Lords of the Sands: An Epic Dark Fantasy Novel

by Paul Yoder

  “You’re saying that bracelet broke the hold the arisen lord had on you?” Fin asked, clarifying the grim one’s claim.

  “Perhaps that, perhaps something more profound than even that. I didn’t just detach from my master; I began to think—feel—differently than I once had. Repulsion became comfort, and vice versa. It changed who I was, unprecedented as it sounds, I bear witness that change did occur. Where once I sought your life, I feel compelled now to defend it. I do not attribute this change to myself, for I know I was a blight upon the land and would not have changed my ways. I was a mindless drone to facilitate evil deeds. I can only attribute it to this device. The fates have determined my course, and I am willing to walk the path they have lain before me.”

  Fin reflected upon Dubix’s explanation for some time, Malagar tending to Wyld who had sat upright in her bedding, eyes open, Seam scars swirling slightly.

  Fin had no immediate answer for Dubix’s claims, nor time to discuss or question them, as Wyld stood up now, drawing everyone’s attention.

  “A foul presence approaches,” Dubix hissed, drawing his sword, ordering Fin to awaken the others.

  Yozo stood straightway upon the announcement, joining the others.

  Fin did as told, rousing Matt and Hamui roughly, not sure why everyone was being called to arms, but believing Dubix would not make a claim idly. Aside from that, being in the field for as long as he had, the charge on the air was unmistakable. He had, at that point, a sixth sense for danger, and that sense was backing Dubix’s warnings.

  “Which direction?” Fin whispered to Dubix after Matt and Hamui groggily stood up to seek revenge against Fin’s rough kicks in their backs.

  “There,” Dubix hissed, pointing a bony finger upon the nearest ridge, revealing two silent, ironclad figures with dark, winged helms marching towards the camp still a hundred yards out.

  “Beware, I do not know of this line of arisen—though—it reeks of Denloth,” Dubix told the group, Matt and Hamui starting to understand the reason for the break in their short slumber.

  Matt, wiping his eyes from weariness, nudged Hamui to attention, “Prep your strongest spells, boy,” the old man commanded, in an unusually worried voice, a tone neither Hamui nor Malagar had heard the old man use until that point. It was a tone that scared the two more than the two intruders themselves.

  Fin’s frame trembled as well. Something told him and Matt, both seasoned warriors, there was power headed their direction, perhaps more power than even they could deal with.

  Yozo seemed cautiously confident, as he ever had when facing death head on.

  The group stood ready for the two figures, waiting for their approach. The only one rustling was Wyld and Malagar, who was trying to calm her.

  Twitching nervously, her limbs jolting from time to time, Malagar could see a change come over her eyes. Where once there had been a soulless void, now tears—softness—shown through. A look of dread or regret racked her face in anguish as she seemed to struggle with her own body.

  An insidious whisper slithered into everyone’s ears, penetrating their minds. Harsh words that only Dubix truly knew, though Fin had heard more than once associated with the arisen.

  “What’s it mean?” Fin asked Dubix, prying his eyes from the quickly approaching figures that were now in a dead sprint towards them for a moment to get Dubix’s attention, knowing the arisen knew the fell-language well.

  Dubix didn’t directly respond to Fin’s question, but instead called to Malagar, “Tie her up, now!”

  Malagar hesitated for a flicker of a moment, faltering to fully latch onto Wyld’s wrists before the kaith growled and ripped away from her would-be captor.

  Fin looked to the wild woman, hackles raised, looking as though she were scanning her surroundings for prey. He had no time to deal with her, though he knew she would need to be dealt with. How much of an issue she was going to prove to be was yet to be determined.

  “Mal, take care of her. Everyone else, get ready for them. Hit them from range if you can, then be ready for a melee. Dismantle them at the seams, their armor looks sound.”

  Matt, Dubix, and Yozo stood at ready, swords and fists gleaming with bright steel brass in the moonlight.

  Hamui chanted softly, his crystal staff beginning to glow blue as he gathered a tight-knit clump of cloud vapor in the sky above them, darkening the scene dramatically as the charging knights drew closer.

