For an instant Mazael saw fury on the Old Demon’s face, a rage older and deeper and blacker than any mortal mind could comprehend, an unending lust to control and enslave and dominate.
Then the amusement returned.
“She loves you, Mazael!” said the Old Demon. “She defied death and my power all for love of you.” He waved his free hand at the others. “Just as they do. Such a band of ragged fools you have inspired to follow you. The half-breed, the ragged barbarian wizard, the bastard brat, and the dead woman. How very noble.”
“Does this speech have a point?” said Mazael. “If so, come to it quickly.”
“You can have more, Mazael,” said the Old Demon. “Join with me, and you can become a god. Not merely the lord over barbarian rabble, not even the Destroyer, but a god who will rule at my right hand. I can give you…”
Mazael burst out laughing, and the Old Demon’s eyes narrowed.
“Really?” said Mazael. “You are trying to tempt me still? After everything that has happened? I know you for what you are, and you still try to tempt me?”
The Old Demon laughed.
“Why, I suppose you’re right!” he said. “You know…I have lied for so often to so many people that it is almost refreshing to tell the truth. So let us speak plainly at the end, eh? I’m going to kill you, Mazael. Maybe I’ll kill Romaria in front of you first – we’ve already done that. Or perhaps I’ll kill your pet barbarian wizard and his assassin whore, and then kill you. And then, once you all are dead, I shall stride over your corpses and become the new god.” He grinned, and against he seemed like a bestial, monstrous thing crouching in human form. “And then I shall call you back…and your true torment will begin.”
“No,” said Mazael. “This is the end…but your end, father. All the lies and plots. All the centuries of slaughter and torment and destruction. You will pay for it all today.”
The Old Demon laughed again.
“You will not become the new god,” said Romaria, taking her bastard sword in both hands.
“You’ll pay for what you did to me,” said Molly, “for what you did to Nicholas.”
“The purpose of the Guardian is to protect mortals from you,” said Riothamus, “and today that purpose will be fulfilled.”
“Then,” said the Old Demon, “let us begin.”
He lifted the Glamdaigyr, the darkness swirling around the blade deepening.
###
Wrapped in his most powerful spell of obscuring, Skalatan stood against the wall of the Chamber of Blood and watched the confrontation.
He felt no need to declaim his intentions in a challenge. Such follies were an indulgence of those ruled by emotion, and Skalatan had no such need.
And given how his enemies hated each other, he had no need to fight most of them, either.
No, he would stand here and watch the fight. He would intervene here and there, to ensure the Old Demon and his son fought each other to exhaustion. And then, when one or the other triumphed, Skalatan would strike with his full power.
No obstacles would remain between him and the powers of a god.
He waited.
###
The Old Demon raised the Glamdaigyr, and Mazael braced himself for the attack, as did Molly and Romaria. Golden light flared around the Guardian’s staff, a candle flame in the darkness of Cythraul Urdvul.
But the Old Demon only beckoned with his left hand.
Bursts of flame erupted from the pillar, striking the floor in a dozen places. Mazael thought the Old Demon had unleashed a spell of attack, but none of the flames struck flesh. Instead they hit the floor, smaller pillars of flame rising from the impacts.
Man-sized pillars.
“What is this?” said Mazael.
“Do you still not understand, my son?” said the Old Demon. “You are mine. The Demonsouled are mine. All of them! And is it not fitting that I should summon them here, at the end, to watch you die?”
The pillars of flame coalesced into men and women, and Mazael heard Morebeth gasp.
The first one he saw was Amalric Galbraith, clad in the armor of a Commander of the Dominiar Order, the red longsword of the Destroyer in his hand. His gray eyes glinted beneath his eagle-winged helm, and narrowed when they saw Mazael. A short distance away stood Corvad, wearing chain mail and plate, also holding a sword identical to Amalric's, his face lighting up with murderous glee when he saw Mazael. Behind him appeared Ragnachar, a crimson greatsword in his hands.
