by Chris Fox
“Of course, Master. I—what do you wish to know?” She returned to her seat and folded her hands in her lap, probably aiming for meek. Even now, she couldn’t disguise her eagerness, though to be fair Skare hadn’t been able to either when he’d been in the same situation.
Jolene’s body shot suddenly into the air, and her arms and legs bent backward as her body went rigid. Skare detected a wave of magic emanating from the darkness. The spell contained all eight aspects, though spirit was the strongest in this case. A binding of some form? Did he bear a similar one?
Her body slumped back into the chair. She shivered violently, and her pupils were nearly wide enough to swallow the entire eye. Skare edged a bit further away from her.
The darkness vanished, revealing Talifax’s dark grey armor, and too-thick limbs.
“There is no deception in you.” Talifax took a step closer, looming over both of them. “You will sacrifice anything to achieve your goals. That is good. I can offer you power and immortality.”
“What will this cost me?” Jolene whispered. She stared up at Talifax adoringly.
“Your son is a threat. He represents a possibility I have not foreseen.” Talifax frowned. “Capture him, and bring him to me so that I might unravel his mind and find out who is tugging his thread. Almost, I believe it must be Neith.”
“Of course, Master.” Jolene bowed low. “I will have him subdued and brought before you immediately.”
40
Wights
Aran knelt to inspect the drone. It was nothing more than two barrels bolted onto a squat frame. One barrel fired conventional rounds, and the other, fatter nozzle fired a thick sheet of flame. They had two dozen of the boxy little contraptions, which was enough to cover about 70% of the vents in the command bunker itself.
That left the vents in the corridor outside exposed, and several near the doors leading inside. They’d arrayed the Marines around those weaker points, each armed with a backpack attached to a portable flamethrower. Each heavy Marine was protected by a squad armed with more conventional rifles, though Aran noted each had one of the heavy pistols belted to their thigh as well. Those would probably be of more use when it came to close quarters. And it would.
“Crewes, I need you, Bord, and Kezia to reinforce the Marines holding the room itself.” Aran nodded toward the blast doors at the end of the corridor. “Kheross and I will help the Marines at the base of the elevator shaft. If we have to fall back we’re going to need you guys in a hurry. Nothing gets through that door.”
Crewes gave a broad smile. “I got a real special surprise for anything that comes through that door. Spoilers, it ain’t a fucking surprise. It’s fire. Lots and lots of fire.”
“I almost feel bad for those wights.” Aran clapped his friend on the shoulder, then strode back up the corridor to inspect the defenses near the lift itself. There were some positives, at least. The Krox could only come at them down the shaft itself, which let them set up an easy kill zone. The barrel of every rifle and every turret already pointed directly at the door. Anything vulnerable to conventional ordnance was going to die quickly.
“Kheross?” Aran called to the Wyrm. He stood inside the lift itself, staring up into the shaft.
“Can you feel their approach?” The dark-haired man rumbled.
Aran stepped onto the lift and followed Kheross’s gaze. The shaft disappeared up into the unrelieved darkness. He couldn’t see anything, but Kheross was right. Something…sang in the distance. A potent, many-layered power he was familiar with.
“That’s void magic. A lot of it.” He cocked his head. “I’ve felt something similar before, at the Skull of Xal. Demons.”
“You sound surprised.” Kheross eyed him with mild interest.
“The Krox use spirit magic. Earth sometimes. We don’t often see void.” Aran’s hand fell instinctively to Narlifex as he assessed the strength of the approaching magic. Narlifex thrummed in greeting.
“A wise mage harnesses all eight aspects as quickly as they are able,” Kheross offered. He returned to staring up at the darkness. “Evolve past your enemies, and they will move to counter who you were, not who you are. You said that, or a future version of you, anyway.”
It chilled Aran that there was this whole other version of him, one that had apparently lived centuries and helped to define an entire culture. Right now, though, he was more concerned about the approaching enemy. “I don’t know a lot about demons, beyond that they don’t go down easily. Any advice we can offer our allies?”
