A few more minutes passed, and as the battle continued, Caymus found himself so concerned with his own defense that he wasn't able to execute his attacks properly. His arcs were becoming short, his swing half-hearted. Even the molten rock around him was beginning to cool. He'd killed hundreds of krealites already, but there were still so many more, and they were pressing in, getting closer.
Just as he was certain he was going to lose his footing, that the forces of Black Moon were finally going to press him to the ground, he felt the help he needed coming toward him, falling down on him from the sky.
Caymus couldn't help but laugh out loud. He wondered which of his friends had taken upon himself the responsibility of firing Rill's fire-sludge at him. It didn't matter. The feeling of comradeship, the sensation that he wasn't in this fight alone, gave him new strength.
He knew he didn't have to worry about the sludge itself: he could handle even that immense heat. The container the sludge was in, however, a small barrel twice the size of his head, was also coming down at him too. He'd need to find a way of staying out of its path if he wanted to avoid a concussion. For the moment, he held back on his attacks and, instead, concentrated on the arc of the projectile.
He discovered that he needn't have worried. The barrel wasn't coming straight at him, but would rather fly over his head by a couple of yards. He smiled. The setup was nearly too perfect. He took a deep breath, waited until the thing was about to sail over him, then jumped as high as he could and struck the container with his flaming blade.
The resulting explosion of flame was incredible. Burning fire-sludge rained down all about him. Most of the stuff, in keeping with its inertia, sprayed over the Black Moon soldiers behind Caymus, but the sheer force of his strike had been enough to send a good deal of sludge the other way, too. All around him, his enemies either writhed about on the ground or died instantly as fire seared through their flesh.
As the krealites burned around him, Caymus planted his sword in the ground and took a knee, catching his breath. He hadn't realized until he'd stopped moving just how tired the constant fighting was making him, how hard his lungs were working just to keep him standing. He looked about himself, trying to judge how many of the enemy might be left. Several dozen, burning or no, still remained in this market square, but more kept pouring through the gate or funneling in through other side streets. They gathered at the edges of the flames, waiting, glaring, preparing for another assault.
The fight wasn't nearly over yet.
After a few minutes, the flames began to die out, having severely pock-marked the ground. The very moment they could cross the ground safely, the Black Moon soldiers approached. Caymus stood, pulled his sword from the ground, refreshed the circle of fire about him, and waited. As the dark figures stepped closer, he noted that, for the first time, only the men were visible. Not a single one of the huge insects was anywhere in sight.
The Black Moon soldiers gathered around him, stepping over pools of still-burning sludge. One of them was about to press his first attack when another barrel came out of the sky. This one had been aimed to hit before reaching Caymus, rather than after, so he didn't have to react to it at all. He felt the flaming barrel hit one of the soldiers, then explode against the ground, again showering everything with Rill's sludge.
Caymus felt the burning liquid on his skin as though it were the warm sun on his face. It gave him a feeling of peace, somehow, to be so coated in the terrible concoction. He noticed, too, that the leather armor he wore seemed as immune to the flames as was he. It seemed the Unburning could be extended beyond his own skin.
The krealites, however, didn't fare as well. Again, ashen-skinned warriors writhed and died around the market. Those that had been outside of the projectile's radius watched in amazement as Caymus, their tormentor, also burned under the stuff, but to absolutely no effect. He smiled. He could actually see their resolve withering away as they began looking to look at each other with fear in their eyes. For the first time, they were facing an enemy that was able to hurt them.
Then, it happened. Caymus actually felt the exact moment that the soldiers of the Black Moon Army lost their will to fight. He wasn't sure what the sensation had been at first—it had been like the snapping of a strap pulled with too much force—but, an instant later, they began their surrender. Weapons clattered to the ground. Men turned and ran. Heads bowed and bodies pressed themselves to the ground in supplication. He marveled at what he was seeing: he felt as though, rather than a collection of individuals, he was watching a single organism giving up the fight.
He could hear, too, sounds of celebration from the Kepren soldiers. The noise was modest at first—a cheer and a laugh from a single voice—but as more voices joined in, the intensity increased. Caymus frowned and took a deep breath as he turned to the hole in the wall between the Grass and Guard Districts. They shouldn't be celebrating; the fight wasn't done yet. He could feel the presence—just one more presence—coming their way.
Not all of Black Moon had given up. Not yet.
When he saw the Chieftain step through the broken masonry, past the fleeing forms of ash-skinned soldiers, Caymus felt a sensation of memory. The memory wasn't his own; it came from the sword. Sometime, in the depths of forgotten history, another knight had seen this same image, the leader of a defeated army crawling out from behind his forces to offer one last round of resistance.
The Chieftain was easily as tall as Caymus, probably a few inches taller. The armor he wore, armor which covered the entirety of him, was fashioned from the plates of the insects Caymus had been fighting for so long now. The armor was deepest black, as though the figure wasn't made of anything, but rather constituted a hole in the world that light simply vanished into, lost forever.
Black horns, like those of a bull, reached forward from the top of his helmet. The helmet seemed to be connected to his breastplate by a weave of articulating blackness, as though it wasn't designed to be removed. Caymus wondered if this thing even had a face.
