by Wight, Will
For a fraction of a second noticeable only because of the half-frozen world around him, the Incarnation of Valinhall stared into the eyes of Ragnarus.
Zakareth's eyes widened—the first time his expression had changed since the fight began—and the jewel at the top of the Rod of Harmony flashed.
The red light crashed around Indirial like a warm wave, but he'd called no external powers from the House. The Rod found no purchase, nothing to turn against him, and he exulted in the freedom.
That was one gamble won...but it wasn't even much of a gamble, was it? Of course he'd won. He was unstoppable.
Indirial summoned Vasha, and he could fully sense her personality for the first time. Every other time he'd held the blade, he could only feel Vasha as a distant mind. At times, he'd wondered if she was even real.
Now, her cold hunger for battle flowed through him, matching his own. But there were other things that didn't feel quite right, so he stood in place, trying to figure out what was wrong, while King Zakareth leaped over the back of his throne and away from the Incarnation of Valinhall.
Ah, that’s right. The King had banished his medallion, Korr, almost as soon as Indirial had been captured. Incarnation of Valinhall or not, he wanted his advisor.
Ordinarily, he couldn't summon his advisor directly from the House, but it seemed so straightforward now. He simply willed it to happen, and Korr vanished from Valinhall and appeared, hanging on a gold chain around his neck.
I'm sorry, Indirial, Korr whispered. That almost threw him off. Korr never apologized, and he couldn't remember the last time the medallion had actually used his name.
But, well, at least Korr was here now. He didn't feel comfortable fighting a battle without him. Speaking of which...
He was already reaching out to summon the Nye cloak from Valinhall when he stopped. He didn't need the cloak anymore, and who knew how it would react to his new eyes? He needed something better. Something more.
Shadows crawled from the House, folding into a hood that crept over his forehead. The shadows flowed down behind him, spreading into a cloak that fell almost to his feet. After a quick mental adjustment, the fabric retreated to leave his arms bare.
Vasha, Korr, his cloak...perfect. Now he was prepared for a real fight.
The Ragnarus Incarnation surprised him, leaping over his own throne in a jump that might have been fueled by Valinhall's steel. King Zakareth wasn't showing his age, but then again, Indirial wasn't sure such mundane concerns even applied to Incarnations. He had the Lightning Spear in both hands, and for a second Indirial was surprised; hadn't Leah held that spear? But then the steel spearhead was driven toward his chest, and he had to slap it aside with one hand, driving Vasha toward Zakareth's throat as he did.
The length of their weapons was almost exactly equal: the Lightning Spear drew a slice across the inside of Indirial's arm as Vasha cut a piece off of King Zakareth's cheek.
The King's wound healed in a sizzle of scarlet sparks, and Indirial's flesh knit together with a spray of green and gold.
So neither of them could be permanently injured. “This should be interesting,” Indirial said happily. He couldn't imagine a better fate than two immortals, locked in combat. The only problem was going to be finding a challenge to top this one, after the King was taken care of.
“Asphodel!” King Zakareth called, turning another strike from Vasha with the end of his spear.
Maker, that's right! Indirial thought. He'd almost forgotten about the other Incarnation, focused as he was on Ragnarus.
He knocked the Lightning Spear aside and jumped backwards, though he hated to do it. More distance favored the man who held the devastating ranged weapon, but he had to get some space to see what Asphodel was up to.
The Asphodel Incarnation was...still lounging on his chair of petals.
He noticed Indirial looking at him, and a broad smile split his pale face. “Oh, excuse me, gentlemen. I'm afraid I'm entirely outclassed.”
A blue-edged Asphodel Gate spun open beside him, and he casually strolled inside. “Oh horrors, it seems that he's caught me. No, help, I'm bound in my Territory. Ah, cruel fate.”
He turned toward King Zakareth and waved good-bye as his Gate shrank behind him. “If you need me, Your Majesty, you know where to find me.”
The Asphodel Gate winked shut.
