The Captain stopped and peered at her with sightless emptiness and Tiadaria's sense of hope was renewed.
“I can't help you, little one. I can't even help myself. I am damned. As are you.”
With a thrust only slightly less powerful than that of which he was capable in life, he plunged the rusty scimitar into her. Tiadaria screamed as the flesh below her ribs parted, tearing away from the blade as the Captain's lich ran her through. The icy coldness of shock flashed through her and she tried to fight back the darkness. It was a battle she couldn't win. Still swaying against the ropes that bound her, Tiadaria passed from the physical realm.
#
Wynn came to at nearly the same time that the door to the common room exploded, sending a rain of wooden shards into the room. Faxon and Adamon dashed through the ruined door, their eyes blazing with the harnessed power of the Quintessential Sphere. These weren't mages prepared to defend themselves if necessary. They were ready for war, which is exactly what they got.
Wynn thought Faxon recovered well from the surprise of coming face to face with a dead man. The Captain's swords were dull and rusty, but still sharp enough to do serious damage. It was then that Wynn realized that the Captain's blade was already stained with blood.
That he had forgotten about Tiadaria was secondary to the shock that coursed through him when he saw her body slumped limply against the ropes. Blood stained her tunic around a ragged hole in her gut and her arm was covered in a sheen of drying blood. Wynn couldn't see her face, but her skin was pale and waxy.
His connection to the Quintessential Sphere was there, but it was too far away from him to be able to do anything to help. The Xarundi and his accomplices had planned this attack well. Without their magic, Tiadaria and Wynn wouldn't have stood a chance against the trio and the Captain's lich. Only the appearance of Faxon and Adamon improved the odds of their survival. A few city guards followed the quintessentialists into the room, but their presence meant little in the face of a quartet of determined foes.
“Wynn!” Faxon cried, recognizing his former apprentice.
Before Faxon could close the distance to where Wynn was hanging, the Captain had intercepted the quintessentialists. His scimitars flashed out, aided by power drawn from the sphere. Adamon countered with a spell to deflect the blades, pushing the lich off balance as the spell landed. Zarfensis leapt into battle, scattering the city guards with a single swipe of one muscular arm.
Faxon seized the distraction offered by the battle to run to Wynn, using a simple cantrip to sever the ropes binding him to the building supports. Adamon and the guards were holding their own against the Captain and the Xarundi. Tionne and Nerillia were gone. They'd also taken advantage of the initial moment of conflict and made a hasty retreat. Wynn removed the restraints and rubbed his wrists, trying to restore circulation cut off by hours of abuse.
“Faxon!”
With an apologetic glance, Faxon abandoned Wynn and rejoined the fight that was raging around them. One of the city guards was splayed against the wall, his entrails spilled down the front of his obliterated leather armor. The Captain's lich was a blur of frenetic motion, holding both of the remaining soldiers at bay with ease. Faxon and Adamon had teamed up against Zarfensis, who, despite the missing eye, was providing a more than adequate challenge for the pair of them.
Without his magic to call on, Wynn knew there was nothing he could do to assist either of them, so he turned his attention to Tiadaria. He put his fingers against her throat, feeling for the life beat. He found one, but only barely. It was far too faint and far too slow. She was nearly gone. His stomach leapt into his throat. He lifted her face, prying one eye open. Only the whites showed. She was almost gone.
Wynn, his fingers trembling, untied the ropes that held Tiadaria to the posts. She slumped to the floor between them. It was then that he saw the Captain's blade had gone straight through her. He couldn't imagine the kind of damage that would do and didn't want to. Wynn rolled her over and tore one of the sleeves from his robe, doubling it over into a thick pad which he pressed against the wound in her abdomen. He pressed his hand against the puncture in her back, feeling only a tingle of the link shock that normally bound them together.
There was a roar and Wynn's attention was torn from Tiadaria to see Faxon and Adamon backed into the corner by the lich and Zarfensis. The other city guards were dead. They'd simply been no match for the horror they had come to face. Wynn could relate. He was torn between wanting to help the quintessentialists and doing what little he could to keep Tiadaria alive. Helplessness and frustration welled up in him, fighting with anger and fear to take control of him. He forced all of his emotions down, struggling not to panic.