  Fin hefted four of his sturdiest throwing knives at the ready as he split his focus between gauging the distance between himself and the two knights, and watching Malagar approach Wyld, who recoiled from his advances, looking ready to spring on him at any moment.

  Wyld snarled, the rip of translucency across her face warping in and out just before she leapt at Malagar, claws out and forward. He was ready for the attack, however, and if any were going to grapple with the intensely strong and agile kaith, Malagar knew he was probably the best suited to do so.

  He caught her wrists and locked his grip firm just as she lunged in with her fangs, attempting to go for his neck. Ducking under the bite and her right arm, he slipped around to her back, picking her up and throwing her over his back as he arched to attempt to suplex her.

  Her ancestral reflexes activated, twisting mid throw around in his grip, bounding off of him as he touched down on the ground, attempting to recover his stance before she sprang out and back into the fray just as Malagar got standing upright again.

  The scuffle was fierce, and Fin sighed as he began to line up his first target, hoping that Malagar would be able to handle the unforeseen issue that their former companion was looking to give them.

  Hefting the thick-handled throwing knife to his side, holding it at balance behind the middle of the shaft, Fin hurled the steel stake towards the closest target as though he was chucking a spear, releasing it with his index finger just so that the hefty knife flung through the air in a low arch through half a rotation, punching through a slit in the gorget along the knight’s neck.

  The group took heart at the finely landed strike, a knife as thick as that sinking into the knight’s armor would have felled anyone, but as the thing kept charging forward after the small setback, not seeming phased by the blow, the realization that they were dealing with some arisen abomination sunk in firmly.

  Fin didn’t miss a beat with the ineffective throw, however, and he wasted little time in lining up his next shot, tossing his next heavy dagger at the same target, going right for the only other opening in the helmet down by the jawline.

  Once more, the dagger landed true, this blow knocking the thing’s head sideways as the tip slid through the binding hinges to loosen their opponent’s helm slightly, showing a blood-soaked jaw beneath.

  “Damn wretches, what hellish horror are they sending at us this time?” Fin murmured.

  The one that took both knife points to the head lagged a moment, but it was only to let its partner lead the charge, the other one rushing in to work on closing the twenty-foot gap between it and the line of warriors that stood to stop it.

  Hamui clenched his fist and slammed the staff butt to the ground as the heavens rumbled above them, charging the air above, their hair standing on end. Yozo’s long, fine hair rose up just before a flash and clap of energy connected from the cloud to the tips of the golden wings atop the charging knight’s helm, flinging him back several feet in a blast of pink light, rolling to a stop as the other knight jumped over his lightning-kicked companion.

  Fin landed yet another solid hit to the same knight that had eaten his last two heavy throwing daggers, this one completely dismantling the bottom half of its black sallet, exposing its fleshless blood-soaked identity. None in the group had ever seen skeletons that resembled these, except for Dubix.

  Dubix was the first to step up, ensuring that he was the first to cross blades with the formidable foes. At the last moment, long, slightly curved sickles came out, and it brought one of the shortsword-s
ized sickles to catch Dubix’s longsword, slashing the other blade across Dubix’s tatters which would have resulted in a disemboweling if Dubix had been living. Instead, the slash pushed him to the side, and the knight began to thrust in at Dubix’s skull.

  Though the attack jarred Dubix to the ground, its attack came to a sudden halt as Matt leapt in with a flying up kick, knocking the winged helm right off its slick skull, blood speckling everyone nearby.

  The shock of the moment, seeing the grim visage that faced them, was only surpassed by Yozo’s swift blade, cutting in at a sharp angle, slicing the dome of the thing’s skull clean off, bursting a magenta nova along its spine, producing a snap as it fell back to the ground, giving the group time to reform a line.

  “Prepare yourselves. These are Oathbound. However many lives were sacrificed in their making is how many reanimations they’re allotted. It may be a long night,” Dubix hurried out as the skull’s cap sickly slid back onto the open hole on its skull, the wet blood slicking over the cut while the other knight gathered himself, standing once more, small arcs of energy bouncing across its armor.

