The Dark Paladin

by Rex Jameson

  But the more Jeremy reflected, the more he realized: dying would have been too easy. Freddie knew what he was doing by leaving Jeremy alive. Justice and vengeance were allowing Jeremy to live with the consequences. Justice was holding his dead father while shocked commoners cried over the corpses of the royal family, all people who Jeremy had not only failed to protect and serve—he had an active role in creating the situations that killed them. He was the source of all this death. He hung his head in the hallway, amidst the screams of the servants, and sobbed.

  23

  For Whom the Bell Tolls

  Cedric Arrington stared into a pyre outside of Xhonia. He held his black helmet under his left arm. His wife Allison held onto his other arm, her face pressed against his plate rerebrace. Sylas, his oldest, stood beside him, and Sarah beside her mother.

  Nine other fires burned behind the pyre, but this one was the most personal to the Arringtons. His son Jonas lay on his back with his hands crossed over his chest. His un-scuffed leather armor crisped, splintered and buckled atop the logs. Cedric wept silently. Due to the heat and proximity of the fire, his tears evaporated before they reached his chin.

  Somewhere in the dark night, another Jonas probably wandered. Cedric’s father-in-law had fought a demon lord to save Cedric’s wife, sons and daughter. Jonas the Elder had sacrificed himself. He deserved his own pyre. The thought of Orcus raising his father-in-law, the man who had taken Cedric in when he had lost his father to demons, made Cedric hot as the fire before him.

  He looked to the woods for the reflection of eyes—the tell-tale signs of the undead. He wanted to smite something, but nothing blinked back. The enemy had fled from the paladins after they emerged from the caverns beneath Xhonia. Even while the men cut down trees and cleared brush and kindling for the pyres, the paladins had been undisturbed and unmolested.

  Perhaps the undead respected the wishes of the paladins to honor their dead. Or maybe the undead feared the men who had entered Xhonia with a silver box, killed one of their demon lieutenants and cut off any reinforcements from the underworld. Whatever the reason, Cedric appreciated the respite and the chance to honor his son—even if he had to kill every last one of them after the funerals were done.

  After he had taken the oath to the Holy One when he was eighteen, Cedric’s feelings toward the men around him had been mixed. He loved them, but they had all betrayed him. Each of them sat by while he took an oath that they knew would damn his soul. His parents. His friends and family. The Monks of Godun. The Holy One herself.

  He had experienced the crushing realization that his own sons would be doomed to the same fate. He had promised himself that he would never marry, that he would never have sons, and he would finally break the cycle and free the Arringtons from an ancient curse.

  But that same night after his initiation, Allison sought him out, burdened by her own guilt and doom. They had laid together. Cried together. Watched over her father Jonas, who had been so overwhelmed by his daughter’s oath that he had suffered a stroke. Allison blamed herself, and Cedric wordlessly agreed. He had cried again when his sons were born. He had failed them—cursed them into the very life he had grown to detest.

  He cried now, standing beside the pyre of his son, for a different reason. He wept because he finally realized the sacrifice he had made was necessary—even the sacrifice of his father, father-in-law, and son. He cried not because his son would never know the love of a woman or have his own children, but because Jonas would never know what it felt like to smite a demon. And yet, his son had tried. He had tried to save Cedric’s life, even if it wasn’t necessary—even if Cedric could have handled himself. The act was important. His son’s sacrifice was important. In his own way, against all hope, his son had tried to save the world.

  Cedric finally understood.

  And just as he felt this profound relief, a massive soundwave rushed over him, pushing him and Allison backwards until he dropped to a knee. A beautiful noise, alive and powerful, like a 90-foot church bell ringing beside him. It vibrated him so hard that his plate armor rattled against each other, and the war hammer on his back jostled out of its holster and onto the ground. He reached back for it and found it white-hot. Arcs of lightning leapt from the hammerhead. Allison grabbed the Twin Sisters that crisscrossed her back and held them before her. The same electrical pulses traveled along her blades and cascaded up and down the length of Cedric’s weapon.

