by Tim Waggoner
Leontis stood by, only half-listening while Diran explained his plan to the psiforged and the artificer. The priest watched with increasing frustration as the battle took place around him and, far worse, without him. He was Sir Leontis of the Order of Templars, and it wasn't in his nature to stand idly by while others risked their lives in the struggle against evil. He understood why Diran had asked him to stay back, though. If Nathifa was a powerful enough lich, it was possible that both priests would be needed to stop her, but Leontis knew another reason-perhaps the most important one-was that Diran didn't want to risk having Leontis lose control of his lupine side again so soon after what had happened in the forest when they'd fought the shadowclaws. The werewolf had helped the others against those monsters then, but what guarantee was there that the beast wouldn't turn on Leontis's companions this time? None at all.
Leontis recognized the logic in Diran's strategy and even agreed with it, but it still chafed. Diran had played upon their friendship to convince Leontis to come along on this quest, all for the sake of some dubious visions revealed by a demon desperate to make a deal to prevent being cast out of its young host body. Leontis had allowed himself to be convinced, telling himself that perhaps he could do one last bit of good before leaving this mortal plane and joining with the Silver Flame. But he'd contributed little to the group's efforts so far. He'd stopped a Fury-crazed Ghaji from slaying Diran, and he'd killed the flying creature that had been about to attack them as their longboat had approached the island, and that was all. The werewolf had done far more, killing numerous shadowclaws before being caught in the fireblast. It seemed that for all his vaunted training and priestly abilities, Leontis was of less use than the wild animal that shared his soul.
Why should he keep fighting the wolf inside him, then? Perhaps there was a reason he had been infected with the curse of lycanthropy. Perhaps it wasn't a curse, at least not in his case. Perhaps it was, instead, a weapon that he was meant to wield in his order's battle against evil. Evil against evil, fire against fire…
He shook his head. That was the werewolf talking, not the man. The beast would do anything to be free again, even attempt to persuade Leontis to believe that evil could be used as a tool for good when wielded by one of the Purified. But that was the sort of thinking that led to abuses of power. The ends did not justify the means, no matter what. The teachings of the priesthood were absolutely clear on this, and so Leontis vowed to continue fighting to keep the werewolf caged inside him.
But then he heard an animalistic roar, and the sound sent a strange fire surging up his spine and into his brain. Leontis trained his gaze upon a creature that appeared to be half-human and half-shark. In the confusion, Leontis hadn't taken much notice of the creature, but he knew instinctively that it was a fellow lycanthrope. The wereshark attacked the tomb spider, leaping upon the arachnid and biting huge hunks out of her.
Leontis felt the fire in his mind build into a raging inferno at the sight of the wereshark glutting itself on the spider's internal organs, and when the wolf came to the fore, there was nothing he could do to stop the beast from taking possession of his body. And as he felt his persona giving way to the werewolf's savagery, he was horrified to realize that not only did he like it, he welcomed it.
Diran saw Leontis shift into his hybrid wolf form and bounded toward the wereshark. The sea-based lycanthrope had slain the tomb spider-something Diran supposed they all should be grateful for-and was engaged in devouring the mutilated remains. Diran had been born and raised in the Principalities, and thus knew that sharks would eat virtually anything, but he had a difficult time believing anyone with even a shred of humanity in them would eat a tomb spider, let alone do so with such enthusiastic delight. In addition, tomb spiders were creatures suffused with negative energy, and Diran couldn't see how even a lycanthrope could ingest the horrid thing's meat without being affected somehow by that energy.
Diran shouted Leontis's name, in a vain attempt to call him back, but it was too late. The man was gone and only the werewolf remained. Leontis snarled as he threw himself upon the wereshark, and the lycanthropes began trying to kill each other, two predators that instinctively sensed and loathed a competitor.
Diran wished he could go to his friend's aid, but there was nothing he could do for Leontis right now. He spared a second to wonder where Makala was-he'd seen her transform into mist and attack the tomb spider, but he hadn't witnessed the outcome of her action. Either the spider had wounded her somehow or, more likely, Makala was still close by, either in mist or bat form. He'd vowed to free his former lover from the curse of undeath and undo the mistake he'd made by not slaying her the moment she awoke as a vampire. Hopefully, he'd get the chance to redeem himself soon… after Nathifa was stopped. The lich had to be dealt with before she could absorb even more of the magic in Paganus's hoard.
