Plague of Shadows

by Howard Andrew Jones

  The bard's head and shoulder struck the pavement, and Drelm knew a moment of satisfaction as blood and brains erupted into his face. Then he too struck the ground. There was a sharp pain, and then all sensation left him.

  Elyana's range of motion was limited by the shadowy arms encircling her, but not entirely restricted. Crown clasped tightly, the elf bent her arm to pass the artifact through the band of shadow holding her to the dead man's bed. The restraints parted the moment the metal touched it.

  At the same moment, Nadara released the guillotine blade, and it plummeted, rumbling in its wooden tracks.

  Her left leg hooked under the dead man's bed, Elyana pulled hard against the shadow gripping her right side, tearing free at the last instant. The blade sliced off her trailing hair and the shadow holding her right arm, as well as the armor on her right shoulder and a hunk of muscle beneath. She gasped, grabbed the crown from her crippled arm, and set it on her head as she rose.

  Power hummed through her, dulling the pain. Everything around her glowed with a corona of energy, especially the guillotine blade and the brow of the shadow wizard that furrowed at her even as the woman lifted another hand.

  Elyana kicked out, booted foot catching Nadara in the kneecap with a crack. The woman dropped with a cry along the edge of the guillotine platform. Her hand went up, crackling with dark energy.

  Elyana's hand closed on her sword hilt. Nadara cast a weave of darkness at her like a net. It battered Elyana back, clogging her breath, freezing her with its icy touch ...and slid away as the crown on Elyana's brow bathed her in light. The shadows couldn't be used upon someone wearing either side of the crown, she realized.

  Nadara must have understood this at the same moment, and was mouthing another spell even as Elyana's blade crashed down and pierced through cloth and sinew. Nadara's casting arm dropped bloody and separate on the planks. Nadara had only begun to scream when Elyana followed up with a thrust through the woman's throat. The elf pulled the other half of the crown free while the Gray Gardener was still writhing.

  The square was almost completely empty now, save for twisted bodies. A few folk still looked from windows in horror, and from down the street came the sound of hoofbeats. A cavalry detachment was on its way, banners waving, feathered helms bobbing. Lightning flashed within the clouds above.

  Renar burst through the front doors and raced to where Drelm lay crumpled on the pavement. Sareel, cradling Arcil's upper body, called for Elyana to hurry.

  She could feel all of their energy: Renar, pulsing with the vibrancy of youth, ringed by protective magic. Arcil, cold and small beside Sareel's mighty life force, his lesser energy swiftly draining into the ether. Drelm, broken and near to death.

  She also felt the power of the guillotine, the shrieking of the souls trapped within its blade. She could sense them straining against the bonds of the weapon and understood that if she just focused the power she might learn how to release them. If she had but a little time ...

  But there was no time. The cavalry thundered on, and Renar was calling to her. Sareel was shouting her name. And if they didn't teleport home before Arcil died, they would all be trapped in Woodsedge, at the mercy of the local justice.

  Renar was manhandling the half-orc, dragging the limp captain by the shoulders. Elyana sheathed her bloody sword and leapt down from the platform, feeling the pain that coursed through her body only at a distant level. The crown enabled her to tune it out. She reached Arcil's side at the same moment as Renar.

  The magical attack had burned through Arcil's illusion as well as his robe. His mummified face stared up at her from above his charred and smoking garments. The glow in his eyes was dim. His hand fumbled for her, but Elyana didn't grasp it until she had stretched for Renar, the other half of the crown dangling like a giant's bracelet around her wrist. Renar's gauntleted hand touched her left one; her right clasped the dry fingers of the lich, and she had a moment to stare up at the guillotine and the oncoming cavalry before everything faded and they sat suddenly before her tiny wooden house with its green eaves.

  Here in Taldor, the sky was clear and blue and white clouds drifted easily by. To the east was a distant storm front. Birds sang. A few of her horses looked up from their contented grass munching, then bent back to the task that occupied most of their lives.

