by C. M. Carney
The Barrow King had just used their souls. As casually as Gryph would use a healing potion. He advanced on Gryph with terrible speed.
44
D isarmed and facing the onslaught of a rampaging bull, Gryph did made a desperate gamble. He forced Mana into his boots and he felt every fast twitch muscle fiber in his body flush with energy.
With his speed doubled he dodged the Barrow King’s clumsy onslaught. He dove to the side, drew his Ice Dagger and flipped over a sideways swipe of his enemies staff. The power of the boots boosted his leaping ability as well and he came down behind the Barrow King, thrusting the dagger into the base of the creature’s neck where skull met spine.
Gryph was rewarded with a dry snap as the dagger buried itself into the top vertebrae. He filled the dagger with Mana and the frigid field expanded, crumbling already brittle bones. The Barrow King wailed in agony and spun to and fro trying to dislodge Gryph, but he held fast.
“AVERNERIUS!”
A voice that both was and was not Wick’s boomed, and a point of crimson light appeared a dozen feet in front of the Barrow King. The point expanded into a vertical line and then the line widened into a door to hell.
This time when Gryph saw the horrid devil rushing towards the door, he did not fret. He smiled. His momentary glee distracted him enough for the Barrow King to grab his arm in a cold, skeletal embrace. Iron strong fingers of bone dug into Gryph’s forearm and he heard bones crack.
Gryph yanked the dagger free with his other hand and tried to thrust it into the side of the ancient skull, but the Barrow King’s other arm spun in its socket in a way no living arm could and grabbed his wrist. Now trapped Gryph could only watch as the Barrow King’s head twisted 180 degrees, his gaping mouth mere inches from Gryph’s face.
Gryph’s entire world became that gaping maw of death and the horror it was about to spew forth.
*****
Wick chanted the final word of the summons, nearly tearing his mortal vocal cords to shreds. The gnome collapsed to one knee as the infernal portal tore a slice in reality. The strain of summoning hell’s lieutenant made him dizzy and weak. He willed himself to get to his feet just as the massive demon crossed the threshold into this realm.
Frantic eyes searched for Tifala and he smiled when he saw her exiting the cage. She gave Xeg a quick pat on the head, eliciting a smile and a coo from the imp. Her eyes darted up to his, and he sent the thought run through the mental link Ovyrm had given them.
She grinned up at him, shook her head no and his mind filled with her voice. No, my love, I am here with you to the end. Wick scowled, but knew there was no talking her out of it.
Tifala summoned blinding white energy to her hands. She unleashed two life bolts at the nearest dread knight, taking the creature unawares from behind and blowing its head from its shoulder.
Avernerius swung his tree length sword of flame back and forth in slow, almost lazy arcs. Each swing decapitated or bisected the torso of a dread knight. Dirge, who had been fighting the dread knight the demon had just bisected, back flipped away from Avernerius’ third swing. The arc of flame just missed the thief as he thudded hard to the ground.
Wick couldn’t help but laugh. Apparently he'd forgotten to name the traitor bastard as friendly. “Whoops,” Wick said aloud.
A little help here, came Gryph’s frantic mental call, pulling Wick from his temporary glee. He saw his friend being stretched by the Barrow King’s misaligned limbs and saw the revenant’s head spin.
Wick jumped from the balcony and slid down a support column. As he landed, he threw his arms out to the side and pulsed Mana into them. Two short swords of blazing crimson darkness appeared in his hands and he ran towards the Barrow King’s back. He leaped up, just as the cloaked shadow’s shoulders hunched and buckled like a child about to vomit.
Wick brought both summoned swords down on the Barrow King’s shoulder. The chthonic metal sliced through shadow and bone and severed the arm. Wick landed with agile grace as Gryph brought both feet up to kick the Barrow King in the head.
The wraith’s head was knocked to the side as a stream of black ooze erupted from its mouth. It covered both the Barrow King’s arm and Gryph’s wrist. Gryph screamed in agony as his arm burned, but the revenant’s skeletal arm was immune to the acidic damage. The creature’s head turned back to Gryph, ready to hurl another volley of black death.