As the Chieftain of Black Moon, the Sograve's agent, stepped slowly closer, it reached over its shoulder and retrieved a sword that was easily a match for Caymus's in size, if not in color. The sword was blackness itself. It seemed to disappear when it crossed before the armor. A dark, smoky substance emanated from the length of the blade, too, as though death itself was trying to escape from the weapon.
Caymus gritted his teeth as, without taunt or preamble, the figure took the sword in both hands and began jogging, then running, toward him.
He knew he would not be able to burn this foe.
Kreal itself, in its purest form, was completely unable to react to the element of fire. Caymus had been able to burn his opponents, thus far, because those agents, even the insects, had existed in the Quatrain, in this world, before becoming servants of the Sograve, and were thus made of the Quatrain's elements. The kreal could take the place of the elements in a person's body, but could never completely replace them without killing the host. Even during Caymus's training in the Conflagration, the things he'd fought had been forms that lived in places between the elemental realms, and so had been impure.
This thing was not of the Quatrain, was not impure in any way. It had come here from the Sograve, had been constructed there, then had been sent here and given life. It would not burn, no matter how intense the flame, no matter if it were under the directed fury of a being of the Conflagration itself. Even the Knight of the Flame would not be able to set this being alight. Caymus would have to defeat his last foe by martial skill alone.
Thoughts and memories of battle flitted through Caymus's head as the krealite struck out with the kreal sword, swinging wide in a horizontal arc. Caymus stepped backward and avoided the blade completely. The thing was fast; that would make things a lot harder. He knew exactly where to strike the Chieftain in order to kill it; his memories told him that he would have to push his blade straight down at the base of the giant form's neck. The thing was so quick, though, t
hat any attempt he made to place his blade there would leave him wide open to attack.
Again, the kreal incarnate attacked, striking downward. Caymus raised his weapon and deflected the blade, then rotated his shoulders and turned the block into a counterattack. His opponent was ready for that, though, and was out of reach by the time his sword had swung out.
Again, it attacked. Again, he defended, only just getting his sword placed in time to protect himself. He looked for a moment to counter, but the dark blade was already swinging again. This time, he stepped to the side, avoiding the attack. He brought his sword up again, intending to go for a leg, to see if he could knock it out from under the krealite, only to find himself needing to block again.
The cycle repeated, over and over. The Black Moon Chieftain moved so swiftly, was so light on its feet, that Caymus was forced to stay on the defensive, blocking and dodging. He kept trying to claim a moment to attack, but each time, before he could get his blade in a position to strike, his opponent was already attacking again, not giving him time to press his own offensive.
Caymus's memories didn't include the speed of this thing. What he remembered of the last krealite emissary he'd faced—that the last knight had faced—was that it had been heavy, lumbering, and slow. At first, he wondered if the sword's memories were deceiving him somehow, but he supposed that was unlikely, that it was more likely that the denizens of the Sograve had learned something since the last time they had sent one of their own against the Knight of the Flame.
In a heart-wrenching moment, he wondered if he was going to be able to win this fight.
Another barrel of fire-sludge fell out of the sky, and the two combatants were covered in the fiery substance. The krealite, however, paid the burning liquid no more mind than did Caymus, and instead pressed his attack. Caymus felt just a little more hope drain away.
He found his thoughts running to his friends. Rill was likely the one lobbing the fire bombs at him. Be'Var would be stitching soldiers back together. Milo and Aiella, standing only a few yards away, had done so well today. If he failed in this fight, if he didn't find a way to beat this one, last opponent right now, they would die; the krealite Chieftain would rally the remaining Black Moon soldiers and his friends would die.
Somehow, he had to beat this thing. Somehow, he had to press his attack. With all the defending he'd done already, he'd gotten a good understanding of the way the Chieftain moved, how its joints were put together. He just needed to get that one attack in.
He just hoped he'd figure out what to do quickly. He had been tired before this fight had even started. If he didn't have a very good idea in the next few minutes, simple fatigue would decide which of the two combatants walked away from this.
"You must not try to be as quick as me." The memory caught him off-guard. He hadn't given thought to his sparring session with Aiella since the day it had happened. Now the recollection of it jumped into his consciousness, unbidden. It surprised him so much that he nearly missed his next block and caught a blade in his shoulder. The sword's ability to keep memories, it seemed, did not flow in only a single direction. It was trying to tell him something.
Then, in that moment, he knew what he had to do.
When he squeezed the conduit that was his sword, making it burst into fiercer flame, he got the distinct impression, despite the lack of a face, that the krealite was laughing at him. He didn't care. He was about to really need that connection.
Caymus knew he would have to trick his opponent to get what he wanted, but that his subterfuge would rely on waiting for precisely the right moment before striking. He would need exactly the right circumstance to appear before he could get that one, decisive blow in. Thinking back over the course of this fight, he knew he'd felt such a circumstance a few times already; he just hoped another appeared soon.
"Protect your face, neck, and heart," she'd said.
A few blows later, and he felt it.
