Paladin's Oath

by M. H. Johnson

  Girding herself, Jess began to make her way toward the fortress that clung to the wasted land like a festering sore, carefully watching her step, knowing without being told that the massive tower was her final destination.

  “I think, dear Jess, that this place reeks of rot and decay. Have you noticed the sky overhead? Billowing green clouds, no doubt spewing rains that stink of sulfur.” Twilight sighed. “It’s a good thing we are in the Shadowrealms, dear Jess. The soul made flesh. Were we breathing such air in the living lands, I fear what it would do to your lungs.”

  Jess nodded. “Worse than breathing the forgemaster’s fumes, I have no doubt. Ye gods, Twilight, look at that thing!”

  Twilight hissed even as Jess gazed upwards along the line of her carefully aimed blade, seeing the outline of a vast beast flying in the howling winds, looking like nothing so much as a massive bat; flaps of skin serving as its wings, its head a hideous cross between bird and lizard, serrated beak and all too knowing eyes now gazing straight at Jess even as it emitted a shriek of challenge.

  “Guard thyself, Jess!”

  Jess laughed at this, her fierce crimson eyes bright with bloodlust. “Let it come!”

  As if her words were an invitation, the creature swooped and dived, its racing speed matching the hammering beat of Jess’s heart, the heady rush of battle about to commence both exhilarating Jess and inspiring the intense concentration it always induced in her, time seeming to slow down to a crawl as she took in every detail of her descending foe, every bubble and pop of the fiercely boiling mud pools all about her, knowing instinctively where she could step safely as she prepared to turn and spin away from her racing foe even as she struck. There. She felt the exultant rush as if she could sense her opponent's actions the instant before it made them, as if both of them were but participants in a dance as old as time, with but one inevitable outcome.

  She sensed its snapping beak as the beast twisted its dive to spin right passed her, and her blade lashed out with a lightning fast strike, cleaving off the rightmost claw that had lashed out, attempting to disembowel her in passing. The beast shrieked, spraying caustic blood even as it spun away, its massive claw sheered completely off by Jess's wicked blade.

  With a graceful snap, smoking ichor flew off Jess's sword, the brilliantly shimmering instrument of death of such perfection that neither dirt nor blood nor gore would stick to the razor-sharp edge.

  "Ware, Jess, you have crippled it! It has no choice but to take us down and feed, or die a slow death, so it will not toy with us now!" Twilight warned, and Jess couldn't help but grin in anticipation even as she nodded her head in acknowledgment of her familiar's insightful counsel. The creature was indeed banking for a final attack. Coming toward her at even greater speed despite the mist of blood Jess could see even from this distance spraying from its severed limb, the beast could only mean to charge head on. To smash into them, kill or be killed, in one final deadly engagement.

  “Come, beast! Let us dance!” Jess laughed as the sweet caress of battle madness embraced her. Every second stretched to an eternity while spinning away in the blink of an eye. Muscles tingling in anticipation, waiting for the perfect moment… now! She felt it, instinctively. The instant she needed to act, her arms lashing her blade forth in a fierce Oberhau strike, even as she dove and rolled, feeling the blade cut deeply into the beast’s massive chest, shuddering as it cleaved through its rib cage in but an instant, Jess feeling the slightest lurch as its one remaining claw just managed to snag a couple links of her mithril mail before jerking away, crashing into the ground where she had stood but an instant before, rolling and coughing great bloody gobs of steaming gore as its shattered body writhed and twisted in mortal agony before shuddering one final time, then laying utterly still.

  "Well done." Those quiet words and a faint nod of acknowledgment was all her familiar needed to convey his pride in her. Her timing had been perfect, yet one look at the beast's massive talon made her wonder if it could have cracked her bones, crushing through her mail, squeezing her like a melon, had her timing been even a fraction of a second off. Its vicious beak gave her pause. She knew it could have torn right through her all too mundane helm of bronze.

  And even as she felt for the briefest moment humbled by how fierce an opponent she had faced, how close she had come to a far more tragic ending, all such sobering reflections were near instantly washed away as she was flooded by a heady euphoria, almost orgasmic in its intensity. For she felt the sweet thrill, then. The rush of her enemy's power, its very life force, surrendered in death, slowly trickling away through the ether, the barest threads easing softly, naturally, into her. She tasted it, teasing her, and she wanted more. Acting without thought she plunged her blade deep into the beast’s heart, like a boy plunging his aching need deep into his lover’s moistness.

