“It’s over, Cai!” Diran said. Energy blazed through every fiber of the priest’s being, but there was no pain, only a sensation of strength and Tightness as the Silver Flame did its holy work through him. He was the weapon, and the Silver Flame, which was the power of Life itself, was the hand wielding him. Some called Diran the Blade of the Flame, and that title was never more appropriate than at this very moment. “Surrender, and I promise your destruction will be swift and merciful!”
Erdis Cai cringed from the intense illumination radiating from Diran’s hand, and the priest stepped closer, reaching back into his cloak for a dagger—any dagger—that might end the vampire’s foul existence, but before Diran could locate a suitable blade, Erdis Cai turned and clamped his gauntleted fingers around Makala’s throat.
“Extinguish your light, priest, or I’ll close my hand and pop off her head like the bloom of a dandelion!”
“Don’t—” Makala started to say, but the vampire lord tightened his grip, choking off her voice.
Diran knew what his former lover had intended to say, for he would’ve said the same in her place. Don’t worry about me—kill him! Diran also knew that as a priest of the Silver Flame, it was his sworn duty to destroy creatures like Erdis Cai, regardless of the personal consequences. Diran knew then what he had to do.
, He closed his fingers around the silver flame burning in his hand, extinguishing it in his fist.
The blinding holy light gone, Erdis Cai released his grip on Makala’s throat and whirled around to face Diran once more. His armored hand lashed out and fastened around Diran’s neck. The priest felt a jolt of freezing cold as the metal came in contact with his skin, and a numbing sensation became to spread outward from his neck into the rest of his body. He felt weary, listless, drained of energy, then he understood what was happening. Erdis Cai’s obsidian armor was enchanted, and the vampire lord was using it to absorb Diran’s lifeforce.
Erdis Cai’s inhuman gaze bored into Diran’s eyes. “You put up a good fight, priest, I’ll give you that much. In fact, it was the most fun I’ve had since I became immortal, but the game’s finished and I’m the victor. Go to your death knowing that your strength will be added to my own, and your woman will join me in the dark glory of undeath. Farewell, Diran Bastiaan.”
Diran caught a flash of orange-red out of the corner of his eye, and Erdis Cai’s head snapped back as Ghaji’s fire axe bit into his skull. The vampire lord screamed as his head burst into flame, and he loosened his grip on Diran’s throat—not much, perhaps, but enough. Diran felt the transference of his lifeforce cease, and he opened his hand to reveal a still-glimmering flicker of the Silver Flame. The flicker grew and lengthened until to became a dagger of pure energy, and then Diran rammed the blade of silver fire through the opening in Erdis Cai’s breastplate.
The vampire lord opened his burning mouth to scream anew, but all that emerged from within was a shaft of bright silvery light. Other shafts burst forth from his eyes, ears, and even his nostrils, the light spreading, merging, until it covered Erdis Cai’s entire body. Diran pulled his empty hand free of the vampire lord’s chest. The silver light dimmed and the flame surrounding Erdis Cai’s head slowly died away as Ghaji’s fire axe deactivated. All that remained of the undead explorer was a suit of armor and an ash-flecked skull with an axe embedded in it. For an instant, the skeletal remains continued standing, as if held upright by the obsidian armor encasing them, then Erdis Cai’s remains collapsed to the walkway, his armor striking the ground with a loud crash.
Diran felt like collapsing himself, but Ghaji shouted, “Do you mind tossing my axe back to me? I could really use it right about now!”
Diran turned to see that Ghaji and Tresslar stood on the walkway, battling the undead warriors as they came one and two and a time. Ghaji was forced to make do with his old axe, hacking off desiccated arms and legs, while Tresslar’s dragonwand had conjured what appeared to be a gaseous reptilian claw from its tip. The claw was solid enough, though, for it gouged out large chunks of undead flesh from one hobgoblin after another. The destruction of Erdis Cai appeared to have had no effect on the undead goblinoids. They continued to fight, and though Ghaji and Tresslar had taken out a number of the creatures, more were being resurrected by the moment.
