by Rachel Aaron
“We can handle this,” he said, clapping his lieutenant on the shoulder. “We are the chosen protectors of the world, blessed by the Shepherdess herself. She would not have given us our gifts if we were not able to handle whatever situation arose.”
“Yes, sir,” the man said, gripping his sword with renewed determination.
Alric smiled and released his grip, hoping he hadn’t just told the biggest lie of his career.
“Spread out,” he ordered. “We’re going to take the creature down in one strike, before it can eat our swords. I will deal the cutting blow to the chest that frees the seed. The rest of you focus on its joints. Try to take off the limbs, just like in drill.”
“Yes, sir!” the men shouted, fanning out in a circle.
Alric positioned himself at point, directly in front of the demon, who was still feeding with little attention to its attackers.
Alric drew his sword with a crisp metallic scrape. It lay heavy and perfect in his hands, impossibly long and slender, the cutting edge glowing with its own golden light. He looked at it sadly. His beautiful Dunelle, Last Sunlight, his partner and treasure. If this strike succeeded, it would probably be her last. From the way the hilt pressed into his palm, she knew it. But she shone as brightly as ever, urging him to strike the blow. Alric tightened his grip. She had been his best sword; he owed her a valorous death.
Sensing danger, the demon stopped eating. It coiled itself on what was left of the sandy arena floor, enormous claws flexed and ready, its jaw open and drooling around its horrible, ragged teeth.
“On my mark,” Alric said, raising his glowing blade. “Three. Two. One—”
As the word left his mouth, a whistling scream drowned out his voice. He threw his head back just in time to see something white crashing through the buildings behind him. It flew screeching over his head and into the arena, striking the demon square in the chest.
The demon’s scream ripped through Alric’s mind as the ground rocked under his feet. The shock wave hit him a second later, knocking him over. Alric’s hands went instinctively to cover his face as he landed hard on his side, buried instantly by the wave of dirt, rocks, and broken swords that flew out from the impact. For a moment, he lay there, stunned, and then he began to thrash, kicking himself to his feet and scrubbing the dirt from his eyes just in time to see something enormous, white, and sharp-toothed running across the ruined city toward him.
“Alric, isn’t it?” said a familiar, female voice. “Are you all right?”
Alric looked up to see a ghosthound staring down at him, and on its back was a redheaded woman with a concerned expression on her face.
“Miranda Lyonette,” he said, coughing. “What are you doing here?”
“Saving your neck, League man,” the ghosthound growled, nodding toward the center of the arena.
Alric turned to look. The place where the demon had been crouching seconds earlier was now nothing but an enormous crater. He stared at it for a second, not quite believing what he saw.
“What did that?”
Miranda grinned and pointed behind him. Slowly, Alric turned around and his eyes went wide. Standing on the rim of the canyon that surrounded the bandit city was Heinricht Slorn. He was crouched on one knee, holding something on his shoulder that Alric didn’t have a name for. Nearly as long as Slorn was tall, it was metal and hollow, like a tube. It had two legs in front that dug into the ground at Slorn’s feet to brace its weight, but its back was a nest of piping that hooked to an enormous wagon, which was absolutely covered with water. Even at this distance, Alric could see the blue water arcing in and out of a dozen different containers, moving against gravity and glowing with its own watery light.
Alric shook his head and sheathed his sword. Of course Slorn was here. He should have known it would all come together. At the canyon’s edge, Slorn lowered the metal tube from his shoulder and hopped into the water-filled cart. The cart began to move as soon as he was in, climbing down into the valley on spindly spider legs. It picked its way over the wreckage and came to a stop at the arena’s edge. The cart knelt and Slorn climbed down, landing stiffly beside Miranda.
“Well,” the Shaper said, staring at the crater. “That worked rather well.”
“Quite,” Alric said. “Mind telling me what you did?”
Slorn reached into the bag slung across his chest and took out a white object. It was the size of a small melon, slightly longer than it was round, and sharpened to a rough point at one end. Its surface was smooth, like carved soap, and from the way Slorn held it, Alric could tell it must be very heavy indeed.
