by Mark Eller
And then it all stopped.
Roiling energies faded away. Anothosia stood beside her, sweat drenched, bleeding from her nose and ears. Sagging, Zorce glared hate from his side of the gate, but he looked little better than Anothosia. His front was drenched in blood. His body was charred, battered, but the fieriness in his eyes had not abated.
“Hold fast, Ani,” Anothosia panted, her voice strained. “Maintain your courage, child, and hold fast.”
Straightening slowly, Zorce shook himself. He roared.
And then he charged the Hell Gate.
He struck it with a resounding crash that threatened to burst Ani’s eardrums. The gates trembled beneath the blow. They shivered and vibrated. Zorce struck them again, hitting them with both lightning from his horns and blows from his fists. The mighty barrier came crashing down, hinges screeching, bones snapping.
Everything paused.
Ani’s voice quieted. The roars ceased. Only a few dying screams remained. Ani was so tired, so exhausted, that she doubted she could turn and run to save her life. There was no way left for her to go except forward, into Hell, into the arms of a being who desired almost nothing more than to rape her body and control her soul.
Shivering, she drew in a shaky breath and attempted to sing once more, but it was too late.
The sudden stilling had been the lull before the storm as Hell’s creatures realized they were no longer bottled up. After several silent moments they released excited roars and began to stream toward the gate, unhindered in their mad rush to escape the slaughter behind them.
Ani dived to the side as Zorce’s two-headed hound sprang forward and lunged for her. Her failing song stopped abruptly. Her energy seemed to drain into the ground, and her courage faltered.
Hell was unleashed, and it was all her fault.
* * * *
Omitan stood waiting at the Hell Mouth, guarding Anothosia and the other’s backs. His task was to let no one pass to harm them, nor would he let anyone leave. He would stand guard until either his granddaughter and Anothosia won or he was destroyed. It was his nature to preserve. It was his nature to stand fast like a giant oak leaning against hurricane force winds. Nothing would prevent him from guarding those he had placed beneath his protection.
Closing his eyes a moment, he tried to see the battle above. The time difference between the battle now going on with Athos and the one taking place with the dark god’s father was disorienting. Anothosia’s gift of warping reality was a powerful thing…something none of the other’s could quite manage. When combined with the warping that had already been taking place with greater and greater intensity for more than a year, the results were dizzying. Although it was fascinating how she could make dimensions move at different speeds, it was also unsettling and tricky. If she made an error, even a small one, it could give the Two the needed advantage to win.
Omitan briefly contemplated what would happen if the Two succeeded, and he shuddered. He did not want to think what the ground above would become or what would happen to his essence if he were killed. This was the last stand. This was the place where the evil they had spread needed to be stopped.
He stilled. A fine tremor moved through the earth and into his body.
Zorce had broken through; Anithia had fallen. Within his mind he could hear her distressed thoughts calling to him, begging him for help.
Closing his eyes, Omitan released a low, long bellow. His voice reached deep into the ground. The earth began to shake. Bits and pieces of dirt and rock shivered around him, broke free from the walls, and crumbled down. Thick, black roots shot up from the beneath his feet and down from above his head.
“Go high— go low!” he shouted to the world around him. “Find all who need you and give them aid. Destroy our sworn enemy!”
Reaching out, Omitan called to his creatures, to everything that grew upon the surface and below. He poured his strength into every living tree, plant and shrub, causing each to grow beyond its limits, linking his own essence into each one, his vengeance being their vengeance.
And then he commanded them to fight.
They obeyed.
* * * *
Belthethsia stroked Athos’s cheek, feeling the jarring shock of lightning crackling off his skin. His power surrounded him, exuded. Around them, simpering hellborn cringed and whimpered, showing more fear and respect than they had ever given Athos before.
