The incident already forgotten, the undead archer notched an arrow—
And was promptly tackled by a heavy, armored form.
The dagger that sank deep in his chest would have killed him, if he had not already been dead. His attacker started to lean back, clearly confident of his strike. The vague outline of a morlu filled Achilios’s gaze.
The archer grinned, a sight he was certain would have been ghastly to any living person. “Too little…too late.”
With a strength now as inhuman as that of the morlu, Achilios threw the bestial warrior high into the air. The morlu collided with a tree, cracking the latter in two.
Achilios, well aware how little that would stop his adversary, was already on his feet. The bow came up and a shaft went flying even as the armored assassin rose from the tangle.
With utter accuracy, the bolt hit one of the black eye sockets. As the morlu grasped for it, Achilios fired at the remaining socket.
Grunting, the helmed creature batted away the oncoming missile. However, Achilios had already expected that. His shot had only been to distract. The bow fell to the ground as the hunter pulled free a long knife. He leapt toward the morlu as the latter finally pulled free the one bolt, a sucking sound accompanying its removal.
The knife, honed sharp and wielded by an expert, severed the armored creature’s head from the neck.
Achilios kicked the twitching body aside. He grabbed the head even as one of the morlu’s hands sought for his leg.
Hefting the head, the archer threw it deeper into the jungle. Turning back only long enough to retrieve his bow, Achilios raced past the torso, which sought in vain to regain its footing. The foul magic animating it would last only a short time longer, too short for the morlu to save himself by retrieving his head. Achilios wondered if the same thing would hold true should someone remove his. Perhaps, if somehow the crisis passed and the others no longer needed his questionable aid, he would test it out himself. After all, what was there left for him? No love, no life…
The hunter grimaced. As an animated corpse, he had become very maudlin. All that mattered was fulfilling his mission and then dying again. Everything else he could leave to Uldyssian, Mendeln…and, if there was still hope, Serenthia.
If there was still a Serenthia.
The morlu had been a warning that the woman’s scream had alerted some of those he sought. Achilios stuffed the knife in his belt, then readied another arrow.
By this time, four wary figures had emerged through the gate. Three were guards, the last a priest he estimated somewhere in the middle of the hierarchy. The guards faced different directions, evidently checking the safety of the immediate area.
The priest—his robes that of Bala—stared in the direction of Achilios.
The hunter let the bolt fly. With darkness to shadow it, it should have cut down the robed figure. Instead, the priest raised a hand—
Achilios’s arrow exploded in midflight.
But the archer had already expected that something might happen. Barely had he let fly the first than he shot a second. As Achilios had surmised, the priest had quick reflexes, but not that quick. The second arrow burrowed deep into the robed chest, its momentum sending the prey falling.
The guards turned in his direction. One shouted something and two more came through the gateway.
Achilios fired three more bolts in rapid succession. One bounced off the breastplate of his target, the second caught a guard in the arm, and the third pierced the throat of its quarry.
The two survivors retreated to the new pair. They looked convinced that they were being attacked by more than one person, exactly as he had wanted. Achilios retreated from his location, blending into the darkness in a manner that he could only do by being dead.
There was no sign of another morlu, which possibly meant that the rest were involved in the chaos. That increased Achilios’s chances of finishing the special task he had set upon himself. All he needed now was to continue pressing those seeking flight from Hashir.
But at that moment, he sensed something else in the jungle, something as unsettling to it as he was.
The ground below him heaved up, as if about to erupt. What at first he mistook for the upturned roots of the nearby trees shot up and around him. Only after the first had snared his leg did the archer see them for what they actually were.
Tentacles…the tentacles of some huge, grotesque creature burrowing through the soft dirt.
A creature that was not of Sanctuary.
As a second tendril snared his bow arm, Achilios cursed himself for forgetting the true patrons of the Triune. The priest he had shot had been a servant of Baal, the Lord of Destruction. Foolish of the archer to forget the man might have summoned another servant of the Prime Evil, a servant not in the least human.
