmy – she was the key to this. If she didn’t come around soon they’d all be dead at the demon’s hands. Ignoring the furious battle going on between Sabu and the Darkman, he hurried over to the altar and grabbed her by the shoulders. “Emmy! Wake up! Emmy!” It was useless. She was completely unaware of him. He tried to prise her hand from the tree, but even though she wasn’t gripping strongly, it was impossible to pull her away from it. It was as if she and the altar were joined by some immovable force. More than that, he felt a distinct sense of disapproval ripple through the air when he tried to disrupt her communion.

  “Get away from there Gasp!” Rimulth urged. He must have felt it too. Gaspi let go and whirled back on the battle, willing Sabu to find some superhuman resource of skill.

  The blademaster hadn’t let the Darkman take control of the fight. He kept in constant motion, bewildering his foe at every turn. As Gaspi watched, he parried an attack, stepping to the side and lacerating the demon’s side as he danced away on the balls of his feet. The Darkman roared and swivelled, its unbroken weapon slicing towards its elusive enemy. Sabu made it out of reach, but only just, the blade ripping through his cloak but failing to score his flesh.

  Gaspi’s frantically tried to think of something he could he do to help. Maybe he should just transport out? The Darkman’s compulsion would force it to abandon the battle and chase after him again. It would mean weeks of travel for the others to get the fragments back to Helioport, but they would be safe. He almost pulled the amulet out there and then, but then he saw the flaw in his reasoning. Whatever compulsion kept the Darkman from killing anyone except him had clearly expanded to include Sabu, just as it had Zlekic and Zaric when they stood between it and him. If he transported, he was sacrificing the blademaster, and what was to say the spell hadn’t already permitted the Darkman to kill the rest of them too? There was no way of knowing, but it was a risk he couldn’t take. Grimly, he acknowledged that they were in it to the bitter end. All they could do was give Emmy the time she needed to retrieve the fragments.

  Sabu was attacking the Darkman again, teasing it with a feint and then slicing its forearm open with a vicious side-swipe of his right-hand scimitar. He pressed his advantage, going for a body blow, but the demon caught his sword on its broken spar of bone and swept it aside. It threw out a heavily clawed hand to clamp down on his head and crush his skull, but Sabu was too quick for that, ducking away from its hand and wounding its other flank with another well-timed stroke.

  He tried to spin away unharmed, but the Darkman anticipated his movement and caught him with a brutal back-hander to the face. Sabu’s head snapped back, the force of the blow lifting him into the air and flinging him a dozen feet across the flagstones. Gaspi’s heart was in his mouth as the blademaster crashed into the floor but, amazingly, he bounced right back to his feet. His face was bruised and bloodied, but he looked determined.

  Sabu had insisted that this was his fight, but Gaspi wasn’t so sure. The blademaster’s plan to buy Emmy time had seemed like it was working, but the first blow the demon landed had thrown him across the room like a toy. How could he hope to keep it at bay much longer on his own? He thought about rushing it as a group; perhaps one of them might damage or even kill it, but they also gave it the chance to kill several of them at once. Sabu’s face was a mess, but so far he’d avoided been pierced by the demon’s tainted weaponry. A wound from the Darkman meant death of the body and soul. Even if a wounded victim got away from his foe, the wound would putrefy and rot his flesh away in a matter of days. Death at the Darkman’s hands meant your soul would be enslaved in torturous limbo until the demon was banished from this plane or destroyed entirely. It was only the blademaster’s phenomenal speed and skill that kept the demon at bay. If anyone else entered the fray, they almost certainly wouldn’t fare so well. Torn by indecision, Gaspi found he couldn’t ask anyone else to rush to their death. They were going to have to do this Sabu’s way.

  The Darkman stalked towards its enemy, black blood dripping from the many wounds Sabu had inflicted. This time the blademaster didn’t attack, but waited, balanced on the balls of his feet. The Darkman took the bait and burst into motion, trying to overwhelm its opponent with strength and speed, but the injuries inflicted by the chimera slowed it down, and Sabu was ready for it. He leapt forwards and slid under the demon’s jagged blades at the last moment. He thrust out with his foot, trying to smash the Darkman’s kneecap and roll away. Any human knee would have been shattered by the impact but the Darkman’s joint held, robbing Sabu of his momentum and leaving him within reach of the demon’s bony blades.

  Sabu rolled to the side, trying to put distance between himself and the Darkman, but the demon was on him in a moment. One of its clawed feet stamped down on his midriff, holding him in place and, before the blademaster could do anything about it, it thrust a poisoned blade into the flesh below his shoulder.

  “No!!” Gaspi cried, echoed by his companions. He couldn’t believe what he was seeing. Sabu, the indomitable warrior, had been mortally wounded. His face was taut with agony as he writhed on the demon’s blade. With a wild cry, he whipped the scimitar in his free hand across the Darkman’s cheek, rending a bleeding gap in its already hideo
us face. The Darkman reared back, its bony weapon emerging from Sabu’s flesh, and the blademaster scrambled back away from it.

  Somehow, he got to his feet again, but this time he looked weary, his dark skin tinged grey with pain and something worse. The outcome of the battle was now inevitable. First the chimera and then Sabu had wounded the demon, but it was far from incapacitated, and now the blademaster was in deep trouble.

  Suddenly, the Darkman was in motion again, seeking the death of its foe. Sabu managed to defend against its first stroke, and then its second, but the third cut him across the bicep. Dropping his scimitar, he found the wherewithal to shove the palm of his hand into the demon’s face, but he lacked the strength to cause any damage. With one hand it grabbed him by the hair, and with the other it grasped a handful of his clothing. It heaved him up and flung him aside as if he was a rag doll. Sabu landed heavily and skidded to a stop. He’d lost both of his scimitars now, but he wasn’t giving up. One last time he managed to get to his feet, blood pouring from his arm and shoulder, his face heavily grazed from scraping along floor. He held himself carefully, but still managed to adopt a battle stance, balancing on the balls of his feet as he prepared to go hand to hand against the demon.

  “NOOOO!!!!” came a cry from Gaspi’s left. It was Taurnil, and before anyone could stop him, he ran at the Darkman, his glowing staff bursting into bright blue flame.

  “Taurnil!” Lydia cried as the demon turned to face him. It sprang into motion, leaping at this new enemy, but Taurnil blocked it in mid-flight, his staff connecting with the demon’s shoulder and knocking it from its feet. Gaspi was amazed. Despite Sabu’s inhuman skill, he hadn’t been able to do more than scratch the Darkman, but Taurnil had caused more damage with a single blow. The demon sprang to all fours, roaring in pain as it beat out blue flames, flickering from its skin where the staff had touched it. Taurnil was already in motion again, his spinning staff scything through the air. The demon dived to the side and rose to all fours again, wary of this new enemy and its flaming weapon.