Soul of Dragons

by Jonathan Moeller

  She drew her bastard sword and hammered the blade upon the black staff. The ancient wood shivered and shattered into a dozen shards, the skulls rolling away. The ebony dead came to a halt, and for a uneasy moment Romaria wondered if they would go berserk without the staff's power to govern them.

  Then the green fires in their eye sockets winked out, and the skeletons collapsed into piles of motionless black bones.

  Romaria let out a long breath and looked for Mazael.

  ###

  For a moment darkness blinded Mazael, and a cold chill blew through him.

  Then the darkness cleared, and Mazael found himself on the far end of the pillared hall, Molly's sword digging into his guts, his hand hard around her wrist. She stared at him in shock, gray eyes wide.

  Mazael shoved against her, drawing Lion back for a stab.

  Molly tried to break free, but his left hand held her hands pinned to her sword hilt. She twisted the blade, and a wave of agony burned through Mazael. Again Molly heaved back, trying to break free.

  Mazael kicked, his armored right boot slamming into Molly's left knee. He heard bone crack, and she staggered. Once more she twisted her blade, blinding pain shooting through Mazael, and he almost lost his grip on her wrists. Yet he kicked again, and Molly hissed in pain. She threw herself back, darkness swallowing her.

  Taking Mazael with it.

  They reappeared in another corner of the pillared hall, far from the raging melee.

  “Damn you!” screamed Molly.

  She threw herself against him, driving the blade deeper into his flesh. Mazael's knees buckled, but he kept his grip on Molly's wrists, and slashed Lion at her face. Molly flinched from the blow, and sank into the shadows, perhaps out of reflex, and again drew Mazael with her. They reappeared in another corner, not far from the wall.

  Mazael moved before Molly could react, legs pumping. He slammed Molly into the stone wall, the point of her sword bursting from his back and scraping against the inside of his armor. The pain exploded through him, and his hands loosened. Molly twisted free, ripping her sword from his flesh.

  But not before Mazael struck her left leg with Lion's point.

  Again the sword blazed, the azure fire pouring into the wound. Molly screamed and slumped against the wall, Mazael's blood dripping from her blade. His blood, his accursed blood, tainted with Demonsouled power. With that blood Lucan had fashioned his bloodstaff, with that blood Mazael had fathered Corvad and Molly...

  Blood loss was making him light-headed.

  But not light-headed enough to miss the obvious. Molly hadn't vanished into the darkness. Lion disrupted her ability to disappear and reappear in swirling shadows.

  Molly's eyes cleared as Mazael swung again. She dodged, but Mazael reversed his swing, catching her across the hip. Again Lion's flames blazed, and again Molly shrieked in pain. She thrust, the point of her sword gashing his jaw, but Mazael stepped into the blow, ignoring the pain, and stabbed. This time Lion sank into her side, blue fire pouring into her. Molly shoved away from the blade, sword waving back and forth as she tried to fend off any blows.

  But still she had not vanished into the shadows.

  Mazael swung, both hands on Lion's hilt, and this time Molly barely had the strength to block the blow. She tottered backwards, and Mazael's boot caught Molly in her wounded knee. She fell, landing hard upon her back, and Mazael brought Lion down, all his weight and strength behind the blow.

  The blade sank through Molly's stomach, the tip scraping against the floor.

  She screamed, fingers curling around the sword to pull it free, and jerked her hands away as the blue fire burned them. For a moment she shuddered, trying to rise, trying to escape. Then the fight drained out of her face. Mazael had seen it before.

  She was finished.

  He leaned against Lion's hilt, sweat and blood dripping down his face as his wounds healed. He felt them closing, bit by bit, but the pain was hideous.

  “Do it,” whispered Molly.

  Her sword lay by her side. He picked it up with his left hand, his right remaining around Lion's hilt.

  “Do it,” said Molly, her face glistening with sweat, dark circles below her eyes. She could not heal the terrible wound in her stomach, not with Lion buried in her flesh. “Kill me. Kill me as you murdered Nicholas. Do it!”

  Mazael raised her sword.

  Her gray eyes bored into him, full of hatred and pain.

