Legacy of the Blade: The Complete Trilogy

by Joseph J. Bailey

  I was locked in place for countless eternities while the gate’s baleful regard peeled me back layer by layer.

  Worse yet, this gate was not empty.

  The gulf overflowed with evil, evil that now had a way onto Uërth.

  And it was coming through.

  Falling to the Uërth in an aphotic tide, seething unchecked across the barren ground, its motion far too fast to track, a wave of Darkness spilled forth from the immense, swirling rift in the firmament.

  Just trying to watch gave me a headache and made me question fundamental assumptions about the nature of my existence.

  The divine seal of the Empyrean Gate had fallen, its magic shattered along with the Heavenly Host.

  This travesty was the outcome of Empyrean Gate’s demise.

  The spawn of Chaos was being unleashed upon the Uërth.

  I was all that stood in the way of the demonic horde.

  And I could not move.

  Or act.

  A wall of gibbering madness rushed across the plains toward me—gnarled and crooked arms, scabrous bodies, taloned limbs, thrashing tails, gnashing teeth, blazing eyes, and surging horns—every shape and flavor of nightmare. Trailing the advancing masses above, living clouds of Darkness, great winged horrors whose wingbeats cracked like thunder and shook the heavens, hosts of specters and ethereal entities, swarms of imps and cacodemons, vital shadows, among many other abominations, spilled outward from the great rift, filling the sky itself in an implacable fuming tsunami of horrors vomited from the very heart of the Abyss. Dispersed far too liberally amongst the roiling unholy horde, teeming with fell powers far beyond those of even the fearsome demon lords flying above the massed throngs, greater powers stirred—demon princes, the terrible juel’dathra whose might rivaled that of the angels themselves—strode or flew like titans amongst the common mob, molders and annihilators of hopes and aspirations.

  Fell arcana laced the moving tide in unholy magics, curses bespoiled the land and stole its spirit, dark rites empowered the foul horde with all the timbres and textures of terror.

  The very cause of Heaven’s Fall marched upon the Uërth.

  Toward me.

  Finally, I loosened the bonds constraining me.

  A bit.

  “M-m-master!

  “C-c-come!”

  My voice was quavering.

  My body was shaking.

  I wet myself.

  Adrenaline rushed through my veins, calling me to action, urging me to respond.

  But I could not get the words out.

  My stuttering, long held in check after years of disciplined practice, was out of control.

  My words would not reach my teacher in time.

  Together, we could make a difference.

  Together, we could at least warn the people of Uërth of the terrors that would soon be upon us.

  If only I could get the words out.

  If only I could find my voice.

  But no words came.

  My summons went unheeded.

  And the demons came.

  Tears began falling down my cheeks, my emotions unchecked.

  I realized then that there was no one to come.

  There was no one to help.

  My master was gone.

  And with him went all my hope.

  I was all alone.

  As were we all.

  A Rest Disturbed

  Something nudged me.

  Startled, jolted from unconsciousness, from one nightmare into another, I nevertheless refused to move, to give myself away.

  I wanted to scream, to launch myself from the spot, but I feared what would happen, what could be.

  Again.

  It pushed firmly against the small of my back.

  The pressure seemed to say, “I know you’re awake. Now get up before I kick you.”

  I did not get up.

  But I did crack my eyes.

  Barely, but bravely.

  Where I expected to see a hulking brute ready to rend me limb from limb, some demon from the nether realms, I could see nothing but the empty sky of another day.

  Thinking my accoster might be invisible, I muttered a silent spell to see the unseen.

  My flower halo turned to butterflies.

  Seen through slitted eyes, they were quite striking, wing tips sparkling with rainbow hues in the sunlight.

  I still could not see anyone.

  With an inward sigh, I released the magic binding the butterflies to me.

  They did not leave.

  Perhaps I smelled too much of flowers.

  Grim Acceptance

  This was it, then.

  The moment of truth.

  I was soon to meet my Maker, to join my master in Heaven.

  This last demon was enough good fortune. There had to be more. There were always more.

  I sighed silently, enjoying the fullness of one last breath before I faced my attacker.

  Preparing the words in my mind, I began a curse that would set the essence of the demon on fire and consume it from the inside in divine flame.

  Rolling over carefully, for I did not wish to harm any of the butterflies resting on my robes, I blurted out my incantation but stopped abruptly in mid-utterance, letting the arcane energies that had gathered fall away.

  There was no one behind me.

  Nothing.

  I looked to the left and right.

  Up and down.

  Whoever, whatever, had been poking me appeared to have left.

  Perhaps the disturbance had been the ghost of Master Nomba urging me on, cautioning me against staying where another demon would soon find me.

  Yes, one duaga, one demon lord from the darkest pits of the Abyss itself, was not enough. Perhaps my master’s passing in my defense was not enough, either.

  There had to be more. There always were.

  Maintaining a low crouch, one that was perhaps entirely unnecessary when demonic senses could detect me regardless of what I was doing unless I was wreathed in suitable eldritch defenses, not a kaleidoscope of butterflies, I performed a slow rotation, looking in all directions.

