Street Fair

by Cook, Jeffrey

  "I think I'll stick with engineering. Unless I can bring a trebuchet next time," Lani said, dropping her sword.

  "I don't know. That was kind of fun," Megan said. "Justin, could you teach me some sword moves?"

  "Of course, my lady," Justin said.

  "Okay, that's fine," Lani said. “But Megan?"

  "Yes?"

  "Until he does, maybe you should lay off the She-Ra act?"

  Megan dropped the sword. "That might be for the best, yeah."

  "Come on," Justin said, limping just a little as he headed deeper into the city, "Reinforcements will be coming soon, and we still need to figure out what O'Neill is doing."

  Chapter 35: Hail

  The group scrambled into a hiding place around the corner of a gray stone building just before the first skeletal patrol arrived. A pair of riders showed up first, soon joined by a crew of more typical skeletons.

  "How many of these guys are there?" Megan asked in a whisper, peering out from around the building.

  Lani tugged Megan back into hiding. "A lot, apparently. At least they're not individually all that tough. There's just a lot of them."

  "Tough like iron golems?" Megan said.

  "Or wights," Lani said. "I'm okay with there being just a few of those."

  "If there are any more that aren't out on the battlefield, O'Neill will likely have them close at hand," Justin said. “From the inscription in the first tomb, we're missing at least one.”

  "So comforting," Megan answered.

  The group started moving again as the literal skeleton crew left the site of the little skirmish and started checking the surrounding buildings. Trying to stay ahead of that patrol nearly ran the group into another. They were just able to wait until that patrol had passed, sneaking across a street to another alley before their pursuers found their hiding place. After that, they ducked into one of the larger buildings to get out of the streets, heading to the second floor to get a better view of the streets below.

  "I can see at least three groups down there," Lani pointed out, after going room to room. "I'd have thought if he had this many more skeletons, O'Neill would have put them outside too."

  "He doesn't need to as long as the army he has keeps getting back up." Megan said.

  "And I'm starting to think he's just as worried about us as he is the fae army outside," Justin said.

  "What exactly does he think we're going to do that the faeries won't, when they get a hold of him?" Megan asked.

  "Walk right past the faerie wards," Lani said.

  "Well, sure, but the pixies and sprites will undo those eventually, and they'll get in. Even with the skeletons getting back up, you saw Inwar. They were making progress. O’Neill can't think he's going to win like that, right?" Megan said.

  "With so many resources held in reserve, carefully planned patrols, wards against the faeries," Justin said, "No, he doesn't think this army is going to win. He's studied the fae. He knows them too well. He's just delaying them."

  "Okay, but delaying them for what?" Megan asked.

  "I don't know,” Lani said. “Something an Ard Ri wants to do.”

  “So you think he really is the Ard Ri?”

  “I think it's likely he's likely gotten on the stone and proven himself, yeah, what with all the power. Like, y'know, necromancy.”

  “He's been doing necromancy already,” Megan said. “He raised the wights.”

  Lani shook her head. “That's not necromancy. Wights are kind of self-starters. He just gave them a reason. But once he came to Falias, he could use the stone. And with the stone, and the right qualifications—bloodlines and body parts intact, mostly—he's the High King. And since High King trumps other kings, and Falias doesn't even have anyone else at the moment, boom: instant Sorcerer-King complete with necromancy.”

  “And an immediate skeleton army,” Megan said.

  "As a delaying tactic," Justin said again. "He's thinking bigger than just an army."

  "Okay, so what's enough bigger than an army that you think it will stop the fae? He's made himself an awful lot of enemies," Lani said.

  Megan glanced out the window and towards the highest tower. "Uhm, could Balor have been buried near here?"

  "Well, no one know—wait, raising Balor? That's insane!" Lani said.

  "Is it?" Megan said. "You saw the Queen. If someone had Balor on their side, they could control an awful lot, right?"

