“The other things…” Nassar heard himself murmur. He hadn’t meant to say it out loud, but the dread coursing through him had forced the words off his tongue.
He’d seen the ‘other things’ during yesterday’s tour of camp. The Consul kept them corralled like bulls in a warded tent, out of view of the general army as well as sealed off from elae’s currents. Nassar had observed them at their milling rest, sluggish flies trapped in a glass jar—curiosities for wanton boys or weapons for wanton princes.
The comment earned him a sharp stare from hal’Jaitar.
Prince Radov turned with unsteady legs and a fixed smile. “Our secret weapons, Commander. They’ll be inside the oasis in a matter of minutes. Watch. You’ll see.”
Nassar would watch, but he very much doubted that he would enjoy what he saw.
***
Farid al Abdul-Basir, Prince of the Akkad, gripped his saddle with his knees and spared a look over his shoulder. The wind churned by his speeding horse turned the scarf from his turban into a whip. He absently secured the trailing end across his face while his eyes searched the walls.
Horns were blaring through the oasis, bursts of communication passing from one unit to another, warning of incursion, summoning reinforcements. They told their story of the battle.
The currents told a different one. And whatever was coming towards them, it had the currents in a roiling fury.
Farid turned forward again and held their course towards the western gate. Beside him, Trell’s king father clung to his horse. He looked a bit uncertain in the saddle, but Farid found no uncertainty in his gaze. As they raced west, Farid felt Fate racing with them.
The horses ran into a tunnel beneath a wall and they plunged into darkness. That’s when Fate struck them a blow.
Farid drew back hard on his reins, forcing his mount and Gydryn’s to come to a skidding, clattering halt on the sandstone-paved road. In the bright daylight beyond the tunnel’s crescent, men were fighting.
But what were they fighting? Whatever it was, elae’s currents avoided the thing in choppy ridges of revulsion.
Even as Farid watched, the black-skinned creature smashed in a man’s skull, kicked another into the air to land out of Farid’s view, and crushed a third’s windpipe in its fist.
“Shade and darkness!” Gydryn swore.
Farid bit back a curse of his own and urged them on. They stormed out of the tunnel, careened around the creature as it was battling two soldiers, and stormed down a promenade. Around the oasis, more black things were dropping from the walls. Men were fighting atop the ramparts, others in the city streets, but the bulk of his father’s forces were arrayed to the east.
Had the eastern attack simply been a diversion while the real attack came from the rear? And where were the Sundragons?
Long before they reached the west gate, Farid feared they would find the way blocked. True to his suspicions, the unit that had been intended to ride as Gydryn’s honor guard were now all involved in fending off two of the creatures. Farid watched a third one scale the wall with its bare hands and then launch itself into the clump of fighting men, taking several of his father’s soldiers down beneath it.
This then was how the monsters had gotten inside the walls—they’d simply dug their hands into the sandstone!
Farid flung a look into the skies. By the Seventeen—where were the Sundragons?
He bit back another curse and turned to Gydryn. “I can’t get you out this way.” He might not be able to get him out at all. But could he get him somewhere safe?
Would anywhere be safe?
“Back to the palace!”
Farid spun his horse around and stormed back the way they’d come. His father’s elite guard were protecting the palace. They wore elae-enhanced armor crafted by the Mage and carried Merdanti blades. If they couldn’t hold these creatures off, no one could.
Their flight drew the gaze of a pair of the monsters, and they broke away to chase them. He did curse then. Perhaps the gods would forgive him this one indiscretion, under the circumstances. He drew his sword and urged his horse faster.
They barreled through the center of the soldiers fighting near the tunnel. Farid leaned in his stirrup and made a blow for the creature in their midst. His strike took a chunk out of the creature’s neck, but it felt like he’d slammed his blade against a rock. The blow reverberated all the way into his shoulder.
A glance back just before they dove into the tunnel showed that at least the monster was down—his father’s men were chopping at it like boys with hatchets—but the other two demons were still chasing him.
