by Mark B Frost
Abaddon suddenly stopped and his eyes went wide. His hand shot up to his Dual Blade and he drew it as he turned around in a fluid motion. “Those boulders we just passed were mirages and the shrubs were carrying warding spells. They just slid away and a large force has come out of hiding. Can you feel it?”
For a moment, Atheme Tethen panicked. He saw nothing but a sheet of solid white and his hands clenched uselessly into fists. Then his warrior instincts and years of experience snapped into place, his eyes narrowed, and he was a soldier again. He extended his sare, drew his Morabet, and charged back down the canyon. “How many are there?”
Abaddon was a step behind him. “We brought two thousand soldiers, twice that many are surrounding them. I can feel our numbers being chipped away. This is my fault. If you and I were marching with the army, they might not have been caught by surprise.”
The troops came into sight and Atheme saw that Abaddon was correct. The soldiers of Felthespar were caught off guard, surrounded by a swarm of Revians twice as large as their own force. The Lord Councilor felt his temper slip. “Regrets will come later. For now, destroy them!”
He felt a wave of ether suddenly shift to his right, then Abaddon leaped into the fray with a roar that froze blood. Atheme veered off and tacked around to the canyon wall, hoping to take out a large group of enemies with powerful spells. Out of the corner of his eye he saw entire bodies flying into the air where Abaddon was fighting, but he blocked it out and focused on his own battle.
He cut into a group of soldiers wearing dirt-brown uniforms. He surmised these uniforms had probably made the camouflage spell more stable. This reminder filled him with further rage and he ferociously renewed his onslaught. He began slicing through troops with sword and sare mercilessly, tearing dozens of enemies apart. He cut troops in half with the force of his Morabet, as the blinding speed of his sare dismembered or lamed any enemy within its range. For a few minutes, Atheme Tethen became a Destroyer himself.
Despite his ferocity, the damage he dealt was relatively low. These Revian soldiers were better than any he had fought, and managed to stave off most of his attacks. One spearman came within a foot of striking him down, but at the last second Atheme spun his sare in the man’s direction and reduced his flesh to ribbons. He fell with a sickening gurgle, but by the time his lifeless body hit the ground Atheme was set upon by four other men. While he was killing them off an arrow embedded itself into his shoulder, and with a short gasp he came back to himself. He sheathed his Morabet and spun his sare in a circle over his head, clearing some room. It only took a second for the soldiers to close back in on him, but it gave him time to size up the situation.
The sounds of chaos filled the chasm surrounding him, but somewhere close to the center of the crowd he heard Abaddon’s voice shouting orders. He smiled and felt a pang of regret. For once, Abaddon had maintained composure while Atheme had acted solely on rage. He resumed his killing spree, but now began running battle calculations.
They had been outnumbered since the beginning, and the element of surprise had quickly reduced their numbers even further. Furthermore, the Revian soldiers had responded to the tides of the battle swiftly, allowing them to utilize their advantages and minimize their disadvantages. In the time that he had been fighting even Atheme had amassed several deep wounds, something out of the ordinary for him.
If they were going to win this battle they needed two things: quick, effective organization, and attacks that could kill large numbers of enemies at a time. Abaddon seemed to have the organization situation well in hand, so Atheme decided that it was time for him to unleash some powerful black magic.
* * * * *
Military Councilor Galbion Antares, Lord of the House Lurin, Lord of the White Hand, ran about frantically, doing his best in the carnage that had ensued since the ambush. He had been brought on this mission because he was the best medic in Felthespar—thanks to his adept mastery of both white magic and herbal remedies—but in these direct battle situations he felt useless. He tried coordinating the medics to stay away from the fray and heal any wounded that could reach them, but as healers it went against their instincts, and they kept moving into the battle to aid their brethren. Galbion watched helplessly as his medics were cut down with soldiers by either sword or arrow, until finally he could take it no longer.