What was wrong with him? He had decided to seal himself permanently into his own Territory instead of seeking out a perfectly good fight?
King Zakareth shook his head. “I never have understood Asphodel.”
“Me neither,” Indirial said. Then he leaped straight up.
Sure enough, the Lightning Spear blasted into the tiles at his feet, driving a hole straight through and into the ground beneath. A rough-edged crater of rubble and dust now dominated the center of Zakareth's throne room, and through the cloud of dust, the Spear flew back to its owner.
Indirial whipped Vasha to one side, then the other. She bit through the ordinary steel, slicing through the chains above his wife and daughter's cages. The prisons fell alongside Indirial and he threw Vasha to the ground in order to free up both his hands.
Then, reaching to either side, he caught each cage by the bars.
When his feet hit the ground, he had to hold the cages up to the sides to prevent them from slamming to the ground and injuring his family. The bars warped and bent under his grip, the bolts at either end of the cage popping out, but his strength seemed limitless. He hardly felt the strain.
Delicately, he placed the cages down, hardly noticing the tears that wove their way down his wife's face, or his daughter's look of unrestrained horror.
He summoned Vasha back to his hand and slashed her down from head-height all the way down to the floor. Earlier, all his Gates would have been the same size, and it would have taken him the better part of a minute to open one.
Now, the Valinhall Gate opened easily.
His family screamed questions at him, but he didn't bother to answer, tossing the cages through the portal. He willed it shut in time, as the Lightning Spear blasted toward him from the cloud of dust.
Danger, Korr said, and the violet flame burned on the end of Zakareth's spear.
Indirial had never felt anything so intoxicating. He could die here, right now, and if he did, then he would go to his grave at the hands of a powerful enemy.
On an instinct, he dropped Vasha again.
If this didn't work, the Spear would blast him to pieces, and he would see what the immortality of the Incarnations was worth.
But he couldn't resist the chance to try.
He clapped both hands together on the head of the Spear, catching it between his palms.
The sheer force of the blow knocked him ten paces backwards, the bottom of his boots skidding along the shattered tiles. He ground to a halt at the end of the throne room, the Lightning Spear quivering in his hands.
But he'd caught it.
He grabbed the weapon around the shaft as it tried to jerk out of his grip, attempting to fly back to its master. It struggled, but he wouldn't release it.
The Ragnarus Incarnation had lost, but by the Maker, he'd put up a good fight. He was worthy. Indirial would let him live; in the coming world, he would need warriors like Zakareth.
He started to say so, but then the column of dust and smoke cleared.
King Zakareth stood next to a huge Ragnarus Gate. Another woman, red-skinned and clothed in scarlet light, sat inside the Territory, perched on something that looked like an impossibly massive barrel tipped onto its side so that Indirial was looking down its deep, dark mouth. If the woman on the top of the barrel was any indication of scale, it looked like it could swallow a wagon and a team of horses.
Indirial didn't know what was supposed to come out of that barrel, but he liked the look of it. Maybe this would be a true test. He dropped the Spear and summoned Vasha, holding her in both hands.
We’re both dead, Korr whispered.
“There's
no one else like you, Indirial,” King Zakareth called. “But I can always build another palace.”
Red light swelled deep within the barrel.
Indirial called ghost armor.
The room vanished in a tide of red light.
***
Leah, stepping out of the Avernus Gate with a raven on either shoulder, was swarmed by officers, clerks, and concerned well-wishers.
“Thank the Maker!” one woman said. “You were gone, Overlord Feiora was gone, Overlord Indirial was gone...we were afraid you were all dead.”
Cold fear settled into the pit of Leah's stomach. “Slow down a moment,” Leah said. “Indirial's gone? Where did he go?”
Then the Lightning Spear vanished from her grip, and she was afraid she knew.
***
When Indirial regained consciousness, his entire world was dark. Practically every part of his body felt torn and broken, but in a distant way, as if he had simply heard of someone else being tortured. He tried to reach up and feel his way forward, but his arm wouldn't respond.