Wynn heard Faxon speak in a voice so unlike him that he actually did a double take. The quintessentialist's eyes were blazing. In one hand, he held a crystal orb. Inside the orb danced formless ivory flames. Faxon brought his other palm down on the globe and screamed a word of command.
The flash that filled the room was blinding. Wynn heard the Captain's lich scream, an unworldly screech that seemed to come from within the Deep Void and made his skin crawl. The roar that followed was easy to identify as Zarfensis. The air moved around Wynn and he felt something massive strike the wall behind him. A snarl nearby made Wynn instinctively grab Tiadaria and drag her toward where he'd last seen Faxon.
There was a crack, the sound of splintering wood and then silence. A silence so deep and sudden that it was almost as unnatural as the Captain's lich had been. Wynn blinked a few times, hoping to clear the flash blindness from his vision and finding himself unable to see. Half blind was bad enough, being unable to see at all was maddening.
“Faxon? Adamon?” he called, perversely pleased that his voice didn't crack as he'd expected it to. “Are you here? Are you alright?”
“Here is one thing,” Adamon's stern voice answered. “Alright, another.”
“We're both here and okay, Wynn,” Faxon's voice had returned to normal.
Wynn shuddered. He'd never seen Faxon so consumed by the power of the Sphere and he wasn't sure he wanted to again. He'd heard stories of mages that went mad with power, unable to control what they pulled from the Quintessential Sphere. Wynn knew that Faxon was regarded as one of the most powerful quintessentialists of their time, but he'd had no idea to what extent that power ran.
“I can't see, Faxon.” Wynn turned his head, trying to figure out where the others were by sound. “Tia's hurt, it's bad.”
“I know,” Faxon was beside him now. Wynn could feel him on his right. That meant that the presence on his left would be Adamon.
“We have to save her,” Wynn said, almost pleading. “I'm not sure we can stop this without her.”
“Nor I,” Faxon agreed grimly. “Adamon, what can you do?”
“Me?” Adamon's voice was incredulous. “Nothing.”
“We may not be friends,” Faxon snarled. “But I know your history, Adamon. You were a cleric before you became an inquisitor. You were powerful. A 'power of the Lyr' Master Tanglar put it, before you mysteriously quit and never looked back.”
“Please, Adamon.” Now Wynn was pleading in earnest. “Please, you have to save her.”
“Why?”
The mage's voice was cold and hard. Wynn turned his head to face the sound of Adamon's voice, staring at him with a sightless eye.
“Why? Because we need her!”
“No,” Adamon countered. “You need her. She is a rogue mage. The flawed product of another rogue mage. As far as I can see, this is justice. She's been put down by the one who created her.”
“Mages aren't created! They're born! You know that she couldn't control her becoming a mage any more than you could! She was born to the clans, they don't even recognize our laws. How could she have presented herself to the Academy?”
Wynn wondered why Faxon wasn't coming to his aid. How could his former mentor abandon him now? When Wynn needed him most?
“She lives here now
,” Adamon retorted. “She knows the laws of the Human Imperium, but somehow they don't apply to her. Just as they didn't apply to her mentor. Yes, I know all about Captain Royce MacDungren. I know that he was a rogue mage who kept his abilities just out of sight of the King and managed to have enough of the right friends in the right places to evade my censure all those years.”
“So you're taking it out on Tia?” Wynn screamed. “You can't!”
“Give me one good reason why.”
“Because he's right,” Faxon interrupted, his voice slow, low, and calm. “Because she may be the only way that the Captain's lich can be defeated and the Imperium saved. And you know it.”
There was a long pause and Wynn felt Tiadaria's body move. At first, he thought she might be coming to, then he felt Adamon shift next to him. His hands were on the body now, lingering at her throat.
“She's almost gone,” he said, his voice no softer than it had been. “Letting her go would be a mercy.”