Out of the tunnel, Farid turned them onto the main boulevard and gave his horse its head. The animal needed no encouraging to lengthen its gait. Doubtless it was as aware of the evil things chasing them as Farid was. The king proved more able than he appeared and kept his horse apace with Farid’s.
The palace walls had just come into view when Farid heard the horns. So the damnable things had gotten to the palace ahead of him. He said a quick prayer for his father and struck left, making for the harem gate.
It was open—abandoned—and they clattered through unimpeded. The things were still chasing them.
Inanna give us wings!
They sped the horses across a lawn, clumps of grass flying in their wake, and through a narrow archway into a walled garden where tall trees shaded a sacred spring. Farid spun his own mount around to face the things coming after them.
The first bolted through the gate and took a running leap. Farid kneed his war-trained horse sideways, and the demon speared through the grass, churning a furrow of dark earth. It rolled back to its feet and came at him again.
Farid laid it flat with a blow to its head. But before he could recover in the saddle, a force like a falling boulder rammed into him, something hard struck his head, and he tumbled from his horse, blinded by pain’s black and debilitating veil.
***
Gydryn watched the black-fleshed creatures come swarming over Raku’s walls and experienced a sickening dread. Radov had truly made a pact with darkness, for who else but the Demon Lord could’ve raised such things out of the ashes of men?
Farid struck down a creature as they flew through a melee, wielding his Merdanti sword—black-bladed in a gold hilt—and leaning half-out of his saddle to do it. They put some distance between them after that, but Gydryn wondered if anywhere would be safe from the creatures. Beyond the two chasing them, many more were scrambling, fighting, running atop the walls. It was like the oasis had become infested with ants—if ants possessed the strength of beasts.
And when not engaging Akkadian soldiers or Converted, the demons made dark streaks in the same direction as Farid, heading for the palace.
Horns sounded just as he and the prince sped beneath an arch into a walled garden, with the first of the creatures fast on their heels. Farid leaned in his saddle and laid the demon flat, but he’d barely recovered before the second foul thing was upon him. They both tumbled to the ground, with the Akkadian prince landing beneath the demon and far from his sword.
Gydryn finally overcame incredulity to find his anger. Before he knew himself, he was off his horse and had the prince’s blade in both hands. He hadn’t counted on it being so heavy, though. It took everything he had to lift it over his head. Gravity gave him a needed assist as he brought it down on the back of the demon’s head, just as the creature was clawing for the prince’s throat.
A dull crack signaled the demon’s end, and it toppled to one side. They didn’t bleed, these things, but only oozed an unwholesome, tarry sludge.
The weight of Farid’s descending blade pulled Gydryn down onto one knee. The king braced himself against the hilt and bent to the prince. “Farid?” He shook him hard.
The prince roused with a startled inhalation. Then he saw Gydryn and blew out his breath. “Your Majesty.” He quickly sat up. “Are you injured?”
“Only my pride.”
The prince’s dar
k eyes fixed on his Merdanti weapon lodged in the earth. “You used my blade to kill that creature?”
Gydryn gave a sort of wince. He hadn’t thought himself so infirm as to barely be able to lift a sword.
The ghost of a smile touched Farid’s lips. “This is a sentient blade, Your Majesty. It wakens to a flow of elae. Beneath the lifeforce, it feels an extension of my own arm, but without it? It’s a wonder you managed to lift it at all.”
“Yes, that’s what I was thinking.”
They each rose. Farid sheathed his blade and frowned at the demon. “But without it, I doubt you’d have made a dent in whatever this thing is.” He cast a troubled gaze over his shoulder to the pool behind them, where the shadows of deep water reflected the two tall jade pillars standing at the center. “This is a sacred place.” His dark eyes darted to the king and away again, betraying conflict in their cast. “I cannot decide if Jai’Gar spared us here, or if we’ve offended Him by killing such a thing as this before His sacred spring.”
Gydryn didn’t believe in a god who would care one way or another what men did in front of a pool of water. “You’re familiar with the concept of acting without asking and begging forgiveness later, Prince Farid?”
The prince looked gravely to him by way of his answer.
