Maryx darted around him, sword raised, and whipped the gleaming blade through the design.
Valen gasped, shaking as the fear vanished. The echo of it left him sweaty and jittery. The smoke had stopped, too, and the lines were nothing more than a child’s scrawl now.
“Suppose that means the rats will come back,” the elf said, stretching out her left arm with a wince.
Valen grinned at her. Nothing came barreling down the tunnel, as he expected it, and then continued forward, Maryx leading now.
Another twisting turn, one that led them down steeply, and they found themselves in a huge chamber, with a large bridge spanning over a shallow chasm. “Past the walls now,” Maryx said.
He looked at the floor below. It was a drop but not a large one, marked by the rippling lines he knew from elven ruins. “It’s older than the city.”
“Yes. Some sort of temple or something. No writing, not any kind I recognize, anyway.”
A wailing howl rang off the walls. They both looked for the source, bringing their weapons up.
A small dark figure dropped from the ceiling onto Maryx, sending them both rolling, weapons clattering aside.
Valen reached for Maryx as she and her attacker toppled over the side of the bridge.
The black shield slammed him in the back. He reeled as the giant demon warrior from the day before finished clambering up from under the bridge.
The man swiped at him with his club, and Valen blocked from reflex. The blow sent him staggering, but he knew the weapon wouldn’t kill him.
The warrior drew back. He remembered, too, then. He watched Valen from behind his shield for a heartbeat, then shrugged and lunged forward, rounded shield first, its central wreath of spikes seeming to ooze darkness.
Valen swung, trying to deflect the rush with his weapon, but his foe was too strong and too close. The shield hit him with all of his foe’s weight behind it, twisting his arm at an awkward angle.
Snap!
Pain hit him in a wash of red. He screamed, gripping his now-twisted right arm. The hard slap of the stone beneath his knees made only the vaguest impression.
The warrior twirled his club gleefully.
Valen forced his way through the agony, panting. The demon weapons couldn’t kill him, but they could hurt him. Could knock him off the bridge, now, like a cat would bat a toy away, to break his back or neck on the stony floor.
He tried to shift this arm so it didn’t dangle in the way and the pain made darkness rim his vision. His sword was gone—it had probably fallen, like he would, like Maryx had.
Maryx. Maryx’s sword. The glinting curve of the elf’s weapon seemed to flash at his side, as if summoned by the thought of the she-elf.
The warrior flourished his club one more time, chuckling loudly, and brought it back.
Valen swept up Maryx’s sword with his left hand, catching the dark, smoking club as it swung for his side.
The sword felt light, felt fast, felt alive. He pulled back from the block and struck at the warrior’s other side, catching the shield, but switched directions swiftly to slice into his other arm.
The black armor parted like butter and his foe let loose an animal shriek.
He shouldn’t be able to move that fast when he hurt so much and was using his left hand. He sent the silver blade lashing out again, slicing at the gauntlet holding the club as it came around from below. He didn’t catch the man’s hand but he opened the armor over his wrist.
Blood gushed and the man dropped his club, roaring in rage and agony.
They drew apart. Valen’s relief at finding the sword started to drain away, the pain clawing its way back in from the corners of his mind. His foe squared up like a bull readying for a charge.
Valen shifted his footing and held a guard as best he could and waited.
12
Maryx struggled to catch her breath as she slammed into the stone beneath the bridge. If it didn’t hurt so much, she would have thought she was dead.
The demon warrior, that infernal tiny woman again, landed full force in the stomach and quickly scrambled around to start punching.
She got one good hit to Maryx’s eye in before the elf blocked and rolled over onto her, using her greater height and strength to try and crush the pest.
The human woman made a satisfyingly prey-like squeak. She got her knees under her and broke Maryx’s hold, turning with fists flying again.
Maryx blocked, tumbling back again under the onslaught. By rights her enemy should have been too weak to pull that off; human females were orders of magnitude weaker than elves…
The demon armor.
The woman snatched Maryx’s arm and pressed it down against her throat. Maryx bared her teeth at her, but got none of the usual human reaction from the faceless helmet.
Her free hand scrabbled at her belt, searching for her knife. It was a tool, not a weapon, but all she needed was space.
She found it but it had gotten twisted around in the struggle. The edges of her vision started to blacken…
With a triumphant cry, she drew her knife and slammed it into her enemy’s side with all her strength.
She fell back with a cry and Maryx jumped to her feet, catching her by her unarmored throat as she rose.
What she wanted to do was tear it open, but that was too slow. She seized the dark-helmed head and twisted.
The snap echoed and Maryx dropped the limp, swiftly decaying body. Sour smoke poured from it. She looked up at the bridge, searching for a path up to Valen, and saw a narrow spiraling ledge up one of the stone supports.
Not unoccupied, though. A third demon warrior, a man with the sword, hurried along it, then made the short jump to the top of the bridge and levered himself up.
“Stop!” Maryx yelled, useless beyond uselessness.
She grabbed her knife from the skeleton of her opponent and bounded up the thin ledge, forcibly ignoring her bruised back and swelling eye.
✽✽✽
The demon warrior charged Valen.