“Stay out of the way and pray for the best?” Kheross gave a half smirk. “You and I both know these tiny men will be as saplings against the ferocity of the storm about to crash over us. They may distract a stray attack, but I expect little else.”
Aran glanced at the hard-eyed Marines behind the barricades. “I think they might surprise you. Magic is powerful, but there’s a reason that the Krox haven’t been able to conquer Ternus yet.”
“Let’s pray you are right.” Kheross tensed. “Our enemy is nearly upon us.”
Aran could feel the void magic growing closer. He darted back off the lift and spun to face the Marines, “Don’t be shy about explosive rounds. Overwhelming force.”
Marines moved smoothly into position, and the action of multiple rifles sounded in quick succession as the soldiers prepared themselves. Aran rolled into position behind a pile of sandbags, and waited.
Inhuman screams split the silence, their otherworldly wails echoing from the very walls around them. The scream passed down the corridor, the terrible sound moving steadily toward the command bunker itself. Aran tensed, but resisted the urge to sprint into the bunker and help. He needed to trust his people. Crewes would deal with the wights there. He was needed here, to hold the line.
“Brace yourselves,” Aran roared. He reached into his void pocket and withdrew his rifle.
One of the vents on the wall to his right burst open, and a pallid, grey fog boiled out. It strongly resembled the breath weapons they’d seen the Krox use, but the breath coalesced into a rough human outline, a ghostly woman of exquisite beauty.
Her eyes were utterly devoid of color, holes in reality that led into the depths themselves. A chill passed over Aran, and he grew numb as he met that gaze. He was dimly aware of the magic the wight used, some sort of paralysis designed to slow him long enough for it to make a kill.
The wight lunged suddenly, its ghostly form melting into an ancient hag with cracked, weathered skin. She slashed at him with wicked claws, and he leapt backwards at the last instant.
The wight seemed surprised, and he capitalized on that. Aran snapped his spellrifle to his shoulder, and filled the weapon with fire. A glowing, orange ball the size of his head streaked into the creature’s face, and the parts of the creature that came in contact dissolved into dense, black smoke.
Aran smiled grimly and fired a level one fire bolt at the creature’s chest. A ghostly shriek echoed down the corridor as the creature broke apart, then dissolved entirely.
“Guess fire does work,” he called to Kheross as he pivoted to find another target.
Wights burst from many vents at once, a dozen or more attacking Marines up and down the corridor. Pandemonium broke out. Automatic weapons fire echoed up and down the corridor, drowning out all other sound, and filling it with the acrid odor of gunpowder and sweat. The bullets did nothing but ricochet off the walls—that, and fill the corridor with smoke that made the wights even more difficult to see.
A Marine with a flamethrower stepped up to a wight, and aimed the barrel at its ghostly back. A sheet of orange-white flame engulfed the spectral creature, which fell back with an enraged cry. It flew back into the vent, disappearing from sight. The Marine stuck the nozzle into the vent, and unleashed another torrent of flame. The wight’s death cry echoed through the walls.
Aran sighted down his scope at the next nearest wight. He gently stroked the trigger, and his chest tightened as more fire magic was pulled into t
he weapon. The level two fire bolt caught the wight where the chest would have been on a human. It shrieked, and then its energy dissipated. Much cleaner than the first kill.
“Crewes,” Aran barked into the comm, “level two seems to be enough to one-shot these things.”
“On it, LT,” Crewes panted back. A moment later Crewes’s laughter echoed from the other room. “Oh, yeah! Get some, you skinny bitches.”
Danger. We. Kill. Now. Narlifex’s voice pulsed in his mind. It was thick with battle rage, but tinged with caution too, a new emotion.
Aran spun to face the elevator shaft just as shadowy forms began landing around Kheross. They stood head and shoulders taller than Kheross, with thick arms, curved horns, and smoldering, purple eyes. The dark-skinned brutes looked a great deal like the tech demons he’d faced back at the Skull of Xal, though these wore battered armor that looked like it might have been stripped from tanks.
