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We Unhappy Few

Page 18

by G R Fabacher


  “Boudira, what can kill a lich?” Damon called over the noises of battle. He picked up his sword from the ground and sheathed it.

  “According to my mom, eating all of your beetles no matter how gross they taste.” The dwarf said. She ducked under a swipe of his lower hands, swinging her hammer with both hands. The flat side smashed into the lich’s skull. The head twisted around completely, the jaw hanging slack.

  The lich chuckled dryly. The sound of popping bones filled the burial chamber. Everything slid gruesomely in place. The lich reached up with both upper hands and snapped his head back around. The creature gave a rictus smile. Its teeth yellow with age, nose black and rotting. The creature’s eyes grew black.

  “I think this game is finished. I have a civilization to rebuild.” The lich said. A ball of black energy built on the tip of its forefinger, growing to about the size of a pea.

  “Web of Death!” Damon called out.

  Sparky jumped forward and attacked with her own purple line of energy. The two met in the middle and there was a pause. Suddenly the two beams began to split into dozens of other lines, each black beam being checked by a purple beam.

  “How?” The lich growled. “I know your magic whelp. You cannot last.”

  Hellaina gave a pained grunt. The web grew into a ball of energy like a globe made out of wires.

  “Boudira?” Damon said, “Really need something that can hurt this thing.”

  “Where’s a holy sword when you need one? There’s always a hero with a sword. Try something cliché.”

  Damon looked around and saw the sword from the statue. It was large, but with the enchantments in his armor, he hefted it with both hands. The blade began to glow with a pearlescent light of enchantment.

  “Please be some kind of break-in-case-of-undead-super-mage thing.” Damon thought aloud.

  “Yes… I am.” He heard in his mind, but also he swore that someone was talking to him.

  “What?” Damon said aloud.

  “I was placed here by the matron of what you call the elven race. I have been carefully reading the currents of magic, learning how your world evolved in the absence of the Ahmagistratii. I will help you defeat, Raz’kal tuth Ulano.”

  “Good enough for me,” Damon thought, “hang on.”

  Damon looked up realizing that the strange conversation with the sword had taken place at the speed of thought, even though he could have sworn he was talking. Giving himself a mental shake gripped the sword and stood up.

  Damon broke into a dash, hefting the sword behind him. His right hand was by the tear-shaped pommel. Leaping from the first landing Damon brought the sword down. It glowed blue before it struck the lich’s outstretched arm, severing it. Ulano screamed his deathly scream and lashed out.

  “Pathetic blade. Old and useless.” It snarled.

  Damon ducked the backhand, pitching into a roll.

  “Shaya!” Damon said throwing the blade.

  “Got it!” Using her armor’s enchantment and her half-elven reflexes she leapt into the air and caught the blade by the quillons of its crossguard and plunged the blade down through the lich lord’s back. The blade emerged and struck the stone, sparking slightly.

  The lich screamed as blue fire seemed to burn up from within. Damon groaned as his armor had a difficult time filtering out the soul-rending sound. Ulano grunted and his two lower hands began to seethe with dark energy. He brought them down smashing through the blade like it was made of nothing more than glass.

  “Did you really think mere steel with some paltry enchantments would beat me?” The lich said.

  Faster than a blink the lich turned around despite the sword within him and thrust the forefinger of its remaining upper hand into Shaya’s chest.

  Shaya jerked and twitched before the lich let her fall bonelessly to the floor.

  Damon screamed and pulled out his Manticore. He fired flechette after flechette into the lich’s head. The undead creature’s head snapped back with every shot, chunks of parchment-like skin flaked off. Damon’s pistol clicked as he pulled the trigger. The lich smiled and reached behind itself. Plucking the blade from its chest with its lower arm.

  The corpse grinned and brandished the broken blade.

  “Do you want to play hero… Bard?” He laughed. “Yes, I know you. I know you loved the mongrel. Should I tell the others how intimate you were? Does it make you burn with rage? You can no more kill me than you can kill a hurricane.”

