The Hidden Relic (The Evermen Saga, Book Two)

by James Maxwell

59

  EVRIN Evenstar sighed as he regarded his handiwork. He'd done what he could, built what wards and traps he was able to, but he was too weak, his injuries were too great and now he could do no more.

  He lay on his back, his breath coming hoarsely as he looked at the still, reflective surface of the pool. The stone was hard behind his back, but if he moved the pain would overwhelm him. Better to stay like this.

  He glanced at the blood-stained bandage on his right leg and chuckled. The cloth had been so crudely wrapped around the gaping wound that he could still see down to the bone. The skin around was mottled with colours of blue and black, puffy and inflamed. The bones in his other leg rubbed against each other whenever he moved. It took all of Evrin's effort to suppress the pain and stay conscious.

  The source of Evrin's humour wasn't his injuries; it was the fact that here he was with all the essence in the world in front of him, and yet he lacked the strength to do any more with it. There was a time when he could have healed himself without a second thought. Those powers were forever lost to him now.

  "Evrin Evenstar. Killed by gangrene," he muttered. "What an epitaph. Could at least have been a sword."

  Evrin had done what he could. Now he could only wait.

  Two days ago, passing time in the chamber with only himself for company, Evrin had run out of food. An hour ago he ran out of water. The pool was tantalising, but it wasn't filled with water. Unlike the Primate's foul elixir, this oily black liquid was tasteless, but quenching Evrin's thirst was impossible. The raj ichor wouldn't kill him, but drinking the essence would give him no benefit besides making him quite ill.

  Evrin looked around the vaulted chamber, wanting to fix his eyes anywhere but on the reflective surface of the pool. It was hard not to, however, for there was only a crescent-shaped gallery of stepped stone; everywhere else was taken up by the walled pool.

  At one end of the crescent a hole could be seen where the spiral stairway led down to the base of the statue. Evrin lay in wait, propped up against the stone tiers at the opposite end, where he would see any who made it this far.

  The pool was perhaps fifty paces across, lined with a stone wall where it met the crescent, its opposite walls formed by the shell of the statue. It had been filled to the depth of a man's knees.

  In the very centre of the pool a stepped island of stone emerged from the liquid. On this platform, the relic of the Evermen dominated the room, graceful and beautiful, ethereal and otherworldly.

  It looked like an oval mirror, twice the height of a man and unbelievably thin, hovering in the air without apparent support, with no part of it touching the stepped island in the pool. The mirror initially appeared reflective, but on examination it was not; its surface shimmered silver and was difficult to focus on.

  On the mirror were three seals: one on the rim below, a second on the left, and a third on the right. The seals were made of a glossy, metallic fabric, akin to the material that the pages of the Lexicons were made of, and each seal was covered with runes.

  The pool was simply the power source for the magic. Creating the relic had required breakthroughs of knowledge even for the Evermen, yet gathering such a large amount of essence hadn't required skill, simply dedication and ruthlessness. Evrin glared at the essence now. Every drop was obtained by blood. The gods had betrayed their worshippers.

  Long ago, when Evrin was last here, he had put the three seals in place. He didn't have the power to destroy the portal, but he could turn his brothers' magic against them. All of the energy provided by the pool of essence was now being drained by the seals. The pool now powered the seals that kept the portal closed.

  Evrin cast his mind back to the events that had brought him here. It had seemed so simple, back when he had charged Killian with the task of destroying the Primate's refinery and set himself the task of destroying the knowledge hidden at the Pinnacle.

  But he had failed at his task, and whether the Primate discovered the location of this place or not, Evrin knew he would die here.

  For he hadn't been able to build the traps with a mechanism to allow his passage back out. Evrin's wards would prevent anyone from entering, but they would also prevent him from leaving.

  Guarding this place was the whole reason for Evrin's existence. He might have liked to share this burden with Killian, but perhaps the lad was better off not knowing about the portal, just as the rest of them were better off in their ignorance.

  The devout of Merralya prayed for a day when the Evermen would return, and take them to a land of golden skies, far from the pain of this world they lived in.

