by Chuck Black
The second warrior advanced, and Carliss prepared herself. She had never faced the sword of a Shadow Warrior before. From Dalton’s description of his battle with Lord Drox, she was up against a powerful force.
The first blow came and Carliss met it, gave, then countered quickly, not allowing the warrior to back her into an unrecoverable position. The ferocious volley of cuts and slices that followed obviously frustrated her opponent. At one point Carliss deflected his cut and countered so quickly that he had no choice but to use his forearm as a shield against her blade.
Carliss’s sword impacted the chain mail without damage, as she expected. She slid her blade forcefully across his protected arm as quickly as possible to recover her defensive position and was shocked when the warrior screamed and recoiled. His chain mail had been severed, and a deep gash in his arm was bleeding profusely.
Carliss glanced around her, breathing heavily. The first warrior was on his feet again. She readied her sword for another attack, concerned now that she would have to face the blades of both warriors—and who knew when more Shadow Warriors would arrive.
They looked at her through steely eyes, clearly amazed that one young female Knight of the Prince had held them off this long. The warrior with the injured arm raised his sword, his face full of fury. Just as he was about to strike again, the other warrior grabbed his arm.
“Stop!” he commanded. “You’ll not win. You’re fighting the Morning Star!”
The other warrior’s fury vanished, and the tip of his sword slowly fell as he stared first at Carliss, then at her sword. The warrior with the bleeding head pulled his fellow warrior back and spoke in hushed tones to him.
“She’s the one who escaped!” Carliss heard him say. The warrior she’d been fighting turned and looked at Carliss again, disbelief in his eyes.
“Impossible,” he said. Carliss saw him grip his sword more tightly, as if he wanted to resume the fight and finish her off. He whispered something back to his comrade, then disappeared into the swamp.
The injured warrior felt his head and looked as though he was struggling to focus. Carliss heard a crashing sound behind her and knew that other Shadow Warriors would be on her in an instant. She was trapped between the warriors at the pit and another contingent of darkness that was surely on its way to seize her. Either way, her feeble rescue attempt was over.
She looked for an avenue of escape, but it was too late. She saw movement in the trees behind her assailant, but this time it was not caused by the esca lizards. Warriors were closing in on all sides.
“The King reigns…and His Son!” Carliss called out. She raised Morning Star to make a final stand.
Just as she pulled back on the mighty sword, the warrior held out his arm, and a familiar shriek filled the air. Carliss stood frozen as an esca lizard launched from a tree limb toward the warrior. It latched onto his outstretched arm, and the antennae recoiled, ready to strike.
The warrior dropped his sword, grabbed the lizard by the body, and ripped it from his arm. The lizard shrieked angrily, but only for a moment. The warrior threw it to the ground and stomped his heavy boot in a crushing blow to the lizard’s head.
The warrior looked up at Carliss.
“I hate those things!” he said. “The King reigns indeed…and His Son!”
Carliss’s jaw dropped. “Who are you?”
“My name is Branton,” the mighty warrior said just as three others stepped through the trees to join him, their eyes all fixed upon Carliss.
“Is she the one?” a warrior asked. “The overcomer?”
Branton pointed to Carliss’s sword. “She carries Morning Star, sir. We mistook her to be a Vincero, but she fights like the Prince. There can be no other explanation.”
Carliss realized with relief that she was in the company not of Shadow Warriors but of Silent Warriors. Their talk of her made her uncomfortable, however, for she had taken the sword out of necessity, not for some noble calling they seemed to think her capable of. Just then she heard an eerie horn blast from the direction of the pit.
“What is that?” she asked, not yet daring to turn away from the warriors.
The warriors’ faces all took on a countenance of great sorrow.
“Evening falls,” the commanding warrior said gravely. “That is Malco’s call to the esca lizards to be fed.”
“No!” Carliss exclaimed. “How many prisoners will die?”
“We’ve only just discovered this pit of horror,” another warrior replied, “but from what we’ve seen… all of them.”
