by Jack Conner
Howling, Rauglir dropped the sword as he stumbled back.
Baleron rolled aside just as Rondthril’s blade plunged toward where his face had been just half a second earlier. Then he was picking the weapon up and leaping to his feet.
Rauglir had time to raise one clawed arm, then Baleron was there, thrusting Rondthril up through the demon’s chest, right into his heart.
Rauglir’s growl died in his throat, and his eyes lost their anger, their fury. Smoke rose up from the wound. Baleron and the demon stood that way for a moment, locked in a mortal embrace, their eyes staring into each other for a long moment.
At last Rauglir slumped and Baleron jerked his blade free. The demon collapsed to the floor in a shaggy, bloody heap, and Baleron spat on Rauglir’s corpse.
“That’s for my mother,” he said.
He saw the smoke rising up from the back of Rauglir’s leg and silently thanked Rolenya—and Rauglir himself. If not for the demon’s greed, the Flower of Itherin’s power would not course through Baleron’s blood in the first place.
Rolenya still sang, but her voice was fragile and raw now. He ran towards her just as white smoke began rising from her body.
“Rolenya!” he cried.
Gilgaroth was too enchanted to notice the raggedness of her voice, Rolenya hoped, lulled nearly senseless. Yet if she stopped singing he would rouse.
What was taking Baleron so long? The energies filling her were killing her, she could feel it. She had opened the floodgates too wide, had drawn on powers beyond her skill to handle, and now they were going to consume her. Incredible pain filled her, searing her, and it was all she could do to go on singing.
She had to. For Baleron. For everyone.
The pain rent her voice and made it rough, and then it stole her breath, and she couldn’t concentrate on the words. What was happening? Was she really dying? If so, she prayed she would not return to Illistriv.
The pain overwhelmed her. She choked out one final burst, and then the whole world turned to mist. She collapsed in a heap to the wet terrace. White smoke like steam rose from her body.
As soon as the singing stopped, Gilgaroth’s eyes snapped open. His horned head lay limply on the floor, but it began to rear up.
Suddenly Baleron was next to it, Rondthril at the ready. He raised the Fanged Blade to strike one last time.
But without Rolenya’s voice to keep him spellbound, Gilgaroth was no longer helpless.
Angrily, moaning, he tossed his huge head and knocked Baleron away, then slithered forwards, around Rolenya, towards the archway leading into the Main Hall—and the stairs. The blow nearly flung Baleron over the side of the terrace—doubtlessly that had been Gilgaroth’s intention—but as he hit the floor and went sliding on the wet surface, he struck the body of a dead Borchstog, halting his slide just in time.
He glanced down, over the edge of the terrace, and gasped. The Inferno was consuming Krogbur. It climbed, even as he watched, the bright red flames licking into the jet black surface, and smoke boiling up in thick sheets. Within minutes the flame would climb to this very terrace.
Baleron glanced back. Gilgaroth was disappearing within the tower. Damn it all! Rolenya had saved their lives and given him enough time to retrieve the sword, but, curse Rauglir, not enough time to use it.
Swearing, Baleron climbed to his feet. A glance at Rolenya showed that she still laid lifeless, white smoke drifting up from her body. His heart twisted violently, and, though it pained him, he knew he did not have time to tend to her.
Reeling from his wounds, he pursued the Dark One as he retreated into his lair, surely going to heal himself in the Black Temple. If he managed to make it there, it would be as if none of this had ever happened. Baleron had to stop him now, stop him and kill him. Now might be the first time Gilgaroth had ever been truly vulnerable, it might be the last, and Baleron knew his window of opportunity would not be open for long—only as long as this stairway was tall, for once Gilgaroth reached his Throne Room with all his servants about, wraiths and Colossi and demons, he would be protected. The only reason others had not rushed to aid their Master yet was the chaos caused by the shaking tower and Gilgaroth’s pain.
The Hell-Worm crossed the Main hall and began to slither up the black steps. Dark, smoking blood pooled in his wake, eating into the stairs.
Baleron, cursing, limped after.
Moving with distressing swiftness, Gilgaroth was far ahead of him up the stairs, which seemed endless—in the gloom of the hall, Baleron could not see their top; there must be a thousand steps!—but they would end all too quickly. He staggered upwards.
