Nothing could stop her now.
***
Tara-Khan fought the pain, even as he poured what little of his life was left into holding open the portal. If he stepped forward or back, if he stopped the lightning from his hands, the portal would close, and close forever. No one, not even the child of prophecy, could ever open it again, and the Ka’i-Nur Crystal of Souls would be lost forever. If Keel-Tath had opened it and stepped inside to gain its powers, the portal would have closed behind her, trapping her for eternity. It was, in fact, a trap set by Anuir-Ruhal’te’s opponents in the last gasp of the Second Age. They had not been able to destroy the crystal or upset her other plans, but in the end they had hoped to trap her future offspring.
Using the ancient, fragmentary knowledge of the Books of Time, Ayan-Dar and Ria-Ka’luhr had conspired to spring the trap, and for that they needed someone with the powers of a priest who had shared blood and soul with Keel-Tath.
They had needed Tara-Khan.
The portal again began to close. Crying out with the effort, he sent another wave of lightning into the ravenous vortex. A healer valiantly tried to put healing gel on his hands, braving the lightning, but her efforts were in vain. The symbiont nearly died, and so did she. Sar-Ula’an pulled her away before it was too late.
In the brief moments he could spare from the intense concentration necessary to keep the portal open, he had seen Keel-Tath with his second sight. She was leading a small host of warriors, including his tresh Ka’i-Lohr and old friend Drakh-Nur, down the stairway. He could not understand why she did not simply step through space to be with him, and feared that she might be too late.
His legs finally gave way and he collapsed to his knees. But the lightning still flew from his hands, and would continue to do so until he took his last breath.
It was then that bedlam erupted behind him as Syr-Nagath and her warriors fell upon his companions.
***
“Get back!” Sar-Ula’an pushed the healer who had tried to help Tara-Khan against the wall of the chamber as a hundred, perhaps more, Ka’i-Nur warriors dropped to the floor with an unlikely grace for such hulking brutes. Sar-Ula’an had already formed the surviving warriors in a protective arc around Tara-Khan and the robed ones, but he knew it would not last long against their attackers.
But the odds did nothing to deter his fellow warriors. They met the Ka’i-Nur in a thundering crash of steel upon steel. Exhausted as he had been only a moment before, Sar-Ula’an felt renewed as he was taken by the power of the Bloodsong, which burned in his veins like molten fire.
The battle would have been over much sooner had not the builders, who were still gathered around the base of the column, caused another section of stairway to fall. Nearly half the Ka’i-Nur were crushed under the weight of the stones that came crashing down. The rear rank of those who survived saw the builders, however, and wrought a swift and bloody vengeance with their swords.
Sar-Ula’an witnessed the slaughter, but he could do to nothing to save them. Ducking low as an enemy war hammer swept through the air where his head had just been, he lunged forward, driving his blade through a gap in the enemy’s armor near the hip. The Ka’i-Nur fell with an agonized scream, and Sar-Ula’an took off his head before he hit the floor.
The builders’ gambit bought the defenders time, but not enough. The Ka’i-Nur were too big, too powerful, too numerous, and were not facing exhaustion. The tide quickly turned, and the enemy warriors began to smash their way toward Tara-Khan and the robed ones.
Then Sar-Ula’an saw her. Syr-Nagath. He had never set eyes upon her face, but there was no mistaking her. Of normal size and appearance, unlike the giants of pure Ka’i-Nur blood, she wore a cloak and had the rune of the Ka’i-Nur emblazoned upon her breast plate as if she were a priestess. He had heard of her prowess with a sword, and saw now as she swept through those who stood before her that the tales were true. As she felled another of his companions, he moved to meet her in battle.
He never got the chance. A pair of Ka’i-Nur warriors charged forth, blocking his path, and it was all he could do to fend off their frenzied attack. He watched as Syr-Nagath killed yet another of the defenders before coming to stand directly behind Tara-Khan, her sword raised high.
“Tara-Khan!” Sar-Ula’an tried to warn him, but the priest who was not a priest did not move. He could do nothing if he was to continue holding open the portal.
Syr-Nagath then did a most unexpected thing: completely ignoring Tara-Khan, she sheathed her sword and braved the lightning to run through the portal.
