Exile's Gamble_The Chronicles of Shadow_Book II

by Lee Dunning

  Rage ignited Raven’s souls. Not since Linden tumbled lifeless at her feet had such blinding hate threaten to tear her apart. First Queen shrieked, echoing the fury singing in Raven’s veins. Raven's will inflamed the gryphon. As one, they hurtled down, wings screaming, blade humming in Raven’s grip. She dropped her arm low and wide. Her teacher’s voice tickled at her memory: Broken Wing.

  Raven’s vision narrowed. The devil’s maw spread. It tilted its many-chinned head back in anticipation. An infernal glow eminated from its gullet as if it opened into the Abyss itself.

  It gave a careless flip of its hand, sending Lady Culna’mo in a lazy tumble toward its mouth and the eternal hell waiting within. Its piggy eyes squeezed shut in anticipation. Raven screamed vengeance in two voices.

  A burst of blood and golden light cracked open the skies.

  K’hul reached up in wonder as a mote of pure sun drifted like a snowflake to settle onto his fingertip. It melted away leaving behind a flush of strength and vitality he never expected to feel again. What just happened?

  Across the field, murmurs of awe flowed to his ears. He shifted, for the first time comprehending that he lay stretched out across the ground. Something tickled his jaw. He turned his head and gaped at the vibrant green blades of grass pushing up through the blackened waste. More glowing specks settled into the earth nearby. A curling tendril stretched toward the sky. At its tip a bud swelled and burst open in a swaying glory of yellow. A second later, a brilliant scarlet butterfly settled upon it.

  K’hul pushed himself to a seated position. Everywhere his gaze settled life sprang from the fire and blood-ravaged land. He stared up where the remains of his elemental sprawled. Grass, flowers, and even a sprinkling of tiny saplings covered it. More vegetation thrust up through the cracks in the stone.

  Stunned elves stirred among the green. Slowly they gained their feet, checking the rents in their armor and prodding smooth skin where mortal wounds had gaped. Wounds so grievous even regeneration couldn’t explain their absence. Clouds of the jewel-colored butterflies swept through the miraculously healed soldiers.

  Of the two mountainous devils, no sign remained.

  K’hul almost forgot to retrieve his sword and shield when he stood. He’d never believed in an afterlife but his mind couldn’t grasp the enormity of the marvels surrounding him. He stepped through the throng of armored souls and wondered anew as a vision greeted him.

  A great black gryphon had come to land next to Lady Earthfire knelt hugging her daughter. With a start, K’hul noted the old warrior clasped Lady Culna’mo with two perfect arms. How was that possible? How was any of it possible? K’hul was certain he’d seen the devil swallow Lady Culna’mo whole.

  Lady Earthfire released her daughter with one arm and reached up to grasp the hand of another. Raven?

  K’hul jumped as nearly two dozen more crow-black gryphons descended upon the field. Wood Elves straddled each eagle lion. One of the beasts landed next to him with a predatory thump of claws. Kela grinned at K’hul from the back of the creature. She hopped down, and swaggered up to him. “How do you like that, Warlord?” she said. “Your people destroyed this land with your fire and lightning, and one Shadow Elf turned all that death into new life.”

  “All that fire and lightning saved your bloody forest,” K’hul said, his wonder draining away as if Kela had thrown a bucket of ice melt on him. His flinty eyes switched back to Raven. Her sword dangled from one hand, spirals of gold twisting along its blade. “She cast magic.”

  Kela sniffed. “Don’t be an ass. She bonded with the sword the smith made for her.”

  K’hul waggled his own sword at Kela. “My sword holds magic, too and it can’t resurrect dead earth, or regrow arms.”

  The Wood Elf shrugged. “Maybe she made Raven a better sword.” When K’hul snarled at her, Kela snorted in derision. “Or maybe she’s ten times the elf you are, Warlord.”

  K’hul tried to retort but a surge of sound drowned out his words. Every elf on the field, and those gathered on the elemental turned hill, cheered. Raven, flanked by Lady Earthfire and a hale Lady Culna’mo, raised her glowing sword skyward. “To Castle Teres!” Her midnight-heavy voice carried across the field, crashing over the upraised voices like a wave.

