by J. C. Owens
He set the wood carefully and then, with trembling, cold-weakened fingers, he worked the flints, praying under his breath. The flame snapped forth, sputtered, then caught on the tinder, flaring fully to life.
Within moments, heat began to waft toward him, blessed, blessed heat. He held his hands before it, beginning to shiver, then turned back to where he had laid Shaynith-una down. Rummaging around the ransacked hall, he found a length of tattered cloth and brought it forward to lay before the fire.
It was more difficult to lift the knight this time, as though his resources were fading, his strength sliding away. He almost fell as he carried Shaynith-una forward and laid him on the cloth, tugging him even closer to the flames. Then he collapsed over his former master on hands and knees, head hanging, shivering violently.
His eyes closed and he sank down beside the knight’s battered body. Safe, for the moment, they were safe and free of the elements.
* * *
He woke to the steady heat of coals. Blinking, he startled up, rubbing at his eyes and cursing himself for sleeping. He had no idea what awaited them here, no clue of who or what had survived whatever attack had laid the fortress low.
A sound to his right had him spinning round, hand flying to the hilt of the elven sword in his belt.
Shaynith-una moaned again, soft and low, his head lolling back and forth.
Brenaith stared in disbelief, then cautiously extended a hand to touch the knight’s swollen face, his lips thinning at the terrible heat there. He had expected Shaynith-una to slip silently into death, never to regain consciousness. Had hoped he would never feel the pain of his tortured body.
Dry, cracked lips parted, another pained sound escaping between them.
Brenaith’s snatched his hand back, letting it come to rest upon the hilt of the sword.
Would it be kinder to kill him now, rather than let him regain consciousness and suffer further?
Memories of Tynan rose, of his illness and how he had clung to Brenaith’s hand throughout, deliriously ranting of the past, and freedom.
He had not been able to save him, had not been able to find a weapon to free him of the horror of their existence.
Now. Now he had the ability to take away the pain and suffering.
He shook his head harshly. This was not Tynan, not a chance to change the past. His stiff fingers slowly released the sword.
He would search the fortress first, find out if there were any demons left, perhaps one that could help Shaynith-una in ways that Brenaith could not.
A part of his mind whispered of his own cowardice in delaying the inevitable, but he ignored it. Rising to his feet, he pulled the shadow knight a little closer to the warmth of the flames, then left the hall, trying not to feel spooked at the echoing sound of his own footsteps in a place that had been so full of life but a short time ago.
What had happened here? Where had the demons gone, and more importantly, were there any left who could help?
He paused in the doorway, fingers wrapping round the hilt of the sword. Without Shaynith-una’s protection, it was doubtful any demon would show Brenaith respect. It would be up to him to make it through this, a warrior once more.
He drew the sword, testing its balance, smiling at the beauty and craftsmanship, so very much lighter than a human sword. He had read tales of the power of an elven blade, but had never expected to see one, much less possess one. He half expected the owner to come after it. Surely he was not pleased to lose it, especially after an act of kindness.
Brenaith drew a deep breath, fortifying himself. There was nothing he could do in that regard. It was with him now, and he would see it used well if need be. A small grin overtook him then, a hint of wonder in it. As far as he knew, he was the only one of his kind to have such a weapon in his possession. He felt better with it in his hand, found his old skills rising to the fore. It was like a homecoming of sorts, as though a tiny portion of his old self rose from the ashes of his slavery.
His passage through the fortress was cautious, the eeriness of the silence wearing upon his nerves.
Nobody, nothing.
Up the long winding stairs, level after level, until he finally approached Shaynith-una’s own rooms.
There was little damage in this part of the fortress, so that it was obvious that if any had survived, if any remained, they would be here. He opened the doors to Shaynith-una’s rooms with one hand, alert and wary, letting them swing outward and readying himself.
All was silent and still, and yet, his warrior instincts were screaming. There was someone here.
“Hello? This is Brenaith, Shaynith-una’s bloodservant. I need your help for him.”
