Cyrus looked at the rock giant’s hands, and, unmistakably, it looked as though the craggy skin had given way to sharper points at the end of each finger. “Does that … did that … hurt?”
“It felt joyful,” Fortin breathed, and Cyrus almost wanted to take a step back from the giant at the euphoric tone. “Once this is over, I will rip the heart from one of my foes and hold it aloft, showering myself in his lifeblood as it courses out—”
“Stop,” Cyrus said, shaking his head. “You just … I was an adherent of the God of War, and that might be a little too much for even me.”
“‘Was’?” Terian asked, sounding like he was teasing. “Didn’t I warn you about losing your belief in things?”
“This is not—” Cyrus stopped mid-explanation and waved a hand at him. “Never mind.”
They came around a bend in the road, the last bend, and before them was laid out the city of Kortran, haven of the titans. Cyrus’s eyes ran around the edges of the place. A ring road circled the entire city in a long ovoid. The path ahead of them joined on the narrow end, and to his right the mountainside was carved in beautiful reliefs, with stone entries to any number of grand doors. When he looked to the left, where the road curved to the other side, the mountain there held only two entrances, but enormous statues and dual arches gave both the doors there a feeling of great importance. Sandwiched between the mountains on either side, and in the midst of the ring road, situated in a rough sort of indent in the earth, sat Kortran itself.
Many of the buildings looked to be carved directly out of the rock, but others had been built with thatched roofs and wood. Some of the structures looked new since last he’d been there, and the whole place had a more crowded feel. Watch fires burned in the night, and titans were visible down in the city streets from where Cyrus watched on high. He counted himself fortunate that no moon hung overhead to light his passage or illuminate him to his waiting enemies.
“On the mountainside over there,” Terian said, pointing to the dramatic entries on the left side of the curved road. “The dragons say that the Emperor’s palace and the titans’ greatest temple lie over there, separated from everything else because of their importance. Their god first, their leader second.”
“A temple to Bellarum?” Cyrus asked, brow furrowed. “Sounds wrong. He’s supposed to be worshipped in battle.”
“And yet, there it is, if the dragons are to be believed—and I suspect they are.”
“Which is which?” Cyrus asked, peering at the entries.
“The dragons aren’t clear on it, and so the wurm brothers didn’t know,” Terian said with a shake of the head. “It’s not like they come here, after all, it’s all just rumors from prisoners that Ehrgraz has interrogated.” He glanced at Cyrus. “Surprised he didn’t tell you himself.”
“He didn’t give me as much as you might think,” Cyrus said, staring at the city before them. “Mostly counsel on what lay before Kortran; I got the feeling his main concern was to piss the titans off, stir them up, and that he thought the key to that was wrecking everything they’d set up on the savanna.”
“Guess he didn’t count on the grand ambition of Cyrus Davidon carrying you quite this far, eh?” Terian asked with a smirk. “I suppose he doesn’t know you well enough.”
“I suppose not,” Cyrus said, considering all he was seeing for only a moment before issuing his orders. “We’re going with plan B.”
“Excellent,” Fortin said in a low voice.
“Do you even know what plan B entails?” Terian asked, leaning to look past Cyrus at the rock giant.
“I know it involves me prying the most sensitive pieces of flesh off more titans,” Fortin said. “I recently discovered that they keep their genitals between their legs, and it has resulted in considerably more screaming and terror than I was ever able to yield before—”
“Oh, gods,” Terian cringed, “I don’t know if I even wish that on the titans.”
“They’re pretty big,” Cyrus said, “if we don’t attack their weak points we’re at a real disadvantage.”
“Still, ow,” Terian said.
“All right,” Cyrus said, cautiously, as they reached the ring road, clouds rolling in overhead and blotting out the starlight, “we have a job to do.” He started toward the left, following the road as it curved around, fixing his gaze on the space between him and the temple in the distance. Sentries were obvious there, but no guards were present between the two. How far off will they be able to see us? He tried to count, but amongst the entryways into the mountain were columns, plenty large enough to break the outlines of the titan guards.