“Forget the axe!” Tresslar said. “Throw Onkar’s arm into the pool!”
Diran recalled how his poison-coated daggers had affected the Mire, and he thought he knew what the artificer had in mind.
“Do it, Ghaji!” he shouted.
The half-orc dispatched another hobgoblin then raced across the walkway, weaving between more of the undead warriors. He reached Onkar’s severed arm with its bloody, ragged stump and kicked it into the pool. Immediately, the blood remaining in the giant basin turned black, and the ebon color rapidly spread along the upward flowing streams of liquid and down the twenty-five runnels and back into the alcoves where the rest of the hobgoblins waited to be restored to life. A rank stench of rotting meat and sewage wafted from the openings, and a flood of brackish liquid gushed out, flowing back into the basin and filling it almost to the brim once more. Skeletal fragments bobbed in the horrid soup, but they quickly dissolved and were gone.
Diran smiled grimly. Onkar’s arm had poisoned the blood his master had harvested over the course of four decades, destroying those warriors that had yet to be resurrected. Unfortunately, it hadn’t done anything to stop those hobgoblins that had already been reanimated, but at least no more would be replenishing their ranks.
Diran pried Ghaji’s axe out of Erdis Cai’s skull and tossed the weapon to his friend. The half-orc caught the axe easily, and the metal burst into flame once more. Ghaji then returned to doing what he did best—hacking things to pieces. Diran turned, stepped over Erdis Cai’s armor, and went to Makala’s side. With the vampire lord dead, her paralysis had been lifted and she sat up.
“I’d say it was good to see you, but that would a monumental understatement.”
Diran smiled and leaned forward to kiss her. When they parted, Ghaji said, “If you two are finished, Tresslar and I could use a little help over here! Too many remain for us to deal with alone!”
Diran bent down and picked up the wooden dagger that had been embedded in Erdis Cai’s neck. He cut the ropes binding Makala’s wrists and ankles, then offered her the blade.
“No thanks,” she said. “There are plenty of weapons lying around.” This was true; the chamber was littered with mutilated hobgoblin corpses and the weapons they’d wielded. “Nothing personal, but I’d rather use something a bit more substantial than a dagger.”
“Suit yourself,” Diran said. “Ready?”
Makala grinned. “Try and stop me.”
Together they ran down the walkway.
* * *
“I never thought I’d say this, but I think I’ve killed enough undead monsters to last me for a while,” Ghaji said.
Ghaji, Diran, Makala, and Tresslar walked through the domed goblinoid city on their way to the dock. They moved cautiously, for while they’d escaped the sacrificial chamber, a number of the undead warriors yet survived and might still prove a threat. So far, it seemed as if the ancient hobgoblins had no intention of leaving the chamber, but they kept careful watch just the same.
“Where is everyone?” Makala asked.
“Hiding,” Diran said, “or perhaps with their master gone, they’ve abandoned Grimwall.”
“There are several passages that lead to the surface,” Tresslar said.
“I take it you don’t want to hunt them down,” Makala said.
“Erdis Cai, Onkar, and Jarlain are dead. The prisoners are free—assuming things went well for Yvka and Hinto—and the Black Fleet is no more,” Diran said. “I think that’s enough for one night, don’t you? I doubt the others will return to Grimwall, and perhaps knowing their master has been defeated will convince them of the folly of worshipping Vol. Perhaps some of them will even cross over to the side of Light.”
> “I think you’re being overly optimistic,” Tresslar said.
“Oh, I don’t know,” Makala countered. “I can think of a time or two that it’s happened before.”
Diran smiled at Makala and reached out to take her hand, but before their fingers touched, a quartet of naked figures came rushing out of one of the domed buildings in front of them.
“Ghouls!” Ghaji shouted.
The undead cannibals come running toward them, eyes burning with hunger, tongues lolling out of their mouths. Ghaji, Diran, and Tresslar stepped forward to deal with the creatures, Makala still had the sword she’d taken from one of the dead hobgoblin warriors. She reached for it now, intending to help slay the ghouls, but she froze as a horribly distorted voice whispered in her ear.