“No!” Tara-Khan cried in surprise and anguish, but he was helpless to stop her.
As was Sar-Ula’an. He managed to land a painful blow on one of his two opponents that dropped him to the floor, howling in pain, but the other took the opportunity to charge forward, ramming his huge shoulder into Sar-Ula’an’s breast plate, sending him flying. Sar-Ula’an slammed into the wall, then slid to the floor, stunned, as the Ka’i-Nur warrior loomed over him. Roaring with bloodlust, the giant raised his battle axe high over his head, ready to strike a killing blow.
The blow never came. Sar-Ula’an blinked with relieved surprise as the warrior froze for a moment, just before his head toppled from his shoulders. The decapitated body collapsed in a twitching heap to reveal Keel-Tath, her blade red with blood.
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
“We must teleport,” Sian-Ala’i insisted, “or we may not catch them!”
“No.” Keel-Tath shook her head as she moved as quickly as she dared down the stairway. She could sense the builders below trying to keep it from collapsing, could feel their power at work in the stone. She could feel everything, sense everything, and it was near to overwhelming her. Her senses were amplified to a painful degree that became worse the closer she came to the crystal. Her second sight was deluging her with a torrent of images, as if she could see the entire universe at once, and she was having difficulty telling apart what her spirit and eyes were telling her. It was all she could do to keep her mind focused on the steps, to keep moving ever downward. More than once, she thought to stop in hopes that doing so might ease the flood of sensations, but she was terrified that she would never move again. “I dare not,” she said in a shaking voice. “I cannot control it. I could find myself on the far side of the galaxy.” And might take half the planet with me, she thought but did not say.
“Then let me lead us, mistress!”
Sparing a moment to turn and look Sian-Ala’i in the eye, Keel-Tath said, “That would be even worse, my priestess.” She was afraid that Sian-Al’ai’s power would magnify Keel-Tath’s own. Her expression hardening, she added, “No. We cannot teleport. Even you alone may not. Not here. Hear my words and obey.”
Bowing her head, Sian-Ala’i replied, “As you command, mistress.”
They continued down, slipping, sliding, and jumping over the transformed and damaged sections of the stairway, often at great peril.
“There!” One of the warriors, having leaned out over a section where the railing had fallen away, pointed down. Taking a shrekka from his shoulder, he flung it downward.
Keel-Tath and the others on the outside of the stairs looked down to find Syr-Nagath’s warriors gaping up at them. As if on an unspoken command, her own warriors began to barrage them with shrekkas and spears.
“They are building a platform,” Sian-Al’ai whispered.
Below them, a tracery of fine filaments that was only visible from the reflection of the torch light illuminating the chamber rapidly grew in the gap between the level where the enemy waited and the surrounding wall. Shrekkas that missed their intended targets hit the filaments and sliced through, but the webbing repaired itself almost instantly.
“We will not be able to cut it down,” Ka’i-Lohr observed.
Keel-Tath barely heard him. Her attention was drawn to the warrior, small among her companions, who stared up at her. Syr-Nagath. But from her Keel-Tath could feel nothing, her voice silent in the
Bloodsong that pounded through Keel-Tath’s veins. It was like looking at the image of a ghost.
Syr-Nagath ducked under cover as Keel-Tath’s warriors rained down more shrekkas, but to no avail.
The platform quickly gained in substance, until it was an arc of shimmering material that filled the space between the stairway and the wall.
En masse, Syr-Nagath’s warriors moved onto it.
“No,” Ka’i-Lohr breathed with a worried look at Keel-Tath.
She stood there, staring down as Syr-Nagath joined her warriors, who shielded her from the remaining shrekkas and spears Keel-Tath’s warriors threw.
The Dark Queen stared into Keel-Tath’s eyes and laughed as the platform plunged downward.
“Come,” Keel-Tath finally breathed. “Quickly.”
Moving with reckless speed, she again led them downward. The steps before them that had broken had now been mended, if only to a thickness that would support their weight. Keel-Tath absently realized that she was channeling the power of the builders, along with her own power, of course, to help repair the structure.