  His son Sylas and daughter Sarah looked alarmed. They had not been pushed back. They did not vibrate with power. They thought something bad had happened to their parents.

  “What’s wrong, Father?” Sylas asked.

  The spear he had leaned against a tree vibrated and lit nearby kindling with its sparks of lightning.

  Cedric dragged the hammer across the ground, and a small explosion of light nearly knocked him over.

  “What was that?” Allison asked.

  Cedric lifted the hammer from the ground, careful not to touch the hammerhead against the ground again.

  “I think,” Cedric said, “we’ve been empowered.”

  “An upgrade?”

  The place on the ground that his war hammer had touched was covered in black soot, as if a fire had scorched it.

  “Stand back!” Cedric commanded.

  He waited for his wife to take a few steps away. Sarah and Sylas also moved a few paces outward. Cedric held his hammer of Light high above his head and watched as the arcs of white, holy lightning licked his pauldrons, vambraces, and gloves.

  He gripped his hammer tightly with both hands and let out a mighty yell. He slammed the hammer against the ground before him and heard the torrent of power unleashed against the surface. Brightness blinded him briefly, and he thought he saw the Holy One in the aura that lingered in the aftermath. His daughter and son tumbled away in the rush of wind. His wife braced herself behind her swords.

  The ground took the brunt of his brief assault. A six-inch deep, dark crater appeared in the earth where there hadn’t been one before. Around the crater were burn marks that splintered off for several yards, but the burns were not dark like the center—they were glowing and white. The pattern on the ground reminded him of a sun. It reminded him of the paladin emblem—a sun rising from the earth.

  “What does this mean?” Henry Claymore asked as he approached from the pyre of Francis Jericho.

  “Something has happened,” Cedric said. “The Holy One has acquired something, and we are vastly augmented. Lift your hammers with me, friends! Smite the ground! Swing your swords! Let the undead and demons of this world hear the roar of the mighty paladins!”

  Henry Claymore yelled defiantly to the night as he lifted his huge two-handed sword and brought it down mightily. The ground cracked as the blade hit, and white light erupted in a ten-foot line before him.

  Henry laughed and raised his sword. Allen Bigsby brought his hammer down as well, creating an impact crater and pushing other paladins aside.

  Allison looked at her swords curiously. They were short swords, too compact to swing at the packed dirt without crouching. She walked a few dozen paces away to a tree and readied a strike. Cedric watched her closely. Even amongst paladins who each wielded Light-filled weapons, her swords were legendary. The Holy One had created her second blade out of thin air to match the number of weapons Cedric carried, somehow knowing or possibly just decreeing that Allison and Cedric would couple. Where Cedric’s weapons were simply anointed with divine power—one of hers was an actual miracle pulled from the very ether.

  Twenty paladins stopped swinging their weapons to watch her cut and stab at a thirty-foot-wide oak. Each swing tore into the wood, igniting the bark with sparks from her blade. It was impressive to watch, but not exactly what anyone was hoping for.

  “What’s going on?” Henry asked in a hushed tone from beside Cedric.

  “I don’t know.”

  She swung dozens of times, hacking away at the bark and doing considerable damage to the old tr
ee. She grunted in frustration before throwing one of her blades tip first into the dirt. Cedric winced, expecting her sword to make the same rushing sound and crater, but it didn’t. The sword wobbled back and forth as Allison paced around it.

  “We’ll figure it out,” Cedric said.

  Allison shot him a warning look that clearly told him to shut up.

  He nodded in understanding and put his arms around Sarah and Sylas, both watching their mother curse at her blades. Like them, he watched patiently for this new talent to take effect. It was only a matter of time before Allison figured it out.

  “Maybe put them in the ground together,” Henry suggested.

  She tried it, but nothing happened. She grunted in frustration.

  “Maybe try striking the tree with both swords at the same time,” Allen said.

