by Bill Ricardi
There was an immediate reaction from the tribe. The collective booing and jeering drown out whatever the Chief said next. His face became confused, then enraged. Families started to come out of their tents. A number of bashers shook their fists or weapons at the Chief, while the rest started to distance themselves from him. The protests became even louder when an army of undead started to pour through the northwest passage, slowly marching out of the thick mist. These deformed orcs, skin made of clay and tribal accoutrements tattered and rusty, started to take up position around the Necromancer. Leading the phalanx of the dead was none other than a half-ogre golem with a hole where its heart should have been. The outcry was deafening.
“Challenge real, Chief must fight!”
“Dese not our people, dis is mockery.”
“You break ritual, dishonor tribe!”
When the noise had died down some, Shaman gave his reply:
“You bring army of dead. Kenvunk tell me to bring army of living! He call on his brothers and sisters. He bring champions from four winds. Dey protect tribe from you. Holy warrior of Aro-Remset, Kenvunk’s battle brother. Priestess of Melflavin, he who make swamps grow. Blessed of Omi-Suteth, once mate of Kenvunk, who teach smart orc to fight. Dese gods see what you done. Dey not let you make tribe into servants of death. Dey fight for us, for freedom of tribe’s soul!”
From the shelter of the family tents emerged Toby, Tara, and Hemitath. The murmur that went through the crowd was one of both shock and reverence. Shaman had invoked the gods, and they had answered. At the same time he displayed his ability to make powerful alliances for his people. I didn’t have any doubts now. The tribe wouldn’t accept anything less than a challenge for leadership.
But the Chief had other plans. He turned to the clerics of Harrington and simply said, “Kill ‘em all.”
Then there was chaos.
Shaman took advantage of the Chief’s distraction to summon Kenvunk’s divine power in the form of Tangling Plants. The prayer caused thick roots and vines to surge up out of the ground and grab a hold of the tribal leader. He didn’t have enough time to draw that wicked sword, one arm already tightly bound before the Chief managed to react. The brute cursed, having to instead draw his belt knife and hack at the plants one handed. As quickly as he chopped, more vines sprouted from the ground in an attempt to restrain him.
Toby rushed over to the left flank, where the undead had started to shuffle forward. Tara and Hemitath followed in his hoofsteps. Reluctantly, the apprentice mages scrambled out of one of the family tents to join them. Facing the Necromancer, the sheep-rustling golem, four clerics of Harrington, and dozens of skeletons and zombies, I didn’t rate my friends’ chances as very good. But the Jeywafa clan stood up. Some of the bashers who were sympathetic to Shaman’s cause lined up to Toby’s left. Traders and craftsmen, mothers and fathers, the heart and soul of the tribe lined up to Tara’s right, wielding anything they could get their hands on. They would stand for the living.
Even the bashers who had been the most loyal to the Chief decided against joining forces with the army of the dead. Instead they formed a defensive circle near Shaman’s old tent. They looked ready to stand against anyone, living or undead, who approached them with bad intentions.
On the right flank, Grenth had decided not to wait for the outcome of the challenge. He strode towards Ames, almost casually. That wicked spiked club rested on the lanky orc’s shoulder. He said, “Here kitty kitty.” Ames’ only reply was a rolling lunge that nearly gutted the chief’s right hand man before the fight had even started. But Grenth managed to leap back just in time. With a newfound respect for his opponent, the assassin readied his club and started to circle the were-cat slowly.
I had summoned an Invisible Shield, doing my best to ignore the curse’s drain for the moment. Benno pointed at the center of the fray.
The lad said, “Look. Almost nothing in middle, we can go.”
I sighed. “The last time I charged right up the middle, my body was completely obliterated.”
The apprentice looked at me like I had gone insane.
I said, “Nevermind. Stay close.”
I reached into my belt pouch as we moved, rough fingers wrapping around a burnt stick. As a couple of more adventurous zombies shambled towards the middle of the battlefield, I murmured the incantation to Flaming Sword. I chose a simple fiery longsword and moved to intercept the first of the undead, keeping myself between Benno and the rest of the fray.
