During the hours when they were resting, Jerissa had explained how her father, King Herrisan Stoneblood, had become king of the dwarves even though he was a paladin.
Apparently, Jerissa’s uncle, Gortan, had been king before her father. When King Gortan had a son and heir, Jerissa’s father had felt safe in leaving to pursue his own interests. He was called to the Prism, and after a year of training he became a paladin. Five years later, though, Gortan and his son both died in an accident in a mine where the king was showing his son a new vein of gold that had just been discovered. Jerissa’s father was immediately recalled and, as the only living relative, was forced to take the throne despite his vows to the Prism.
The Prismatic Council understood his conflict and placed no restraints on him, political or otherwise, with his ascension to the throne. For a few brief years, the unprecedented had happened and a paladin had held a position of power and the throne of an entire race.
All this rolled through Birch’s mind as he approached the door and slowly opened it. He gripped his sword with one hand and tightened his other hand around the grip on his shield. Selti stayed at his side, obeying his paladin’s instructions to be wary and not dart ahead. Behind him, Garet drew his sword and gripped the massive blade with both hands.
And in the rear, Wein Drolgis readied his own sword.
Chapter 32
A man with a soul of darkness may hide his black foulness and, thus benighted, walk under the midday sun. In this, he yet acts as his own dungeon of Hell.
- Playwright Brent Deerey, as Narrator,
“Cameran and Samin” (first performed 307 AM)
- 1 -
The room was pitch black, but to Birch’s eyes all was revealed in fiery-orange detail.
Birch’s hand itched on the hilt of his sword, but he ignored the feeling as he studied his surroundings. The room was enormous and had obviously served as either a training room or else a hall for holding troop formations and ceremonies. One wall was dominated by a series of low stone steps that Birch quickly realized were benches sized for dwarves. The rest of the room was empty at first glance. At Birch’s side, Selti bristled and hissed furiously at something only he could sense.
Birch’s hand began to tremble, then his arm, and eventually his entire body was shivering uncontrollably. He clenched his eyes shut and tried to calm himself, then abruptly the spasms ceased. He opened his eyes and instinctively stepped back into a fighting stance.
Where once the room had been empty except for the three paladins, now it was crowded with dozens of demons. Most were imps that were only slightly larger than Selti’s drann shape, but many were larger and a few were man-sized. It was the demon in the center of the snarling mass, however, that held Birch’s attention.
The demon was the size of a young boy, and his smooth flesh was brown like the bark of a tree. Small, pointed ears stood out slightly from the side of the hairless head, and needle-like teeth grinned a malicious promise to Birch. The demon’s left cheek was horribly scarred, and Birch thought he could just make out what had once been a Tricrus.
He recognized the demon instantly. It was one of The Three. Sal.
“Garet, can you see them?” Birch murmured.
“No. See who?”
Birch switched his sword to his other hand, letting his shield hang by the straps on his arm, then turned to look at Garet. He gripped the Red paladin’s head with his free hand and locked eyes with him.
“Trust me,” Birch said as Garet flinched back.
Birch’s eyes flared and Garet cried out. The flesh around Garet’s eyes was red as though burned, and he clenched one hand over his eyes.
“Don’t heal it,” Birch ordered crisply. “It’ll hurt, but as long as it’s there you can see them.” Birch didn’t know how he knew what he’d done, or why it would work, but the knowledge was there nonetheless.
“What? Who?” Garet said, his eyes still covered.
“Look.”
Garet uncovered his eyes and let out a slow curse.
“Wein, go run and find the others,” Garet said without turning. “Go quickly. We need help here.”
When he didn’t hear anything from behind him, Garet turned and saw Wein standing behind them, his eyes feverish with madness.
“Wein?” Garet said. “What’s wrong with you, man?”
The Violet paladin ignored him, focused entirely on Birch.
“At last the curse shall be removed,” Wein said and raised his sword.