  "Balor was on Balor's side," Lani said. "I mean, yes, in theory, but Balor isn't a weapon. He was a warlord with armies of his own. Some college professor isn't going to come along and be able to tell him to do anything."

  "But he's not a college professor anymore, or he wouldn't be. If the stone says he's the rightful Ard Ri, that's got to be worth something, right?" Megan said.

  "Balor fought the gods. What's a king in comparison?" Justin said.

  "Okay, okay, so not controlling him. We'll assume for a second that he's not dumb enough to think he can do that." Megan said.

  "Ashling would disagree," Lani said.

  "Right, and maybe he is that dumb," Megan said, "But let's assume he isn't. What if he's not trying to control Balor, just trying to be important enough to make a deal with him?"

  "What sort of deal?" Lani asked, sounding more like she thought the idea was plausible.

  "Bringing him back from the dead would be pretty good leverage, to start with," Justin said. “O'Neill's obviously well informed. If he can make the deal in the process—which shouldn't be impossible to work out with necromancy—”

  “—then there is his renewable source of 'sacred power, for a special value of sacred,'” Lani said. “And that would be why he wanted the shrouds. They're the only things that stop Balor's eye from just destroying everything he looks at."

  "And you're just noting that now? I'm surprised you haven't planned for a Balor-raising since the point when we'd collected half of the things. You're supposed to be the reasonable one," Megan said.

  "Right. I'm the reasonable one. Which is why I didn't figure on Balor-raising. Because if that's his plan, it's still completely insane!"

  "Any other ideas?" Megan asked.

  Lani was about to respond when the cats perked up their ears, and hissed a warning. "I think someone's downstairs. Out the window, and let's move," Lani said.

  Megan was already hurrying for the window, checking to make sure the street was clear of patrols for the moment. "Move where?"

  "Towards the center of the city," Justin said. "The Count is the only one who made it past the walls. So we need to get somewhere he recognizes and follow him from there."

  "Caw!" the crow answered, flapping out into the streets ahead of the group as they escaped through the window, climbing down as best they could until it was safe to drop to street level again.

  "I hope that means 'follow me,'" Megan said, "instead of 'this way to the smorgasbord.'"

  The crow flew low, scouting ahead, and guiding them through the streets. Despite a couple of close calls, they managed to avoid any more fights. The closer they got to the center of the city, the more direct the crow's route became, as if he was in territory he was more familiar with from his fly-over. Finally, the sound of a voice, chanting in ancient Gaelic, came echoing through the alleys.

  Interspersed between the verses of chantsong were occasional remarks, enunciated as if they were poetry, but generally along the lines of, “How much more can there be?” and “All right, maybe it is a little long for a Moment of Destiny, but it can still be an Hour of Triumph.”

  Avoiding another patrol, they circled around, trying to find an open path to keep moving towards the sound of the voice. The first two alleyways they found were blocked off by rows of skeletons, faced away from them, but still in the way. They finally entered one of the buildings bordering on the central square, moving until they could look through a rear window.

  The window looked out on a massive, wide-open space, large enough for a good portion of a whole town's population
to gather. Megan figured the place seemed well suited to making grand, kingly announcements, or for the whole populace to watch people either be declared Ard Ri, or humiliate themselves trying.

  Despite the vast size of the central square, the entire east side of it was filled with one positively massive corpse. The titanic form, longer than a city block, stretched from one end of the square to the other. In sections, bare bone still showed, but over most of the body, organs and muscles were growing, spreading and stitching together over the skeleton. Familiar black cloth was secured over the face.

  At the very center of the square, some fifteen yards from the giant's body, was a large stone, laid lengthwise. The entire length of the rock was decorated with ancient writing, which glowed, sometimes softly, sometimes brighter.

