by A. J. Ponder
“Don’t worry, Amarinda,” Sylvalla said, knowing there was no way Amarinda could hear. “I’ll save you, or die trying.”
Dothie-Xem, wizards surrounding him like personal bodyguards, inched closer, parting the crowd, Arrant by his side. They were headed for the small duelling square being levelled in front of Amarinda and the dragon. The soldiers working on it were distracted by a commotion of soldiers attempting to draw a sword set in stone.
The workers drew back nervously as Arrant and Dothie-Zem approached to reveal the fancy sword.
“Excalibur,” Capro said. “Why’s Arrant brought it here, still encased in stone? What’s he trying to prove? Surely, he could have pulled it out himself.”
What would Torri do if she was here? Invent something amazing, probably.
I’m not Torri—all I know how to do is fight—but I can reduce risk and keep playing for time.
“Stay here,” Sylvalla asked Mr Goodfellow senior. “Make sure everyone in Scotch Mist is protected against magic.”
“No, he doesn’t need to,” Dalberth said. “Maey and I can do that.”
“And you’re not leaving me behind, either,” Dirk said.
“You’re just lusting after that pretty sword,” Sylvalla said. “This is my duel.”
“No,” Dirk said, a nervous grin revealing the lie, “I wasn’t thinking anything of the sort. Fergus’ sword is too showy; if I even thought about taking it, some idiot would call me a prince, and I’d never escape.”
Arrant obviously had the same idea—that removing the sword would proclaim him king. He swaggered to the sword in the stone and raised his arms like the charlatan he always was.
The crowd cheered.
“No!” Mr Goodfellow senior yelled, but he and Jonathan held back as Dothie-Xem’s wizards and were-wizards stepped forward eagerly.
Sylvalla rushed toward the square to stop Arrant. But she didn’t need to worry. Arrant tugged and tugged, but he couldn’t release the sword from the stone.
Someone in the crowd sniggered. Arrant turned and threw a stone at the heckler. There was a small explosion, and the man dropped to the ground.
A ripple of consternation spread through the crowd.
Dothie, seeing Arrant fail, quietly tried to lift the sword. He failed as well, his magic bouncing off the rock.
That’s interesting. Whatever the pair had tried to do, it had unexpectedly failed.
“Behold my brother and I as we defeat the Witch Queen,” Arrant said, pulling his sword from his scabbard.
Damnation, they’re cheating already, Sylvalla thought, but Dirk was delighted. “Two combatants!” he said triumphantly as Dothie-Xem and Arrant entered the duelling square. “Then, I shall fight, too, as the second champion for Avondale.” He ran to join Sylvalla.
She glanced over at him. His magic-resistant sword would be useful, almost as useful as the Goodfellows and their friends standing on the side-lines and watching out for magical attacks.
Dothie-Xem, sword in hand, strode up and threw a fireball.
Sylvalla sidestepped.
The fireball exploded where she’d been standing—the hair on the right side of her body crackled, frizzling in the heat.
“Is that the best you can do, Wizard?” Sylvalla charged Dothie, but the wizard wasn’t there. He stood yards away with Arrant, both of them grinning from ear to ear.
Arrant threw a stone.
Dirk sidestepped.
The stone exploded behind him.
Arrant threw a few more ensorcelled stones, only to have them explode mid-air on a wizard’s bubble-shield.
Thank you, Mr Goodfellow.
The magical attacks had only just begun. Terrible power surrounded Sylvalla and Dirk, the magic frizzling and spitting off the surface of Dirk’s sword. Magic alone should not hurt them. Not with the magic-repelling sword and all the charms and potions they’d inoculated themselves with. Even so, the Goodfellows and their fellow wizards were sweating with exertion. The line of red-cloaked wizards behind Dothie were also showing signs of exhaustion.
“Witch!” Arrant screamed, stepping forward, sword outstretched.
What’s he doing?
The crowd cheered, and all seven butterflies rose with the cheer, hovering above their respective kings—and Arrant and Villyus.
Sylvalla jumped back. He’s no swordsperson. It’s a trick.
Sylvalla turned on Dothie and Arrant. “Go, I command thee in the name of the Seven, the Mother, the Maiden…”
The pair fell back. Sylvalla kept walking as the night thickened, the crescent moon visible in the thickening darkness. The soldiers’ eyes glittered green in the night.