  Nothing.

  Just rubble, dirt, and the sad fragments of our plans; the remnants of the mountaintop that Master Nomba had blasted to the heavens, along with himself, in his superhuman effort to destroy the demon lord.

  Reassured, at least for the moment, I stood, dusting myself off as I tried to decide what to do next.

  One of the rocks rose with me.

  Wera’dun

  This living fluid-filled receptacle showed promise.

  Its longruen, the fiery heart-essence of its true self, burned bright and intense, like the fierce flows in Uërth’s deepest, most vital core. There were some odd blockages and currents within its liquid form, unusual permutations and eddies atypical compared to the usual dyunda geometries, but these could perhaps be mended with time.

  Perchance the disturbances and dislocations were temporary manifestations of the psychological stresses still vibrating through the fluid chambers of its inner being.

  Guraem, and most mortal creatures like them, were fragile beings.

  The loss of another guraem could have devastating effects on their liquescent essence, drying it out forever, or creating a turbulent froth that would not settle for many long years, internal storms that would wreak havoc on their soft, often leaky, selves.

  Above its promise, this living fluid-filled receptacle also showed potential, not just in its possibility for growth—that was a given, with its luminous blazing core—but in something far more important.

  It was, above all else, a magnet for juel’dara. Its energetic emanations spread outward from its viscid core in radiant waves that drew the unholy spawn of the dark reaches between dimensions more effectively even than it could draw the butterflies presently hovering around its quivering frame.

  This talent was, above all, how Luecaeus had noticed the guraem in the first place, why he had rushed to
this spot to see a being of such unusual majesty.

  Though Luecaeus had arrived too late to save the guraem’s fellow sharer of water, its hun’zar, he had not been too late to miss the spectacle that was this watery vessel.

  He would stay near this one, perhaps in time choosing it as his next wera’dun. For of one thing he was certain: where this guraem went, juel’dara were soon to follow.

  And where the juel’dara went, so would he.

  A Rock with a Name

  As quickly as I stood, I fell back down, landing hard on my haunches.

  Moving faster than my fall, however, my mind summoned forth words of banishment lest this floating mineral apparition do me in.

  Nothing happened.

  I felt the magical energies gather around me in their raw power, their possibility of being shaped according to my will, but to no effect.

  What had happened?

  Maybe I had not cast a full banishment. Maybe I had just managed a stasis spell. After all, the rock was just hovering in the air before me. It was completely still, undisturbed by arcane energies and any effort on my part.

  Surely that was it.

  I had put it in stasis.

  I would leave before the spell broke.

  I took two steps away from the floating, fist-sized rock, intending to give a quick survey to the erstwhile peak to make certain Master Nomba had, in fact, fallen—and the rock matched my trajectory and hovered in the air a few steps behind me.

  It made no effort to bridge the gap between us; instead, it held a constant distance.

  I tried sprinting ahead, nearly falling face-first on the piles of loose scree left from the magical explosion that had decimated the ridgeline, but the rock easily matched my pace.

  I stopped abruptly.

  There was no point in running.

  I was tired of running, and I had not even begun.

  I just wanted to sit and cry, to have back what little of my life was left.

  Taking a deep breath, marshaling what little bravery had taken refuge in my awkward body, I asked, “What do you want?”

  I tried to keep the edge of hysteria from my voice lest it engender the creature’s ire.

  Surprisingly, it answered. “Living fluid-filled receptacle”—that was, I supposed, me—“I wish to express my deep sadness at the loss of your sharer of water.”

  It must mean Master Nomba.

  And we had shared water. I still had the waterskin in question on my back in my satchel, along with my most important belongings.

  “I am Luecaeus, heart of the earth, and I have often been kith to your kind.”

  Lucius?

  “Allow me to rest in your shade for a time, that my nature may bolster yours.”

  The spell must have worked!

  Even if it was nowhere near what I had intended, maybe it was exactly what I had needed.

  I could speak with the rock!

  Now what?

  “I will help protect your heart-essence from the devourers of heart-essence.”

  Demons?

  Did it want to help protect me from demons?

  “I would take much pleasure in this.”

  Lucius seemed like a good enough rock.

  Elementals were few and far between.

  They had suffered almost as much as humankind with the arrival of the demons after the Fall.

  I nodded, gathering myself in recognition of Lucius’s formal offering. “It would be my honor to have you share my shadow, Lucius.

  “I am Maeraeth, disciple of Master Nomba, and it is my heartfelt pleasure to meet you.”

  Companion

  Luecaeus knew he had been wise to select this guraem as his companion.

  Already the living fluid-filled receptacle was speaking from his heart. This was of deep significance.

  Luecaeus would make a fast friend.

  At least until the receptacle popped, sprung a leak, deflated, or his soul-essence dried up.

  Fortunately, Maeraeth now had Luecaeus as his companion.

  With Luecaeus at his side, Maeraeth should not burst for many years to come.

  Happenstance

  In all of Uërth, why had Lucius been here?