Carliss felt a righteous anger rise up within her like never before. Chills began in the hand that held Morning Star and flowed through her body until she could not be still. Her eyes narrowed.
“Why haven’t you stopped it?” she demanded.
The mighty warrior of the King stepped forward with a ferocity that matched her own. He spoke through clenched teeth.
“We are bound here by the actions—and inactions—of the King’s people. The call to free the people from Lucius’s prisons does not belong to us but to the Knights of the Prince!” The warrior pointed threateningly at Carliss. “We have waited for Morning Star to be given!” The warrior’s muscles tightened, and he looked like a vessel of great destruction waiting to be unleashed. “Are you the one?” he demanded.
Just then the eerie horn blasted again, and Carliss could take it no more. She imagined Si Kon, Takara, Kei, Mariko, and the others being torn apart by the horrid esca lizards. She glared back at the commanding warrior.
“I am no great knight or mighty warrior, though you might wish me to be, but I will serve the Prince and fight for His people to my last dying breath. And I will not stand by to watch the horrors of Malco be accomplished this day!”
Carliss turned and ran toward the pit of Despon Swamp with the valiant power of the Prince resonating in her heart and in her great sword. She did not wait for help nor care if the warriors followed. She jumped across a shallow pool of muck-green water and dashed between the dangling vines. She saw subtle movements going the same direction and knew the lizards were gathering.
The hissing grew in volume as she approached the pit. Then she sensed something large moving beside her and realized it could not be a lizard. She glanced to her right and saw four massive Silent Warriors matching her pace, brilliant swords drawn and ready. She looked to her left and saw three more join her.
“The King reigns!” she called out.
“And His Son!” came the reply of dozens of deep voices.
With every step she took, more mighty warriors rose up out of the cover of the swamp and joined in her charge to the pit. Carliss felt momentarily cheered… until she saw the glow of the torches ahead and began to hear the cries and shouts of a tormented people.
“Kei!” Carliss heard the distinct voice of Si Kon cry out and knew she must move faster.
By now Carliss was leading a wave of warriors that seemed to flow back from her like a wake as far as she could see in both directions. She saw esca lizards attack some of the warriors, but their chain mail and leather armor protected them, and they were not hindered by the fruitless attacks of Malco’s lizard demons.
Carliss broke through the line of torches just in time to see two Shadow Warriors dragging Kei to the near edge of the pit. Other warriors were dragging more captives to various spots along the edge of the pit.
“The King reigns!” Carliss shouted again, this time as a battle cry.
The entire area erupted in a unified response from hundreds of Silent Warriors and also from captive Knights of the Prince: “And His Son!”
A continual wave of Silent Warriors spilled into the light of the pit from the darkness of the swamp. The Shadow Warriors were momentarily dazed by the assault, but an alarm soon rose and the two stone buildings emptied themselves of vicious dark warriors. The air filled with clashing swords and anguished cries from the prisoners. The esca lizards’ hissing turned to thousands of deafening shrieks.
Carliss brought her blade immediately to bear on the two warriors who held Kei. One drew his sword to fight Carliss, while the other continued to drag Kei toward the waiting lizards. She tried to cut him off, but the blade of his fellow warrior hindered her way.
“Carliss!” Kei cried out as the warrior neared the edge of the pit, where Carliss saw a slithering, hissing mass waiting for its food.
The Shadow Warrior before her laughed as he held his sword ready to defend the evil act of his accomplice. Carliss pulled Morning Star far back and unleashed a cut that flew with all of her strength behind it. The warrior raised his blade to stop it, but Morning Star cut clean through the warrior’s grisly blade, continuing on to sever first the armor and then the torso of the evil warrior. He fell instantly to the ground.
Carliss jumped over his body and thrust her sword through the other warrior just as two lizards struck out at Kei. Carliss grabbed the girl’s arm and yanked her back, slicing through one of the lizards in one quick motion.
