by Ivory Autumn
Andrew patted his friend on the back, staring at him with kindness. “Freddie, whatever awaits us out there, cannot be as bad as what we have faced in this castle of darkness. You are the bravest person I know. You pulled me out of my own fear, kept me going when the darkness could have consumed me. Follow closely behind me, and I promise, that I will let no harm come to you.”
“What if fate has other ideas?”
“Fate? Ha, we will show her up, then, together.” Andrew offered Freddie a smile, then motioning him to follow, he darted through the doorway and shot across the courtyard, hiding behind a statue of The Fallen, himself. The statue was tall and dark, glistening with glimmering gems and glass. All around this statue, were flaming blue torches that never dimmed or stopped burning. Freddie and Andrew stood in the shadow of the statue catching their breath.
Beyond the statue many unseen creatures lurked, scraping through the snow, their armor and weapons clacking together in rhythmic pulses. Anguished, angered cries, ruffling, rustling, sheets of hissing, sputtering shadows, like boiling teapots, crisscrossed through the air, their sounds entangling and entwining into a massive knot of sound and chaos.
“What do we do?” Freddie whispered. “Listen to them. We can’t go out there.”
Andrew tightened his grip on his sword, watching the mass of shadows darting through the air, as soldiers marched in distance. The soldiers were mere formless outlines in the darkness, only illuminated by The Fallen’s own light from a great tower far above them.
Andrew’s face grew firm, as his heart filled with resolve. Andrew felt the strength of the sword surge through him like lightning pulsing through every cell of his body. He could feel the power of the brave hearts and their strength which powered the sword. They were out there, fighting now. They had made their stand. And now Andrew was going to make his. The feeling was overwhelming, intoxicating. He could wait no longer.
“Freddie, if we are to drive the darkness back, we can no longer hide in its covering. There’s a reason our skin glows. The time for blending in has passed. The time for standing out is now. It is time to come out of hiding. The third day has come, where all must rise. I promised that I would protect you, and I will. What I do now is what I must do. What all must do.”
He looked at Freddie, then stepped out into full view, drawing his sword as he did. The blinding, brilliant light from his sword sent masses of formless bodies reeling backwards. Its beam of solid, warm, golden light cut through the darkness causing all to cower before him in its powerful, pure light.
Lamentations, and exclamation of disbelief and fear swirled about him. Those who abhorred such illumination recoiled away from the light, screaming in revulsion. From the thinnest shadow, to the smallest crack, to the darkest thought, the smallest fear, to the deepest doubt, to the malice encrusted soldier, all knew what light Andrew bore in his hands.
Andrew breathed deeply, letting the light of hope surge through him. Andrew could feel the power of the sword pulsing inside his veins. He felt like a tree with great roots that reached far and wide connecting him to every soul that gave light and power to the blade that now illuminated his way before him. Holding the sword gave him a strength that he could have never had without it. It vanquished the pain of his wound, pumped energy to his limbs and caused his mind to be focused as it never had been before. With the sword in his hands, its light and truth it bore directed him to the path ahead that was his to follow. The path led through the thickest mass of soldiers, towards a great tower on which The Fallen stood.
“Freddie,” Andrew cried, waving the sword in a circle around him at the fiendish mass of shadows and darkened soldiers that stared at them, hungry for blood. “Get behind me!”
Freddie obeyed, watching as Andrew cut through the masses of blackened soldiers in front of him. The sword illuminated the way through the darkness. It gave form to their unseen, shadowy enemies. The power of his sword was so great that with one strike, the strength from its blade created a wind that knocked down any who stood against them.
A loud roar of anger filled the air as more soldiers and shadows surged in around them, coming at them from all sides.
