“What’s that smell?” A sentry threw open the door.
Sefron blew the grains of dust into the air.
The smoke in the room poured out into the next. The sound of men choking and gagging was music to his ears.
“Not so talkative now, are we?” He crossed the threshold, upright on a solid six-foot frame. He pulled the dagger from the gagging sentry’s sheath and stabbed him in the spine. “I’ve been meaning to do that for quite some time.”
Two more sentries remained, hacking and spitting, blinded to his presence.
Sefron stabbed one in the neck and left the dagger in the other’s heart. He cracked his knuckles, went back into his room, and took another look at himself.
His countenance wasn’t handsome, but strong and dark, his skin no longer pale nor sagging. His stomach was tight and his legs firm. His damaged eye was still gone, but better. He felt good. He’d been saving up decades for this, and now his time had come. “Let the powers of Bish last as long as they can last.”
He focused on his personal quarters in the castle, closed his eyes, and drew in more power. A portal appeared. He stepped through it, back into his room.
“Ah yes.”
It felt good, being back inside his place. Very good. Incredibly good. He grabbed his robes from the wall and tied another belt with pouch around his waist. From the corner of the small disheveled room―littered with vials, jugs and old bits of food―he grabbed a crooked staff.
“It’s been a long time,” he said, kissing it before exiting his door.
Despite the battle raging outside, the massive hallways were quiet. Everyone in the Castle was either fighting somewhere or dead. No longer shuffling, Sefron strolled, whistling rather than wheezing, on the legs of a twenty-year-old man. Making his way through one of the living rooms, he pressed a panel on one of the decorative shelves. A hidden door popped open behind it, and inside he went.
The spaces between the walls of the rooms were a set of catacombs that Sefron had discovered years ago. Even most of the Almens had no knowledge of them. They’d been used by servants at one time, short cuts through the castle, but Sefron had seen to it over time that no servant recollected them. They were where he did his spying, and they traversed through most of the castle’s main rooms, except for the keep.
He hopped his way down a narrow set of steps, a smile on his face. It had been a long time since he moved so gracefully.
If I see Melegal, I’ll kill him first.
Stopping, he pushed aside a peephole door and looked through. A dining room greeted him, undisturbed, still shiny in silver and crystal. No longer would he have to watch behind the walls after this. No longer would he be a servant to Lord Almen. No, he would be the Lord of this Castle. He pictured himself and Lorda sitting side by side. “Yes, she’ll be—eh?”
Somewhere not too far distant, steel banged against steel. He trotted through the narrow passageway two dozen yards, the sounds becoming more distinct and profound. He lifted another peephole door open and got an eyeful.
Underlings were in mortal combat with sentries and Royal magi. Two Royal soldiers in plate mail armor swung their broad swords into a mass of well-armed underlings. Barrages of green and red missiles of light were shooting back and forth. Men were howling; underlings were screeching.
Sefron made his way down another short level of steps to a dead end. Opening a peephole on the final battle, he saw a group of underlings being forced down the steps that led down to the Current. Yes! It was everything he hoped for. The underlings had invaded from below as well as above, but there seemed to be a problem. The underlings were trapped. They were losing.
CHAPTER 33
Triumph! Master Kierway felt nothing but triumph when the door shattered and he and his brethren blasted through. Leading the way, he bounded up the stairs and greeted a pair of Royal soldiers with his whirling blades.
He drove his steel through the plate covering one man’s heart and cut the mailed neck of the other out. Blood, the only shade of red that he liked, dripped from his blades.
“Inward! Inward!” he ordered his underlings. “Nothing human lives! Everything human dies!”
Juegen soldiers, coated from head to toe in black metal armor, surged past, followed by Badoon warriors with crude knives and hatchets, albino urchlings with claws that could rip metal, and underling magi whose fingertips crackled with energy. Their faces told it all. Hungry. Fearsome. Vengeful. Hate filled. One by one they went. Bright colored eyes narrowed. Soldiers of war that meant business. And Kierway had hundreds of them at his disposal.
