Wisdom Lost

by Michael Sliter

  Disorder still knelt on his father and, without more preamble, he shot another bolt of power into Darian’s opposite shoulder, again eliciting a bloodcurdling scream which rivaled those coming from the fortress below.

  Phanton-Fenrir saw his body visibly shake itself from his stupor, coming out of the convergence of emotions that had incapacitated him, and which had made him welcome death. With a quick motion, Body-Fenrir brought his booted foot up and across the side of Disorder’s face, knocking him off Darian and sending him rolling. Body-Fenrir scooped up his sword on the return motion, pushing aside his weeping daughter and leaping over his maybe-dying father to pursue a violent attack on his disfigured brother.

  His overhand strike ricocheted off the stones where his brother had lain a moment before. Disorder rematerialized a foot away in a black mist.

  “There is fight in you, little brother,” Aiden commented, stepping back quickly as Fenrir swung a riposte in his direction, effortlessly recovering his balance. Fenrir looked like a Ultner-damned Blue Adder, in truth.

  “There’s always been fight in me, Aiden. You just always had me outnumbered.” Body-Fenrir’s voice was a monotone, but it was clear.

  Disorder grinned a sickening grin, his expression only emphasizing the uneven, shadowed dent in his head. He tossed aside his black cloak—wearing only a sleeveless black vest now, despite the cold. His arms with riddled with ritualized scarring.

  “Fine, it’s just the two of us. Let’s see how you fare, man-to-man, when you can’t strike me unawares with a Pandemonium-damned chunk of metal.” Disorder drew his own sword, which immediately began to glow a hot red, the air shimmering around it with gentle flames.

  Body-Fenrir pursued an attack, unfazed by whatever magic fueled his opponent’s weapon. Disorder parried his slash, and sparks flew; Adder blades were made of the best steel, but Phantom-Fenrir hadn’t a clue how long they would last against an enchanted sword. But, there was little to be done, as Body-Fenrir had to knock aside a quick riposte with a second shower of sparks that landed on his face. Despite what must have been burning agony, the dancing Blue Adder did not hesitate. He did not even react to the pain.

  “You are nothing without Ethan at your back,” grated Body-Fenrir in a harsh monotone.

  “And you, brother, are nothing.” Disorder extended his fingers toward him and Body-Fenrir threw himself down, narrowly avoiding a pinky-thin bar of crimson energy. He sprung back to his feet against Disorder’s discordant laugh.

  “I could make you dance all night if I wished it. But, alas, I’ve too much to do, with Darian’s little stunt.” He gestured toward the galleons burning in the distance.

  Phantom-Fenrir examined Disorder, his strange black spectacles seeming to suck up the light of the moons. They were held on with a strap, given that his misshapen skull prevented the things from staying in play by themselves. With a wound like that, how had he survived?

  “How did you survive?” Body-Fenrir asked, light on his feet to dodge whatever was thrown at him next. Disorder stood at ease, his burning sword held at the side.

  “You mean after you murdered me?” Body-Fenrir nodded. “Truth be told—and why wouldn’t I tell the truth, given that you are to die in moments—I remember little. One’s head caving in will have that effect. I should have been dead. I was dead, except that someone found me, and not as if by accident. A man with these,” he tapped his spectacles, “who could see beyond what was typical. Just as I can now.”

  Disorder turned his head and looked upward, making whatever passed for eye contact with Phantom-Fenrir. If a spirit, or whatever the Pandemonium he was, could have shivered, his teeth would have been chattering. His body, though, was unmoved.

  “Apparently, I had potential. They healed me, to an extent.” He tapped his misshappen head with a sword that suddenly wasn’t enflamed. “They took me to Menoga; locked me away. Made me into this.” He flashed in and out of existence for a split second, as if to demonstrate. When he reappeared, his lips were pulled back in an angry snarl.

  “And you… brother. You and that pile of old shit laying on the ground are the reason I am this way.”

  “Powerful,” said Body-Fenrir, echoing his mindless thoughts.

  “Broken,” said Disorder, reigniting his sword and rushing forward, leaping the useless body of his father.