  "The crown," Arcil was saying, "give me the crown."

  "The blast shattered his soul," Sareel said. And she rose toward Renar. "You little bastard!"

  "The bard compelled me!" The boy raised his hands in protest.

  "Leave him be!" Elyana spat. The warrior woman halted, looking back and forth between Arcil and Renar, even as Elyana turned the two pieces of the crown over to the shaking hands of the lich.

  "It's in two halves," Elyana told him. "Let me—"

  He was too feeble to resist her as she took the two portions away, desperately striving to slide them together. Without the crown on her head, though, the effects of the pain spell returned. Her shoulder was agony, and her fingers fumbled even as Arcil slumped.

  "Arcil, hang on!" she urged. The crown halves slid into place, and she passed them to the wizard, only to find he was too weak to grasp them. She cradled the horrible head with its sunken flesh and placed the crown there. She sensed a surge of energy run through him.

  Arcil felt like a drowning man given a brief gulp of air. He could think clearly, and felt for the power of the crown, reached for the energy he needed to wield. He had to restore his soul to his body—if even a little bit returned to him, the rest would find its way, and the crown would heal him. He had stored his essence in the supposedly unbreakable scrying sphere. Yet the magic from the lance had cracked it. His soul had leaked away.

  Exhaustion overcame him, and he sank back against Elyana's arms. "There's nothing left," he said.

  Elyana nodded. Tears streamed down her face. "I wasn't sure ..."

  Power over life and death. He'd been so blind. Shadow magic was illusion. The Crown of Twilight could destroy, and it could shield from shadows. It could trick the body into healing itself. It could even shape shadows into a semblance of life, just as Nadara had done with the images she'd formed of the Galtan leaders she'd killed. But it could not return a departed soul.

  He let out a long sigh and considered Elyana. She still wore the illusion spell he had placed upon her.

  No matter the energy of the crown—it wasn't enough to sustain him much longer. Without it, he would already have expired.

  He raised a shaking hand and dismissed the illusions, suddenly desperate to see Elyana as she truly was. One last time he stared into those violet eyes, now misty with tears. He watched her push back that glorious auburn hair, and felt her hand on his own scalp as she touched him. He always hated to see her sad. He regretted that.

  "I'm sorry, Elyana ..."

  Elyana alone heard the whispered words. She was staring into those dead sockets as the red light within them flickered out. And she wept.

  "Heal him!" Sareel screamed behind her. "Use your magic! Use the crown!"

  "He's dead," she said. And Arcil looked as though he had been so for a long time. But Drelm was not, or at least he hadn't been a few moments ago. Still weeping, Elyana turned to where the heavy body lay.

  A meaty hand closed on her good shoulder and flung her around. "Save him!"

  The horned warrior woman was electric with rage. Elyana saw her clearly for the first time since their return. Sareel's chin was swollen. Gaping rents stood out in her armor.

  "The crown can't do that!" Elyana said.

  "You lie!"

  "It can't heal him!" Elyana shouted, grief fueling her anger.

  "Then you heal him!" Sareel's voice was hysterical. "I've seen you heal in that stupid crystal ball! Why won't you heal him?"

  "He's dead—but I can still save Drelm."

  T
he woman's face contorted in fury. Her sword came up and she spun for the half-orc. Elyana knew a brief flash of horror. Sareel meant to finish Drelm.

  Elyana's entire body protested as she flung herself into Sareel. It was more a stumble than a tackle, and she shouted in pain as her damaged shoulder smashed into Sareel's side.

  Both women went down in the grass behind the half-orc, and in the fall Sareel's pommel struck Elyana's skull. Half stunned, the elf could offer no resistance as Sareel pushed her savagely away. She was faintly aware of Renar screaming for Sareel to halt, and of Sareel shouting back that she'd kill Drelm if Elyana didn't save her master. A booted foot crashed into Elyana's side, and a new wave of pain rolled through her.

  "I'll kill you, too!" Sareel declared.