  Again a try and again a fail. Each of the paladin weapons began to dim, and the lightning arcs no longer formed when the weapons were holstered or out-of-hand. Cedric watched his war hammer light-up when he put his hands along the grip and then dim again when he let it go. Similarly, if he dropped his hammer, nothing happened. It was only when he struck the ground while gripping it, that it did the real damage.

  Allison roared in frustration. “Come on!”

  She looked to the heavens, both swords down and then raised them up with her gaze. “What do you want from me? All you do is take, take, take! What more do you want from me? You want my soul now?”

  The paladins collectively gasped. To talk about the price of being a paladin was expressly forbidden. The Holy One had clearly spelled it out. If you revealed the Holy One was a demon lord, if you told your children what the price of admission to the Order was, your children would die.

  “You’ve taken my father!” Allison continued to defy the heavens. “You’ve taken my son! And still, I fight! I’m not asking for much. Give me something! Give me anything!”

  She twirled around, facing the other paladins and then the forest. In the darkness, a pair of eyes reflected back at her. Henry and Allen saw them too. They both started moving toward the undead creature.

  “No!” Cedric commanded, holding them back. “This may be what she needs. Perhaps, the Holy One is sending her a message.”

  He shook the thought away, and Henry and Allen both looked at him queerly. He understood why. They had thought themselves damned too—that the Holy One wanted only their souls. But now, Cedric felt differently. He felt the change inside of him. He wasn’t depressed anymore. He didn’t feel useless or cursed. He felt hopeful. He felt like he finally had a purpose—that there might even be some greater plan. He felt like he might actually be a part of something real and not just some demon’s plaything.

  The undead creature stumbled forward on two legs. As the light from the illuminated weapon revealed its body coming through the brush and growth, Cedric recognized it was a man. He wore a soiled gown. His light brown hair was a mess, and he was freshly undead.

  Cedric was not the first to recognize him or the hammer the creature dragged behind it.

  “Papa?” Sylas asked.

  The creature turned its head toward Sylas and groaned noises through its jaw. Cedric’s father-in-law Jonas had been stabbed multiple times in the chest with something that left black scorches. Red stains coated his nightgown.

  “No,” Allison cried. “Papa… no.”

  She held her swords ready but weakly as her father approached, limping and dragging his hammer. The weapon was not lit. His power had apparently gone with his soul to the Abyss.

  “Stay back!” Cedric said. “My wife will handle this!”

  “No,” Allison mumbled again. “No, no, no-no, no…”

  “You can do this, honey,” Cedric said. “You must have known Orcus would bring him back. Better now at your hands, before he has killed someone else that we love. For Sylas and Sarah, you must do this…”

  “Mom?” Sylas asked. He turned to Cedric. “She’s not going to kill him. That’s Papa Jonas!”

  “That’s an undead minion of Orcus,” Cedric replied, “and we must show them no mercy. The demon lords are not here to govern. They are here to kill us, control our bodies, and enslave our souls. We must fight them, no matter their face. No matter the cost!”

  Henry, Allen and the other paladins lifted their Light-filled weapons to the sky and gave a hearty cheer of encouragement to Allison.

  “We’re here for you,” Cedric said. “We’re all here for you.”

  Allison whimpered as she shuffled her feet backwards, her swords standing less-and-less straight and drifting towards each other as her will to fight her father left her.

  “Come on, honey!” Cedric encouraged her. “You can do this!”

  Her father came within fifteen yards, and her swords drooped within inches of each other. Lightning arcs leapt across the space between them. Jonas the Elder began to move faster toward her, and as he approached faster, Cedric saw more and more wounds on his body. The creature limped so awfully because his leg muscles had been hacked at many times. Dozens of wounds leaked fluids from his body.

  Allison wept openly as her father closed the space.

  “No, Father!” she cried. “Please don’t!”

  The creature became more excited as its hammer bounced against the earth. It increased speed and readied a strike.

  “Allison!” Cedric yelled.

