by Wil Ogden
“I’m curious when you had the opportunity to see my father’s crown,” Estephan said. He gestured for page to attend him then sent the page off running. “I don’t recall you coming to the palace.”
Pantros said, “Not every piece of knowledge must be acquired first hand.”
“You mentioned the rest of the sword,” Estephan said. “I can see Kehet has the hilt and crossguard, but the blade?”
“Bryan’s sword,” Pantros said.
King Allaind nodded. “The blade still sits on his coffin,” he said. “I’ll have my best soldiers at the ready to join you at the gate this afternoon. I can offer only so much support, however, if the battle turns against you, we will pull the key and close the portal.”
“Once we reassemble the blade, we’ll need someone to wield it,” Estephan said.
“I was thinking of Marc,” Pantros said. “I’ve never heard of anyone better with swords.”
“Swords,” Estephan said, emphasizing the last ‘s’. “Marc is incredible with a pair of blades. We happen to have in the city the champion of the greatsword tourney of Relarch.”
“Your highness cannot go,” King Allaind said. “While no one questions your prowess with such a weapon, you are the last of your line. If you fall, your kingdom may end. The Archibolds founded Fork.”
“I designate David Norda as my heir,” Estephan said. He’s a cousin to my father and the only other direct male descendant of my great grandfather. That should prevent any serious attempts at civil war in Relarch.”
“I can’t stop you,” King Allaind said. “I appreciate the honor and valor of your decision, but I’ve seen one too many king die this season for honor and valor. I don’t have a swordsman that could lift that sword, though. I’m sure Marc would do fine.”
“That’s not a chance we can afford to take,” Estephan said. “We get one try; we can’t send anyone but the best we have. That means me and that means Marc and Sheillene and I can’t really ask this but your son and daughter, too.”
“Aven won’t,” Allaind said. “He won’t have access to his magic in any realm but ours. That Wizard, Heather and Mirica are my subjects I can order them to assist.”
“Asking would be fine,” Estephan said. “If they decline, then I’d appreciate it if you would be sterner in your request. I’d still rather everyone who goes with us goes by their own choice.”
Allaind turned to Prince Kehet. “You are going as well?”
“I can go with them, but I cannot kill a demon in its home realm.” Kehet said. “Demia is and at the same time is not part of this universe.”
“Demia?” Pantros asked.
“The proper name for what we call hell,” Kehet said.
“Thomas?” Pantros asked. “Should we bring him?”
“A bard?” Allaind asked. “What would a bard do? Offer morale support? I’m not even sure why you should be included. I can certainly see why we’d send Marc and Mirica and the Wizard, and I can even assent to Estephan, but the key won’t be going anywhere other than the top of the portal.”
“I’m still responsible for this mess,” Pantros said. “I feel like I should see it through.”
“You have the Kingslayer on your staff,” Estephan said. “Should we bring him as well?”
“Kingslayer?” Pantros asked.
“You know of that?” Allaind asked. “Julivel is not mine to command. We have a similar arrangement to the one your father had with his assassin.”
“My father wouldn’t have an assassin,” Estephan said. “My father was a good, honorable king.”
“Careful, prince,” Allaind said. “You just insulted my honor by implying that having a spy on retainer is less than honorable. It is part of being a king and one you too will come to use. In any event, a battle in Demia is not the place for a man who only kills from the shadows. When you get back to your kingdom, you would do well to make nice with the thieves who run your capitol city and make amicable contact with the one they call The Green Death.”
“She’s a myth,” Estephan said. “She’s a rumor the thieves use to help them keep control of our streets.”
“She’s not,” Pantros said, remembering the woman in the green cloak from The Three Diamonds. “I’ve seen her. But, we should prepare for the battle at hand and save the troubles of running your kingdom for a time when you’re more certain that running a kingdom is part of your future. If we fail, won’t we all feel silly in the afterlife for having wasted so much of our morning discussing whether assassins make a king less than honorable?”
“I think now would be the time for me to fetch Bryan’s sword,” Kehet flickered into his Unicorn form and ran off like a gust of wind.