“Hello.”
A handless forearm pressed against her mouth, and Makala struggled as Onkar pulled her back through the open doorway of another domed building. There, in the darkness, she felt charred lips press against her throat and sharp fangs sink into her neck.
CHAPTER
TWENTY-TWO
When the last ghoul was dead, Diran took a quick look around and realized that Makala was missing.
“Makala?” he called, but there was no answer. He turned toward Ghaji and Tresslar, but the worried expressions on their faces told him that they had no idea where she was.
Diran still held a silver dagger from their battle with the ghouls, and he gripped it tightly and starting running back in the direction from which they’d come. Part of him wanted to believe that Makala had simply gone off in pursuit of a fleeing ghoul, but he feared something else had happened, something bad.
As he drew near one particular building, he felt a dark presence emanating from within. He could almost see it, as if a shadowy cloud covered the domed structure. Without hesitation, he headed for the building and plunged through the open doorway.
Onkar crouched over Makala’s prone form. Her throat had been torn to shreds and her blood was smeared over the lower half of the vampire’s face. Onkar looked up with a feral snarl and his eyes blazed with red flame, as if he were a wild beast disturbed in the act of feeding. Thanks to the fresh infusion of nourishment Onkar had stolen from Makala, the battle wounds he’d sustained were already in the process of healing. A tiny hand no larger than an infant’s now protruded from the stump where Ghaji had hacked off his arm. The hand possessed miniature claws and the slender fingers waggled, almost as if Onkar’s new hand were waving to Diran.
Onkar grinned, displaying fangs slick with Makala’s blood. “You’re too late, priest. She’s dead, but if it comes as any consolation to you, she was delicious.”
With the litheness of a jungle cat, Onkar sprang over Makala’s body toward Diran, fangs bared and claws outstretched. Onkar slammed into Diran and knocked him to the ground. The vampire held Diran down with his good hand while he lowered his mouth toward the priest’s throat.
For an instant, Diran considered letting the vampire have him. He’d fought so long against the darkness—both within and without—and his soul was weary. He’d come too far to give up now, and if he could reach Makala in time, there was a chance that he might be able to save her.
Just as Onkar’s incisors dimpled the flesh over his artery, Diran brought the silver dagger in his hand up and rammed the blade into Onkar’s left ear. The sacred metal burned its way through undead flesh and bone and lodged deep within the vampire’s brain. Onkar threw back head and screamed. Blood gushed from his other ear, his eyes, nose and mouth. Makala’s blood.
Diran shoved the shrieking fiend off him and quickly crawled over to Makala’s side. As Onkar thrashed on the floor of the domed building, Diran closed his eyes and concentrated on breathing evenly.
Please, he prayed, and pictured a spark of silver fire appearing in the palm of his hand. He felt the holy power of the Silver Flame surge through his body, and when he opened his eyes, he saw that his hand was filled with a brilliant blue-white light. So strong was its illumination that Diran couldn’t look directly at it. The light spilled over Onkar as well, and the wounded vampire’s shrieks rose in volume and pitch, becoming so loud that Diran thought his eardrums might burst, but he didn’t care about that. All that mattered was Makala.
Diran pressed his palm to Makala’s savaged throat and willed the Silver Flame to enter her body, to seek out the foul corruption inside her and destroy it. How long he knelt there, channeling the power of the Silver Flame into Makala, he didn’t know. At one point he became aware that Onkar’s screams had stopped, and he knew that Ghaji and Tresslar had arrived and finished off the damned creature.
Finally, Diran felt the Silver Flame diminish, and the light slowly faded until it was gone. When he removed his hand from Makala’s throat, he saw that the skin was smooth and unbroken, as if Onkar had never attacked her.
“Did it work?”
Diran glanced over his shoulder and saw Ghaji standing there, worry in his eyes.
Diran avoided his friend’s question. “Where’s Tresslar?”
“While you were… busy, I decapitated Onkar and dragged the two halves of his corpse outside. I used my fire axe to set the remains aflame. Tresslar’s watching the body burn. We’re going to make sure the bastard is completely destroyed.”