“Stand back, shadows, and obey the true light to which you are naturally subject!” Andrew shouted, bringing his sword down in a fantastic flash of light that it caused the darkness to cower and fall back. Andrew’s face shone. His eyes were filled with a light that burned from some unseen source. Andrew cut through a great accumulation of embodied doubts, dark deeds, and shadow-infested soldiers, unstoppable, unbending, a beam of light that would not bend itself to the will of the darkness, slitting the darkness with the blade of light. All who came against him were brought down. There was nothing that could stand against him and the light of his sword. He created a wide path as he went, tossing those who came at him aside with a single thrust, creating a path of safety for Freddie to follow in. His body trembled from the strength that flowed through the sword and into his arms. He felt no tiredness, no weariness, no strain in his arms, though he had fought more men in just these few minutes than he had in his entire life. He felt no fear, nor regarded the mass pitted against him as something to cower before. No. The darkness was weak. Never before had Andrew realized how weak, how unstable, and breakable, it really was.
He and Freddie moved far out from the castle until they reached the base of the great tower on which The Fallen stood.
Darkness swirled around them, surging in pulsing angry gusts, carrying with it masses of its soulless servants who struggled to drive Andrew back.
But they could not. He was more powerful than they.
Andrew paused before the tower, staring far up it, feeling his heart beat faster, and his mind surge with the driving purpose for which he had been preordained to accomplish. The tower stood before them, like a black tree rooted in the ground. Its jagged spires reached up and out, as if grasping at the sagging sky trying to hold it up. The Fallen stood on its pinnacle, a gleaming orb, casting shafts of diluted light over the land in terrible splendor.
Andrew paused, and glanced behind him, feeling a jolt within his body. In the distance he could hear the roar of men, and the clash of swords as the armies of light and darkness met in the Fallen’s field of black ice, in this, the supreme battle of dark against light. All the while The Fallen was looking on, watching with eyes that shone with the magnificence of the cosmos.
Andrew faltered for one moment, feeling strange emotions swirl through him as the souls whose strength he borrowed, fought, some dying, some surging forward with great hope and truth filling their breasts, just as others were being devoured by doubt and darkness. Every time even one of them died, Andrew knew it. He could feel it, like a candle being snuffed out. Urgency and strength surged through him.
“What’s wrong?” Freddie wondered, noticing the pained look on Andrew’s face.
“We must hurry.” Andrew started up the tower steps that spiraled around the tower, climbing up and up, with Freddie close at his heels. With each moment, he could feel the power of the sword growing stronger in his hands, as his purpose became more unified with those who fought behind him. The handle became so hot that it made his hand feel as if was it binding with the metal. With each step, it was as if he saw and heard every person behind this sword, counted them, heard their anguish of spirit, felt their heartbeat in his chest, felt their hope. It was if he saw their suffering, the fear that had once held them back, and the courage that it had taken them to finally give into the call that led them to this moment. Every one of them counted---no flickering spirit was insignificant. He knew, without a doubt, that the sword was ripe. Like a fruit waiting to be plucked, it was ready. And so was he. Even in this great darkness, light existed, a light powerful enough that could finally drive that darkness away. It would not bend. And neither would he.
He stopped short, and gasped, feeling and seeing a fleeting vision of Lancedon standing at the head of this brilliant army, blind but every inch a king. Lancedon’s
strength, too, was bound with his, and gleamed out through the sword’s blade.
“What is it?” Freddie wondered, staring at Andrew’s stunned face.
“Lancedon is alive,” Andrew breathed, taking the tower steps two at a time. “He is leading the army. The army of light. I saw his face. His strength, as with yours, lives in this sword. I feel it.”
Freddie’s face lit with astonishment. “Lancedon is alive?”
“Yes!” Andrew breathed. “He lives!”
That comforting thought gave Andrew and Freddie the extra courage they needed to take the last few steps to the top of the tower. Below them, they could see both armies struggling against each other, battling on the black ice---light, and dark, both unbending to the other's will. The pressure and tension in the air was unlike anything Andrew had ever felt. The darkness felt taut and twisted, humming like a wire strung over an instrument, the frets tightening with each moment that passed.
Soon, something was bound to break.
The air stirred with wind, as warmth and icy air collided, the two forces creating strange blasts of cold and heat pitted at one another.
Andrew knew one or the other must soon give, and crack, very soon. And when it did, the world would know which side had won.