Then it began to heal, and in the gold-and-green sparks he was able to see a bit of his prison. The arm itself was twisted around like a wrung-out towel, bone and blood and muscle showing through the torn skin, but Indirial was sure that his powers would sort that out in a moment. More importantly, a slab of rough stone the size of a palace ceiling hung only inches away.
For a second, he wondered if he had been sealed underneath a Hanging Tree. Panic seized him: would he be down here for decades or centuries with no weapons? No one to fight? He would rather die.
Then the stone above him scraped and moved, and he realized that there were no roots twisting around his flesh, hungering for his blood.
He relaxed and waited to see who would pull him free. Whoever it was must have been strong enough to move a whole wall's worth of stone, which meant that they were worthy. Anyone that powerful had earned their place in Valinhall.
Finally, the stone slid to one side, and the sun shone down in Indirial's eyes. Once, it would have been blinding. Now, he didn't even blink.
King Zakareth stood over him, his armor flaring with red light as it provided him the strength to push tons of rock out of the way like he was sliding the lid off a coffin.
He raised the Lightning Spear in one hand.
“I have paid the price for you again and again, Indirial,” he said, his voice once again certain and commanding. “Will you obey me at last?”
Indirial couldn't help himself: he began to laugh. “With persistence like that, you would have done well in Valinhall. Not to mention your weapons.”
He reached out a hand to the Ragnarus Incarnation. Not that he needed the help up; it was symbolic, and Indirial remembered that such things were important.
“I'm with you,” he said. “You've earned it.”
The King's eyes flared with something like satisfaction, and he hauled the Incarnation of Valinhall to his feet.
***
The Eldest stood before two caged human females, studying them both. The older one had explained the situation, asking him politely who he was, begging him to let them out. Everything he would have expected from a human captive. The younger one had alternated between threats and stubborn silence.
That one might have a future here.
They both insisted on using Indirial’s name as much as possible, as though he couldn’t see Indirial’s presence hanging over them like a banner.
“I will free you,” he said at last. The older woman’s eyes filled with hope, but the younger’s narrowed in suspicion. Yes, she would have a future here. He would make sure of it. “Before I do, I have a few conditions of my own.”
If their story was to be believed, Indirial had succumbed to his chains at last. The Eldest wondered if that should be counted as a loss or a gain. On one side of the scale, Incarnations were notoriously lacking in self-control. Getting him to do anything productive would be like getting a newborn Nye to walk in the light. On the other side, the Eldest now had a powerful avatar of the House wandering around in the outside world. Surely, there must be some way to turn that to his advantage.
“You will spend some time as my guests,” the Eldest said at last. “I must decide what is to be done about Indirial.”
A pair of valuable pieces had fallen into the Eldest’s grasp, and it was finally his turn. If he played this right, he might be able to walk away with a new Founder after all.
One way or another.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE:
DAUGHTER OF WIND
359th Year of the Damascan Calendar
1st Year in the Reign of Queen Leah I
6 Days Since Spring’s Birth
”No one's heard from Indirial?” Simon said.
“...and tell them they can decrease the guards on the Avernus side,” Leah murmured to a servant in a messenger's uniform. “I don't think we'll have any trouble from them anytime soon.”
The messenger bowed and departed, and Leah turned back to Simon. “Indirial was last seen in the camp five days ago, screaming about an Incarnation in the camp. Some soldiers witnessed him fighting what may or may not have been an Incarnation before he vanished. Into a Gate, some say.” Her lips tightened. “Into a red Gate.”
Simon paced restlessly, trying to work off the feeling of doom that had been hanging over him ever since his fight with Alin. Now that Indirial was gone...well, Indirial could handle most anything, but they had perhaps eight Incarnations unaccounted for. Images flashed through his head: a man, charred and burned on the ground. A shriveled woman, held in the fangs of a giant snake.
He hadn't been able to do anything to help his parents, but Indirial had saved him. He burned for the chance to return the favor.
But he couldn't do anything if he wasn't there.
