On the ground, Sariel and Aphlel started to rise. Sariel’s eyes locked onto Shamarion, and without needing an explanation, he rushed forward. His crystal sword flashed through the air, but at the last instant, Maries raised his bone blade and intercepted the blow. Manakel grinned.
“Now, that does change things.”
He spread his wings and streaked toward the battle, his sword blazing. Daziel grimaced. “I could not hold the illusion with them drawing enough power to do battle.” He grinned. “It has been eons since those two fought side by side.”
The two high lords moved with inhuman grace as they engaged the general of the abyss. At the last instant, Maries summoned a second sword into his left hand, meeting each of their attacks, blade to blade, and knocking their weapons aside. They came at him from different sides, but that made no difference in Maries’s ability to defend against them.
Every time their swords impacted, a wave of energy was unleashed. The blows happened so fast that one discharge hadn’t faded before the next one came into being. It was almost like music, though Jez could only detect it with his mystical senses. There were silent notes too, an indication that some of the power released was in dominions Jez had no training in. There was a peculiar beauty to the battle, to watching three true masters of the blade, with abilities far beyond mortal capacity, test their skills against one another. The two pharim lords together should have been more than enough to defeat the demon general, but they didn’t just fight with blades and the skill of their arms. Magic was involved too, in ways too subtle for Jez to understand, and while Maries was at full power, Sariel and Manakel were still limited by the binding Sharim had placed on them. It seemed the pharim lords together were an equal match for Maries, but the slightest thing could shift the balance in either direction.
Sharim approached the battle. Jez drew his sword and charged the human demon, taking to the air before he had covered half the distance. There was a sound like thunder as their swords crashed against one another. Sharim smiled.
“I wondered how long it would take you to reach me. You took longer than I would’ve thought.”
Though twelve feet tall and heavily muscled, Sharim moved forward with inhuman speed, dodging Jez’s next slash and countering with a thrust of his own. Jez twisted out of the way, and Sharim grinned.
“You’ve improved.” His sword darted to one side, burning a slash into Jez’s arm as he tried to get in close. “But not enough.”
Fire spread to his veins, but it was nowhere near as bad as before. Whether it was because Sharim’s sword was weaker than Janderol’s or because his body had somehow adapted from the wound the nightmare demon had given him, Jez didn’t know. He moved his sword in an upward slash which caught Sharim off guard and knocked him off balance. The human demon righted himself so quickly that anyone less skilled would’ve missed it, but Jez had been preparing to fight this specific foe for three years. He rose as his sword glided into a thrust. Sharim shifted but not enough to avoid the blow entirely. The point pierced his shoulder, though his continued motion tore the weapon free a second later. The wound steamed, and Sharim snarled.
Off to one side, Manakel and Sariel continued their relentless battle. Jez only caught the occasional glimpse of it. Though the pharim lords seemed unable to get passed Maries’s defenses, neither could the demon general wound them. The trio moved so fast and used so much power that any working thrown to aid them was as likely to interfere with their own magic as hurt Maries.
Sharim waved his hand in a wide arc, and Jez felt a surge of power coming from above. His eyes darted briefly to the ceiling. Sharim stuck again, forcing Jez to return his attention to the battle. He knocked the blow aside, though it came so close that it tore a rent in his robes. He looked up, hoping he hadn’t seen what he’d thought.
From wall to wall, the ceiling was covered in summoning circles. There were dozens of them. They glowed brilliant yellow. They brightened for a moment, and a chezamut dropped from each one. The sulfuric smell that suddenly permeated the air told him that the throne room hadn’t been the only place where the soldier demons had been summoned. The demons landed lightly on the ground, and Jez tried to swallow down the fear. He’d gotten lucky in his battle with Sharim so far. The addition of the chezamuts would end him, as it likely would Manakel and Sariel.
His moment of distraction had allowed Sharim to get the upper hand, and he now rained down blows on Jez like a storm beating against a wall. To make matters worse, Sharim’s transformation had endowed him with a strength nearly equal to the greatest demons, and for all that Jez had the soul of a pharim, his flesh was still human flesh. It had limits that could only be stretched so far, and each blow that Jez caught on his sword felt like it would crack every bone in his arm. The strength granted by his own transformation wouldn’t be enough to protect him for long. Not unless he drew deeper and pushed his limits farther than he ever had.