  He ran forward, completely alarmed at how defenseless Allison seemed. She shook free from her terror for a brief moment—just long enough to raise both of her swords together for a locking guard to block the heavy overhand swing.

  The Twin Sisters touched briefly just as the hammer hit. Arcs of white light flew off the short swords and a bright bubble formed for the briefest of seconds. The undead creature shot backwards, dropping its hammer and writhing on the ground as it reached for its weapon again.

  A roar of sound pushed Cedric backward. He stumbled before recovering and halting his charge to her rescue. The other paladins backed off similarly.

  “Wait…” Henry said.

  “Did she just—?” Allen asked.

  “Yes!” Cedric shouted triumphantly as he realized what had happened. Her swords touching had caused the same bell tone in his ears that his own hammer made when he struck the ground.

  “That’s their power!” Cedric shouted to her. “Lock them together!”

  He motioned to her with his hands in a cross gesture. She nodded but didn’t follow through. She walked over to the creature and put her foot on its hammer. It reached for her leg, and she kicked its hands away. She knelt down, trying to look at it, but it kept grabbing at her.

  She kicked the war hammer away in frustration and leapt backwards.

  “Damn you!” she said. “Let me look at your face before I have to kill you! Let me see my father alive for just one moment more.”

  Cedric and Henry mobilized toward her. They hurried over to restrain the undead.

  “We’ve got him!” Cedric said as he rushed forward and secured the creature’s right arm.

  “Got it!” Henry said as he grabbed the other. He looked at the creature as it snapped at him with its jaws. “Hello, old friend.”

  Allison walked over to her father. Cedric and Henry strained against Jonas as the creature kicked at the dirt and swiveled between attacking each of the three closest persons.

  “Papa,” she said, begging for attention like a child might.

  The creature continued to lash out.

  “Papa,” she repeated. “Look at me, Papa.”

  She held her two swords up and close together, inches from its face. The undead creature bent away from the Light. It hissed and snarled in pain.

  “Papa,” she said. “It’s over. Look at me. Can you see me? Are you in there?”

  The creature seemed mesmerized for a moment. Cedric couldn’t tell if it was looking at her or the blades.

  Allison brought the blades closer together and lightning jumped between the Twin Sisters.

&nb
sp; “It’ll all be over soon,” she said.

  The creature breathed shallowly and rapidly as she drove the blades against each other. Impossibly bright light filled the sky from the nexus of the swords, and Cedric braced himself against the onrush of sound and wind. Allison, through great effort, kept the swords together as a translucent bubble of light grew from her blades, enveloping the undead creature, Cedric and Henry.

  Cedric yelled involuntarily. He wasn’t in pain, but he thought he should be. The creature screamed briefly, and Cedric felt the heat from the Light contacting its body and moving through it. Smoke rose from the undead man’s eyes and face. It stopped struggling and went limp. Cedric and Henry allowed it to drop to the ground, and Allison let the blades come apart.

  Cedric’s eyes couldn’t adjust for several seconds.

  “Cronos, be merciful!” Henry said. “Is it dead?”

  The creature twitched on the ground.

  “Papa?” Allison asked. “Dad?”

  Cedric rolled the creature over so it faced up. A pair of eyes darted around. The lips quivered and so did its hands as it seemed to writhe in excruciating pain.

  “Alllllliisson,” it whispered. It reached up toward her briefly before going limp. Its head rolled toward Cedric, and then it quivered no more.

  “Oh, my God!” Allison yelped. “Oh, my God! Oh, my God, no! What have I done?!”

  Cedric rushed to her side and scooped her into his arms. She cried onto his breastplate.

  “Was he really alive?” she cried. “Did I just kill my father?”

  She looked up at Cedric. He shook his head.

  “Orcus killed your father,” Cedric said. “Your father fought him to save you and the kids, and Orcus trapped him in his body to force him to watch helplessly as this turned creature attacked his own daughter. This is not your fault.”

  “You released him,” Henry agreed, “and in the end, he recognized you. He fought to say goodbye.”