by C. L. Werner
Instantly, Tyrion slashed at Malus with Sunfang, but he didn’t reckon upon the speed and agility of the drachau. Malus’s reflexes and instincts had been honed in the horrors of Naggaroth and the perils of the Wastes. As Tyrion’s blade came for him, he threw himself backwards, lying flat across Spite’s back. Instead of skewering him, Sunfang merely slashed his cheek. Even so, the glancing wound brought a cry of sheer agony from Malus. The filth that bubbled up from his wound wasn’t blood alone, but had within it dark purple strands of obscene ichor.
Infused with the might of a daemon, Malus’s flesh had taken on some of the properties of the daemonic. Sunfang had been forged to destroy such entities in the days of Aenarion, the first Phoenix King. The agony that wracked Malus’s body from even so slight a scratch was crippling. He sagged weakly against Spite’s side, the warpsword dangling from his hand. His other hand clawed desperately at his scarred cheek, as though he could rip out the pain.
‘Now you answer for your outrages, Tyrant of Hag Graef,’ Tyrion snarled. He raised Sunfang for the killing blow. Malus saw death in the Regent’s eyes.
Before the blow could land, however, Tyrion cried out in shock. Blood erupted from the hero’s side, spilling across the ancient dragon armour he wore. It took Malus a few breaths to understand what had happened. When he did, a bitter laugh fell from his lips.
While drachau and Regent duelled, another foe had intruded into the fight. Tullaris drove the First Draich into Tyrion’s back, the ensorcelled weapon tearing through the hero’s enchanted mail, its murderous energies too great even for the armour of Aenarion to defy. Tyrion writhed in agony, his body spitted upon the unholy glaive. The executioner howled the name of Khaine as he lifted Tyrion from Malhandhir’s saddle and threw the Regent to the ground.
Malus clenched his teeth as he watched Tullaris stalk towards his fallen enemy. It seemed the glory of killing the Regent would belong to Tullaris.
The satisfaction of killing Tullaris once the deed was done, however, would belong to Malus Darkblade.
TWENTY
Tyrion’s cry echoed across Reaver’s Mark as Tullaris drove his blade into the hero’s back. Up on the volcanic spur, the scream stabbed into Drusala’s mind, rousing her from her stupor. The sorceress turned her witchsight across the field and cursed herself for the mistake she had made.
Until that moment, she had believed Korhil was leading the asur reinforcements. She had been unaware of Tyrion’s presence. The jewel the Regent wore, the Heart of Avelorn, rendered him resistant to magic. It would have taken a more direct focus for her sorcery to detect him upon the field. Even so, Drusala berated herself for allowing such an oversight. She should have considered the possibility the moment the reinforcements had arrived.
She had hoped to employ Malus Darkblade as a counter against Malekith, a pawn to send against the Witch King. Far more vital to Morathi’s plans, however, was Tyrion. If the Dragon of Cothique fell, the consequences would be dire. Because of her mistake, her complacency, Drusala knew there was now a very real chance that the Regent would be killed. Alone, either Malus or Tullaris was enemy enough to test Tyrion’s mettle. Against both of them, the sorceress feared Tyrion would fall. He might slay one, but then the other would pounce on the weakened hero and cut him down.
Drusala had no choice. She had to cast aside her pawn to save Tyrion. She couldn’t act directly against either of the druchii warlords. The risk of her actions being made known to Malekith, the chance that the Witch King would discover her treachery, was too great. She had to act more subtly. She had to take a terrible risk, one that would allow the Regent a better chance than the odds he faced now.
Weakened by her onerous castings, Drusala turned back towards the Blood Coven. The surviving witches were only now beginning to stir. It was partly their duplicity that had brought things to such an impasse. It was only fitting that they should help set things right. Boldly, Drusala walked over to the witches. Before they could react, she clapped one of her hands against each of their foreheads.
‘Your queen needs your power,’ she said, a malignant glaze falling across her eyes. A sinister scarlet glow spread from Drusala’s hands, slithering down into the bodies of the Blood Coven, worming through the essence of their souls for every speck of energy that yet lingered within them.
At the Eagle Gate, Drusala had re-caged the daemon Tz’arkan. A link yet existed between them. The peril was enormous and it would take more magic than she could safely harness on her own in her weakened state, but she intended to exploit that connection.