  He remembered standing in Castle Cravenlock's defiled chapel, Rachel lying helpless at his feet, the Old Demon urging him to embrace his Demonsouled nature and kill her. Rachel had betrayed him, left him to die in the San-keth temple below Castle Cravenlock. And Molly had done worse, far worse.

  Lion's flame flared, and Molly gritted her teeth.

  “Damn it!” she half-shouted, half-shrieked. “Are you going to watch me suffer, the way you watched Nicholas suffer? Do it! Kill me!”

  Mazael said nothing, Molly's sword ready in his hand. A slender blade, appropriate for an assassin and the smaller hand of a woman. And Molly was an assassin because the Skulls had raised her, because he had abandoned her mother. Just as Rachel had turned to the worship of Sepharivaim after Mazael left the Grim Marches.

  So many mistakes.

  Would killing Molly be another one? Or would leaving her alive be even worse?

  “Kill me,” she whispered, “just as you killed Nicholas.”

  Mazael stared at her.

  He had made many mistakes.

  But he had not killed Nicholas Tormaud.

  “No,” said Mazael.

  “Don't lie!” said Molly. “Not now! Look me in the eye as you kill me, damn you, and tell me the truth!”

  Mazael came to a decision.

  “I didn't kill Nicholas Tormaud,” said Mazael, “and I'm not going to kill you.”

  He tossed aside Molly's sword and pulled Lion from her stomach. She gasped in pain, and Mazael saw her wounds start to close. He heard a noise and turned, wincing at the pain in his side.

  Romaria approached, aimed her bow at Molly, and drew an arrow.

  “Wait!” said Mazael.

  She frowned, still holding her bow drawn...but did not release.

  Molly seized her sword and tried to stand, but settled for slumping against the black wall.

  “Why didn't you kill me?” said Molly. “Is this some sort of game? Do you want to watch me scream before I die?”

  “No,” said Mazael, glancing over his shoulder. The battle was over. His men, Gerald's knights, and Kjalmir's had all taken losses, but the Malrags had been broken, the survivors retreating back up the stairs. “I did not kill Nicholas Tormaud, Molly. I barely even knew him, and I have never been to Northreach. How could I have killed him? But if I had killed him, if I had murdered the man you loved...I understand why you would want to slay me.” He remembered the rage he had felt when he believed Romaria dead, slain by the Old Demon's spell. “And I cannot blame you for that.”

  “This is a cruel game,” said Molly. She levered herself to her feet, using the sword like a cane. Romaria's aim shifted, but Molly made no move to attack. “You only want to see me suffer. This is a trick.”

  “It is not,” said Mazael. “You're free to go. If you attack me or my men, I will kill you. But if you go, I will not hinder you. I did not kill Nicholas, and despite what you think, I'm not here to torment you. I came to stop Corvad, to keep him from unleashing another horde of Malrags on my people and my lands.”

  “Why don't you kill me?” whispered Molly. “You killed Nicholas. Why won't you kill me?”

  “Because,” said Mazael, “you are my blood, my daughter. I knew it not. Had I known, I would not have left you to the tender mercies of the Skulls, to whatever lies the Old Demon poured into your head for all these years. I should have known, but I did not. For that, I am sorry.”

  “You killed Nicholas,” said Molly, voice shaking.

  She would never believe him, Mazael saw. No matter what he said or did.<
br />
  A realization came to him.

  “Then do not ask me,” he said. “Go speak with the oracle statue.”

  Molly laughed. “A fine trick.”

  “No trick,” said Mazael. “I spoke with the statue, and it told me the truth.”

  Molly smirked. “Ah. So it drove you mad, just as Corvad said. That is why you have not slain me.”

  “No,” said Mazael. “If I were mad, could I have reasoned out how to defeat you?”

  Molly said nothing, and Mazael saw the tiniest hint of doubt in her expression.

  “Go,” said Mazael. “Speak with the oracle statue, and...”

  Molly vanished in a swirl of darkness. Mazael raised Lion, expecting her to return and attack once more. But she did not.

  Perhaps she had gone to speak with the oracle statue.

  Or maybe she had returned to Corvad, to warn him of Mazael's attack.