  Evrin knew the truth. The return of the Evermen was the last thing they should pray for.

  Evrin would stand guard at the portal for as long as he was able.

  When thirst overcame him, Evrin would join his maker.

  60

  BARTOLO fought two avengers at once, while at the corner of his eye he could see Shani battling a third from atop her horse. He vaguely remembered leaping from his horse when he'd seen blood gushing from its neck after a legionnaire's sword blow.

  He ducked under the whistling blur of a flail and then thrust at the red slit in the foremost avenger's face, his bladesinger's chant coming full and strong, the sizzling zenblade penetrating the defences of the avenger's mask. As the avenger fell Bartolo was barely fast enough to catch the sword blow of yet another. As Bartolo's song faltered for an instant a legionnaire's sword bit through the armoursilk in his side. Bartolo gasped at the pain of it, turning on his heel and taking the warrior's throat. Two spiked balls of metal smashed into Bartolo's legs, knocking him from his feet.

  He rolled and leapt back to his feet, his sword arcing through the air to take an avenger's head clean off at the shoulders. Bartolo could see Shani, still astride her horse, throwing ball after ball of flame at avengers and legionnaires alike. The smell of burning hair and cooking flesh came rancid and strong. The cries of men, clashes of weapons, and whinnies of horses formed a cacophony. Bartolo could taste blood on his tongue; whether his own or someone else's, he wasn't sure.

  Bartolo scanned the battle after beheading a revenant and a roar came to his lips as his gaze once again found Shani. She screamed as two pikemen came forward and thrust forward with their weapons, withdrawing the dripping points of their pikes and plunging them a second time into her horse's chest. Shani screamed and fell, tangled in her stirrups.

  "Shani!" Bartolo screamed.

  Avengers and snarling legionnaires were everywhere. There were too many of them between Bartolo and Shani, but he had to try. He ran forward and with two successive blows took down a yellow-eyed templar in white and a round-faced Tingaran legionnaire. He leaped up, springing from the legionnaire's back and sailing over a group of the enemy. Where were the rest of the Hazarans? Was it just him and Shani against this horde?

  A legionnaire butted his forehead against Bartolo's unprotected face, breaking the bladesinger's nose and sending waves of pain through his head. Stars sparkled at the edge of his vision but he ignored them, crashing his shoulder into the Tingaran and eviscerating him with the zenblade.

  Bartolo finally reached where Shani had been half-buried beneath her horse. "My legs," Shani gasped. "I don't think I can get up."

  "Nonsense," Bartolo said, gasping the word between his bladesinger's chant as he cut down two more of the enemy.

  He crouched down again and with a mighty heave lifted the dead horse so that Shani could roll away. One of her feet was twisted at a terrible angle, the ankle swollen as Shani gasped with pain.

  "Rest as long as you need to," Bartolo said. "I'm not leaving this spot."

  "Look out!" Shani cried, as she launched a fireball past Bartolo's shoulder. It scattered harmlessly on the rune-covered chest of an imperial avenger, but gave Bartolo time to face off against his enemy.

  He blanched when he realised he was facing three avengers. No, there were four. Two moved to his right while the others moved to his left. He would never b
e able to take them all.

  Then Jehral came out of nowhere, his horse charging into the avengers on Bartolo's left side, knocking them back. One of them stumbled, and Jehral's scimitar rang as it struck the avenger's neck, but the avenger's magic-enhanced body was too strong, and the rider wheeled his horse to strike again.

  A second fireball flew past, striking one of the avengers directly in the creature's face. Shani launched them in a volley, a rapid succession of discharges that leapt from her fingers one after the other, and the metal on the avenger's face began to melt. It screamed then, a terrible, nightmare sound.

  Bartolo ducked under the flail of the last avenger, and then blocked the black sword with his zenblade, shattering it into two pieces.

  Jehral was soon fighting from his horse by Bartolo's side as Shani hovered on one leg, an expression of intense pain on her face as she attempted to hold the enemy back with ball after ball of flame.

