Kylan watched Hechthir disappear through the trees and then turned his back to the snowy edges of the forest leading to Coldember. He knew laying low may be the safest thing to do, just in case any of Archaina’s followers came for revenge, but he had come too far to stop. He had to complete this ritual. He reached up and ran his thumb along the edges of the earth stone hanging from his neck. He had taken a length of leather cord and fashioned the stone as an amulet while he and Hechthir talked around the campfire. He didn’t have time to worry about things that may or may not happen with the coven. He had fought his way through all of that to help Auralyn. And with the embershards in his possession, he reclaimed a confidence he hadn’t felt in a long time.
“Let them come.” He thought to himself. “It will be their death.”
He exhaled a deep breath, steeling his nerves. He changed course and walked south, towards Felmourn. His mind was filled with thoughts of Auralyn, and how he placed her in a magic-induced sleep to keep the necromancer sedated within. He would awaken her to a new life soon enough. He held onto the hope that performing this ritual would finally rid them of Morluna’s influence, and they could move on with their lives.
Kylan approached the edge of Felmourn as the night was darkening around him and walked along the main path, pulling the hood of his cloak over his face. Lamps hanging from posts lined the cobbled path of worn stone and packed dirt, their flickering flames casting a shallow glow over the street. Kylan followed the winding path through town, keeping darkened alleys and quiet corners in his peripheral. He passed the alchemist’s shop and turned the corner. He stopped in front of a house with an indigo ribbon tied to a hook on the door. The ribbon’s border was an ornate pattern stitched in silver. The common townsperson saw it as a simple decoration. It secretly indicated that he was a mage of Silvermoth. Beyond that ribbon, the house looked like any other house in town.
Kylan pushed the heavy wooden door open and slipped inside.
Auralyn was laying atop the bed, sound asleep, entranced by the dreamspell. Kylan took her out into the Elderforest to the south of town and found a clearing where he could perform the final ritual in private. Moonlight drenched the forest in silver, revealing a thin mist floating along the ground. He took in their surroundings, ancient trees with wide canopies provided a safe place to work.
He released Auralyn from the dreamspell. She opened her eyes and smiled when she saw him. He chanted the words from Morluna’s journal. He needed to get this done, needed this to be over. Auralyn’s expression changed and her brow furrowed above eyes flaring with rage.
“No,” She screamed, bringing her knees and elbows together as she folded over on the ground. Morluna was taking over. She screamed again, but this time it was Auralyn’s words. “Kylan, I’m slipping.” She reached an open palm to him, her eyes pleading. Moments later, she fell silent and her body jerked upwards, arms curved at her sides. She looked at the mage. Morluna’s words screamed out. “No, I won’t let you banish me to the void.”
Kylan ignored her pleas, focusing on the words of the spell. She writhed and screamed, her shrieks piercing the sanctity of the quiet forest. Morluna battled Auralyn within the necromancer’s mind and body. Soon the screams became laughter, and a cold sting tore through Kylan’s leg. He fell to one knee and opened his eyes. He was standing face to face with Morluna, her lips crooked upwards in a grin and those silver eyes burning into him.
“What? How could y--”
Kylan couldn’t finish his question, but it was clear Morluna buried Auralyn deep within her subconscious, taking back control over her body. She thrust her arms in quick movements, blasting magic at Kylan again.
A visceral pain seared through him, the soulburn scarring his side beneath an arm. Again she cast her soulfire, curls of deep jade whipping towards him. Another bolt sliced through him, another thick, rigid scar formed across his skin beneath the torn tunic. Every muscle ached down to the bone, exhaustion pierced through him. He tried to ignore the pain, but his vision flared with each heaving breath as he fell to the ground, unable to catch himself. She was more powerful than he had realized. A wounded animal backed into a corner. He crouched there, the thought of defeat closing in on him. His vision began to blur and dark shadows filled his periphery.
This was it. He would experience his second death at her hands.
His final death.
Kylan just wanted one more second to believe he and Auralyn would be together again.
Auralyn, his beloved. So much of their story he thought was left unwritten, an encore before the music faded, one last dance. He could hear the subtle thump of his heartbeat. He felt it. Each pulse of his heart flashed another vision of Auralyn. In the distance, Kylan swore he could hear music. Hechthir’s song to carry him off into the mistfields. He thought about what he had to lose and what it meant to him.
His new friend. His wife.
Kylan pushed the pain down and cast his doubts away. His body came alive with magic flooding his veins. He realized that what he had to lose gave him strength and courage.
He had something to fight for.
He couldn’t give in. He had come too far and endured so much to get here. Here, at this moment, he would fight or die. Kylan stood up.
This would be their final battle.
He knew only one of them would survive this night. She continued blasting him with bolts of magic. He shuttered with the impact of each hit. One after another he took them, grimacing through the sting as his skin was scarred by her attacks. Kylan exhaled as time slowed around him, a cold ache building in his shoulders and legs. He pushed forward and glared at his enemy. He screamed through clenched teeth.
“You betrayed me, Morluna. More than once, you have manipulated me, demon mage. It’s past time I rid myself of your shadow.”