It was a great chance he took, but somehow, he felt that whoever it was, they were demon born, not whoever had destroyed Lutan’s fortress.
A whisper of sound and they were on him, skills far beyond his human abilities. A blade lay at his throat, red eyes glaring into his, a guttural growl shaking the large, powerful black chest before him.
Yet in that moment, all he felt was a surge of relief.
Tar. Shaynith-una’s brother, the leader of the four brothers, who he now knew were actually older than Shaynith-una himself. They had been created for the sole purpose of protecting the newborn demigod. He could think of no better protectors for the injured shadow knight.
“Where is our brother?” The hiss by his ear made him swallow hard. Naban also had survived then.
“In the great hall. I carried him here, got a fire going to keep us alive. He is badly wounded.” He licked his lips, wondering if he should mention that there seemed little hope of Shaynith-una surviving, then bit back the words. With their temper on a knife-edge, now was not the time to test it.
Tar grunted, lowered the deadly blade and tucked it into its sheath, before taking Brenaith’s sword from him. He grasped Brenaith’s shoulder and spun him round, pushing him out of the room.
“Take us to him. No tricks.” Threat lay heavy in the low growl.
As Brenaith was forced forward, he could see Naban to his right, and he drew a sharp breath at the bandaged wounds that graced the demon’s body, one wing showing stitches from a horrific tear.
So even the Elite guards had not completely escaped from whatever had happened here.
Brenaith obeyed the harsh handling in silence. Not the time for protest or questions. At his lack of resistance, the painful grip eased somewhat, and they traveled in near silence, only the sound of Brenaith’s footsteps evident. The Elites, as always, were virtually noiseless in that eerie way that Shaynith-una also moved without sound. Elven blood, it seemed, ran true to form despite being muddied by demon blood.
His musings kept him from true fear, and it seemed no time at all before they reached the great hall. Upon spying their brother, both Elites left Brenaith, striding forward to kneel beside him, hands hovering in uncertainty as they began to realize the immensity of his wounds.
“By Lutan,” Naban whispered, fear in his eyes. His head snapped up and his piercing red eyes pinned Brenaith.
“What did this? Who did this atrocity?” Long, black fingers stroked over the hilt of his sword, fury contorting his face.
Brenaith stepped toward them. They deserved to know. “Elgeni took us, you know that much.”
Tar snarled, lips drawn back over needle-sharp teeth, red eyes flashing at the memory. Brenaith waited, unsure, until the demon got himself under control once more and nodded brusquely.
“The elves had prepared a ceremony, one many years in the creation, I think,” he continued. “They used Shaynith-una to trigger a spell of some sort, one that was designed to draw Lutan in, to imprison him. To do so, they drew runes upon Shaynith-una’s body, set them to create such a prison of pain that your god had no choice but to attempt to save him. I don’t understand how, but I believe that Lutan is now encased within a pendant, trapped.” He hesitated, waiting. “Elgeni freed us, sent us through a portal back here.”
Tar touched the sh
adow knight’s face with the tip of a forefinger, genuine worry and love etched upon his grim visage. “That explains what I feel lacking. Why he is not recovering as he should.” He looked up, met Brenaith’s questioning stare. “His demon essence, the part of his soul that contained Lutan, is gone. Torn free. He is not whole, only the elven parts seem active, and though elves can heal swiftly, they do not have the demon ability to move beyond injury, to work beyond pain. His soul, itself, is damaged.”
Brenaith frowned, stepping closer despite Naban’s warning growl, his form protectively crouched over his wounded brother.
“He is no longer demon? Does this mean his divinity is also—gone?” His mind spun with the implications, but understanding was no closer than it had ever been.
Tar looked bewildered, almost frightened as he looked back down at Shaynith-una. “I don’t know. I have never heard of such a thing happening before. I do not know how to heal this, how to help him.”