“What is it?”
“Bone metal,” Slorn said. “Rather amazing stuff, really.”
“And inedible by demons,” Alric finished. “Very clever. But how did you do that?” He pointed at the destroyed buildings.
Slorn gave him an astonished look. “Water pressure,” he said, like it should be obvious. “Spiritualist Lyonette was kind enough to lend me the use of her sea.”
Alric glanced at the blue water that was still flowing in great arcs from barrel to barrel and smiled. “You made a bone-metal shot for a water cannon powered by a sea?”
“Can you think of a better way to take down a demon as powerful as Sted?” Slorn said.
“Yes,” Alric said. “But in the absence of the Lord of Storms, I’ll take your solution. In the future, though, Heinricht, I’d appreciate it if you left League business to the League, or at least told us what you meant to do before you did it.”
Slorn had the good grace to look abashed at that, and Alric stood up to survey the damage. The other League men were getting up as well, many slowly, some clutching broken bones. But they obeyed instantly when Alric motioned for them to form a perimeter around the crater. Once his men were in position, Alric moved forward, keeping his hand on his sword as he crawled up the crater’s edge to peek into the hole Slorn’s cannon had left.
The demon lay sprawled at the bottom of the crater, motionless. Its long, unnatural arms were flung spread-eagle, the left one shattered below the second elbow. The demon’s head was bent backward at a hideous angle and surrounded by broken teeth while its chest was caved in completely, the shell-like skin shattered around the bone-metal slug, which had passed straight through the ribs to lodge in the creature’s spine.
Alric was still studying the damage when he heard a scrape on the dirt. He turned to see Miranda lying next to him, staring wide-eyed into the crater.
“Is it dead?” she whispered.
“A demon is never dead until you take its seed, Spiritualist,” Alric said. “You can watch if you like, but do not interfere.”
He could see her starting to ask what he meant, but Alric gave her no chance. He stood up and signaled to his men. They nodded, and the League members began to move slowly down into the crater. When they were in arm’s reach of the demon, Alric drew his sword. He could see the seed’s edge through the demon’s shattered chest, a black, wet, oblong shape just below the heart, wrapped in bloody tissue. Alric cursed under his breath. Most seeds were a few inches long, never more than six. If his eyes weren’t deceiving him, this seed was over a foot. No wonder the demon had given them so much trouble. He didn’t even want to think about what would have happened if this seed had awakened in a wizard instead of a spirit-deaf lug like Sted. Seeing the reality of the situation, Alric began to regret all the times he’d championed Slorn’s research. If he’d known that something like this was living inside Nivel, he would have killed the woman himself.
He held his sword out, slipping the point deftly inside the demon’s shattered chest. But just as he was about to press his blade against the sinew connecting the seed to the host body, he heard the faint sound of a sucked-in breath.
Alric threw himself back, snatching his sword out just in time to block the enormous black claw before it landed in his head. The demon launched itself up with a earth-shaking roar, its shattered arm flopping helpless at its side as its good claw pu
lled on Alric’s blade. Alric tried to yank his sword free, but the creature slid its claws down the blade to grab Alric’s arm. The claws dug into his flesh, and the monster lifted him clean off the ground. He barely had time to kick before it threw him as hard as it could.
Alric tucked and rolled, landing on his feet at the edge of the crater. But even as he caught his balance, he heard a hideous crunching as the demon grabbed one of his men and shoved him, sword and all, into its mouth. The other League members cried out and charged, hacking at the demon with their screaming swords. The demon ignored them. It simply kept eating, pushing Alric’s lieutenant between its broken teeth as it devoured the man whole.
“The head!” Alric shouted, charging back down the crater. “Take off the head!”
But it was too late. The moment the lieutenant vanished down the monster’s throat, its wounds began to heal. Its broken arm snapped itself back together with a hideous cracking of bones, and the gaping hole in its chest began to knit together. The League men were still attacking, but the sword wounds closed as soon as they were made, and each new strike injured the sword more than the monster it struck.