“We need her. I need her.” Wynn was no longer pleading. He was stating a fact. He was certain that if they were going to reverse the darkness falling on Dragonfell, Tiadaria would be instrumental to their cause.
“I can't just bring her back,” Adamon snapped. “That's not how the Quintessential Sphere works. Every grant must be repaid. I might be able to heal some of the wounds. Maybe, possibly, save her life. You expect me to make her ready for combat. That, I cannot do.”
“There is a way,” Faxon said quietly.
“No.”
“Adamon, it is the only way.”
“I won't do it, Faxon. You ask too much.”
“I ask only for what is required. I offer myself in tribute.”
“What?” Wynn was lost. His mind adrift on uncertain seas. “Faxon, what are you talking about?”
“Every grant must be repaid,” Adamon repeated, his voice harsher than before. “Faxon means to trade his life for hers. To use the power of the Lyr to take his life and restore hers. And that's not all he asks. The spell is extremely hazardous to the mage acting as the conduit. Some never recover.”
“Faxon!” Wynn gasped. “No...you can't. We need you. We need both of you. How are we going to save the city? How are we going to save the Imperium?”
“Tia will have you,” Faxon said and Wynn felt his hand on his shoulder. “I have faith in you.”
The weight of those words seemed to sink like lead in Wynn's belly. They wouldn't be enough. He was skilled, but he'd never match Faxon's raw talent in controlling the forces of the Quintessential Sphere. Tiadaria would need him. His mind turned suddenly back to Ethergate. Standing in the road, Zarfensis's claws around his throat, unable to do anything but wait for death to come. Waiting for Tia to save him.
“No,” Wynn said suddenly. “Me. Take me.”
“Wynn--”
“Faxon, no. Tia will need you. Who knows how long I'll be cut off from the Sphere? I don't know what they did to me and neither do you. You'll need Tia. She needs me now. Take me.”
“I haven't even said I'll do it,” Adamon roared.
“You will.”
“Why is that, Master Wynn?”
“Because you love the Imperium enough to become an inquisitor, Adamon. No matter what you think of Tiadaria, or the Captain, or of me, or of rogue mages, you won't let the Imperium fall when there is anything you could do to stop it. You may be an ass, but it's not in your nature to sacrifice everyone for an ideal.”
In the long pause that followed, Wynn was almost sure that Adamon would still refuse. Finally, there was a gusty sigh beside him that told him Adamon had accepted the responsibility.
“Wynn,” Faxon said urgently. “Don't do this. We'll find another way.”
“There is no other way. Tia's out of time. We're all out of time. Get me to the hospital. Who knows. Maybe I'll make it out of this.”
“You won't,” Faxon's voice was sorrowful. “But I'll make sure everyone knows what you did here today.”
Wynn swallowed a sudden lump in his throat.
“Quickly, Adamon,” he said. “Time's up.”
The words that Adamon spoke were unlike any that Wynn had ever heard. He knew the clerics had a language all their own, words of command that came down from the Lyr and the forces of life and light that it drew its power from, but he'd never heard them spoken. In fact, spoken was the wrong word. What came from Adamon's lips was more of a sung prayer to the power of the Sphere.
A warmth began in the center of his chest and spread out to his extremities as he listened. Wynn thought of when he was young, when his mother would lower him into a warm bath. She'd sing to him then, as she bathed him. He could almost hear her voice now.
He closed his eye, following the voice into the ether, allowing it to carry him up, lift him out of his body. Everything seemed to fade away. The only thing that was left was the sweet melody his mother was singing, leading him into the infinite expanses of the Etheric Sphere.
The voice faded away, an echo of an echo. For the briefest of moments, Wynn was apart from everything and a part of it all. He stood behind himself and took in the room. His hands were still on Tiadaria, holding the makeshift bandages in place. Adamon was beside him on one side, still chanting the words that were channeling his life into Tiadaria. Faxon was on the other, his hand still on Wynn's shoulder.
Tiadaria's body spasmed and Wynn felt faint. He saw Tiadaria's hand move and he knew he could let go. And he did.