Gryph was injured, but he was a warrior born. He lifted the Barrow King’s severed skeletal arm with his left hand and crammed it with tremendous force down into the Barrow King’s open mouth. The arm blocked the torrent of black ooze allowing only a trickle to bubble forth.
Gryph landed on his feet and tossed several of his throwing knives at the Barrow King. They didn’t do too much damage, but he recalled and tossed them again. The small blows slowly whittled at the lich’s Health.
Wick helped Gryph to his feet and doused the taller man’s arm with the last of his silver solutions. The acid dissolved under the metal’s onslaught and Gryph’s pain abated. Gryph nodded his thanks and was about to say something when the Barrow King screamed again.
Gryph pushed Wick aside as several more globes of silver soul energy flew from the defeated dread knights and down the Barrow King’s throat. In an instant the creature was again at 100%. Even the severed arm regrew.
He snapped the new arm out and the fallen staff flew to its hand. With a dramatic two handed thrust the Barrow King smashed the staff into the floor.
The massive doors at the far end of the room opened.
“He’s summoning reinforcements. Send the demon,” Gryph yelled.
Wick nodded and sent a mental command to his demonic minion. Block the door. Kill anything that enters.
With a final backward swing, Avernerius decapitated the second of Dirge’s cohorts. Alone among enemies, Dirge turned his attack to Ovyrm. As if predicting his question, Ovyrm’s voice filled the communal channel.
I have this. Help Gryph.
*****
“So, this is how it ends,” Dirge said, his dagger held forth. Ovyrm knew the skill with blades possessed by the leader of the Grey Company. He had seen it many times before and faced it once. The blades Dirge held were not so much tools as extensions of the wiry man’s deadly intent.
But Ovyrm was an Adjudicator and he would dispense justice. The xydai settled his mind and his body eased like water. He sent an invocation into the aether and felt spirit energy flow down his arm into his saber. While Dirge’s weapons may be extensions of his body, Ovyrm’s weapon was an extension of his will. And it wasn’t his only weapon.
Ovyrm lashed out with his thoughts, attempting to stun Dirge into submission. The dagger-wielding thief threw up a barrier. For an assassin the smaller man was an adept thought mage. Dirge grinned at Ovyrm.
The Aegytian slashed with his left dagger, an obvious feint meant to distract Ovyrm from his mental assault. Another opponent would have succumbed to the stunning mental bolt Dirge sent. But few could overcome the defenses of a fully trained Adjudicator.
Ovyrm let the aether in and his mind expanded. Dirge’s mental attack flowed over him like river water over a stone and Ovyrm parried the dagger strike with ease. He pushed his momentum into a kick to Dirge’s stomach. Pain and surprise tore across the smaller man’s face, before a cruel grin replaced them.
“Oh Ovy, you’ve been holding back on me darling.”
“You are a traitor Dirge. And I am here to pass judgment on you.”
“You sanctimonious jackanapes. Who are you to pass judgment on me? I know all about your Order and the Accords, and how you’ve spit on them both.”
Shock crossed Ovyrm’s face. Few people on Korynn even suspected the Outer Realms existence, much less the laws and powers that governed them. How had this thief learned of these things?
Dirge grinned and launched a flurry of attacks. Ovyrm barely avoided the poisoned whirs of death. Dirge would know that Ovyrm was immune to the paralytic. He wasn't playing any
longer. He was here to kill.
“You see it don’t you?” Dirge said. “You sense the death dripping from my blades. Well, let me tell you a little story.”
Dirge danced left, then right and spun and stabbed. Ovyrm blocked the attacks, but only just. His counter attack sliced through cloth, but left flesh untouched.
“Deep in the desert of my homeland is a spider. A tiny thing, so easily missed. Not like the giant monstrosities that the dark forests harbor. No the mother of death is barely the size of a thumbnail, but it has bears a gift unlike any other. A poison made of the distilled essence of all spheres.”
Dirge lunged again. Ovyrm ducked and rolled and felt the blade zip by his ear.