“Fall back!” Alric shouted, grabbing the nearest soldier.
His men scrambled back, and the demon rolled to its feet, screaming as a fresh wave of demon panic washed out of the crater.
“Alric!” Slorn shouted.
Alric whirled around to see Slorn back atop his wagon with the long metal cannon on his shoulder again, and this time, Miranda was beside him.
“Hold it down!” the bear-headed man bellowed.
He didn’t need to say anything else. Alric threw out his hand and opened his spirit until the entire panicking world was roaring in his ears. He grabbed everything, every weeping spirit, every terrified spec of dust he could touch, and forced them all into one command.
DON’T MOVE.
The world froze, and the demon fell to its knees. It threw its head backward, roaring in defiance as it fought the command, but Alric held it firm. It took everything he had. He could feel the sweat pouring down his face, feel everything in the town fighting his hold in the panic to escape the demon, but he did not let go. With every second that passed, he fought to hold it just a second more, hoping it would be enough.
“Do it!” he shouted. “Do it now!”
On the edge of his vision, he saw Slorn slam the bone-metal slug into his cannon. Behind him, Miranda raised her arms. The spider-legged wagon began to shake as the impossibly blue water raced across it, picking up speed as it flowed from barrel to barrel in an endless loop. Slorn mouthed a command, and the cannon’s metal legs uncurled, anchoring the Shaper on the wagon’s top just as the Spiritualist thrust her hands forward. The second her hands moved, the water followed, blasting itself into the piping at the cannon’s back. There was an enormous crack as the water hit the bone metal, and then the sea’s triumphant roar. The bone-metal slug shot out of the cannon faster than Alric could see, nearly turning the wagon over with its force. It split the air with a whistling scream, flying right past Alric’s ear to land square in the demon’s neck.
The shock wave blasted Alric into the air. He landed on his back in the dirt, but was on his feet in an instant, waving his hands in a desperate attempt to see what had happened. The crater was thick with blown-out dirt. He could hear Slorn’s wagon scrambling behind him, probably trying to right itself after the cannon’s kick, but he couldn’t see anything but yellow, billowing dust.
He’d taken two blind steps when the demon’s claws lashed out of the dust cloud and hit him hard in the shoulder. Alric went down with a shout, raising his sword instinctively to block the next blow. But the claws went right over him, thrashing wildly through the air.
Alric rolled clear, gripping his bleeding shoulder as the dust began to settle. The first thing he noticed was that several of his men were down, knocked over by the blast wave or taken out by the demon, he didn’t know. The cratered arena they’d been fighting in was now twice as deep, and he could see the outline of the demon at its center, still madly lashing out. Alric wiped the dust from his eyes with a bloody hand. How could it still be standing? Had the shot missed? But as his vision cleared, he saw the truth. The demon’s head was gone, blasted clean off, but the body was still fighting. It struck blindly, the claws stabbing out. As he watched, one of the random blows landed in the back of one of his downed men.
Alric shouted, but it was too late. The man screamed as the claw skewered him, and the demon stopped thrashing to lunge at its kill, dragging the man toward its ruined body as its claws began to eat his flesh right then and there, drinking in his power to heal its wounds.
“Shoot it again!” Alric shouted, scrambling up the edge of the crater. “Damn it, Slorn, shoot it again! Now!”
Miranda jumped down from the scrambling wagon, landing on her waiting ghosthound. The water followed her, sliding over her shoulders like a mantle as the hound cleared the distance to Alric in one jump.
“There aren’t any more shots,” she said as Gin slid to a stop. “We only had two.”
Alric gritted his teeth. “Then we do this the hard way.” Miranda jumped down. “What do you mean the har—Wait!”
But Alric was already gone. He charged through the dust cloud, picking up speed as he ran down the crater toward the demon, who was still eating its victim.