“Birch, move!” Garet shouted and shoved the Gray forward. Garet’s sword shot out and blocked Wein’s strike, which would have cut Birch in half from shoulder to hip.
“Are you mad?” Garet yelled, putting his back to Birch’s to hold Wein off.
“I’m sorry, Garet, but you’ve been corrupted, too,” Wein said. His face was locked in an expression that was part ecstasy and part horror. Garet finally realized that his companion and brother paladin was completely insane. He shoved him back several feet, knocking the Violet paladin off balance for a few critical seconds.
“Birch, I’ll take care of Wein,” Garet said over his shoulder. “You’re on your own for a few.”
“Just hurry,” Birch replied grimly. He reached over and the two paladins clasped hands.
“For God and for man. For life,” they said together.
Garet rushed Wein and forced him back through the doorway, then shut the door behind him. There was no lock, so he knew he’d be able to get back in, but he didn’t want any of the demons to attack his back while he was engaged with the mad paladin. Garet whispered a prayer for his friend’s soul then added one for his own.
- 2 -
“Selti, now!” Birch yelled, leaping forward to keep the demons away from Selti while he changed shape into his full-sized dakkan form. The demons charged as a mass, howling their hatred of the holy warrior standing before them. Birch saw that the scarred demon stayed back, obviously not willing to risk fighting Birch directly unless it became necessary.
“Oh, I’ll make it necessary, you unholy vermin,” Birch muttered. Then speech was beyond him as he became one with his sword and the battle around him.
There was little finesse in Birch’s attacks. Refined footwork and swordplay were for the practice field and fighting duels against another man. Instead, Birch hacked and chopped at the demons as though they were so much wheat in a field before him. He reserved his energy and style for evading attacks that came from all sides.
Demons were hewn and dismembered as Birch carved his way through their ranks. Whenever a serious wound was delivered, the demon dissipated into black vapor and vanished. A few were strong enough to survive Birch’s first attacks, and they lay howling in anguish on the floor from the blow dealt by his holy sword.
Birch never moved more than a few feet from his original position before the door. Behind, beside, and above him, Selti slashed and tore at the demons with his claws and teeth, dismembering them and throwing the pieces down to the ground. In many cases the severed body parts either reattached themselves or else the demon simply grew a new arm to replace the one Selti had ripped free, but Birch was surprised to note that several of the smaller demons were destroyed outright by the dakkan, something he hadn’t thought possible. Unable to spare a thought for the aberration, Birch was nonetheless grateful for his mount’s efforts. Even the less effective of Selti’s attacks slowed the demons down and made it possible for Birch to survive, and soon the phenomenon was forgotten entirely.
Alone against more than a hundred demons, Birch knew most men, even paladins, would never stand a chance, and for the first time, he was truly grateful for the two decades he’d spent in Hell, which were now saving his life. Countless times over the years he’d spent on his inbound journey, Birch had fought against overwhelming odds and survived. Selti’s presence replaced that of his departed mother and comforted Birch with the same sure loyalty and dependability she had once possessed. More than any living mortal, man or demi-human, Bi
rch had the experience and abilities to live through a battle such as this. If the scarred demon had thought to easily overwhelm Birch and Garet, he’d grossly underestimated the paladins.
Had the demons numbered more among the stronger demons from Hell, Birch’s chances would have dramatically decreased. But the more powerful demons were still blocked by the Merging, and so only these lesser ones could cross. Birch was grateful for this, because had there been even a handful of childris or daemelans,[45] he would have stood no chance at all.
Birch blocked a blow from one of the larger demons, then spun his shield, gripped the lower handle, and slashed the demon across the throat with the metal spike on the bottom of the shield. The demon fell back, clutching the wound, which Birch knew would heal in a few moments. Birch stepped forward and drove his sword through the demon’s face, then pulled the blade free and sliced two smaller demons in half on the back swing.