  “That was very risky,” said Romaria at last.

  “Most likely,” said Mazael. “But...I could not kill her.” He closed his eyes. “It was like I was in the chapel again, with the Old Demon urging me to kill Rachel. Perhaps Molly deserved to die. But I did not have it in me to slay her. Not after what she had suffered.”

  Corvad, though...Mazael suspected he would have no such qualms about Corvad.

  “We seem to have won the fight,” said Mazael. “What happened to that old shaman, the Seneschal?”

  Romaria smiled.

  “Ah,” said Mazael. “Let's rejoin the others and finish this.”

  “You're not in any shape to fight,” said Romaria. “Not yet.”

  She was right. Drying blood caked his left leg, and the pain from his wounds had not yet vanished. And Mazael felt a deep weariness settling into his bones. Demonsouled he was, but he was still mortal, and mortal flesh had limitations that not even Demonsouled power could overcome. He needed rest, badly.

  “Unimportant,” said Mazael. “Corvad will not wait on my wounds. He will turn Lucan into a Malrag Queen the minute he finds the Glamdaigyr. And I mean to stop him first.”

  Romaria gave a reluctant nod, and they rejoined the others.

  Romaria's earlier words echoed in Mazael's head. He had refused to kill Lucan. Perhaps that had been a mistake, or perhaps it had not. It didn't matter.

  Mazael's free hand closed into a fist.

  If Corvad turned Lucan Mandragon into a Malrag Queen, then Mazael would not hesitate to strike his friend down.

  It would be a mercy, both for Lucan and for the world itself.

  Chapter 30 – The Malrag Queen

  Molly reappeared before the oracle statue, her hands shaking, her stomach and leg aching from the wounds Mazael had inflicted. The cuts from that cursed sword did not heal quickly, and every movement sent pain shooting through her limbs and belly.

  Molly didn't care.

  She almost didn't notice the pain through the turmoil in her mind.

  Why hadn't Mazael Cravenlock killed her?

  He was a monster. He had abandoned her, had slain Nicholas. Yet he claimed not to have done it.

  And he had spared her life.

  He should have killed her. Molly would have killed him, had their positions been reversed. He had to know that she would come after him again, that she would never forgive him for Nicholas's murder.

  But he had let her go.

  To speak with the oracle statue.

  Was that his plan? To have her speak with the spirit and go mad? But Mazael had spoken with the statue, and he seemed sane enough.

  Unless letting her live was an act of madness.

  “Enough,” whispered Molly, and walked toward the statue.

  She would settle this, here and now. If the oracle statue told her the truth, well and good. And if it drove her mad...madness could be no worse than the storm raging in her heart. Mazael had killed Nicholas, yet he had spared her life.

  Why?

  She had to know.

  The statue's eyes flicked open as she approached, shining with green light.

  “Ah,” said the oracle in that voice of inhuman beauty. “You return, demon child. So Mazael Cravenlock has made his choice, and his fate is sealed. As is yours.”

  “What does that mean?” said Molly.

  “You mortals have free will,” said the oracle statue, “but rarely are your lives shaped by a single decision. Instead, you make many smaller choices, over and over again, like water wearing away a stone. And in the end, the weight of those choices decides your fate. So it is with Mazael Cravenlock...and so it shall be with you. But you did not come to ask me that."

  “No,” said Molly.

  “What,” said the oracle statue, “does your heart desire to know?”

  Molly took a deep breath.

  “How did Nicholas Tormaud die?” she said.

  “He was murdered,” said the statue.

  Molly made an impatient gesture. “I know this. Who killed him?”

  “Another Demonsouled,” said the statue, “one of your kin.”

  “I still know this,” said Molly. “Who killed him? Mazael Cravenlock? Did Mazael kill Nicholas?”

  “No,” said the oracle.

  “Then he was not lying to me,” said Molly.

  “No,” said the oracle.

  Molly blinked. She would have expected to feel rage, or angry defiance. Instead she felt an eerie, glassy calm.

  Like the final instant of quiet before a storm.

  “Then,” said Molly, “then who killed him?”

  “Your grandfather and your brother,” said the oracle statue.