“Yes, brethren! Go! Slaughter!”
Everything was working. Within hours, Castle Almen would be theirs.
Up the stairs the underlings went. The last one, bringing up the rear, was an albino urchling, all four nostrils flaring.
“What is this?” Kierway said to himself, bounding down the steps. He hissed. The doorway was sealed. “No!” He looked for a handle, a bar, a lock, but there was nothing. “NO! CATTEN!”
Was this a ruse? Had Catten betrayed him and all his underlings? He didn’t have time to worry about that now. Trapped or not, he could still pull this off. He had enough underlings, so he thought. Dashing up the stairs, he was halfway to the top when the wind and the screeches came. Mystic power flowed everywhere. At the top, underlings were knocked head over heels by an unseen force. Fire licked over them. Burning them.
“No! This cannot be!”
A blast of hot air came. One, two, three underlings tumbled backward over the stairs, landing at his feet. At the top, an underling’s head was taken from its shoulders, green eyes bouncing off the steps all the way to the bottom. Kierway hesitated. How many Royals were at the top? But there was nowhere else to go. Taking six steps at a time, he charged, confronting a big warrior. A heavy blade came down at his head. Kierway sidestepped and cut the man’s wrist from his arm. The man howled long enough to catch a blast of underling energy inside his mouth.
Kierway ducked under a blast of lightning that struck an underling mage full force. He rolled alongside a wall and got a better look at things. All of his brethren underlings that made it up the steps were gone.
Where did they go?
On the far side of the dining room, two robed humans were guarded by three soldiers, and the air shimmered before them.
Hmmmm.
Several feet away, an underling Badoon and one albino urchling were in mortal combat with the Royal Soldiers. Kierway chittered at an urchling that had sunk its teeth into the neck of a dead soldier and pointed at the magi at the other end of the room. Blood dripping from its fangs, it tore itself away and charged across the room. Blink! The urchling was gone.
Furious, Kierway sprang into action, assisting his brethren, hewing into one Royal soldier after the other. The battle raged for another minute and then the last Royal soldier fell, leaving himself, one Juegen, one Badoon and one mage left standing. He shook the blood from his blades and faced the Royals on the other side of the room. The faces of the men showed no concern, but rather, supreme confidence.
Kierway banged his blades together, calling a Royal soldier out. None of them moved, except the magi behind them. One gyrated his hands while the other one spoke in tones. Kierway slung two knives.
Sssz!
Sssz!
They disappeared midflight
The underling mage hurled a ball of fire, lighting up the room, shaking the chandeliers. It stopped, hovered in the air, and returned. He jumped out of the way just before it exploded. Tiny fires licked over his clothing while the underling mage burst into flame, screaming.
Whatever barrier the humans had put up, he knew they could not pass. It was a mystic dimension spell of sorts, and for all he knew the underlings that passed through were on the outside of Bone. Possibly imprisoned in a wall somewhere. But the spell wouldn’t last forever. It couldn’t. He banged his swords together.
The Royal Magi acted. A missile of mystic energy burst from t
he hands of one, then another, careening towards him.
He flicked his blades up. The missile smacked into them with a shower of sparks, knocking him from his feet. One by one, he and his men backed towards the stairwell. One bright missile soared after the other. Behind the human magi, another man appeared, dark and mysterious. Reaching out, the strange man grabbed the two magi by the shoulders. They choked, mouths popping open. Their skin tightened and shriveled. Their faces sunk in and dried. The space between them buckled, images contorting before returning to normal.
The dimension spell was gone. Kierway could feel it.
“Kill them!” Kierway said.
The two remaining soldiers readied themselves.
The urchling, Badoon warrior, and Juegen sped across the room. Kierway followed close behind.
The Royal soldiers braced themselves, chins down, swords up.