Kheross’s axes materialized in his hands, and he began to dance. Demons swung at him with clawed hands, but he flowed around each strike, then delivered wicked counter attacks. The blows wounded the demons, but their armor and their own thick hides prevented any single strike from killing them.
Aran dumped his rifle back into his void pocket, then guided his spellarmor into a quick dash toward the corridor. He needed to trust Crewes to deal with the rest of the wights. If these demons made it past the lift the Marines wouldn’t stand a chance.
“Hernandez,” he roared over his shoulder. “If those things get past us, fall back to the bunker.”
The dark-haired Marine gave a thumbs up, and then went back to firing from her position behind a pile of sandbags. She used a pistol, and at first Aran wondered why. Then he saw one of the tech demon’s knees explode. The creature staggered, and Kheross decapitated it with a sudden strike.
Okay, he stood corrected. Maybe the Marines did stand a chance.
He drew Narlifex, and flew toward the demons. Several pivoted at his approach, their hungry eyes settling on him. Aran blurred forward, and dropped low at the last second. He braced Narlifex against his arm. “Burn them, bud.”
Narlifex flared to blue-white brilliance, a hotter shade than he usually used. Aran accelerated and his momentum lent Narlifex incredible force. The blade quivered eagerly, then sheered through the closest demon’s legs.
The suddenly legless demon toppled to the ground with a deafening roar. Three more leapt over its body. Aran rolled past the first, and slashed at its side. Narlifex cut through the demon’s thick carapace, but the wound was superficial.
The second demon raised a rusted claymore, and brought the massive sword down on Aran. He was about to dodge, but the legless demon seized his ankle in a death grip, pinning him in place.
Aran snapped his spellshield into existence, and interposed it just in time to intercept the falling blade. The force of the blow knocked him to the floor of the lift, but his spellarmor protected him from the worst of it.
He filled his body with flame, enhancing his strength and speed. Aran whipped Narlifex around, and brought him down in a slash that hummed through the air. The blade sliced cleanly through the demon’s wrist, and the claymore clattered to the deck. He reversed the stroke, and sliced off the arm pinning him in place.
Aran flipped to his feet and seized Narlifex with both hands. He had room to swing now, and he used it to full effect. He leapt into the air, dodging a slash from another demon.
Aran brought Narlifex’s flaming blade plunging down at the handless demon. It brought its arm up to deflect the blow, but Narlifex crashed down on him like the judgement of the gods. It cut through the arm, through the demon’s snarling face, and deep into its chest. Smoke billowed from the wound as Narlifex cauterized the demon’s terrible flesh, but the demon was no longer in a position to feel anything.
“Outrider!” Kheross bellowed. The word was panicked.
Aran turned to see Kheross pinned to the deck under the weight of a half dozen demons. They swarmed him, biting and clawing at his scarlet armor. Had he not been in human form he probably could have dealt with them, but the lift was too small to accommodate a dragon’s massive size. That left him vulnerable and the demons were taking full advantage.
Aran risked a quick glance up the corridor, and his heart sank. Nearly a quarter of the Marines were down and dying, and only a few resisted the remaining wights. Hernandez barked orders and was guiding the survivors toward the bunker.
41
Hold the Line
Aran took a single moment to assess the organized retreat. Hernandez and her Marines were falling back in good order, and they were laying down withering suppressive fire that actually gave the demons pause. “Good gods, those Marines are tough.”
Confident that the governor was protected, Aran sprinted toward the knot of demonic bodies obscuring Kheross from view. He infused his entire body with air, as he had when he’d killed Tobek. But this time Aran had spellarmor.
He grinned as the blue-white magic crackled around his armor. The glow intensified until Aran, his spellarmor, and Narlifex all became lightning. He grounded himself into the closest demonic bodies over Kheross, flowing between them in lethal arcs of pure air. Aran entered a demon’s nostril, cooking its brain before flowing out its other nostril and toward the next target.
They screamed and beat at their faces, trying to cover orifices as Aran wove a deadly path through their ranks. He could feel the energy burning away, and knew he wouldn’t be able to sustain it much longer. Aran released air, and hopped backward as he reached for his dwindling reserves of fire.