Laughing gaily, Belthethsia pressed herself against her god. Electric shocks raced through her, jarred her, sheared through her skin and body, sending wave after wave of pain beating into her core. She shook and clung tighter, laughing because the pain excited her, reminded her of the times Athos used her for his passion. Her brother, her lover, wrapped an arm about her body. One huge hand grasped her right breast. Claws dug in, tore skin and flesh, and worried at her nipple until it ripped free and fell. Belthethsia shuddered in passion and laughed with pride because Athos finally displayed his full power to his underlings. Belsac and Mercktos had always treated him with thinly veiled contempt. Because Merctos had been with Zorce from almost the beginning, he truly thought his power the greater. He thought Athos had his position because he was Zorce’s son. Well, if Merctos still lived he would know different now. Athos glowed with power far surpassing anything she had ever seen Zorce display. He exuded, and she felt overwhelming pride. No matter the outcome between Zorce and the bitch goddess, after this day the balance of power would shift. Athos would rule supreme, and she would stand by his side. Zorce, their father, would rue the day he ever sired such magnificent children. As for her and Athos, creating offspring was a mistake they would never make. Thrice she had born her brother’s children. Each time she ripped the child apart while Athos watched. The pieces had been fed to hellhounds.
“They come,” Athos whispered. Removing his hand from her bloody breast, he slid his claws across her belly. The electricity rampaging through his body subsided, became controlled. Focused. It became balls of magical energy bouncing between and roiling near his horns. Belthethsia frowned while her flesh healed and wished she dared place her hand into the magical force, but she did not have the same strength of mind and body as her brother. She did not have the same nano control. The forces he contained were enough to rip her body into a fine mist. Her brother was already an elemental force, and he had not yet empowered the hook.
Belthethsia watched the soldiers below. Arrows and boulders arched toward them, useless gnats trying to batter down a mountain. Soldiers moved forward, their blood and flesh and life force waiting to be harvested, waiting to give Athos more power to use against his father. The hook would reach out, would suck in their souls, would grab power from their deaths, and Athos would become a god in more than just name. He would gain enough strength to destroy worlds.
“They are fools rushing to your glory,” she whispered. Leaning into his touch, she felt his claws enter her belly, “but what else are soldiers for?”
He looked down at her, the ball lightning dancing between his horns suddenly agitated. His eyes became puke yellow, hard. He ripped his claws out of her belly and kicked her legs from beneath her.
Belthethsia’s knees struck the hard roof with a solid thunk. She stilled before her brother’s anger, feeling the thin thrill of sudden fear. Like all of Zorce’s children, Athos’s moods were often volatile. He might kill her on impulse, like he had several times before. Once, he almost forgot to restore her body and replace her soul before she was lost forever. The experience had been…unsettling. The aftermath…exciting.
“Get up,” Athos finally snapped. “Prepare yourself. The soldiers are nothing. Can you not feel him? Are you stupid as well as blind? The spawn is here. Inside the castle.”
Belthethsia rose while her stomach healed. She rubbed a hand across her bare belly, across her breast, feeling the slick sheen of fresh blood. Her blood. It felt sticky and smelled sweet. She rubbed her hand through her hair, cleansing it with red, and opened her senses.
Ye
ssss. She could feel it now. A veil. Clumsily done. It was, perhaps, good enough to fool lesser hellborn, but even a middling demon should have no difficulty discerning this amateurish effort.
It shamed her that she had not noticed before. Her brother had been right to rebuff her. There had been times when such inattention might have gotten her killed, and without her brother nearby, the death would have been final.
She released a feral grin. Tessla was here, too. “Shall we greet them?”
Athos waved a negligent arm, displaying the hook. “Let them come to us. Until then…” He looked over the battlements once more, studied the soldiers. His eyes narrowed. His mouth firmed. He pointed.
“GO!”
And all the hellborn inside the castle left in a deadly wave. Ball lightning flickered white, yellow, orange, and then blue as it built up strength and energy. Athos tilted back his head and laughed as lightning shot from his horns, slicing into the troops below. Hundreds of bodies flew through the air, surrounded by a sudden red mist. Hellkind and human alike died in the strike. Athos roared laughter. More lightning shot forth. Earth exploded upward. Severed grasses shot like arrows into soldiers. Pebbles and dirt pierced armor and cracked shields. Men fell, screaming, crying, begging for mercy. Hellkind flew low, ripping at eyes and throats. Hellhounds raced through sudden gaps, ripping and tearing at flesh while kobolds and orcs and demons and devils and every type of hellborn capable of holding a weapon surged forward to produce murder in a glory of blood.