  “You said you already died once, I’m thinking you can do it again.” Damon said.

  The lich reversed his grip on the blade and brought it down toward the corpsman’s head.

  Suddenly a spout of pure purple flame smashed into the floating corpse, pinning him to the broken statue. His arms splayed out but moving against the energy. Damon saw Sparky with both her hands outstretched pouring pure magical energy at the lich.

  “Damon, if you’re going to do something, do it now.” She said through gritted teeth.

  Damon looked around picked up the sword.

  “I’m sorry, Damon, I failed. He is more powerful than we could anticipate.” The sword said.

  The bard looked at the blade and grabbed the tear-shaped pommel. “I hope whatever you are you’re contained in the gem like everything else magical.”

  “I am but—what are you doing!”

  Using his rage he pulled, pouring more of the magical energy form his suit’s battery into the strength enchantments. Damon wrenched at the pommel. Red warning runes desperately flashed across his faceplate. He ignored them and pulled the pommel free with a shower of magic discharge

  Grabbing his sword from its scabbard he slammed the pommel down into the slot at the hilt. Magical energy sealed the old metal to the new instantly

  “What is this?” The voice said. “These metals, this magic? This is impossible. How can you fledglings—“

  “Not the time.” Damon mentally intoned.

  Taking the hilt in in his right hand Damon called on his suit to move faster than he ever had. More flashing red lights exploded onto his faceplate. The other corpsmen flooded the lich with whatever ammunition they had left. Soon, Sparky’s magic died and she collapsed to all fours. The black wards made an egg-shaped half shell. The flechettes sparking uselessly against it.

  Damon pulled his sword back as he leapt at the shell, thrusting it forward. The blade ignited in a blue flame like a star on the brightest of nights. The point of the broad blade pierced the shell. Veins of starlight spread out from the blade until the ward exploded into nothing but its constituent magical energies.

  The lich hissed and created a sword of pure magical energy. It was a long blade with a heavy point. The whole sword was curved like a scimitar of the Orcana Desert. Damon ducked and parried. Black energy sheared off with each checked move, but Ulano kept up his attack.

  “It’s been a long time since I actually practiced my physical combat.” Ulano said. The sword danced between the creature’s four hands. Damon parried and cut at the creature. The lich moved with supernatural grace. Damon had to push his suit past all the warning runes and alarms.

  “You wear magic, you play at magic.” The lich said, its voice almost echoing in Damon’s head. “I am magic.”

  Damon ducked and rolled under a slash and cut the lich across the middle. The lich growled, and Damon cut off another arm. The lich thrust out with a wall of magical force, knocking Damon head over feet.

  The lich looked at his missing upper and lower arm. “A minor inconvenience…” The lich manifested more swords. The blades of magical energy pursued the other corpsmen. Shakes managed to hold his off by using all four dagger gauntlets in tandem. Firefly used her race’s birdlike speed to dodge and weave around the disembodied weapons. Urani and Sparky stayed together, using a combination of blades and magic to slow them down.

  Damon felt the burn of magical exposure on his skin, but he couldn’t give up. Taking the blade in both hands he chopped down with one final yell
, severing the dark blade and burying the burning blade inches into the lich’s neck.

  “No!” The lich rasped.

  Damon finished cutting through the neck, it flopped over on the last bit of muscle and sinew, creating a macabre display.

  “I cannot be killed, not by you. Not by anyone!”

  Damon thrust the blade into the lich’s heart and watched as the brilliant blue fire began to consume the lich. Particle by particle it spread, expunging the darkness, incinerating the unclean. Even the severed head seemed to be caught in the same magical fire. Damon wrenched the blade out and prepared to strike again, but the damage was already done. He watched as the undying mage was consumed in fire from the magic of antiquity.

  Damon fell to a knee and dropped his sword. The fight was over.

  Chapter 27

  Damon couldn’t see the display on his faceplate through the tears. He beat his fist on the stone and popped the seal on his helmet, letting it hit the ground. The skull façade rolled into his blurred vision, mocking him.

