“Eleven or twelve feet tall,” said Rallios. “It must weigh at least a thousand pounds, maybe more once you include the armor. But it’s quick, though, as quick as lightning.”
“Archaelon grafted plates of bronze all over its body,” said Parmenio. “We didn’t have any weapon that could penetrate that armor.”
“It must have joints,” said Ridmark.
“It does,” said Rallios. “But the creature is so fast that it doesn’t matter. It wouldn’t stand still long enough for us to land any hits.”
“What does it have for weapons?” said Ridmark.
“Maces,” said Parmenio.
Ridmark frowned. “What, it carries two maces?”
“Not quite,” said Rallios. “Instead of hands, it has stone mace heads grafted to the end of its arms.” Ridmark nodded. “Don’t try to block, my lord. The sword of yours will probably survive anything, but if you try to block, we’ll find your sword embedded in the pulped meat of your torso.”
Calliande shuddered at the mental image, and the men fell silent as she approached.
“It’s ready?” said Ridmark.
“Aye,” said Calliande. “I just have to release the power.” She pointed at a section of the wall south of the gate. “It should tear open a breach right there.”
“The men are ready,” said Ridmark. “The minute I destroy the Champion, cast your spell. The hoplites will charge through the breach, and we’ll take the castra.”
Calliande nodded. “I want to talk with you alone for a moment.”
Ridmark looked at the others, and they moved away, just out of earshot.
“I know this is dangerous,” said Ridmark in a quiet voice, “but this is our best chance of getting Gareth and Joachim back. I wouldn’t do it otherwise.”
“I know,” said Calliande. She found herself blinking back tears. “Ridmark, I’m…”
He waited.
“I’m sorry,” said Calliande.
He blinked. “For what?”
“For not being faster,” said Calliande. “For not stopping Rhodruthain before he transported us here. For not keeping the boys safe.” She shook her head. “I could have stopped all of this if I had just been a little quicker. If…If I had been thinking clearly.”
She left unspoken the truth that if she had been able to heal Joanna, if she had not failed their daughter, then her mind would not have been clouded with grief and she might have been able to react faster.
“Calliande,” said Ridmark.
She closed her eyes. “If I had just…if I had just…”
His hands grasped her shoulders, and she opened her eyes.
“This isn’t your fault,” said Ridmark. “Not Joanna, not Rhodruthain, not Archaelon, none of it. The fault lies with Rhodruthain for bringing the children here and Archaelon for taking them captive. Not with you.”
She opened her mouth to protest, and he put two fingers over her lips. Calliande was so startled that she fell silent. He never did that.
“This is what we’re going to do now,” said Ridmark. “I’m going to kill that damned Champion, and you’re going to rip open Archaelon’s walls. Then we’re going to kill Archaelon and Khurazalin and free their captives and get our sons back.”
He sounded so confident. Calliande knew exactly what he was doing. He had told her more than once that a man who commanded soldiers in battle could never show fear or doubt. A commander had to project confidence to his men, for their morale would break if they thought a fool or a coward led them. Calliande had seen him do this countless times before.
She knew what he was doing…but damned if it wasn’t working. She almost believed him.
No. She did believe him.
“All right,” Calliande whispered. “All right. That’s what we’ll do.”
Ridmark nodded and stepped back.
“Ridmark,” said Calliande. “I love you. And I’m sorry that I’ve…I’ve been...”
“I love you,” said Ridmark. “And you have nothing to be sorry for. Maybe if I keep repeating it often enough, you’ll believe it.”
She drew breath to answer him, and then Rallios’s shout rang over the rocky hill.
“The gate opens!”
Ridmark turned and headed back to the others, Calliande following him. She looked towards the gate, turning the Sight towards it as she did, and saw a locus of dark magic approaching. Another aura of dark power flashed before her Sight, and she saw Archaelon step onto the rampart over the gate, flanked by his bodyguards.
There was no sign of Khurazalin, at least not yet.