  Body-Fenrir stepped forward to meet him.

  Phantom-Fenrir watched himself fight. By Yetra’s glorious clit, he was good. He was better than good, in fact—he was greater than the best Blue Adder that he had ever seen fight. He anticipated every move that his brother made, moving a split second quicker. Disorder sliced at his feet and Body-Fenrir was already in the air. Disorder threw a punch when their swords crossed and Body-Fenrir batted it away. From his ascended view, Phantom-Fenrir actually thought he was going to win—particularly when he drove his sword into his brother’s gut.

  Or he should have, anyway, had the dead man not dissipated into a black, shadowed mist and reformed two feet behind where he’d been, immediately resuming his attack. By Ultner’s shaved balls, how does one kill a man who can fade in and out of existence like a godsdamned demon?

  Another pass. Sparks flew as flames struck steel. Again. A sizzling burn, from Disorder’s flat blade, bubbled the flesh on Fenrir’s arm, melting right through his leathers. And again. Disorder hissed into nothingness as Body-Fenrir’s blade threatened to disrupt his jugular. Neither man seemed to tire, though Phantom-Fenrir knew it was a battle of attrition. He hadn’t landed more than a couple of blunt kicks to his brother while he himself had taken several burns. He should run. In fact, he willed his body to run, but it didn’t listen. And it seemed that, deep down, he truly didn’t want to escape.

  The reason, of course, was Astora. His daughter was overwhelmed with smothering fear, and yet moving toward the melee, clutching a table knife as if it held the answer to all of her problems. Disorder’s back was to her, his attention focused on his brother as he parried a deadly blow at the last moment. Phantom-Fenrir wanted to scream at her, telling her to run and that she needed to escape this place. That his life wasn’t worth saving. But, if his body sent that message, it would just give her away and lead to her death.

  Astora raised her knife with shaking hands, up above her head. She had a clear path to Disorder’s back, and yet she did not strike. Her arms were paralyzed, tears streaming down her face unchecked. Strike! willed Phanton-Fenrir. Strike now or run away! But it was no use. Her bravery evaporated as quickly as a drop of water in the summer sun.

  A wracking sob, with the sound of glass scraping across stone, escaped her mouth, alerting Disorder to the danger. He blinked out of existence and reformed behind her, extracting the knife from her hand with a ‘tsk’ing sound as he wrapped another arm around her throat.

  “Brother, she looks like you. Poor little bitch.” Disorder smiled and tightened his grip on her neck.

  “You would harm an innocent girl?” Body-Fenrir asked, his voice flat and his sword unwavering.

  Disorder’s face spasmed. “There’s little I haven’t done at this point. And the same could be said of you, Bull. And that heartless old fuck lying on the ground there, as well. He’s the worst of us.”

  “No, you always were, Aiden. Ethan may have been the main bastard, Ethan and Sigmund, but you… you allowed it. You knew better. You were always reluctant, but too much of a coward to stop them. And you could have. You could have saved my knee. You could have saved my mother, if you’d had an ounce of courage.” Body-Fenrir’s voice was still blank, but it echoed every thought of his consciousness. “You could have used that silver tongue. You could have used your training. But instead you cowered and gave free reign to bad men to torment a boy and his mother.”

  Disorder’s mouth twisted, with a fierce frown and then a sneer. Not at Fenrir, though. At himself. He tightened his grip on Astora and the girl gasped for breath.

  “You can stop this now,” said Body-Fenrir, tossing his sword to the sto
nes with a clatter. Tact might work, thought Phantom-Fenrir, pushing his body to say the words while somehow maintaining control. Disorder lightened his grip, and his face softened for a moment. And then Darian groaned, causing Disorder to reaffix his mask.

  “No, brother. I am too far gone.”

  He blinked out of sight in a wet cloud, Astora falling backwards upon losing her support, coughing and gasping for breath. Phantom-Fenrir lost track of his body as Disorder reappeared a foot away and lashed out with a foot at his weak knee. The thing buckled, and Body-Fenrir tumbled to the ground. Before he could spin away and reach for his fallen sword, Disorder came down on his stomach with a powerful knee, knocking the wind out of him. Brother knelt upon brother.