  “Yes!” she whispered, shuddering with pleasure as the creature began to shiver, boil, and shrivel at last to smoking ash, Jess screaming in sudden ecstasy as a wave of dark power roared through her, heady and sweet.

  She licked her lips and sighed. “Now that was a battle, Twilight!” She laughed, trembling with an incredible burst of energy as if she had drunk a tankard full of her father's finest brandy.

  Twilight just gazed up at her. “You worry me sometimes, Jess.”

  Jess shrugged. “What can I say? He was tasty.”

  Twilight gazed back at the shriveled pile of ash and charred bones then back at his master and sighed. “At least you have the sense to wait until after the battle was finished to drink this deep of your foe’s power. Still, it concerns me. I fear this Shadowrealm is far closer to our old home than I care for, for your true nature to be awakening this strongly, this early in the game.”

  Jess squinted at her cat unhappily. Though still near bursting with sweet hot energy, her familiar had rather abruptly dampened her euphoria. “You’re hinting at depressing crap I’d rather not remember. I can tell.”

  Her cat paused to meet her eyes with his own. “Don’t worry about it, Jess. Look at it this way. All adventurers feed off their kills, taking the power of the Dreamrealms for their own. They don’t wish to admit it, but they are all vampires of a sort. How else would they become so inhumanly strong, such as you already have become, or learn dark arts and other strange powers it would take a normal human a lifetime to master? You, my dear Jess, simply have a hunger, and a potential, that goes a bit deeper than most, shall we say.”

  Jess just shivered. “You’re totally killing the sweetness, you know.”

  Twilight smirked. “I know.”

  Her cat purred as Jess sighed. "Come, Jess, let us be off! We have a damsel to rescue. And more battles as well, no doubt."

  Jess grinned. "An utterly adorable damsel who didn't pretend nothing had happened after we collapsed in each other's arms. No. She wants us to visit regularly, to be together, to be more than just pillow friends." Jess just smiled and shook her head, before her expression turned grim. "And she's in trouble, and I'm just standing here. Come Twilight, on with the rescue."

  “Indeed,” Twilight agreed, gracefully leaping to his master’s shoulder as she took off for the towering spire of stone jutting so darkly atop the heart of the massive fortress brooding against the landscape, Jess adroitly dodging or gracefully leaping over massive puddles of boiling slime with a grace and power that would have shocked an audience, had any mortal been able to survive in these blasted lands, so potent and quick Jess had become.

  "It's huge!" Jess said with some awe, having finally arrived at the deceptively distant fortress, gazing raptly at the tower at its peak. What had shown as little more than a sharp needle of obsidian rock highlighted against the shattered landscape and ill green sky was, in fact, a massive edifice, the top floors of the spiraling tower seeming to pierce the brooding clouds above.

  “Indeed.” Her familiar nodded his head. “I do not think this will be an easy fight, Jess.” He gazed intently at his mistress. “I think, perhaps, it is time y
ou summoned our Hound.”

  Jess shivered, struck by a sudden chill, though she could not say why. “Twilight?” Her question was almost plaintive.

  Her familiar’s gaze was unwavering. “It's time, Jess. We are lucky there are no enemies in sight that I can see. Once we leave the shelter of this rock we are observing our enemies from, it will be nothing but battle. If you our going to summon Rage, it must be now.”

  Jess sighed, her eyes grave. “You mean Malek, don’t you, Twilight.”

  Her familiar tilted his head in exasperation. “Of course I mean Malek! He is your Hound, Jess. Bound to you for more lives than either of you can remember. Bound to you since our home was forged from the very embers of Chaos and made whole by the first great paladin ever to walk the land.”

  Jess shivered coldly. “If you tell me that I was her, I’m going to scream.”

  Twilight’s eyes seemed to pierce her very soul. “Then I won’t say it. Summon Rage, Jess. It is time.”

  Jess nodded solemnly. Knowing, without being told, without studying dark arts in tomes best left forgotten for years under ancient masters, exactly what she had to do. It was a part of her. The knowledge was in her blood.

