Legends of the War (War of the Magi Book 3)

by Stephen Allan

  She gripped the red crystal tightly as she watched the battle unfold. Gravity did not bound her monsters to the ground, but the sky belonged to Bahamut. Ifrit reached the being first, clawing at its tail. But its hide was so thick that Bahamut did not even flinch when Ifrit bit down. Instead, it whipped violently, knocking the fire demon off. Bahamut turned and unleashed a forceful fire, endowed with lightning, that shot Ifrit down into the ground so hard it produced a crater where Ifrit landed.

  “Get up!” Artemia yelled as she grabbed the red crystal so tightly she thought she might crush it. “Go! Don’t waste time!”

  Above her, she heard a loud shriek, but it had not come from Bahamut. Instead, Shiva came tumbling down to the ground, another crater made.

  The phoenix went next, tucking its wings and slicing toward Bahamut, but the dragon deftly moved to the side seconds before it struck, causing it to crash head first into the mountain.

  The phoenix tried to shake off the pain, but Bahamut grabbed the bird and one of its wings. With raw strength, it ripped the left wing of the phoenix from its socket. The shriek haunted even Artemia.

  “Phoenix!” she cried.

  Then, perhaps granting the bird a mercy, Bahamut impaled the bird with its tail. It then sliced its tail through the air, splitting the phoenix in half, letting its body parts tumble to the earth.

  Things looked bad. She now had just three monsters by her side, and two of them had already suffered brutal attacks. Perhaps she had overshot herself fighting Bahamut. Perhaps she would pay with all of their deaths.

  No matter. She would die here or witness Bahamut die. The flow of the battle mattered far less than the final outcome. The phoenix paled in comparison to my other monsters, anyways.

  Finally, she heard a cry she wanted to hear.

  The shriek of Bahamut.

  It came as Odin had sliced at Bahamut’s arm, drawing blood. While a vicious blast of fire, embedded with a secondary electric spell, knocked Odin off course, it did not do as much damage, and Bahamut had suffered the first wound of its battle.

  But then, rather than continuing to fly circles around the arena, Bahamut paused mid-air and dove straight at Odin. It knocked the knight off its horse, which without its rider went into free fall from several hundred feet in the sky.

  “No!” Artemia screamed.

  She sought any magic possible to get the horse back up, but it fell in horrifying fashion to the ground.

  Dust flew into the sky. Seconds later, another impact came, this one as Odin and Bahamut came crashing into the ground. Artemia dared to venture over, noticing that the hole that Bahamut created went far deeper than the one Odin’s horse had created. Debris obscured her vision.

  When it cleared, she found herself face-to-face with the legendary dragon, its eyes as large as her arms, its jaws as large as her body, its head large enough to swallow her and her remaining army of monsters.

  “I wanted you, and I have you,” Artemia sneered. “You think what you’ve done so far scares me?!?”

  She began laughing deliriously. She had accomplished what only one other person in the history of Hydor had achieved—a battle with Bahamut. Even if she failed, she would already go down as a legend. She had already earned her place in the history of Hydor. She would have surpassed Auron’s expectations and his own legacy.

  Bahamut reared back, preparing to break the pitiful hunter before it with a single snap of its jaws.

  At the last second though, it staggered downward, as if some great force pulled it down. Its jaws missed crushing Artemia by about five feet, but its strike came so quickly Artemia scarcely had time to flinch.

  Bahamut bellowed with a great fury as it flapped its wings, flying to the sky. Odin held on to its foot, grabbing as best as it could, but the great knight was on its last legs. Blood seeped out of its armor. One of its legs looked bent out of place.

  Artemia glanced over at the horse. It did not move.

  She gulped as she looked to the sky. With a vicious strike from its tail, Bahamut impaled Odin and held it up to its face. It sneered, roared, and slammed it back to the ground, inches away from Artemia. Bahamut had not split Odin as it had the phoenix, but the knight would not survive the next minute, let alone the rest of the battle.

  “Odin!” she shrieked.