Diran nodded. He’d been so focused on Makala that he hadn’t noticed the foul stink of burning flesh, but he smelled it now.
Ghaji nodded toward Makala. “Is she hurt?”
Diran turned back to look at her. Though her body and clothes were stained with blood from Onkar’s attack, she looked peaceful and relaxed, as if she were only sleeping.
“I don’t know,” Diran admitted. “What I tried has never been attempted, as far as I know. If I got to her in time…” He trailed off and reached into a pocket and brought forth the silver arrowhead that was the symbol of his faith. He reached out, placed the arrowhead in Makala’s palm, and closed her fingers around it.
At first nothing happened. Then came a soft sizzling sound, as of meat cooking over an open flame. Diran opened Makala’s hand and removed the holy token.
On her palm was a scorch mark in the shape of an arrowhead.
* * *
Makala opened her eyes.
“Welcome back,” Diran said.
She sat up and reached for her throat. She ran fingers over smooth, unbroken skin and sighed with relief. “Did you heal me?”
Only a few feet away, Diran sat cross-legged on the stone floor. The domed building contained a single large room, crudely furnished with a wooden table, chairs, and sleeping pallet set against a curved wall.
“I tried,” Diran said, his voice hollow, “but we found you too late. Onkar hadn’t quite… finished yet, and I destroyed him, but he’d nearly drained you dry by that point, and the vampiric contagion had already begun its work inside you. Despite my best efforts, I could not reverse its effects. I am… so sorry.”
Makala stared at Diran, as if she couldn’t comprehend what he was saying. Then she reached up and gingerly felt her elongated canine teeth.
“No… No!”
She began to cry, and cold tears trickled down her cheeks. She wiped the tears away with her fingers then looked at her hands. Her fingertips were smeared with crimson—the tears of a vampire. Without thinking, she started to bring her hands to her mouth to lap up the blood, but when she realized what she was doing, she shuddered in disgust and wiped her hands on the dirt floor.
Diran reached out to embrace her, but she scuttled away from him. She wanted Diran to hold her, but at the same time she feared his touch. The hurt Diran felt at seeing her recoil from him was plain in his eyes, but she couldn’t control herself. It was as if she were an animal acting on instinct. She was now an unholy thing, and Diran was a priest. No matter how much she wanted to, she couldn’t bring herself to go near him.
“It took a day for the transformation to complete itself. I’ve sat here the entire time, waiting.”
“Waiting for wha
t? To destroy me?”
“If that’s what you wish.” Diran lifted his hand and showed Makala the wooden stake he held.
“I don’t understand.”
“Remember what you said just before Onkar attacked you? You were telling Tresslar that you knew two examples of people crossing from darkness over to light, from evil to good. You were talking about us, Makala.”
“Yes.”
“We both found the strength to do without our dark spirits, and we both stopped killing people for profit. If you could do those things, perhaps you will be able to resist the darkest aspects of your new… condition. You may carry evil’s taint within your blood now, Makala, but that doesn’t mean you have to let it control you. I will not slay you, not unless you want me to.”
A silence fell between them then, and it was some time before Makala finally broke it.
“I can hear the blood pulsing in your veins, Diran. I can smell it. The thirst is so strong…” She began crawling toward Diran, the first flickers of red flame dancing in her eyes. As she drew near, she pulled her lips back from her teeth and opened her mouth wide.
Diran made no move to stop her. He simply sat and waited for whatever would happen next.
Makala paused. Slowly, the crimson light in her eyes dimmed and she closed her mouth. “I don’t want to live like this,” she said, “yet… Sovereigns help me, I don’t want to die, either.” She forced a laugh. “Emon would be proud of me, don’t you think? I’ve become the ultimate assassin. I no longer need another spirit to share my body—I am an evil spirit all by myself.” She felt as if she was going to cry again, but she fought back the tears. She didn’t want Diran to see her weep blood.
“No matter what else you have become,” Diran said, “you are still Makala, and I will always love you.”
01 - Thieves of Blood Page 27