Still, whether or not the dead priest had summoned this denizen of the Burning Hells was a moot point. What was important was escaping it; no easy task. It already had both of Achilios’s legs and one arm and he had still not seen more than the tentacles. Instead, the only measure he had of his foe was that the ground everywhere around him continued to shake, as if whatever lurked below it was gargantuan.
Reaching the knife would have driven a living man to terrible wrenching pain, but Achilios was thankfully beyond such mundane sensations. Thus, he was able to grip the blade just as another tentacle sought his wrist. Twisting, Achilios slashed at the tip, watching with satisfaction as the faithful edge cut through.
A low, thick thundering arose from beneath him. The jungle shook violently. If not for the very tentacles holding him, Achilios would have fallen on his back.
“Hurt you…did I?” he rasped triumphantly.
In response, another, thinner tendril shot out, wrapping like a whip around his throat. The appendage constricted.
Fortunately, unlike most, Achilios no longer breathed. He did not actually even draw breath when speaking. The power that animated him also gave him voice. Hence, while having his neck snared did slow Achilios further, it did not incapacitate the hunter as it would have a living being.
He took immediate advantage of the demonic creature’s misconception, slashing with the knife at not only the tentacle snaring his throat, but his other arm, too. Both times, Achilios struck true. A black substance resembling tar dripped from the cuts. The two appendages were instantly withdrawn.
Achilios wasted no time in assaulting the others. One received a shallow line across its width, but before he could do more, both retreated below the soil.
The hunter allowed himself a brief smile as he righted his balance. No beast had ever had the final laugh against him; that triumph, however short-lived, had been the archdemon Lucion’s alone.
Still, it was best not to simply stand there. Achilios plucked up his bow—
Again came the thundering that the archer had decided was the demon’s roar. A quake that toppled most of the trees near him also sent Achilios tumbling. This time, he lost not only the bow, but his knife.
“Damn!” he gasped. “Damn!”
And out of the ground burst a dozen tentacles of varying length and size. Whether they belonged to one monster or another did not matter, only that suddenly they snagged him by the legs, the arms, the torso, and the throat.
There was nothing he could do. Against their combined might, Achilios might as well have been a newborn baby. At this point, there was only one question as to his fate. Would the beast tear him to pieces—which might or might not actually finish the undead hunter, although it would certainly make him useless—or instead drag him down into the ground, a much more daunting prospect. Achilios had been buried once; he found the idea of a second interment frightening.
The tentacles tightened. Achilios felt his body strain. Dismemberment was the decision made by his captor. The archer perversely wondered if he should thank the demon for that choice.
A brilliant golden light suddenly turned the jungle brighter than day. Achilios felt a warmth such as he had not known even be
fore death and which, because it actually did warm him, stunned the archer that much more.
But if it warmed Achilios, the light did much more to the beast. Now the thundering reached an ear-splitting crescendo. The tentacles shook and Achilios noticed burning flesh.
The demonic appendages shot back into the ground. The jungle shook…then stilled.
The golden light vanished…leaving a puzzled and very disturbed Achilios. He lay there for a moment, uncertain if either would return. When neither did, the archer stood.
However, no sooner had he done so, than Achilios experienced an odd sensation. Had he been living, he would have thought it vertigo.
His legs gave out. The world swam. Achilios tried to reach his bow—
And then all was blackness.
Eleven
Uldyssian had heard the voices for several moments now and although a part of him sought to react to them, his body would not obey.
“He has still not opened his eyes,” came what he vaguely noted as Mendeln’s voice. But that was not possible; Mendeln was lost to him. Uldyssian recalled thinking that he had heard Mendeln earlier, yet that, too, had to have been his imagination.
Have patience, young one. Her strike was as subtle as it was heinous…
Even unconscious, Uldyssian jolted the moment that the second speaker voiced himself, for the words resounded in both the head and soul of the son of Diomedes. He must have moaned at the same time, for that which sounded like Mendeln suddenly grew excited.