He held his ground until the last possible second, then twisted awkwardly.
The giant of a man yelled as he went tumbling off the bridge, flailing.
He slammed into the floor below, landing hard on the stone, and was still for a moment.
“No!” he called, twisting—but only his upper body, “No! No no no no!”
The words became a howling scream as his armor began to smoke, while his body seemed to shrivel. Valen looked away. Death didn't scare him, but this was something else, an echo of that fear sigil.
“Valen!” Maryx shouted. He turned to see the elf trying to drag herself onto the bridge while pointing towards where a dark shape vanished around the turn.
He started forward, but stumbled, jarring his broken arm and dropping to his knees.
Maryx finished pulling herself into the bridge and rushed over to him. She gripped his arm lightly, though it still hurt badly. She muttered in some language, probably cursing, and cut off a strip of her cloak. “It would be in the middle of barren stone. This is going to hurt.” She fixed him with a violet gaze and he just nodded.
She felt up his arm, agony coming in waves as she did it, then twisted it in some way that made his vision go black. She laid her knife flat against the arm and wound the strip of cloth around it. “I hope your Temple guards can put him down,” she said, grabbing her sword to cut loose a broader section of her cloak, “Because neither you nor I are going to get there in time.” She stood carefully, wincing.
“Keepers, not guards,” Valen muttered. Maryx tied a rough sling around his neck and helped him stand before they settled his arm into it. “Maybe they can.”
“Right.” She sheathed her sword, every motion pained. “Aren't we a pair.”
His own blade was somewhere below. No time now. He started walking forward as quickly as he could. The pain was still a demanding thing, wearing him down with every heartbeat. “I know the way. Let’s go.”
They hurried a
s they could, running until their wounds slowed them. Every step seemed darker, as if the passing demon warrior had done something to the light.
They stumbled over the Keeper’s body in the darkness before the threshold. He’d been opened up from belly to throat and the smells of death were heavy in the air.
Steel clashed loudly from within the tunnels of Reliquary. Valen and Maryx hurried past the threshold, its pressure plates sunken deeply into the stone, following the noise deeper.
The last demon warrior was a shadow of a man. Galian’s blade was glowing golden as he parried and slashed, and all of it was lit by the frail blue light of the vessels.
Valen swore he felt the blow landing before it did.
The dark blade whipped around in a feint from below, the true attack coming up and slapping Galian across the eye.
Blood flew. The demon warrior caught some of it, then turned and stared back at Valen and Maryx for a triumphant moment. He plunged the bloody hand onto the nearest vessel.
Galian surged upward with a raw scream, locking his arms around his foe’s hand, biting at the black armor, but it was too late.
The vessel’s light flickered and faded.
The heartstone tumbled out like a lonesome star in the night. The demon warrior reached for it eagerly. Maryx lunged at him, blade drawn. Galian hung on, clawing madly.
Fire spiraled out from the heartstone, ripping the darkness apart.
Valen threw up his uninjured arm to shield his eyes from the violent brightness and stumbled backwards, landing hard on his back, rattling his broken bone hellishly. Maryx collapsed nearby, covering her face.
The light settled but was not tamed. Valen dropped his arm to see what demon had come to Crownshold.
Shining feathery wings furled and unfurled chaotically around and between eyes, so many brilliant starry eyes, all ringed in fire. It was massive, impossibly fitting into the tunnels, seeming to stretch the space to make room.
The demon warrior sprawled beneath it was staring, but not in awe. His sword was raised as if to ward off this impossible entity.
The eyes, all of them, turned down upon him. The fires grew wilder, lapping out to scorch the sides of the tunnel.
The black sword seemed to flee existence. The armor began draining away, and Valen realized the man was pleading and muttering.
“It’s supposed to be the Blight! I made a deal with It! The Blight freed for being able to fight back! Please, please, I didn’t know, I didn’t understand, please!”
The armor vanished, and a wiry naked old man lay there, gibbering to the flames and wings and eyes.
Then he was a white hot fire, then he was ash.
This was not a demon. It was something else entirely.
The eyes turned in their ten million directions again, covered and uncovered by wings in dizzying rhythm. A vast wolf-gold one turned upon where Galian huddled against the wall and a wing reached out to sweep across him briefly.
Valan shifted, wanting to run but certain it would not matter.
All the eyes snapped to Valen as they had to the demon warrior.
Its voice was humming power, the sound of the fires that fueled the stars, a roaring yet bell-like sound. “The Tribunal will have no mercy, Valen, so great is their fear.” There was sorrow beneath it and in the eyes as well, the weeping of a river plunging off the edge of all things.
Its fires flared and it drew all its wings in, then it was gone, only the pale ember of the heartstone remaining.
The tunnel was silent, only dimly lit by the functioning vessels. The only sign that the great being had been there were the scorch marks and a deep, sweet burning scent.
Valen forced himself painfully to his feet. He hobbled over to where Galian lay shivering against the wall.
The other Paladin uncurled just enough to look at Valen with his one remaining eye. The other was a gaping hole, somehow cauterized cleanly. “I’m going to die, right?” he managed chokingly, “Demon weapons.”
Valen nodded, gripping him gently by the shoulder.