“Witch Queen,” Dothie-Xem taunted. He loosed the dragon’s muzzle with a flick of his wrist.
The dragon surged forward, jaws snapping, and pulled up short on the leg chain cruelly clamped around faer leg.
It can still reach Amarinda. Sylvalla ran to free Amarinda as the dragon roared.
“Save the dragon!” Amarinda yelled.
“Save Dirk,” Jonathan yelled.
A collective gasp rose.
Dothie threw another fireball.
Is Dirk all right? Sylvalla glanced back.
Dirk yelled and scampered away, staying just within the fighting square. Enthusiastic soldiers commented on who’d kill him if he stepped outside.
Something needed to change. Freeing Amarinda wouldn’t help.
“Cut the dragon’s chains,” Amarinda insisted.
It went against everything Sylvalla wanted to do, but she dodged another fireball and ducked out of the ring.
Westmisery soldiers rushed in to attack Sylvalla. She dodged past them, yelling, “I’m rescuing you!” to the dragon, unsure if it could hear her over the cheers and taunts of the crowd.
The dragon snapped one of the Westmisery attackers in two. Sylvalla raised her sword to cleave the chain holding the dragon’s leg. Clang! Half way through, Sylvalla raised her sword again, reversed it on an attacker, then struck the chains. Clunk.
Dothie and Arrant were laughing, sure that Sylvalla was sealing her own doom. To be fair, Sylvalla wasn’t entirely certain she wasn’t. A dragon on our side is about the only hope we have.
The dragon pumped its wings, chain dangling from its leg as it leapt into the air, breathing fire.
From the gates of Scotch Mist charged a tiny army of ex-soldiers and the walking wounded. Many had stumps for arms, or peg legs, and almost to a man they were yelling, “Amarinda!”
“Stay back!” Sylvalla yelled to the eager Scotch Mist warriors. If they attack Arrant’s army, they’re doomed.
But they would not stay back.
So fast. Everything has changed so fast.
The butterflies whirled overhead, and flickers of green A’rieal rose over the field.
Westmisery soldiers were so close she could see the green in their eyes as they attacked. King Reginald, the hole in his chest now green, and his injured horse thundered toward her, yelling, “She’s mine!”
And then the dragon swooped, snapping up a butterfly.
King Reginald and his horse dropped to the ground. More soldiers fell, and others blinked as if waking.
“Kill her,” Dothie shouted, incensed by this sudden reversal. “Kill the Witch Queen.”
Dothie’s were-wizards hurried to obey, but there were only a handful left, and Dragontooth was quick as its namesake, sampling their blood and spitting it out faster than the eye could see.
Meanwhile, the dragon was in the air, swooping, not at people, but at the butterflies. Then it changed direction, swooping toward Amarinda.
What’s it doing?
“No!” Sylvalla yelled. There was no way she could get to Amarinda in time to save her.
Stretching out its claws, the dragon splintered the stake Amarinda was chained to. “I’m all right,” Amarinda said, holding out the chains for the dragon’s claws to shred. The dragon slivered the chain like cheese.
Those cla
ws are sharp as swords.
The Scotch Mist soldiers cheered, but their cheer was short-lived as Arrant’s army marched toward them, angrier than ever, butterflies whirling above them.
Sylvalla rushed over to protect Amarinda, but Amarinda shooed her away. “You’re making Tara nervous,” she yelled. “Besides, I think the sword is mine!” Confidently, her red dress swirling around her, Amarinda strode to the sword in the stone.
The injured Scotch Mist soldiers who’d run onto the battlefield to support Sylvalla and Amarinda were falling fast.
“Focus,” Dirk yelled, rushing over to her and standing back to back. “We can’t do everything.”
The dragon flamed the enemy soldiers standing around the sword, and they ran.
With no one to stop her, Amarinda reached down to pick up the sword.
“All hail Queen Amarinda, who pulled the sword from the stone,” Sylvalla yelled, seeing her chance for another life.
“Amarinda! Amarinda!” the crowd chanted as the dragon took flight. Jaws wide, it snapped another butterfly from the sky.