As Andrew stepped onto the pinnacle, he shielded his eyes, momentarily blinded by the dazzling figure before him, the radiator of stolen light. The Fallen was far more brilliant than before. He was magnificent, stunning, resplendent! Before, Andrew had been astounded by his splendor, but now, The Fallen was something far more amazing, far more captivating. Light beamed from every pour of his skin. Every breath he breathed seeped with light that mingled freely with the shadows that surged around his head like buzzards circling around a carcass, trying to snatch up what light they could.
Freddie stood paralyzed in place, dazzled as Andrew had been when first he saw The Fallen.
The Fallen stood perched on his platform a mixed array of light and shadow, a mesmerizing orb of grandeur, illumination, darkness, and light mixed together into one frightening, brilliant star in human form, smiling down on his subjects with cold eyes. By The Fallen’s side stood Talic, sitting on his haunches, with his head tilted up. His long whiskers, and jagged, tall ears stood on end, twitching at the sound of their approaching feet. Talic scratched his ear with his foot, like a dog, suddenly turning his head in Andrew’s direction. He stopped short, and stared at Andrew with dark, distrusting eyes. His face and hair was filthy. His eyes were big and glassy, as if a curtain had closed, and the light in his eyes had gone out. His clothes were drenched in darkness as if he had been dipped in a vat of ink.
“Talic?” Andrew called.
Talic flinched at the sound of his name, yet he made no move to come to Andrew. The Fallen glanced up, his face filling with surprise. “You?” The Fallen purred, casting Andrew a look filled with limitless hate. “I had suspected something like this had happened. I knew there had to be a reason, for all this,” he waved to the glimmering army of light beyond the tower.
“I was not the reason,” Andrew replied. “Hope summoned them. Not me.”
“Ah, I see…” The Fallen’s velvet voice seeped out, mixing with light and shadow in dazzling rivulets in the frosty air. “And this hope has summoned you back from the dead to pursue this false hope still again?”
“Yes,” Andrew shot back. “I have been summoned back by the power of light, and all that is good. It has called me back to finish what I started.”
“And what have you started?” The Fallen laughed. “The fight is already finished. I have won. I have absorbed all the light from the cosmos. This multitude of sparks who battle for freedom will easily be snuffed out by my darkness. Your kind are out-numbered by my darkness, and always will be.”
“We may be out-numbered, but there is now enough light to drive you back!” Andrew cried raising his sword, causing the light emanating from The Fallen to scatter before him like a school of frightened fish.
Talic howled in savage fear, hugging the hem of The Fallen’s shadowy cloak, reaching up and grasping the bits and pieces of shattered light, like a mouse scavenging cheese.
The Fallen circled around Andrew like a swirling vortex of light seeping out light-years of blackness. “Enough to kill me? I think not. With that dull blade? Hardly. Don’t you see? I am the soul-bearer of light now. Not you. Not anyone. Only I, and I alone.”
“Then it is you who cannot see,” Andrew cried, standing tall and undaunted before the brilliant black void, his sword casting the vividness of the Fallen into shadow. “For there are many gathered together who bear light, a light you cannot destroy, even with all your blackness. No one person can keep all the light to himself. It can only be given away. That is the only way it can expand and never diminish.”
The Fallen narrowed his eyes and laughed a dark laugh that was filled with the might-have-beens, and should-haves, and never-weres of every soul he had snuffed out, siphoned away by his darkness. The powerful laugh shook the ground causing a great discharge of oily darkness to surge off The Fallen, and out his mouth, twisting through the veins of light he emitted, polluting it like ink dumped into clear water.
“I do not give, light,” The Fallen boomed. “I take it. And I will continue to take it. To give, will only make me weak. To take is to expand. To hoard, is to grow. Have I not proven this? Have I not caused the nations of the world to bend to my will, to worship at my feet, and to kneel, and to partake of the fruit of darkness at my table?”
Andrew’s eyes gleamed with light. “No. You’re wrong. To give, is to have strength. It is self-sustaining, a source of power that will never diminish even in the darkness.”