Down they went until they reached the level where Syr-Nagath and her host had been. The builders that must have been here were gone, and Keel-Tath had a momentary image of them fleeing down a long corridor on this level.
They heard the bellows of the Ka’i-Nur below as they attacked the honorless ones, then a horrendous crash of stone that silenced many of those very voices.
“Here,” she said, reaching down to take a handful of the fine threads in her hand. The strands had lost much of their tension now that the platform was no longer occupied. The entire structure the Ka’i-Nur builders had created was feather light. “Follow me.”
“Mistress,” Ka’i-Lohr said, putting a hand on her shoulder. “Let me go first.”
Shaking her head, she said, “Most of us can go at one time. There are plenty of strands. Take them in your hand like this,” she nodded her head toward the bunch she held, “and then do…this.”
In a smooth motion, she launched herself from the stairs. Holding the bunch of filaments in her hand, she wrapped her feet around them and shot downward as if she were sliding down a rope.
The others instantly followed.
Slithering down at a breakneck speed, Keel-Tath gritted her teeth, struggling to keep her mind focused. Her head pounded harder as she came closer to the Ka’i-Nur Crystal of Souls, and she could not fathom who could have opened the vessel, or had even known where or how to find it.
None of that mattered now, for the vessel stood open. Her goal now was to prevent Syr-Nagath from reaching it. She did not know if the crystal would bestow its powers upon one who stood in its light without a priest or priestess to act as a conduit, or if touching the crystal — or even standing in its presence — would kill Syr-Nagath. All Keel-Tath knew was that she could not take the chance of Syr-Nagath gaining whatever powers it might possess.
She could see the warriors battling below, the Ka’i-Nur hammering at a semicircle of honorless ones who were defending a solitary warrior. He was on his knees, lightning flying from his hands into a circular opening in the wall whose edges were white hot. With her heightened senses, she could feel the heat even from here, and cringed with pain as she drew closer.
The Ka’i-Nur pressed against the defenders, swords and battle axes rising and falling. Suddenly, like a dam giving way, the semicircle broke. The Ka’i-Nur roared as one with bloodlust as they poured through the gap and began to slaughter the honorless ones.
Her sword was already clear of its scabbard, and two Ka’i-Nur fell dead before she even touched the floor. She killed without a thought, the blade of her sword slicing through the enemy as if with a will of its own. Unerring, merciless. Surrounded by enemy warriors, she found plenty to kill as her companions joined the fray, adding their swords to the fight.
Finished with those nearest her, she found herself behind a Ka’i-Nur who was about to kill one of the honorless ones. With a blindingly fast slash of her blade, she took the enemy’s head from his shoulders.
The honorless one looked up at her, eyes wide, as the Ka’i-Nur’s body fell to the floor. “Keel-Tath,” he breathed.
She had no time to hear more before she found herself standing beside the warrior who knelt on the floor, pouring lightning, pouring his very life, into the ancient portal. His hands were charred and blackened, the armor on his forearms red hot, and yet still he held open the bridge between here and there.
She nearly dropped her sword as recognition swept over her. “Tara-Khan,” she whispered, her mind refusing to believe her eyes.
“Quickly, my love,” he gasped. “Syr-Nagath…she has gone through the portal!”
Tearing her eyes from the love she had been sure was lost, Keel-Tath turned to see Syr-Nagath running across the chamber to reach the crystal. Putting her hand on Tara-Khan’s shoulder, she closed her eyes and imagined him healed, wishing she had time to hold him and tell him what was in her heart.
But time was a luxury she did not have. With a glance behind her to make sure Sian-Ala’i and the others had the Ka’i-Nur warriors in hand, she reluctantly let go of Tara-Khan before plunging through the portal in pursuit of her quarry.
***
Syr-Nagath ran across the enormous domed chamber toward the pillar on which stood the crystal. She had read and heard accounts of how the other crystals were of differing colors, but the Ka’i-Nur Crystal of Souls was different. It was a light drinking black, so black that in its own way it seemed to glow, radiating darkness into its surroundings. She had never seen the like, but her joy surged as she grew closer, for with every step the power of the crystal grew. Its power surged and ebbed in her blood like white capped waves upon the ocean, and she laughed like a child.