  The man they'd seen in the Market before was dressed in far more lavish garb now—though Megan saw what Ashling had meant about a very fancy bronze lapel pin—with a sword at his belt, and a black-iron spear in one hand as he circled and paced around the center of the stone at the center of everything. As he moved, he shouted and chanted. The rise and fall of his voice seemed to be what was spurring on the reactions in the intensity of the glow from the runes.

  Dozens of skeletons ringed the square, mostly blocking off the alleyways and easy routes to the ritual, and a large, armored figure with glowing green eyes stood near the stone, just far enough away as to not block O'Neill's pacing.

  "We have to stop him," Megan hissed.

  "There's too many skeletons out there, my lady," Justin said. "He's well prepared for us."

  "We don't have a choice," Megan said, getting ready to go out the window. "We only have one shot at this." She paused, looking at Justin, "But, seeing as you have the sword and shield and stuff, you can go first if you want."

  Justin nodded, then pulled himself out the window, with the others following. He quickly dispatched the handful of skeletons nearby, as the group rushed towards the ritual.

  O'Neill glanced up and stopped chanting. “Your Highness is not much for protocol? It is not very decorous to enter someone else's realm without an invitation.” He resumed chanting but changed his tone, calling out a different spell instead. Balor's body glowed a bright red, the same shade as the pulse they'd seen sweep out from the city before. The light exploded outward from the massive frame.

  Justin thrust the sword up in front of himself, standing between the group and the oncoming light. The sword flashed brightly, and a part of the ring of red light dissipated, with the wave passing harmlessly around the group. O'Neill, for his part, looked infuriated but quickly calmed himself.

  “Well,” the man said. “I should at least reap the benefit of human company. Some historic moments should always be repeatable for an audience.”

  He stepped onto the stone, and Megan could swear he actually posed. It was debatable whether the cacophonous sound that followed was shouting, singing, or a heraldic call, but the words were clear: "Brian Angus Ui Niall, Ard Ri."

  Chapter 36: Confrontation

  Justin attempted to charge at O'Neill, but was cut off by the hulking figure of the wight. The Claiomh Solais survived the impact with the wight's claymore, but Justin was still sent reeling back.

  "Your Highness should agree to work with me on my terms," O'Neill shouted to Megan over the sound of the swords clashing, and the rattle of the skeletons starting to move. "A little courtesy between royalty. I am the High King of Ireland, but that is just the beginning. You would like my Earth far better than living here under Balor."

  "Just ignore him. Counter-magic," Lani hissed at Megan. She grabbed Megan's shoulder, trying to pull her back towards the wall, shouting towards O'Neill. "Give it up! Just let him stay dead. It's better for everyone!"

  “Young lady, I have been planning this since you were in diapers. I think I know what is better.” And the chanting began anew.

  Justin tried and failed to get inside the wight's reach, but was slowly pushed back as well. In backing away, he did manage to cut down a few of the skeletons, but also took a couple blows that glanced off his armor in the process. Both cats moved to defend the girls, taking down the first skeletons to approach.

  Megan took Lani's suggestion, launching into her reworked dirge of a countersong. She directed it first towards the nearest skeletons, no longer worried about drawing more attention. When she did, the nearest skeletons lost animation, tumbling into piles of bones.

  “Very effective bardwork for not even being in the right key,” O'Neill observed loudly between chant-verses. “I would still advise you not to be using amateur, jury-rigged magic during an undertaking of this caliber. You have no idea what I have studied and what I have sacrificed to reach this point.”

  "Not them, Balor!" Lani called, ignoring the sorcerer-king's attempt at professional feedback.

  Megan shifted her focus there, trusting the others to guard her as she tried to counter O'Neil's resurrection spell. In response, O'Neill stopped his inadvertent monologuing and resumed his chants. Megan kept singing, feeling like something was pushing back against her spell. For the moment, Balor's regeneration froze, but the strain was building.

  Used to Ashling on her shoulder, Megan was still surprised when she felt Lani lean in and try to sing in her ear. “Thistle! Lavender!”