  All around the verdant plains, the cerulean glow of portals popped open. What had been K’hul’s army mere minutes ago, marched toward the portals as if he’d ceased to exist. He didn’t care what Kela claimed. No amount of enchantment woven into the steel of a sword could resurrect a land turned to waste by fire and demon blood. W’rath—the scheming fuck—knew all along that Raven was some half-breed, Umbral-worshipping witch. He’d used his wiles to hide her nature.

  I know the truth now. K’hul hefted his sword and shield, and moved in with the rest of his people to pass through the portals. He would rid First Home of the Shadow Elf taint. But first, Kiara’s life depended on his ability to fell demons. He’d deal with Lord W’rath and Lady Raven later.

  The flames died down as the last of the demon dissolved into a foul-smelling memory. A small, twirling elemental breezed through the room, clearing the choking smoke. Renoir pulled free of Tyan and staggered toward the smoking, blackened remains of the furniture those trapped in the throne room had pushed into a pitiful barricade.

  He stopped. A large, crusted globe covered most of the back room. Brother and Sister, what horror is this?

  Like an egg preparing to hatch, a crack snaked down the blackened shell of the sphere. The elves retreated, raising their shields to form a wall of magic steel. Two casters shouted out a flurry of twisting words, Renoir didn’t recognize. The air sizzled and popped as a wall of energy rose between the defenders and the massive orb.

  More cracks appeared across its surface and light leaked out as if an inner fire pressed out from within. A deafening woomp made Renoir’s ears pop. An instant later, the fractured shell spewed outward in a thousand, thousand shards, burning away as it propelled into the magical shielding.

  As one, the elves lowered their shields, faces identical in their shock. Renoir joined them in their gaping. A choking sob tried to work its way up his throat.

  Before them floated a bubble, shimmering and clear. Within it dozens of frightened but living faces peered out. Above them, arms spread, long ponytail waving as if caught in a breeze, Lord W’rath hovered. He cracked one eye open and then the other when he saw the crowd before him. He nodded his head at Renoir. “I had no idea which of these … beings you called family, priest, so I was forced to save them all. I’d call us even except my life is easily worth a hundred humans.” He paused and lowered his arms, making show of counting the survivors. He sighed. “It appears I must save another fifty-three of you uncouth creatures.”

  With a twitch of his shoulders, the Shadow Elf let the bubble drop. The rescued humans and elves spilled out onto the floor. Tarako and the girls extricated themselves from the mass and rushed past the Shadow Elf to throw themselves on Renoir. The priest hugged each of them fiercely before pulling back to check on their wounds. Bruises and scrapes mostly. Some burns.

  In one hand, Tarako still clutched what looked like a heavy chair leg. She raised her chin, defiant, when she noticed his attention on the impromptu weapon. “No words in a book or gospel by men will keep me from protecting my daughters.”

  Renoir backtracked to the place where he’d dropped the sword and retrieved it. He brought it to Tarako and gently pulled the chair leg from her, replacing it with the pommel of the sword. Her eyebrows raised. “New doctrine?”

  “If I have any say, yes,” he said. “If not, then we’ll start over—make our own doctrines.”

  Lord W’rath gave an amused huff. “Perhaps there’s hope for your folk after all.”

  W’rath stepped across the devastation left by the desperate battle. The conflagration left a carpet of horror across the floor. Amid the shattered and blackened furniture, corpses curled like fetuses of the damned. Too many skulls peered from the rubb
le with the oversized eye sockets of elves.

  He cast another glance at the priest and his family. A third daughter had joined the reunion. W’rath did not think they’d witness too many such happy scenes this day. He turned from the Renoirs, the memory of another youngster forcing his eyes to search the tumble of bodies.

  An older man W’rath recognized teetered out of the pile of survivors. When he spied the Shadow Elf scrutinizing him he tried to toddle off in a different direction. W’rath teleported in front of him. “Where is the girl in the pink dress?”

  “Get away from me!” the old man shouted, stumbling back, trying to put distance between himself and the elf. “You brought this hell upon us!”

  W’rath considered arguing but decided he cared little what the human thought. It didn’t help the Shadow Elf blamed himself for underestimating the enemy. Others might argue he couldn’t have anticipated a fellow elf would betray them but he didn’t accept that as an excuse. I should have anticipated such a possibility.