  Perhaps sensing the need to reconvene, Ifrit and Shiva gathered around her once more. Artemia glanced up to see Bahamut’s head tilting back, a great surge of energy pulsating through its body.

  “It is about to launch its most powerful attack, one that will eradicate the existence of anything that stands before it,” Ifrit said. “You must run, Artemia. We cannot survive it head on.”

  “No! I did not come here to run!”

  Bahamut’s energy reached peak brightness, to the point that Artemia had to raise a hand before the beast.

  “We cannot block it without killing ourselves,” Shiva said.

  “Then let me.”

  The words came from Odin.

  The knight rose from the ground and turned just as Bahamut unleashed a blinding light of white fire down onto the field. Odin raised his sword in defiance, cast some sort of barrier around him, the other monsters, and Artemia, and stood his ground. The resulting contact and following explosion knocked Artemia to the ground, debilitating her senses for several seconds.

  When the blinding light ended, the spot where Odin had stood had nothing. Where his shadow would have appeared, the blast of white fire had burrowed a hole into the ground.

  Artemia looked around. Ifrit and Shiva had survived, although they looked wounded. Burn marks covered their bodies. Artemia was dazed but unhurt otherwise.

  Bahamut came to the ground. It leaned over, and it appeared to pant. Still, it bellowed, signifying it was nowhere near as vulnerable as Artemia might have hoped.

  But then she saw the bleeding cut on its arm, the one Odin had delivered.

  “The beast is wounded,” Artemia said, the implication of the words bringing a smile to her face. “Ifrit! Shiva! Kill it now!”

  But then, the scream of a young girl from atop the cliff she had just descended from broke up the battle. Artemia turned. She saw Eric, Abe, Romarus, two young girls she vaguely recognized, and an older woman standing there defiantly, their chests held high, their weapons aloft, and their faces taut. The six enemies Ifrit spoke of.

  They stood as one atop the cliff, all of their weapons pointed not at Bahamut, not at Ifrit, not at Shiva, but at her. Artemia could not believe what she saw. How did they all live? And who were the girls? Who was the older woman? How had they made it this far? How?!?

  But disbelief gave way to fury. Fury that someone would dare interrupt her battle. Fury that she had not actually killed Eric, Abe, and Romarus. Fury that she would have to kill them before Bahamut.

  Then, fury gave way to opportunity. Opportunity to turn today into the greatest day of her life. Opportunity to end all of her threats.

  Opportunity to become a legend.

  “You’ve come to join my greatest battle yet!” Artemia yelled. She laughed before rage consumed her. She held her sword aloft, hatred burning her soul and in her eyes as she stared down Eric. “Come! Meet your destiny and die before my eyes!”

  CHAPTER 19: ERIC AND ZELDA

  In the minutes before, Eric and the rest of the crew had moved at a moderate but controlled pace. They had spotted the mountain in the distance, but they did not yet know if they had found the right place.

  But when the lightning bolts struck from impossibly specific spots, and when even from that distance they could see the tail, the body, and the face of Bahamut, it struck fear into every single person.

  It struck fear into Eric that Artemia might accomplish her mission and awaken Iblis.

  It struck fear into Abe that his worst fears about an unchecked Artemia might come true.

  And it struck fear into all of the magi that someone with the monsters of Ragnor might rule the world, allowing Iblis to create the wor
ld in his image through the evil that Artemia possessed.

  “Let’s go!” Eric roared, kicking his horse into high gear.

  He watched the battle unfold as the six rode toward the carnage with a singular purpose. If Eric could have flown into battle on the back of a dragon, he would’ve. He didn’t know who he should root for—the legendary dragon that ruled all other beasts and could annihilate cities with a single blast, or the monsters that could take the greatest beast in Hydor down. The question was not who he would support, but who he thought would make for an easier battle.

  That question seemed to have a default answer when Bahamut made short work of the beasts Artemia had. The monster soared through the skies, deflecting Artemia’s monsters with such ease that Eric almost wondered if it would make the most sense to hang back and let Artemia fall into her own death. No need for the six of them to also draw the wrath of Bahamut if they didn’t need to.