  He crawled to Shaya and held her. He took her helmet off and found her normally green skin covered in black veins, like the blood had gone bad within her body. He held the sides of her face, her normally erratic hair was disturbingly still. He stroked her cheek.

  “Please breathe…” he said, “open your eyes… do anything…” He begged her. “Please… please… please…” He rocked gently. She refused to answer him. Her body still and stony.

  Somewhere in the back of his mind he became acutely aware of the other around him, and the hammering of footfalls in the background. He felt a hand on his shoulder. Damon shrugged it off, but the hand reached under his armpit and hoisted him up away from Shaya.

  “Sacreon…” the Lieutenant said, “Sacreon… what happened?”

  Damon looked around, mutely. The lich was gone, there wasn’t even ash left to him. He saw Varant dead in the corner, and the proper military soldiers corralling the corpsmen, locking them out of the higher functions of their armor and marching them out at gunpoint.

  “Sacreon.” The Lieutenant shook him. Damon looked into the man’s eyes and saw something of himself.

  “He killed her, sir…” Damon sobbed.

  Damon looked down at Shaya’s body and related the events that happened in the burial chamber. It took a long time for him to get through the retelling of the fierce battle. Eventually the Lieutenant looked down, and Damon saw tears in the old man’s eyes.

  “She was special, Sacreon…” He said simply. Damon nodded.

  Damon picked up Shaya cradling her in his arms. His armor’s battery was almost dead, but he could make this walk. They walked past the Republic engineers and the surviving Rangers. Damon met the eyes of the few of the Rangers and they nodded, tapping the emblem over their hearts.

  Out in the sallow sunlight of the mashes around the compound Damon looked up. He saw the majority of the corps around the impromptu field hospital. Damon saw a large dragon talking to the man in black from ROCO.

  Damon set Shaya down on the tarp that Joyride’s covered corpse occupied. He looked at her rune tag. The Lieutenant stepped beside him.

  “Do you remember everyone you’ve seen die?” He asked.

  “No,” the Lieutenant said, thumbing one of his numerous tags. “No I don’t. It is my shame that I can’t. They grow old in my mind, the memories fade with time.”

  “Does it make you feel better when they fade?” Damon asked.

  “No.”

  Damon reached forward and took the rune tag from Shaya. Willow was written across it. He worked it over in his fingers.

  “I saw her die…” he whispered, “I’ll carry her with me.” He pushed the tag to his chest by his own tag. It sealed with a hiss.

  Damon draped a cloth over Shaya’s corps. “How did she want to be buried?” He asked.

  “I don’t know, kid.” The Lieutenant said. “We’re already dead, so we don’t like to dwell on where we’d like to spend the big sleep.”

  A couple of field medicos began stripping the corpses of the corpsmen and rangers of their armor and other possessions. Damon watched as they slipped Shaya into a body bag.

  “What is that convict still doing in his armor?”

  Damon looked around and saw Knight-Captain Mortens stalking toward him, his pistol in his hand.

  “Mortens,” The Lieutenant said, “Now is not the time—“

  “I’ll deal with you later, Zuro.” Mortens said.

  The knight-captain moved toward Damon. “Your job is done, criminal. It’s time to go back into your pen. You lot sure botched this operation. The Rangers are decimated. This could mean war with the Union. Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t shoot you right now?”

  Damon’s hand snapped out and grabbed the knight-captain’s wrist, ripping the pistol from his hand. His left came in a cross jab. His armored fist obliterating the man’s nose. Mortens hit the dirt, blood streaming down his face. Damon crouched over the man, pushing the gun to his face.

  “Don’t do it. You’ll be killed.” Mortens sputtered.

  Around him he heard the cycling of flechettes.

  “Sacreon…” the Lieutenant said, “Damon, put the gun down. It’s over.”

  Damon powered down the pistol which caused the chambered flechette to lower back into the clip. He tossed it aside and a pair of the surviving Rangers took him away. They stripped the armor from him, and medicos started tending to his wounds.