“I’m coming!” he roared. “You can’t run from me!” Breathing hard, blood dripping into his eyes, he said, “But run anyway! Run, Gilgaroth! Run! I want to see you flee!”
He mounted the stairs, one weary step at a time. He tried to avoid stepping on the spilled black blood, hissing on the stone.
Shadows fell on him. Like living pieces of darkness, the wraiths descended in a howling cloud, tearing at Baleron with insubstantial claws. They must have come down from the Throne Room to aid their Master. Ghostly as they were, incredible pain filled Baleron every time they touched him, and he knew they weren’t clawing at his flesh, but his soul.
He flung his bloody hand at them. The red drops clove through the half-substantial shadow-bodies, parting them, and the wraiths shrieked in fear and veered away.
Emboldened, Baleron swiped Rondthril against his bloody abdomen, then slicing it at the wraiths, and whenever Rondthril passed through them they wasted away, almost seeming to evaporate. Still they clamored around him, howling and shrieking, tearing at him with their awful claws, but he pressed forward through them, hacking at them as he slogged up one more step. Then another.
Above, the Dark One reached the halfway point, then passed it.
Desperation surged through Baleron. Summoning his last reserve of energy, he sprang up the steps, slicing at wraiths as he went, and at last reached Gilgaroth’s tail. With a joyful howl, he stabbed Rondthril through the hard scales and deep inside the Dark One’s earthly flesh. He tried to pin Gilgaroth to the stairs, but the stairs were too hard to penetrate, and the Hell-Worm kept going, not even acknowledging the blow with a moan of pain. The blade sliced right through his tail, and fire licked out from the wound.
Gritting his teeth, Baleron followed.
Again he caught up to his enemy, and again he stabbed into Gilgaroth, cursing as he did so.
“Die, you bastard!”
He stabbed, and stabbed again. Black blood sprayed him and he staggered back, nearly toppling. He felt whoozy and sick. The very blood of the Wolf! It burned his skin. A weariness came over him, and he almost retched, but something in him fought the poison; he felt the thrumming in his veins. The Flower. He doubted it would be enough to save him, but it would give him time. He had never thought to live beyond this day anyway. Only let me kill the bastard first.
He had to hurry. They were nearly to the top now.
Wraiths continued to howl and tear at him, but Baleron had only to fling a few drops of his blood and they scattered.
He rose, though every step seemed like a torture. He had lost too much blood. The world spun and reeled around him.
He saw Sophia and Salthrick; he saw his father and mother; he saw Shelir and Elethris and Celievsti; he saw Felias and Jered; he saw Lunir and Logran and his brothers and all of Glorifel; he saw many others whom Gilgaroth had destroyed. Anger welled up in him, and he marched on.
He caught up to Gilgaroth again and stabbed him, punching through his scales. Gilgaroth hardly noticed. Baleron stabbed again. And again. Rondthril flashed. Thunder shook the tower.
“Die!” Baleron shouted. “Why won’t you just die?”
With each strike, fires shot out from the wounds. Baleron knew only vaguely how Gilgaroth and the Second Hell were connected, but they were, one wound about the other, and with every hole Baleron put in the Dark One he seemed to put another
in Illistriv.
He struck again and again. Metal flashed. Black blood spurted. Flame shot out. Gilgaroth moaned in pain, but kept mounting the stairs.
As he went, he moved slower . . . and slower.
Baleron roared and grunted. Rondthril struck.
“Die!”
As Gilgaroth slowed, Baleron was able to ascend up the Hell-Worm’s body, poking holes all through his enemy’s length. He slipped on the black blood, got scorched by jetting fires, but he pressed on, all he could hear the thunder of his own heartbeat.
He reached the Dark One’s horned and whiskered head.
“Now we come to it,” Baleron told him, panting. “Your end is here.” He poised the sword so as to drive it through Gilgaroth’s eye and into his brain.
Yet Gilgaroth would not be so easily overcome. Suddenly, with one sudden jerk, he reared up and knocked Baleron back. The prince tumbled down a few stairs but caught himself, bracing his weight with Rondthril.
Gilgaroth, eyes flaming as well as body, twisted about and loomed over him.
“Yes,” Gilgaroth said. “Now we come to it. Let me end your Doom, little prince. It is what you have wanted.”
Baleron glared up at him. “It’s king now. Thanks to you.”