  But then Bahamut reared back and unleashed an attack mixing lightning and fire that was so blinding, even at their distance, even with trees blocking some of the light, Eric had to turn his arm up and his horse stalled, whining at the obscene amount of light.

  “Come on!” Eric yelled, grabbing the reins and yanking against the horse’s will. “Keep going! Come on!”

  Eventually, the horse acquiesced. The rest of the horses followed, ignoring the sound of two thunderous quakes and dust flying into the air. After just a couple of minutes, they’d made it.

  Down below, in the valley, Eric saw her. The woman who inspired so much hatred in him, the one who had killed his entire family out of nothing more than a grab for power and control. The one who had tried to kill him and leave him for dead. The one who was the true evil dragon he needed to slaughter.

  Artemia. Just her name sounded like a curse, one that the magi must have felt when they said Iblis.

  But at the moment, she stood face to face with Bahamut, only two monsters left by her side. The great dragon hovered just over a crater in front of her, and now stood poised to kill her.

  “We leave if she dies,” Eric said.

  But then, just when that seemed like an inevitability, something grabbed Bahamut from below and dragged it down. Bahamut, in turn, quickly rose to the sky and impaled a great knight. Eric remembered that beast from Ragnor’s cave, but now that he saw it here, it seemed like small work for a dragon like Bahamut. When the king of kings flicked the knight to the ground like a broken toy, Eric took a step back.

  “What in the name of Hydor…” Romarus said. “I have never seen power like this. We should not be here.”

  “And you’re about to see something much worse,” Tetra said as the dragon leaned back, power visibly pulsating through its body. “Shield your eyes. It’s about to unleash its most powerful attack. This will actually blind you.”

  The six of them did as commanded, though Eric allowed a small window through his fingers to glance at the bottom of the valley. There, he saw Artemia, the horned demon, the blue-skinned woman, and the knight standing defiantly before Bahamut. He watched as he felt sure they would all perish.

  Then the light from the fire blinded him, even with his fingers held up over his face, and he went down to his knees, burying his face into the ground.

  When it finally felt safe, he opened his eyes, the white aura of the fire still encompassing the battlefield. A crater had formed. The knight had vanished entirely. Artemia rose from the ground—how had she not died?—while her two surviving monsters came back to her side, limping and wounded but still fighting.

  He looked up to see Bahamut hovering down to the ground. It looked exhausted from the attack it had just unleashed.

  Zelda came up to Eric’s side.

  “Did that do it?” she asked hopefully.

  “No,” Eric said. “If anything, it may have just made the battle sloppier. Which will—”

  But then the echoes of Artemia’s words reached them. Eric’s grip around his sword tightened. Artemia wanted the final kill.

  No. He would have the final kill. He would now join this battle.

  “Kill it now!”

  “No!”

  Zelda screamed with force that Eric never would have imagined a fourteen year old—or anyone who hadn’t fought a thousand wars, really—could produce. Her scream echoed across the entire valley and back. Eric may have become more of a man and more of a leader, but Zelda had found her voice as well. She would not let matters go against her. Good. It’s what we need.

  Artemia slowly turned. The remaining four members of the group joined Zelda’s side, and Eric held his sword out at Artemia in defiance. He could finally see what he had hoped to since awakening in the crevices of Ragnor’s temple.

  Fear in the eyes of the true dragon in his life.

  Though it vanished quickly, it told Eric all he needed to know. Artemia would not fight with the spirit of someone certain of the outcome.

  “You’ve come to join my greatest battle yet!” Artemia yelled. She laughed. That drove Eric mad. He reminded himself to control his emotions, not to let his emotions control him—and he would certainly have to funnel his anger properly, for the battle would supply an endless amount of it. “Come! Meet your destiny and die before my eyes!”

  “Like you thought I had in Ragnor’s cave?” Eric shouted. “Like you tried to kill all of us at different times? You think you’re about to fulfill all our destinies, Artemia, but this is the end of the line for you. I have returned with part of the essence of Indica. Zelda has returned with the full essence and the greatest power a magi can possess. Yeva and Romarus have come with powers you cannot match. And Abe and Tetra have come to exact their own revenge on you.”