By Hekarti, she only prayed she was able to act before it was too late to salvage her carefully laid plans.
Even as Drusala began her spell, she felt the aethyric vibration sweep through her. Far away some tremendous and profane ritual had been performed, a feat of magic so colossal that its echo was roaring through the winds of magic with the fury of a tempest. The sorceress exerted her will, trying to draw down the energies blown ahead of that storm, trying to harness the magic she needed before the aethyric tidal wave struck.
Tyrion lay in the dirt, blood streaming from the wound in his back. He glared up at Tullaris as the executioner raised his bloodied draich. It was an unsettling thing, to watch as his blood dripped from the ghoulish weapon.
‘Khaine told me I should find you here,’ Tullaris declared. Slowly, the executioner raised the First Draich.
As Tyrion saw the murderous weapon poised to take his head, a ghastly sensation turned his insides cold. A profound sense of loss, a loneliness that gnawed at his vitals and made his heart feel as cold as iron, a numb misery that washed through him with an agony unspeakable. His daughter, Aliathra, was dead. He didn’t know where or how, he only knew that she was. For an instant, he seemed to feel her soul reaching into his own. Then she was gone. Even her spirit was no more – it had been consumed by the same atrocity that had taken her life.
Fury blacker and more terrible than anything he had ever felt before filled Tyrion’s mind. Long had he feared the curse of Aenarion, the murderous madness that plagued all those of the first king’s bloodline. Now, he didn’t care. He didn’t care if this was the curse, if this was madness. All he cared about was the pain inside him. All he cared about was making it stop. All he cared about was making something suffer as he suffered.
He no longer felt the wound in his back or the weariness in his limbs. Strength poured through him – the power of rage and unbridled hate. Snarling like a rabid beast, Tyrion lunged at Tullaris as the executioner brought his draich slashing down. The Regent slid beneath the cutting blade and slammed into the druchii killer, bearing him to the ground. Roaring an inarticulate cry of unfettered savagery, Tyrion brought Sunfang stabbing into the executioner’s side. Tullaris struggled against the blade as it punched its way deeper into his body, puncturing armour, crushing bone and rupturing organs. Blood gushed over Tyrion’s hands as he ripped the sword free, severing the executioner’s spine.
Tullaris flailed his arms on the ground for a moment and then fell still. His eyes struggled to focus on the asur prince who stood over him. ‘Khaine told me I would find you here,’ he repeated. ‘I hear His voice even now, thundering through my brain. When this shell of flesh is finished, I will join Him.’ The executioner reached his hand out, fumbling blindly at the air. ‘Finish me. Set me free. Set yourself free.’
Tyrion glared down at Tullaris Dreadbringer, recounting in his mind the many atrocities, the countless sorrows this villain had inflicted upon Ulthuan. There was no mercy in him for this monster, no pity for this fiend. Let him die like a dog in the dust. It was a kinder doom than he deserved.
‘You are weak,’ Tullaris spat when Tyrion failed to deliver the killing blow. A cruel smile formed on the druchii’s bloodied face. Attuned to the Lord of Murder, long in the service of death and slaughter, Tullaris had felt that fleeting instant when Aliathra’s spirit had reached to her father. The executio
ner forced his paralysed body upright. His blind eyes struggled to find his enemy. A blue and gold blur was all he saw, yet towards this he turned a mocking smile.
‘You are weak,’ the executioner snarled again. ‘That is what killed your daught–’
Tyrion drove Sunfang into the executioner’s head before he could finish, cleaving it in half and spilling the fanatic’s brains. ‘This is what killed you,’ he spat. Tyrion pressed his boot against Tullaris’s chest and tried to wrench his burning blade free.
It was then that he heard Malhandhir’s warning snort and he remembered that his fight wasn’t with one infamous fiend but with two.
Like a jackal after the wolf is gone, Malus Darkblade came rushing in to finish the wounded Tyrion.
Tyrion’s horse tried to intercept Malus as the drachau charged towards the Regent. Spite barged past Malhandhir, sending the horse stumbling back with its side torn by the reptile’s claws.
Malus had eyes only for his intended prey. He had bided his time, waiting to see which of the combatants would prevail. He had to admit he was surprised to see Tyrion triumphant. He was grateful, in his murderous way, that the Regent had eliminated Tullaris for him. Now he wouldn’t have to bother about that small detail. He could devote his attention fully to the asur prince. The glory of killing the Dragon of Cothique would be his and his alone.