Gydryn nodded to the dead thing that had once clearly been a man. “This is one of those times when it seems appropriate.”
Farid’s brow furrowed deeply at this.
That’s when the creature Farid had first laid out pushed up on one arm and gave a ratcheting cry to the heavens.
Raine’s truth, hearing that clattering demon-call sent a chill coursing through Gydryn.
Farid launched towards the thing and took its head off with slash of his blade, but not before that call had sent its echo ricocheting through the cloisters. They had time in their locking of gazes to imagine the worst potential the next few minutes could present to them, and then more of the creatures were dropping from the walls.
Farid put himself between Gydryn and the oncoming demons.
Gydryn placed a hand on his shoulder. “If my sons display half your courage, Prince Farid, I will die a proud father.”
The prince spared a tight glance for him. “I would we both survive this day, Your Majesty.” He glanced heavenward, as if seeking favor of the gods, or perhaps seeking the Sundragons, who were conspicuously absent.
Gydryn drew his sword. His blade might do no more than irritate the creatures, but that wouldn’t stop him from using it while strength remained in his limbs. “I may not be of much help to you, Farid, but I’ll keep them off your back. You have my word.”
Farid gave him a grim nod. Then the creatures were upon them, and no more words mattered.
Gydryn swung for the first demon’s head. It veered back, and the tip of his blade skittered across its cheekbone, leaving a faint tracing, as of stone scraped across stone. So mortal weapons would mark them, just not grievously.
Farid had more luck, being possessed both of youthful vigor and a Merdanti blade. He felled his first monster as Gydryn was parrying another swing from the villain accosting him. It beat at him with bare hands, trying to get to his flesh, his neck, anything it could rip asunder, and if he gave those black fingers a chance to close around his blade, they would try to rip it out of his hands.
Gydryn pounded at the thing determinedly, but the creatures quickly had them backed up against the edge of the deep pool. There were two on the ground now but many more trying to get past their swords. It was all the king could do to hold the monsters back.
Behind him, the towering jade Pillars of Jai’Gar cast colorful shadows on the water. Gydryn had hardly given the desert gods a second thought until Trell declared himself blessed of one. Now, as he battled before the sacred pillars, said to be Jai’Gar’s eyes into the world, Gydryn admitted a willingness to pray to all the Seventeen if they’d only provide some divine intervention.
The sounds of running feet rebounded from the arcade bordering the garden, and then a shout. Gydryn felt a twinge of hope that guards were coming to their aid, but then a troop of harried Converted rushed into the garden. They all seemed to spot Farid at the same time—or at least to spot his black-bladed Merdanti sword—and poured towards him in a wave.
The demons turned from Gydryn and Farid, who had not made soft targets of themselves, and rushed the Converted like rampaging bulls.
Farid stormed after them in pursuit. Gydryn was twenty years and a breath slower.
In moments it became a bloodbath.
Gydryn and Farid shifted from defending one to defending many. If the king’s blade could only drive them back, at least he kept them off the few behind him, many of whom were already wounded. But for those he protected, just as many he could not. He fought within a chaos unlike any battle of his days. Betimes the creatures stole a blade and slashed at a man until they became drenched in his bits. Other demons simply tore and shredded with clawed fingers, ripping flesh and limbs. Men tumbled into the pool, staining its waters.
Farid’s was the only blade capable of truly harming the things, though Gydryn had learned that with a well-placed blow he could at least fell them for the space of a few breaths. But Farid fought as though every man there was his responsibility. Gydryn could see this in his gaze, in the tension of his jaw, in the way he swung his sword and drove himself after every creature as if personally offended by the aberration of its existence.
And the king watched helplessly, in the way one knows a sort of prescience when past experience crosses present events, as Farid extended himself across danger’s lip.
The prince beat one of the creatures back until the two of them moved out of the scrabbling fray, towards the pool. The moment Farid’s back became an open target, two demons abandoned their victims and jumped on him.