  And then Renar sang a happy little melody. Elyana heard a thud, accompanied by the scent of scorched metal and roasting meat. She pushed herself up with her good arm, stomach churning.

  Renar was suddenly there, offering a gauntleted hand. "Elyana! Abadar preserve you, you look awful!"

  A half-dozen witty quips rolled through her head, but she had not the strength. "Help me to Drelm." Her voice was a hoarse whisper.

  Renar pulled her up, supporting her as he walked her to Drelm.

  Elyana sank to her knees beside the captain. She caught a glimpse of her shoulder and wished she hadn't. It was a black and red mass of skin and bruises, leaking blood. She was sure she had seen exposed bone through the mess of muscle and armor.

  She was so dizzy. She needed something, and couldn't recall what it was. It was close, she knew.

  Elyana's gaze traveled the area, fell upon Sareel. The warrior woman's face was still twisted in fury, but her eyes stared sightlessly toward the heavens. A smoking, fist-sized hole had been blasted through the center of her chest.

  "I wish I hadn't had to do that," Renar said beside her.

  Elyana had used up her magic healing Drelm on the Plane of Shadow, but there was one last chance. "Crown," she said, so softly that Renar had to ask her to repeat herself. She sagged over Drelm's body. It took nearly all her remaining energy to explain. "Crown."

  Renar hurried to Arcil's grisly remains and gently lifted the crown from his brow. He knelt down by Elyana and placed it on her head.

  The moment he did so the pain ebbed. She felt it still, like an unwanted visitor lingering on the doorstep, and knew that her own energies were dangerously low. "Ride for help," she told Renar.

  He nodded, then shot to his feet and whistled for a horse. Elyana heard the clop of hooves, then the rustle as he vaulted onto the animal and kicked it into gallop. She supposed he was holding on to its mane, riding bareback. Dimly she perceived the sound of the hoofbeats receding.

  Elyana did not imagine it was wise to tap into energies beyond her own, especially when she herself was so close to unconsciousness. But she sensed that the half-orc's life was dimmed almost to nothing. There was no time to wait for a cleric. She put her hands to the sides of his bruised head and stared down at his eyelids. And she called on the power of the crown.

  It came instantly, sliding through her body in a torrent she was almost too weak to control. She gritted her teeth, forcing herself to concentrate, and sent her life force questing out toward Drelm's own. She found it, a dying ember cradled in a broken hearth, and poured incredible energies toward it, trying to shape them into the waves she knew.

  The energy was too great. One moment she was at the forefront of the wave; the next she was consumed, floundering within it. Everywhere was the energy, and it drew her down, down, swirling powerlessly away.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Final Words

  As Elyana stirred, she thought for a moment that she lay in her own bed, and it was time to rise and saddle Persaily.

  But the scent wasn't right. She smelled stone, and the blankets were softer than those on her own bed. She was accustomed to only one flat pillow, and she lay propped up on a very thick one. As she opened her eyes, she perceived that the light slanted in from the wrong angle to be the window in her bedroom. A figure stood silhouetted in profile by the sunbeam, looking outside. Stelan.

  As she noticed that this was a room in the keep, all the recent events came flooding back to her. She looked down at her body and saw herself under thick blankets, the collar of a blue sleeping gown open at her throat. A tapestry she had always liked hung on the wall to her left, one featuring huntsmen on finely fashioned horses racing gaily, not after game, but for the sheer thrill of the speed that the weaver had captured in the horses' raised tails and flared nostrils.

  As she'd turned her head, something about the way her hair lay on her neck felt odd, and she reached back. Her probing fingers discovered that her hair had been trimmed short, now stopping midway down her neck rather than at her shoulders. At first she was affronted, then remembered the guillotine had probably made a proper mess of her hair. It was only after she reached up that she recalled how the shoulder she now used had recently been aching. Throbbing. Now there was no pain anywhere in her body at all. She felt blissfully cleansed, though still very tired.