Shaman had sent Lizzy to harass one of the evil clerics, who were all chanting and pointing at the basher line on the left flank. Though the flying lizard managed to disrupt one with a rake of claws across the cheek, the other three opened up painful whip marks on one of the loyal orc warriors, and killed another outright when the divine retribution opened his throat. Shaman had his own hands full however. The Chief had broken free of the entangling plants and was able to draw his sawtoothed sword. My friend shook his ceremonial rattle and slowly clenched the fist of his free hand, chanting loudly all the while. After a moment, Shaman’s last big trick crawled out from between two of the eastern tents: A rather large crocodile. The reptile, mesmerized by Kenvunk’s Call to Battle, stopped the advancing Chief in his tracks. Big orc and big lizard eyed each other warily as Shaman backed up a bit further.
Toby was exactly where he loved to be: In the thick of things. The Axe of McGrondle swept through two of the makeshift zombies at a time, smashing rusted shields and fracturing weathered swords with each two handed swing. Tara had used her favorite trick, and her icy Divine Warhammer was hard at work, helping her to stem the tide. The two minotaurs were an inspiration. Bashers and civilians alike pressed into the wedge that they were creating, pushing the temporary advantage.
Hemitath waited until the minotaurs had baited out the Necromancer’s first spell. As soon as the undead elf started to cast, the living elf did as well. It was a Counterspell, a gambit that allowed the archmage to undo the arcane magic of another, assuming it wasn’t too powerful. In this case, Hemitath was correct. Whatever the Necromancer had tried to cast fizzled and died upon the wind. The former Headmaster traded a spell for a spell, and frustrated her opponent’s efforts.
Ames had fought Grenth to a standstill. The orc assassin’s club kept the were-cat at a distance, but the lightning quick ripostes that Ames could deliver meant that committing to a solid swing was a dangerous proposition. I suspected that the feline had poisoned their blade… but it was equally likely that the assassin had poisoned his alligator tooth as well. First blood could conceivably be last blood in this conflict.
My flaming sword sliced through the weapon arm of the first clay zombie that Benno and I encountered. It pressed its body against my Invisible Shield, as if trying to mob me. It would have been a good tactic if the undead creature wasn’t alone on the fringe of the enemy forces. In this case the mindless aggression cost it a leg. We stepped over the maimed zombie and continued our advance towards the Voodoo Engine. As another clay-covered skeleton veered towards us, I heard Benno chanting. Then the creature shot off into the distance, victim to the lad’s Force Bolt.
Benno wasn’t the only apprentice unleashing. In a tactic that was clearly rehearsed, Hemitath’s orcish trainees took turns casting Magic Missiles at the Necromancer. The first would cast their spell to make the powerful undead wizard lose his concentration, and the next would pause for a few seconds before employing the same tactic. It bought the archmage time to weave the powerful and yet complicated Forked Lightning. Just as our lines were starting to falter, a surge of chaotic fractal energy swept through the press of undead bodies. Dozens of the creatures seemed to explode or incinerate from within, their soft clay coating hardening and bursting. Toby and Tara used the favor of their gods to turn the undead closest to them. The wave of Aro-Remset’s and Melflavin’s combined divine power caused the mass of the zombies to lose their tenuous connection to this plane of existence. They crumbled, as in if they had never been there at
all. A hole opened up in the enemy ranks, one that took a while for the shambling army to refill.
The much needed respite meant that the wounded could be pulled from the field of battle, and also allowed a volley of stones and debris to be launched at the Duke’s clerics, who had started to chant again. This time their curses were never fully voiced. One of them fell, clutching his split scalp. The others either doubled over in pain or were forced to take cover behind the next wave of undead. This time the half-ogre golem stepped forward as well, no longer content with just commanding the shambling hordes. The former sheep rustler, wielding twin tomahawks, trudged towards Toby with intent.
Grenth had found his range. By swinging his wicked club in short arcs with his arm fully extended, the assassin didn’t give Ames enough time to dart in. The were-cat’s much shorter and lighter sword could only be used to parry, and every time the feline attempted to stop or slow one of those clubbing attacks, their arm got a little more numb. Ames was forced to dodge and roll, expending far more energy than the wiry orc. If this continued, mistakes would be made.
The cleric with the head wound had managed to crawl all the way to the Voodoo Engine, perhaps hoping to get aid directly from the conduit that the artifact had opened to Harrington. I put him out of his misery, the void where his head once was neatly cauterised by the longsword’s magical flames. My arcane blade and shield dissipated as I reached out to touch the Voodoo Engine. I fell into a crouch so that the artifact gave me cover. “Okay, I’m ready.”