His flesh burned as more power than could be long contained in any mere mortal vessel coursed through it. The pain in his arms lessened as a pair of chezamuts drew near. Jez sent a jolt of power into the earth, shaking it. Tendrils of earth reached up and grabbed both the demons and Sharim. Sharim managed to break them with a working of his own, but the ones around the chezamuts crushed them.
It was only then that he heard the sounds of battle all around him, not just sword on sword, but growls and roars of the animals of the wild. The entire throne room had been transformed into a battlefield, nearly drowning out even the fight between Maries and the high lords.
He and Sharim continued to exchange blows while Jez’s forces battled the newly summoned soldier demons, but Jez didn’t find himself as thoroughly outclassed as he had before. Sharim was still the better swordsman, but he seemed to no longer be the implacable foe against which there could be no victory. He still scored several hits, though Jez came close to wounding him a number of times. If Jez had been the naïve young boy he’d been when he’d first met the demon, he might have believed his skill alone was enough, but years of experience had taught him rough lessons. There was no way he’d grown skilled enough. Jez allowed himself to slow just a little as if the numerous cuts Sharim had given him were slowing him down. Rather than take advantage, Sharim slowed enough to not overwhelm Jez. Sharim had to be planning something, but there was nothing he could do.
Osmund cried out, but Jez couldn’t spare the attention to look over his shoulder. He tried to circle Sharim to see what was going on, but the human demon was effectively in control of the battle. Whenever Jez moved more than a few feet, Sharim would drive him back into position.
“Your king is dying on the ground. Your allies have been defeated or possessed. You did well in gathering the afur and the limaph, but even that hardly delayed me. Surrender.”
Sharim’s blows slowed a little. Jez redoubled his efforts, striking with all the speed he could muster, but Sharim fended him off with as much effort as it would take to stop a toddler.
“Feel free to answer. I won’t kill you.”
He was right. Sharim could obviously kill him at any time so Jez risked a glance over his shoulder. Osmund was down, bleeding from more wounds than Jez could count. Jez’s forces fought a veritable army of chezamuts. The addition of the limaph had made them much more effective, but with so many demons, it was only a matter of time before they fell. Both Manakel and Sariel had taken wounds from having to deal with the occasional soldier demon as they battled Maries. Jez turned back to Sharim.
“Why do you care? You’re just going to kill me and then you’ll draw me out of the Keep of the Hosts to destroy me.”
Sharim grinned. “Certainly, I could do that, but you are a very powerful Shadowguard, and most of my sources of extra energy have been expended. I can retrieve you, but it would be much easier if I did not have to.”
“Do you really expect me to make this easy on you?”
Sharim let out a bark of laughter. “No, I expect you to fight to the last, but I ask
ed in case you had grown a brain since we last spoke.”
A flick of Sharim’s wrist tore the blade out of Jez’s hand, but he had been disarmed too often to not be prepared for it. The sword hadn’t even hit the ground when Jez dismissed it, summoning it back to his hand just in time to deflect Sharim’s blow. Jez tried to counter, but Sharim knocked his attack aside before stabbing him in the shoulder.
Jez cried out. Sharim twisted his blade, sending pangs of pain surging through Jez’s body. He staggered back, and Sharim let him pull free of the sword. He fell to one knee. He glanced around, trusting that Sharim still didn’t want him dead, and his heart fell. Only a half dozen of the afur remained, and few of those were warriors. His forces had been driven to the center of the throne room and were surrounded. Aphlel knelt over the king, and even now, color was starting to return to Haziel’s face. The lord of healing looked at Jez and smiled. For some reason, the expression caused some of the fear to drain out of him. He gripped his sword in both hands and staggered to his feet.
“Why prolong this, Jezreel? You were never a match for me, even unwounded at full strength.”
