That left only the two with weapons at the ready. Before the man picking his nails with the knife could utter a sound, another of Rindu’s throwing spikes sprouted from his throat, severing his windpipe and silencing him for good. Sam had separated his staff into sticks and threw one, adding to the force with his rohw, at the remaining man’s head. The man moved slightly, causing the stick to bounce off, only landing a glancing blow to his head. Disoriented, he screamed a loud warning before Sam had closed the distance and rendered him unconscious with a strike from his other stick.
The three humans and the hapaki stopped and looked at each other, waiting to see if anyone had heard the soldier. Rindu reached down to the bodies of the three men and took back his throwing spikes, cleaning them on the men’s clothes.
One breath. Two. Three. Then with a flood of footsteps and yelled alarms, the party knew they were in for a fight. Seconds later, a rush of men came through the door at the far end of the room, brandishing weapons. With a shrug of apology, Sam threw himself into the fray. Sealing his staff back into one piece, he used it to deflect weapons and keep soldiers at bay in the cramped chamber. Rindu had put his spikes away and was fighting unarmed, as he normally did. Nalia’s shrapezi were flashing as they spun so quickly Sam could not follow them. Before ten seconds had passed, all the soldiers were dead or incapacitated.
“It is time to move on,” Rindu said as he heard alarms being repeated down distant corridors. “They know we are here, so the time for stealth is past. We must finish our mission now.” Bending down to pick up one of the fallen soldier’s swords, he ran through the door and toward where he sensed the Gray Man.
As the party passed through different rooms, halls, and chambers, waves of soldiers came at them. At times, the enemies had a crossbowman or archer with them, but one or two arrows were easily deflected by Rindu’s sword, Nalia’s shrapezi, or Sam’s staff, much to his own amazement. He hadn’t known that he was able to do that, thinking maybe the one he deflected in Medit was a fluke, but an arrow coming at him that was swept out of the air by the swirling edge of his staff without conscious thought settled the matter.
They fought through the groups of soldiers and pressed to move forward as quickly as possible so that they would not be attacked from behind. Each chamber they went through was closed and locked behind them, if possible, to prevent that from happening. Though the stream of enemies seemed endless, the restricted corridors and rooms made it possible for them to fight the enemies coming at them in small groups. Sam just hoped that the numbers of soldiers would give out before his strength did.
Even now, he had several small cuts to his arms and one not so small to his right leg. None of them were affecting him yet, but he knew that if he bled enough, he would be weakened. He wondered if he would have any strength left to fight the Gray Man. For that matter, he wondered how he would fight the villain. Despite what Rindu said, Sam felt completely inadequate for the task. Narrowly avoiding a sword cut to his head, he decided that he had better things to think about at the moment. Focusing on the song of battle, he continued on.
Skitter somehow was avoiding conflict of any type. He was small and agile and seemed always to know where to be to prevent being attacked or stepped on accidentally. At times, he would jump at a soldier attacking Sam, even going so far as to scratch the face of two of them, just at a time when Sam needed it most. He thanked Skitter silently for watching out for him and admonished him to be careful.
Rindu, still apparently sensing the Gray Man’s power, turned them sharply right into another corridor. Less than twenty steps later, he burst through a door on the left side of a passage and the four spilled into a massive chamber.
“Ah, I see our visitors have arrived,” said a rich voice coming from a raised section of the floor on which a table and several chairs were placed. From a large stuffed chair at the end of the table, a man stood up. His red-rimmed eyes bored into Sam’s eyes and Sam swallowed hard.
Chapter 53
Sam looked the man over. He was of average size and build, fit, and appearing to be in his late forties, though it was hard to tell. He was completely bald, with skin the color of wet ash. His eyes, dark enough that they could probably be called black, were rimmed in red and his gaze burned into Sam when their eyes met. He had no weapon, and his demeanor seemed to indicate that he didn’t need one. To Sam’s rohw sensitive sight, the man fairly glowed, outshining the brazier light that flooded the room.
