Whetstones of the Will

by R J Hanson

  Using minimal movement, the two undead masters jabbed with pommel, slashed with crosspiece, and then gouged with sword tip in a single, fluid motion. In the time Dunewell or Silas could strike twice, or Maloch four times, these masters of the Shrou-Hayn struck out with eight attacks each.

  “Please, brother,” Dunewell pleaded, worried that Silas might be cut down before his soul could be given a chance. “Surely, you understand the difference between killing and murder. It is about defending the weak… fighting for those that can’t fight for themselves.”

  Dunewell, Maloch, and Silas parried, called upon spells to turn the blades, and lurched violently to keep from being mortally wounded. Dunewell had seen the Shrou-Hayn wielded in battle, but never like this. Maloch understood the secrets of Raven Wing, but it had been eons since he’d had to defend against it.

  “Who was there to defend me?” Silas screamed his retort in a rare moment of raw emotion. “I was a child once too! I can tell you I suffered far more than those in my Sanctum did in their last moments of life!”

  Despite his best efforts, the cursed tip of a Shrou-Hayn bit through Maloch’s armor and deep into the muscle of his chest. As he was reeling from that wound, the crosspiece of the great sword slammed down to crush his collarbone. The holy shrou-sheld dropped from Maloch’s feeble grip.

  Silas took a blow to the face from the pommel of one of the Shrou-Hayns that staggered him and, as Dunewell moved for a low strike, the other end of the same Shrou-Hayn cut a deep furrow through Dunewell’s right thigh. Dunewell’s leg collapsed, but not before he was able to drive the point of his rider’s pike deep into the undead master’s knee.

  Maloch was battered to the side by the sheer weight and force of a crosscut by the other Captain. The mighty drow Paladin was knocked to the ground. Silas, stumbling backward, fell over Maloch, both of them tangling together in a heap. Dunewell’s rider’s pike was ripped from his hand as the creature from the Abyss twisted away from him and then was struck down from behind. Dunewell looked up in disbelief as he was relieved to see Paladin Illiech standing over him, sword in hand.

  Slythorne, seeing the ogres, giants, and drow cutting through his forces, closed his eyes in a moment’s concentration. He called upon the innate powers of a master vampire and sent a compelling command throughout their ranks. In another heartbeat, ogre turned on giant, and drow against drow.

  Slythorne then divided his attention between those recently mastered and the demon-possessed Erin. The one called Silas must be kept to torture; he is the bait for Lady Dru.

  The fallen champion sent the command to the undead beneath her, who began to fight with a renewed vigor.

  The templars and watchmen were all about them then, striking and thrusting at the two Captains of the Abyss and driving back the surrounding horde. Dunewell’s heart was gladdened upon seeing his friend, Ranoct, suddenly appear at his side.

  “Form up!” Ranoct commanded the soldiers of the church and the watch. “Form up, I say!”

  Dunewell smiled and reached out for the hand offered to him by his friend, his brother-in-arms. Ranoct took his hand and began to pull Dunewell from the ground. Then, seeing the cursed longsword in Ranoct’s other hand, Dunewell had just enough time to wonder, why?

  Ashdow stabbed the Muerso blade into Dunewell’s chest. Maloch and Silas both cried out, but none could hear them. As the blade entered his flesh, Dunewell felt the flower that he wore, the white rose pinned to his breast, wilt.

  “NO!” The command, the plea, erupted from Silas’s throat.

  Ashdow let go Dunewell’s hand and drew a long knife, another cursed blade. Ashdow aimed the knife for Dunewell’s eye. As the dagger plunged in, Silas called upon his powers of shifting and his command of the demon within him. Silas propelled his body between the knife and his brother. The knife plunged into Silas’s breast.

  Completely piercing Silas’s body, the tip of the knife slipped deep into Dunewell’s left eye, slick with his brother’s blood. Dunewell cried out, in pain and loss.

  “Shezmupaulauk Erruk!” Slythorne spoke in an unworldly voice of command. “Depart!”

  Slythorne, invoking the true name of the demon Silas had mastered, broke the bonds of slavery with those few syllables. Shezmu, no longer bound by Silas’s will, wasted no time in escaping to his home plane to seek his place at Prechii’s side. Silas’s body slouched to the ground, limp and devoid of power.

  “Whitburn of Bolvii!” Slythorne then called. “Depart!”

  Dunewell felt the strength of an ancient oath take hold within him. He felt Whitburn swell in his soul in a defiant shout against the command. The power of the rose closed the wound in his chest, but his eye burned with a pain that struck him to the core of his being. Dunewell’s will, fed by Whitburn’s rage, captured that pain and pushed it far from his mind.

  Slythorne, once called Truthorne, you cannot command me thus, Slythorne and Dunewell both heard in their minds. I am Ivant the Second, father of Jonas and Velryk, descendant of King Ivant, and you cannot command me thus!

  Dunewell felt the power of the fading rose flow into him. He felt the strength of a thousand generations rise and swell within his breast. He felt the sting of the Muerso blade diminish and fade. Dunewell, conditioned from a young age to fight, to always fight, struck out with the head of his hammer and crushed the knee of his assailant. Ashdow collapsed to the ground.

  I looked to the place of justice, and there I saw wickedness reign, Dunewell heard in his mind. He understood that it was Slythorne quoting to him from the book of Bolvii. I looked upon the sons of sinners, and saw their father’s sin upon them. Those are the words of your Bolvii, your great and majestic god. Let go this need to please those who are so possessed of vanity and pride. Let go your faith in an empty name.

  It was not a command, not a proclamation of Bolvii’s, Dunewell retorted. It was an observation, a warning, for he had seen the hearts of man. To stand for the weak, to defend the defenseless, those are the tenets of my faith. You cannot turn my heart with your weak words.