“Look!” Kei pointed. Two other warriors were just about to throw another woman to the lizards just twenty paces to their left. She was screaming in terror against the horror of her demise.
Carliss thrust the handle of Morning Star into Kei’s hand, whipped her bow off her back, and quickly set an arrow in the string. She aimed, released, and was already drawing back a second arrow when the first sank solidly into the side of one of the Shadow Warriors. The other warrior looked briefly about for the threat but only saw the tip of the arrow just before it penetrated deep into his chest.
Carliss set her bow back on her shoulder and recovered Morning Star. “Come, Kei.” She led the girl back to the domed cages. The Shadow Warriors were now all completely occupied with their fight against the King’s Silent Warriors… a battle resumed from across the Great Sea.
How long will this war last? Carliss wondered.
Nearly all the captives who had been offered to the lizards had made their way back to the cages, which now seemed to be the only safe haven from warriors and lizards alike. Carliss found Si Kon and the rest of the Followers in one of the cages. She unlocked the cage, and Si Kon and Takara embraced their daughter with the joy of restoration.
“Carliss … how did you …?” Si Kon looked around in wonder at the raging battle of powerful forces.
The Silent Warriors seemed easily to be overtaking the Shadow Warriors who guarded the pit, but then Carliss saw a contingent of Malco’s warriors enter the battle from the direction of Esca Prime. More Silent Warriors joined from the swamp, and the fight seemed to escalate beyond anything Carliss had ever seen. This place… this time… this battle seemed to hold great significance for both forces.
“We must get the people out of here,” Carliss shouted.
“Yes.” Si Kon nodded. “But how, Carliss? The lizards will kill us all!”
Carliss looked about.
How? She echoed his question in her mind.
ESCAPE FROM THE PIT
“Branton!” Carliss called out to the warrior she had hit earlier.
He was unlocking the door to the other unopened cage. Carliss ran over to him.
“We have to get these people out of here. Can you spare eight warriors to guard them through the swamp?”
Branton nodded and pointed to the west side of the pit, where the fighting was the least intense. “Gather them there, and I will meet you with my men.”
Carliss, Si Kon, and Soro quickly organized the other knights to gather and lead nearly one hundred captives to the edge of the pit. More than thirty Silent Warriors gave them cover as they went, but Carliss still had to engage three Shadow Warriors at different times to save the lives of some of the people. As they arrived at the edge of the pit, the prisoners seemed overcome with terror at the prospect of entering the very place they had feared only moments earlier.
“Grab the torches!” Carliss called out to Si Kon and the other knights just as Branton and seven other Silent Warriors arrived. “The lizards fear the light.” Si Kon responded quickly, recovering a sword from one of the fallen warriors and then wrestling a torch from its stand.
The warriors bracketed the people, and the Knights of the Prince spaced numerous torches from front to back. Carliss wasted no time in leading the group out of the pit and into the swamp. Thousands of lizards hissed angrily as she swished her torch back and forth, clearing a path for the people to follow. Carliss heard frightened shouts and screams from behind her as the lizards tried to penetrate the light and the warriors’ defenses.
The Silent Warriors did not falter in their duty to protect the captives. Their swords flew in a constant wall of protection. Carliss held the torch in her left hand and cut through hundreds of lizards with Morning Star. The air around them was filled with the constant sound of shrieking and hissing lizards.
They hadn’t gone very far before it felt as though they were being overwhelmed. The Silent Warriors could not keep the beasts at bay, and the slithering walls of the swamp seemed to collapse upon them. They finally stopped all forward movement and huddled in a single group as Carliss, Si Kon, and Branton and his warriors fought an endless sea of esca lizards.
One of the knights holding a torch screamed, and Carliss looked to see that one of the esca lizards had succeeded in reaching him. The man fell back into the group, instantly reacting to the poison.
“What will we do?” Si Kon called out to Carliss.
Carliss finished slicing through three more lizards. She glanced at Si Kon and could give him no answer. Two more lizards fell to her sword.