Movement caught Sam’s attention from the side of the chamber. He looked over to see that Dr. Walt was in the room as well. He was strapped down to a table that was tilted so that he was almost standing, but his weight was entirely supported by the straps. His eyelids fluttered weakly and the profusion of cuts all over his body told Sam that they had been torturing him even as the party was infiltrating the fortress. On either side of the table stood the giant Shordan Drees and the assassin woman.
The Gray Man continued, “It is very rude of you to break into my fortress like this when you could have come in a civilized manner.” His demon eyes locked on Sam. “At least, you could have come in a civilized manner, Sam. These other two I have no need of. They are merely loose ends I should have snipped years ago. It is a problem I will remedy now.”
With a nod toward Shordan Drees, the Gray Man sat down, steepled his fingers in front of him, and watched. They didn’t have to wait long. Drees shouted a command and dozens of soldiers flooded into the chamber from the side doors.
Sam looked to Rindu, who looked wearily back, saluted with his sword, and gave Sam a small bow. Sam held his hands, one still gripping the staff, in the formal salute of honor, and bowed back. He looked to Nalia, wished he could just have a few more moments to talk to her, smiled, and bowed to her as well, still saluting. She returned the formal salute with her shrapezi and faced the mobs rushing in. Sam could not locate Skitter, but sent him a mental message. It has been a privilege to know you, my friend. Please escape if you can. And then he was fighting for his life.
The Gray Man sat perfectly still, fingers still together in a casual triangle, watching every movement in the battle. He seemed not to care that blood was splashing and that men and women were dying only feet away from him. He, Dr. Walt, and his two minions remained still, some watching with more intensity than others, as soldiers tried their best to kill the three warriors.
Cutting, slashing, spinning, striking, the three formed a triangle so that at least one side was guarded by an ally. Going near that triangle was death for the soldiers, and the three had to shift it around the chamber several times when the bodies surrounded them piled too high for them to move as they wanted.
Rindu’s borrowed straight sword claimed lives as he slashed and stabbed. Occasionally, he would snap a neck or break bones with kicks or with his other hand as well, but the range of the sword was helpful in keeping people away from him.
Nalia’s shrapezi, on the other hand, slashed in wide swaths, following her spinning body or striking in opposite rotation, seeming to defy the laws of momentum. She would hook weapons or body parts with the razor sharp pointed hooks and then draw the soldier in for a killing blow, sometimes lopping off of part of their body and sometimes stabbing through a vital area with the end spikes.
Sam had separated his sticks again, not having the room to use the staff with the multitudes of soldiers rushing in on him. Being past the situation where he would hold back killing blows, the porzul wood shattered weapons and bones, blocked strikes that normal wood could not have withstood, and caused death and devastation not only from the force of the blows, but the rohw energy he ejected out of the end of the sticks as he struck to make his strikes more powerful.
All three fought valiantly and heroically, though with their fatigue and the sheer numbers of soldiers they had to fight, it seemed as if they were fighting a losing battle. As Sam blocked a sword strike with one stick, disarmed and crushed the swordsman’s hand with the other, and then crushed his skull with the firs
t stick, he suddenly realized that there were no more soldiers rushing in. Looking around, he saw nothing but bodies and blood.
Except that then he saw the Gray Man, still sitting with his fingers steepled, unmoved from when the battle started. Dr. Walt’s eyes had closed, though Sam knew it was probably just from exhaustion and not death. On either side of him, Shordan Drees and the woman were still standing. Looking to the Gray Man, they both appeared to be waiting for something.
“Shordan, Ix,” he said. That and a small nod was all it took for the two to spring into action, Drees going toward Rindu and Ix teleporting to an area right next to Nalia, attacking as soon as she was substantial. Rindu said something softly Sam didn’t quite catch. He took it as a cue and ran toward the Gray Man, sticks ready to end his life.
He had only taken two steps when he felt like he hit a concrete wall. Bouncing back painfully, he shook his head to clear the ringing sound and looked toward the Gray Man. The man still had not moved. Trying to move toward the villain again, he found he couldn’t get past the barrier there. It was an invisible, solid wall of force.