“Most poisons can be countered by their antipathetic magic. Life can cure death, death life,” Dirge said with a grin at his witticism. "But the mother of death mixes all spheres in her tiny crystalline body. A single drop of Mother’s Milk will bring the full power of every sphere to bear. No immunities can counter it. No antidote exists. You will feel as if you are on fire while you are drowning. Your breath torn from you lungs as your blood turns to dust.”
Dirge spun and threw a dagger at Ovyrm. A pulse of aether took control of Ovrym’s body tossing him aside before his mind was even aware what was happening. So attuned to the aether was Ovyrm.
“Impressive,” Dirge said in surprise. “Now I won’t bore you with what the rest of the spheres do, save one. Those who succumb to Mother’s Milk lose their immortal soul. The poison eats away at the core of your being, feeding he who delivered the killing blow. This is how I knew what power the Barrow King possessed. This is how I knew what bargain to make.”
The man’s impossible knowledge stunned Ovyrm. The Aegytians had long claimed ancient and secret knowledge, but most of the mystery schools were shams feeding power to charlatans. Soul magic was a rare affinity with even fewer practitioners.
Dirge backed Ovyrm up further and he stumbled over the desiccated corpse of a twice killed dread knight. The warrior monk went down and Dirge jumped putting weight and momentum into his deadly knife. Dirge came down hard on Ovyrm’s sword hand, snapping his wrist. His sword fell from his hand and he barely caught the arm, arresting the dagger's deadly intent.
Normally Ovrym was much stronger than the thief, but he was on his back, one arm immobile. Dirge had the superior position, and he leaned his entire body weight onto his knife arm. Slowly the blade came closer. Ovyrm could see a milky white sheen on the blade and knew that the Aegytian had not been lying. Death was mere millimeters away and coming for him.
Dirge pushed all his weight down and pushed his face near Ovyrm’s. In a low voice full of malice and hatred Dirge whispered. “Dearest Mother, I offer you a gift.”
Desperate Ovyrm pumped his mind full of spirit energy and the aether took ahold of him. He could feel every mote in the room. His friends facing off against the Barrow King. The summoned demon raging against a horde of dread knights. Tifala firing life bolts in and around the giant devil, potshots that found their target more often than not. Only Ovyrm was near death.
Then his mind found salvation, and he grinned.
“What are you grinning at you madman?” Dirge asked as the knife tip came ever closer to Ovyrm’s face.
“I think you dropped something.”
Ovrym’s mind grabbed onto Dirge’s other blade, another blade soaked in death, and called it. A flash of metal flew past Dirge and embedded itself in the wall behind Ovyrm. The movement startled Dirge, but then he laughed.
“Missed.”
“Did I,” Ovyrm said as a single drop of blood welled on Dirge’s cheek.
The thief’s eyes went wide, and he backed off of Ovrym like a man bitten. His fingers trembled as his fingers came to his face. They pulled away, marred by a small dot of crimson.
“You Bast…” Dirge began, but then his body seized. He fell back, choking and burning. Boils and pustules erupted from his skin. His eyes turned crystalline and his skin glowed a warm yellow light. His skin sloughed off as if ten years of decomposition had occurred in mere seconds. Dirge stopped moving and his body turned to dust.
Ovyrm reached out with his mind and felt the small man’s soul die. A sin of the highest order and Ovyrm was responsible. A tear rolled down Ovyrm’s cheek as he stood. “Forgive me for the unforgivable.”
Then he heard Tifala scream.
45
O nce again Gryph faced a fully powered Barrow King. This time without a weapon. Sure he had throwing knives and a very nice dagger, but against this self-healing, soul sucking perversion of nature that was worse than David with his sling.
He fired several volleys of Flying Stalactite at the spectral monster, but the Barrow King set them aside with almost casual waves of his staff. Wick got into the game, tossing several chthonic bolts. One hit the Barrow King in the side, earning an angry snarl that exposed rotten teeth.
The Barrow King held his staff in both hands and murmured. A shimmering semicircle of energy pulsed around him, giving off an oily haze, like a polluted puddle in a parking garage. Wick’s next several bolts bounced harmlessly off the shield and the Barrow King floated towards them.
