by James Somers
But there were more to replace those who fell. Ethan noticed that General Rommil had not entered the battle. A possessed attacker managed to strike Ethan. The pain was excruciating, but his armor protected him from the worst of it. He fought back and dispatched the demon and its host—one to unconsciousness, the other to the netherworld.
Two more strikes got past his defenses. He felt the pain even though he did not see any wounds. Their strikes weakened him—each unseen wound sapping his strength. Ethan leaped straight up out of the swarm of bodies trying to pile on him like ants on a piece of discarded food. He reached the high stone ceiling, clinging to it like a fly. Rommil still stood at the far end of the throne room. Ethan leaped away from the granite ceiling at an angle, bringing him down near the general.
Rommil appeared surprised by Ethan’s aggressive move. He grabbed his broadsword from its leaning position at the arm of the throne, holding it out in front of him. Ethan hit the floor, running toward General Rommil and the demon, Jericho, within.
Ethan used his momentum to his advantage. He struck Rommil’s broadsword with one of his own, deflecting the weapon. He drove the other right into the Wraith General. But in the split second before it hit Rommil, Jericho leaped from the old soldier’s body. Without the presence of the demon, Ethan’s weapon pierced Rommil’s physical body. Jericho shot away to the stone wall, immediately bouncing back with his own spiritual sword in hand. Ethan withdrew his sword from Rommil, letting the old soldier fall back on the throne. He deflected Jericho’s attack, but noticed the possessed soldiers closing in again from the far side of the throne room.
Jericho deflected several shots and struck Ethan’s face with his fist, sending the boy falling backward to the floor. Ethan recovered quickly, then scrambled back to his feet to attack the demon.
The possessed mob had begun to overrun Ethan’s position, when a wild whoop erupted from the middle of their ranks. Howls of pain came from the soldiers between the two gigantic lavers filled with wine. Levi and Gideon had emerged from the floor grate, swinging cutlasses taken with them from the earlier sea battle.
Levi had the same wild-eyed expression as before. Ethan loved seeing it now in his time of trouble. Gideon somersaulted over some of the possessed soldiers, landing among them. His entire body became a whirlwind of destruction. His elusive blade dispatched members of the mob like a scythe laying down wheat, while his fists and feet pounded through their ranks like battering rams.
Jericho grew furious at the sight of them coming to Ethan’s aid. He launched into a furious barrage of jabs and slashes, forcing Ethan back. Jericho continued to advance on Ethan, his every hacking blow threatening to dispatch the Deliverer once and for all.
Gideon and Levi searched for Ethan, but they could not see him or his demon opponent. They only saw Rommil’s dead body draped haphazardly across the throne. Gideon and Bonifast continued to push in that direction, hoping that Ethan was still in the throne room somewhere.
Ethan felt his wounds aching—the same wounds he had just received when the mob of soldiers had swarmed against him. He grew weaker by the second. What had happened to Shaddai? Where was the strength he had known recently? Why had he not prayed before coming into this battle as Gideon had warned?
All of these questions hammered Ethan’s mind as Jericho took advantage of his weakness, driving him back. Jericho knocked one of the spiritual swords from Ethan’s hand. It evaporated in mid-air as it left him. The demon smashed Ethan’s face with his boot, knocking him back further, then Jericho flung his demonic broadsword at Ethan with both hands. Ethan was not fast enough to stop it. The weapon spun at him, struck his blade, deflected off and hit Ethan. The weapon exploded against him, shooting pain through his entire body. Ethan felt darkness take him as he disappeared from the spiritual plane.
Levi Bonifast and Gideon hammered away at the soldiers and armed civilians in the great throne room. Gideon remembered a time when he had been brought to this very room as a warrior apprentice. They had come nine years ago when he was just ten years old. He had been among a dozen others who would be officially accepted as fully trained priests in The Order of Shaddai that year. The High Priest, Isaiah, had brought them to receive the king’s blessing. That day had been one of the proudest moments of his young life. Now, Mordred owned the throne and darkness reigned in Nod.