“To give is to shrink.” The Fallen roared, blasting Andrew in the face with heat and ice, entwined with bits of darkness and light that pulled and tugged at him, trying to make him bend.
“To give is to expand. To grow. You have never held true power. True power is something that resides in its own sphere, and it cannot be created or made. It lives because it gives itself, and those it gives itself to, rejoice and are made better. You have always taken what you wanted. You deceived your followers with promises that will never be fulfilled. All that you give is death and darkness. That is why you will never be anything but a black hole. The power, the light, the truth and strength in this sword is freely given. Thus it is more powerful than any force that you can aim at me.”
“And just as easily can be taken away,” The Fallen cried. “Your army will soon be dead, and with it, the power inside the sword. I’m not afraid of you or your sword.”
Andrew took a bold step towards The Fallen. “But you’re afraid of something. I can see it in your eyes. I do believe that it is you who are really afraid of the dark. You’re afraid of what you have become. Otherwise, you wouldn’t cling to the light of others, grasping at it like you do. You’re afraid that once all the light is gone, you will cease to exist.”
The Fallen laughed, expelling a surging mass of shadows and light from his nostrils. “Afraid? I created fear. I gave it life, gave it meaning. The creator can not be afraid of his own creation!” The Fallen let out thunderous roar, causing the tower to tremble and crack. Light and darkness surged around them, swirling and curling in billowy gusts.
“Master!” Talic’s eyes filled with alarm. He screeched, and howled, looking at Freddie and Andrew with wide, dark eyes that were filled with only loyalty for The Fallen, and hatred for them.
Below them, Andrew could hear metal hitting against metal and men crying out as light battled with darkness, holding back the tide. The smell of sulfur filled the air, mixed with the smell of darkness. It was a stale, lingering smell, like a room that had been sealed shut for years. It smelled used up, heavy, and filled with the stench of a thousand polluted thoughts.
“Talic,” Freddie said waking him from his hypnotic trance that The Fallen had cast over him. “It’s okay. Come!” He bent down and stretching out his arms in friendship to his co
nfused friend. “Talic, come back to us.”
Talic’s eyes filled with a wild, red glow. He hissed, and clung to The Fallen’s glowing robes, sneering at them with raised lips, his jagged teeth showing---his mouth frothing with foam. He snuggled up to The Fallen, like a chick hiding beneath the black feathers of a mother hen. The Fallen turned his shining lips into a victorious smile, watching Andrew’s dismayed countenance with satisfaction. “You see,” The Fallen breathed, bending down and patting Talic on the head, and scratching him behind the ears. “Everyone fears me as you do. Some even love me.”
“Love?” Andrew retorted. “That isn’t love. He is merely dazzled by your deception, held captive like a moth to a light.”
“Ah,” The Fallen said, his voice filled with venom. “Your friend here seems to have more sense than you do. He has accepted his new master. And in return I have taken care of him.”
“You care for no one but yourself,” Freddie lashed out.
The Fallen’s face gleamed in anger, his eyes settling on Freddie. “On the contrary. I care for those who care for me. That is…until they are no longer useful.”
“Get away from him, Talic. Run, Talic, run!” Freddie cried, bending down and waving a piece of black bread at him. “I have food. Look!”
Talic’s eyes suddenly lit up as he saw the morsel Freddie held. Without hesitating, he ran towards Freddie, his fingers outstretched, his whiskery frame trembling.
“Stay back,” The Fallen cried, throwing out a long lash of darkness. The darkness wove itself into a chain-like cord, wrapping around Talic’s right foot, yanking him back. “He is mine!”
Talic squealed, and let out a pain-filled cry, struggling against the chain.
“Let him go,” Andrew commanded. He stepped towards the churning, swirling orb of light, the creator of fear itself, yet he was unafraid. The sword in his hands cast out the fear, filling his body with light.
The Fallen’s eyes burned with wrath. Darkness flowed around them, boiling and bubbling, mixing together with light, creating shafts of gray.