  Solemnly, she drew her mithril blade and kissed the flat of it, carefully slicing both cheeks with her hideously sharp sword, proceeding with a ritual her hands knew as if long ingrained. The blood flowed down her cheeks and mithril mail to pool of its own volition upon the dark sands between her knees. Strangely, the blood was not soaked by the ground but appeared to float just above it, spreading out in a perfect circle. Slowly, it began to throb, to pulse, to glow.

  Lost in a light trance, though fully aware of her surroundings and sensing no danger, Jess felt her lips speak almost of their own accord. “By the ancient rites of blood and bone, by souls brought forth from the darkness of the Void, bound to the Queen of the Garden since Time began, I summon you, Malek de Sousel, servant of Jezabelle. He who was once known as the Death of Stars, roaming the endless ashes of that which came before. Reborn as the Hound of Battle, the Rage of War, and always my brother-in-arms. Malek! Come to me!”

  Jess’s voice roared forth and a howling dark wind sprung out of nowhere, whipping the sands around them in a fierce gale, for all that the eye of the storm was as calm as a spring day. All was obscured, outside of the small circle of sand around the glistening pool of blood that had grown from but a few drops of Jess’s potent essence.

  From that shimmering darkness, a scene began to unfold. It appeared almost as if Jess were looking through a window. Or, a mirror. The mirror in Jacob's bedroom, in fact. Even as Jess stared, she saw the two youths entwined in a passionate embrace. She heard Jacob cry out, saw Malek shudder and collapse. Saw the evil glint in Malek's eye as he brushed his lips to Jacob's own, watched Jacob near instantly claimed by deepest slumber even as Malek got up and stretched; his sleek, muscular body displayed in all its glory. Jess grinned in appreciation even as Malek blinked, his warm brown eyes drawn to Jacob's mirror, and he gasped with wonder. "Jess, is that you?"

  “Yes!” Jess laughed with delight, never mind the horror of the realm she strode upon. It was good to see her friend. Someone she had missed for months, far worse than she had realized.

  Malek shook his head in bemusement as he approached the mirror. Jess nodded in surprised approval as she noted the fearsome greatsword he strapped to his back even now. Too precious an artifact to leave unguarded, he appeared as obsessive over keeping it close as Jess was about her own mithril blade. “If I weren’t dreaming, Jess, I’d be yelling at you, you know. You haven’t responded to anyone’s letters, we haven’t heard from you for months! I only found out just this week that Raphael and Josie had come out to visit you under the pretext of delivering gifts of gratitude to your family, and not even they could wheedle concessions for you to come visiting us at the college, or even us all convening at their chateau, the Circle of Midnight reborn again. It's like you forgot us.” His wry expression didn’t completely hide his hurt, and Jess felt her heart pierced with guilt.

  “I know. You’re right, Malek. I’ve been too lost in my own troubles, my own guilt.” She gave a shaky smile. “It took me a long time to come out of my shell, and when I finally manage to, I’m off humoring my mother attending a gala. I swear, Malek, I had every intention of writing when I got back. I wasn’t expecting to Delve once more into deepest Shadow.”

  Malek laughed. “I swear, Jess, you have excuses even in my dreams. It sounds just like you.” He sighed fondly. “On the off chance this is some dream link to your subconscious, please write to us. Or better, visit us at the college! We miss you.”

  Jess nodded, smiling, wiping away a hard, crystalline tear. “I’ll do you one better. Come and see me right now! All you need to do is grab my hand.”

  Tilting his head quizzically, Malek gave a wry nod of his head and gently pressed his hand against the glass of his lover's mirror, toward Jess's own. He gasped in wonderment as his hand slipped through, as if the mirror were no more than a still pool, and he shouted in surprise when Jess smoothly pulled him through.