  Dunewell looked up to the trees, not with his eye, but with his sight.

  Be not proud, oh slave to your vanity, Dunewell thought/said. For your sins have come due.

  As Dunewell thought those words, Jonas struck out with his Shyeld-Hayn, his Lanceilier’s blade. The blessed weapon sheared through bone, undead flesh, and a blackened heart. Slythorne gasped, an unbelieving look upon his face. The master vampire fell unceremoniously from his perch in the high tree, his body striking several limbs before finally colliding with the white marble of path below.

  The horde of undead collapsed just as quickly, falling back to the dust from whence they came. Jonas hopped from branch to branch, making his way deftly to the ground in pursuit of the fallen Slythorne.

  Dunewell crawled over and took Silas into his arms. Weeping, he began to kiss Silas’s still cheek and cold forehead. Dunewell summoned the power of Whitburn, now known to him as Ivant II, and his hands took on a blue hue. He pushed the healing energy into Silas’s body but felt no response. Dunewell also reached out to Maloch and summoned the power within him once again. A blue hue began to build around Dunewell’s hand and flowed from his palm into Maloch’s wound. Maloch slumped to the ground, unconscious, but breathing easily.

  The fallen champion that possessed Erin was at a loss. Champions, fallen and otherwise, were conceived to take orders and direction, deciding their own plans was a feat beyond most of them. After hesitating for several moments, the demon fled the killing field of Nobles’ Rest.

  A terrified Illiech screamed, “form up!” and then ran to the aid of Ranoct, or the man he thought was Ranoct. The inquisitor was the only man Illiech could think of that might salvage some of this nightmarish scene.

  Dunewell cried out as Illiech took Ranoct, or rather Ashdow wearing Ranoct’s face, under the arm, and helped him to stand. The remaining dozen templars and watchmen fell into a loose defensive semi-circle around the Paladin and the assass
in.

  Jonas dropped to the ground next to Slythorne. The master vampire looked up at him and smiled.

  “You think this will be a salve to your heart?” Slythorne asked as his black blood oozed over the brim of his lips. “Do you believe you will sleep soundly this night? I have avenged myself on this world for thousands of years, and I can tell you…”

  His words were cut short when Jonas struck Slythorne’s head from his body in one brisk stroke. Jonas pulled a sack from his waist and shoved Slythorne’s severed head into it. Then he tied the end of the sack to his belt and pulled forth a flask marked with the owl and gauntlet, the holy symbol of Bolvii.

  Jonas poured the contents of the flask onto Slythorne’s corpse, which burst into a blue-black flame at once. The magical flame consumed Slythorne’s body at a rapid pace. Jonas looked from the vampire to Dunewell and then ran to his side.

  “Bait?” Dunewell asked.

  “Bait,” Jonas said, smiling and nodding.

  Then both looked to the smoke flash that burst at the feet of Illiech and Ashdow. Jonas, knowing this spell, began to scan the horizon and spotted the duo on a rooftop over a hundred yards away. Dunewell struggled to his feet, blood still flowing from his left eye, and eased Silas’s head to the ground. He stood over his brother for another heartbeat and then looked back toward the assassin. Both warriors ignored the contingent of ogres, giants, and drow that now gathered at the far edge of the graveyard.

  Dunewell’s shock was complete when Silas’s body was snatched out from under him with supernatural speed. He caught that something was also taken from Maloch’s pocket, but couldn’t tell what. He scanned about and saw a woman of exotic beauty clad in an elegant Ussa gown crouched over Silas almost fifty yards away. Dunewell had no doubt this was the vampire Medaci had hunted those many months ago.

  “You can chase your assassin, or chase your need to make up for failing your brother,” Lady Dru said as she kneeled over Silas’s fallen body. “I care not.”

  With that, she, along with Silas, vanished into the ether.

  Dunewell looked to where Maloch had fallen and saw the ghostly image of Dactlynese taking him into her arms and vanishing. Then Dunewell looked in the direction Ashdow had flown. He turned back toward the tendrils of smoke that still floated in the air about the area Silas had so recently been. Jonas grasped Dunewell’s arm and jerked him violently.

  “We have a mission yet to finished,” Jonas said.

  Dunewell nodded and wiped the blood from his face.

  Epilogue

  Dark Guardian

  “Why don’t we face the thing ourselves?” Dactlynese asked as she looked over Maloch’s wounds again.

  Maloch sat on a rock stripped to the waist and enjoying the icy wind that lashed at his black skin. Dactlynese had brought Maloch to this high mountain top in northern Lawrec, where Lynneare studied the Dark Guardian provided by Queen Jandanero. Lynneare had repaired Maloch’s many injuries, but Dactlynese still insisted on inspecting the dark Paladin to make sure he was healing properly.

  “As I’ve said, my dear, I have seen the defeat of Elvvleth,” the Warlock of the Marshes replied while he inspected runes carved into the Dark Guardian. “The urn, the phylactery, must be destroyed, but that is still beyond my sight. The physical beast must also be destroyed and that I have seen. There was no mistaking it. It is defeated by a Dark Guardian.”

  “Your visions have been wrong before,” Dactlynese said as she turned her attention back toward her father.

  “Not wrong,” Lynneare corrected. “I misinterpreted a few, yes. Sometimes there are multiple possible outcomes that are difficult to foresee, yes. However, the visions themselves are never wrong.”

  “What of this Frost that you mentioned?” Maloch asked as he pulled his shirt on over his head. “That was something new.”

  “Yes, that was new,” Lynneare said, briefly turning his eyes from the enchanted armor to the Paladin of Time. “We see only what we are meant to see.”

  “You’ve sometimes contemplated my anger and its source,” Dactlynese said with an edge in her voice. “It’s vague statements like that!”