CHAPTER NINE
Tiadaria awoke in the middle of a field. She sat up, her head spinning. The ground was oddly soft under her, spongy almost. Climbing to her feet, she glanced around the clearing. Tiadaria knew exactly where she was. This was the training field near the cottage in King's Reach. It was different though. The colors of the trees and grass were muted, pale imitations of their normal vibrancy. What struck her most was the lack of sound. There were no insects buzzing, no birds singing, and no rustle of wind through the trees. All was still and quiet.
“I was wondering when you'd get here, little one.”
She whirled and saw the Captain, not the weatherworn corpse, but the actual Captain, hunkered down in the grass a short distance away. Tiadaria wanted to run to him, but something stopped her. A hazy memory she couldn't quite put her finger on.
“Where are we?”
“The training field,” the Captain chuckled. “I'd have thought you'd have recognized it by now, little one.”
“There's something wrong. It's different.”
“Different isn't wrong. Just different. The Etheric Sphere is a pale imitation of the physical world, in an almost literal sense. Things here are very 'almost'.”
Tiadaria's gut went cold, the hairs on the back of her neck seemed to stand on end.
“Are...are we, 'almost'?” She didn't really want an answer to that question, but knew it had to be asked.
The Captain nodded.
“Almost dead, or almost alive. Depends on how you look at it.”
“And so we're here?”
“It would seem so,” the Captain agreed. “I think it's a place that we both took comfort from in life. Only fitting that we should return here when we are both so close to death.”
The memory that had been evading her materialized. The agony of his blade flashed through her and she clutched her stomach. Then it was gone. She was surprised to find the ugly wound there, but no pain to accompany it. Tiadaria prodded the edge of the ragged gash with an exploratory finger.
“You can remember the pain you felt in life, little one, but you'll feel no pain here. In time, you'll forget the wound and it will fade. Or you can choose an entirely different avatar. Boundaries are fluid in the Sphere.”
“You killed me,” she said, her voice soft and ragged. “How could you? I thought--”
“The thing that killed you isn't me. Not really. It has my memories, my thoughts, my skills and knowledge, but it isn't me. It is forced to obey whatever commands it is given by the magic that binds it.
Without free will, the construct isn't me. It, like this place, is a pale echo of what I was.”
“I thought you might be able to break through, to save me.”
“Then you were doomed from the start, little one. The only one who can save you is yourself. Didn't I teach you to stand on your own? That you, and you alone, are the only person on all of Solendrea that you can be certain of?”
“You did.” She faltered, looking out over the clearing and its static trees. She'd have given anything to see a single bird on a branch, or a bee buzzing about the sallow wildflowers that dotted the grass. “But it's lonely.”
“Our lives are solitary, Tiadaria. We are unique. We alone can stand against some that would seek to tear down the Imperium and its people. In our prime, we don't have time for others. Our duty won't permit it.”
“I thought I could have both.”
“Unlikely,” he snorted. “Remaining vigilant requires all our time and resources. Other relationships consume those valuable resources. Think about what brought you here. How much of what you've seen could you have prevented, if you had seen it? How much could you have changed if you'd have been present?”
“I never wanted this!” she screamed. “I was just a girl. You made me into what you thought I should be, I never had a choice!”
The Captain shook his head.
“You never had a choice, but not because I took it from you. Would you, could you, stand idly by while the Imperium falls? If you want a choice, make it now. Walk away.”
Tiadaria stood and stared at him. What was this madness that he was speaking? How could she just walk away? How could she allow hundreds or thousands of innocent men, women, and children die just because she wouldn't take responsibility for their safety?
“I--”
“You can't. No more than I could. We are breeds apart, Tiadaria. It was your destiny to come to me that day on the executioner's platform. You were guided by the hand of the Primordials. They had a plan for you. The only choice you ever had was the one you make every day: walk away and let the evil win, or accept your responsibility and fight for good.”
The Swordmage Trilogy: Volume 03 - The Pegasus's Lament Page 15