As Tyrion struggled to free Sunfang from Tullaris’s body, Malus charged. Not for an instant did he question the honour of striking his enemy from behind or taking advantage of a wounded foe. Such compunctions were for those too weak to endure, too soft to rule. He had made himself drachau by his own hand only by divesting himself of such foolish ideas as these. There was nothing, absolutely nothing, that he wouldn’t do to expand and maintain his power. The head of Tyrion would help him accomplish both, and no druchii would ever question how he had claimed his trophy.
Malus raised the warpsword, ready to cut down the Regent. The strength of iron was in his arm as he hefted the blade high. Then he felt that strength expand still further, felt waves of power rushing through him. His sword fell from his hand, clattering to the ground as a spasm of searing agony coursed through him.
The drachau cried out as the familiar, hideous sensation pulsed through his body. After so long thinking the daemon subdued, he could feel Tz’arkan rising once more. The daemon brushed aside the barriers presented by Malus’s mind and soul. Like wine pouring into a glass, the fiend was expanding to fill every corner of the elf’s essence.
It was the change, not brought on by any act of will on the part of Malus but by Tz’arkan itself!
Spite hissed in fright and tried to unseat its master as it sensed the change that was consuming Malus. This time the transformation was too swift for the horned one. Howling in pain, the reptile collapsed beneath the expanding mass of Tz’arkan as the daemon distorted flesh and bone, twisting the form of its mortal host into a shape more to its liking. Spite flopped against the earth, its back broken by the daemon’s weight. Tz’arkan grinned down at the crippled beast and brought one of its cloven hooves smashing down into Spite’s skull.
‘Does that make you sad, flesh-worm?’ Tz’arkan taunted the retreating soul of Malus. The daemon’s face twisted in a grisly leer. More of its essence came boiling up, driving the spirit of its host still further and further back into the darkness.
‘The witch, I warned you about her,’ Tz’arkan hissed. ‘Her magic caged me, now her magic frees me.’ Tz’arkan’s head rotated back on its neck, staring across Reaver’s Mark, glaring at the volcanic spur where Drusala stood. ‘Of course, she meant only a half-measure, to leave us a quivering heap of flesh, neither Malus Darkblade or Tz’arkan. We couldn’t have that, though. We’re much too strong for that now.’ The daemon paused, its leer turning into a snarl. ‘Still, your soul acted as a bridge, a chain she used to bind me again.’
Inside it, Tz’arkan could hear Malus pleading with it, begging it for mercy.
‘Shut up, mortal,’ Tz’arkan growled as it sent its essence flooding into that last tiny corner where the soul of Malus Darkblade lingered. The drachau’s spirit shrieked as the daemon smothered it into nothingness.
Tz’arkan’s eyes glowed with vindictiveness as it stared at the spur and Drusala. ‘What will you do, witch? How will you cage me now?’ The daemon laughed as it plucked the sorceress’s thoughts from the aethyr. ‘I think I’ll punish you by finishing what Malus started.’
The hulking daemon swung around. Asur and druchii alike had fled from the monster, drawing away and forgetting their own battle in the presence of this monstrous fiend. Only Tyrion remained, his blade finally torn free from the skull of Tullaris.
‘An elven princeling as an appetiser and then two armies to devour,’ Tz’arkan hissed at Tyrion. ‘Or should I save you as a dessert and let you watch all the others die before you? Would that…’ The daemon hesitated, its burning eyes shifting colours as it became aware that something wasn’t right with the elf who stood before it. There was a shadow, an aura hanging over the Regent of Ulthuan, something of such ghastly power that it caused even a daemon king like Tz’arkan to feel the icy touch of fear.
Tyrion stared up at the fiend. ‘What’s wrong, daemon? Have you lost your appetite?’
Bellowing its fury, Tz’arkan lunged at the asur prince. Its great claws tore at the ground as Tyrion nimbly darted away. ‘I shall give your soul to the furies as a plaything,’ Tz’arkan vowed, venom dripping from its fangs. Again the beast charged at its foe, but this time Tyrion darted beneath the sweep of its claws. The enchantments woven into Sunfang blazed into brilliance as he raked the blade across the daemon’s hide. Flesh bubbled like wax, ichor steaming from the hideous wound as writhing worms of dark magic slopped from the daemon’s marrow.