  10

  “By all the gods!” Malek shouted in surprised outrage, naked save for a silken shirt and the massive serpentine sword strapped to his back. Forged originally by an ancient queen of Hell, it had been reformed in a brilliant burst of madness when Jess had been ripe with the power of a shattered realm. It now served Malek with fierce devotion, and Malek alone. Even now the blade glowed with an angry crimson heat upon entering the Shadowrealms once more, and the howl of the souls entwined within the dark metal could be clearly heard. For a moment, Jess felt her gut lurch, a chilling flash of the madness she had embraced on that terrible day flaring through her. Horrors completely forgotten until that very moment, deep within the darkest of Dreamrealms once more. Jess trembled with the visceral memory of nightmares long forgotten, even as Malek held her in a fierce embrace.

  “Jess! By all the bloody hells! I am so bloody angry with you!” Malek held a sobbing Jess fiercely for some moments before pulling away, gazing at her with tear-stained eyes. “I missed you, you silly, crazy bitch!” He kissed her passionately, and Jess pulled away in surprise, blushing fiercely.

  “Time to focus, Hound. Battle is upon us, and our mistress needs us ready.”

  Malek tilted his head to behold Twilight, gazing at him implacably before laughing at the madness of it all. “I missed you too, you crazy talking cat! So, what mad adventure have you dragged me off to, Jess? And are you sure I’m not dreaming?”

  Jess cracked a bemused smile, shaking her head, admiring her friend’s sleek, muscled form. His intense dark gaze and thick lustrous hair had been the downfall of more than one girl at the college. Sadly, and much to his amusement, they had to console themselves with the fact that he much preferred boys.

  “I’m afraid you’re not, Malek. This, my shieldbrother, is very, very, real.”

  Malek wrinkled his nose. “Damn. It stinks here, too. And bloody hells, Jess, this is the first time you could think to reach out to me in the last three months? It looks like I’m in a sandy desert in the middle of a windstorm and I’m half naked! Are we heading off to battle?”

  Jess nodded solemnly. “Fear not, my brother. I would not let you go unwarded. Clasp your hand to mine. You know these arts as well as I.”

  Malek's gaze was unfathomable. "Oh. So it's that time, then." He closed his eyes and sighed. "It's frightening how it all comes back to me, but only in the Dreamrealms. During the daylight, I almost always forget what I can do." Solemnly, he brushed his hand against the edge of Jess's exposed blade, hissing only slightly at the shallow cut, placing his palm against Jess's own.

  As one they began to chant, syllables ancient and terrible pouring from their lips, and if asked after the fact, Jess knew that neither would remember the words being said. Nonetheless, the powers of blood and battle poured through them both, and Malek was soon surrounded by a red mist that coalesced into thick hardened armor
the color of blood.

  Malek gasped and slumped over, breathing heavily. "Wow. That took it out of me. Ye gods, Jess, you weren't kidding. I am most definitely awake, and we are most definitely in the realm of dreams." He carefully withdrew his Zweihander, moving the serpentine greatsword slowly and gracefully through a series of strikes, lunges, and parries very similar to those used for the longsword he and Jess had trained so diligently to master under the unforgiving eyes of General Eloquin himself. It was obvious to Jess that he had adapted those techniques quite successfully, with slight adjustments for a weapon near as long as Malek was himself.

  “It looks like you’ve mastered that blade well,” Jess admired, even as the fierce windstorm shielding them from their environment slowly dissipated.

  Malek grinned wryly. "Eloquin said it puts my ridiculous strength to good use. He's trained me, and hard. Frankly, Jess, I think he's trying to make up with me whatever he feels he did wrong with you. And he doesn't mind punishing my body, adventurer's strength aside." Malek spent a few more moments practicing with his sword, his motions as fluid and graceful as the most exquisite of dancers, his powerful body and massive blade moving with a grace and fluidity that put a warm smile to Jess's lips. "And this armor doesn't hinder my movement at all. Like the finest plate, it feels made for me."

  Jess’s grin was sad. “How is he?”

  “He’s fine.” Malek shrugged, finishing his blade dance. “Even asked if I knew when you would return to finish your training and earn your third crossed sword, or so he put it.” He turned to face his friend, expression solemn. “He never says it, but behind his steely gaze, I think he regrets how close he came to denying us entrance into the rooftop garden, and you having been so close to death. And all of us, having risked our lives in a mad gamble for the sake of the college, not that I remembered anything at all regarding that mad little adventure or how I had obtained this rather nice greatsword. That is, until now.” Malek shivered, flashing a weak smile.