Benno trotted over and put one of his small hands on my shoulder, and the other on the Voodoo Engine. Nothing seemed to happen.
The undead army had resurged, and several of them were now looking directly at us. “Umm. Benno, hurry.”
“Just a second.”
Several of the clay coated undead warriors shambled towards us. I asked, “Our bodies come with us right?”
Benno said, “I think so.”
My eyes must have been bulging as I stared at the young orc. “What do you mean you think s-”
Then Panos disappeared.
It was replaced by a kind of darkness and calm that I had never experienced. It wasn’t like the inside of a Private Sanctum spell, since the potential for some kind of vision was still there. The closest I had ever come to feeling like this was laying on the deck of Leeson’s ship, on a cloudy night. But even then there was that gentle rocking sensation. Here, in the Astral Plane, there was no physical sensation at all. Instead, everything was an impression in my mind. I felt the presence of Benno’s mind behind me, without having to look. Ahead of me and to my right, I knew that the manifestation of the Voodoo Engine was waiting. And something else.
As I turned, I knew I was in the presence of Duke Harrington. Or should I say, the Demon General Harrington. But he was not manifest in red skin with flames dancing all around him. No, his aura was superimposed over that of the Voodoo Engine itself. He possessed it, entwined with it. The artifact was both his sanctuary and his gateway to Panos.
At the same time, we could ‘see’ what the Duke and the Engine ‘saw’. They had a 360 degree perception of the physical world surrounding the Voodoo Engine. Because Benno and I had used the artifact as our gateway’s link to the Astral Plane, the ghostly images of reality were available to us as well. However, the mind can only handle so much. We couldn’t see through our Astral eyes at the same time as we shared the sight that was being provided by the Voodoo Engine. Instead we saw this information as a panoramic series of window panes hovering above the artifact itself.
It was through these windows looking onto reality that we saw the Chief rapidly picking apart Shaman’s summoned champion, having suffered only minor wounds himself. My old friend and mentor had performed some kind of divine incantation that allowed him to throw powerful gusts of wind at the Chief, but the strong orc leader was able to keep his feet throughout the buffeting assault.
Another window showed Toby fully engaged with the half-ogre golem, matching strength for strength, but neither making headway. Axes clashed violently, armor of both metal and clay was tested. Tara’s icy spiritual warhammer had disappeared, and she was using holy water to try to push back the new onslaught of undead. Hemitath and the apprentices had turned, as more undead had marched around to the broad southern entrance to the village and threatened to crush the rebellious forces between two fronts. Dutch had constricted a couple of the fiends and had given the archmage early warning, but was unable to stop so many from getting past. This left the remaining clerics and the Necromancer free to re-raise many of the fallen undead as skeletons. They were simpler and less durable than the clay zombies, but they represented additional forces that our side simply couldn’t handle.
In another pane, my mate had found a new tactic. The were-cat was using the lines and poles of the nearby family tents as additional cover, forcing Grenth to avoid them or smash through them. The assassin was irritated by his inability to land a clean blow on the nimble and quick-thinking rogue. It looked like Ames was gathering energy for a resurgence.
I knew that I had to try to end this quickly. Taking out fur and rod, I murmured the incantation and directed my Lightning Bolt at the Voodoo Engine. It seemed to impact with a thin skin of energy surrounding the device, which surged, but held.
“I don’t think you have what it takes, Sorch Stonebender. Maybe you should have sent the elven bitch with her stealth magic. She could have snuck around until I died of boredom.”
Harrington’s voice was certainly annoying, but that wasn’t what I was focusing on right now. I had felt no drain at all. The Lightning Bolt spell slipped from my mind, as normal, but in the Astral Plane Glogur’s curse had no hold. I was limited only by my skills.
“Benno. Give it everything you have.”
Benno rained Magic Missiles in against the Voodoo Engine while I dug in my pouch for beetle guts. The viewing pane focused on Shaman showed the Chief beheading the giant reptile, sawing through tough flesh and thick spine with unnerving ease. He fought against the druidic winds that attempted to push him back, creeping inexorably closer to Shaman with each heavy step.