  Fin hurled his last heavy throwing dagger at the now standing unhelmed Oathbound, the spike smashing through its face with enough force to punch through the other side, the same magenta light flashing as the hole quickly reformed as blood rushed to cover the gap. The eyeless warrior turned its focus to the dagger-throwing impaler who had caused it such trouble so far.

  It jolted forward at blinding speed, ripping an iridescent tear in its wake, slamming into Fin, sickle point firmly embedded in Fin’s shoulder. No one had time to react.

  “They have the touch of the Seam!” Dubix hissed out the warning, readying his sword for the oncoming, fully armored Oathbound approaching them at a menacing jog. At the last second, it Seam-jumped several feet left, then appeared to the right as colorful tracer trails lined its briefly traveled path, rushing towards Matt.

  Dubix stepped in front of the old man, bringing up his sword to point, attempting to gauge the approach, but as the Oathbound was just about within range to engage, it Seam-jumped through Dubix, stabbing at Matt whom, either by chance or lightning reflexes, had brought his arm up just in time to take the blow, which had been aimed for his chest.

  Thrusting his other blade backwards, the Oathbound caught Dubix through the ribcage, flinging him, once again, to the ground as he ripped the sickle out of Matt, forcing the old man to the ground in the other direction.

  Fin kicked the armored knight in the midsection away from him, and as the two separated, the sickle came tearing out of its fleshy sheath.

  Fin saw blood squirting out of his periphery, and he knew that would need to be staunched quickly or he’d be dead within minutes. The Oathbound had other plans for his immediate attention, however, giving Fin no time to disengage further.

  It came into Fin in a flurry of blade swipes and thrusts, each testing Fin’s defenses, which were now greatly compromised. He did what he could with his left arm, but parrying two blades with a stiletto while losing blood every passing moment allowed him to carry on through the assault for only a few seconds before the Oathbound scored another hit, slashing Fin’s left forearm clean open, a smattering of blood spraying both of them as Fin fell back against the hard ground in a cry of pain and exhaustion, feeling the end rushing in as his life essence gushed out.

  Barely had Fin slammed to the ground than the red skeleton was thrusting for his throat. Fin rolled to the side, still aware enough to clumsily evade, and as the Oathbound brought up its other blade to deliver the coup de grâce, its head split in two as a dull pink flash erupted once more, blood mixing with the ample amounts that Fin already wore.

  Yozo kicked the body to the ground away from Fin, taking the brief pause the skeleton needed to reconstruct its skull to tear off and toss Fin Yozo’s thick scarf, seeing just at a glance, that Fin was going to need something to staunch his wounds.

  Yozo turned to the rising bloodskull, his hair tousled, but as his blade leveled, his deathly still stance gave the Oathbound a moment of consideration as it eyed him, dripping blood from the newly given slash to its dome.

  Though Malagar could hear the melee going on within the camp, he had little choice but to block the plight of his friends out of his thoughts as Wyld kept him on his heels, ducking and dodging her claws and fangs, the two getting further and further away from the encampment as they tripped and scuffled further into the canyonlands.

  Snatching a stray wrist, Malagar pulled Wyld in, feeling the sting before the numb from gripping the phasing scar along her arm. Her mouth was on his forearm within a blink, biting wildly into his flesh. She wrenched free of his grip, but not without a blow from his elbow on the back of her skull.

  The jolt roughly dislodged her of him, breaking a Seam-touched fang deep in him, its chill freezing his arm before going numb.

  Shrugging off the tingling chill, he went back in, grabbing around her downturned head as she lulled there briefly from the head knock. He smoothly snaked in his wrist around her neck, forcing her head further inward as he locked his hands up around her, cranking inward and to the side.

  She bucked, her senses coming back to her enough for her to realize she was getting in deep to a compromised position, and Malagar did let go of his grip, but he quickly threw his arm over and around her arm, locking back up with the neck crank, squeezing it downward and in, forcing Wyld to go to the ground, or risk having her neck snapped under the constricting pressure.