Gideon plowed through the ranks of sword bearing merchants and infantry soldiers toward the throne. Between his skillful prowess and Captain Bonifast’s swashbuckling antics, they made steady progress. More enemies entered the throne room from the doors at the far end.
Gideon saw a flash of light nearby, Ethan suddenly appearing—tossed out of the spiritual plane like a rag doll. He spilt onto the stone floor like a basket of potatoes, unmoving. “LEVI!” Gideon shouted.
Levi ducked under one of the massive legs of a giant laver in order to block a sword and return his own. He looked up in time to see Gideon shoulder block a merchant out of his way and use the poor fellow’s back as a springboard to somersault over several other people.
Gideon landed on the stone floor, running toward Ethan. The boy lay unconscious but breathing. Gideon found the strength to lift him onto his shoulders, bearing the boy’s weight. He tried to avoid the mass of soldiers coming after him. At least, the enemy had been diverted between himself and Levi.
Gideon ran away from the group of possessed soldiers rushing after him. He led them in a wide arc around the end of the throne room, using one of the long tables from the banquet as a barrier. He ran straight for Levi, who had cleared out the soldiers around himself. Time had run out for them.
“What do we do? There are too many,” Gideon said, as they met again in front of a giant laver. The demon possessed closed from behind. They had seconds before the soldiers overwhelmed them.
Without thinking about it, Levi turned and hacked through one of the four support legs holding the laver up. Two strikes damaged it enough, so that it gave way completely, spilling massive quantities of wine out onto the chamber’s stone floor.
Hundreds of gallons of red wine swept up the wooden banquet tables, tossing them around the room like toys. Translucent red waves toppled bodies and furnishings, searching for the path of least resistance.
The waves hit the laver on the opposite side of the room so hard that it, too, gave way, toppling over, spilling its contents into the flood, making it even harder to find footing as the wine cascaded across the floor, hit the sidewalls, and came back on itself.
The flood also swept Gideon, Ethan, and Levi off their feet. Levi spotted their way of escape. There in the middle of the chamber, a whirlpool formed above the only hole in the floor. “Come on!” Levi shouted as he pushed toward the whirlpool. Gideon still held the unconscious Ethan over his shoulder.
The vortex seized them, sending them spinning around three times before plunging through the drainage hole. In the mass confusion of bodies and debris swept around the throne room, no one even noticed what had happened to them.
THE DELIVERER LIVES
The flood of wine sent Gideon, Ethan, and Levi shooting down the drain tunnel, riding an overwhelming current. It sloshed and whipped through the three-foot diameter pipe like an angry snake as gravity urged it downward toward the sea below. They were not sure how it happened, but they were all three sent down an intersecting tunnel off the main pipe from the one they had climbed through earlier.
After a quick but brief ride through this intersecting pipe, it deposited them rather violently into an anteroom. They splashed down into a shallow pool about two feet deep. The anteroom was large and rectangular. A stone walkway stretched down either side of the pool. Gideon pulled Ethan up onto the walkway with Levi following.
“Is he alive?” Levi asked.
Gideon laid Ethan flat on his back and checked for breathing and a heartbeat. He sighed and said, “Yes, he’s alive. Thank the Lord.”
Ethan began to stir. He opened his eyes to slits and tried to speak. “Gide
on?” he whispered. The effort made him wince in pain, clutching his midsection.
“Maybe he’s wounded, but I don’t see any blood,” Levi said. He opened up Ethan’s shirt and what he saw horrified him. “They look like burns of some kind.”
Gideon saw them as well. “I’ve never seen anything quite like them,” he said.
The wounds looked as if a red-hot sword had been drawn over the flesh. They were obviously causing Ethan great pain.
“Do you think you might be able to stand?” Gideon asked.
Ethan winced and nodded. “I’ll try,” he said through the pain.
Both Levi and Gideon helped Ethan get to his feet. He was still dazed and weak, but the Deliverer of Shaddai lived. Ethan found it hard to stand or walk without leaning on his two friends, but to his credit, he tried hard.
