by Tom Lloyd
'It is Dreams,' Isak confirmed, and held Eolis awkwardly out before him. The sword bore another Skull. Behind him three figures were slowly approaching. Legana and the witch of Llehden flanked him, one on either side. Their part in this was played. Mihn stood behind, in his master's shadow. They watched in silence, bearing witness to the consequences of their actions.
'This one is Ruling, first among the Crystal Skulls,' Isak said.
He stabbed the sword down into the ground and unleashed the power of the Skull. White cracks appeared in the ground, racing through the trampled grass towards the mage's platform.
Styrax immediately raised his defences and a cocoon of energy burst into life all around him before the shining cracks could reach him – but the shimmering power raced around the platform, well clear of the Menin lord.
Once again the tortured air roiled under the magical assault. Isak felt the scars on his skin come alive with pain, but still he continued, guiding the force through the Skull and into the sword.
Now, for the first time, he raised his voice, crying out, 'Obey me – come forth!'
Colours burst all around and lightning lashed the ground between them, ripping the air apart to reveal a swirling column of darkness behind.
'Come!'
The darkness writhed, coils of energy spreading to encircle the platform. Jagged lightning forked across the sky, again and again, striking all around the perimeter of the earthen platform. The Ralebrat reeled and cowered, some dying even as they supplicated themselves.
Isak pulled Eolis from the ground and levelled it towards the darkness, and the column wrenched around so violently the air itself ignited, burning white-hot. Death stepped out of the dark and raised His golden sceptre and all around the platform the Gods of the Upper Circle of the Pantheon stepped forward, obeying Isak's call.
The Skull of Ruling was tied to Death, the Chief of the Gods, and it was the most powerful, and the most perilous to use. Aryn Bwr had seen that, and known that possession conferred the strength of rule, but Death's place was at the very centre of the Land, and that was too much for even a king to bear long.
At the sight of the Gods who'd abandoned them in punishment millennia ago, the Ralebrat attacked once more, throwing themselves with abandon at the Lord of the Menin. His protective cocoon burst blindingly as they destroyed themselves upon it, but still they did not stop.
'Peerless you were made, and unmatched you will die!' Isak shouted over the wind that churned around them.
The Gods of the Upper Circle knelt, arms outstretched in the torrent of magic that was whirling, faster and faster, around the platform, all focused on Lord Styrax – save for Nartis, whose blank, midnight-blue face watched Isak.
'But death is not the only defeat. You taught me that.'
An incantation tolled through the fractured air, the sonorous voices of Gods drawing such a torrent of magic down from the sky that the very clouds above were dragged down.
Styrax didn't wait to hear more, but started to fight his way towards the platform's edge, but the Ralebrat continued to bar his way. They didn't make any attempt to fight their preternaturally swift opponent, just threw their stone bodies in his path to slow him as the energies surrounding the Gods and Isak struck at everything within the circle, battering elementals and mortal alike. The Ralebrat were shattered, but the white-eye was only driven back a step or two as the Crystal Skulls on his armour pierced the blistering hurricane of magic, flaring as bright as the sun.
'They gave you power,' Isak cried, feeling the sparks of energy burst from his white eyes and race across his skin. 'In their fear they gave you more power than any mortal should possess, and with it came pride, and arrogance: an understanding that nothing was beyond your skills. That no being – mortal or God – was your better.'
Isak took hold of Eolis in both hands, letting the blade cut deep into one palm. The blood seemed to boil on its surface and some droplets were scattered by the wind, but there was enough of the viscous liquid to run the length of its edge.
His voice dropped to a whisper, but it resonated around the moor like the heartbeat of the Land itself. It shuddered through earth, flesh and God alike. Somewhere far away he heard Mihn cry out.
'And so I curse you,' Isak gasped, both with the pain running through his body and the memories of Styrax's vengeance.
Up above, the Menin's wyvern was a dark shape in the sky, compelled by its master's call despite the lighting. Styrax reached out with his sword and turned in a full circle, casting a burning trail of light that drove even the Gods back, but he could not stop their chant as Isak continued, 'They made you to be untouched by God or mortal. As I cannot kill you, so I curse you, not with death but life,' he choked. Limbs shaking and bile rising in his throat, he deflected the vast raw power Styrax was throwing in all directions.