They drew closer and closer, the quiet of the sleeping titan town below a lulling feeling. Could they really be this arrogant? he wondered. After a moment’s reflection, he came to his conclusion. I probably was, back when I believed in the promise of constant battle offered by the Society.
His feet crept over uneven stones, and though he tried to do his stealthy best to mask them as they came around the curve, his efforts were middling at best. He looked back at J’anda’s pets, and only hoped that their approach would mask the sound of the smaller forces cloistered around their feet. He looked back and saw the entire army trailing behind him, some thirty thousand or more, still filtering down the mountain pass into the valley. If it comes to an all-out fight, we’re going to make it a good one.
He made a motion to halt, and everyone did. His eyes searched until they found Ryin Ayend, and Cyrus beckoned him forth. “Falcon’s Essence,” he mouthed, and was rewarded once more with the spell that helped him compensate for lack of stature in these fights with beings on whom he only reached the knee. When he had seen the spell cast a few more times, he started forward once more, followed immediately by Terian and Vara, Fortin only a few paces behind them.
They crept between the columns, striking swiftly and quietly. Fortin came upon the first, overtaking Cyrus, ramming his hand into the guard’s mouth as he turned to gape at the surprise appearance of a fighting force at his side. The rock giant removed his hand a moment later, with a great and horrid tearing noise, and half the titan’s face came with it. Disgusting, watery gasps in the night were the only hint of the titan’s passage from life as Fortin lowered him, gently, to the ground below without a further sound.
They took out the next three almost as silently, save for the flopping noises the massive creatures made when they died. By the time they reached the first entry to the mountain, Cyrus was once again covered in fresh ichor and quite sick of it. He motioned for part of the army to keep going, cleansing the second entry, and J’anda sprang forward with his small squad of titans to oblige. He wore an unmistakable look of satisfaction as he rode past on a titan’s shoulders, and Cyrus moved to enter the first great hallway to the mountain’s interior.
The tunnel was not well lit and looked only big enough for two titans to walk side-by-side within. It seemed to stretch long into the darkness, however, the torches ensconced on the walls unlit.
“This is the temple, right?” Terian whispered next to him. Vara, on his other side, gave them both a look that indicated they should shut up. “They’d keep the palace entry lit all night, wouldn’t they? But a temple …”
“Disciples of war should make their prayers always,” Cyrus answered by rote. “Whatever the hour, just like to any other deity.”
They followed the tunnel, and ahead Cyrus could see the darkness did not break. Even with the spell cast upon his eyes, he struggled to discern anything more than the vague lines of the tunnel walls and ceiling up to the point where they seemed to cease. Beyond that, he could see nearly nothing, just a blackness that hung in the air like smoke over a fire.
“What is that ahead?” Cyrus asked, and he watched Vara peer into the darkness. “Any idea?”
“I think it’s an open space with no light,” she whispered back. “This is a cave, after all. Perhaps you should ask the expert on these.”
“It’s an open space, yes,” Teria
n said, staring confidently into the dark. “I can’t see much other than carved rock, though, and it’s enough of a distance that the purpose isn’t entirely clear to me yet.”
They advanced, Cyrus casting a look back to be sure his army was still in close attendance. They were, and he caught a flash of Andren’s face as the healer shot him a thumbs up. Cyrus gave him a nod then let his gaze fall to Longwell, whose spear was up over his shoulder, that look of weariness mingled with caution present on his face.
When he reached the edge of the tunnel, Cyrus paused, letting Terian look out. “Huh,” the dark elf said. “Well.”
“Well, what?” Cyrus asked in a hushed voice.
“Well, it’s the temple,” Terian said, but there was more than a small amount of tension in the way he said it.
“I don’t care for your tone,” Vara said, staring at him through narrowed eyes.
“You’re going to care even less for what I have to tell you next,” Terian said tightly, and then he sighed, deeply. As the dark elf’s breath faded, Cyrus heard something else. Deeper. More resonant.