The heavy sword of one Royal chopped downward, burying itself in the Badoon’s shoulder, drawing a howl. The Juegen and Badoon pounced on the man, knocking him off balance and to the floor. Focusing on the other soldier, Kierway sidestepped one swing, followed by the other, staying wary of the man who had assisted him moments earlier. The man, holding a crooked staff, was laughing.
Clang!
Kierway batted away the soldier’s heavy swings, one after the other, hissing and taunting. The eyes behind the soldier’s metal helmet were determined but became weary. Each swing came more sluggish than the last.
Rip!
Kierway struck the man’s knee, sending flesh, blood and steel across the room. The man stumbled forward.
“Urk!”
Kierway drove his sword through the man’s heart. Yanking his blade out, he turned on the man who laughed. He and the remaining underlings surrounded him.
The man kneeled and said, “Master Kierway, it is I, your servant, Sefron.”
Kierway could see it now. The man’s good eye bulged a little in his socket, and his disturbing expression, though more vital, remained unchanged.
“Do you have the Keys?”
“No,” Sefron said, flatly.
Kierway nodded to his men.
“Kill him.”
Sefron’s arm shot out.
“Wait! Master Kierway, I may not have the Keys you seek, but I can open the door at the bottom of the stairwell.” Sefron’s eye glanced over the dripping blades of Kierway’s two men. “I am your humble servant, Master Kierway, now and forever.”
Kierway held out his arm. The underling drew back.
“Do it then,” he said, sheathing his blades behind his back. “But make it quick if you don’t want underling steel fileting your back.”
Sefron rose, led them across the room and down the stairwell, and stopped at the oversized door.
“Hurry!” Kierway said.
Sefron leaned his staff against the wall, pressed his hands on the door and chanted. One syllable after the other, faster, slower, lower, higher. Sweat dripped from his bald head, and his knees buckled a little. Panting, he turned.
“It’s over,” he said, stepping aside. “Shall I open it?”
“Or course, you fool!”
Sefron pushed it open.
A sea of underlings greeted him.
***
Sefron stood aside. Several feet away, floating across the great Dining Hall, Kierway was in a heated conversation with an underling whose likes he’d never seen before. His golden eyes radiated with power, and a mere glance in his direction ran his blood cold. Even Lord Almen didn’t command such authority. Still, Sefron managed to pull back his shoulders and keep his chin up.
Show no fear. No fear at all.
His knuckles were white on his staff as a squad of underling fighters dashed by. They spread like a swarm of bees through the castle and into the main courtyard. Their numbers were overwhelming. Sefron knew that within hours, minutes possibly, the Castle would be taken over. He began to have doubts as to whether this was a good alliance or not.
It was inevitable. The Lorda and this castle or another shall be mine.
Keeping his head down, Sefron kneeled. Kierway and Catten approached.
“How many are in the keep?”
“A few dozen, if that.” Sefron said. He kept his head down, eyes up a little. He could feel heat from Lord Catten’s eyes boring into him.
“Master Kierway,” Catten said, “do we have further need of this man?”
Sefron’s eyes shot over to Kierway, heart pounding in his chest. Kierway rubbed his chin.
“Masters!” Sefron fell on his face. “I’ve betrayed my castle for your glory! I know many of its secrets I can share. And I am still assisting with the one that has the Keys. Spare me!” He looked at Kierway. “You promised me, Master Kierway!” His voice echoed in the large chamber.
“I made promises for the Keys, which you did not deliver.” Kierway said. “And we have an imp that can find the man you speak of, and the Keys, whenever we want.”
“But, certainly, you won’t kill all of us? Underlings and men have held many alliances before. Outpost Thirty-One and Castle Almen were united on that endeavor.” He wiped the sweat from his brow with his robes. “Certainly we can be united on this endeavor as well. I killed off two Royal magi who held a pivotal location.” He crawled towards the two husks on the floor and lifted one up. “I am not loyal?”
Catten snapped his fingers. The entire room shook, knocking Sefron over and turning what remained of the corpses into dust.
“Kierway,” Catten said, “You say this one is a life drainer?”