The wyvern dropped closer, close enough for the Menin to reach its claws, but it was too late and they both felt it.
'I curse you – with the pain of ten thousand days in the Dark Place, with the life's blood of a mage's sacrifice, with Death's authority held in my hands.'
He felt it then, the cold fingers in his mind, and on Styrax's face he saw the icy claws reached even deeper in.
'I curse you, and I strike your name from history,' Isak howled in agony and grief, 'stripped of arrogance and pride, empty of the self you once knew, gutted of all you are. I take your name and all you have won by the strength of your hand. I curse you for eternity, to find only darkness where once you knew your own face.'
He could not speak any longer as the chill touch of the curse entered his mind, questing through the brutalised corners of his head for a name and ripping it away forever. Isak felt the words fade like a whisper on the wind, a curl of smoke whose shape hung on the breeze and was then gone – vanished.
The man on the platform screamed, his hands clasped to his head, his fingers digging so deeply in that blood welled up. Skull and sword discarded, he fell to his knees as the claws tore into his brain. The Skulls fused to his cuirass dropped from the armour, then the first of the black whorled plates slipped off his body and clattered to the ground. The man was oblivious; convulsing, he collapsed to the floor.
Isak heard shouts from all around as the curse spread, reaching out through friend and enemy alike to steal a name from all of them before rippling further out and across the Land. He felt the power of the Gods, fed by the Skulls in their midst, waxing strong, even as the effort drained them.
The man on the platform writhed and shrieked as the claws reached the last recesses of his soul, shredding memories and excising even the smallest remnants of the man he had once been. He tried to fight, beating at his head and ripping his clothes, but to no avail. The curse bit deep, as he scratched bloody shreds of cloth from his body. Somehow he fought his way upright, muscles straining against the weight of the Land, but all the while he was howling at what was being taken from him.
And then it was over. The gale subsided, the magic of the Gods dissipated, and the man fell, exhausted, mewling, to his knees. Isak took a hesitant step forward, barely able to stay upright himself.
'And I dub you the Ragged Man,' he whispered, blood trickling from his nose and mouth as he spoke.
He reached Death and the cowled figure turned to face him. The air smelled of age and fatigue, of a temple drained of its majesty and power.
'It is done,' Death intoned. He made a dismissive gesture at the Ragged Man, and a pair of Ralebrat grasped the whimpering figure by each arm and dragged him into the ground, moving through the earth as easily as a bird ducking below the surface of a lake.
'They will take him far from here.'
'There is a cottage by a lake,' Isak said hoarsely. 'There is a place for him there.'
Death inclined His head. The God's presence was less awe-inspiring now – the curse had required so much power that the Upper Circle were winking out of existence, back to their distant palace. Only Karkarn, Nartis and Death remained.
<
br /> 'You know what you have done,' Nartis called.
Isak felt a great tremor of pain run through his body as he nodded, and in the next moment Mihn was there, slipping underneath him and taking some of Isak's great weight on his shoulders.
'We have weakened you,' the witch of Llehden stated, advancing just past Isak as he wilted under the strain.
'We have made a choice,' Legana added, resting heavily on her staff. The Gods-touched woman faced Death without flinching, her emerald eyes shining through the unnatural gloom. 'A choice that was ours to make.'
'You have weakened us,' Death said slowly, looking from one to the other. 'For what is to come, the Gods will not be able to intervene.'
'Good,' said Legana firmly. 'It is our fate as much as yours. The choice should be ours this time.'
'It is our time,' Isak agreed wearily. 'This was the only way, and now – Now the Land will be remade.'
'By whom?'
The scarred white-eye tried to smile, but it hurt too much. He started to turn away, but caught sight of one half of Cetarn's charred corpse, and his gaze lingered there.
It was the witch who answered, speaking for them all. 'By those of us willing to sacrifice everything.'
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