A jet of white flame rushed over the demons, blackening their armor and completing the work he’d already begun. All but one collapsed to the floor of the lift, and Kheross was already dealing with the final assailant. The Wyrm flipped to his feet, and his fist rocketed out, shattering the demon’s spine just below the neck. Kheross threw it to the ground, then stomped on its skull with an armored boot.
“Eww.” Aran winced as demon brain splattered his armor.
Something beyond conscious thought drew his attention, and he glanced up, into the darkness. In the distance, many floors above, Aran caught sight of a pair of violet eyes. They stared down at him, unblinking.
“Why isn’t he attacking?” Aran muttered. He shifted into a defensive stance, but the figure above made no move to approach or to flee.
Kheross flicked ichor from his boot, and moved to stand next to Aran. He stared up into the darkness. “He isn’t attacking because he wants you to chase him. He seeks to provoke you.”
Aran nodded thoughtfully. “Makes sense. Bait me into following, so he can ambush me.”
A rustling, like autumn leaves in Shaya’s upper gardens, grew around them until it resolved into a voice, “If you followed me there would be no ambush, only an execution.”
Aran couldn’t help but laugh at that. “Man, I never get tired of the clichéd villain crap. You’re a Krox, aren’t you? I’d recognize that arrogance anywhere.” He assumed the spell would allow the binder to hear them, or that he had some other way of listening. Clearly he must.
“I am no mere Krox. I am Arkelion, son of Drakkon,” the voice whispered back. “I give you one day to regain your magic. One day to rest. Then I will return, and when I am finished no stone will be piled atop another. I will lay waste to this place, to you, and to any who remain.”
“’Kay. We’ll be here.” Aran buckled Narlifex around his spellarmor, and by the time he glanced back up, the eyes were gone.
Kheross chuckled, shaking his head. “That was cruel. My kind pride themselves on our posturing, you know. Cutting him off like that will enrage him.”
“That was the point. Our only hope is him overextending himself so we have a shot at taking him down.” Aran turned wearily, and guided his spellarmor back up the hallway. A half dozen medics had already darted out and were pulling survivors to safety. Far too many men and women lay unmoving, most clustered around their machine gun
emplacements. “Looks like Crewes and the others took care of the wights, at least.”
He drifted up the hallway, and back into the command bunker itself. Crewes stood protectively inside the doorway, but stepped aside for Aran. “Those skinny pieces of shit burn like everything else. How’d it go on your end, LT?”
A shimmering, white ward blocked the rear half of the room, and Aran could see silhouettes behind it. Bord’s work, almost certainly. He removed his helmet and brushed his hair out of his eyes. “I’m not sure. We dealt with the demons, but I get the sense this whole thing was just a test.”
“You are not wrong about that.” Kheross glanced nervously back through the doorway. “Some Wyrms, like me, are brash. We are an apex predator after all, and that lends itself to aggressive tactics. Yet others are more cautious. More practical. I believe we are dealing with the latter.”
“That surprises me.” Aran rested a hand on Narlifex’s hilt, and the blade hummed. “Drakkon style is all about offense. This Arkelion guy said he’s the son of Drakkon.”
“That’s the mountain-sized lizard on Marid, right, LT?” Crewes rested the barrel of his spellcannon on his shoulder, and followed Aran as he picked a path toward the ward. The walls he passed had all been scorched, and while there were fewer bodies in here they’d still clearly been hit hard. So many dead.
“Yeah, that’s the one,” he finally muttered.
“I am not familiar with Drakkon,” Kheross ventured. “He sounds impressively powerful. Who is he?”
Aran paused, and turned to look back at Kheross. “I find it odd you haven’t heard of him. Drakkon is the guardian of Marid, a goddess killed by Krox during the godswar.”
Kheross merely shrugged. “Neither name is familiar.”
Aran filed that fact away for later. If Kheross didn’t know either, there was a high chance that both Marid and Drakkon were nothing but a memory in his timeline. It could be important, but not right now.