The Shadow prepared to strike, to snap up Baleron in his iron jaws and destroy him utterly, but before he could do so the fires that were pouring from his body in great gouts began to consume him, and he bellowed in pain. His whole black length burst into a tortured mass of flame.
He flung himself upon the stairs and writhed. He blackened, his scales blistering, as the fires of his own creation devoured him. Baleron shrank back and watched on, awed. The flames drew sweat from his pores.
From deep within its bowels, the Black Tower rumbled violently.
Baleron shook off his awe. Gilgaroth lived. Baleron stood, spitting blood from where he’d bitten his tongue, and stalked up the length of Gilgaroth one last time. Fires scorched him and smoke stung his eyes, and the writhing coils threatened to crush him, but he endured.
“You made Man,” he said, breathlessly, as he went. “You said one from among the Fallen Race would be your Deliverer, and so it is. I, Baleron Grothgar, King of Havensrike, deliver you into darkness. Farewell!”
Reaching Gilgaroth’s head, he swiped Rondthril across his belly, gathering a coat of blood, and plunged the unholy sword into the Dark One’s skull. A shock ran up his arm, but he felt Gilgaroth’s flesh and bone give beneath him. Gilgaroth roared. His whipping head knocked Baleron back down the stairs.
The Hell-Worm thrashed and moaned, writhing in his death throes, Rondthril embedded in his brain. Flames shot from his fanged mouth and washed across the glistening black stairs.
Baleron retreated down the steps, stumbling, his eyes on Gilgaroth, as Krogbur shuddered and broke apart.
The shadow-wraiths swarmed about their Master, trying and failing to help him. His fury drove them away, so they circled him at a distance, wailing in terror and sadness.
The Dark One’s thrashing finally ceased, and his body slumped to the stairs and was still. Thunder boomed and the walls shook and broke. Fissures spread. Cracks split the stairs. Wind screamed and howled.
Gilgaroth did not move.
Awe fell on Baleron. The Wolf . . . is dead.
As he watched, insubstantial shapes, like shadows of shadows, suddenly poured from the holes Rondthril had dealt the Dark One. They boiled out of the Second Hell, some screaming, some wailing, all in haste to be gone as Illistriv collapsed. More and more poured from Gilgaroth’s wounds—thousands, perhaps millions of them—and Baleron watched in wonder, completely transfixed.
Illistriv was breaking. It must be. And all its prisoners were being set loose. Even now Baleron might be watching Salthrick’s soul escape its torment, along with millions of others. Baleron felt a smile spread across his face. The wraiths, seeing the imprisoned souls go free and fearing retribution, scattered.
Baleron turned about, meaning to go down, and his smile faded instantly.
Rolenya, white and smoking and still, lay in a heap down on the terrace.
Calling her name, Baleron leapt down the stairs as fast as he could, slipping and cursing, but at last he reached her and, sinking to his knees, cradled her in his arms.
“Rolenya!” he said. “Can you hear me?”
She didn’t move. The wind blew her hair, fluttered her dress, but she didn’t move. She was still warm, but Baleron had no idea if that would last. She was already cooling under the frigid rain.
Bitter tears welled in him. After all this, for her to die . . .
A large slab of Krogbur smashed into the floor near him, pelting him and the princess with shrapnel, and he knew it was only a matter of time for them both. The tower would fall, and he and Rolenya would be obliterated in its collapse.
A great winged shadow fell upon the terrace.
Baleron looked up to see a familiar form descend from the skies. Wounded and bloodied in a hundred places, weakened by his mother’s poison, Throgmar landed on the platform and inspected his father’s smoking remains, which could still be seen high up on the black stairs, smoldering.
In the air about the tower, the moat of dragons was breaking up and scattering. They felt their Master’s passing and knew that Krogbur was the wrong place to be at the moment. At any second it would collapse, killing anyone near it. Even the Borchstog army at its base was beginning to flee, though it was too late for them. The leaping fires of the Inferno spread, consuming all in its path, burning itself out. All was chaos and pandemonium.
Baleron could smell thick smoke on the suddenly-hot breeze. The Inferno must be close to the terrace. At any moment the terrace would be consumed in fire. The very air shimmered with heat, and the floor burned him. Its wet surface began to hiss.