It was an accusation. A warning.
Fury rose up within him and he let it out. All of it. He poured his emotions into it, every ounce of passion, rage, and regret.
“I will see this through and save my wife, gods and magic be damned.” Kylan said out loud to himself. “And damn this necromancer’s curse. I will break Auralyn free of her hold, and I will have her by my side again.”
He would die fighting for Auralyn, or finally defeat the necromancer. His actions here tonight were his love letter to his wife. The air swelled around them, waves of heat washing over. Viscous red flames of magefire screamed from his palms. Morluna threw up a ward shield but her body lurched beneath its impact. Her ward deflected the blast and knocked her backwards.
But Kylan was not the only one fighting for a life.
The necromancer screeched, her banshee’s wail pierced the roar of the flames. She threw her fists forward, blasting another bolt of green-tinged soulfire. Kylan dodged the blast, his cloak flowing as he spun to the side. He came back around fighting fire with fire. Their flames collided in the air between them, an explosion of magic, golden-orange and green tendrils of entwined flame curling outwards. Each held the other’s gaze. Each held their stance, arms out in front of them with palms open.
Morluna laughed.
“If I die, so does she, Kylan.” She slid a bare foot backwards, catching a thick gnarled root of the elderwood stretching over the ground. “Your precious Auralyn.”
Morluna waved her arms, her eyes glowing green. The ground vibrated beneath Kylan’s feet. One by one, skeletons and undead broke through the dirt and circled him. Morluna laughed from the shadows beyond them, backing between the trunks of the ancient trees. The corpses moved in on him, their skin like torn paper stretched tight over jagged bones. Their featureless faces were silent and cold. They were ready to kill.
Kylan’s will had been tested before, but nothing like what he has endured during this time beneath the dark of the necromancer’s crushing shadow. He leveled his gaze across the forest and looked at his opponents. The necromancer’s green energy glowed like fire in the hollows of their eyes. A bend of the wrist and her servants followed her si
lent commands.
They attacked.
Kylan raised his arms, blasting each one with fire and turning to the next. Each one he felled, Morluna raised again, a never ending flood of bones and claws. The skeletons hit him over and over, knocking him down on one knee. Pain flared in the scars over his leg and across his side. His other knee buckled, bringing him to the ground. Within moments, the necromancer stood over him, her silver gaze just as cold and undead as her minions.
The wind carried the haunting notes of the elf’s refrain through the forest. Kylan heard the requiem song echoing through the trees and he forced his magefire outwards in a burst of magic. The undead surrounding him fell, some burned to ash and dust, and Morluna staggered backwards.
Kylan began weaving the words of a new spell together in his mind.
“I’ve been trying to rid myself of you this entire time, but we have been connected since the beginning.” He jumped to his feet, the heels of his boots digging into the dirt. “So let us be connected until the end.”
Kylan pressed his advantage. He knew was taking a drastic risk. But the reward of giving his wife her life back and finally ending this cycle of madness was worth it to him. Even if he died doing it. He stepped to the side and the earth stone amulet around his neck moved over his skin beneath his tunic. In his desperation, he forgot that he had it. He focused his mind on his connection with the stone and harnessed its energies, raising his hands above his head.
This time when he raised his hands, it wasn’t fire he controlled, but the ground itself. Large chunks of stone and dirt broke away and flew through the air, knocking the necromancer back. She toppled over, and Kylan noticed her skin bore deep scrapes, that her skin was damaged.
Auralyn’s skin was damaged.
But wounded flesh would heal. Kylan had to end this now or there would be nothing left of Auralyn.
Nothing left of him.
Kylan swiped both arms across the air. The ground broke into chunks and threw the necromancer backwards. Her body crumpled against the gnarled trunk of an ancient oak.
She did not move.
He didn’t have time to think or feel. He had to act. He was a mage, much more than the elements at his command. Kylan removed the leather cuffs from his forearms and fell to his knees, pulling the two remaining embershards from his pocket. He held the obsidian death stone in his right hand, raising his arm. With the jagged edge of the shard, he brought his hand down, piercing his left wrist with the stone, and pressing it deep into the flesh of his forearm. He groaned. His vision was peppered with pinpricks of light and his blood soaked the stone and torn flesh. He quickly waved three fingers in the air and cast a binding sigil over the wound, healing the stone within his wrist and sealing it with an unbreakable spell. He repeated the steps for the other arm, embedding the heart stone into his right wrist, and pulled the bracer cuffs back over his forearms. The pain surged up each arm, but instead of trying to ignore or fight it, he embraced it. He used the pain and power of the embershards to drive him.
Kylan’s body stiffened beneath the currents of magic filling his bloodstream. He had never felt such power before. His pulse quickened. He had to do this now if it was to work. Morluna lay just a few feet in front of him. He stepped forward, moving into the shadow of the great oak’s twisted branches and looked down at the fallen necromancer. He held his hands out in front of him, his palms glowing with the ancient energies of the stones in his wrists.