Hundreds, thousands of Demonsouled appeared, generations of them, filling the Chamber of Blood. Some wore fine armor and rich robes, while others wore rags and furs and carried clubs and flint-tipped spears. Some were clad in the robes of wizards, while some were nearly naked, their bodies covered by elaborate scars and tattoos.
The battle madness played on their features, the Demonsouled rage that Mazael knew so well.
“Aren’t you glad to see your brothers and sisters, Mazael?” said the Old Demon. “So many of them! Generations I sired, and generations I slew, and now they are mine to command. I will devour their power and become a god. But first, I will command them to kill you…”
“Mazael,” said Morebeth, “you can command them. He is the Old Demon, but you are his son…and you are alive, and you bear Lion. You can command them.”
“How?” said Mazael, but then he felt the other Demonsouled.
He sensed the dark fire within them, the same fire that flowed through his veins and burned in his heart. The Demonsouled rage and fury, passed on by their father…but now enslaved and dominated by his will.
Just as he would dominate the world.
But Mazael intended to contest his father’s will.
“Hear me!” shouted Mazael, lifting Lion over his head.
The Old Demon laughed. “Don’t be…”
“Fight with me!” Mazael shouted, focusing his will upon the presence of the Demonsouled in his thoughts. “Fight with me, and be free of our father’s tyranny at last.” Agony flooded through his head as his will competed with his father’s. Was this how it felt for Riothamus when he cast spells against an enemy wizard’s wards? “Fight, and repay our father for all that he has done to you!”
He felt his will struggle against the Old Demon’s, and most of the Demonsouled held fast, their father’s will binding them like iron chains.
But in some, Mazael’s will prevailed.
A brief hint of shock passed over the Old Demon’s face.
“Kill them!” the Old Demon roared. “Kill them all!”
And chaos erupted in the Chamber of Blood.
Hundreds of Demonsouled rushed at Mazael, weapons wreathed in crimson flame. But other Demonsouled met them, shouting and screaming with centuries of fury, and in an instant Mazael found himself in the middle of a battle. A Demonsouled clad in ragged furs and armed with a club lunged at him, howling, and Mazael sidestepped the blow, sweeping Lion around in a backhand. The blade ripped through the fur-clad man’s abdomen, and the man dissolved into crimson flame, the fire leaping back to rejoin the great pillar.
“Mazael Cravenlock!”
Amalric surged through the press, drawing closer, his cold face twisted with livid fury.
“You slew me!” he roared. “And you will die and join us here!”
Mazael turned to face the attack, Lion thrumming in his hand.
“No!” Morebeth stepped between them, her eyes steely. “I will deal with him. I will make him answer for Sir Brandon’s death at last. Stop our father, Mazael.”
“Sister,” spat Amalric, lifting the sword of the Destroyer. “You betrayed me. You turned Mazael into your puppet and had him slay me. Now we are together…and you shall die for me over and over.”
“I think not,” said Morebeth, and her form blurred. Her gown transmuted into armor of crimson scales and chain mail. In either hand she bore a slender sword like Molly’s, each blade shimmering with crimson fire. A helm covered her head, flanked with eagle’s wings fashioned in ste
el, much like Amalric’s.
Amalric laughed. “You think to fight me?”
“In the living world, you were the stronger. Here, dear brother,” said Morebeth, “I am just as strong as you are.”
She charged at Amalric, their swords flashing and clanging.
And then the path was open to the Old Demon.
Mazael charged at him, Molly at his right.
The Old Demon lifted his left hand, darkness and crimson flame dancing around his fingers. Romaria loosed an arrow at him, exchanging her sword for her bow, and the shaft plunged into the Old Demon’s chest. But he barely seemed to notice the impact, and he pointed at Mazael, the fire and darkness forming a symbol of power before his fingers…
Then golden fire hammered into the Old Demon, and the ancient creature rocked back a half-step. The fire around his fingers went out.
Mazael sprang at him, Lion drawn back to stab.
For a moment, just a moment, Mazael saw a hint of fear on his father’s face.