“You’re killing them without the hook,” Belthethsia gasped. “Please, my lord, harvest their power! Drink in their souls!”
Athos roared laughter one more time. Fire fell from his mouth. It roared over the battlement to strike the ground and roll toward the empire troops. Five hundred hellborn burned before the fire caught its first empire soldier. Another thousand hellborn died while the hellfire raged among the intermingled combatants, but more than six thousand Altude soldiers flared like torches, twisting and screaming and flailing before they finally fell and died.
“I LOVE IT!” Athos screeched. A hundred tiny lightning balls suddenly shot out of his fingers in a staccato rush. He looked to Belthethsia, his expression exultant, his eyes a bright blazing red of bloodlust passion. “By ME, I’ve wanted to kill like this for a thousand years.”
“The hook!” Belthethsia shouted again.
Athos shook his head. “Not yet. Not now. The spawn doesn’t know I have it. Once he does his only interest will be in running away!”
Turning his attention back to the carnage below, he screamed again, and fire poured from his mouth. Already, more than an third of the enemy troops were down, either dead or being ripped apart by hellborn. Another thousand hellborn and soldiers died in Athos’s latest assault.
“Please lover,” Belthethsia begged. Falling to her knees, she grasped Athos’s legs. His three foot long cock brushed against her cheek, throbbing with excitement. Two of its barbs hooked into her lips when she kissed it. Looking up, she cast pleading eyes on the rampaging god’s face and spoke with a bleeding mouth. “Please. Don’t kill them all. Leave some for me.”
Athos suddenly stilled. His face became serene. His hand lowered to her head and gently stroked her bloody hair. He pulled her to her feet. With one careful touch, he turned her toward the closest stairwell. “Those outside belong to me. These are yours. Kill them, sister.”
* * * *
Ani screamed when a hellhound loomed over her, but just as the hellhound’s slathering jaws were ready to rip into her flesh, the hound’s head flew from its body, spraying her with foul smelling black blood.
Merrac reached down, hoisted Ani to her feet, and in an instant, was gone again. She watched him as he stood in front of the tattered gates, swinging his blade from side to side in a blurred sweeping motion, destroying all it touched in a blaze of thick, oily smoke and a cacophony of screams.
Panting, in a near panic, Anithia frantically scanned the chaos around her but found no trace of the goddess…of Missa.
She stepped forward and nearly fell over again as the earth shook. Frustration and anger and fear raged within her. She wanted to scream. She wanted to storm. She wanted to know what the fuck Anothosia had done with Missa.
Debris fell around her, dropping into her hair, eyes and mouth. Ani spat out dirt and pieces of twigs and leaves and tried to shelter her head with her hands.
“Anithia!” Merrac’s bass voice cut through the chaos, “Sing!”
Ani suddenly realized she no longer fueled Omitan’s army. They were falling back, falling away, dying because her strength and nerve failed. Fear seized her chest, made the air in her lungs clog. She tried to concentrate on her song, tried to gather the magic within her once more, but she had exhausted her reserves. All she had left was the remnants of her own life force.
Ani opened her mouth— and hesitated. If she used her own energy, she would die. Who would take care of Missa then? Who would make sure Missa had food and clothes and a place to live? Larson was gone. She couldn’t count on Calto surviving, and once the goddess was done with her daughter’s body, she too would abandon this world for the refuge of her Garden. But if Ani didn’t sing it wouldn’t matter. They would all perish.
“Damned if I do, damned if I don’t.” she whispered. She had to sing. No matter what the price, she had to be strong.
“Anithia, what are you doing?” Anothosia called to her, something close to panic in her voice. “Get up! Sing!”