“Thought it would hurt more. Just sort of…a clean sort of pain, like whiskey burning on a cut. Getting less.”
He should be begging for his life like a lunatic now. Valen couldn’t be sure in the low light, but he didn’t see any evidence of the oozing blackness that came from wounds inflicted by a demon. Galian’s shivering steadily ceased.
Valen sat back on his heels, confused. “Somehow…I think you’re not going to die.”
He looked back to Maryx. She was half-sprawled on the ground, her arms rigid, staring at the scorched spot on the floor around the dull heartstone. She must have felt him looking because she looked at him, wide-eyed. “Wings and eyes and fire,” she said, “It was what told me about you.”
“Not a demon.” It wasn’t really a question.
She sat up on her knees and took her time to stand. “Nothing like a demon.”
Valen suddenly felt weak and had to sit. He noticed that the cloth of his splint was wet; he must have been cut during the fight.
Galian found his strength and came up into a crouch, even though by rights he should be horribly dead, and looked at Valen’s arm. “Broken?”
He nodded, shutting his eyes against a wave of pain and nausea. When it passed--mostly-- he opened them to see Maryx looking down at him. Her eyes really did glow slightly, in a dimmer way than the vessels, with a different color.
The first coherent thought he had was that he really liked that color. The next was, “I think you might need to carry me out.” And then there was darkness and merciful rest.
13
It was hunger that woke him.
Valen blinked blurrily awake in a room paneled in golden wood. He rolled out of bed and found a chamber pot as another need presented itself, noticing that someone had splinted his arm properly. There wasn’t any blood on the bandage, either, and he was wearing loose, clean tunic.
As he sat back down on the very fluffy bed, he realized that this wasn’t a Temple infirmary. Too much furniture for that. He leaned his head back to look up at the ceiling and noticed the rafters had an elaborate version of Lyrica’s sunburst carved into them over and over, warm and happy in the candlelight.
Leaning back caused his eyelids to grow heavy, and he decided Maryx had the right idea about comfortable beds. He could go find food later.
The door opened as his eyes drifted shut, and he turned to see someone enter with a tray, setting it on a table next to the bed. “Maryx,” he muttered after drowsy moment. No one else would wear a their cloak’s hood inside.
She pulled the cloak from her shoulders, tossed it over a chair, and dropped into it wearily. “You’ve been asleep for a day, you know.”
“Shock,” he answered, his voice raspy and dry. Maryx poured a cup of water for him from the pitcher on the tray and handed it over. The scent of fresh bread wafted over from the tray to set Valen’s stomach rumbling.
The elf snorted and tore a chunk of that off and gave it to him, keeping another for herself. “From a broken arm? The Orishalite we found to help you said it wasn’t that bad as she reset it. No.” She gestured to silver bowl on the elegantly carved wooden dresser across the room. It was covered in Tribunal sigils. “It was that. Or what was in the bowl, anyway; it was evaporating when I last looked at it.”
He furrowed his brow as he devoured the bread.
“A sliver of demon…essence. It’s why Galian and I had to drag you here, and he couldn’t just take you to the Temple.” She gestured at the room. “In case you haven’t noticed, between the extravagance and my own willingness to be here, we’re at the Sunshield. The Reliquary was close enough to Temple grounds for one lifetime, thank you.”
“What do you mean, he couldn’t just take me to the Temple?”
“The wards beneath the wall were uncooperative. Lots of sparks when we tried carrying you across it.” She stared at the bowl. “If you were anyone else, I think it would have killed you as slowly as a demo
n’s swordstrike. As it was, it just made you very sick. We had to find the maddest Orishalite in the world to help you. Two others walked in the room to start their little ceremonial treatment and nearly ran out immediately.”
Valen followed her stare, his mind finally beginning to move past the heavy veil of sleep. “There were spikes on the shield, all around the boss. One must have broken off when he broke my arm.”
“He used his shield? I guess they realized they couldn’t kill you, but they could incapacitate you.”
“No, he was still trying to kill me, just not with weapons.” He gestured to the sword at her side with his uninjured arm. “He would have, if not for your sword.”
She cocked her head and carefully drew it, laying it across his lap. “It does that.”
He turned it by the sleek hilt, examining it. It still held the same sense of speed and liveliness he’d felt in the cavern. “It’s definitely magic. I shouldn’t have been able to fight that well using my left hand.”
Maryx grinned lightly. “It belonged to my grandfather. He wouldn’t let me take it until I was good enough to wield it, so I didn’t cheat to get to that point. I only cheat presently.”
Valen caught sight of a set of symbols engraved on the curving blade, the only decoration on it. They were a short series of weaving, slashing curves, only visible at a certain angle. “These are letters,” he said, “Elvish.”
“Its name. A magic sword has a name, of course.” She handed him another chunk of bread and took yet another for herself.
He ate the second as quickly as the first. “What is it?”
Her smile turned rueful. “Maryx.”
“You named the sword after yourself?”
“I named myself after the sword. As I said, it belonged to my grandfather. It’s older than the death of the gods, even.”
“You…named yourself?” That was a strange custom, but then elves were strange.
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