White fire blazed along Calliande’s staff, and she thrust the weapon before her. A wall of shimmering white light leaped up to meet Qazaldhar’s attack, and the ward struck the billowing plague mist. There was a brilliant flash of white light, and both her ward and the necromantic spell collapsed, canceling each other out. Calliande started another spell, preparing to hit Qazaldhar as Kalussa and Tamara and the others dueled with muridach priests.
Then Qazaldhar cast a new spell, something that Calliande had never seen before.
The Maledictus seized the Sign of the New God that hung against his chest and raised the dark medallion high. The Sign burned with blood-colored fire, and the flames surrounded Qazaldhar.
Dark magic rushed out from him, and Calliande heard some muridachs screaming. She followed the currents of power and saw that five nearby muridach soldiers, fleeing from the gray elves, had gone motionless. Crimson fire played around the muridachs, and they shuddered, Qazaldhar’s magic sinking its talons deeper into their flesh.
And then the muridachs exploded.
At least, that was what it looked like. Blood exploded from their eyes and mouths and nostrils and ears and sprayed out in a high crimson arc, drawn by Qazaldhar’s power. The five muridachs fell dead, drained of every drop of blood, and the fluid hurtled towards Qazaldhar. Instead of striking him, it whirled around him in a crimson cloud, growing darker as his power charged it with malevolent force. The spell was a hideous, evil thing, a corruption of magic that Calliande had never seen before.
She hurled a shaft of white fire at Qazaldhar, hoping to disrupt him before he could finish his spell. The shaft of white flame stabbed into the snarling cloud, destroying a portion of it. More muridach soldiers screamed nearby, and more arcs of blood joined the cloud spinning around the Maledictus.
Qazaldhar gestured with the Sign of the New God, and a portion of the bloody mist exploded outward. It expanded into a curtain of rippling crimson mist, black flames dancing within its interior. The grass underfoot had already been trampled by the muridach host, but it withered and crumbled into ash as the bloody cloud passed over it. Calliande realized that the cloud was a spell of powerful necromantic magic, a plague so virulent and deadly that it would kill anything it touched.
She cast her warding spell again, and the bloody cloud pressed against it. Calliande gritted her teeth, trying to hold the ward in place, and her ward shattered against the power of Qazaldhar’s blood spell. Yet it had also burned away a portion of the mist, and Calliande struck again at once. White fire burst from her staff and ripped through the bloody mist, burning it away.
But Qazaldhar was already casting again, killing more passing muridach soldiers and siphoning their blood into his whirling cloud, and Calliande summoned more power to fight him.
###
Nerzamdrathus thundered towards Ridmark, moving much faster than a creature his size should have been able to move. The spells on his armor must have made him faster, and no doubt they made him stronger. Ridmark started to raise Oathshield in guard, realized that a parry would be useless against a sword that large, and elected to dodge instead.
It was the only thing that saved his life.
Nerzamdrathus swept his black sword at Ridmark with a backhanded blow, and Ridmark avoided the blade. But the Great King stepped into the attack and punched with his armored left hand. It landed with the force of a catapult stone, and the impact picked Ridmark up and threw him backward a half-dozen yards. He landed with a clatter of armor. Without the armor of the Shield Knight, that blow would have collapsed his chest. Even with the armor of the Shield Knight, it had still knocked the wind from him.
The Great King sprang after him for the kill, and Ridmark rolled to the side, ignoring his pain and using the armor’s power to get back on his feet. Nerzamdrathus started to straighten up, and Tamlin and Third reached him first. Third stabbed her remaining short sword into a gap in the armor, and Tamlin brought the Sword of Earth hammering down on the muridach’s right wrist. Yet the Sword of Earth rebounded from the crimson metal of Nerzamdrathus’s gauntlet. The blood sigils upon the armor were strong enough to deflect even the terrible power of the Sword of Earth.
Nerzamdrathus straightened with a roar, lashing his black sword at Tamlin. The younger knight had no choice but to duck and roll away, scrambling back to his feet. In the same motion, Nerzamdrathus drove his left fist at Third. She started to dodge, but the mighty blow clipped her left shoulder, and the impact spun her around and knocked her to the ground.
