How much he’d given for them. How much there was still left to give.
He could feel them stirring inside him. Every life he’d touched. Every person who believed in him, who believed in the power of good over evil. Of life over death.
That flame didn’t just destroy, it could create.
Fire surged from his hands, covering the molten ore with red flames. The ore seemed to surge back, fighting the strength of his soul. For the first time in his memory, he felt the heat of flame. It surprised him with its intensity, but he refused to back down. Not now. He had come too far. He wouldn’t surrender now. He couldn’t.
The heat was more intense than anything anyone present had felt before. It was more than any corporeal flame. This flame was something more, more than forge fire or hearth fire or anything of the sort. This fire came from deep inside Thomas. From the very root of who he was.
Soulfire.
The fire covering his body suddenly burned even hotter, until his veins glowed with blue-hot flame. It surged from his hands with such intensity everyone else was forced to look away. Only Thomas stared into the roiling flames without batting an eye.
Then the molten ore started boiling so fast it looked like it would overrun its container. The golden substance inside literally shone for a long moment before the entirety of it ceased to sparkle.
When the flame faded from a barely conscious Thomas, the molten ore was now bluer than the sky. Thomas fell to the ground, drained beyond any measure he could have accounted for. This was more than a physical weariness, more than mental fatigue. Thomas felt like, well…
He felt like his very soul needed a rest. It was a deep ache in the very core of every muscle, as if he had exhausted his energy hours ago but kept doing the task at hand anyway.
“Well well…” the black bearded Maker said, looking at the molten ore, “I guess miracles can happen.”
Thomas smiled, the only muscle he was sure was under his control. “Can you… forge the sword…?”
“We’ll have it ready in no time. You look like you could use a rest.”
“Yeah… bit of a nap… no problem.”
Hands lifted him from the ground, but his body was under no one’s control. All he could do was lay there, limp as a boned fish, and allow them to carry him wherever they thought best.
Turned out, they thought it was best he lay in a cot. At least, that’s what he discovered when he woke up. He was still sore from his head to his toes, but he could at least keep his eyes open. He tried to push himself into a sitting position, but that didn’t work out. Instead, he simply lay flat on his back, staring at the black ceiling and wondered how the lamps so high up stayed lit. He mulled it over for about ten minutes before he decided he was never going to figure it out.
“Get up, lazy boy.”
The order was like a whipcrack, and Thomas would have jumped if he was even capable of moving. But as it was, the Keeper’s order went unanswered.
“Peace, Keeper,” the younger voice of Morando said, “he has been through much. He needs time and healing.”
“Is he going to be okay, Daddy?” the innocent voice of Etanta asked with concern etched into every syllable.
“Eventually,” was her father’s answer.
“Nice to… see you all… are okay.”
“Yeah, we’re managing,” the most welcome voice of all said with her usual flirtatious giggle.
“Cynthia?” Thomas said, trying to sit up and again failing. He was able to turn his head just slightly and his gaze found hers, standing on her own two feet. Her leg was in a makeshift cast, but she was standing on it easily enough.
“You’re alright,” Thomas said, “everyone’s all right.”
When a moment of silence greeted his words, Thomas began to worry. “What’s happened?” he asked.
“Well, we are well,” Morando said slowly, unsure of himself. “We… perhaps this should wait until you’ve had some rest.”
“There’s precious little time,” the Keeper said, his reply stern but not unkind.
“You… are right,” Morando said, bowing his head. Thomas’ worry only intensified. “Thomas… Andomer has fallen. The outpost was taken by the Inanis.”
Thomas closed his eyes, his temper rising in unison with his sadness. Now the dwarves had been crushed as well. There was no one left to fight.
His eyes suddenly grew hard, and he forced himself to sit up. The pain was incredible, but he pushed it down. There was no one left to fight but him.
“Then let’s take it back.”
Heads shook, but Thomas ignored them. He tried to get to his feet, but Morando put a hand on his shoulder and forced him back down with very little effort.
“The mountain is safe for the time being. You must rest and recover, and then we can discuss how to fight back.”
Thomas didn’t think much of the idea, but he knew Morando was right. He couldn’t even stand, let alone swing the…
“Is the sword forged yet?” he asked, excitement etched in every syllable.
“Should be finishing up really soon,” Zach said, joining them with Miranda close behind. Thomas raised his eyebrows at them in an unspoken question. “Gilkor’s helping finish up the blade. I think the black bearded Maker is really impressed with him.”
“Zacharias,” the Keeper said reproachfully, “this is no time for idle humor.”
“Oh come on now,” Thomas said, leaning against the wall with only a little bit of discomfort, “a little humor ain’t gonna hurt anybody.”
The Keeper made to respond, but a gesture from Morando silenced him. It was only then that Thomas realized the elf’s hand was still on his arm.
“Are you healing me?”
“Trying. You damaged yourself in a way I have never before seen. Given enough time, I can fix the burns you’ve incurred.”
“Burns? What’s been burned?”
“You have. It is as if your veins were burned somehow.”
“Hmph,” Thomas grunted thoughtfully, “well, that’s Soulfire for you.”
“I’m sorry,” the Keeper said, his mouth agape, “what?”