Sam softened his gaze and saw the wall in front of him glowing faintly. Whereas he thought that it was surrounding the Gray Man to protect him, he realized that instead it was surrounding Sam, keeping him from moving too far, keeping him from interfering. The Gray Man looked at him with those red-rimmed eyes and nodded his head toward the fighting pairs as if to tell him to settle down and enjoy the show. Sam wasn’t sure he had a choice.
As Shordan Drees attacked, Rindu said quietly, but loudly enough for the others in the room to hear, “If no one cleans the stalls, the manure will pile up.” He saw Sam’s eyebrows lift before the boy shook his head and ran at the Gray Man.
Rindu circled Shordan Drees. He was so tired, he was not sure he could defeat this man right now. But, that was life. It tested you in ways that you would never have thought it would test you. That was half of the battle in life, predicting what you would need and then training to be prepared for it. He had done his best and would continue to do so, but his body felt sapped of all energy. The small wounds all over his body from the battles he had fought in the last few hours felt as if they were letting his very life force seep through them and out onto the floor.
The giant rushed forward and tried to crush Rindu with that huge mace of his. He barely avoided the blow in time. He still could not see how someone that large could move that quickly. Flicking his sword in and out several times, trying to tempt the opponent into committing himself to a blow, Rindu wondered what it would take to win this battle.
He shifted his vision quickly to Nalia in her battle with the assassin woman. She was tired, too, he could tell. They would both need to defeat their enemies quickly so they could help Sam. He saw the wall of force surrounding Sam and knew that the young man would need him. To do that, he would need to get through this man-mountain first.
Slapping the mace with his sword as the big man swung it toward him, Rindu slipped on some of the viscera and blood on the floor. He turned his momentum into a roll and recovered, but not before he saw the look in the big man’s eyes. It was a hungry look, an excited look. Drees thought he had slipped because he was fatigued. He thought he could close in, that Rindu would be easy prey. The beginnings of a plan were forming in the Zouy’s mind and maybe, just maybe, it would be enough.
Chapter 54
Nalia narrowly escaped the two dagger strikes the assassin aimed at her while appearing from thin air right next to her. It was not bad enough that she was tired from the constant battles and the minor injuries she sustained during those battles, but the woman could teleport. If she was caught unaware just once, the woman would slice her throat with those oversized and strangely shaped daggers of hers.
Blocking a dagger with one of her shrapezi, she threw the other out to hook the assassin’s arm but was unable to snag her. That was not the actual intent of her strike, though. When the woman pulled her arm back out of the way, she put it into the correct position to meet Nalia’s foot swinging in an arc from outside her opponent’s circle of vision. The inside of Nalia’s foot connected to Ix’s forearm with an audible snap and the dagger went flying. Ducking the other dagger strike, Nalia danced to the side, hoping to end this confrontation quickly.
She was not sure if she had broken the woman’s arm or not, but removing one of her weapons was a step in the right direction. As she struck toward her opponent’s head, the assassin suddenly was not there any longer. She centered herself to sense an attack and thrust both shrapezi up behind her in a cross block just in time to stop the assassin’s blade as it was traveling toward her neck. She was not able to evade the kick that slammed into her back and threw her forward, though. Stumbling a step, she turned to face the assassin again and found that the woman was gone.
Sam could not keep his eyes from widening and his heart from pounding as he watched the others fight. Rindu was so tired he was stumbling and Nalia was fighting a woman who was there one second and gone the next, teleporting and hopping around, trying to surprise her just once so she could kill the Sapsyr. He banged on the wall of force surrounding him with his weapons, tried to push through, tried using rohw strikes on it, all to no avail.
Thinking of the lessons that Rindu had taught him, he stopped moving and breathed deeply. The way of the rohw was the way of harmony, not of chaos or anger. He sat on the floor cross-legged, sticks resting in his lap. He breathed rhythmically for several breaths, calming himself.