Ridmark charged and went into a furious attack, slashing Oathshield at the Great King with two-handed blows. The muridach held his ground, his black sword snapping back and forth to deflect Ridmark’s attacks. At last Ridmark’s momentum played out, and Nerzamdrathus went on the offensive. The black sword came up and fell in a massive blow, and Ridmark dodged, barely avoiding the sweep of the dark blade. He struck back and stabbed Oathshield, and the point of the soulblade skidded off Nerzamdrathus’s cuirass. The tip slashed through two of the dozens of blood sigils on the armor, and they flickered, flared, and went dark.
And an idea came to Ridmark.
“Tamlin!” he shouted. “Keep the Throne Guards off me! I’ll deal with Nerzamdrathus.”
He saw Tamlin’s dubious expression, but they had been through enough for the younger man to trust him. Tamlin ran to join Calem and Krastikon where the two men tried to cut their way through the Throne Guards to reach Qazaldhar, who stood wreathed in a swirling vortex of bloody light. Ridmark had never seen a spell like that, but he dared not take his attention from the Great King.
Nerzamdrathus’s black sword blurred at him, and Ridmark dodged and attacked again, aiming his sword at the glowing symbols on the cuirass. Oathshield connected, and one of the sigils winked out, going dark beneath the fury of the soulblade’s fire. Oathshield had been forged to destroy creatures and spells of dark magic, and the power on Nerzamdrathus’s armor was surpassingly mighty, strong enough to resist even the edge of the Seven Swords themselves.
But nothing was invincible.
Nerzamdrathus recovered his balance and attacked, and Ridmark retreated, barely staying ahead of the Great King’s sword. There was a flicker of dark armor and blue fire from the corner of his eye, and Third struck, slashing at the towering muridach’s legs. Nerzamdrathus punched for her, but this time Third danced away, keeping out of the creature’s reach.
“Third!” shouted Ridmark. “Blood sigils!”
Her burning eyes flicked over Nerzamdrathus’s cuirass, noted the darkened sigils, and then widened with understanding. She attacked, and Nerzamdrathus whirled towards her, but Third jumped out of the way. Before Nerzamdrathus could turn back, Ridmark hit him again. Oathshield clanged off the crimson armor, quenching another of the blood sigils.
Then it was a race.
Could he break through Nerzamdrathus’s armor before he lost his grip on the power of the Shield Knight?
Because if he lost his grip on the power before he had broken through the Great King’s armor, Ridmark was going to die, and so was Third and anyone else Nerzamdrathus could reach.
###
Calliande battled against the clouds of plague blood that Qazaldhar hurled at her and the Augurs.
Somehow, Qazaldhar was getting stronger as the duel raged on, while Calliande felt exhaustion spreading through her limbs. The muridach army was collapsing around them, even as the Throne Guards and the priests fought on, and countless muridach soldiers were fleeing to escape from the fury of the gray elves and their newfound ability to travel in the blink of an eye.
Which meant Qazaldhar had countless victims to fuel his blood sorcery.
Most of the blood went to the hideous cloud of crimson mist that swirled around him, but some of it was converted to raw dark magic, adding its power to Qazaldhar’s already potent strength. The Maledictus had been a match for Calliande, and now he was even stronger.
It took all Calliande’s power to hold back the fury of th
e Maledictus and his plague mist.
Qazaldhar gestured with his amulet, and part of the cloud exploded out, rising up in a wall of crimson mist. Calliande’s Sight showed her the dark power charging the mist. It rolled forward in a hideous crimson wave, killing any grass that it touched, or any unfortunate muridachs that blundered into its path. This time Calliande did not bother to ward against it. Instead, she went on the attack, sending a shaft of blazing white fire sweeping through the cloud. The magic of the Well of Tarlion disintegrated the walls of bloody mist and also destroyed a portion of the cloud swirling around Qazaldhar.
But it hardly mattered. The Maledictus of Death gestured with the Sign again, and more passing muridach soldiers died, blood exploding from their eyes and ears and mouths and noses. The blood arced across the battlefield to join the mist swirling around Qazaldhar, and to Calliande’s Sight, the aura of dark magic around the undead wizard grew ever stronger.