The daemon shrieked, its painful screech causing hundreds of elves across the battlefield to clap their hands to their ears in a futile effort to blot out the sound. Those closest to the fray collapsed to the ground, their bodies quivering in agony as Tz’arkan’s scream ripped at their souls.
Tyrion alone stood immune to the daemon’s howl. Rushing in, he slashed at the injured monster, raking its flesh again and again with the burning Sunfang. Step by monstrous step, he drove the fiend back. Tz’arkan plucked elves from where they lay in the dirt, flinging both the living and the dead at its foe. The asur prince deftly avoided each flailing body. Only when he was beside the carcass of Spite did he hesitate in his pursuit of the monster. Reaching down, Tyrion retrieved something from the bloodied earth. When he stood again, he held two blades in his hands. In his right, the holy energies of Sunfang blazed. In his left, the malefic power of the warpsword.
Tz’arkan growled at its enemy, a final snarl of hate and defiance. It had felt the bite of Sunfang and it knew the power of the warpsword. Against these weapons, in the hands of a mortal who had such an ominous presence lingering around him…
The daemon turned to flee, but as it did so it found its path blocked by a force of elves who, like Tyrion, didn’t cower before it. Caradryan and his Phoenix Guard had fought their way clear of the druchii and now hurried to support the Regent of Ulthuan. Their halberds stabbed at Tz’arkan, driving the beast back towards Tyrion.
Tz’arkan rounded on his pursuer. The daemon’s eyes blazed with infernal fires, scorching the waxy flesh of its face. Leathery lips pulled away from monstrous fangs in a grotesque leer. ‘Are you the best your people have to send against me?’ Tz’arkan hissed, its voice searing across the field like some morbid echo of the ancient volcanoes beneath Reaver’s Mark. The daemon cackled derisively. ‘You wear the trappings of a dead maniac and you think yourself a hero? The blood of madness pulses through your veins and you think yourself virtuous? You bear the blades of both righteousness and depravity in your hands and you do not see the hypocrisy?’
The elf stalked towards Tz’arkan, Sunfang and warpsword held at his sides. ‘I am
Tyrion of Cothique, heir of the line of Aenarion, son of Morelion! By the faith of my people am I Regent of Ulthuan–’
A cruel laugh rumbled from the massive daemon. ‘Regent? Then they would not have you as their king?’ Tz’arkan’s fiery eyes diminished into little slivers of malice. ‘Tell me, mock-king, why do you think that is? Could it be they know you for the mad dog you are? Could it be your gods have turned their faces from you?’ Tz’arkan laughed again as he saw the doubt that made Tyrion halt in his advance. The shadow of power still clung to the asur prince, but Tz’arkan thought of its own imprisonment within Malus Darkblade. However magnificent the power, the vessel was still but a mortal, and with that came mortal weakness.
‘Shall I tell you of the petty scavengers you call gods?’ Tz’arkan sneered. ‘I have seen them, little mock-king. I have seen them cast about themselves a veil of deceit and trickery that they might drain the strength of your foolish people and fatten on them like so many leeches! You place your faith in weak parasites who will not dare stir themselves in your hour of need.’
Tz’arkan saw the doubt spread, the hissing corruption of its voice clawing into Tyrion’s soul, drawing out all the doubts and fears that lurked within the hero. Still, the aura of power was there, wrapped all around the elf’s essence, almost blinding the daemon in its awful potency.
‘I may be benevolent,’ Tz’arkan declared. ‘If you like, I shall allow you to fly back to your court, mock-king. You can hide behind your fortress walls and the spears of your armies. You can find the safety of wizards and mages. Go, little mock-king! I allow you to run back to your castle. After all, if you die here, who will lead the asur in the futile fight to save their land?’
The seeds of doubt and fear provoked by the daemon’s voice dropped away from Tyrion as he raised his face and stared into Tz’arkan’s eyes. ‘It isn’t I who will die here this day, daemon.’ Grimly, he hefted Sunfang and warpsword, bringing the two crashing together above his head. The clash of their antithetical enchantments was like a clap of thunder, an explosion of arcane energy that went rippling away from the Regent.