Louder breaths.
“We’re not alone,” Cyrus said as he caught the first hint of Vara stiffening in reaction to the sounds. Terian just shook his head, almost sadly, and lifted a hand in the air before casting Nessalima’s light and illuminating the room around them.
They stood at the entry to a floor filled with bones and sand, spots of blood and rotten flesh discoloring everything and giving the room a ghastly smell that Cyrus noticed only now. The space before him was enormous, bigger than Sanctuary’s foyer, and it reached considerably higher up into the mountain, farther than Terian’s spell could light it.
Forty feet up from the ground, the stone had been carved into a tier that circled the killing floor upon which they stood. There was another ten feet further up, and another, stairs carved into the mountain’s insides that stretched far above them in an ever-widening cone. There were seats in each tier, and with cold surprise, Cyrus finally realized the purpose of the ‘temple.’
“The only way to worship the God of War in a temple,” Cyrus said tightly, letting his eyes fall on the top tier as someone lit a brazier far, far above him, and then another, and then another as the light made its way down, handed by the processions of titans that were already waiting, hidden, above them.
“As well you should know, Cyrus Davidon,” a voice called, one that sounded like it took amusement in every misery it could, drawing Cyrus’s eyes to a stand far to his right. There, sitting in the very first tier was a titan, his head adorned with a crown made of a dragon’s skull dipped in gold. The cloak perched on the shoulders of the titan was green dragonskin, and the scales stood out as more torches were lit around the arena. The breastplate worn by the beast was a hard metal; it looked like quartal even to Cyrus’s inexpert eye. “As any adherent of the God of War should know.”
“Emperor Razeel,” Cyrus said, resignation flooding through him as the first of the titans reached the edge of the last tier and vaulted it, jumping down into the arena to stand before him. At the head of them was Talikartin the Guardian, his silver armor shining in the torchlight, and his scarred face stretched wide in a smile that told Cyrus that he had been waiting for this moment.
38.
“I think they call this an ambush,” Cyrus muttered, looking at the titans arrayed against him. The arena was slowly filling, and it looked as though it had room enough for thousands. The smell of death filled his nose, and he clutched carefully at Praelior, drawing his sword and holding it before him in preparation for the battle to come.
The sounds of fighting outside reached his ears over the movements of the titans within the arena. “The battle is joined,” Vara said, and Cyrus caught the hint of worry in her voice.
Cyrus swept only one look behind him, and saw no fighting in the tunnel. It’s all outside, and those lot are on their own; there’s nothing I can do for them right now. With the lone look he dared to give, peeling his eyes from the titans for mere seconds, he noted Curatio, Andren, Fortin, Martaina, Belkan, Odellan, Longwell and Scuddar all close at hand, at the fore with him. I have to hope that some of the others I trust most are with the army outside, leading them against whatever mad battle they’re currently facing.
“I don’t think much of leaders who send their subordinates into battle while they watch,” Cyrus said, turning back to taunt Emperor Razeel. “I don’t think Bellarum does, either.”
The titans that had been creeping closer to Cyrus’s war party halted as though someone had yanked the collars of all of them, save Talikartin, whose grin seemed to widen just a bit. Every eye turned to Razeel, who stood abruptly and clutched one of his rough hands against the edge of the first tier. “And I suppose you think I should take instruction in the art of war from a whelp such as yourself?”
“I think when a man of any size calls a warrior a coward, he probably deserves the most forceful possible answer,” Cyrus said. He caught a glimpse of Terian’s hand still glowing with Nessalima’s light. No cessation spells on this place, which means we could still run …
Razeel peeled the golden dragon skull off his head and tossed it behind him. It rattled against the wood of his seat, and then the tall Emperor unfastened the cloak of dragonskin around his neck and vaulted over the edge of the first tier to join his soldiers. His face matched his voice, full of malice and anger, with a hint of delight in his eyes in anticipation of the upcoming battle. He looked to Talikartin. “If you defeat Davidon, save his corpse for me. I wish to bite his head off before you consume his body. His armor will make a fine plaything for our younglings.”