Estephan’s page returned and set a box on the table. Estephan opened it and removed the crown.
“Would now be a bad time to ask for amnesty for all I’ve done in the past?” Pantros asked.
“You’re a hero of my people,” Allaind said. “In my kingdom you have done no wrong.”
“I know you,” Estephan said. “I’m sure you’ve done shady things here and there in your past. Since these are all in your past and not part of the man I know now, I grant you forgiveness for your actions before now. I cannot promise immunity from crimes you commit in the future, so please avoid committing any.”
“Thank you, my prince,” Pantros said.
Kehet returned to the room and shifted again to his human form. In his hands he held Bryan’s sword. He held the crossguard under his arm and twisted the pommel off. He then pulled off the hilt and crossguard. He chuckled, “No wonder it was hard to twist off that pommel, it was pinned through the tang. I should have expected as much. The Matderi invented the threaded pommel a couple centuries ago. This sword is far older.”
“The crown setting is similarly pinned,” Estephan said. “I don’t suppose anyone has jeweler’s tools handy.”
“I have these,” Pantros produced a leather folding pouch from a pocket in his shirt. The pouch contained a dozen rods flattened and bent to various angles. “As long as we’re not cutting the gem, these should work to pop the pin out.
Kehet disassembled his own sword and slipped his hilt and crossguard onto Bryan’s. He then used one of Pantros’ picks to remove the gem setting from the Relarch crown. He used the same pin to affix the setting as the sword’s pommel.
“I would have expected some kind of reaction,” Estephan said. “At least a glow from a sword so renowned.”
Pantros remembered why he’d insisted on the amnesty. “Oh, right,” he said. He then pulled the pouch with the crown jewel from his shirt and proceeded to use his tools to remove the glass gem from the sword.
“I’m feeling a little anger right now,” Estephan said. “I’m also a bit amused. Amnesty: now I understand. I’m also thinking to enforce the ban on your presence in Fork. Good thing we already agreed on that land deal, so I won’t have to worry about you having nowhere to go.”
Pantros said “Whatever I did in the past, the gem would be on the sword now.” He affixed the gem back into the pommel. When he finished, the sword began to glow with a pale white aura speckled with red flecks. “Behold, the Blade of the Baron.”
CHAPTER 33: KEHET
It was shortly before sunset that Estephan had his group of raiders ready to enter Demia. They were delayed while the king had several leatherworkers and smiths put some real armor together for Marc. It wasn’t pretty, but the large man seemed to retain his full range of motion and now had a couple layers of leather and some metal plates between him and whatever wanted to make him bleed.
Marc’s own swords were strapped across his back, but he held an Abvi made dueling sword in each hand. They were ancient single bladed weapons that once belonged to the Twin Kings. King Allaind had actually offered them to Marc as a gift, but Marc insisted he would return them after the demon was dead.
Sheillene had a dozen arrows she’d procured from the king’s armory. They weren’t much, but they were the only ones
she felt confident would help against potent demons. They were made of some translucent crystalline metal she called Opalite. Princess Adria also had a dozen similar arrows.
Pantros was standing by Prince Estephan. He was wearing an Abvian breastplate and bracers and seemed uncomfortable in the minimal armor. He carried a helm in his hands and stared at it in disgust. He then set the helm on the ground and stepped away from it.
Heather approached Kehet and gave him a long hug. “I get to go first,” Heather said after she’d released him. “I get to see how much damage I can cause intentionally.”
“I can go ahead of you,” Kehet said. “I can’t fight, but I can distract.”
“No,” Heather said. “I’m stepping through as soon as the Portal is open and doing my thing and then stepping back. Aven seems sure the energy I release won’t pass through the portal. Marc and the Prince will then pass through and clean up my mess. Mirica will be going with the others, standing with Adria and Sheillene. No one is making any plans for that Pantros boy. He’s the only one who thinks he should be going in.”