The anteroom opened up at one end into a large tunnel. Here the pool turned into a creek of sorts, flowing gently toward a distance speck of light. They chose to walk in this direction. Light probably meant sunlight, and all they had to do at this point was reach the end of the tunnel and see where they were.
The walk was a long one. Ethan managed to gain a little more strength as they continued. Within a half-hour, they had still not walked half of the tunnel’s length. The point of light grew steadily, but they still had a long way to go.
Ethan spent most of his steps moaning, wincing in pain from his wounds. Then he spoke up. “I’m sorry for not listening, Gideon. I was a fool for not taking your advice.”
“I’m sorry you weren’t able to rescue your sister,” Gideon said.
“I probably could have, if I’d only listened to you and allowed Shaddai to guide my actions. Hopefully she’s safe and I’ll have another chance to try.”
“We’ll not give up hope. We’ll try again as Shaddai leads, all right?” Gideon said.
“Aye, lad, we’ll get her eventually,” Levi said. “Just trust in the Lord and the power of his might.”
Ethan smiled as much as he could through the pain and nodded. He cast a glance toward heaven, whispering, “I should have done that in the first place.”
The trio continued, walking through the tunnel. The point of light gradually became a circle of light, terminating into the mouth of an underground cave. They emerged into bright sunshine, hearing the noise of horses in the distance.
A high grassy band rose up on either side of the creek as it continued on away from the mouth of the cave. The men climbed, having to drag Ethan all the way. When they reached the top, they saw an army, apparently in full retreat.
The white granite walls of the city of Emmanuel lay to their left, two miles away. The army retreated from the city and looked badly beaten. Many horses trotted along with wounded men in their saddles. Other men walked as best they could.
There appeared to be no rush to leave and none of Mordred’s soldiers were in pursuit. Levi and the others scanned the walls of the city, finding them stained with black powder burns and blood. It was obvious King Stephen had not breached the wall. A great many, perhaps thousands of men, lay in the battlefield round about the walls of Emmanuel. The sight of so much death marred the city’s once unblemished beauty.
“They’re retreating!” Levi said.
“They’re beaten,” Gideon corrected. “I wonder if the king has survived this ill-fated attack.”
Levi simply stood, staring as the king’s army limped away, like a beaten dog, from Mordred’s bloodstained ramparts. There had been such high hopes in the planning. They had supposed the king’s plan so well conceived. Had they not undertake this fight for the Lord’s glory? Had they not done their duty?
“We should try and catch up with King Stephen, if he lives,” Gideon said.
That uncertainty left a hollow feeling in Levi’s stomach. Was the king alive? It had only been King Stephen’s unrelenting determination that had gotten the war effort this far. If he had been killed, then Levi feared no one would be able to rally the people against Mordred. And if they didn’t defeat the dark lord, then it would only be a matter of time before Mordred pushed into other kingdoms like Wayland and beyond.
DEFEAT and DISCOURAGEMENT
Levi and Gideon, with Ethan in tow, tried to head off the retreating army of King Stephen. They took a path following the creek and were able to intercept the wounded band as it followed the Emmanuel road. Ethan saw why a pursuit was not forthcoming from Mordred’s Wraith Generals. He saw the heavenly host guarding between Mordred’s army and King Stephen’s retreat. They had not brought him victory, but neither had they allowed him to die. Ethan turned his gaze back to Stephen’s horsemen as they began to pass by on the road.
Gideon and Bonifast stayed back on the side of the road as the despondent army passed by. Stephen’s army marched like a funeral procession. They had been soundly defeated, and from the looks of these remaining soldiers, they had expected not to win.
A larger group of soldiers on horses approached in the midst of the others. In the middle of the armed cavalry rode King Stephen of Wayland. He looked disheveled in his bronze armor. Bloody smears covered his garments and his mount. Some of it may have even been his own. A rivulet of dried blood ran down his temple to his neck. His helmet was missing.
“King Stephen!” Levi shouted, entering the road ahead of the king.