For a timeless moment, Birch was suspended in the mindless carnage around him, blocking and slashing with as much instinct as any deliberate skill. He cut down two more lesser demons and spun, then realized there were no more to kill. The ground was littered with the dismembered pieces Selti had left behind, and a few amputee demons struggling to put themselves back together, but a swift cut with his sword was enough to dispatch those who might still recover enough to attack.
Birch checked on Selti and saw horrendous gashes scattered about most of his scaled body, but the gray dakkan was smiling triumphantly despite his pain and exhaustion. Birch laid a hand on Selti’s snout, then turned to look for his last opponent.
The scar-faced demon was standing alone across the room, fury and shock evident on the inhuman features.
“What’s wrong, Sal?” Birch called. “Realizing your pathetic minions weren’t enough to take on one paladin? How long did it take you to filter that many imps through the Merging? Did you just gather the other lesser of this rabble from this world? Mephistopheles will be upset you’ve wasted all his efforts.”
Birch was only half aware of what he was saying. It felt almost as though someone were putting the words into his mind, and he was merely repeating them.
Sal’s eyes widened, then narrowed in suspicion.
“You were lucky, mortal,” Sal hissed. “So I underestimated you. Of course you’ve fought lessers before, but I am a demon lord, and you’ll not find me so easy to defeat.”
“You’re nothing without your brothers,” Birch taunted him. “You think yourself so strong because you act in concert and your thoughts are one, but that’s your weakness: being singled out and away from the others. Alone, you’re weak and vulnerable.”
Sal snarled, but stayed put.
“Perhaps, mortal,” he growled, “but even alone I’m more than a match for you. I’m no longer weakened by that human bitch’s mark, so you’ll not repeat our last encounter.”
Birch knew it must have been Sal who he’d seen on the road from Demar, and for no real reason he wondered if it was Moreen who’d marked the demon. It wasn’t common knowledge that doing so would harm or destroy a creature of Hell, but Moreen would have known.
“Be careful, Sal,” Birch said with a mirthless smile. “The mark that I draw on you will not just leave a scar.”
Sal snarled again, and his body began to change. His limbs thickened and elongated as his chest swelled and broadened. He took on a man-like aspect, then the curved contours hardened and shaped themselves into thick armor. A sword and kite shield appeared from nowhere, and at last Birch was faced with a man half again as tall as he was, whose blade was made of black fire and smoke. The shield was a thick barrier made of the same ebony flame.
“Come, puny mortal. Meet your doom.”
Birch glanced at his own leather armor and his eyes narrowed. Without knowing how he did it, Birch gestured and his brown leather was replaced with shining steel platemail. The suit of armor fit him perfectly and was identical in every respect to his own armor left on the ship. The familiar feeling gave him a sense of comfort and confidence.
“Impossible!” Sal gasped, looking a little less sure of himself.
“Apparently not,” Birch said, his voice still detached from his conscious thoughts. Suddenly he found himself charging forward, sword upraised, and then he was in command of himself once more.
Birch had battled demons this large before, and even some that were humanoid, but none had wielded weapons and armor, and so he was faced with a unique opponent.
Their swords met with a loud clang, and Birch’s arm nearly went numb from the shock of the impact. He ducked a swing that would have split open his head, then spun and cut at Sal’s knee. His sword bit into the armor, leaving a small nick in the surface. Sal screamed, and Birch saw the edges of the cut were smoking.
Birch attacked again, and Sal blocked the blow with his shield, but because he was so tall, Sal couldn’t stop Birch from ducking down beneath the shield and attacking the demon’s feet. Birch swung his sword down and cut across the front of Sal’s foot, and again he cut into the armor and was rewarded with a scream of pain. That wound also hissed and smoked, and Birch realized that Sal’s armor was just for show. The sword and shield were created purely out of the demon’s āyus and were hardier and more powerful, but the demon lord had made a mistake in fashioning his armor from his flesh. Against an angel or another demon, it would no doubt be effective, but as a mortal paladin, the armor was still vulnerable to Birch’s attacks.