Slowly, Throgmar lowered his horned head from inspecting the ruin of his father to regard the shape of Baleron cradling Rolenya at his feet.
Wind whipped Baleron and rain tore at his flesh, but the heir to the throne of Havensrike did not attempt to flee.
Throgmar met his eyes.
Thunder shook the tower, and another slab crashed right near the prince, spraying him and the princess with shards.
“YOU,” said Throgmar slowly. He did not seem to be in a rush. Indeed, far from it.
Rolenya’s flesh was growing colder. If she was still alive, Baleron had to get her to shelter quickly. As for himself, he felt sick from his contact with Gilgaroth’s blood. It felt as though a fire were spreading throughout his body. The Wolf might kill him yet.
He blinked, looking deep into Throgmar’s amber eyes.
“Help us,” he said.
The Betrayer just stared at him. The dragon said nothing. Wind shrieked through his horns.
“Or,” Baleron pleaded, “if you don’t want to help me, save her at least. She deserves better than to die like this.”
“FELESTRATA DESERVED BETTER THAN WHAT YOU GAVE HER, TOO.”
“But she did not exist!”
Heatedly, the Worm shouted, “SHE EXISTED TO ME!”
The rawness of his voice was painful to hear. Desperately, Baleron proffered Rolenya to him. “Take her. Fly her far away from this. Release her somewhere safe.”
“PERHAPS I WILL TAKE YOU AND LEAVE HER. THAT IS WHAT YOU DID TO ME.”
Baleron gnashed his teeth. Damn him!
A crack developed in the terrace to his right, and part of it fell away. Smoke from the Inferno drifted up, wreathing the platform. The soles of Baleron’s feet began to blister, as if he wore no boots at all.
“I will not go without her!” he said.
Ul Mrungona appraised the body of his father. “IT SHOULD HAVE BEEN ME,” he said, almost quietly. “I SHOULD HAVE HAD THE PLEASURE OF SLAYING HIM. FOR DENYING ME THAT ALONE, I SHALL HAVE TO PUNISH YOU.” Another chunk of Krogbur fell away, smashing into the terrace and taking some of the platform with it. “YET I DON’T HAVE TIME TO THINK ON IT HERE. I’LL HAVE TO T
AKE YOU WITH ME, WHERE I WILL PONDER YOUR PUNISHMENT AT MY LEISURE.”
Warily, Baleron let the dragon scoop Rolenya up in one huge claw and himself in another. She still lay limp and smoking, like a doll that had been steamed, her eyes closed and her clothes plastered to her skin.
Throgmar chuckled darkly as, with a mighty pump of his wings, he lifted off from the terrace and flew away from a disintegrating Krogbur. Baleron watched the Black Tower recede through a gap in the dragon’s claws. Within seconds of Throgmar departing it, the terrace broke and fell away, flaming.
Its stump grew small with distance until it was lost in the chaos of the night. Baleron watched Krogbur collapse, one chunk at a time. The fires of the Inferno had consumed nearly its whole length. The tower was a rod of flame stretching from the ground into the lightning-rent heavens.
On the endless black stairs, Gilgaroth moved. He moved only slightly. Not even the tail twitched.
But the eyes, the two burning portals to a vanishing Illistriv, opened, then narrowed in hate.
Summoning his last strength, Gilgaroth sent out his will to the brooding storm clouds that thronged the tower, and lightning struck down.
“Revenge,” said he.
A thousand bolts of lightning, the very last effort of Gilgaroth, split the skies. Their electric snake-tongues chased Throgmar as he fled the devastation. Air whistled through his claws as he picked up speed, trying to outrun his death.
In his one hand Baleron gripped a claw, steadying himself. This was the Wolf’s work, he knew. He could taste the stench of Gilgaroth’s hate on the heavily charged air.
Across the gap of Throgmar’s chest he could see the limp form of Rolenya encased in a mighty dragon-hand. She did not stir.
White whips struck all about the Worm, hounding him. Throgmar flew faster, frantic to be away.
Other dragons flew at him, breathing flame. Their fires scoured his armor, torching some patches of hair, but did no real damage. One blast came close to roasting Baleron but managed only to bring a flush to his skin. When the smaller Worms came close, the Leviathan’s own fires chased them, and his fires were more deadly. Some of the dragons fell smoking from the sky.