“You don’t always fight evil because you think you can defeat it.” Jez tasted blood on his breath, and his arms felt heavy. “You fight it because evil needs to be fought.”
Sharim laughed. “If you want to die, who am I to deny you?”
Jez drew deeper of Luntayary until he could barely stand the burning. To his surprise, someone walked up from behind and stood next to him. He glanced at the figure, and a wave of relief washed over him as he understood why Aphlel had smiled.
Before Sharim had bound the high lords to the mortal realm, they had commanded that no pharim come to the world. Unlike when mortal rulers gave an order, the command of the high lords changed the pharim on a fundamental level. They were unable to disobey without falling. The high lords had been unable to countermand their order with their power reduced. A few, Darkmasks mainly, had found ways to temporarily get around the restriction, though what aid they could provide was limited. There were also others, Shadowguards set to watch over the greatest demons, that were exempt from the command. They, however, were held by a different restriction. They were to guard their charges at all costs, lest the imprisoned demons escape. With the pharim so restricted, humankind had been left to fend for themselves, with only the weakened high lords and the afur to help. The one who stood by his side now, however, was neither weakened nor fallen.
“Luntayary,” Shamarion said. “It will be good to fight by your side once more. Shall we show this creature just what Shadowguards can do?”
Sharim backed up a step. For a second, Jez thought he was afraid, but then he smiled. A circle, so complex that runes covered every inch of the floor, burst into blue light. At its center was one that Jez had hoped he’d never see again: the rune to the Keep of the Hosts.
Blue light went out of Sharim in a wave. It passed over most without effect, though the pharim lords flinched. When the wave hit Jez, it drove him to his knees. Normally, something like that would cause him to lose his grip on Luntayary’s form, but instead, it was like chains bound him to his current form, unwilling to allow him to change back. His flesh continued to burn as Shamarion fell to his knees and screamed.
CHAPTER 30
Sharim walked up to Shamarion and put his sword to the pharim’s throat. Shamarion scampered back, fear painting his face. He brought his own sword up to knock Sharim’s away, but the blow was off balance and clumsy. It slammed against the demon’s liquid fire blade but didn’t move it so much as an inch.
“He can kill me,” Shamarion said. “He has bound me to this world.”
Jez rushed forward, catching Sharim’s blade on his own and giving Shamarion a chance to retreat. Sharim backed up a step and laughed. “You still don’t understand, do you? I can kill you too. Luntayary is as much here as the rest of them.”
Jez backed up several steps. He tried to push Luntayary away, but to his horror, the pharim’s form remained, steadily burning away at his flesh. Sharim laughed.
“You’ve always been so easy. I barely had to goad you at all to get you to draw enough power to have your pharim-self caught by my binding.”
“You mean...”
Sharim nodded as he lifted his sword. “If I kill you now, there will be no returning to the Keep of the Hosts. You will be destroyed utterly.” He sniffed at the air. “I believe it will happen sooner rather than later. One more chance, Jezreel. Join me. I can save your life. A mortal can choose any path, and you could decide to follow me without the loss of power that the afur experienced.”
“Do not, Jezreel,” Aniel said as he walked up to Jez and put a hand on his shoulder, causing the burning to subside.
Jez glanced at him. He’d used the transformation working before when Jez had needed more power than he could safely use. The working had its limits, though.
“A few minutes?” Jez said.
Aniel nodded. “Perhaps half an hour.”
“Don’t be so fast to rush into battle,” Sharim said. “If your friends die, their souls will move to whatever lies beyond mortal life. You have no soul, nothing beyond the pharim. What do you imagine will happen to you if you die and Luntayary is destroyed? There will be nothing for you. Is that what you want? Join me. You have no idea what I could do with the power of a corrupted pharim on my side.”
For several long seconds, Jez was silent. When he spoke, his whisper sounded over the din of battle, and he guessed Daziel had something to do with that.