“A fatal mistake,” Birch murmured inside his helmet. It crossed Birch’s mind that his own armor had been created in just such a way, but unlike Sal, Birch’s weapon was a physical weapon, not something crafted of his own essence. Somehow, he knew the difference would come down to the crafted steel in his hand and the faith in his heart.
Birch jumped back as Sal tried to kick him and bash him with his shield at the same time. The kick missed, but the shield thumped down on Birch’s helmet and left him dazed. It was only a timely intervention by Selti that saved Birch from another blow that would have surely ended him.
Unnoticed by either combatant, Selti had shifted to his drann shape and slipped across the room until he was behind Sal. Once there, he enlarged to his natural shape again and waited for an opportune moment to strike. When he saw Birch staggering under the demon’s attack, Selti leapt forward and latched onto the demon warrior’s back.
Sal let out a horrendous scream of agony as Selti’s claws ripped into the flesh-turned-armor. Selti was still much larger than the demon warrior, and his claws tore deep furrows into Sal’s back. Then suddenly Selti screamed and withdrew his claws. The last time he’d fought the demon, Selti had almost completely avoided touching the unholy creature’s blood. Now, however, his sharp talons were smoking and being slowly eaten away by the demon’s black blood, and Selti thrashed about madly in agony. He crashed forward toward a door and tore through the stone surrounding it, then leapt into the open air. Selti dove toward the ocean and disappeared beneath the frothing waves.
Birch, meanwhile, had recovered from his daze and blinked furiously to clear his vision. His helmet had been crushed down onto his head from the force of Sal’s blow, and something had cut into his forehead, leaving a wash of blood across Birch’s vision.
He looked up and saw Selti break free of Sal and flee the room, then suddenly Sal screamed, “My brother!” and stood motionless in shock. Birch used the demon’s distraction to press his attack. He caught the edge of Sal’s shield with the side of his own and pushed the demon’s kite shield out of the way. With a quick slash of his sword, Birch cut a long line down the front of Sal’s breastplate. The wound blackened and hissed, leaving a trail of smoke in the wake of Birch’s sword.
Sal staggered back, but Birch followed him and slashed across his chest, perpendicular to the vertical slash. Birch swung his sword to make the third cut to end Sal’s existence, but the demon flailed wildly with his sword and knocked Birch’s own weapon free from his hand, then struck Birch’s upper arm with
the flat of his blade. The air rang at the impact, and Birch’s arm went numb and dangled uselessly at his side – he wondered if it might be broken.
Sal recovered his wits and saw Birch was unarmed, and the demon lord practically leapt on top of him in his eagerness to destroy the Gray paladin. Birch fell back under the onslaught, holding his shield high and looking frantically over his shoulder for his sword. He saw it across the room, embedded point-down in a pile of rubble brought down from Selti’s destructive departure.
Birch turned and sprinted across the room and heard Sal howl in fury. The demon warrior was close on Birch’s heels and had a longer stride, and the paladin realized he’d never be able to make it to his sword in time, even if he could use his arm to wield the weapon. Birch glanced back over his shoulder and saw Sal running after him, his arms wide in preparation to swing down and crush Birch.
With a lurch, Birch planted one foot and spun to face Sal. At the same time, he flipped his shield sideways and gripped the lower handle. Before Sal could slow or react, Birch slashed across the demon’s chest with the shield’s spike, completing the holy Tricrus. Birch spun fully around with the momentum of his swing, then stopped himself by planting the spike in the stone floor.
Sal was staring in surprised horror at the mark on his chest. He looked at Birch, and their eyes locked for a moment. Sal’s eyes widened further, and his looked changed to one of pure fury.
“You!” he bellowed, and took a step forward. Sal’s leg crumpled beneath him, and the enormous warrior toppled to the ground, laying on his chest. His body began to contract in on itself, until he resumed his original shape. His body twitched once, then the room shook as the demon’s body exploded.
Hunting The Three (The Barrier War) Page 39