“And my sword will make a mighty nice toothpick,” Cyrus quipped, staring at the Emperor of Kortran. He waved Praelior in the air. “Or possibly a letter opener, assuming you read?”
“Only a weakling taunts when he can hurt,” Talikartin said, easing closer to Cyrus, a hundred titans at his back.
“Only a gutless idiot would hold back from charging a clearly smaller, physically inferior enemy,” Cyrus shot right back. And before Talikartin’s face could do much more than twist in rage, Cyrus charged right at him. Everything seemed to explode into action at once, titans leaping forward as Cyrus sprinted toward the fight. “Get Razeel and Tali!” Cyrus shouted, and saw Vara following a few steps behind Terian, who was just at his back.
“If you think killing their leaders will make this lot calm down,” Vara shouted back over the bellowing roars of countless titans, “I have a fine lakeshore property to sell you in Saekaj Sovar!”
“Actually,” Terian said, “we do have the Great Sea, although parceling out lakeshore isn’t something we’ve looked at yet. Maybe when I get home … might be worth a look—”
A titan darted into Cyrus’s path, moving quickly and yet still slowed by the power of Praelior in his hand. A knotted face with mouth yawning open in front presented itself, and Cyrus dodged, maneuvering up over the creature’s shoulder. He struck its nose at he went by, ripping open a nostril and turning the howl of rage into one of pain. The titan had no time to respond, however, for Terian sailed by in Cyrus’s wake and chopped right into the side of its neck like he was swinging to fell a tree, his attack geysering a slow blast of blood out as they both moved on.
“You’re pretty good with that thing,” Cyrus said, consciously speaking faster, knowing Terian would catch it.
“Have you gotten used to slowing down your speech when talking to people without a godly weapon?” Terian asked, speaking just as quickly. “Because it feels like having a conversation under water sometimes, and I just want to reach in and drag the words out of their mouth so I can respond.”
“I actually use my sword to give me an extra margin for thought during troubling conversations,” Cyrus said, shrugging.
Terian’s eyes burned on him. “I always thought you were a little too witty at times, and others such a dunderhead.”
Cyrus dodged an overhand strike from a titan, catching it with
Praelior on the titan’s wrist and cutting until he hit bone. Moving on, sneaking under the arm and around the back, he poked his blade above the titan’s buttock and kept running, withdrawing it and watching a small spurt of blood tell him he’d hit something important.
“That’s right, keep softening them up for me,” Terian called from behind him. Cyrus heard the satisfying sound of an axe hitting home, breaking bone and drawing a sharp grunt from a titan over the sound of howling, enraged voices that echoed in the arena under the mountain.
Cyrus looked back to reply and completely missed the titan reaching for him from out of his blind side. The grasping fingers wrapping around his midsection were a rude awakening to his distraction, and he snapped his head around as the titan pulled him toward a furiously open mouth. They were squeezing, but his armor was holding the mighty grip at bay, keeping it from crushing him like grape.
The mouth drew closer, and it didn’t take Praelior-enhanced time to think for Cyrus to realize that the titan meant to bite his head cleanly off. Well, that would kill me, he thought as his stomach dropped. And I doubt they’d get my head back in any condition for a resurrection spell … and probably not within an hour, either …
A buzz of spellcraft shot past Cyrus struck the titan in the face, hurling his head back with a snap. He bellowed, but the force of the spell’s impact caused him to lose his balance, tipping over and landing on the arena floor with a hard clatter, rattling against the bones in the dirt.
The smell here was fierce, and Cyrus took the opportunity presented to jam his sword into the back of the giant creature’s hand. It drew a scream, and more importantly, caused the titan to relax his grip. Cyrus stabbed him again, then brought his legs up, using the Falcon’s Essence spell to create a foothold on air and propel himself up and away from the fallen giant, climbing the invisible steps the spell provided more quickly than any staircase he’d ever climbed.
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