He launched himself off the slope, drawing his sword in a golden flash. Hungry and blind, the demon didn’t raise a claw to defend itself. Alric’s blow sliced into its back, his golden blade peeling through the demon’s shell and into its spine. The creature screamed, and the demon panic hammered Alric’s mind. But he was further than fear could reach. He pressed the blow, cutting down through the demon’s torso. It dropped the soldier and reached backward, clawing wildly at Alric, but it was too late. With a shout of triumph, Alric turned his sword and sliced up through the tissue that connected the seed to its host.
The demon howled. Claws ripped into Alric’s back and threw him down. He landed under the demon’s clawed feet. There was no time to dodge; the thrashing demon’s claws landed right on top of him. He closed his eyes, bracing for the explosion of pain as the demon’s foot ripped into his chest, but he felt nothing. He opened them again, staring up in amazement. The demon’s foot was on his chest, but there was no weight to it. The monster was still thrashing, but with every movement, bits of it were breaking away. The demon was crumbling like ash, breaking apart and floating away. Already, the fear was receding as the demon crumpled in on itself. By the time Alric managed to sit up, it was nothing more than a pile of black dust around a long, black seed.
Alric took a deep, pained breath. It was over. The demon was dead. He looked around, doing a quick count of his men. Two dead for certain, three more lying motionless, but the rest were pushing themselves up. Not bad considering what they’d faced without the Lord of Storms’ backup. But there was one loss he felt more than the others.
Alric looked down at the sword in his hands. The long, slender blade still glowed faintly with its own golden light, but the cutting edge was ravaged. Enormous chunks were missing, leaving great gaps all the way to the core of the blade.
“Dunelle,” he whispered. “My Last Sunlight. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
“You did what had to be done.” His sword’s ringing voice was warped and muffled with pain, but the pride in the words stood bold and clear. “It has been an honor to serve you, sir.”
The golden light grew dimmer as it spoke, and Alric felt tears in his eyes for the first time in a century. “The honor has been mine,” he whispered, laying the destroyed blade across his knees.
He heard the crunch of boots behind him, but he did not take his eyes from the blade until the last of the golden light faded out completely.
“A noble sword,” Slorn said, his voice soft by Alric’s ear. “One of the finest I ever made.”
Alric nodded, but said nothing. Slorn knelt down beside him. “I know it will be no r
eplacement, but I can make you another blade.”
“I don’t need another blade,” Alric said, sliding his ravaged sword back into its sheath.
Slorn left it at that. “You should see to your wounds.”
“What,” Alric said, “and leave the seed to you?”
Slorn stiffened. “That is not what I meant, but it is Nivel’s seed.” He turned his bear head, staring at the long, black shape lying in the demon’s dusty remains. “It is all I have left of our work together, of our lives. If I was ever kind to you, Alric, if our work ever opened a door of thought in your mind, you will let me study it a moment before you lock it away.”
Alric heaved a deep sigh and waved him on. Slorn stood with a murmur of thanks and walked over to kneel by the seed, staring at it with an intensity Alric had never seen.
“You really should do something about that shoulder,” said a voice behind him. “You’re bleeding everywhere.”
He looked back to see Miranda hovering at the edge of the crater.
“Thank you for your concern, Spiritualist,” he said, pushing himself up. “But your worry is wasted. I am very hard to kill. It is my gift.”
Miranda frowned. “Your gift?”
Alric smiled. It was refreshing to meet someone who didn’t know all the secrets for once. “The League requires great sacrifices of its members. To counterbalance this, the Lord of Storms bestows gifts upon us. Some men choose power, others choose invulnerability. I chose eternal life.”
“You mean you can’t be killed?” Miranda said, impressed.
Alric frowned. “There is a wide difference between eternal life and invulnerability to death. I can be killed just like any other man, given enough damage, but over the years I’ve gotten fairly good at staying alive. Don’t worry, it will take more than this to kill me.”
He left her pondering that and walked off to gather what was left of his men. There was much to clean up before the day was done.
“Eternal life,” Miranda said, shaking her head. “No wonder he’s always so smug. I’d be smug too if I knew I was going to survive most anything.”