Zach spoke up, spending the next fifteen minutes catching the elves up on everything that had transpired since they had parted. Cynthia helped fill in the blanks while Thomas sat there, enjoying the company of his friends before the inevitable chaos that was sure to be on its way up the mountain.
“Then Thomas burned the bunch of ore, and it turned blue. He turned it into soul-ore,” Zach finished with more excitement than Thomas felt was necessary.
“I’ve never heard of such a thing,” the Keeper said, awestruck. “Could that be how soul-ore was created in the first place? This could revolutionize magic-casting, smithing! This could lead us all to a new age of discovery!”
Thomas would have laughed, but Morando chose that exact moment to dig his fingernails into Thomas’ arm.
“Ow!”
“I apologize,” the Healer said, “but I’m trying to get to a very specific injury. It is… elusive.”
“Elusive?” Thomas repeated, “how in the world can an injury be elusive?”
“That is what I am also trying to figure out. It feels like it is avoiding me.”
Thomas sat there, completely confused. How could an injury try and escape healing? Shouldn’t his body be trying to do the exact opposite?
Their confusion was put on hold by the arrival of Gilkor, who was holding a large sack in his hands. Conversation stopped as he placed it on a table in the middle of the room. Thomas stood, not realizing how surprising it was until he did. Morando certainly hadn’t held back his healing power. The group gathered around the table as he pulled the sack open, revealing three things: two swords and a bow.
“Turns out you mutated all of the ore within a few feet of you. So we had a bit more to work with than we expected.”
“So…” Thomas said, “instead of one sword, we have two and a bow?”
“Aye.”
“Wow,” Thomas smiled, “some good luck. What a change.”
“And just in time,” the Keeper said, his head cocked as if listening for something. Thomas listened too, and he heard what the Keeper did.
Footsteps. Not quite a march, more like the shambling footsteps of hundreds of troops. The Inanis had found their way up the mountain.
“Looks like it’s time we fought,” Thomas said, taking one of the swords. “No one has to fight with me that doesn’t want to.”
“Please,” Zach said, taking the other sword. “No way I’m letting you have all the fun. Or all the glory.”
“And this is too tempting to leave sitting here,” Gilkor said, taking the bow. “No telling if it will do the job, but hey – at least it should be fun.”
“What should the rest of us do?” Cynthia asked, though an unconscious glance at her leg betrayed her misgivings.
“Morando, keep working on her leg, please,” Thomas said. Somehow, his head was clear and he knew what to do. “Miranda, you’re going to be Zach’s back up. If he gets tired, you two switch places. Keeper, you do the same for me. Morando, I need you to keep everyone fighting. Cynthia, you be Gilkor’s support. Back him up with arrows and switch out when he needs a rest.”
No one said anything, and for a moment Thomas was worried they weren’t going to listen to him. Eventually, however, they all nodded.
“You make an able field commander,” the Keeper said. Thomas’ heart almost stopped from shock.
“What should I do?” Etanta said, looking very much like she wanted to be involved.
“Are you a magic-caster? Can you heal people like your father?”
“I don’t know,” the little girl replied, “I never tried.”
“Well, you’re going to try now. Morando, teach her whatever you can, help her figure it out as fast as possible.”
“It takes years to become proficient in the healing arts…” Morando said, clearly worried.
“We have minutes,” Thomas replied, “we don’t have a lot of options.”
“I can do it, Daddy,” Etanta said, her jaw set. Morando looked stricken, but with the Keeper’s nod he accepted it.
“No more talk,” Gilkor said at the door, looking out at the snow-covered hills. “They’re here.”
“Gilkor, head up to the top of the building. You’ll have a good shot from there. Cynthia, when you can walk, join him. The rest of us, let’s get outside. If we keep them on the path, we can bottleneck them there.”
“When did you become good at strategy?” Zach asked, following him as he headed to the door.
“I read. You think I never read a book or two about strategy? You know, back in the good ol’ days when I had a farm to worry about defending in case of brigands.”
“Maybe I should read more,” Zach said, feeling the blade of his sword. Thomas did the same, and noted that it was incredibly sharp. The Maker’s certainly had done a great job.
“You should read more,” Thomas chuckled. They both shared a smile before turning back and looking at the others. The room was full of the people he had befriended, those that had fought the darkness without feat. He couldn’t have asked for better people to stand with him.
“Just in case this doesn’t go so well,” Thomas said, “I just want you all to know… I’m glad I tripped on that broom.”
He knew no one would understand the reference, but they more than understood his sentiment. They took just a moment longer to smile at each other before Thomas and Zach issued a mutual war cry.
They ran into the snow with swords drawn and voices high.
Inanis were there to meet them, bunched up due to the high rock walls they walked between. Without hesitation, Thomas and Zach dived right in.
Thomas struck first, his blade slashing at the nearest Inanis. It cut a line in the monster, and the glowing cut shone for a brief moment. Thomas stared, silently praying that the soul sword would be able to do what it had been unable to do as the General’s sword.
Thomas’ heart literally skipped a beat. The Inanis fell to the ground and didn’t move again. Not dead, Thomas was sure, but out of the fight. He looked at Zach, who felled an Inanis of his own with the blade. That Inanis didn’t move again either.