Blue and red soldiers appeared from behind the mountain—Grehaum and Francis’ armies. They cut through the Riverdale soldiers scrambling to face the unexpected foe. Without their butterflies overhead, Northdale and West Mist had lost their taste for war. They milled about in confusion.
“Queen Amarinda! Sword-in-Stone,” Sylvalla yelled again.
“Amarinda! Amarinda! Amarinda!” several armies yelled back.
Sylvalla laughed and hugged Amarinda. Just Arrant, Dothie-Xem and the turncloaks to go…
Dothie-Xem and Arrant pointed to the earth, and the ground split open.
Soldiers and turncloaks caught on the edge toppled into the gaping chasm.
“Come!” Dothie-Xem and Arrant-Emz called together. “Come, this world is now ours. Take it.”
The remaining five butterflies flew into the chasm.
There was a shared intake of breath.
Something emerged from the rift.
Sylvalla gagged.
Pustulent, green-black, pallid-white, scuttling, it was all the disgusting things she’d ever imagined. It’s not the monster from A’lganathrieal. It’s too big, there are too many arms…
“By the gods!” Dirk gasped. “There’s more than one.”
A’Rieal
Lest you fall alone, lest you fall
Tomas raised his fancy sword high, his gold cloak flowing behind him. “Gods! Gods! Come to me! Take this gift I have brought you!” In his other hand the boy held a shadowy package of substanceless darkness.
Jonathan stepped back, horrified.
Two pustulent monstrosities slither-scrambled to the top of the chasm, each wrapping their tentacles around a were-wizard—not tearing them apart, but oozing into them. As they took humanoid shape, Jonathan thought the figures were familiar, their cloaks of brown and yellow trailing oozing slime wherever they walked on the winter ground.
Another monstrosity emerged and snatched up a body. Reminiscent of Zed, his pallid skin, visible skeleton and black robes flew in the traditional manner of the God of Death.
A tentacle wrapped around a turncoat, so the creature looked like the God of War in a red cloak, transforming him, until even his features had morphed to look almost exactly like the leering face she’d seen in the mirror. The possessed turncoat moved to intercept Dirk.
Mr Goodfellow senior gesticulated at the creatures crawling from the pit, screaming, “Get thee hence, foul demons, I command thee by the light.”
“We are the gods now,” Dothie-Xem yelled at Sylvalla, still defiantly facing them with a sword—despite the fact she could not reach them across the chasm.
“See how the underworld answers to our call.” Dothie-Xem’s tongue was running away with him in the need to explain his superiority. “Soon you’ll be dead, Sylvalla, and we’ll begin our final attack. Surely you knew we’d make your followers and wizards pay?”
“The moon shall die!” the thing infecting Tomas yelled. “A thousand stars shall tumble from the sky.”
The moon and stars disappeared. A collective gasp rose at the darkness, broken only by eerie greenish flickers of A’Rieal and the soft glow coming from the pit. The gleaming-green eyes of the possessed turned to watch the creatures climb from the chasm. No longer tentacled like the monsters of A’lganathrieal, but clothed in human form, they were not so unlike the beings inhabiting Arrant, Dothie and the young Prince Tomas. In the strange light, they appeared as gods, while above them, the swarming Rieal and butterflies adding a mystical aura to the spectacle.
Jonathan threw a fireball at the creatures. Potsie and the other wizards followed suit, and yet nothing so much as singed their skin.
Soldiers who hadn’t been given charms were falling to their knees to worship the gods, calling out to the Mother, the Maiden, Death, War, the Harvester and even Pestilence and Disease.
“The gods!” Capro yelled. “Tell me we do not fight against all seven of the charlatans.”
All seven? Capro has forgotten the Nameless Ones.
The God of War turned to face Dirk, and opposite them, the Maiden turned to Sylvalla.
“No!” Capro yelled, running toward them.
The brown-cloaked Pestilence flicked out a sickeningly elongated arm, wrapped it around Mr Goodfellow and flung him into the pit.
Jonathan screamed as his father plummeted into the pits of hell.