  Molly blinked. Corvad had told her that Mazael slew Nicholas, and the Old Demon confirmed it.

  The glassy calm in her mind started to shiver.

  “But why?” said Molly. “Why would Corvad and my grandfather have killed Nicholas? He was no threat to them. He didn't even believe the Demonsouled were real. He thought them a story to scare peasants. Why would Corvad have killed him?”

  “Because of you,” said the oracle statue. “Nicholas Tormaud meant nothing to your kin. But your choices sealed his fate.”

  “They killed him because of me?” said Molly, incredulous.

  “They killed him because they wanted you for themselves,” said the statue.

  The calm trembled a bit more.

  “Jealousy?” said Molly, barking a laugh. “They loved me more, is that it? Ridiculous. Grandfather and Corvad love nothing but themselves and their own power.” Especially their grandfather.

  “They love you not,” said the statue, “but they want you for themselves. They want your flesh and your blood and your soul. For you are their pathway to ultimate power.”

  “I don't understand,” said Molly.

  The statue moved, a stone arm rising.

  “Then take my hand,” said the oracle, “and you will see the past as I see it. You shall see the truth for yourself.”

  Molly hesitated. Was this how the statue drove its victims mad?

  But she had to know the truth.

  She reached out and grabbed the statue's cold stone fingers.

  The world dissolved into writhing gray mist.

  ###

  A moment later Molly found herself standing on a hillside.

  She knew it well. It was a hill in Northreach, a few miles south of Castle Arminus, the stronghold of the Knights Arminiar. She saw the rocky hills and thick pine trees of Northreach, dotted here and there with plumes of smoke from the hilltop villages fortified against Malrag raids. Yet the landscape wavered and flickered around her, like an image viewed through a pane of smoky glass.

  “How did you bring me here?” said Molly.

  The oracle spirit's voice whispered inside her head.

  “I did not. This is only an echo, a phantom. A shadow of things that were. Behold.”

  Corvad stood at the crest of the hill. He wore the chain mail and leather armor of a mercenary soldier.

  “Corvad!” said Molly.

  He did
not turn.

  “He cannot hear you,” said the oracle. “His image, too, is only an echo of deeds already past.”

  Corvad had become a captain of mercenaries after leaving the Skulls, holding them in line with his brutal personality. This “echo”, whatever it was, showed something that must have happened no more than a year ago.

  Corvad turned and dropped to one knee, his chain mail clinking. “Grandfather.”

  The Old Demon walked towards him, black robes shifting in the wind. He stopped and gazed down at Corvad for a moment.

  “Rise,” said the Old Demon at last.

  Corvad rose, staring at their grandfather with a mixture of respect and fear.

  “Where is your sister?” said the Old Demon.

  Corvad scowled. “She abandoned us.”

  A hint of a frown crossed the Old Demon's hard face. “Why?”

  Corvad's scowl became a sneer of contempt. “She fell in love.”

  The Old Demon threw back his head and roared with laughter, leaving Corvad nonplussed.

  “Oh, but this is rich,” said the Old Demon. “First Mazael and his half-breed, and now Molly? Infuriating. Why do they always fall in love? They must get it from their mothers. I was never such a romantic.” He shook his head. “Tell me more.”

  “A nobleman named Nicholas Tormaud, son of the Lord of Ironcastle,” said Corvad. “He came north, to serve for a time in the ranks of the Arminiars. Molly was smitten with the fool at once.”

  “I sent you here to wait,” said the Old Demon, “until I found a source of corruption equal to our needs. If your sister has a dalliance while you wait, I see no harm. It might even take some of the sandpaper from that girl's tongue.”

  “But she no longer wishes to aid us,” said Corvad. “The blood of gods flows through her veins, but she no longer desires to use it. Instead she wants to spend her life with this fool. To live as a common mortal, rather than the progeny of the Old Demon.”

  The haze of red light in the Old Demon's gray eyes grew brighter. “Then she will no longer take part in the plan?”

  “No,” said Corvad. “The little fool only wants to playact as Tormaud's wife.”

  “Ah,” said the Old Demon. “Distressing. We need her.”