“Spensa and Pensir will be returning soon from gathering supplies. Spensa has a healing touch and an understanding of magic from our bearer. Perhaps he will know what to do.” Naban’s voice held the same bewilderment as Tar’s. He looked up at Brenaith, narrowing his eyes. “I do not sense the bond.”
“The elven priests broke it before…” Brenaith waved an encompassing hand at Shaynith-una.
“That will not help,” Tar grunted. “The bond would have been a stabilizing influence, something to keep him grounded in the here and now. I fear that without it, he will not find his way back to us.”
Naban did not take his intense stare from Brenaith. “If it is broken, how is it then, that you returned him here? Why did you not leave when you had the chance?”
Tar looked up at the question, his own head tilting as he waited for Brenaith to answer.
Their combined attention was difficult to endure with any equanimity. “I was going to leave him outside the gates for someone to find, thinking you would sense him, but…” He hesitated, looked away. He had little hope they would understand his motives. They seemed to understand emotions and motivations as little as Shaynith-una himself. He pressed on anyway. “I could not leave him to die alone, and once I realized that something had happened here, an attack of some sort, I could not be sure that anyone actually remained to aid him.”
Naban looked confused and turned his head to Tar, who grunted. “Human morality, conscience.”
Naban eased, nodding sagely as though he held some conceptual understanding of human nature.
Brenaith relaxed to some small degree. They did not seem overly aggressive toward him. Indeed, he had expected far worse with their anger up and protective instincts flaring. That they were actually speaking to him, asking him of events, he felt as though they saw him as more than an ornamental toy.
He prayed it lasted.
Naban eyed him, a certain curiosity evident. “Humans are so strange in their motivations. A warrior should see to his own, not worry on an enemy.” He titled his head in a motion eerily similar to Shaynith-una. “But do you truly consider him an enemy, I wonder.”
The question was far too close to Brenaith own, deeply buried musings.
CHAPTER TWELVE
The other two Elites returned by nightfall, bringing a wagon of supplies. They looked weary and as battered as the other brothers, Pensir with a tear in his wing worse than Naban’s, their own shock and concern for Shaynith-una just as evident. Their reaction to Brenaith’s presence was less certain. They eyed him with a cool reservation, but to his relief, did not treat him as a servant.
Spensa spent the night working tirelessly on healing Shaynith-una, spending much of his own reserves in the effort. Morning found the shadow knight little better, and certainly not conscious. Spensa, on the other hand, looked closer to death than his patient, sitting propped up against the wall, one hand lying limply upon Shaynith-una’s chest.
It was Pensir who gently pulled his hand away and eased him down so his head rested on Pensir’s lap. “Sleep, brother. You can do no good if you are drained yourself.”
Spensa made no sound, but closed his eyes and went utterly limp within seconds, clearly showing how close to collapse he had been.
Brenaith let out a harsh breath, eyes fixed upon Shaynith-una. He had hoped—a small hope—that the Elites could make a difference, could draw him back from the brink, but that seemed a diminishing wish.
“Touch him.” Naban’s growl seemed to echo in the large, empty hall. Brenaith snapped his head round to stare at him, realizing that Naban was speaking to him alone.
“The bond is broken,” he whispered wearily, “it will not help.”
Naban flared out one wing, the wounded one still tucked tight against his back. “It is worth a try, human.” The force behind the words indicated he would drag Brenaith over to Shaynith-una if he had to.
Brenaith glanced at Tar, who though less determined, nodded in acceptance.
This was sheer foolishness…
Brenaith sank down beside the shadow knight, reaching out to gently touch his face, feeling sorrow rise at the swollen skin, the burns that wept clear fluid down his cheeks like tears. Whatever this being had done to him, he could not find it in his heart to wish him this level of harm.
This close, the pale skin seemed to possess a translucency that made Brenaith shiver with foreboding. It was as though the knight were becoming something else, something that would soon cease to exist in physical body.
It felt like he was slipping through their fingers, and there was nothing they could do.