  Then Jehral's horse was cut down from under him by a revenant. The desert warrior fell heavily to the ground, then leapt back up, just in time to block an axe blow from the tall warrior in grey with half his face rotted away.

  Jehral, Shani, and Bartolo fought side by side. The warrior from the desert saved the Petryan's life, and the bladesinger then saved the desert warrior. Clustered around the bodies of the horses, the corpses of their enemy piled up around them.

  But it was three against a horde, and they all knew it was hopeless.

  Even as Bartolo fought legionnaires, avengers, templars and revenants, his mind took note of the carnage around him. Fallen Hazarans fought beside their dead horses, their honour forcing them to stay against all odds. Bartolo realised he stood directly between the great gates to the city of Seranthia. How close they had come.

  Bartolo missed blocking a revenant's sword and felt fire in his arm as the blade tore into his fading armoursilk. Beside him he heard Shani's scream, a sound he never wanted to hear from the woman he loved. Turning, he saw her, high in the air in an avenger's grip. "No," he cried weakly. Tears ran down his cheeks as he saw the avenger's black sword rising.

  Bartolo prepared to leap forward. He knew he wouldn't be quick enough, but he would destroy the creature that ended Shani's life.

  Suddenly Bartolo heard a rumbling sound from all directions and felt the ground heaving beneath his feet. Were the walls falling down? What else could make such a sound?

  Clarions sounded behind the enemy's lines. The avenger dropped Shani; she fell heavily to the earth, but she was alive.

  "They're regrouping," Jehral gasped. "I don't know why."

  As the enemy drew back into the gate and once more formed up ranks, the rumbling grew louder, and Bartolo turned around and looked at the hills surrounding the city.

  It was the most beautiful sight he had ever seen.

  61

  ROGAN Jarvish and seventy thousand men from Altura, Halaran, Loua Louna and Torakon had marched for two days and two nights. They were exhausted but they were determined, and they were ready to fight.

  "Are you sure?" Marshal Beorn asked.

  "I'm sure," Rogan said. "There's a time to lay plans, and there's a time to roll the dice and join the battle. The gate is open, but the Hazarans are nearly done for. Proper battle order will have to take second priority. Marshal Scola has the left flank, Beorn you have the right. I'll take the centre. Call the men to arms immediately."

  Heralds ran along the lines and messengers dashed to and fro. Rogan had hardly finished speaking when he heard the clarions, and then the thumping of the colossi drowned all other noise as they took positions up front.

  Down below the enemy were starting to realise their grave danger. Some astute commanders were pulling the warriors back and reforming ranks, but Rogan intended for them to be too late.

  Rogan drew his zenblade as he faced down the hillside at the city of Seranthia. "Let it end here, today," he whispered.

  To the left the Alturan heavy infantry were formed up with Torak spearmen and Halrana pikemen, and the thousand Dunfolk archers stood side-by-side with their taller allies. There wasn't time to separate the men into their divisions, and in a way Rogan found the idea of them all fighting together somehow fitting.

  To the right were Halrana animators and the ironmen they controlled, mixed-up with Alturan archers armed with rail-bows and the youngest, newest of the recruits, most of them farmers who had never held a sword.

  In the centre Rogan would command the men he had trained in Ralanast, along with the multitude of Halrana who had pledged to fight by his side since the liberation of Halaran. With them were the three Halrana colossi, and the animator Luca Angelo would control the largest of them all in front.

  By Rogan's side were the last four bladesingers. These were men he had trained and led, in a brotherhood that had once consisted of more than seventy, yet whose numbers could now, at the war's end, be counted on one hand.

  The call to arms had barely finished when Rogan ordered the signal to advance. Even mixed up as they were, the men ran forward together, tight and controlled. The soldiers in green and brown, blue and tan poured down the hillside, the ground trembling under the strides of the colossi. As the enemy drew back to reform, the Hazarans rode away to regroup, then joined the great mass of marching men, scimitars waving above their heads as they cheered wildly.

  "The revenants are pulling back, leaving just the templars and the Tingarans," one of the bladesingers shouted above the din.

