by Shawn Keys
The center minotaur took an extra step forward. His focus was totally on the sun elf Prince. “Your time has not yet come, Prince Riluranath. And I sense the vitality in the warrior and mage that ride by your sides. Why have you roused us from our slumber if there are no souls to convey through our maze and into the Wyld?”
“It was not for our sake we called you forth, Guardians!” The Prince didn’t speak to them as a supplicant. The minotaurs might hold some small power in this place, but he was still a sun elf prince. He gestured toward Ajax, Helleanna and Jyliansa where they stood. “Dire need drives these travelers, and my King has promised them aid. I beseech you, listen to their needs and grant them passage if you find their cause worthy.”
Ajax didn’t miss how Callistia was kept apart from them.
Neither did Callistia. Her horse danced under her as the animal sensed her restlessness. It pranced a little sideways, mirroring the large part of her that wanted to join her friends. But the draw of her people would not so easily let her go. Nor the specter of the Prince, who claimed to cherish her.
Ajax wanted to gnash his teeth. Struggling to contain the rage, he turned to the minotaurs and channeled that anger into determination. We need to clear the path, and fast. If we can just get into the maze before the Prince strikes. And before Dassereen finds us.
He spoke in a baritone that shook the hills, rivaling the minotaur leader’s own voice, “There is no more noble purpose than to free a slave from their bonds. But the paths to this prisoner’s home are few, and all of them are perilous. I will take her to the doorstep of her rightful place in the universe and save a being more precious than I shall ever be. Hear me, Guardians of the gateway, and find that worthy. Not for my sake, but for hers. We know the danger. And we will gladly risk it to see her freed.”
Wise gravity surrounded the minotaur’s aura, and Ajax wondered if this creature was as ancient as a dozen elves. The Guardian rumbled back, “Many claim they are ready to face the Wyld. They say they are ready for death, just as you have done. But in the Wyld, death is not the worst fate you face. It is a place of chaos and creation not yet locked into the ordered purpose of the mortal realm. You could find yourself twisted and bent, unable to perish and locked in a freakish state of anguish and horror you can never escape.”
None of them flinched. Jyliansa spoke, coming to her knight’s support. “We are in earnest, kind Guardians. Tell us how to prove that to you, and we will do it.”
Helleanna finished with equal determination, “Hear us, and you will never doubt our resolve again.”
The elder minotaur’s lumbering head considered them one after another. Then, he intoned, “Then bring forth the spirit of which you speak. Let me feel the resonance inside of the being’s cage. If their rightful place lies beyond the gateway in the outer planes, then I will not block your path. Speak the name of the spirit, and I shall feel the connection with her true bearer. Through you, I can feel her being pulled toward her home.”
They were saying yes! Ajax instantly measured the distance to the ghostly doors standing open. If the Guardians clear the way, then he was sure they could cross over before the Prince and his Fist struck. Surely, if the minotaurs blessed their purpose, they wouldn’t stand idly by while the elves lashed out at them!
The devil inside whispered suspicions in Ajax’s ear. But why are they waiting? They want me to unveil the artifact, but as soon as the minotaurs can sense it is real, we’ll be under their protection. Such a bold risk. Sun elves don’t take such gambles. Not easily…
His hands were rising toward his hair to undo the braid in which he had concealed Quala’s prison when he stopped short.
He craned his neck, and looked up into the sky.
And suddenly understood.
The guiding star. It wasn’t above the gates. It wasn’t hanging above where the minotaur maze would be behind the doors. It was close; so very, very close. But it hovered above a peak an hour’s hard walk to the east.
His eyes fell back to level, cold certainty settling in.
The elves can see it. We’re not the only ones. My wish failed to guide Quala properly.
All of it fell into place. He was stunned by the audacity. The King had out-maneuvered Ajax using his own game of misdirection on a scale the knight could hardly comprehend. Cymarramathis had used Ajax’s own cleverness against him. His companions had never spoken a word about the guiding star, believing it to be their secret. Never asked of it, the King had no need to lie. He had seen to it that not a single noble, not a single warrior, nor even a single servant had spoken of it. They hadn’t so much as looked up at the strange object hovering in their sky. What had he threatened? Death? Exile? All this time, the star had been visible, probably goading Dassereen to use his wind mages even more ruthlessly when he came within sight of it a week off the coast.