Then that ancient, ravenous fury returned, and the Glamdaigyr blurred to meet Lion’s strike.
###
Amalric Galbraith’s head thundered with the will of his father.
He had served the Old Demon in life willingly, even eagerly, seeking to claim the sword and mantle of the Destroyer for himself. He had vowed to prove himself worthy. He would cast down the thrones of men, trample the nations beneath his feet, and lead an army across the world.
Then Morebeth had betrayed him…and transformed Mazael Cravenlock into a weapon to wield against him.
But now Amalric would have his revenge. The Old Demon would claim his rightful place as the god of the world...and there would be so much killing to follow.
Starting with Mazael Cravenlock.
Once Amalric cleared his wretched sister from his path.
But Morebeth wielded her blades with a skill and speed she never possessed in life, the burning swords weaving a crimson cage in front of her. Again and again Amalric hammered at her, but every time Morebeth weaved and ducked around his blows.
“Always the same, brother,” spat Morebeth. “Still thinking in a straight line. Never using a knife when you happen to have a hammer.”
“I enjoyed killing your precious Sir Brandon,” said Amalric, lifting his own sword. “I laughed when the rebels filled him with arrows, and I laughed again when he thrashed in his own blood like a pig with a slit throat. He cried your name when he died, did I tell you that? We are the blood of the Old Demon, and you degraded yourself by lying with him.”
Morebeth remained unruffled. “And yet I was not our father’s dupe, brother. Did he promise you that you could slay Mazael? How did that…”
Amalric roared, the Demonsouled madness erupting through him, and came at her with all his strength and fury, and around them the battle between a hundred generations of Demonsouled raged.
###
For a wild, mad moment, Molly thought Mazael would strike the Old Demon down, that he would drive Lion right through her grandfather’s rotting black heart.
But the Old Demon, too, was Demonsouled.
He held the Glamdaigyr one-handed, but wielded the massive black greatsword as quickly as if it were a quill pen. Lion’s blade clanged off the Glamdaigyr, both swords shrieking as the magic within them struggled. Mazael struck again and again, and the Old Demon blocked the strikes with ease, the Glamdaigyr blurring back and forth.
“Shall we fight with swords?” said the Old Demon, laughing. “I was going to blast the flesh from your bones, but I suppose it would amuse me to…”
Molly glanced at Romaria, who nodded, and they struck in one motion.
Romaria ran towards the Old Demon, her bastard sword blurring for his head. The Old Demon’s red-glazed eyes darted towards her, and Molly seized the opening. She could not walk through the shadows, not so close to the Glamdaigyr’s malevolent aura, but she still had Demonsouled strength and power. Her sword and dagger plunged for the Old Demon’s chest, all her hate and fury driving the weapons.
Yet the Old Demon dodged the blows in a black blur, moving faster than Molly had ever seen anyone move.
And unlike Molly, the Glamdaigyr did not block his ability to walk through the shadows.
The Old Demon blurred into darkness and reappeared a dozen yards away, amidst a knot of struggling Demonsouled. Molly wheeled to face him, as did Mazael and Romaria, but the Old Demon lifted his hand.
“Dear granddaughter,” he said, his smile revealing jagged fangs, “go and die.”
He gestured, crimson flame pulsing around his hand, and invisible force hammered into Molly. She had been hit by blasts of psychokinetic force before…but never by a wizard of such strength.
It felt as if a Tervingi war mammoth had fallen upon her.
The blast flung her across the Chamber of Blood and slammed her into the wall fifty yards away.
Molly slumped, broken bones jutting from her arms and legs, blood pooling around her.
###
Ragnachar son of no one strode through the chaos, cutting down Demonsouled left and right.
He had once fought to contain the darkness inside him, listening to his mother as she counseled patience and control. But in the end, the struggle had been too much. In exhaustion and despair he had rejected her and embraced the dark fire in his blood, and listened to the counsels of the Urdmoloch. He would kill and kill until there was no one left to kill.