“It’s time,” said Ridmark. He drew Oathshield with his right hand, the sword’s blue blade glowing with white flames. “You all know what to do.”
He looked at Calliande, and she gazed at him. She wanted to say more, but they had already said everything that needed to be said, and anything more would simply delay the inevitable.
Then Ridmark nodded to her, turned, and strode towards the opened gate.
“Ridmark Arban!” Archaelon’s voice thundered from the rampart. “Are you ready?”
“Yes,” said Ridmark. He shouted the word without threats. Another man would have blustered. Ridmark simply strode to the halfway point between the hoplites and the wall and waited.
“Very well,” said Archaelon as the gate finished swinging open. “The Champion will come forth, and the gate will close behind it. Once it has killed you, your army will be permitted to withdraw with their lives. If they fail to do so, this night I will summon more wraiths. Without you and your high elven weapon to protect them, the wraiths will kill them all.”
“That reminds me of something,” said Ridmark.
“What?” said Archaelon. “What does it remind you of?”
“A proverb about counting chickens before the eggs have hatched.”
Aegeus burst out laughing at that.
Calliande could not tell from this distance, but she thought Archaelon looked irritated. Evidently, the disciples of the so-called New God were a serious lot. Or maybe Archaelon just didn’t like Aegeus.
“Laugh while you can, Sir Aegeus!” called Archaelon. “For either you shall die below my walls, or you shall fall screaming to your knees when you behold the might of the New God! Let us see if you can laugh, Sir Aegeus, when the Champion cuts down your leader!”
Something moved in the shadow of the gate, and then the Champion lumbered into sight with terrifying speed.
Calliande’s stomach twisted with revulsion.
Rallios and Parmenio and Tamlin and the others had not exaggerated in their description of the Champion’s grotesque appearance.
The creature did indeed stand twelve feet tall, and it was roughly human shaped. It looked as if it had been assembled out of slabs of rotting meat, the slabs held together by thick black stitches. Even from this distance, the stench was unpleasant. The creature had no head, save for a faceless bronze helmet. Sheets of rough-hewn bronze covered the creature in a corroded greenish-yellow carapace. Slime leaked from the joints of its armor, trickling down the rough bronze plates.
As Rallios and Parmenio had said, the Champion didn’t have hands. Instead, it had two rough-hewn balls of stone affixed to the ends of its thick arms. Each one of those stone balls had to weigh hundreds of pounds, but they didn’t seem to slow the Champion at all.
When the Champion had attacked Sir Tyromon’s force, it had faced enemies armed with bronze swords and spears and elemental spells. Little wonder it had defeated them. The Champion would have been able to shrug off those attacks with ease. The Sight stirred to life within Calliande, and she saw the mighty necromancy that animated the hulking creature. The wraiths had proven that Archaelon was no petty necromancer, but this monstrosity was a masterpiece of necromantic magic. She saw the dark power in the thing…and the cords of dark magic that tied it to Archaelon.
Calliande readied her magic, linking her will to the whirling cylinder of purple fire behind them. When the moment came, the inst
ant Ridmark cut down the vile thing, she was going to breach the wall. And if Archaelon interfered in the duel, she would attack him.
And if Ridmark was in trouble, she would help him.
Ridmark came to the halfway point between the hoplites and the wall and waited, Oathshield in both hands.
The Champion went motionless as the gate slammed shut behind it. The undead thing stood as still as a statue. Nothing living could ever go that motionless, but the Champion wasn’t living. It was a puppet of dead flesh and bronze and dark magic, manipulated by the corrupted will of Archaelon.
Then it surged forward, hurtling towards Ridmark with terrifying speed.
###
The duel almost ended in its first instant.
Ridmark had expected the Champion to be fast, at least as fast as an urvaalg or an ursaar.
He had not, however, expected it to be quite that fast, its left arm blurring as it drew back the stone ball of its left hand to strike.