  Megan switched tunes. She had no idea why she was switching, considering how necessary the counterspell seemed to be, but not trusting Lani's judgment by now would be ridiculous. Eventually, she sang all the harder when she finally noticed the row of skeletal archers forming up.

  The wind burst forth as the arrows were loosed. It was nearly too late, but the blast caught and scattered the arrows. Megan redirected her spell outward, not worrying about Justin so long as he held the sword. O'Neill also seemed to be protected, holding his ground—Megan noticed that, as the wind hit, the lapel pin's runes glowed brightly. Everything else caught up in the winds was affected. The wight staggered, giving Justin room to retreat further, cutting a path through skeletons towards the girls. The skeletons, much lighter than the wight, were far more than staggered. Many that weren't destroyed by Justin were knocked off their feet or crashed back into the rank behind them.

  Megan almost picked up the pace, but Lani was pointing frantically at Balor. O'Neill's spell had picked up again, now unhindered by Megan's efforts, and the muscles were growing and spreading over the bones again. Worse, Megan could see a faint glow building up under the three secured shrouds.

  Mrs. Chang's art class had once spent 20 minutes on a color called sinople, which was sometimes a dark red paint derived from an almost-black rock, and sometimes confused with green. As fascinating as such a visual concept was to try to grasp, Megan was fairly sure nothing was ever supposed to glow that color. And yet...

  But Lani was calling out a dirge, trying to get her to focus. Megan switched keys and tone from the charged-wind song back to the counter-magic, with the resistance that came with it. She once again halted the progress in the resurrection, but was no longer able to help her friends.

  The wight recovered his footing and came at Justin again, forcing the young knight to backpedal while fending off the bigger combatant with the Sword of Light. Maxwell went on the offensive, savaging one of the skeletons while it was trying to get back to its feet, and driving it back into some of the others, buying the group some room. Jude remained near Megan, doing his utmost to protect her from everything that came close, though he took a couple more wounds to his front shoulders in his efforts to do so.

  Megan shifted her attention and her countersong to the skeletons pressing in on them, immediately feeling less resistance from O'Neill's magic. Several of the skeletons around Jude collapsed. So did a trio trying to strike at Justin while he focused on defending himself from the wight. She finally gave Maxwell a little bit of additional support—which the cat immediately used to rush to help Justin. Maxwell shattered a skeleton, driving it to the ground, and managed to bite down on one of the wight's elbows. Ju
stin struck at the wight, but one of the skeletons got in the way, in its attempts to get in a strike of its own. The wight batted Maxwell away, sending the cat into a mass of skeletons, while Justin destroyed a few more. Free of the harassment, the pair clashed again, with the wight slowly driving Justin back towards the group.

  By the time Megan looked back towards O'Neill, the regeneration had progressed significantly, and seemed to be picking up speed. She turned her attention back towards the ritual. This time it was even harder to battle against O'Neill's spell, as he directed his power against hers.

  Worse, it didn't actually stop the regenerative process, this time, but just slowed it down significantly. Despite her best efforts, the muscles continued to knit, and in a few places, dead-white skin started to spread over the musculature. The bright impossible glow, muted by the shrouds, just grew impossibly brighter.

  In the midst of the battle, O'Neill's lapel pin lit up again, tiny runes glowing across the bronze. Anger spread over his features, and he paused in his chants.

  “Infuriating sideshow,” he said, still managing to complain as if he were trying to do Shakespeare. “It will get them nothing. This would have been more efficient if I'd had more iron, but all is still well within the plan.”

  He shifted his focus, stamping one foot down on the Stone of Kings. The runes on the stone lit up, and the lapel pin's runes glowed brighter. Megan's mournful-sounding efforts showed signs of progress while she cast her magic without resistance. Some of the flesh and muscle retreated and shrank away from the massive body. All thoughts of continuing fled as the now-familiar red light started to build. Lani didn't even bother to try singing this time, just shouting into Megan's ear, "Morale!"