§
“No!” Sylvalla yelled, collapsing to her knees as Mr Goodfellow senior plunged into the pit, his horrendous screams cut short as the sides closed on him. The other wizards threw fireballs, lightning bolts and more. They sizzled through the sky, and fizzed away to nothing. Jonathan screamed and ran at the monstrosity, only to be knocked aside with a careless flick of a tentacle. He tumbled across the ground and lay still.
There was no time to grieve.
A’Rieal swarmed around the monsters, infecting the soldiers nearby—possessing them. Most fell to the ground and ranted like prophets. Those closest to Sylvalla kept repeating, “They’re here. They’re everywhere, and they infect us all.”
Sylvalla shivered from the pinpoints of cold, the words of old Granny Earwax echoing in her ears, “The cold. Can you not feel the cold? It is unseen and creeps into your very bones. Awake! Open your eyes to…to…”
What had the old lady been trying to say?
“Mighty are the fallen three
“Death stalks, evil walks,
“My words,
“My gift to thee.”
Why is the morpholag prophecy still haunting me? Mr Goodfellow is dead. And we’ve lost, not just Avondale and Scotch Mist, but everything.
One of the monstrosities approached, oozing between tentacle monster and the semblance of flesh and blood.
Green light pulsed in her breast, the eerie green of A’rieal. And as the creature climbed, it transformed to resemble Mahrawyn with her lustrous skin and heaving bosom laced into a blue dress.
It was wearing the Maiden’s blue.
Mahrawyn’s red lips parted below solemn brown eyes. “I do not think you could kill me twice.” The ghoul reached up to unwind the glorious dark hair Mahrawyn had been so proud of.
Sylvalla stepped backwards. “Mahrawyn,” she murmured, tears rolling down her cheeks. “You were supposed to tell me something, Mahrawyn. You climbed and climbed and you called, but I could not hear you.”
“You never listen…you are the day…” The phantom faltered, writhing, fighting against itself.
“The day?” Sylvalla said, remembering how she’d created a burst of light when she’d tried to open the lock.
“For the day!” Sylvalla yelled—trying to blast light and creating nothing but a pitiful spark.
The beautiful creature became hideous, hair falling in clumps, its mouth open in an eternal rictus of a scream. Clawed, bony fingers stretched out as if to grasp Sylvalla and tear her to shreds—but somewhere in the monstrosity, Sylvalla thought she
heard the voice of Mahrawyn, the real Mahrawyn.
My nightmare become real. “Mahrawyn? I could not save you, but I will save you now.”
“Don’t!” someone yelled. “Stay back.” It was Jonathan. He was pointing at Dothie-Xem and Arrant and their growing entourage. “She will take your soul.”
But Sylvalla couldn’t let Mahrawyn die again. There had been altogether too much death—and for all Mahrawyn had refused to learn the sword fighting skills that might have saved her, she didn’t deserve this. “Let me save you.”
Sylvalla reached out.
“Though the moon shall die, it shall be but the beginning… Sylvalla, you are the day, and the midday sun burns,” Mahrawyn said. “Rescue your brother!” the words choked from a mouth tearing itself apart from the inside out.
Tomas.
Mahrawyn’s hand grasped greedily for her.
§
Amarinda pulled the sword from the stone with a mighty clang.
“I did it!” Amarinda said. “I pulled the sword.” She wasn’t sure whether to be shocked or pleased, but she had expected more of a reaction.
Congratulations, Tara said, taking to the air. I trust you’ll be safe now.
“Congratulations.” This time it was Francis. He’d run to join her with a heroic streak she’d not expected. “We need to prove to the crowd that you’re the true ruler of the Seven Kingdoms. But,” Francis continued, “I think you should do it again, later, when more people are looking.”
Francis was right, everyone was so focussed on the gods that they weren’t even avoiding Tara, who dove and whirled in an effort to catch the jewelled butterflies. Tara’s efforts were ineffectual as fae bounced off some kind of barrier.
The wizards? Jonathan was tearing at the ground where the pit had been, but the others were rallying around the soldiers, giving them potions, trying to stop them from worshipping or following the instructions of the false gods.
That leaves me with one job. Save Tomas.
§
Although fighting rang all around her, Sylvalla could see little of the battlefield through the gloom. The dragon swooped to catch another butterfly, almost falling as it skidded across a magic shield cast by Arrant and Dothie.