As my Acid Bolts washed over the flickering magical barrier protecting the artifact, a new window came into focus. The resistance was drawing into a tighter circle, starting to be pressured from all sides. Tribesmen and women fell under the relentless assault of the dead. The apprentices were out of spells, simply surrounding Hemitath now. They did their best to keep the press of bodies off of the archmage, give her a chance to cast her next spell. But the elf was down to the most basic of spells, sending Fans of Flame into the undead army, buying what time she could. Tara had gone completely defensive, making as much space for Toby as possible. The male minotaur was winning the battle of the axes with the half-ogre, having removed the golem’s left arm entirely, leaving the brutal creature with a single tomahawk. But the zombie and skeleton mob, bolstered by the incantations of the evil priests, threatened to overwhelm the bashers on the left flank.
Benno stepped closer to cast his last spell, his Fan of Frost crackling against the force field that the Voodoo Engine stubbornly maintained. As I prepared my last spell, I saw the Necromancer being lifted by his minions. The undead elf was casting a long, complicated spell, the likes of which I’d never seen before.
Demon general Harrington’s voice floated through the Astral medium, almost lyrically. “After the boy tires, this all ends, Sorch. Eventually his mind will need to rest and you’ll return to Panos. And after a few months of torture, the two of you will be sacrificed upon my altar.”
I launched my final Force Bolt against the Voodoo Engine, hoping to shatter the field of energy protecting it. The force field dimmed, but didn’t dissipate. Benno and I were out of magic. I could only watch in apprehension as the window following Ames showed the feline’s final gambit. Grenth had stepped in to avoid one of the ropes that held up a nearby tent. Too close. The were-cat lunged with their short sword just as the orcish assassin’s c
lub whistled in. The poison on Ames’ blade caused paralysis, so the slightest nick to Grenth’s left ventricle was enough to stop his heart forever. But not in time to halt the momentum of the counterstrike. Wood fractured the left side of the were-cat’s rib cage. The spike punctured the feline’s lung, and the poison that Grenth used was designed to cause agony. Ames’ screaming was silent.
Harrington wasn’t silent. “And so it begins. By the way: Your old friend Salt is nearly at the elvish border. His elementals will kill countless treehuggers, clearing the way for the ‘orcish’ army to invade. It will be a lovely war.”
My mind seemed to fracture. Time moved more slowly for me, as I searched for some way to inflict pain. Pain upon the Duke for bringing his misery back to me and my friends. Pain upon the Voodoo Engine for the countless number of lives that it ruined. Magic was the tool that brought pain in this place, not martial ability. We were out of magic. But I still had to inflict agony upon this amalgamation of evil.
Part of my eerily calm brain recalled the words of Assistant Donnelly: ‘Fireballs, lightning bolts. Positive or negative energy. Stuff from certain pocket dimensions.’
Pocket dimensions.
I strode towards the Voodoo Engine with purpose. I activated my Gloves of Secrecy, recalling the object that I had stored just before Benno and Lizzy came out of their hiding spot.
“No. That’s not fair!”
I ignored the suddenly distressed voice of Harrington and raised Rock above my head. The first blow shattered the weakened force field, confirming that Rock’s detour to the pocket dimension had made it ‘real’ in the Astral Plane. The second blow elicited a terrible double-scream, the first demonic and the second mechanical.
I continued to smash the Voodoo Engine even as the viewing window showed Toby taking out the golem’s leg at the knee. The resurrected half ogre lay useless on the battlefield. I didn’t allow hope to enter my heart when Ames had the presence of mind to invoke the Ring of Leaping and land at Toby’s feet. My arm rose and fell once again when the Necromancer finished his incantation, and the Disintegration Ray carved through the undead forces too slow to get out of the way, intent on reaching my friends. Tara stepped between Toby and the path of the destructive beam, shield raised. The sustained wave of devastation burned away the cleric’s armor and shattered her shield. I pummeled the Engine again, hearing more parts snap and break free. In the pocket of safety that Tara had created, Toby crouched and laid hands on Ames, bathing that dire wound with Aro-Remset’s holy glow. I looked on in horror as Tara’s cudgel melted away, as did her horns. Finally the onslaught stopped. The minotaur priestess was scorched, half naked, weaponless and armorless, hornless, nearly furless… but alive, with the holy symbol of Melflavin still glowing brightly around her neck.