“He’s stubborn,” Kehet said. He’d tried twice to convince Pantros to let others handle the fight, but the young man wouldn’t concede. He felt responsible and felt he needed to do his part to make it right.
“Good luck,” a familiar sultry woman’s voice said. Beldithe stepped up behind Heather and hugged her, giving her a gentle kiss on the neck before releasing her. “Call it cheating, but that kiss will protect you for a little while. Until you harm anything, no one will want to harm you. They’ll just stare at your beauty longingly. It should give you the moment of concentration you might need.”
“Thank you, goddess,” Heather said.
“Thank you, Heather,” Beldithe said. “I prefer this world be populated by the peoples that populate it now. I don’t know if I would continue to exist if there were no mortals left to worship me.”
The Prince waved toward Kehet and called to Heather.
“Wish me luck,” Heather said. She kissed Kehet on the lips and walked briskly towards the portal.
“Come with me,” Beldithe said. She reached over and took Kehet’s hand in hers.
“Where are we going?” Kehet asked.
“We already went,” Beldithe said.
Kehet became aware that he no longer stood anywhere in Mealth. The sky was the color of smouldering charcoal. Kehet stood on the balcony of a tower above a black landscape. A city built of black stone sprawled out in all directions to the horizon. Off in the distance and far below, hundreds of demons were gathered around a stone structure Kehet recognized as a portal.
“We’re in Demia?” Kehet asked.
“I know you cannot travel between the worlds on your own,” Beldithe said. “I can go anywhere, but I tend to stick to where I have the most influence, Mealth. But, I wanted to see how your friends fared and I’m sure you’d like to see Heather do her thing.”
Kehet could see the portal clearly and by adjusting his perception, it seemed as if he were standing just feet away from the structure.
A woman’s voice, with even more purr than Beldithe at her most seductive, brought Kehet’s attention back to where he stood. A crimson skinned woman with glowing gold eyes and a pair of bat-like wings waving gently from her back stood with Beldithe. She wore a gown made of pale blue translucent crystal chain links. “Something is about to happen at the portal?” the woman asked.
“Yes,” Beldithe said. She nodded to Kehet, “He won’t remember you.”
The woman held a hand out toward Kehet and said, “They call me Lady Glacia.”
Kehet carefully took her hand a kissed it. “I take it you know me,” he said.
“Not as well as I’d like,” Glacia purred. Unlike when Beldithe was being seductive, when the demoness spoke, Kehet felt like he was prey. It unnerved him slightly.
“She’s doing it on purpose,” Beldithe said. “With Glacia it’s more about the power than the conquest.”
“And with you it’s all about the experience without agenda,” Glacia said. “We all have our means and our reasons. If you are here, Pantros is coming to seek a more permanent conclusion to this game.”
“Game?” Beldithe asked.
“Everything is a game,” Glacia said. “This one is my game. I wanted to see if I could get a pesky minor lord to destroy himself.”
“By helping him try to conquer our world?” Beldithe asked. There was nothing seductive in her voice as she spoke.
“Relax, pretty,” Glacia said, still with a purr in her voice. “No demon has ever successfully conquered a mortal world. None have lasted more than a season. And I have the benefit of knowing of proof that Pantros will survive at least long enough to father a son.”
Beldithe looked at Kehet and he knew that she knew what Pantros had done the night before. “You think?” Kehet asked.
“He did, and it’s done,” Beldithe said. “There’s no guarantee of his safety today.”
“Well,” Glacia said, “Then the show is about to get interesting. It’s always a bit boring when we know how the ending will go.”
“The portal opens,” Beldithe said.
Kehet shifted his perspective back and saw Heather step through a shimmering mist. She looked around, spread her arms to the sky and took a deep breath. The demons around her gathered close to her but none made any aggressive action toward her. Heather closed her eyes and released her breath. Halfway through the exhale, Kehet’s perceptions became nothing but a bright orange light. He felt his skin singe.
“Ouch,” Beldithe said. Without shifting his vision back, Kehet knew the fire had reached where he, Beldithe and the demoness stood.