  “There is nothing to do, Fenrir, but follow my course, the course you sent me on.” His voice was vitriolic. “Do you know how you have made me suffer? Look at me! My life has been pandemonium since you destroyed my face. You think I like what I’ve become? You think this is pleasant? You think I can change because of your soft words?”

  He held Body-Fenrir’s face down with a strong hand on his neck, his bare, muscular arms rippling with the force of the push.

  “It is only right that you suffer as I have.”

  He ignited his sword then, and considered the flame for a moment before resting the flat of the blade on Fenrir’s face, just over his left eye.

  His body writhed as the burning metal pressed against his skin, which blistered and bubbled at its touch. The eye itself must have melted immediately beneath the inferno. And yet, Body-Fenrir did not scream, and did not betray what must have been excruciating agony.

  From above, Phantom-Fenrir could not feel the pain, but he could see the damaged mass of flesh as Disorder leaned away and drew back the blade. And he began to lose control, too—he felt himself swirling back toward his body in a dizzying, shaking array of colors. For a second, he could feel everything… the brutal, blinding pain of his facial wound, the half a dozen burns all over his body, and the familiar ache in his knee. He shrieked and raged, feeling a madness take him. A rage, a sadness—a piercing cry against Ultner and Yetra and a begging for forgiveness. An emptiness. Fenrir couldn’t take it; it was too much. He wrested back control before fully merging back with his body.

  Disorder frowned at Fenrir’s still-silent and struggling body, and then he glanced up at his Phantom.

  “There is something to you, brother. Something I don’t understand. But, I will make you howl by the end.”

  He switched his sword to his other hand, letting up on his grip on Body-Fenrir’s neck. The Phantom willed his body to fight. He demanded that his body fight.

  Despite his wounds—wounds that would cripple a normal man, both physically and psychologically—Body-Fenrir’s arms snapped up, grabbing each of Disoder’s wrists. Disorder grunted in surprise.

  “Stop this fighting!”

  “Never,” he said, though his voice was a croak.

  Slowly, inexorably, Disorder overpowered his brother. He’d always been stronger, always heavier, and he was in a position of power. The red heat of his sword inched toward Fenrir’s other eye little by little. Even with him being a Phantom, the flames consumed his vision. Flickering orange, red, and blue, swirling together in a flesh-consuming flurry.

  It was a hand’s width away.

  It was a finger’s width away.

  And then Disorder recoiled with an inhuman roar, his now-cold, steel sword clanging against the stones.

  He stood up, gripping his left bicep with his right hand, neck muscles straining as he glared toward the sky and howled in agony, staggering backwards. Body-Fenrir regained his feet while his Phantom watched. Disorder’s arm was blackening now, degree by degree, starting with a spot on his tricep and moving toward his hand and his shoulder. His flesh died, and he felt every piece waste away.

  He flickered in and out of existence, his screams cutting off for moments at a time until he didn’t reappear.

  Disorder was gone.

  Darian still lay moaning in his unconscious state while Astora rested on her hands and knees, coughing and hacking. Body-Fenrir stood looking at their savior.

  Sigmund Fitra, his face covered with drying blood, stood mere steps from Fenrir, gripping a tiny vial that had once held the essence of meldus.

  “You look like… well…. We need to get out of here,” he said quietly. He knelt over Darian, checking the man’s wounds and then looking up. “The Adders are on their way.”

  And Phantom-Fenrir finally, inevitably, lost control. His conscientious slammed back into his broken body and he dropped to his knees with the agony of the burns, with the understanding of his lost eye and his hideous visage. Wracking sobs shook him to his core and he curled up on the cold stones of the Plateau. Heavy footsteps approached, but Fenrir didn’t care. He was being pulled to his feet then; someone was shouting orders, talking about the Feral. It didn’t matter.

  As he was guided away, one foot in front of the other, he could only think of his brother. Aiden, twice maimed now and wanting revenge on his family.