  Why now?

  I was not exactly unthankful for my good fortune, but I was skeptical.

  In a world where angels had fallen from the heavens, where demons ran free across the width and breadth of the planet, killing and destroying as they went, where humanity was on the brink of extinction, skepticism was, in my view, a rather positive response.

  So I asked.

  “Why are you here, Lucius?

  “What good fortune brought you to me?”

  Seen through the floating haze of the rabble of butterflies, Lucius seemed to glow in the day’s half-light.

  The small floating rock tilted in mid-air, the motion indicating deep consideration, or so I thought. “My most recent partner in life’s flowing expression sealed the yawning chasm to the juel’dara’s pit of origination.”

  The Chaos Gate?

  His friend had sealed the Chaos Gate?

  The one the Heavenly Host had been unable to maintain?

  After all this time?

  I snapped my jaw shut, not realizing it had been hanging open until a butterfly almost flew in.

  “The Chaos Gate?”

  Lucius bobbed up and down enthusiastically.

  “There is not more than one.”

  He was right there.

  I...I did not know what to say.

  Apparently taking my silence as grounds to continue with his answer, Lucius added, “I sensed the foul emanations of the mighty juel’dara seeking your heart-essence from afar just as I sensed the curious mua’di you and your sharer of water were performing in the valley below.

  “Also, there are so few living fluid-filled vessels left that you are hard to miss.”

  That was a joke, I think, albeit a grim one.

  Mostly because it was true.

  “And your longruen burns like the core of the sun.”

  I ignored that last bit, mostly because my mind was elsewhere, and I did not exactly know what he was talking about.

  “So, your friend just saved the world and you decided to come save me?”

  I must be something of a letdown.

  Lucius tilted once more, halting his bobbing motion.

  “My task was done.

  “My wera’dun is no longer on this plane. By your reckoning, he has been gone some time. He went through the devourers of heart-essences’ planar chasm before sealing it.”

  More cheerily, Lucius added, “A facet of his heart-essence yet remains, so he is not entirely gone.”

  So, his friend had saved the world and then willingly entered the Chaos Gate?

  But part of him was somehow still here?

  I could not see myself holding Lucius’s interest.

  I could barely cast a spell, much less the one I actually intended, and he wanted to spend time with me?

  “If part of your friend is still here, why did you leave him?”

  “He was not left. His heart-essence has joined those other heart-essences in the Angel Sword Loer’allon.”

  Joined those in the Angel Sword?

  His soul was in an Angel Sword?

  Along with many others?

  I could see my initial questions were just the beginning.

  Lucius’s friend must have had quite the storied adventure!

  “And what was your friend’s name?”

  “He was called Saedeus by others of your kind.”

  “And what did you call him?”

  “Wera’dun.”

  I wanted to learn more, but I also wanted to live a little while longer. The passage of time was becoming apparent as the day’s shadows slowly grew longer.

  “Are we safe here, Lucius?”

  With the loss of Master Nomba, what little confidence I had in myself, and my ability to protect it, seemed to waver and collapse.


  “I would like to say goodbye before we leave.”

  “We have time for the parting of ways.”

  With a brief nod, I scurried over the rubble to where my teacher had fallen and bowed my head.

  Lucius followed.

  In the Beginning, the Word

  “Maeraeth!

  “Come here, lad!

  “Come see what we’ve done!”

  We were standing atop Solitary Mountain, so named not because it was a lone peak, but because one could climb its heights and expect to enjoy a degree of solitude not possible in the valley.

  Of course, the mountain had been named before the demons came. Now one could have solitude just about anywhere since there were so few people left.

  Even in solitude, however, one was seldom alone for long, because where people went, demons were soon to follow.

  The mountain’s high slopes fell away before us, great, sweeping swathes of rock, stone and bare earth transitioning to sparse, then thickening patches of trees and forest before opening onto fields of grass and planted crops.

  At the mountain’s root, the headwaters of the mighty Bouras River were but a healthy creek dividing the Greensward Valley roughly in half. Some ten or more leagues opposite, the matching flanks of the Dragon’s Teeth Range began, their mighty peaks marching on into the far northern distance.

  Worlds away, far past the terminus of the Dragon’s Teeth, lay mighty Kerraboer, the untouchable keep of the Empyrean Guard, bastion of Light and principal thwarter of Darkness on Uërth thanks to the unyielding Knights of the Undying Light. Kerraboer sat directly before the maw of the Chaos Gate itself, miraculously stemming, if not stopping, the tide of the demonic advance for long centuries.

  Though Kerraboer and her mighty Empyrean Knights held strong, many creatures of Darkness found their way past the formidable defenses of Uërth’s sworn defenders, wreaking havoc upon lands and people largely too weak or too few to defend themselves from infernal assault.

  The Greensward Valley had been one such place, at least when my master intervened.

  Three gems spread upon a velvet blanket, the hamlets of Taere, Bolwen, and Meera bedecked the near and far mountain flanks and the valley bottom, each nestling in a place of distinct advantage within the Greensward.