Perhaps then the terrible hunger in his blood would at last be sated.
Ragnachar had hoped to kill the world…but instead Mazael Cravenlock had cut him down outside the gates of Sword Town.
But now Ragnachar was dead, and there was no more exhaustion, only pain. No more weariness, only rage and bloodlust. No more doubt, only the will of the Urdmoloch filling him with relentless purpose.
And that purpose was to kill.
He destroyed another of the rebel Demonsouled, the red flame flying back into the pulsing column, and spotted Riothamus son of Rigotharic.
The Guardian stood a short distance from where Mazael and Romaria battled the Urdmoloch, blue fire straining against green. Riothamus cast spell after spell, destroying the Demonsouled that tried to attack him and hurling bolts of golden fire at the Urdmoloch. Ragnachar felt a smile spread over his face.
Oh, but he would enjoy stepping behind Riothamus and burying his sword in the Guardian’s back…
Then he saw Molly Cravenlock slumped against the wall, blood pooling beneath her.
Riothamus’s beloved.
And killing her would inflict far more pain on the Guardian.
Ragnachar turned to face her, his greatsword coming up.
###
Mazael let the Demonsouled rage fill him, making him stronger and faster, letting it drive his limbs with fury and might.
For if there was ever a foe that deserved his rage, his hatred, it was the Old Demon.
Yet for all his speed, for all his strength, he could not land a blow. The Old Demon was too fast, the Glamdaigyr a blur of darkness and green light around him. The sheer force of his blows knocked Mazael back, and time and time again Mazael almost lost his balance and fell. If he ever did, he knew the Old Demon would kill him in a heartbeat.
Or one of the other Demonsouled in the mad melee.
His only respite came from the blasts of golden fire Riothamus unleashed. Every hit rocked the Old Demon. They gave Mazael a chance to recover his balance and strike back…but the Old Demon always recovered, regaining his balance to block the blows and launch attacks of his own.
So far, at least, Riothamus had kept the Old Demon from casting another spell. If the Old Demon worked a spell of sufficient power, he could kill Mazael and Romaria both in a heartbeat.
As he might have already killed Molly.
Mazael fought on.
###
Riothamus threw his full power into the next spell, the might of the Guardian’s staff augmenting his magic.
And still
it was not enough.
The golden fire slammed into the Old Demon, staggering the ancient creature, but left no lasting injury. Riothamus had seen how quickly Mazael and Molly healed injuries, but the Urdmoloch’s powers of regeneration were far stronger. Worse, layer upon layer of ancient wards armored the Old Demon, blunting most of the force of Riothamus’s spells.
Unless Mazael drove Lion through the Old Demon’s heart, they would lose this fight.
As Riothamus fought, he loosed the Sight, seeking for Molly. The Urdmoloch’s spell had thrown her across the Chamber of Blood, and he feared that the Old Demon had killed her. Or had left her crippled, making her easy prey for the maddened spirits of the Demonsouled that raged against each other, their screams and howls filling Riothamus’s ears. The terrible dark power of Cythraul Urdvul blazed before his Sight, the magic of the Demonsouled in the crimson column of flame shining like a dark sun.
He spotted Molly slumped against the far wall, her aura flickering and wounded. She was still alive, but badly hurt. He had to go to her, had to aid her…but he could not leave Mazael to face the Urdmoloch alone.
For an instant agonized indecision gripped his heart.
Then his Sight saw a peculiar rippling further along the curve of the wall.
A warding spell, perhaps? Or a spell of concealment?
###
Skalatan saw the Guardian’s blue eyes widen.
He had been spotted.
No matter. Even when measured against the power of the Old Demon, the Guardian was a dangerous foe. Killing him was just as good a place to start as any.
His carrier leveled the drachweisyr as he called on the enslaved dragon’s power.
###
Molly groaned, agony rolling through her, and waited for her Demonsouled blood to heal her.
She hoped it could. She had taken terrible wounds, and her blood might not have the strength to heal her.
Soul of Swords (Book 7) Page 44