If only we had more torches. Carliss looked up at her torch, then out into the swamp. That was foolish, she thought, having just ruined her night vision with a residual bright spot everywhere she looked. But that bright spot reminded her of Petolemew’s shop, and she remembered his black powder.
“Here.” Carliss handed her torch to Si Kon.
The Silent Warriors were nearly overcome, and the people could press no closer together. Carliss reached into her sack and grabbed one of the smaller leather pouches filled with the black powder. She took an arrow, then skewered the leather pouch onto the arrowhead and held it high before her. A little of the powder trickled out.
“Hold the torch to the pouch,” Carliss shouted above the noise of the beasts. “Then turn away.”
Si Kon brought a torch to just below the pouch, and it exploded in a flash of brilliant light. Everything fell silent—everything except the sound of thousands of six-legged lizards scurrying for cover. The calm stunned the people and the Silent Warriors alike as they tried to understand what had just happened.
“Quickly!” Carliss shouted as she took her torch back from Si Kon. “We must cover as much ground as we can before they return.”
They organized back into their former protected line and resumed their exodus, carrying the injured man along with them. They made good progress, but slowly the lizards returned. After some time they were once again immersed in a fierce battle with the evil creatures. Carliss exploded a second pouch of black powder, giving them another reprieve from attack and a chance to cover more ground.
“We’re going to make it,” Si Kon said, encouraged by their progress.
“Yes,” Branton replied breathlessly, “but thousands of other Arrethtraens will fall to the same evil.”
Carliss looked at Branton and his men, who were breathing hard from their sacrificial protection, and wondered how many Arrethtraens they had already seen fall to Malco’s evil scheme. She knew something had to be done and realized she was the only one who could do it. This was her moment; this was her call.
Carliss gave the sack of black powder pouches to Si Kon.
“What are you doing?” he asked.
“Use this arrow with the pouches and continue to journey west. The warriors will show you the way. There should be enough of the black powder to get you to the edge of the swamp.”
“Wherever you are going,” Si Kon said, “I will come with you.”
She shook her head. “Your family… these people… need you to lead them out of here, and you will need all of the warriors as well. Akiyma waits along the river, north of Moorue. If I am not there by morning, get the people to Brimwick Downs. Sir Norsington will help you.”
Si Kon looked at Carliss with great concern in his eyes. She put a hand on his shoulder.
“I have to take care of something, and only I can do it, my friend.”
She reached into her vest and gave Si Kon the four harvested swamp lilies. “Crush up the root of one and give it to the knight who was stung. Do the same for any others who fall. If there are any left by the time you get out of the swamp, please try to get them to Dalton…” She paused, realizing it was probably too late, then forced herself to continue. “He is being taken care of by Petolemew, who lives just outside of Pembrook.”
Si Kon took the flowers and placed them in his tunic. “I will, my lady.”
Carliss turned about and launched back into the swamp, willing to sacrifice everything to stop the evil of Malco before his wicked plot could spread farther into the kingdom.
VALIANT KNIGHT
Taking out Malco’s castle would require thousands of knights and cost many lives. Carliss was alone, so she set her course for the source of Malco’s evil…the esca lizard nest area. The torch she was carrying gave her enough light to move at a relatively good pace through the night. She soon came to the wall of trees and vines that told her she was near the nesting area and was amazed at how unhindered by the esca lizards she was. She figured that most of them had been drawn to the pit for the evening feeding. In the distance, she heard the clash of battle still raging there.
Carliss secured Morning Star through the leather straps that ran across her back and drew her bow. She set the nock of an arrow in the string and paused for a moment, trying to prepare herself for what was to come. She knew there was a strong chance she might not make it out alive. The swamp lily seemed to have made her immune from the attacks of the smaller lizards, but she suspected things might be different in the nest area. The mother lizard was large and fast, and Carliss knew that most creatures fiercely protected their young. The mother esca lizard would be no different.