“Let's say it was a Ragnarus Gate,” Simon said, pausing his pacing to stop directly in front of Leah. “Where would it come out?”
Leah shook her head wearily. “He could be anywhere by now, Simon. And without Indirial, it's even more important that you stay here.”
“I came after you.” Simon hoped that would make enough of an impact to end the argument, but Leah's mouth quirked up into a one-sided smile.
“Yes, and look how necessary that turned out to be. We're not even sure it was a Ragnarus Gate. If it was red, it could as easily have been a Gate into Naraka, or even parts of Ornheim. It could have been an Elysian Gate, for all we know.”
Simon turned that over in his mind. It still irked him, a little, that Alin was still alive and free. Not that he wanted Alin dead, exactly, but it almost insulted his pride that an Incarnation had fought him one-on-one and escaped virtually unharmed.
Would Alin have kidnapped Indirial? Simon still wasn't sure what the Elysian Incarnation might be capable of, but Alin himself wouldn't have targeted the Overlord of Cana. It might not have even occurred to him to do so. If he came after anyone, it would be Simon or Leah. Or perhaps Grandmaster Naraka, who was still bound, gagged, and guarded somewhere in the camp.
He couldn't believe that Alin would plan and execute a trap to capture Indirial, but it seemed that someone had. And even though Vasha was missing from the entry hall, Indirial hadn't entered the House in over a week, as Valinhall reckoned time.
Simon had recovered enough from the mask that Valin and the dolls had pronounced him fit for duty. The chains hovered around his shoulder blades, but he could feel their cold links crawling back down even as he met with Leah.
“I don't think it's Alin,” he said. “You have to say, it makes more sense if it's Ragnarus.”
Leah sighed and nodded. “It does. That's why I have the camp on alert. We've been avoiding Cana ever since the barrier went down, waiting for someone to contact us, but so far no one has. The people are getting restless; most of them have family in the city. We're going to send a few parties of Travelers in later.”
“When do they leave?” Simon asked.
“I would rather you sta
y here,” she said. “An Incarnation, possibly two, infiltrated the camp only a few days ago, and we haven't heard from our most powerful combat Traveler since. We need you in case of an attack.”
It made sense, but Simon didn't have time to explain the powers of Valinhall to Leah. As long as he had a mask and Indirial didn't, Simon had a better chance of pulling him out of Cana. In his mind, he had a responsibility to try.
“If they were going to follow up with an attack, they would have already done it,” he said reasonably. He was interrupted by the raven on Leah's shoulder.
He'd tried to ignore the bird throughout their conversation, which was what Leah had advised him to do, but it was getting harder. The bird stared at him, stared through him, in a way that made him nervous. He couldn't help feeling that the raven knew his thoughts and didn't approve.
Besides, it was shouting in Leah's ear, which made it hard to ignore.
Leah didn't seem as irritated as he would have expected, given that a bird was shrieking at her. Instead, she reached out and pulled the Lightning Spear from out of nowhere, her eyes searching the sky. He didn't know what she was looking for, but she obviously knew something he didn't. He called steel.
A screech, as though from a hunting bat the size of a horse, echoed through the camp. The noise of the people dulled to a muted roar as many froze, waiting to see whatever had made that sound.
They didn't have to wait long.
A man, blazing with blue-white lightning, rocketed through the sky. His eyes shone like a pair of thunderbolts, and even his hands and feet were shrouded in bright, flickering light. A set of wings streamed from his back, seemingly made from smoke...no, from stormclouds. They, too, flashed with light from deep within.
The Endross Incarnation screamed again, and this time it sounded like laughter.
A dozen bolts of white, unnaturally straight lightning hammered down from a clear sky, all over the camp.
Leah and Simon stood on a hill rising above most of the tents, so Leah would have a better view of the camp's overall layout. Where the lightning bolts struck, fires burned, and smoke began to rise. Meanwhile, rolling thunderstorms the size of donkey carts flowed through the rows between tents, spitting out hissing snakes, giant lizards, and creeping vines that shot sparks.