Thomas and Zach both looked at each other and smiled. Then they waded into the Inanis with reckless abandon. Their weapons were potent, and anything they connected with went down in the snow. Soon, they had the path blocked off with the bodies of the Inanis, and the wooden terrors had to climb over each other in order to attack. They were cut down the moment they appeared.
The boys were careful not to try and impale any of the Inanis. Without having to tell each other, both knew that there were still people inside, and maybe they could be saved. Any mortal injuries to the Inanis would be a mortal injury to the person.
Not that dealing mortal injuries was exactly easy.
The more they bashed the blades against their wooden adversaries, the more Thomas began to worry that they were dulling the swords. If the swords were dulled, they’d be right back into the same issue they had been at before, which was being totally defenseless against an army of attackers.
Thomas raised his sword again anyway. It wasn’t like there was another option available.
“BEHIND YOU!”
The warning came from high above them, and Thomas turned just in time to avoid getting his face ripped off by an Inanis. Apparently, they had gotten clever and were able to go around the mountain, circumventing the path.
“Damn,” was all Thomas could say before he and Zach were surrounded on all sides. They stood back to back, blades held in a defensive stance, and waited for the hammer to fall.
It did a moment later when at least a dozen Inanis descended on them, claws tearing at anything they could reach. Zach and Thomas tried to defend themselves, but they were badly outnumbered and their blades could only cut so much wood at once.
Three arrows felled three Inanis in rapid succession, turning the tables just a hair. Miranda and the Keeper joined them, using a table as a weapon to knock more Inanis down. Only by falling to the ground did Thomas and Zach avoid getting knocked over with them.
“Give the swords here and go!”
The order came from the Keeper, and neither of them had the presence of mind to dispute it. They tossed the blades to Miranda and the Keeper and headed inside to recover. Morando was there to meet them and heal some of the minor wounds they had sustained.
“Their numbers are great,” the Healer said as Thomas hunched over to catch his breath. “The fake Priest no doubt has brought the entire army forth to destroy us.”
“Can you take control of them?” Zach asked, but Thomas was already shaking his head. Just the thought of trying to control the Inanis made his head spin.
“I’m still too burned from making the soul-ore,” Thomas panted, “and there’s so many of them… I’m pretty sure even tryin’ would be a bad idea. We’re gonna have to do this by hand.”
Zach nodded, and walked towards the door. The Keeper and Miranda were putting on quite the spectacle, both of them clearly better trained than Thomas and Zach. The only advantage the boys had was they worked better together than the Keeper and Miranda. They were constantly getting into each other’s way as they battled the Inanis.
The arrangement couldn’t last, or they would be killed.
“I’m going to go back out there,” Thomas said, “you stay here and wait for Miranda. We’ll change up the teams.”
Zach was clearly torn about the change in dance partner, but he nodded his understanding nevertheless.
Thomas waited for the right moment to relieve Miranda, but she made that simple by slipping and falling as the Inanis descended on her. Sprinting to her defense, he lifted the blue-hued blade and slashed through three chests at once.
“Get inside,” he ordered, “we’re changing up the teams.”
“Good,” she muttered in response, “he isn’t exactly a team player.”
Thomas had no reply as he had to fend off four more Inanis. The Keeper seemed in a world of his own, spinning his blade so fast it appeared to be more a shield than a sword. Thomas turned his attention to his own situation, unsure if the Keeper was even capable of sentient thought.
The Inanis were piling up, but now the bodies were hemming Thomas and the Keeper in instead of keeping the Inanis out. They were pushed back to the door by sheer volume alone, running out of space to work. The arrows flew from above them, taking out the invaders further off, but their enemy seemed to have a never ending supply of bodies.
Thomas called the Keeper back, letting Zach and Miranda take their places. The Maker’s forge was shaking as the Inanis attempted to get in through the walls. The impromptu barricades held, but they were swiftly running out of breathing room. After three more switches, bodies were piled high and their strength was failing, and still they kept coming.
“We’re almost out of time,” Morando said when it was Zach and Miranda’s turn to fight, “what do you suggest?”
Thomas was silent for a moment, thinking hard. His muscles were starting to break down as fatigue settled in.
“If we find their leader, we can end this,” the Keeper said, his breathing heavy. It seemed even the old soldier had his limits.
Thomas nodded his agreement. “We need to draw him out,” he replied, “or he’ll just keep sendin’ his minions after us.”
“How do we do that?” Morando said with beads of sweat on his forehead. They were taxing his healing abilities, and Etanta was only able to do so much.
“Simple,” Thomas said, “I start shouting.”
Without another word, he whistled. Miranda and Zach took the signal and pulled back, trading off the blades yet again. But this time, neither the Keeper or Thomas engaged the Inanis.
“Come on out, you parasite!” Thomas shouted at the top of his voice.
It was as if the pretend Priest was just waiting for the challenge. As soon as the words left Thomas’ mouth, the sea of Inanis parted to reveal the pretend Priest and the honorable swordsman from the Verdonti invasion.
The Soul Forge Page 18