Brenaith heard a growl, and realized to his astonishment that it came from himself. Something within him, something deep and powerful, did not wish to see Shaynith-una go.
It made no sense, so he did as he always had, cast the questions to the side and force his mind into moving on, doing instead of thinking. It had ever been his escape from discomforting emotions.
He gently laid his hand upon Shaynith-una’s throat, the only part of his body not touched by the runes, and felt the feeble pulse throb against his fingertips. Leaning closer, he watched the faint rise and fall of the knight’s chest. So fragile, this link to life itself. His gaze rose back to the immobile, almost marble like features, pressing his fingers harder against the throbbing pulse, as though he could capture it, protect it.
“My lord. Shaynith-una.” It felt like freedom to say the knight’s true name. No matter what, he was not going to call him master ever again, even to bring him back. Something in Brenaith had risen and would not be beaten back down.
“My lord, come back to us. It is safe now.” His eyes widened with realization, even as the words left his lips. That was it. The shadow knight had hidden deep in his own consciousness in a desperate bid to escape the unendurable.
So deep, was he aware that he was no longer being tortured?
Brenaith’s touch turned gentle, stroking across the soft skin, hoping the small pleasure would convince Shaynith-una to move past the memory of pain and focus on that single, simple caress.
“Shaynith-una, you are free. You are not imprisoned, not with the elves at all. Come back.”
He waited, breath half held in anticipation, but nothing happened, not the slightest flicker of change seemed evident. He slumped back but stubbornly refused to remove his fingers.
The three awake Elites had leaned forward, hope in their expressions, but they too sagged back, despair rising higher.
Brenaith caught the merest flicker of movement, and his gaze snapped to Shaynith-una’s face. There. A small ripple beneath his eyelids, more than they had seen for hours, since he had stirred upon their initial arrival.
Brenaith caught his breath, forcing his weary body up to his knees so that he could lean closer, watching intently, half convinced he had imagined the movement at all. Fumbling, he gently caught one of the shadow knight’s hands in his, trying to avoid the bleeding wounds that encircled his wrists, raw and angry, evidence of his struggles.
“Shayni
th-una,” he whispered more fervently. “Come back. It is only your brothers and I here now. No danger, no magic. Just us.”
The eyes snapped open, startling him so that he almost fell back on his heels. Pale pink, they stared into his with fearful intensity, as though something lay coiled and waiting in protective fear.
Brenaith did not release the hand, only firmed his grip, letting his eyes speak for him, letting his thoughts become calm and true.
It was doubtful that Shaynith-una could read his thoughts as he had before the bond had been broken, but perhaps he could at least sense lies and truth.
The moment hung suspended, and Brenaith was vaguely aware of the Elites moving cautiously closer, their hope an almost physical entity.
Shaynith-una blinked, and the darkness faded, his expression becoming confused as he looked past Brenaith and saw three of his brothers crowding round. His gaze returned to Brenaith, and his fingers twitched within Brenaith’s grasp.
“You live,” he whispered faintly, something like relief flickering in his expression, a hint of wonder. His cracked lips slowly curved into a smile. “You live,” he repeated, and his fingers curled over Brenaith’s in the weakest of touches.
His eyes closed and he sank back beyond their reach, but this time, there was the faintest flush of color beneath the alabaster skin.
* * *
When morning came, they carried Shaynith-una up the flights of stairs on a shattered door, slow and precise, stepping carefully to avoid jostling him in the slightest. Within his rooms, they laid him upon his bed, layers of cloth set down to protect the sheets, the covers folded back to the end of the bed. Nothing must touch the wounds.
Pensir stoked the fire, and soon blessed warmth filled the space, chasing away the chill of abandonment from the suite.
Spensa slumped down upon one of the couches, and was soon back to sleep, his black skin almost gray with exhaustion. Pensir tended to the fire before coming to slide down beside him, cradling Spensa’s head upon his lap and stroking back his hair with almost unconscious affection.