Beyond her nearly delirious sense of joy, she could not help but be awed by the chamber itself, because she knew that it was not physically here. Had she cut into the stone of the stairwell where the portal was, she would have found herself amidst the glowing hot forges of the armorers, which was why no door had ever been put there. Whatever this place was, it was apart from reality in a way that she could not understand. That did not, of course, bother her in the slightest. She only understood that the powers of the crystal belonged to the Ka’i-Nur, and that meant they belonged to her.
At last, she reached the dais upon which stood the pillar holding the crystal. Gasping in excitement, she reached out with both hands to touch it, to take into herself whatever it might choose to give.
Nothing happened. Nothing at all, because she found she was unable to touch it. It was as if her fingers could almost contact its surface, but not quite. With a howl of fury she lunged forward, slamming her palms against the crystal’s facets, only to be rebuffed. It sat there, tantalizingly close, yet completely out of reach.
“It will only recognize the blood of the chosen one,” a quiet voice spoke from behind her.
Turning around, Syr-Nagath confronted Keel-Tath. Like Syr-Nagath, she was covered from head to toe in the blood of those she had slain.
Whirling her sword in a circle with her hand, Syr-Nagath said, “Then I shall spill your blood to satisfy it.”
***
Keel-Tath grunted in pain as she was struck by one of the bolts of lightning from Tara-Khan’s hands, but shrugged it off as she dashed after Syr-Nagath. In her mind’s eye, she imagined herself standing at the dais, putting herself in between the crystal and Syr-Nagath, ready to step into the not-space between here and there.
Nothing happened. She tried to leap from the ground to soar through the air, but couldn’t. She could not even project her second sight. Passing through the portal had somehow stripped her of her powers. Even the power of the Bloodsong was somehow muted in this place.
Accepting what was without pausing to try and understand why, she bent her head low and charged even faster after her opponent, but she could not hope to catch Syr-Nagath before she reached the dais.
And reach the da
is she did. Keel-Tath watched in horror as the Dark Queen reached for the crystal, which radiated a palpable darkness into the chamber, and was relieved when nothing happened.
Instantly, she knew why. Among all the crystals, this one was keyed only for her. Even had one of the other priests or priestesses somehow gained access to this place, they would not have been able to draw on the crystal’s power. She wondered at Anuir-Ruhal’te’s foresight in all that she had done, and wondered if any among her race would ever again have such infinite wisdom.
To be certain, it would not be Syr-Nagath. Slowing as she came upon her, Keel-Tath watched in amazement and disgust as the Dark Queen tried to hammer her hands against the crystal, to no avail.
Coming to a stop, Keel-Tath said in a quiet voice, “It will only recognize the blood of the chosen one.”
Syr-Nagath turned, spinning her sword in one hand with deadly ease. “Then I shall spill your blood to satisfy it.” She cocked her head. “Or would you simply destroy me with your powers, rather than face a challenge of sword and claw?”
“I grant you the right of challenge,” Keel-Tath allowed, “and vow not to use my powers.” She need not confess to the Dark Queen that her powers had somehow been nullified. She did not know if that, too, was part of Anuir-Ruhal’te’s plan, or perhaps some trap set by her opponents for Keel-Tath. It did not matter now. “But you shall not best my sword.”
“We shall see, child, we shall see.”
Before the last word had left her lips, Syr-Nagath lunged forward, driving her blade in a blindingly fast thrust toward Keel-Tath’s midsection. Keel-Tath parried it as she pirouetted around, timing her movement perfectly to land a brutal strike with one of her elbows to Syr-Nagath’s temple.
Syr-Nagath staggered for a moment but quickly shrugged off the blow. “My congratulations, child,” she granted. Turning, she attacked more cautiously, testing Keel-Tath’s defenses with a series of cuts and thrusts, slowly driving Keel-Tath back.
Having had enough, Keel-Tath went on the offensive, her sword flashing in the strange light of the crystal as she, in turn, forced Syr-Nagath to give ground. She began to worry, for she knew that Syr-Nagath was better than this. Keel-Tath, as good as her skills were, should have been fighting for her life, not sparring as if they were young tresh in the arena.
Mistress Of The Ages (In Her Name, Book 9) Page 32