“Behind you,” Gryph heard Tifala yell, and he spun just in time to see a dread knight swing a broad headed axe down at him. The heavy metal blade bit into the stone where it stuck. Gryph kicked the legs out from under the undead warrior and it hit the ground with a sickening thunk as its head pounded onto the stone of the floor.
A living creature would have lost consciousness. Being dead had advantages. The dread knight rose to its knees and wrapped long, skeletal fingers around Gryph’s neck. The strength in the dead fingers was incredible and Gryph could not breathe.
He punched up into the dead beast’s face, once, twice, three times. The third blow took the knight’s jaw off, but apart from a slight dip in health seemed not to faze the creature.
Debuff Added: Suffocation
Well, it isn't drowning, technically, Gryph thought as he continued to punch. Each blow having less and less strength as his life faded. As his vision blurred, and the colors melded, he noticed a familiar sparkle and moved to the beat of his ever-weakening punches.
One last rush of adrenaline cleared his mind enough to realize the sparkle was from his ring and in his head he laughed. With the last of his life petering away Gryph pumped as much mana as he could into the Ring of Air Shield. He punched again, but this time he fully sank his fist into the dread knight’s mouth. It rotten teeth bit into his knuckles as his fist pushed down the creature’s throat. Then he sent the command.
The air shield expanded and the dread knight’s head exploded. The hands around his throat stopped squeezing and the air shield blinked.
Oh, not this again, Gryph thought, and he scrambled to the left as the air shield collapsed raining gore and rotten bits of brain down upon him. He sucked ragged gasps of air into his lungs and coughed. He lay there a few moments, trying to recover.
Then he heard Tifala scream.
*****
Wick saw Gryph go down, but there wasn’t much he could about it. He now faced the Barrow King alone. His Mana was near depleted and he couldn’t spare a single second to chug a mana potion.
He fired the last few chthonic bolts he could muster and then pulled his summoned swords from their netherworld sheathes. They had a few more minutes of potency before they too would dissipate back to the chthonic realm.
Wick spun and ducked, using his superior dexterity to avoid the Barrow King’s attacks, but the revenant still cowered behind its shield. Wick reached out to summon Avernerius to help, but felt the last of the demon’s health disappear. A quick glance showed that at least the demon had collapsed the tunnel. The Barrow King would get no more aid.
Tifala was holding her own against one final, wounded dread knight. Ovyrm was battling the traitor Dirge.
Wick realized he was on his own. If he didn’t stop, or at least delay the Barrow King, they were all dead. Then
a crazy idea popped into his head. An idea that just might work, but one that would likely end up with him dead.
He glanced once more at Tifala and poured waves of love at her. She danced and spun, pulses of white life light shredding the dread knight’s health. He smiled grimly and returned his attention to the Barrow King. He got into a fighting stance and then ordered his summoned weapons to blink and disappear.
The Barrow King grinned in triumph as it saw Wick’s weapons disappear and it advanced upon him. Wick took a few fearful steps back before forcing himself to stand his ground. Fear ate at his mind as he felt the outer edge of the revenant’s energy field pass over him. He felt stained by a residue of hateful evil and nearly vomited.
But, he was where he needed to be. The Barrow King reached out with one of his arms and grasped the small gnome by the throat. He hoisted Wick off his feet and brought him close to his face. This close, Wick could see the Barrow King was only partially physical. A human face seemed to phase in and out of existence over desiccated flesh pulled taut along the creature’s skull. Wick was seeing the face of the man who had become the Barrow King and he looked oddly common.
Then the Barrow King spoke. “You are a fool, gnome. I will feast on your soul and its power will enable me to take the Godhead from your pathetic companion. He does not even know what he possesses, does he?” The Barrow King laughed.
Wick summoned is short swords and drove them down and into the Barrow King’s shoulders. The lich buckled, but did not let go. His hand squeezed Wick’s throat tighter, forcing Wick’s mouth open.
“This isn’t going to plan,” Wick thought as the Barrow King breathed death into his mouth. Wick’s body seized, and he felt energy drain from him. Through his goggles he could see that it was the same color as the energy he’d seen stolen from the wyrmynn. That seemed so long ago now.