“It seems he has that craft,” Kierway said, checking the bandolier of knives on his chest. “What of it?”
“Give him your hand,” Catten ordered.
“Give him your own hand!” Kierway fired back.
“You’ll do as I say, Kierway!” Catten’s voice shook the chandeliers.
Sefron came forward, his limbs stiffening. The power he got from draining people didn’t last forever, but the magi he’d drained would hold him for hours. He extended his hand.
Kierway sneered at Lord Catten, who sneered back.
“You’re such a fool, Kierway. Stupid and cowardly.” Catten snatched Sefron’s wrist with a grip of iron and said, “Drain me, Human!”
Fearful, Sefron hesitated.
“Do it, else I’ll have Kierway skewer and skin you like a rodent.”
Sefron summoned his power. The dust stirred on the floor, mystic powers flowing through him, giving him more enriching vitality.
“You like that, do you Human?” Catten ran his tongue along his teeth. “A taste of centuries of tempered energy, something your kind cannot comprehend.” He pulled Sefron in face to face. “Well, I’ll share a secret with you. I’m feeding you my power, Weakling. You are not taking it.”
Catten closed his eyes, holding Sefron fast.
An urge to pull away overcame Sefron.
But Catten held him in a supernatural grip.
Something was wrong. He wasn’t draining the underling. Instead, the underling was feeding him dark, exhilarating energy.
“Human,” Catten said, “certainly you knew that you are only capable of draining your own kind. I, however, can do both, and what I give, I can take away.”
Sefron choked. His breath was gone. All of his vibrancy was being sucked dry. He shrunk. He shriveled. He wheezed, fought to stand, and teetered to the floor. He pleaded with his eyes. Catten released him. He fell down and clutched his chest.
“You really should consort with a better class of human, Kierway. But I should expect so much.”
Sefron looked down at his flabby belly, and the skin jiggled under his chin. Wheezing, he pushed himself up on his staff.
Just need another fresh body and I’ll be fine, thank you.
“Now, Kierway, take your flabby ally away. Take some of your men and secure the Chamber of Keys. Certainly, someone will show up eventually. As for me, I’ll see to it the demise of the Castle is completed.”
Sefron’s shaky legs struggled to move. He was in worse condition than before. His good eye caught Lord Catten’s hard stare once more. He turned away. It wasn’t likely Lord Catten would keep him around if he didn’t think of something.
Kierway shoved him forward, “Lead the way, you saggy piece of meat.”
CHAPTER 34
“Die, Fiends! Die!”
Jarla’s inner fires ignited with every stroke. Underlings, one after the other, fell under the precise patterns of her blade.
Chop!
Glitch!
Zurk!
She rammed a dagger into the last one’s throat. Beside her, Tonio hewed the underlings down with powerful blows. A tireless machine among the chaos. The underlings, as well prepared as they might be, couldn’t have been prepared for this; two skilled fighters with an unrivaled passion for killing.
Body splattered with red-black blood and gore, Jarla churned out one death after the other.
Toowah!
Toowah!
Toowah!
The darts struck her arms and legs.
“Cowards!” she said.
Whack!
She split one amber-eyed underling’s skull.
Toowah!
Toowah!
Toowah!
Tonio laughed, half a dozen darts in his face, and yelled in his garbled voice, “There is no escape from me, underlings!”
They chopped at the man, jumped on top of him, tried to drag him down, but Tonio shook them off like a dog sheds water.
Jarla stayed close. Her lungs were burning behind her heaving chest. Her sword became heavy, sluggish. Still, she hacked. She chopped. Cognizant of the pounding on the door behind her. The underlings would chop through that door at any moment.
“We’re going to have company!” she rasped. “I hope you can hold them all, because I can’t.”
“Let them come!” Tonio said, ramming his sword through one’s skull.
Claws and fangs bared, an underling charged, leaping towards her from the bar. Engaged with another one of the underlings, she caught it in the corner of her eye, but couldn’t turn in time.
Chaos At The Castle (Book Six) Page 18