They knew. They hadn’t taken two weeks to wait for the minotaurs to emerge. They had invented the tale, and taken two weeks to set up this fake gate within a stone’s throw of the real one! They’d used an illusion as real and perfect as the one he’d used to trick Lyvarress with the false pendant.
And he had fallen for it. All his suspicion. All his caution. All of it looking at the wrong spot. An old magician’s trick; and he had fallen for it. Even when he realized he was betrayed, he still had not seen how badly they were duped. There would be no trap to spring, because he was already inside the snare, the noose already around his neck.
But he had never been fond of surrender.
Rather than reach for his braid, Ajax’s hand closed on the huge hilt of Skyreaver. Smooth and slow, as if presenting for the crowd to see, the knight drew the powerful blade with a long, metal hiss. He wished he had time to tell his lovers what he knew. But he would have to trust them, and they would have to follow his lead.
Riluranath narrowed his eyes. “What are you doing, knight?”
Even Callistia was worried, wondering why he wouldn’t reach for his goal now that it was in sight. “We’ve come so far. Please, Ajax, take what they offer. See this through to the end.”
She meant every word. She might be torn, but Ajax knew beyond a doubt that she was not involved in this treachery. His heart went out to her; she yearned to find even one of her people with a core of honor and loyalty and goodness. The irony was, she was the one she was looking for. She was the very proof that sun elves could be glorious both inside and out.
Ajax met her eyes, and prayed she would forgive him for tearing apart her dreams. “I will, My Lady. You can be certain I’ll see this through right to the end.”
Then, he raised his voice further, roaring out into the woods. Figure out my game, Safaunya. We’ve only just met, but show me you can follow my lead and I’ll love you forever. “Enough of this nonsense! This double talk has served its purpose! I’ve done as you’ve asked, Dassereen! They fell for the story. No-one will ever know what happened in this remote place, and Lyvarress will find nothing but a soft throne filled by a weak old elf when he invades!”
Riluranath’s youthful features twisted through the rainbow of shock, panic and anger. “What are you –”
Ajax cut him off. Either he was right or the Prince was innocent and unaware of his father’s games. Either way, he was about to pay the price. “Slay the Prince! Kill all who follow him!”
It would probably come as a great shock to Dassereen that Ajax’s order was obeyed.
From her hidden perch, Safaunya fired. She didn’t miss. The arrow ripped the air, humming with whatever magic the forest elf possessed. She had taken no chances, imbuing the deadly missile with the full measure of her mystical ability. The arrow simmered with a dazzling array of sparkling red motes of light that exploded in a ring as the point struck the Prince’s mystical shields and lanced through the protective layers. As the glittering motes rained in a lovely shower over the three sun elves, the arrow punctured through eye, brain and skull until it transfixed the royal’s head. Quivering to a gruesome stop, the wet thu
nk of the impact echoed over the canyon.
Even Ajax didn’t react right away, stunned by the brutal impact and the chaos it was about to unleash.
The dead Prince slumped on his horse, then collapsed in a heap to the ground below.
Nahallanal howled in pain and loss.
Callistia’s eyes filled with a different sort of pain, blended with horror as Ajax seemed to become the monster she had never believed he could be.
But then, the gendarme beside her transformed as well. An elegantly curved blade appeared in his hand, and he hissed at the minotaurs, “Kill the knight and his wenches! Rip them apart!” But instead of lending his considerable aid, the gendarme leaped up and stood on his saddle. “Revenge will be mine for this treachery, Dassereen!” With a supernatural leap fueled by the wind, he launched himself in a long arc over his Fist, landing between them and the forest. “You will have nothing! No prize! I will send you back to your King as kibble for a dog! Show yourself!”
An unknown voice screamed from the night. “Take what’s ours! For King Lyvarress!” A throwing knife whirled from the night, stabbing into the weak point in a moon elf squire’s armor.