The death stone gave him control of her soul. The heart stone gave him control over her blood. He closed his eyes and felt the pull of magic within his own body. He connected his mind to hers and opened his eyes, now glowing with the same haunting jade energy of Morluna’s magic. He looked around at the scattered bones strewn across the forest floor. He waved his hands and magic formed concentric patterns in the air, lines of glowing green energy connecting to form a new spell.
His ritual was almost complete.
Kylan was creating this new spell to bind her. A sharp jerk of the left hand ripped Morluna’s soul from her body. A push and pull of the right hand, and he absorbed her soul into his own. He could feel her confusion in the darkened recesses of his mind. Could hear her questioning as if he had thought her words himself.
“What just happened?”
Morluna’s voice echoing inside his head was strange, but his desperate attempt worked.
A wave of his right hand. The heart stone released the necromancer’s spectral form from within his own body. It hovered in front of him, a glimmering spirit. Her image flickered with her magic’s haunting green glow. She tried to attack him. No strike reached him. Kylan could feel her rage within his mind, and his own emotions flared in response.
But she could not hurt him. His binding spell was too strong. Within moments, Morluna’s realization settled in and Kylan knew she understood.
He controlled her.
He could release her from his body in spectral form, but she was bound to him.
“I think you know now what happened, Morluna.” Kylan said, raising his hands, the subtle jade light glowing from beneath the black cuffs covering his forearms. “I used the embershards to defeat you. And then I bound your soul to myself. You now do my bidding.”
“You can’t do that. It’s not possible.”
Her words echoed in his head. She swiped an arm back and sent a blade of green soulfire slicing through a nearby tree stump. The scarred wood smoked with bright green flames. Kylan grinned.
“I have three of the embershards, Morluna. And your power combined with my own, I am now the most powerful mage in Everscia.”
Kylan raised the dead from their fight earlier with just a thought. The corrupted, as they’re called in Everscia, due to the dark nature of the magic corrupting them, stood awaiting commands. Kylan’s eyes strayed to each one. Then his eyes met Morluna’s. The necromancer’s spectral form hovered in the air. She gave in.
“What is your command, Kylan? What would you have me do?”
“I would have you fight for me whenever I summon you, to help me defeat any threats that may arise. Together, we will keep Everscia safe. But first, we need to return to Silvermoth with your body.” The mage looked down at her body crumpled on the ground. “My Auralyn is still in there somewhere. And since you no longer need a body, she will take over your body permanently.”
Morluna didn’t respond, but he could feel her displeasure. Kylan waved his left hand and the death stone pulled her back within his body. It would take some getting used to, but Kylan would learn to control her. He may always have Morluna with him. A spectral companion, a shadow haunting his steps. A ghost within the dark recesses of his mind and body. For now, he was satisfied that his wife would live again, regardless of what it cost him. After all, what’s love if not sacrifice?
A groan from below turned Kylan’s attention to the necromancer’s body. Her silver eyes were looking up at him. Emotions rushed to the surface and tears poured from Kylan’s eyes. He had made it through these tribulations and got his wife back.
He had survived.
They had survived.
He had defeated a necromancer. What does that make me? Mage killer? Mage breaker? He remembered the mantle from the crypt, Kylan the Undying, and decided that he had earned it. After all, he had died once and yet here he stood in the Elderforest quite alive and more powerful than before.
Kylan’s thoughts subsided as he became more aware of the ache in his wrists and soreness of his body. Exhaustion was setting in again and it was getting harder to ignore. Kylan exhaled, his chest heaving with deep breaths.
He had known loss in his life, and betrayal, but nothing like what he faced when Auralyn fell ill with scarlet plague. All this he’s been through, to emerge with something more valuable than a rare spell or artifact.
Redemption.
Kylan had no way of knowing that when he first stood with his wife surrounded by fires in that crypt, that they would end up here. Not only had he brought his love b
ack from the fringes of death itself, but he now had the ability to summon a powerful mage to fight for him as an ally. And with the embershards, he wielded a magic that no other Everscian mage had ever known. The thought hung in Kylan’s mind for several moments and he considered that never before would he have risked so much.
But this was his wife. His love. The woman he swore vows of marriage to, and in his honor gave himself to her.
Until the end.
He looked at the face of the woman who would now respond when he called his wife’s name. For the first time, he didn’t see the necromancer. He saw Auralyn. He searched those silver eyes looking back at him and though this woman did not wear the face of his memories, at this moment he couldn’t recall her looking any different.
“Auralyn, are you alright?”
She shook her head. “I’m fine, Kylan. What did you do? Did you defeat the necromancer? Are we safe?”
“Yes, we are safe, my dear. But I’m afraid this battle has earned me a wound that I’ll carry with me from now on.”
He leaned down, extending a hand to help her to her feet. Soft moonlight broke through the canopies of the elderwood trees. Auralyn brushed out the folds of her robes, pushing a lock of hair behind her ear, and stepped over the large tree roots and into the clearing.
“Kylan, I don’t know what to--”
The mage wrapped his arms around his wife and pressed his lips to hers. Morluna screamed inside his head, but Kylan ignored it. He had endured the necromancer’s hell and took Auralyn back. Nothing else at that moment mattered.
THE END
The Blade Unbroken: Magebreaker Page 6