The guards riding with Stephen drew swords in order to defend their king. “Captain Bonifast? Is that you, Levi?” the king asked.
“Yes, Your Majesty,” he replied, bowing deeply at the waist. Gideon was still helping Ethan to stand. He had regained a good deal of strength, but Ethan was still dependent on his friend for support.
The cavalry relaxed when they saw their king responding kindly to the captain. In truth, they had had their fill of war for the day. The king approached on horseback and stopped with his men, who now gathered around Levi, while watching Gideon and Ethan as well. “What news, Captain?” King Stephen asked.
“We were able to destroy a great deal of Mordred’s fleet in the bay, my lord. However, the mercenaries making up much of our armada betrayed us. They fired upon the ships which were loyal to you and helped Mordred’s navy to sink them. Man-O-Wars surrounded my ship after surprising us from the far side of the bay. We did, however, manage to blow up the Maelstrom and destroy several of these vessels in the process of escaping.”
“Bravo, Captain…and your crew?”
“Killed, sire,”
“I’m sorry, Captain,” Stephen said. “As you can see, we were defeated in our efforts to gain the city. Most of my men were killed or ran before our enemy. They attacked with such ferocity. I’ve never seen anything like it. I’m amazed we’ve been able to retreat without Mordred sending his army after us.”
“Mordred is not in the city, Highness,” Ethan said through his pain.
“What did you say, boy?” the king asked.
“Mordred was not in the palace or the city,” Ethan repeated.
“And how do you know that?”
“We managed to get inside of Mordred’s throne room,” Gideon said as he helped Ethan to approach the king.
“Is this true, Captain?” King Stephen asked.
“Yes, it is,” Levi confirmed. “After we escaped from my ship, the boy was able to locate a drainage tunnel leading up into the palace through the white cliffs.”
“I see.”
Ethan spoke up again. “I fought with a Wraith General named Rommil who claimed that Mordred was in hiding while your army was being defeated. He was laughing about it.”
“You faced Rommil?” the king asked.
“He did, Sire,” Gideon affirmed.
Levi nodded. “He also killed him.”
“I see,” the king said, admiring the young man. “You are indeed a brave lad. I congratulate you on your personal victory. My army, on the other hand, can do nothing more here. And if Mordred is truly in hiding, we have wasted many lives today.”
“Mordred fears the Deliverer of Shaddai,” Gideon adde
d.
“The Deliverer of Shaddai?” the king said. “The village of Salem was destroyed along with the Deliverer nearly ten years ago.”
Gideon squeezed Ethan’s arm before he could correct Stephen’s assumption. “Sire, are you saying that you do not believe the prophecy?” Gideon asked.
Stephen’s expression grew cold. “What is done is done, priest of Shaddai. How can I place my faith in a dead man? I was not the one who allowed the Deliverer to be destroyed. I have attempted to do what the prophesied Deliverer was supposed to do, but Shaddai was not with us today.”
“Can we hope to be successful against Mordred if our faith is not in the Shaddai’s Word, Highness?” Gideon asked.
Stephen clearly did not like the implication that he had given up his faith, but he could not take back what he had said. His pride wounded, the king simply said, “And where, pray tell, were Shaddai’s warrior-priests today? Did my eyes fail me, or were they absent from the battlefield while my men and I were spilling our blood, attempting to dethrone Shaddai’s enemy?”
“We must all do things in Shaddai’s time, Sire,” Gideon said.
“And still, Evil has been victorious over the righteous, today” the king spat. He turned back to his men waiting with him. “We ride for Wayland! Sergeant Jepson, leave these men some horses.”
With that, the king goaded his mount and began his slow march back toward his homeland. The cavalry soldiers fell into place with their king, leaving Ethan and the others standing in the road. One of the soldiers, riding behind the king, stopped with two mares in tow. He handed the reins to Levi, then got back in line with the others marching toward Wayland.
They watched the sad procession limping away. “Seeing that lot passing through on their way back to Wayland will do more to depress hope in Nod than anything Mordred could do to us,” Levi said.