Reflex and the power of Oathshield saved him. Ridmark threw himself to the right, calling on his bond with the soulblade for speed, and he hit the ground, and rolled. The sweep of the stone ball missed his head by about six inches, and his roll carried him away from the Champion’s stamping feet, which were encased in cylinders of bronze. Ridmark surged back to his feet, Oathshield held out before him, and whirled to face the Champion.
The creature was farther away from him than he thought. It stood six yards away, facing the hoplites. At least, Ridmark thought it stood facing the hoplites. It didn’t have eyes or nose or mouth.
The Champion was turning, and Ridmark charged.
Oathshield’s speed let him reach the undead thing before it finished turning, and Ridmark struck, all his strength and the sword’s power driving his blow. The top of his head came to the middle of the Champion’s stomach (assuming it even had a stomach), and Ridmark aimed for the right hip joint. There was a gap in the armor as wide as his hand, the rotting flesh beneath the bronze armor leaking yellowish slime across the plates of metal. Even if the men of Owyllain had landed hits on the exposed flesh, it likely would have done no harm to the Champion.
But none of the men of Owyllain had carried a soulblade.
Oathshield bit deep into the rotting meat beneath the gap. The wound sizzled and smoked, the flesh turning black and charred. Ridmark felt his soulblade’s fury surge through him. The Champion shuddered, and the creature let out a snarling groan.
Evidently, it did have a mouth. Or at least the capacity to make noise.
Ridmark ripped his blade free and stepped back. He had been tempted to try and attack again, to wound the Champion once more, but that would have left him open. The wisdom of his decision became apparent about a half-second later as the Champion kicked out. The bronze cylinder of its left leg blurred before Ridmark’s face with enough force to turn bone to powder and flesh to crimson mist, but he had anticipated the blow and avoided it.
The Champion came after him in a blur, swinging its stone fists and kicking with its armored legs, and Ridmark had no choice but to fall back.
###
Kalussa watched the duel, her heart in her throat.
She never liked to admit to fear. She was of royal blood, a daughter of King Hektor Pendragon and a descendant of the High King Arthur Pendragon himself. But undead creatures frightened her in a way that few other things did. She knew that the souls of the dead resided either with the Dominus Christus in paradise or with the Adversary in perdition, that the wraiths were only the echoes of the dead called forth and given killing power by corrupted magic.
But she still feared them, and she feared becoming one of them. The encounter with the wraiths had shaken her, and the sight of the Champion had been terrifying. It had been a nightmare of dead flesh and dark magic, ripping its way through the valiant hoplites like a man striding through tall grass.
And Ridmark Arban had strode to fight that abomination alone.
The soulblade was like a shard of white lightning in his hands, and he whirled around the Champion, again and again, landing quick strikes with the sword and withdrawing when the creature tried to trample him. Kalussa had never seriously fought with a sword in her life, but she had seen enough men fight with swords to realize what was happening. Ridmark didn’t dare stand in one place for too long, else the Champion could crush him. He could deal a score of blows without doing much damage to the undead thing, but a single strike from the Champion would kill him. He dared not stand still for more than a heartbeat.
Kalussa wondered how long he could keep that up.
She glanced at Calliande. The Keeper stood motionless, her face a bloodless mask as she watched her husband fight for his life. She looked calm, even serene, but Kalussa saw the knuckles shining white as she gripped her staff.
If Ridmark died here, Kalussa knew, Archaelon’s remaining life would be measured in seconds.
That made her look towards the battlements. Archaelon stood over the gate, his gaze fixed on the lumbering Champion. His whole stance radiated tension, even alarm. Perhaps he had not expected Ridmark to put up that much of a fight against the Champion.
The thought gave Kalussa a vicious satisfaction. Nothing was more loathsome than a traitor!
Again, Ridmark slashed Oathshield across the Champion’s leg, and again he jumped back, sweat glistening on his face as he avoided the creature’s blows.
###
Tamlin held his power ready, holding the elemental magic of air to strike as he watched the duel.
The Dark Lady had warned him that this moment would come. She had said the Shield Knight would need his aid, that if he did not help Ridmark at the critical moment, then all would be lost. Tamlin intended to be ready once that moment came.