  Malagar sprawled on top of Wyld in the dirt, and she began to thrash, but his vice-like grip was locked about her neck, and as she struggled, he followed her with his secured grip.

  Her slanted eyes were squinted in pain and strain, and her breathing was extremely labored as Malagar dug the blade of his forearm in deep around Wyld’s throat, and the knuckle of his thumb turned inward, cutting off blood flow.

  She bucked wildly, her mobile spine helping her to twist around on her back, raking madly at Malagar who released his grip on her throat seeing that he’d be torn to shreds within moments if he had decided to be stubborn on the hold. Instead, he spun around low on one foot, winding up a low, perfectly timed, back kick, slamming his heel into Wyld’s temple, knocking her in a heap against a large boulder, slumped motionless.

  Malagar held his low, one-footed stance for a moment before approaching his unconscious friend, checking her pulse to make sure he had not knocked the life out of her, seeing what could be done to bind her before hauling her back to the battlefield with him.

  Matt clutched his forearm, stepping back as the winged knight came in at him again with another stab and thrust combo, Matt easily dodging the two attacks.

  The Oathbound lurched forward, Dubix smacking the back of its helm hard, but failed to detach the protective encasing that was preventing mortal blows from being landed.

  It turned, backhanding the unarmored skeleton across the skull, smashing Dubix’s cheekbone into shards as he let out a hellish scream. It was immediately cast back as a strong gust of air from Hamui blew the knight over on top of Dubix.

  Gripping the wings of the Oathbound’s helm, he wrenched it off just as the Oathbound Seam-walked instantly around and behind him, gripping Dubix’s skull with its gauntleted hands, ripping apart Dubix’s jaw as teeth and bone shrapnel splintered the area.

  “Now!” Matt yelled at Hamui, the Oathbound turning to look at the praven just as a molten bolt of plasma shot forth from his staff’s crystal straight through the red skull, exploding chunks of blood and bone everywhere.

  Dubix threw the Oathbound off of him with some effort, getting to his feet once more, Matt taking the breather to find Hamui and stand between him and their foe as Hamui began chanting again in an exhausted, gravelly voice, preparing for the next spell. The crystal atop his staff, which once glowed a bright azure, now flickered a dull blue.

  The thick blood reformed the skull on top of the suit of armor with demonic speed,
each revival quickening in pace.

  Dubix bounded back just as the Oathbound dashed forward, streaking a Seamline through him midair, creating diamond fractals in the surrounding area, splitting time and space.

  The Oathbound warped to and fro, suspending Dubix in his back-peddling position momentarily.

  The red skull locked its murderous gaze on Hamui, completely ignoring Matt, rushing to him in blinding fashion.

  As soon as the Oathbound jolted forward, Dubix’s dimensional fractal chains broke loose, and he bolted for his sword on the ground, running to charge back into battle, his skull half gone.

  Within a split second, the Oathbound was at the chanting praven and old man, giving Matt only time enough to step in front of Hamui, yelling, “Now!” again, praying his sacrifice gave the young talent a precious second more to finish his spell.

  Two sickles jabbed into Matt’s torso, snagging his innards as the knight ripped him viciously to the side, Matt landing in a bloody heap.

  Hamui’s hair lifted, his crystal flashing once, then faded out, another bolt of lightning coming down to strike the bloody warrior, blasting plates of armor off him this time, shooting him back in a flash of blinding pink light to Dubix.

  Swinging his sword at the lightning struck Oathbound, he chopped down through the opening in the shattered breastplate to cleave through bone and cracked armor alike, the magenta snap that followed blasted not only the armor apart, but launched Dubix’s sword off into the bush.

  The Oathbound was unclad now, its iridescent bony figure fully exposed under the pale moonlight. It looked to Hamui, who had fallen from overextending himself, and started to warp the space about him, wrapping himself in a Seam rift.

  Dubix rushed him, tackling him from behind, catching the Oathbound off guard, tumbling through image after dizzying image of his moment of impact on the Seam-walking Oathbound.