  "Some of the legionnaires are trying to close the gate," another yelled.

  "We need speed!" Rogan cried. "Attack!"

  The cry was taken up by the men around him, passed to those further away, until seventy thousand soldiers were shouting with one voice.

  "Attack!"

  Ahead of Rogan the three colossi were the first to hit the gates. All three pushed against the closing gate on the left, while the ironmen under Beorn's control hit the right-hand gate. Inexorably the gates' halting motion ceased, and then with a mighty crash they were once more pushed wide.

  Rogan was the first man through the portals of Seranthia, but once he was through he stopped, remembering Amelia's words, knowing he was a young man no longer. The soldiers passed him on both sides, pouring through the gates like a rushing river, unstoppable and inexorable. This was their moment. Let them go first.

  Then he realised that he hadn't been the first man through after all. A warrior in the green of a bladesinger slumped against a wall, just inside the gate. A woman in a red robe leaned against him, and beside them both was a dark-skinned warrior in loose black clothing with a yellow sash.

  Rogan walked over and grinned at Bartolo. "Looks like you beat me inside the city."

  Bartolo opened an eye, the other so encrusted with blood it stayed shut. "Looks like we did, Blademaster."

  The Hazaran warrior coughed, blood trickling down the corner of his mouth. "I would say we all came in together. Thank you, Marshal. You saved the lives of many of my people."

  "You got the gates open," Rogan said. "I would think that makes us equal."

  "I thought you were dead, you know," Bartolo said.

  "I keep hearing that," said Rogan. "Have you heard from Miro?"

  "No," Bartolo said. "He's not with you? Wait, I'm coming with you."

  "You'll do nothing of the sort," Rogan said. "Take care of your friends, and we'll speak later. I'm sure Miro's fine."

  Rogan knew the battle was far from won.

  He headed for the Imperial Palace.

  62

  MORAGON cursed the Akari as he stormed into the Imperial Palace. Cowards! He had ordered them to stand their ground, but when the time came, they had run like the skulking curs they were.

  Guards and servants got out of his way, most of Moragon's fellow Tingarans fleeing in panic, as with his mind fixed on one thing and one thing only, Moragon searched the palace for his son.

  He climbed the wide marble stairs and then ran up a second stairwell. The living chambers inside t
he palace were all clustered on the fourth and fifth levels, and, still clouded by battle-lust, he momentarily couldn't remember which chamber he'd left the Alturan woman in. Finally it came to him, and he climbed yet another set of stairs and turned down a corridor, his boots leaving bloody footprints on the spotless white floor. He hit the wall with his metal arm as he walked, so filled with rage that he could hardly think.

  He had held victory in his grasp! The Hazarans should have been crushed beneath his boot-heel, and Moragon could have again closed the gates before the newcomers arrived.

  Scratch it all! The scouts had said the Alturans were far away. How could such a thing have happened? Even so, if those craven Akari hadn't fled he could still have held. He hoped the four meldings he'd sent after Dain Barden had made a bloody mess of the Akari leader.

  Moragon came to the door and kicked it open. The heavy wood fell back on its hinges, bouncing off the wall behind it.

  The Alturan woman, Amber, stood by the window, looking out at the commotion below. Even she would realise the city was lost. All Moragon wanted was his son. He drew the long sword from the scabbard at his side. He planned to disappear into the wild lands of northern Tingara, or perhaps head for one of the free cities. The woman wouldn't be coming with him.

  Amber turned and fixed a sad smile on Moragon. In her arms she held a bundle, and Moragon had a sudden premonition she was going to do something rash.

  "I'm not letting you take my son," she said.

  "He's my son, woman, and you'll give him to me or I'll run you through."

  Amber inched closer to the open window.

  "What are you doing?" Moragon demanded. He could see through the window how far below the streets of Seranthia were.

  "I said I'm not going to let you have my son," Amber repeated. She held the bundle out through the window and turned back to Moragon, her eyes threatening. "Do you understand me?"

  Moragon continued moving towards Amber, the light from the window glinting from the steel of his sword. "I don't believe you. You wouldn't do it."