Gydryn choked on urgency as he rushed to the prince’s aid, bashing through anything in his path, even leaping the fallen to reach the prince before the creatures ripped him apart. He rammed his shoulder into one of the monsters and it tumbled in a tangle with him. Gydryn got out from beneath it, but the demon grabbed his leg and then clawed its way up his back. Bloody fingers slashed for his throat.
The king felt wet warmth pouring down his chest. Stars overcame his vision, dizziness his balance, and he tumbled limply into the pool.
Seventy-one
“They say Cephrael could feel the Balance shifting. It would pull His gaze towards man or beast, towards those who were causing the disturbance. A rare gift.”
–Genesis Legends, Tales From The Before
The patch of darkness spreading through Sinárr’s universe expanded until it blocked most of Tanis’s vision. Then another Warlock emerged.
His muscular torso shone as though an artist had painted him in gold foil, while liquid-dark pants draped his legs. He stepped into Sinárr’s universe trailing an expanse of velvet wings. As he approached across Sinárr’s bridge, his shoulder-length raven hair shed flinty sparks.
“Rafael, I bid thee welcome.” Sinárr bowed low to him.
“Sinárr.” Rafael stepped into a bent knee and bowed in return. His wings flared behind him, blocking out a swath of stars and raining silvery deyjiin. Tanis had never seen anyone so impressively intimidating.
Rafael straightened, and his wings folded into a cloak behind him as he approached. “I’m pleased by your summons.” His striking features emitted a golden radiance beneath his dark eyebrows and tousled hair. A round red crystal glowed between his brows. “Though I confess a slight confusion.” He shifted void-black eyes between Sinárr and Tanis.
Tanis cleared his throat. “That would be my fault, sir. I summoned you without understanding what I was doing. Please accept my humblest apologies for troubling you.”
“You summoned me?” Rafael studied Tanis more intently. “Ah…but I’ve seen you in another’s thoughts of late.” He directed a telling glance towards Sinárr, as if delighting in some dark entertainment. “Many myster
ies become newly clear to me.”
“Undoubtedly, Rafael.”
Rafael looked Tanis potently up and down. The feel of the Warlock’s hypnotic gaze licking over him soon had all the hairs on Tanis’s body standing on end. He fought the inclination to hide behind Sinárr.
One corner of Rafael’s mouth curled upwards, hinting at a formidable interest. “What name am I meant to assign to this alluring creature, Sinárr?”
Sinárr placed a hand on Tanis’s shoulder. “Rafael, may I present Tanis to you.”
Tanis very much misliked the phrasing of that introduction.
Rafael’s obsidian eyes glinted with an alluring luster; unfortunately, Tanis couldn’t be sure that he wasn’t as unnervingly captivated by Rafael as the Warlock was by him. The lad suddenly recalled the stories from the Before, which spoke of Warlocks having mesmerizing power over mortals—frightening stories, where men committed atrocious act against themselves or each other to entertain their Warlock masters.
Upon their first meeting, Sinárr had magnetized Tanis’s interest in a way that had frightened and disturbed the lad. Tanis had thought the experience singular to Sinárr. Now, seeing Rafael, he reconsidered that assessment.
Rafael touched a finger of crackled gold beneath Tanis’s chin and looked deeply into his eyes, studying him through the magnifying glass of his curiosity. “You permeated Pelas’s thoughts like you now permeate Sinárr’s.” He arched a raven brow with dangerous fascination. “Explain this to me if you will…Tanis.”
Tanis glanced to Sinárr. Knowing the Warlock as he did, he could tell that complicated rules of etiquette were governing this meeting—Sinárr was practically radiating solicitude—but Tanis understood little of the politics of Warlocks.
He dropped his gaze to his hands. “Sinárr and I are bound, sir.”
“Bound.” Rafael turned a narrow stare on Sinárr. “A concubine?”
“The binding is mutual, Rafael.”
Rafael reared back with a flaring pulse of his wings. Deyjiin rained from them in a sparkling veil. “You tell me this impossibility without prevarication?” His obsidian gaze speared Sinárr. “You worked a mutual binding with a child of Light?”
Kingdom Blades (A Pattern of Shadow & Light 4) Page 111