  W’rath spun away from the old man and his accusations, and caught sight of a flash of torn lace, singed but still familiar. A pile of the dead hid any other signs of the tiny girl’s presence. He shifted the bodies with his will. Brittle limbs snapped into pieces. Faces shriveled into mummified masks grimaced as if W’rath’s intrusion pained them beyond what they’d already suffered. Two adult humans. The child’s parents.

  “My son,” the old man said, shuffling past. He fell to his knees next to the larger corpse.

  W’rath ignored the old man’s mutterings, and sent his senses questing into the ash. Beneath the dead he discovered something still pliable and warm. He concentrated and set a bubble around the figure and then drew the entire capsule free of the debris. The girl lolled within the sphere, face twisted into the visage of one who’d peeked into the deepness of the Abyss and found their mind unfit for the horrors found there. Remarkably, her chest still rose with breath.

  “Your granddaughter still lives,” W’rath said to the grieving man.

  The human gave the girl only the briefest of glances. “She’s just a child of no worth. She takes and takes, and gives nothing in return.”

  W’rath raised an eyebrow and dismissed the bubble, allowing the limp child to fall into his arms. “Fortunately, her parents thought differently.” He adjusted the girl so she nestled in the crook of one arm. He frowned at the child’s grandfather. “I’d rid the world of you but it occurs to me I might prefer you live a long life. May you wither slowly and know nothing but loss.”

  The man’s rheumy eyes bugged. He raised his hands as if fending off a blow. “Have I not suffered enough? Must you also lay one of your vile fae curses upon me?”

  That I could live up to your primitive superstitions. A drop of W’rath’s usual mischievous cheer returned. He turned away from the old man and his newfound horror. “Do enjoy,” he called over his shoulder. “I doubt we’ll meet again.”

  Lady Swiftbrook crackled with her seething anger. The little squirrel had only just started to regain his color when he disappeared right in front of her.

  A half-broken demon tried to crawl past her foot. She sent lightning down her sword to make it twitch in a mad dance. She imagined it was W’rath but then the memory of him lying cold and grey in the hall drained the satisfaction from her fantasy. Her ire fizzled.

  The throne room spread in front of her, its floor a chaotic mess of bodies, both living and dead. She crunched across the neck of another demon and finally spied W’rath. He handed something over to a tall woman standing next to Chalice Renoir. The woman frowned and shook her head at the bundle. Lady Swiftbrook swallowed hard, at last recognizing the torn and dirty pink dress. Ancestors, this is a disaster. We’ve brought nothing but death to these poor people.

  W’rath’s shoulders drooped. “Do what you can, healer,” he said and made his way to Lady Swiftbrook.

  “You’re overextending yourself,” she said. It wasn’t what she wanted to say but somehow her desire to offer W’rath comfort didn’t strike her as a welcome gesture. “Your arrogance almost got you killed once already. You had no business teleporting in here without any sort of assistance.”

  “No, stupidity almost got me killed,” W’rath replied, voice heavy. “I embraced my arrogance a long time ago and the two of us are comfortable with one another.” He thrust his chin toward Renoir and his family. “The priest saved my life at the risk of losing those important to him. I refuse to be beholden to a human—I needed to repay the debt.”

  Lady Swiftbrook rolled her eyes. W’rath put up a fierce exterior but she’d finally seen behind the curtain. You’re far softer of heart than you wish anyone to realize. “What of the little girl?” she asked.

  W’rath shook his head much as the priestess had. “Her physical wounds are minor. However, her mind is gone. The human healer doubts she can do much for the child.”

  Lady Swiftbrook recalled how W’rath had restored her own mind during the fall of Second Home. “You could.”

  “Possibly—I don’t know for certain. I’ve never attempted to aid a human. Now is not the time for experimentation. Healing drains me, and I need everything I have left to face the enemy.” Before Lady Swiftbrook could fully absorb the fact he’d risked much in rescuing her, he refocused. “What of the ballroom?”

  “I sent a handful of Lord Orcbane’s soldiers to scout it out,” she said.

  “You sent First Born to handle a stealth mission?” It was W’rath’s turn to roll his eyes.