Diran turned to Tresslar and Solus. "Ready?"
The psiforged and the artificer nodded. Both held daggers given them by the priest, one in each hand. Diran held the same number.
"Throw!" Diran commanded, and the three companions tossed the daggers straight up into the air, without even attempting to aim them anywhere in particular. When the daggers reached the apex of their less-than-graceful flight, Solus grabbed hold of the blades telekinetically and sent them streaking toward the oversized eyeball hovering above Nathifa's head.
The guardian eye released a blast of necromantic energy at the six oncoming daggers, but the blades fanned out, and the ebon beam managed to deflect only one. The remaining five encircled the eye and began rotating rapidly around the living orb, moving with such blinding speed that Diran had a difficult time keeping track of the knives. The eye, moving just as swiftly as the blades, oriented on one after the other, blasting them out of the air with dark beams of mystic force. One blade, two… three… four…
At Solus's mental command, the last dagger curved away in the opposite direction from where the three companions stood. The eye tracked the blade, turning away from them as it prepared to deal with this final threat. As soon as the guardian eye faced the other direction and couldn't see them, Diran slipped another dagger out of its cloak sheath, aimed, and hurled the blade at the back of eye. As the eye blasted the last of the rotating blades, the new dagger plunged into it from behind, and the guardian orb exploded in a spray of blood and viscous fluid.
Nathifa cried out in pain and frustration, but she didn't allow her concentration to slacken. The lich continued absorbing magic into the Amahau, but now she had no guardian to protect her. Solus released control of the levitating daggers and the blades fell to the floor. There was no point in the psiforged driving them into the lich. The only way she could be killed was if the phylactery containing her lifeforce was discovered and destroyed. But if Diran could get close enough, he could use the power of the Silver Flame to repel her, giving Tresslar a chance to regain possession of his dragonwand.
The priest drew a silver dagger from his cloak and removed his arrowhead symbol from his vest pocket. He then turned to Solus and Tresslar.
"Be careful," he warned his companions. "Even diminished as Nathifa is by the loss of her arm and eye, she is still most powerful-all the more so because she possesses the dragonwand."
"I shall remember," Solus said.
"You take care of the lich," Tresslar said, a determined look on his face. "You let me worry about the Amahau."
Diran nodded, and together the three started toward the lich.
Nathifa was no stranger to mystic power, but she'd never experienced anything like the Amahau before. The sheer amount of magical energy that it could hold was astonishing. It had already drained a good portion of Paganus's hoard, and Nathifa could sense that it wasn't near to being full. How much magic could the dragonhead contain? With its power hers to command, she would be like unto a god herself. She could keep the artifact for herself, continue traveling throughout the Principalities and absorbing magic wherever she went. And when she finally had enough, s
he could travel to the Fingerbone Mountains and challenge Vol. With the power of the Amahau, she could defeat the Lich Queen, cast her down, and take her place on the throne of bones.
But Nathifa knew it was a foolish dream. She'd made a bargain with Prince Moren to get the supplies to repair the Zephyr, and the bill would come due soon-long before she could ever hope to acquire enough power to challenge Vol. Nathifa wondered if perhaps this wasn't how her Queen had planned it all along. Vol might well have sent the Ragestorm, and Prince Moren had answered her summons rather quickly. Perhaps he'd been waiting close by at Vol's command.
No matter, Nathifa decided. The die was cast, and events would play themselves out as they would. Let Vol's reign continue. As long as Nathifa finally had her vengeance on Kolbyr, she would be satisfied.
Though the bulk of her concentration was focused on controlling the Amahau, she was able to spare a fraction of her awareness to monitor the progress of the battle around her. Skarm writhed on the crypt floor, his barghest physiology doing its best to fight off the web spider's venom. Nathifa knew he was fighting a losing battle, though. The venom was simply too strong. Nathifa was pleased that Haaken had killed the web spider, but she was surprised to see the wereshark now fought with another lycanthrope. The lich had been aware that a werewolf numbered among Bastiaan's companions, and she couldn't conceive of a priest-especially one devoted to the Silver Flame-associating with such a monster. There was obviously more to that story than met the eye.