Anithia’s heart leapt when she saw the goddess, saw Missa, pushing her way to the gate. Torn and bleeding, Anothosia confronted Zorce. It was obvious he was the strongest of the two. Anothosia could not match him blow for blow. She was not in his league, and finesse could only take her so far.
Opening her mouth, Ani released her song again, but the sound was thin and weak. It barely carried past the gates.
“Anithia!” Anothosia cried out. She bled from wounds to numerous to count. Zorce rushed her, pinned her beneath his massive form. Drool dripped from Zorce’s mouth onto the goddess’s face, onto Missa’s face. Zorce’s claws neared Missa’s throat.
Ani’s heart stilled The only thing she lived for in this world was about to be taken from her.
Ani screamed. “NO!” and her voice rent the air around her, cutting into anything fighting nearby, knocking Zorce from the goddess.
Too late.
Anothosia bled profusely from a wound in her side. Blazing light and magical force streaked into the air from the wound, wasted against nothing. Zorce rose to his feet, laughing, sneering, but Anothosia did not stay down. Instead, she pulled herself from the ground, rising against the chaos. Her eyes burned determination while her body bled power.
Anithia’s voice rose high above the chaos. “Omitan! Help me! What do I do?”
Anothosia was again knocked down into a pool of her own essence. Again, she fought on, her voice rising against the horde. Ani knew the goddess could escape, could vacate Missa’s body and save herself, but she refused to give up. Anothosia fought for her faithful, fought for those depending on her to save them. She was willing to give her immortal life for her duty.
Ani stiffened, her decision clear. No matter the cost, no matter the pain, she would do whatever was needed, even if it meant feeding the magic with her own soul. She would not let her baby die without a fight. She would not allow Anothosia’s sacrifice to be in vain.
Anothosia fought for the mortals. So be it. A mortal would fight for her.
* * * *
Screeching, Elise shoved her sword into an orc’s back. The orc released the man it held and turned swiftly toward her, ripping the sword from her grip. It roared, reached out slow, methodical, and Elise stabbed it in the elbow with the arrow she held in her left hand.
The orc roared again. Its arm swung, striking Elise in her ribs. She grunted and gave with the blow, dropping in a controlled fall that had her rolling to the side, reaching out, stabbing with the arrow, sliding it into the
orc’s calf. Leaving the arrow, she crab scrabbled to the side and smoothly rose, pressing one arm against her bruised ribs. Her breath felt ragged, almost uncontrolled. It hurt to breathe, but she couldn’t concentrate on that right now. The orc stumbled toward her. Another hellborn, a type she did not recognize, moved in from an angle.
Groaning, the orc fell to its knees. It looked at her while Elise turned to face the other hellborn. Its expression was puzzled as it watched the orc. Backing slowly, Elise saw the orc’s glazing eyes focus on its suddenly withered arm and then down at a leg which had turned to rot around the arrow. The rot spread across its body, and then the orc died.
Elise did not watch. Still backing slowly, she studied the hellborn approaching her and reached into the bag attached to her belt. This being had five legs, an awkward number, so most likely one of the legs was a weapon of some sort. She reached up to quickly wipe blood from her face, feeling a tooth protruding through her ripped open cheek. She tasted it, her own blood. It filled her mouth, leaving her little choice but to swallow or spit the red fluid out.
No others took notice of her plight, not even Lady Simta who had fought beside Elise on several brief occasions during the last two hours while wearing a monstrous cat’s form. No, this battle was solitary. It was a challenge between two warriors surrounded by thousands of individual combats. Her breathing eased slightly, but blood dripping down her throat threatened to choke her.
The hellborn moved. Fast. Too fast. She tried to twist so the hellborn could not strike when she no longer held a shield for protection. She screamed in protest as fangs dripping clear ichors reached for her face. Her hand shot forth, flinging a fine spray of salt across its body, but salt was not enough to stop the being. It was not enough…
The hellborn lunged toward her but somehow missed, striking six inches to the side of her face. Her neck burned ice again while surprise flashed across the monster’s expression—