  And Fenrir, in his pain-laced mind, couldn’t fault him for it.

  He could only fault him for not succeeding.

  Chapter 40

  Without the strong arm of his brother or the nimbleness of his to-be-bound, Hafgan would have fallen to his death ten times over.

  He sprawled out, exhausted beyond reality, tears squeezing from his eyes by the impossibility of it all. His wounds burned and his head spun so that up and down became the same thing. The ever-present roar of Enorry Falls buzzed in his ears like a thousand maddened bees.

  “A little more, brother. We must push… we must push… we must push.” Repetitive, just like twenty-five years before. But gentle, and seemingly more and more coherent even as Hafgan lost his own tenuous grasp of reality.

  Hafgan battled to his knees, Rian supporting him despite the fact that she stood on shaking limbs herself. They were beyond caring about the cold; though they should have been shivering, the exertion of their bodies pressed them forward. As did Yurin and his gentle mumbling. He was surefooted and focused, almost as if he knew where they were going.

  They had lost all signs of pursuit; the Carreg Da, though driven by that huge warleader, seemed to have lost interest before long, particularly after one of the warriors had fallen to what had certainly been his death. From their vantage, it appeared as if they had attracted enough of the forces to allow the budredda and Offeirs to pass, but Hafgan couldn’t be certain. He could barely spare enough energy to think of his men—his only path forward was their path upward.

  Their little party would have long ago lost their strength, their ability to ascend, except that they traveled a path once tread. Every now and again, in the most impassible areas, there were ropes and spikes affixed to the path, betraying the fact that someone had once forged a road to the top of the falls. Yurin seemed to know each one. Hafgan, in his feverish brain, recalled the story that Taern had shared, that the Dyn Doethas had once sent slaves to the top of the mountain to control the very flow of the falls. Perhaps these pathways were all that remained, the only legacy of those dead multitudes.

  Nonetheless, he was thankful. They were so close, though this last stretch seemed like an impossibility.

  “Hsssst!” Rian hissed out, crouching down next to Hafgan and gripping his arm, pausing his struggle. Yurin knelt similarly, eyes darting around until they settled on what Rian saw.

  The source of Enorry Falls was mercifully only around forty or fifty feet above their ledge, water plunging hundreds of feet to the river below. But, that sight was familiar—what drew the eye instead was a man standing near the falls.

  At least, Hafgan thought it was a man. Against the brightness of the snow, all he could make out was a black figure wearing a long coat that flapped in the heavy breeze. The person stood so still that he could have been a statue, apparently gazing out over the valleys below Limner. For so long, the man stood there, watching
and waiting for something. He did not move his head, but Hafgan felt that, if any of them moved an inch, the man would notice. And, for whatever reason, gathering the attention of this man seemed like a terrible idea. A fatal idea.

  Hafgan shuddered, feeling tears streaking through his facial hair. He struggled mightily to hold back a sob that might give them away. He felt like he was choking, his windpipe clogged with a hundred pebbles. His stomach was a shriveled mess of agony as it twisted about like a serpent. He’d never felt this way before; this was beyond any normal fear. It was beyond terror, even. And the man was not even directing their attention at them.

  There was a power in this man. An impossible power. An unfathomable power. The power of a god.

  Hafgan’s muscles were cramping and clenching, but he dared not stretch them. He dared not move even in inch.

  Without warning, the man simply launched himself forward in a great leap into the air that Hafgan couldn’t have managed in his prime, let alone now. He plummeted toward the city below, falling as quickly as a man should fall. Hafgan lost sight of him through the omnipresent mist.

  “What in the bleeding hell was that?” Rian asked, grimacing as she regained her feet. She was breathing heavily and covered in perspiration. Hafgan realized that he was, as well.

  “I think that… I think that was the Flawless God.”

  ***

  Enorry Falls originated in a cave—a damp, dark place that nonetheless felt surprisingly welcoming as a refuge. The group walked a few dozen yards into the cavern before collapsing in exhaustion. Rian and Hafgan did, anyhow. Yurin continued to stand, although he tossed his and Hafgan’s spears aside with a clatter.