Rilmeira shouted and flung a snarling globe of lightning into the cloud. That proved even less effective than Calliande’s white fire. The cloud swallowed the lightning, and Qazaldhar began casting a new spell. Kalussa shot a crystalline sphere from the Staff of Blades into the mist, but that did little. It penetrated a yard into the crimson mist before it unraveled.
“He is too strong!” said Athadira. “Our magic is not enough to overcome him!”
“I know!” said Calliande. If they could not penetrate that cloud, the battle was over. She felt her strength wavering from the strain of both this fight and the last several days. Unless they found a way to punch through the cloud, Qazaldhar was going to kill them all in a few moments.
And without Calliande to distract him, Qazaldhar could kill Ridmark and Kyralion and Third and the others at his leisure…
She blinked as an idea came to her.
Kyralion was mostly immune to magic. The power of the Keeper’s mantle could pierce his protection, as could the magic of the Seven Swords. Qazaldhar was linked to the Sword of Death if Tamara was right, but she didn’t think Qazaldhar was drawing his power from the Sword.
Which meant Kyralion could walk unharmed through the cloud.
“Kyralion!” said Calliande, drawing power as Qazaldhar hurled another killing cloud at them. “Get Kyralion!”
Athadira scowled at her, but Rilmeira’s eyes went wide.
“Yes,” said Rilmeira. “Yes, of course!”
She ran to find Kyralion, ignoring her mother’s cry.
###
Third was faster and stronger than a human, and she had centuries of experience with violence. She had fought nearly every kindred and every manner of dangerous creature to be found in Andomhaim, and she had won most of those fights.
But all of it, all her skill, experience, strength, and speed, was barely enough to keep her alive against the wrath of Nerzamdrathus.
The Great King of the muridachs was as large as a jotunmir but faster than Third. Worse, he was massively stronger than Third. If that black sword touched Third, there would likely be nothing left of her but blood and mangled meat.
But she fought on, heedless of the danger. The song of the Sylmarus filled her thoughts, but she ignored it. All around Third her friends fought for their lives against the Throne Guards, and that concerned her much more.
And the song of her own blood had changed, somehow, after the things she had faced within the Sylmarus. It had become louder and stronger, strong enough to let her transport through the aura surrounding the Seven Swords. Unfortunately, she still could not travel through the ward surrounding Qazaldhar. Though Third doubted it would have made a difference – if she transported behind Nerzamdrathus, her sword and axe could not have penetrated the crimson armor, and she did not have a weapon capable of destroying Qazaldhar.
So instead she attacked the Great King, drawing his attention as Ridmark hammered at him. The Shield Knight moved in a blur of blue metal, white fire trailing from Oathshield. Even a soulblade could not penetrate the crimson armor covering Nerzamdrathus. But every strike from Oathshield knocked out one of the dozens of crimson sigils covering the armor. Third guessed that those blood spells gave Nerzamdrathus his blurring speed and iron strength, and if Ridmark destroyed enough of them, the Great King would slow enough for Ridmark to land a killing strike.
Third dodged another blow of the huge black sword. The blade fell like a falling boulder and hammered into the earth, sinking a foot and a half into the ground. It should have gotten stuck, but Nerzamdrathus wrenched it free with ease, wheeling to follow Third and stepping back. Ridmark lunged at the Great King, and the muridach dodged, but not before Oathshield’s burning blade struck Nerzamdrathus’s hip.
Another blood sigil went dark.
Third attacked again, and Nerzamdrathus spun to meet her, his sword blurring towards her face. She dodged around the blow, launching a strike at his wrist with her bronze axe. It was a useless gesture. The axe blade struck the red bracer and rebounded without leaving a scratch. Third might as well have tried to penetrate the crimson armor with a slice of cheese.
But her attack distracted Nerzamdrathus long enough for Ridmark to strike, and Oathshield’s tip quenched another of the bloody sigils.
Third leaped back, preparing to attack again, and a flicker of darkness caught her eye.
“Third!” shouted Ridmark.