He grabbed a fallen man’s sword and ran at the nearest group of Revians, screaming, “Murderers!” He managed to strike one man down but another quickly set upon him, mistaking him for a threat. He was easily disarmed and an enemy dagger found its way into his stomach. He coughed up blood, and looked up to see a sword coming at his face.
Looking over the shoulder of the man about to kill him, he saw a dark figure and believed that it was the Reaper come for him. Then his attacker was ripped apart in a horrible gust of killing wind, and Galbion realized that he was not looking at death, but at Abaddon Daemon.
After freeing the medic lord from immediate danger, Abaddon turned and ferociously cleared the immediate area of enemy forces. He began barking orders, but his words and actions were blurs to Galbion, and the troops around him were fuzzy. Abaddon dashed back to him for a moment.
“Antares, are you alright?”
He shook his head hard, breaking the spell of his fear. “Yes, sir!”
“Gather your medics and assemble them over there.” He pointed to a group of over a hundred heavy infantrymen. “I’ve positioned our toughest soldiers to cut off that area. For now that’s going to be our last bastion of defense.”
“Aye, sir,” the rattled man responded in the clearest voice he could muster.
Abaddon seemed pleased, then headed back to his killing. Galbion removed the dagger from his stomach and applied a compress to stop the bleeding. It would need more serious attention later, but he knew if they did not win this battle there would be no later. Behaving like the leader that he was, Galbion gathered his units and followed the Champion’s orders. Wounded soldiers managed to find their way to the oasis they had carved into the carnage, and the Lord of Lurin immediately set someone to tending each man’s wounds. Surrounded by the infantry guarding the area, he and his medics soon had no idea how the battle was progressing.
For what felt like years he concentrated on giving orders and tending to wounds. Then he heard the rumbling. It was quiet at first, and seemed a part of the noise in the air. Then it grew louder, until finally it was the only thing that could be heard. Galbion realized that the fighting had stopped and everyone was trying to discern the source of this rumbling. They looked up at the cliff face to where a tiny point of light could be made out. He followed their gaze, and his face went pale. “Holy Pecoros,” he prayed, “forgive us all.”
Military Councilor Galbion Antares, Lord of the House Lurin, Lord of the White Hand, fell to his knees, bowed his head, and waited to die.
* * * * *
Atheme extricated himself from the soldiers he was fighting, backing closer to his own forces, then tapped the most powerful spell that he had matrixed. “Orien dolcar, norinchi soroccom,” he chanted. The complex rune structure for an Incineration spell appeared, flared, and then died without grounding. Atheme tried to tap a scanning matrix to see what went wrong, but that would not ground either. A few men closed in on him, and he quickly beheaded each one with the sare while carving a Scanner rune with his free hand. The rune flared, but again died without grounding.
Finally he used a grey magic spell to alter his perceptions. His eyes became able to see flowing ether, and he saw that the shrubs Abaddon had mentioned earlier were still hampering the currents. Without a strong current there was no way he could execute any sort of powerful spell. This was almost certainly a part of the Revian’s design.
Using the speed for which he was famous, he carved a path over to the canyon wall and used his sare to vault himself up to a high rock ledge. The currents were still too weak, so he used another grey magic spell to strengthen his legs and leaped to a much higher ledge. H
e took this opportunity to adjust the grey magic on his eyes and looked to the battlefield below.
He could see Abaddon doing his best to command and organize the troops into a cohesive camp, but there were too many enemies to be reckoned with. Everything the man tried, no matter how solid the idea, was quickly anticipated and stemmed by the Revian soldiers. Atheme did a quick count. There was little more than a thousand of his troops remaining, and over thirty-five hundred Revian soldiers, even with the kills Atheme and Abaddon had contributed. Though the Felthespari were fighting at their best now, Revian was easily winning.
He stopped breathing and let his mind go blank. He had only one option. He knew it and hated it. As Lord Councilor his first loyalty was to his city and its citizens. The only thing that he could do, the only thing that his position would allow him to do, was to accept defeat—and take as many of the enemy soldiers with them as possible.