  “Stage two magical exposure, with some mild stage three. Void and fire it’s all over his body…” The female medic said. She was a buteo, her brown and white wings draped over her shoulders. “I’m not a rune-tech but I’d wager you fried out more than one of the armor’s lattices.”

  Damon nodded numbly as she slid the needle in his arm. The cold chelation fluid made him shudder.

  “You’re going to need a couple of days in the hospital.”

  After being tended to, he was herded on the transport with all the other corpsmen. He sat next to Urani and across from Shakes.

  “Hey, at least we’re heroes, right?” Shakes said.

  Damon looked at the new blood for a long moment.

  He began to laugh. It started out softly, but then it grew louder and louder. Damon was doubled up with laughter, all the other veterans began laughing too. The back of the transport was filled with the laughter of dozens of hardened convicts.

  “Just… Just keep your eyes on the news, Shakes.” Damon said reaching forward and slapping the elf’s knee.

  A couple of techs wheeled a hovering cargo hauler carrying the three-limbed golem.

  “Did you see the pile of Unie corpses around this guy?” One of the techs said. “I knew golems could be dangerous, but sheesh.”

  Em turned his head toward Damon. “Damon,” he said, his blue eyes pale and dim, “I am very tired. I wish to go home.”

  “Me too, buddy.” Damon.

  A pair of medicos brought Sparky in on a stretcher. She looked at Damon, her gray eyes full of tears. Damon met them and he nodded.

  “She’s going to need a full workup. She ate a whole one of those mage nutrient bars.”

  “Saints and stones,” the other said. “How’s her liver function?”

  Damon held out his shackled hands and touched her finger as she passed. He’d seen her crush a man like a drink can, but on that stretcher she was just a girl. The Lieutenant stepped up. He was unarmored once more, but unshackled.

  He strode up the aisle and looked at his corpsmen. Damon saw pride in his red-rimmed eyes. Damon looked at him, and for the first time he saw the every line and worry on the old man’s venerable, ageless face. Damon knew that they had won, they had saved the day, and the Lich Corps were heroes.

  But he also knew that no one would ever know. That there victory came at horrendous loss. He saw it clearest in the eyes of the Lieutenant. The pain only a father who lost a daughter can feel. Damon reclined in his seat as the hatch rose and sealed with a faint
hiss. The craft rose slowly and accelerated into the sky.

  Chapter 28

  “D

  amn it!” Sparky said.

  “Language, young lady.” Damon chastised.

  “Damn you, too.” She scoffed dourly. “How do you win every stinking time?”

  Damon picked up the deck and shuffled it again, letting her cut it.

  “You’re cheating, all you bards are notorious cheats.”

  “Maybe you’re just bad at it?” He countered.

  They had been sitting in the hospital ward together, both shackled to their perspective beds, passing the time by playing some hands of tarot.

  “So,” Damon said, “tell me about that bar you ate? I mean I picked up some stuff from the doctors but how could that cause… this?” He gestured to the bottles of potions she’d been forced to down. She’d also had more than one bottle pushed into her veins.

  “I’d rather talk about what tattoo I’m going to get.” She said playing a counter card.

  “Seriously, what exactly was that?”

  Sparky sighed and put her hand face down.

  “You know how dwarves have all these mushroom and funguses that absorb bits of magically imbued minerals like adamantine and orichalcum?”

  “Yeah,” Damon played the maiden upside down.

  “Well, someone got the bright idea that if you mix in granola and chocolate with that bit of… shite… that us naturally-born magic users got a boost in our energy.

  “So that’s why you were all demon-witch, little miss badass, huh?”

  “Yup, you’re only supposed to eat one little chunk of the stuff every four hours though.”

  “Hellaina, there were like sixteen segments on that bar.”

  “Yeah, it sucked a big one.” She folded with a dismissive clicking of her tongue. “Yeah, if you don’t benefit from an orcs regeneration or a dwarves dual livers then you’re in deep shite.”

 

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