  Artemia just looked at the line one by one, shaking her head in mocking fashion. But Eric could practically smell the fear—and certainly the rage—emanating from her. His smile came from a place of confidence. Hers, from a place of weakness masquerading as strength.

  “You have a lot of gall, distracting me from my battle at hand,” she said. “No matter. Shiva! Take out those fools. Ifrit! Kill Bahamut!”

  “As you command, master,” the horned demon said, lunging at Bahamut.

  This is where it ends, Artemia. This is where you die!

  “Charge!” Eric yelled.

  What would come of this battle, Eric could not say. But what he could say was that whatever happened from here, one side would perish entirely. Either the last stand for Hydor would collapse, or the end of Artemia’s reign had come.

  “Abe! Come with me! Magi! Take out that blue monster!”

  Eric and Abe descended down the hill as fast as their feet would take them, ignoring the magic that flew overhead as Shiva and the magi fought a battle to determine the supremacy of magic. Eric quickly stole a glance of Bahamut and Ifrit fighting. It did not sit well with him that Ifrit seemed to have found at least a fighting chance, given Bahamut’s fatigue from his last spell.

  Eric leaped the final portion of the hill, jumping and landing with his left foot in the lead. He rose from his squat to see Artemia standing before him, the red crystal around her neck, a sword in her right hand, and an arrogant smirk plastered onto her face.

  “You thought you’d killed me,” Eric said. “But you should know I don’t die that easily.”

  “Truthfully, I had thought you’d died,” Artemia said. “I came back looking for you after Ifrit and Shiva massacred the dragons around Ragnor’s cave. But the waste of life Valigarmanda never could find your body. I wonder, how did you evade it?”

  “Because I have the power of a god behind me,” Eric said. “Because I fight for the side of justice. The god of Hydor looks favorably upon me.”

  That just drew a mercilessly mocking laugh. Abe came up behind him, his sword at the ready. Eric slowly raised his sword in defiance, holding it out, an invitation for a battle.

  “You have the power of a god,” she said as she raised her sword back. “I have the power of many gods.”

  She poi
nted it to Abe and Eric. The three circled each other, each hunter waiting for the other to initiate combat.

  “You two were my most successful hunters. Against anyone else in this land, I would not even watch, assured of your victory. But you have no hope against me. I relished killing your parents and especially your sister, Eric. Your little sister cried as I killed her. Your mother screamed. And your father… oh, what a delight that was! And Abe. I always knew your love for me was the most easily manipulated thing in all of the guild. But enough talk. Both of you will fall here today!”

  Eric and Abe both let out roars as they charged Artemia, both of them their swords raised.

  Eric entered a state of fighting in which he did not think. He did not react to his emotions. He didn’t even feel his emotions. He entered into a kind of zone in which his sole purpose had become to inflict damage upon Artemia and eventually kill her. He didn’t worry about the consequences. He didn’t worry about how. He didn’t worry about the feelings that came with this battle.

  Had he gotten the chance to consider his actions before, he might have remembered how easily Artemia had dispatched him in the cave of Ragnor. He might have remembered how no one could approach her skills with a sword, and that included Abe. He might have remembered that even though he had the essence of Indica, which now powered his blade with fire, magic worked only as well as the person using it.

  But none of that mattered now, because in his own mind, he understood one thing. The desire to survive and rise to the greatest moment in one’s life overpowered any doubts, previous failures, or lack of skill.

  And on top of that, he had sensed fear in Artemia. Fear that he had survived. Fear that he still stood. And nothing made a warrior thirstier for blood than fear from his prey.

  Blades clashed as Artemia fought off both dragon hunters. She used the space extraordinarily well, using it to keep herself from fighting two of the hunters at once. Although Eric and Abe both managed to keep pace with Artemia, for the first few minutes, they could not draw blood from her. She moved with too much speed and skill to let them get a slice in.