“Did you see? He stirred! Uldyssian! Listen to me! Come to me! By our father and mother, you’ll not leave me like this!”
Mention of his parents finally caused Uldyssian to actually wake. He remembered how he had felt when Mendeln had vanished; if this was indeed his brother, he could not very well let him suffer so, not if it was in his power to do anything.
And then there was Serenthia…
That proved more than enough. With a cry, Uldyssian struggled free of the last vestiges of unconsciousness. Immediately his body was wracked with terrible pain. He rolled about and perhaps might have hurt himself in the process if not for hands grabbing him by the shoulder in order to keep his body still. Yet again he heard Mendeln.
“Be at ease, Uldyssian! Be at ease. It will pass…most of it, anyway…”
There is much within that will take longer. The demoness is a poison deep in his blood…
“And I could have stopped her, if only you’d all have let me!” snapped Uldyssian’s brother. “I could’ve prevented so much!”
Not then. You would have been slaughtered and Uldyssian more in her grip…
“But you said that she went in unsuspecting of the betrayal! That alone—”
A third voice intruded just as Uldyssian forced his eyes open. Vague shapes and much darkness greeted the battered man’s gaze.
“My mother is very adaptable, Mendeln ul-Diomed. You saw how quickly she turned potential defeat of her plan into a new and possibly more terrifying path toward her ultimate goals. Now she is nearer than ever to victory…and Sanctuary that much nearer to cataclysm.”
Some of the agony subsided, enough so that Uldyssian could finally focus. The first thing he saw gladdened his heart, for it was his brother. Mendeln wore an uncharacteristically broad grin and Uldyssian knew that he wore the same.
“I thought you lost forever,” the older brother told the younger.
“As I you.”
“Your sibling was always safe,” the third speaker interjected. In some ways, his voice was very similar to Mendeln’s in both tone and speech, yet there was something about it that bespoke of great age and a person who was not entirely human…if at all.
And when the figure joined Mendeln in gazing down at Uldyssian, the latter saw that this was no mere mortal. The face was too handsome, the features too perfect. Most of all, though, the eyes held more than great age…they were so ancient that Uldyssian immediately suspected the worst.
“He is no demon,” Mendeln quickly stated, recognizing his brother’s reaction.
“Although Lilith is my mother,” added the stranger.
With an animalistic growl, Uldyssian sought to grab the speaker. However, his body was too weak. Worse, intense pain coursed through him again, forcing him to lie back.
Only then did he notice the stars. Their positions were so different from what Uldyssian was familiar with, that he momentarily forgot the demoness’s offspring.
“Where—where are we, Mendeln?” Uldyssian finally asked. “I don’t recognize any of those.”
It was the son of Lilith who responded. “You are somewhere and nowhere.”
Such answers only served to stir Uldyssian back to anger. He did not trust being in the vicinity of a being who claimed Lilith as the one who had begat him. “And who are you? If not a demon, then what are you?”
“My name is Rathma,” the stony figure answered without preamble. “Although that is not the name given to me at birth, but rather the one placed upon me by another after parting from my parents’ ways. It means ’keeper of the Balance’ which is also my function and duty.”
Uldyssian had no idea what Rathma spoke about and cared less. “But Lilith is your mother…”
“And Inarius is my father. Yes, I see that name also fills you with dread. I bear no grudge for that, for both have become anathema to me as I am to them. As to what I am, I am a nephalem…one of the very first, in fact…”
The revelation should have struck Uldyssian harder than it did, but quickly he realized that it had not because, horribly aware of who Rathma claimed for his lineage, there was no other possible answer.
“You…you are like us…”
Rathma shook his head. “No, I am unlike you or any of those who follow you. I cannot explain, but what you call the ’gift’ has metamorphosed. There are abilities that I have that you do not just as you bear some I am lacking. I suppose this should not so surprise me since I am from the very first generation birthed on Sanctuary…”
So long ago as all that, Uldyssian thought in awe.