  Close at hand was a small table with a pitcher of water, and a glass. She realized just how dry her throat felt.

  She sat up slowly, the bed creaking beneath her, and reached for the glass. Stelan turned at the sound and came over immediately, watching as she drank.

  She smiled at him as she set the glass down, and it was almost like old times as he dropped eagerly down on the edge of the bed. He took hold of her hands and squeezed them tightly but did not speak. His dark eyes were filled with such concern he might not have trusted himself to say anything.

  "You are cured," she said.

  "And you are well?" he managed. He looked thin, careworn. But he was alive.

  "I am," she said. "And Arcil kept his word and lifted your curse."

  "He must have," Stelan said.

  "Drelm," she said suddenly. "Gods. Did he make it? I lost control of the spell. Is he alive?"

  "He is."

  Elyana breathed a sigh of relief.

  "You nearly died in saving him, Elyana." Stelan's voice was strained but quiet. He was striving, none too successfully, to conceal the depth of his relief. "The cleric healed you days ago, but you would not wake. He feared your mind had been shattered by the magic."

  "It's still here, I think."

  Stelan gave her a half-hearted smile and squeezed her hands so tightly it pained her, though she did not ask him to let go. He released his grip after a moment and looked away from her. "I was worried for you."

  She almost teased him over the obvious understatement. She restrained herself.

  "You risked everything for me and my family," Stelan went on. "I will never be able to thank you properly."

  "The strength of your friendship is thanks enough," she replied, wishing that he would take up her hands again, though she knew he should not. "How is Renar?"

  "He is well. He is stronger now than I remember him. And a little sadder. Those few days he was gone ...aged him. He has spoken of an elven woman of great beauty."

  They had lost so many, and poor Aliel's death had been one of the most senseless losses of all. The pain of the young girl's pointless death burned afresh at thought of her. "I must pay respect to her family," Elyana said slowly.

  "So must we. Renar says the elves were of great help to you. I would like to thank them personally."

  Elyana shook her head. "No—I do not think that would be the wisest course. Perhaps you could offer a gift, or a poem. But I will deliver it. I think it would be more proper."

  Stelan nodded absently. She sensed that he wished to touch her again just as much as she desired it, which was probably why he still would not meet her eyes. She forced brightness into her voice. "What of the crown?"

  "Given over to the
holy temple of Abadar," he said, finally managing a brief look in her direction. "As you promised it would be, in payment for keeping me alive." He paused. "Lenelle did not think you would return," he added softly, then seemed to regret it.

  "I wasn't sure myself that we would. Renar has told you everything?"

  "Everything that he knows. I don't think he's learned to tailor his stories much, yet, though there are some details he did not share with his mother. I still don't understand Vallyn. What was his real aim?"

  She hadn't had much time to draw her own conclusions. "He wanted the praise of the Galtans. Or the love of Nadara. They had something over him ...maybe it was his little inn on the border. But I can't claim to completely understand. They beat him badly and locked him in a cell, and still he turned on us in the end."

  "Renar said that Vallyn had been aiding you all along the way. Was it just so he could use you to please his masters?"

  "I wish I could say, Stelan. He went out of his way to give Renar advice to protect him. Whatever Vallyn felt, in the end we didn't matter as much to him as his own skin. He knew the Galtans wanted us dead, and never warned us."

  "He always did look out for himself. I knew he was a little bit of a coward, but ...I thought he was our friend."

  "People change," Elyana said.

  "Some of them," he replied. "Nevertheless, I will pray for his soul."

  "I hope that you will pray too for Kellius."

  "I have." Stelan's head rose in conviction. "And I will. He died nobly in my service, and his name will not be forgotten. I am commissioning a statue of him so that we will have a place to burn offerings."

  That sounded appropriate. She wondered if the thoughtful young wizard would have approved. A statue seemed so formal, and Kellius had been so approachable. "Perhaps you should plant a flowering garden in his honor," she said.

  "That can be done as well."