He looked upon the men and women whose lives he was about to abandon. He felt like a coward, but forced himself not to dwell on it. He saw Abaddon fighting fiercely against all odds, ever determined. Every minute he killed another score of enemies, but as always, his wounds were astounding. Atheme knew he could not hold out long enough to bring down this entire army.
He collapsed his sare and hung it on his belt, then turned to the rock wall before him. He gathered ether to his fingers as they began moving rapidly across the stone, drawing runes at speeds that would have made Kinguin tremble with fear. But Atheme’s runes were only hasty, not careless, and each one layered onto the structure he was building.
Finally the rune structure completed and bound together. He felt the enchantments on the shrubs and boulders at the bottom of the canyon fall apart as the ether for miles around was pulled sharply to his spell. Cracks began appearing on the rock wall in front of him, and after a few seconds the cracks shaped themselves into an even larger rune. This rune became a vacuum for ether, and Atheme could feel the currents moving so strongly that he felt compelled to step toward it himself. Instead he released all of the spells that he had matrixed and allowed their energies to also pour into the rune.
For an instant he wondered what the sudden change in the currents was doing to Abaddon, as a mystic. Then his thoughts turned to Relm, whom he realized he would never see again in spite of his promise. Never for a second did his determination waver. When the structure finally flashed a bright white, indicating that it was full, he immediately reached out his left hand and placed it firmly on the rune.
It was the single most powerful black magic spell ever constructed. Unlike most black magic, which transformed ether currents into working energies, this spell created a single powerful matrix on a solid object. If the matrix was tapped by an outside force, the freed energies surged outward in an explosion that destroyed everything in its wake. Ancient mages had used this to create small transportable bombs, until it became evident that since the matrix was easily tapped, the bombs were too dangerous.
So easy to tap, in fact, that the release incantation took only one word. Atheme straightened his back, cleared his throat, and announced aloud, “Flare.”
The rune became brighter than the sun, and Atheme was forced to back away and cover his face. For a moment there was nothing but the light, then he heard the thunder. A rumbling built inside of the canyon wall, and the ledge that he stood on began to crumble. He knew that in a few seconds he would be tumbling to his death below, followed by hundreds of tons of rock.
He adjusted his grey magic one last time, allowing him to see through the light, and looked down to where Abaddon was. He noticed that the fighting had stopped since the armies had noticed the rumbling. Abaddon was on his knees and, Atheme could not be sure, but he seemed to be surrounded by a strange aura. He would have adjusted his eyesight further, but then the earth around him exploded into pieces.
* * * * *
Abaddon Daemon was fighting with all of his strength. Even with his limiter unleashed, his thoughts remained clear and crisp. After separating from Atheme he had somehow found his way into the midst of his own troops. Since Atheme had not made it yet, he quenched his barbarian nature and began barking out orders. He had managed to establish as much of a temporary command post as was possible in the carnage, and had relocated a slightly wounded Galbion Antares to carry out his medic duties from there.
Other than that accomplishment, nothing seemed to be working out. Everything he tried fell apart in the face of the overwhelming odds against him. More than once he found himself wishing that Atheme would show up and assume command, armed with a strategy that could get them out of this. Finally he ceased his attempts at leadership and threw himself back into the slaughter, leaving a few of the best sergeants present to preside over matters.
He was killing at a phenomenal rate, even by his own standards, but he knew he could not make a headway against a force this size. His enemies were no novices, either. They were in a different league than most of the soldiers he had skirmished with in the past. But common soldiers were no match for the ruthlessness of The Destroyer.
Suddenly he collapsed. He felt the strength leak out of his body and his sword dropped to the ground. He lacked the will to even move. The sensation lasted only for a second, but by then there was a score of foes surrounding him. He fought his way past a dizzy sensation, then surged forward and whipped his Dual Blade around, slaying the five men in front of him. He split the Blade into two broadswords and viciously disposed of the remaining enemies who had tried to take advantage of his moment of weakness.