“Take them while they’re on their heels!” Another glittering arrow slashed out, this one digging through the breastplate of one of the mud-knights.
A familiar golden shape emerged from the trees, fury painted on his face. Dassereen yelled as if trying to quell his troops, “No! This is not my doing!”
Callistia twisted in her saddle, mouth dropping open at the familiar voice. Her face betrayed her disbelief that he could be there. Dassereen?
Lyvarress’s gendarme snarled at Nahallanal. “Stand down! This is not –”
The other elf wasn’t listening. “– silence! You can’t wash away the blood on your hands with words! Treacherous snake!”
Five of Cymarramathis’s moon elves were done being targets to unseen assassins. They didn’t care what pretty words the lords were exchanging. They fired their own bows at any shadow they could pick out. They knew a hidden force was supposed to be out there, though they had been told the outsiders were allies. Anger fueled their actions, and they fired rapidly into the forest in a blistering hail of shafts.
Cries of pain rose from within the branches. Then, a dozen bows answered with their own wave of death. Far more than Safaunya and Krizzilani could possibly have fired on their own. Dassereen’s warriors took matters into their own hands. Those without ranged weapons refused to be simple targets. The underbrush exploded as a score of mud-knights and fifty of their trained human warriors charged out, with a half-dozen moon elf squires among them.
Dassereen screamed once more, “What have you done? Fools!”
Nahallanal’s answer carried no words, only rage as he flew at the other gendarme with his blade leading. Their blades crossed, and a terrifyingly loud ring of enchanted metal impacting on each other blasted over the area.
In the heart of the clearing, the minotaurs bellowed their own challenge.
Helleanna blurted out, “No! We still want to pass through the gatew –!”
Ajax couldn’t let her confuse the issue further. He roared over her, “– Begone, beasts, lest you feel our steel! We know your gateway is a vile fake!” He charged in on them, hoisting Skyreaver high and cleaving downward right between the horns of the lead minotaur in front. The hulking creature raised its staff in a cross block, not at all afraid matching the ogrelav knight strength for strength. The iron-oak staff he wielded had taken many a blow from a cleaving weapon and survived.
But it hadn’t met the likes of Skyreaver. The griffin-bone blade slashed through the haft like it was paper. Ajax’s blow hewed right through skull and into the minotaur’s torso, down into his guts, and exploded out though the gap in his legs. He ended his blow with his sword riven into the stone itself. The two halves of the minotaurs’ leader peeled away in a grotesque end to Ajax’s display of power.
The one to his left roared in anger. It charged in and rammed Ajax away from the sword’s hilt. Ajax lost his grip, staggering until he lost his feet and tumbled onto his back. The other fake Guardian came at him as the first recovered, raising its spear to pin Ajax gruesomely to the stone.
Jyliansa flashed between them, her dagger cutting in low to sever the meaty hamstring of the beast-man. Helleanna hurled her own and caught the minotaur right in the chest. Her dagger’s hilt stuck out, quivering as it settled. The minotaur looked at it. Then, its musk-ox face split into a drooling grin. “Need somethin’ bigger ‘en that, girl.” It lurched to one side, unable to support its weight on the leg Jyliansa had cut, but it managed to batter the sea elf with the butt of its spear, sending her flying.
The second minotaur lumbered back into range of Ajax. With the women occupied, there was nothing standing between its spear and the knight’s heart except a couple inches of armored steel. And that wasn’t going to be enough.
Ajax grasped hold of his half-sword, yanking it free just in time to deflect the spear wide. It smashed into the ground beside him. He punched out with the hilt, knocking out a few of the minotaur’s gnarly teeth. It growled back him, grabbed a knife off its belt, and jammed it down toward Ajax’s face. Ajax cross-blocked with his forearm. The two powerful warriors locked into each other, the point of the blade hovering only a few inches above Ajax’s forehead.