  “Well you can’t bloody well do everything!” she retorted. “While you were playing hero in here I had to work with what I had left to me.”

  “Point taken,” he said and nodded toward the shattered doorway where three First Born crabbed in over the broken stone.

  “Report,” she said.

  They each gave a shallow but respectful bow. The center soldier answered for all of them. “Councilor, we found nothing but the remains of a slaughter. We didn’t stop to count but our people must have killed two or three hundred fiends before they fell. We saw no survivors among our own or the humans. Based on the trail of blood and slime, we concluded the surviving monsters came here to throne room after they finished with the ballroom.”

  The tendons in the Sky Elf’s neck grew so taut she thought they might snap. Their easy win against Oblund left them cocky and unprepared for a rematch with true demons. W’rath wasn’t the only one who let his overconfidence lead him to disaster. The walls shuddered, a reminder they still had work ahead of them.

  W’rath cleared his throat. “Not that my ideas have proven all that worthwhile thus far but I would suggest we reestablish this room as a sanctuary, this time with Lord Icewind maintaining a defensive ward,” W’rath said to the Sky Elf. “You and I, and anyone else you choose, will go to the walls and do our utmost to put an end to this siege.”

  Even a casual glance revealed a room that looked more murder pit than sanctuary. Lady Swiftbrook addressed the expectant soldiers. “Gather up some more strong backs and start moving as much of the signs of battle to the far side of the room. I believe Lady Winterdawn ought to have the ability to put an illusion up to hide the worst of the carnage. We’ll never get the humans back in here if they have to stare at hundreds of bodies the whole time.”

  “Surely some of them know how to wield a sword,” W’rath said. “They might do well to take part in their own defense.”

  “There is a storage area where we’ve held most of the weapons we confiscated from the humans,” one of the soldiers offered. “I think I saw the Chalice’s maul in there.”

  “Bring everything here,” W’rath said. “Dole them out to anyone willing to stand and fight.” He pursed his lips and turned his head in the direction of an older man hunched over a pile of remains. “Except for that fool. I don’t want him anywhere near a weapon. He’s just as likely to try to put it into one of us as a demon.”

  “There may be others who think as he does,” Lady Swiftbrook
said. A string of weary humans, eyes red from either crying or smoke, marched by. A couple nodded to W’rath but then quickly dropped their gazes as if meeting his eyes might turn them to stone.

  “Undoubtedly,” W’rath said. “Put Chalice Renoir in charge of them. As much as his priest magic might help us on the wall, his leadership among the humans will be of more value here. Besides, I think it unlikely we’ll pry him from his wife and children again.”

  A plan in place, Lady Swiftbrook’s stomach stopped its roiling. She shooed the three soldiers off to gather the weapons, and then hunted down Lord Orcbane to tell him she needed more of his folk to clear one side of the room. Finally, she stepped back into the hall where Lord Icewind had expanded his protective bubble to encompass the terrified people who’d escaped the throne room.

  The diviner had recovered some. His skin had shifted from robin’s egg blue to pearl white, though his eyes still appeared sunken. “We’ve secured the room,” she said to him.

  He nodded and climbed gracefully to his feet. Lady Swiftbrook noted the relief on Lady Winterdawn’s face. The young apprentice did not relinquish her hold on her mentor’s arm. “How are you with illusions?” the councilor asked the young female.

  “Finally, something within my narrow range of skills,” Lady Winterdawn replied. “Yes, I can help—and gladly.”

  The two moved past Lady Swiftbrook and into the throne room, the protective bubble moving with them. The humans started to murmur in distress. “I’m not going back in there,” more than one said.

  Lady Swiftbrook put on her most stern face. She understood their fears but couldn’t afford to coddle them. “Go with Lord Icewind or stay out here as you will. All of the protection travels with him, though.” The three soldiers stomped by, burdened by a collection of swords, maces and polearms. “We’re handing out weapons as well. Chalice Renoir will see to your assignments.”

  The mention of weapons and the priest won them over. The mob shoved past Lady Swiftbrook. She grunted in annoyance as a large-bottomed woman practically trampled her in a blind attempt to keep from falling behind. The Sky Elf sighed as the last of them trundled through the door, only to jump when she realized W’rath stood at her elbow. “Will you quit doing that!”