When the flames passed, Heather stood nearly alone on a sheet of black glass more than a league across. Only a couple dozen of the demons had survived on the ground, but those that were there were among the largest. One drew a huge sword of flame from his back and started to step towards Heather.
“That would be Murdread,” Glacia said. “He’s a tough bastard.”
Murdread wore black and gold armor that covered every inch of his huge figure, even covering his wings.
Heather stumbled and fell back through the portal. Two breaths later Estephan came running through with Marc close behind. Mirica followed and stopped just a step from the portal. She extended her hands to the ground and threw a jet of air so dense that Kehet could see it at the ground. Of course, Kehet realized. The ground was still hot. Adria came next, loosing an arrow as she stepped to Mirica’s side. The arrow pierced a demon through the chest, dropping it. Sheillene came next and took a moment to pick her target. She chose the demons closest to Marc and Estephan.
“I thought Pantros was coming too,” Kehet said.
“He’s there,” Glacia said. “He bends light around him. He’s not invisible, but if you don’t know where to look, you won’t notice him. Right now he’s behind that demon flanking the archers. See, that was his sword that tore through the demon’s heel.”
Kehet was able to see Pantros after that. The king of thieves was staying close to the portal.
The first to reach Murdread was Estephan. Mirica’s air blasts had been able to make the large demon stumble, but did nothing more. Estephan threw his shoulder into Murdread’s thigh and swung Bryan’s sword towards the demon’s knee. Murdread dropped a hand from his sword and swatted at the prince with a huge claw. Estephan flew several paces before landing with a crash of metal. Murdread was still holding the prince’s breastplate. He threw it at the fallen prince with enough force to roll the prone body of the prince. A puddle of blood began spreading from Estephan’s chest onto the glass-like ground.
Kehet reached out to aid the prince, but Kehet’s body was not the same place as his perceptions.
“You cannot help,” Beldithe said. Kehet knew it to be true. He had to let the battle play out without divine intervention.
Mirica’s wind then started throwing demons into the few remnants of walls near the
portal. Between the arrows, and the Sorceress’s magic, it was only a moment before only Murdread stood fighting Marc. The man, who Kehet considered a giant, looked tiny beside the demon lord. For several passes, the two dodged each other’s swings, throwing attacks that served no other purpose than to feel out the defenses of their opponent.
Murdread took the first serious swing at Marc’s side. Marc tried to parry, but the blade of Murdread’s flaming sword was made of nothing but fire and passed around Marc’s sword as if it wasn’t there. Marc stumbled back. There was a charred gash across Marc’s chest armor, but he wasn’t bleeding. When Marc swung back, Murdread blocked with his arm. Even the Abvi made swords didn’t penetrate the demon lord’s armor. Murdread cackled a roaring, mocking laugh.
Marc then was forced to go on the defensive. Instead of blocking the flaming sword on the blade, Marc was throwing blows at the cross-guard of Murdread’s sword. Though smaller, the man was clearly as strong as the larger demon lord.
Marc’s parries were holding Murdread’s sword away, though the giant now had his back to a wall.
Estephan climbed to his feet and staggered over to stand behind Murdread. Estephan raised the Blade of the Baron above his head and just held it there.
“Prince,” Marc yelled. “Why aren’t you killing this guy?”
“I can’t strike a foe from behind,” Estephan said. “I just can’t bring myself to do it.”
Hearing Estephan speak must have gotten Murdread’s attention. The demon lord spun, his blade even with Estephan’s neck.
Estephan didn’t waver. He brought the Blade of the Baron down, cutting through Murdread’s skull and deep into the demon’s chest.
It was one of Marc’s blades that deflected the flaming sword up and over Estephan’s helm. The flaming sword then fell from Murdread’s hand as the demon slowly slumped to the ground.
Estephan fell over on top of the demon.
“Prince!” Marc yelled. He dropped his sword and pulled Estephan away from Murdread. The giant rolled the prince on his back. There were two deep cuts all the way across the prince’s chest. Kehet could see a splintered rib jutting from the lower of the two.