Nathifa saw no sign of Makala, and she wondered if the vampire had betrayed her and fled. Most likely not, Nathifa decided. Makala had many annoying qualities, but cowardice wasn't among them. Makala was probably lurking about somewhere, alert for an opportunity to turn the tide of battle in her favor.
She was pleased that the web mummies and her dark-eye were proving effective at keeping Bastiaan and his friends busy. If the priest and his companions could be held off for a few more moments, she'd be able to-
Pain blossomed in the empty socket where Nathifa's left eye had been, and the lich cried out, more in anger than in hurt. She didn't know how, since she was only subconsciously connected to the dark-eye, but she knew Bastiaan had somehow managed to destroy it. This knowledge was confirmed a split-second later when warm viscous fluid pattered down onto her head and shoulders.
Not now! I'm so close…
But Nathifa knew her time was up. Weakened as she was by the sacrifices of her arm and eye, she couldn't hope to stand against Bastiaan, especially not without the aid of her servants. Whatever power she had managed to drain into the Amahau would have to serve.
The lich had no need to check if Bastiaan was attacking. She knew he was as surely as she'd ever known anything in her long, foul life. She commanded the Amahau to cease absorbing magic from the items in Paganus's hoard, and she pushed the dragonwand back into the inky-black substance of her shroud. Her body burst apart into dozens of shadowy scraps that resembled ebon leaves, and they swirled about the crypt as if in the grip of turbulent winds. One scrap passed near the ceiling, close to the ear of a black bat, and Nathifa whispered, "Time to leave." Another scrap blew by Haaken's head, and it whispered the same thing to the wereshark. The shadow-leaves then tumbled end over end toward the rough-hewn entrance Paganus had created when he first discovered the crypt millennia ago. She was aware of Bastiaan holding forth his arrowhead symbol, the silver light blazing painfully as she passed. But her form was too diffuse and moving too swiftly for the burning illumination to do more than cause her momentary discomfort. And then Nathifa was through the entrance, a black cloud of shadow-leaves tumbling down the tunnel toward the dragon's cavern lair, her voice a chorus of delighted laughter as she made her escape.
Asenka watched as the web mummies broke off their attack and began a slow, shuffling retreat to the far side of the crypt. The undead things seemed almost afraid of them now, and she couldn't figure out why, until she turned and saw that the tomb spider had been killed-and in an extremely messy fashion. Without their parent to command the web mummies, the egg-hosts had a new purpose: to preserve the lives of the spiderlings growing inside them. They would no longer risk damaging themselves, for to do so would endanger the lives of the children they carried. A distorted reflection of parental instinct, she supposed, but one that proved an advantage for her and the others.
Her hand throbbed from where the spiderling had bitten her. But though sweat dripped down the sides of her face, and she felt light-headed and sick to her stomach, she forced herself not to worry. Even if she had taken a large enough dose of venom to prove deadly, all she had to do was hold out long enough for the battle to end, and then Diran could heal her. She was Commander of the Sea Scorpions, the elite warriors of Baron Perhata. She could deal with a little bit of poison in her veins. After all, the ale in Perhata was so awful, it practically qualified as poison in its own right, and she'd quaffed enough of the bitter stuff over the years to build up immunity to any toxic substance, right?
She was horrified to see Leontis-in werewolf form-battling the wereshark, and the scene was so nightmarish that for a moment she feared the spider venom was making her hallucinate. But then she saw Nathifa break apart into a flurry of shadows, and she decided it had to be real. Even in delirium, she wouldn't have been able to dream up something that bizarre. As the shadows flew out of the crypt, a bat descended from the ceiling and headed for Leontis and the wereshark. The bat changed as it landed, and Makala reached out and grabbed hold of Leontis by the scruff of his neck and saw that the werewolf was bleeding from dozens of cuts made by the wereshark's claws The werewolf spun around, intending to sink his claws into whoever had the temerity to interrupt his battle with a fellow lycanthrope. But before Leontis could land a blow on Makala, Haaken took advantage of his foe's distraction to snatch the werewolf from the vampire's grasp. Before Leontis could react, Haaken hurled him away, and the werewolf soared through the air-
— straight toward Asenka.