“Marrowit tried to offer me something like that. He would’ve returned my father. He even offered to leave the world for as long as I lived. All I had to do was leave him alone.” He gripped his sword, and the sapphire blade glowed a brilliant blue. Sharim’s working stopped Jez from changing back, but there was nothing stopping him from drawing more power. With Aniel’s working guarding his flesh, he could handle more than ever. The amount he held now would have otherwise overwhelmed him. With it, however, he pushed himself to a limit that he had scarcely dreamed of. He held enough power that his flesh started to burn again. He would have been reduced to ash, if not for the beast lord’s protection. He couldn’t last long like this. He would have to finish this battle quickly or he wouldn’t survive. “Evil needs to be fought.”
His hands crackled with blue energy, and his robes shimmered even brighter than Sariel’s. Sharim’s eyes bulged as if he couldn’t believe what Jez was doing. The surprise only lasted a moment. Sharim spread his wings and growled as Jez flew across the room.
Sharim lifted his sword to meet Jez’s attack, but he wasn’t prepared for the sheer power behind that blow. Jez’s sword came within a hair’s breadth of slicing into his neck. With tremendous effort, Sharim pushed the crystal sword away. Power welled within the demon, and flames surrounded his body. Bones crackled as he grew taller until he stood at a height of nearly twenty feet. His wings expanded, and flames appeared in cracks in his skin, which had blackened until it resembled obsidian. Jez had seen this before when he’d been drawn into one of the demon’s own memories. Over the past couple of years, Sharim had worked transformation magic on his flesh to allow him to draw more deeply of his power, but like Jez’s body, there were limits to how much power Sharim’s flesh could bear. He had apparently cast those limits aside to fully embrace his demonic nature. Neither one could survive holding that much power for long, and even the winner of such a conflict might well be consumed by his own magic. Jez clenched his teeth. Sharim had plagued the world for years and had brought Ashtar to the brink of destruction. If his death was what was required to stop this creature permanently, it was a sacrifice he was willing to make.
The musical sound of the pharimic tongue rang in the air. Sariel and Manakel had moved their fight against one wall and were now clearly visible. Manakel nodded and spoke a few words. Sariel grinned as Manakel delivered a wild slash. If it had hit, it would have cloven Maries in two, but it was slow and ponderous. Maries s
tepped aside and drove his sword into Manakel’s chest, but in the same instant, Sariel’s sword flashed and cut Maries in two at the stomach. The demon general didn’t even have a chance to cry out before he turned to ash. Instantly, Aphlel was at Manakel’s side, and Jez turned back to Sharim.
Sharim threw back his head and let out a roar that could’ve never come from a human throat. Sariel, who had walked to the downed Osmund rose, and Manakel, freshly healed, stepped up to stand by Jez’s side. Osmund shed his human form for that of Ziary, and with a nod of thanks to Sariel, he and the lord of protection joined Jez and Manakel. Sariel stepped out in front of them, joined by Shamarion. The pharim still seemed unnerved, but watching the battle had apparently reminded him of who and what he was. He and Sariel each moved their swords in a wide circle, causing a brilliant rune to appear in the air between them. Sariel thrust his hand forward, and the rune rushed toward Sharim. Sharim tried to twist out of the way, but the rune turned in the air and slammed into him. For a second, the rune glowed blue before it vanished.
“No fleeing Between this time, Andera,” Sariel said. “This time, it ends.”
The five of them moved together to attack one of the most powerful demons to ever walk the earth.
CHAPTER 31
Andera, for Jez could no longer think of this demonic thing as Sharim, swung a massive blade that Jez was sure could’ve cut boulders in two. Manakel dashed out in front of them, and though Andera was more than three times as tall, the lord of destruction caught the descending blade and turned it aside as if it weighed no more than a wooden switch. Sariel and Shamarion darted to either side of the demon, their swords moving in a sapphire blur, but Andera’s wings rose slightly, and then came down on the blades, the bone ridges on the wings protecting the demon from any harm and knocking the swords away. Ziary came up behind him, but Andera’s tail lashed out, knocking his feet out from under him before grabbing the limaph and slamming him into the ground. Red flame surrounded Ziary and sizzled, burning the demon. Andera’s tail loosed enough for the limaph to pull free.
Shadeslayer (Pharim War Book 7) Page 13