Glancing at the Gray Man, he saw that the fiend was looking at him quizzically, obviously wondering what he was trying to do. Sam smirked inwardly but showed no emotion outwardly. Perhaps his opponent was not all-powerful after all. He almost seemed like he was nervous about what Sam was trying to do. Was that possible?
With renewed determination, Sam sank down into himself, reaching the khulim almost instantly. Harnessing his rohw, he closed his eyes and inspected his prison with his inner sight. He saw no flaws in it, no way of defeating it, but that was the wrong line of thinking. He looked more closely at it, trying to figure out how it was made.
He was astonished at its complexity. It was, in fact, not a single wall, but many layers, many walls that together made the whole. Each layer had a different vibrational frequency so that it was immune to a single vibrational energy attack. The sheer amount of power and skill to make something like this dumbfounded Sam.
He probed the wall with little jolts of force and was able to penetrate one layer, but one layer only. As one layer was bypassed, the other layers suddenly shifted frequencies, defeating even an attack that changed frequencies itself. Sam decided that he could break a pin hole through such a wall, given days to analyze every shift, assuming the frequency shift was not random. But he didn’t have days. He didn’t even have hours. God knew, he probably didn’t have minutes.
With nothing left to do but try, he gathered as much rohw as he could, channeled it through one of the porzul wood sticks and struck at the wall as hard as he could.
Rindu was balancing on a knife’s edge. He needed to convince his opponent that he was faltering, but he needed to do so without making the fatal mistake of leaving himself too open to attack. So far, he had managed to stay alive, but it was getting harder.
The mace came at him again, a downward diagonal strike meant to crush his shoulder or his arm. Rindu side-stepped toward the giant allowing the weapon to miss him by a fraction of an inch. As it passed, the Zouy twisted his blade and sliced at the tendons in the man’s wrist, at the vulnerable spot just above where the wristbands were buckled. The strike was too shallow. Though blood immediately sprung from the wound, he did not sever the tendons to prevent the man from holding his weapon.
Rindu kicked at the man’s knee to distract him and danced back out of range as the soldier shifted back to a balanced fighting stance. The huge man had a smile on his face and a gleam in his eye, knowing that he had Rindu running and one mistake was all he needed to kill the
mage.
Then, not wanting to wait any more, Drees pulled a short sword with his left hand and came in with both weapons, sending a flurry of blows toward Rindu that he was not sure he could avoid. He dodged the mace head and parried the shaft so the strike went wide, but he was unable to get the sword back up in time to fully deflect the other man’s sword strike to his right side. The sword slid along his own, gashing Rindu’s arm badly. Gritting his teeth from the pain, he watched as blood poured out of the wound. He had seconds left, he knew, before he would be weak enough so as to be unable to fight at a high level. Now was the time.
Stumbling again and feigning weakness that seemed all too close to being real, he dropped his sword arm and let it hang loosely by his side, giving the impression that he could not defend himself. He moved backward hurriedly and hoped Drees would think he was trying to escape.
The ploy worked and the man-mountain moved in, expecting to make the killing blow. As a straight sword thrust came towards his chest and a vicious overhead blow of the mace came down to crush his skull, Rindu suddenly flicked his sword up to deflect the other man’s sword strike, causing it to go slightly wide to pierce his chest, glancing off a rib and punching out his back. At the same time he actually stepped toward the man, causing the giant’s eyes to widen in confusion and shock.
Being too close to his opponent for the mace to strike effectively, Rindu struck upward with his open hand, channeling rohw through his strike, shattering the shaft of the mace near Shordan’s hand as it came down. Then, with lightning speed, before Shordan Drees could react, the Zouyim mage struck downward with his open palm on the front of the other man’s forehead, pouring all his energy into that one strike. For the briefest moment of time, Shordan Drees looked into Rindu’s eyes, confused about what was happening, and then the man’s skull exploded, spattering Rindu with blood and brain matter. The giant soldier’s lifeless body slumped to the ground, followed immediately by Rindu as he fell downward as well.
Harmonic Magic Series Boxed Set Page 36