He'd just forcibly blocked a side-swing, his sword held vertically, ahead of his left shoulder, and the Chieftain was rearing back for a straight thrust. Instead of stepping sideways, moving his sword to his center, and getting ready to parry the thrust, however, Caymus reversed his grip and brought the blade in front of his right shoulder, as though he expected another side-swing. He wondered if the tension he felt was showing in his face. This had to work.
The Chieftain took the bait. The black-clad figure stood on its back foot, then, with both hands, and with all possible might, leaned forward to bury the blade in Caymus's chest.
Caymus took a deep breath. He would need every possible ounce of his concentration and focus to survive the next moment.
He didn't move, other than to shift his body a couple of inches to the right. He saw a bright flash in the middle of his vision before he felt any actual pain, but by the time the dark blade had punctured all the way through his back, skewering his left lung, he was in indescribable agony. Before he could think about his wound, though, he found the Chieftain's neck, exposed now that the krealite had leaned so far forward, choked up on his sword, and placed the tip of his down-turned blade there.
As he pushed, completely blinded by pain, he shaped the flames of the sword, pulling them into himself, into the wound that went all the way through him. As his sword sank down into his enemy, piercing heart and severing spinal cord, he forced a torrent of flame around the blade in his chest, sealing up the flesh around the intruding object.
The two of them collapsed together: the krealite commander dead, Caymus barely alive. He still couldn't see, but he felt his hands drop away from the hilt of his weapon, felt it settle in his vanquished enemy's flesh. Caymus let his body go, allowed himself to drop down on top of the broken body of his foe. As his weight fell, he felt the kreal blade, still buried to the hilt in his chest, rock slightly, its sharpness making additional cuts into the seared flesh. He tried to roll onto his side, so as to let neither blade nor hilt touch the ground. He didn't know if he succeeded.
Time stopped passing for Caymus, then. He knew his chest hurt, knew he was wheezing, but couldn't quite remember why. He was comfortable enough where he was, though. He felt secure, despite the pain. The crackling of flames all around soothed him, reminded him of campfires back home.
When he heard the shouting voices, he turned his head to see where they were coming from, then remembered he was still blind. He could still feel, though. On the other side of the flames, he felt a few figures moving about. One of them seemed light, as though not quite tethered to the ground. That had to be Milo; Caymus was glad Milo had survived.
One of the other figures was smaller than the others, and seemed just a little cooler. That could only be Aiella. He really liked Aiella. She was intelligent, had a lot of interesting things to say, and was easily the most beautiful woman he'd ever seen.
They seemed to be yelling at him, but they were separated by a wall of crackling fire and he couldn't understand what they were saying. With some effort, he reached out to the flames and cut off the conduits that connected them to the Conflagration.
The last thing Caymus thought, as his friends ran toward him, was that they seemed really worried about something.
He hoped they were alright.
EPILOGUE
Be'Var, despite the fact that he still didn't quite believe his eyes, had to admit that he was impressed. "He's actually getting better at this, isn't he?"
Rill, too, watched with a look of amused astonishment on his face as Milo seemed to simply drift upward again. "Better?" he said. "You mean he's done this before today?"
Be'Var nodded and couldn't quite suppress a smile. "Started it last week." In fact, Milo had gotten the idea to actually try and learn how to fly a couple of months previously, after having watched Perra soaring about during a particularly lazy afternoon. "At first, he was just kind of floating around on those air columns of his, but it's looking more and more like he's actually flying, now."
"That's absolutely incredible," Rill s
aid, then tilted his head and narrowed his eyes, "if a little strange."
Be'Var let out a blast of a laugh. He couldn't remember the last time he'd been this content. "If you think it's strange," he said, pointing up at Perra, flying just a handful of yards away from the air priest, "just imagine how the bird feels!"
Rill laughed too. "You think he can hear us from up there?"
Be'Var shrugged. "Only one way to find out." He cupped his hands to his mouth. "Milo!" he shouted, "get down here, you flaming, flying idiot!"
Milo did appear to be able to hear them. Be'Var could make out just the slightest shift in the man's arms, and the wings attached to them, that usually precluded a long, lazy turn. Then, the air priest made a slow descent to the battlements of the Keep's inner wall, where Be'Var and Rill stood waiting. Be'Var was curious as to how much of Milo's new ability was due to the columns of air he was able to create, and how much had to do with those false wings of his. As he watched the man gliding down, he got the distinct impression that the wings were tied to his arms more securely than before. He thought to wonder if Milo had had the idea of flight in mind when he'd made them in the first place.
At the last instant, just prior to landing, Milo swooped up a couple of feet, got his legs under him, then dropped to the ground. "Hello, gentlemen!" Milo said, a ridiculously pleased look on his face. "Is it that time, already?"
Be'Var was trying to wear the expression he often used to suggest that he didn't suffer fools gladly, but was failing to get it right. Instead, he just shook his head. "It is," he said. "Come on," he continued, turning to walk down the rampart, "let's get the flaming thing over with."
Milo and Rill followed closely behind. "Aw, come on, Be'Var," said Milo, fiddling with the feathers that hung from his arms, "don't be like that. This is supposed to be fun."
"Fun..." Be'Var huffed. "Pointless is never fun."
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