As he finished off the last soldier he noticed the fighting had stopped, and everyone was looking to the northern rock wall. He sank to his knees and tried desperately to catch his breath. He let his thoughts slide up the mountain with the currents and saw Atheme surrounded by a blinding light. “Flare,” he whispered under his breath. “Atheme has given up on us.”
He focused carefully on binding a few grey magic spells to himself. It was scant protection against the inevitable rock wall that was about to crush him, but he was still a warrior. He would not lie down and accept death.
When the explosion came, it rocked the ground upon which they stood. This was just the start. Next they were hit by a shockwave so intense that it knocked nearly every soldier to the canyon floor. Abaddon looked up and saw a tiny speck of red hurled across the canyon and into the southern wall. The last thought to cross his mind was, I hope Atheme survived that impact, as a boulder the size of the Chamber Vesovia came crashing toward him, and he turned and ran with all his might.
* * * * *
Atheme Tethen awoke. He was uncertain where, or even how, he knew only that he was awake. He stood and looked around. He was somewhere dark. He could not even see his hands in front of him. He went to tap a matrix for light, but found that his matrixes were empty. His eyes went wide as memories came back in a flood, then his shoulders slumped. “The ambush,” he bemoaned.
He shortly realized that his right arm was smashed and paralyzed. He reached up with his left hand and carved a Shine rune, which flared and created a small ball of light that hovered in the air a few feet in front of him. He saw rock walls around him and an opening a few yards away. He walked over and stepped outside, finding himself on a small ledge on the wall of the Revian Gorge.
Amazing, he thought. I was thrown into a cave by the explosion.
It was dark out, probably somewhere past midnight. Atheme could not see the canyon floor. Slowly, trying not to strain his body, he worked a grey magic spell to give himself night vision. He looked below and saw nothing. There was the avalanche that the Flare spell had caused to fill the canyon. There were no signs of life, or that there had ever been life here.
It took him nearly an hour to make his way down the canyon wall. His body was only barely responding to his commands, and he did not have the heart to heal himself right now. He worked his way east, angling his trip so that when he finally reached land he was clear of the rockslide.
He sat do
wn and leaned his back against the wall he had just descended. He felt empty inside. Too empty to cry. Too empty to scream. Too empty to hurt. There had been many times that Atheme had felt responsible for the deaths of his fellow knights, usually the result of a bad decision or poorly laid plan. This was different. He was not just responsible for the deaths of these soldiers—he had killed them. He had killed nearly a thousand of his own knights. He had killed his best friend.
Too empty to act. Too empty to move. So he did the only thing that could embrace his emptiness. He slept. There were no dreams, no nightmares. There was only blackness. He slept, and for the few hours that he sat there sleeping, he was as dead as the soldiers buried next to him.
When he finally awoke the sun was starting to make an appearance in the east. He looked up to see Abaddon sitting a few feet across from him, with a pair of peists stomping nearby. Atheme thought at first that he was dreaming, but shortly realized that he was awake and they were indeed there. He should have been ecstatic, overjoyed to see his friend alive, but he was still just empty.
Abaddon’s wounds looked fresh, which meant the mystic could not heal with the interference in the currents. Atheme stood up and limped over to one of the peists, rubbing its face softly to calm it. If Abaddon could not heal here, neither could he. They needed to be on their way. He needed to get his arm into a splint. Unless they treated their injuries soon they could suffer permanent scarring or more serious damage. Silently he mounted his peist and headed back towards Felthespar. Abaddon watched his lord for a moment with an unreadable look in his eyes. Then he too stood and mounted his peist, and followed loyally.
Chapter 15.
A New Approach
Atheme and Abaddon returned to the front gates of Felthespar early on a winter morning. The trip back had been made in silence, neither soldier feeling the desire to talk. Since the initial shock and sadness had worn off, Atheme had been so angry he was afraid to speak out lest he explode. Abaddon was his usual taciturn self.