She looked around but saw none of the Throne Guards or the muridach priests nearby. Come to think of it, nearly all the priests were dead, and there weren’t that many of the Throne Guards left. The Augurs and Kalussa and Tamara had done a good job of battling the priests, and Third saw Tamlin and Calem and Krastikon and Kyralion carving their way through what remained of the Throne Guards. Save for Nerzamdrathus himself, there were no enemies left nearby.
No. Up, she needed to look up.
Third saw the dark shape of the Scythe plummeting towards her.
She threw herself to the side at the last possible instant, and the Scythe struck the ground, her sword plunging into the earth. Third started to attack, but the Scythe straightened up, and her wings flexed. Her right wing slammed across Third’s body and chest, and it felt like she had just run at full speed into a wall. Third stumbled back, and the Scythe screamed in rage and leaped after her, longsword a blue blur.
“Together!” screamed the Scythe, her face twisted with rage and madness beneath her silver hair. “Why you should be free, and I am not? Together, we shall die together, and death is the only freedom!” She let out a wild, cackling laugh, but despite the blazing madness in her expression her sword work remained precise and controlled. Her attacks did not give Third even an instant to recover her footing, and Third had no choice but to retreat. “Let us drink from the cup of death together!”
Third stepped into the next swing, snapping up her bronze axe to deflect the Scythe’s blade. The sword of dark elven steel sank into the axe, and the bronze blade shattered. Third cast aside the ruined weapon and went on the attack, slashing and stabbing with her remaining short sword. The Scythe snarled and retreated, parrying and dodging and ducking. Third dared not slow her attacks. The Scythe’s blade had a far longer reach, to say nothing of her wings and talons. If Third faltered for even a second, she would never regain the initiative.
The Scythe’s left hand came up, and shadows and blue fire exploded from her talons.
Third dodged the killing spell, but it still clipped her side. Pain exploded through her, and she spun around, stumbled, and fell on her back, the short sword tumbling from her grasp. The Scythe crowed in victory, seized the dropped sword, and raised it high.
She leaped forward, the short sword plunging towards Third’s throat.
###
Magic beyond anything Tamara had ever imagined blazed back and forth around her.
The Keeper of Andomhaim and the Maledictus of Death remained locked in their ferocious duel, white fire battling against the deadly crimson fog. Tamara saw the strain on Calliande’s features, saw the sweat pouring down the Keeper’
s face as white fire blazed up and down her staff. She looked like every fiber of her strength was going into the battle, and she was still only just holding Qazaldhar at bay.
And the undead Maledictus had no stamina to drain. Sooner or later Calliande’s strength would fail, and Qazaldhar would kill them all.
Tamara desperately tried to think of something she could do to help, but no ideas came to her. She had thrown both spells of elemental earth and elemental air at the Maledictus, using her newfound knowledge to hurl volleys of lightning bolts at Qazaldhar. None of it had penetrated the vortex of bloody haze that snarled around the Maledictus. Even the Augurs’ lightning and Kalussa’s crystalline spheres had failed to do more than damage the barrier of bloody mist. As soon as the mist was weakened, Qazaldhar simply killed more muridachs to rebuild his barrier, and Tamara suspected Calliande and the Augurs would run out of strength long before Qazaldhar ran out of muridach soldiers to harvest.
Another volley of white fire slashed into the billowing crimson mist, and Tamara looked around, trying to find some way to help…
“Tamara Earthcaller!”
Tamara turned and saw Magatai running towards her, lightning snarling around his sword. Rilmeira ran after him, as did Kyralion and Krastikon. That was right – Calliande had sent Rilmeira to find Kyralion, and Magatai and Krastikon must have returned. Tamara still saw Tamlin and Calem slashing through Throne Guards.
“We must be ready to smite the Maledictus!” said Magatai.
“Yes,” said Tamara. “But if you can think of a way to…”
“Kyralion,” said Calliande through clenched teeth. “You might be immune to the necromantic mist. Can…”
“Tell me what I must do,” said Kyralion.
Rilmeira gave him a stricken look, Athadira a neutral one, Seruna an approving nod.
Sevenfold Sword: Unity Page 30