But Tamlin did not know if this was the moment, because he did not know if Ridmark was winning.
He had never seen a fight like this, not in the Ring of Blood, and not since he had escaped Urd Maelwyn and entered the service of King Hektor as an Arcanius Knight. The Champion was a lumbering nightmare of necromancy, a thing that had smashed its way through a force of five hundred hoplite soldiers without difficulty. It should have crushed Ridmark Arban without difficulty.
But it hadn’t.
Ridmark moved with blurring speed to match the Champion, his soulblade an inferno of white fire. Again and again he struck, dodging out of the way of the Champion’s powerful blows. Tamlin could not see the point of Ridmark’s tactics. The Champion’s torso was so thick that even if Ridmark sank Oathshield to its hilt into the creature’s chest, the tip of the blade would still not emerge from its back. But would that matter? It wasn’t as if the Champion had a heart or another critical point. It was just a pile of dead flesh and bronze animated by necromancy.
“He needs to land a killing blow,” said Rallios in a low, urgent voice. “The undead have endless stamina. Mortal men do not.”
“They don’t,” said Calliande, not taking her eyes from the fight, “but it doesn’t matter. You might not be able to see it, but the Champion is slowing down. It can recover from wounds dealt by normal weapons, but it can’t repair the damage the soulblade is doing to the spells.”
Tamlin wondered if that was wishful thinking, perhaps the desperate hope of a wife watching her husband fight a battle he could not win.
Then he looked at the ramparts and saw Archaelon.
The traitorous Arcanius all but leaned over the battlements as he watched the fight. He had been expressionless and emotionless during the parley, but now the traitor looked on the edge of fury. Tamlin had feared that Archaelon had sent out the Champion as part of some clever and intricate plan for victory, but perhaps it had been simpler. Perhaps Archaelon had been certain that his pet monster could crush Ridmark.
The dvargir gamemasters at Urd Maelwyn had been brutal and cruel teachers, but they had said that overestimating an enemy was just as dangerous as underestimating him. Tamlin would have to remember that.
Perhaps Archaelon was a
bout to learn the lesson about underestimating an enemy.
Ridmark slashed at the Champion’s legs, and again the creature surged at him.
###
The hulking undead thing was one of the strongest and fastest foes that Ridmark Arban had ever faced. A single mistake, a single stumble, and a blow from those massive stone fists would crush his skull like an egg.
But the Champion had weaknesses as well.
Specifically, it was stupid.
As far as Ridmark could tell, the creature had only a limited will and awareness of its own. Furthermore, it fought with no skill or finesse. Granted, it didn’t need to bother with finesse. The thing was all but impervious to normal weapons, and it could attack like an avalanche, smashing its way through the hoplites and crushing skulls and bodies with every swing of its fists and every stamp of its feet. Archaelon had created the perfect weapon for fighting the hoplites of Owyllain.
But not for fighting against a Swordbearer of Andomhaim.
Ridmark realized another weakness as he fought, his heart hammering in his chest, sweat pouring down his face, his shoulders and knees aching with fatigue and strain.
The creature was fast, faster than anything its size should be, and it was surprisingly agile. All that was the product of magic, but Ridmark knew firsthand that magic could only do so much. Archaelon’s necromancy had made the Champion stronger and faster…but it hadn’t given the creature the ability to stop any faster.
And because of the Champion’s lack of skill and awareness, it didn’t realize the pattern.
Every time the Champion charged Ridmark, he used Oathshield’s power to get out of the way. Every time he dodged, the Champion skidded to a stop several yards away, turning to strike him once more. Before it could, Ridmark attacked, launching a two-handed swing at the Champion’s right leg. Specifically, Ridmark aimed his blows at the right hip joint. Already the rotting flesh there had turned black and charred from the impacts of the soulblade, and Ridmark saw the creature had begun to slow, that its right leg was jerking under its massive weight.
Sevenfold Sword: Champion Page 27