Lilith’s son nodded as if having read the mortal’s mind, then added, “There are few of us remaining, for when only my father was left of the original refugees, he was strict in his punishment of those who used their powers. He insisted that his perfect world, his Sanctuary, would remain as he desired it…” Rathma shook his head. “But for one who is eternal, my father should have known that nothing stays static.”
That is enough for now, came that other voice from both within and without Uldyssian. He pushed himself up, seeking the source…and his eyes for some reason looked to the stars above. For the first time, Uldyssian imagined that he even saw a shape formed by the celestial lights. Not a complete one, but enough to give the illusion of a vast, half-hidden beast. A reptile—no—something more than that. It was long and sinewy like a great snake, but the head reminded him of another creature straight out of myth—
A dragon…yes, it looked like some sort of serpentine dragon…
The stars shifted…and it seemed to Uldyssian that the half-seen behemoth now stared back at him.
Though we would all wish it otherwise, you are not well enough yet for more strain…
Uldyssian swallowed, unable to believe his eyes, his mind, and his heart. “What—what are you?”
“He is Trag’Oul, brother,” Mendeln explained quietly. “Born in creation, defined when the angels and demons who came here formed Sanctuary. He is more its guardian than any other can claim.”
A simplified description, albeit most accurate…
Oddly, the introduction of this celestial creature was not what most demanded Uldyssian’s attention. Hearing the dragon, then his brother, and recalling how Rathma had spoken…he felt as if he were listening to three extensions of the same being. Uldyssian looked from one to the other and the feeling only increased.
“Mendeln,” he muttered. “Mendeln, I want to leave here now. Both of us, I mean.”
“But we ca
nnot, Uldyssian…at least not yet. There is so much to learn and you need recuperation.”
Rathma stood next to the younger son of Diomedes. “He speaks the truth. It would be unwise at this juncture.”
Uldyssian swallowed. Rathma and Mendeln looked more like brothers than he and his sibling did. The dark garments, the pale faces—and the nearly unblinking gazes—added further to the horrific effect.
Forcing himself to his feet despite the torture to his body, Uldyssian growled, “Mendeln! Look at you! Look at him! Listen to him and that—that thing!—and then yourself! They’re doing something to you!”
He felt his power rush through his body, fueling his emotions and strength. They had been wrong, his kidnappers. He was more than fit despite their games.
Raising his hands toward his brother, Mendeln replied, “No, Uldyssian! You must not do that—”
It was too late. Certain that not only were he and Mendeln trapped here for dire purposes but that his sibling was being turned into something to serve the dragon’s and Rathma’s needs, Uldyssian unleashed the raw forces within.
“You said he was too weakened by her to do this!” Rathma shouted, evidently to Trag’Oul.
He is different! They would all be different! They are no more nephalem than you are human! They are more—
But the fantastic creature got no further, for then it was that the dragon’s empty realm shook as if some giant hand sought to turn it upside down. Uldyssian knew that he was the cause but did not care. He had to free Mendeln and him from this black prison—
As if responding to his thought concerning his dark surroundings, the elemental forces bursting from Uldyssian took on a blinding brightness. Above, Trag’Oul roared. Rathma uttered something in a language unknown and momentarily the brightness lessened. But Uldyssian, fearing that if his effort failed then all was lost, threw his will into restoring the light.
Around him, the very blackness suddenly began shredding as if torn cloth. Utter white at first replaced it…then a mountainous landscape erupted full-blown.
Mendeln called out to Uldyssian, but the two looked now to be separated by miles. Fearing to lose his brother again, Uldyssian attempted to draw back within him the energies he had released, but it was as if they now fought against him. The new landscape began to shiver and shake and seemed as ready as the blackness to shred apart.
Scales of the Serpent Page 15