His arm started to shake. He flickered his eyes over and saw the crippled minotaur swiping at Jyliansa and Helleanna. They were doing what they could to get in under the beast’s long reach and guard, but the bullish warrior was faster than expected. It warded off the elfish women’s darting strikes and came far too close to impaling them as they skipped away.
The knight yelled over his head, “Callistia! They lied to us! From the very start, they’ve lied! They could see the guide star! Do you hear me? They summoned your brother and brought Dassereen here!”
The sun elf was still seated on her horse, somehow floating free of all the carnage as the two Fists fought. Her eyes were locked on her brother’s gendarme. The same thought was flashing through her head over and over. He can’t be here. He can’t be here.
Ajax screamed on last time, losing ground against the minotaur’s massive bulk. “Callistia, we need you!”
A gear ticked in Callistia’s mind. Whatever had frozen her thawed, and emotions flared to the surface like a meteor crashing to the earth. She turned in her saddle and fixed the minotaurs with a deadly gaze sparking with electrical power. “Leave them alone!” Her hand stabbed out and blasted the one on top of Ajax in the chest. The beast-man was thrown back a dozen feet; his chest was nothing but a smoking ruin. Callistia flung out her other hand. This time, the lightning blast tore off the head of the second minotaur before the bolt smashed into the rock face behind. A spiderweb of sparks crawled up and down the rock before fading into nothing.
Then, her baleful eyes fixed on the two gendarmes fighting each other twenty yards away.
Ajax saw the promise of revenge in her. Oh fuck, she’s not going to leave them to kill each other, is she? Groaning with the effort, he rolled off his back and heaved to his feet under the weight of his armor. The weight wasn’t yet comfortable again, and the beating he had taken from the minotaur didn’t help. “Come on you two. We need to be with her. Are you both alright?”
Helleanna planted a boot on the headless minotaur, yanking her knife out of his chest. She looked shaky: not yet the maid-turned-warrior. But she was holding it together. “I’m not letting her die now. Not at the hands of these traitorous snakes.”
Jyliansa scooped up the business-end of the spear that Ajax had cut in half. Before, it had been eight feet tall and thick enough to be a club. Now, it was not quite five, though still possessing serious weight. She flashed him the fierce smile of a shark that had found its teeth. “Thick and ready for action. Just the sort of spear I’ve grown a taste for recently.”
Laughing at her wicked thoughts, Ajax pulled Skyreaver from the ground with a single yank, t
hen led the trio down toward the ongoing battle.
Callistia had goaded her horse into a charge. She was no novice horsewoman, and used the flanks of the animal to knock aside the careless and the hooves to stomp right anyone who got in her way. Running behind her, Ajax carved a swath through anyone that remained. He never stopped, so anyone he missed became a victim to the two knife-wielders flanking him.
Krizzilani was also on the field, having finally left behind the shadows. Ajax didn’t know what had drawn her out, but she was flitting about the battlefield, ending lives with vicious efficiency. He watched as she slithered in on two human warriors fighting each other. She dove between them, her daggers opening their bellies with two mirrored, eviscerating slices. Rolling onto the ground beyond, she vanished from their midst as they collapsed against each other, their spilled guts merging, sharing a death they had been trying to give each other seconds before.
Safaunya was not so bold, though Ajax caught sight of her along the fringes of the forest. Survival was clearly her first priority; she would fire once, picking off a target, then fade into the wood and move. She never shot twice from the same spot, and never seemed more substantial than a ghost.
As the battle raged, the numbers of the living were rapidly dwindling. Prince Riluranath had entered the mountains with a little over two-score elves and men. Dassereen had brought with him a little under two hundred. Already, less than half-that survived, favoring the larger numbers of Lyvarress’s Fist.
Nahallanal and Dassereen danced about each other, and no-one seemed eager to disrupt the blinding duel between the gendarmes. Their swords were alive with light, leaving after-images burned into the air with every movement. Brief flares of elemental power would lash out, only to be dashed upon the ramparts of the other’s defense. They were evenly matched, a study in violent symmetry.
Their words hissed and danced as well. Nahallanal snarled, “Why? We would have handed over the spirit once we had assurances that it would be used for both our realms! Damned your greed!”