She tried to avoid being struck by the werewolf, but he was moving too fast. Leontis slammed into Asenka, and she saw bright white flash behind her eyes, followed by darkness.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Ghaji ran toward Asenka, hoping to shove her out of the way before Leontis could hit her, but he was too late. The werewolf struck her and they both went down hard.
Leontis was momentarily stunned by the impact, but Ghaji doubted he'd stay that way for long. Though the half-orc's axe wasn't made of silver and no longer produced flame, it was still razor-sharp, so Ghaji rushed forward. As Leontis struggled to rise-broken bones already setting themselves and beginning to knit-the half-orc swung his axe and cleaved the werewolf's skull in two. Blood and bits of gray matter sprayed the air as Leontis let out a sharp whine and slumped to the ground. Ghaji knew that as devastating as the blow appeared, it would do no more than slow Leontis. A creature that could heal as swiftly as he had from the fireblast in the forest would have little trouble recovering from even a serious head wound, but at least they wouldn't have to deal with the werewolf while he healed.
Ghaji wanted to go to Asenka's side and tend to the injured woman, but he was too experienced a warrior to lose his focus in the midst of battle. He forced himself to ignore his wounded comrade as he swept his gaze around the crypt, searching for the next threat. The web mummies had retreated, the tomb spider was dead, the crimson spiderlings that had been released earlier had scattered, the barghest was half-wrapped in webbing, and Nathifa was nowhere to be seen. The lich had evidently escaped, and Makala and the wereshark were running for the crypt entrance, obviously intending to follow their mistress's lead. Diran, Tresslar, and Solus were moving toward Makala and Haaken, but the two monsters ran with inhuman speed, and it was obvious the priest and the others wouldn't reach them in time. Diran held a silver dagger, and he hurled it at the wereshark, but Makala-no doubt anticipating Diran's move-knocked the blade out of the air before it could strike the lycanthrope. Solus's psionic crystals glowed as
the construct marshaled his mental abilities, but as the wereshark ran he grabbed an object from Paganus's hoard, a golden shield, off the ground and flung it at the psiforged with all his might. The shield whirled through the air and struck Solus a ringing blow in the face. The psiforged staggered backward, his concentration broken.
Tresslar rummaged in his backpack for a mystic device he might be able to use to prevent Makala and the wereshark from fleeing, but he was too late. The two passed through the opening in the crypt wall and disappeared into the tunnel beyond.
"We must not let them escape!" Diran shouted as he ran toward the tunnel.
Ghaji called out to his friend. The half-orc was unable to keep a note of concern out of his voice, and that, more likely than anything else, is what caused Diran to stop and spin around. When the priest saw Asenka lying on the floor near Ghaji, her body bent and broken, he forgot about the lich and ran over to kneel at the woman's side. Diran saw Leontis then, lying on the floor close by, his lupine skull rent in two by Ghaji's axe. The priest seemed to hesitate a moment, as if unsure who needed his help more. But then he turned away from Leontis and focused the entirety of his attention on Asenka.
Ghaji knew that Diran's order forbade raising the dead, and as much as his friend might love Asenka, if she died, the priest would not bring her back.
"Is she…?" Ghaji couldn't finish his sentence.
Diran placed two fingers against the vein in Asenka's neck. "Her heart still beats, but weakly."
Ghaji let out a breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding. As long as there was a spark of life remaining in Asenka, then there was hope.
The others gathered around as Diran clasped Asenka's hand, closed his eyes, and called upon the power of the Silver Flame to work its healing magic through him. Ghaji had seen Diran heal people who looked as if they'd been chewed up by a tarrasque and spit out, but he couldn't help thinking how awful Asenka looked. Her skin was almost white, and blood ran from her mouth, nostrils, and ears. Her head lolled at an odd angle, indicating her neck was broken, and both her arms and her right leg had snapped when Leontis had collided with her. The leg was especially bad, with a jagged end of bone protruding from the flesh. And though Ghaji was no healer, he'd seen enough battlefield injuries in his time to know that there was a strong likelihood that Asenka had suffered internal damage as well. Ghaji had never known his friend to fail in an attempt to heal, but the half-orc feared that even the power of the Silver Flame might not be enough this time.