Kyel heaved the weapon over his head and brought it down again with a furious shout. Chips of rock ricocheted off the walls, striking Quin in the face. Kyel screamed in agony, and Thar’gon flew from his hands. He wavered for a moment, off-balanced. Then he collapsed, falling forward toward the gaping bore of the Well of Tears.
“NO!” Quin shouted. He caught Kyel by the cloak and jerked him back. His momentum carried him to the floor, Kyel falling on top of him.
Quin rolled him over and sat up.
Kyel stared up at him with a loose, unfocused gaze, his face a glistening mask of blood. More blood ran from his nose in a viscous stream that drained down his cheeks.
Panicked, Quin glanced back at the ruin of the Well. There were still blocks remaining. Kyel needed to get up, needed to finish the job. Only he could wield the talisman.
Quin growled in desperation. He had to find a way to get Kyel back on his feet. Frantic, he grasped him by the shoulders, ready to try shaking him back to his senses. But then he stopped himself. It wouldn’t do any good, he realized with a stab of desperation that felt like a gut punch.
Kyel wouldn’t be getting up again.
Quin looked down at the glowing morning star that lay on the floor next to him. He glanced back at the Well. Then he looked down at Kyel. The Sentinel’s lips were moving, struggling to form words Quin couldn’t make out. He leaned closer, straining to hear.
“Take it,” Kyel whispered in a gurgling breath. “Finish it.”
Kyel’s fingers groped for the silver talisman that lay just out of reach.
Drowning in uncertainty, Quin shook his head. “I can’t. I can’t lift it.”
Kyel whispered, “You can if I’m dead.”
Quin froze, gripped by cold revulsion as he realized what the Sentinel was asking. He shook his head in an attempt to deny him. But one glance back at the pillar of energy told him he didn’t have a choice. He reached for his boot knife.
With a growl, Quin drove the knife as hard as he could between Kyel’s ribs, burying it up to the hilt.
Kyel flinched. Then he blinked. And that was all.
Quin sagged back on his haunches, watching as waves of power gushed from Kyel’s body in distorted waves, lost to the air. Quin threw his head back and screamed. Balling his fist, he smacked his hand against the ground in rage.
Across the room, the surge of energy yet surged from the Well’s gaping bore.
Trembling, Quin reached for Thar’gon. But he stopped himself, suddenly mired in doubt. The talisman was designed to be wielded only by the Warden of Battlemages. And he wasn’t a Battlemage.
But, then, Kyel hadn’t been either.
With conviction, Quin closed his fingers around the weapon’s haft and lifted the talisman from the floor. Immediately, warmth and solace flowed into him along with a newfound strength he’d never known. Filled with a blissful sense of euphoria, Quin rose from the ground.
He glanced back at Kyel and whispered his gratitude to the fallen Sentinel.
Then he raised the weapon over his head and, with all his might, brought the talisman smashing down.
The Well fought back.
Quin screamed.
The Gateway was still open. It shot upward into the sky, spearing the heavens.
Naia struggled against her bonds, trying desperately to escape the advancing demon. Across from her, sprawled in the center of the Circle of Convergence, Darien lay dying in an expanding pool of blood. It flowed into the gaps and crevices of the Circle’s rays, outlining the marble tiles with heightened contrast. The blood continued to advance, as if seeking to saturate the entire Circle.
Zavier Renquist pushed Naia to her knees, positioning himself behind her. He drew the sword back over his shoulder, preparing to strike.
A thunderous clap of air sent him hurling backward. Naia looked up in terror, in hope, in desperation. She gasped in disbelief. Blood streaming down his face, Quin stalked toward her across the glowing Circle, the talisman Thar’gon glowing like a beacon in his hand.
“Run, Naia!”
Naia froze. Renquist was already pushing himself to his feet.
“Run!” Quin commanded again, raising the morning star.
He swung the weapon at Renquist, creating a concussive blast of air that knocked the Prime Warden back to the ground. Hefting the weapon, Quin advanced.
“No,” Naia whispered, shaking her head. This was wrong. It was all terribly, terribly wrong.
“No, Quin!” she shrieked. “Leave him! Help Darien!”
Quin froze in the action of drawing the weapon back for another blow. He growled in frustration. Then he whirled and ran back across the Circle of Convergence.
He dropped to Darien’s side and lay a hand on his chest. He closed his eyes, gripping the talisman. The silver artifact glowed, swelling with a powerful brilliance.
Darien gasped. Then he opened his eyes.
Behind Naia, Renquist was moving. He rose to his feet, eyes menacing pools of shadow. He raised his hand and struck out at her with the Onslaught. Naia was lifted from the ground and hurled through the air.
Her body impacted with the rock, cutting short her scream.
“Naia!” Quin bellowed.
He bolted toward her but halted as Zavier Renquist stepped between them.
Spreading his arms, Renquist began to glow with the vile light of the Gateway. It was then that Quin saw it: a streaking ribbon of energy arcing from the pillar to Renquist, as though he were drawing power from it.
Hellpower.
Quin realized that ribbon of corrupt energy was the reason why the portal hadn’t collapsed. Renquist was drinking in the Onslaught, sustaining the Gateway by keeping the Hellpower flowing through it.
With a great, thunderous growl, Zavier Renquist changed. Before Quin’s eyes, he swelled to enormous size, his arms growing and spreading into heinous, bat-like wings. Quin cried out, scrambling away from the twisted beast. Its head seemed all teeth, its eyes infinite pools of darkness. The demon gave a shrill screech, spread its leathery wings, and launched into the air.
Quin struggled to help Darien gain his feet. Darien wavered, his eyes sliding shut. Overhead, the demon emitted a piercing shriek. Quin looked up. His mouth fell open, his eyes going wide.
“Give it to me,” Darien whispered.
It took Quin a moment to realize what he meant. He pressed the morning star’s haft into Darien’s hand and squeezed his fingers closed around it. A bloom of silver radiance erupted from the talisman, overwhelming his vision. Quin whirled away, throwing his hands up to shield his eyes.
Recovering, he sprinted toward Naia. He ran off the Circle, falling down at her side and turning her over. She was unconscious. Blood ran from a wound over her eye, streaking her face. Without the magic field, he couldn’t heal her. So he did the only thing he could do: he wrapped his arms around her and held her tight.
An explosive crackle of thunder rocked the mountain.
Quin looked back and squinted through the glare. Across the Circle, Darien was on his feet, surrounded by a sphere of dazzling light. Above him, the creature disgorged a stream of flame that gushed against Darien’s brilliant shield, unable to penetrate. Darien danced back, raised his weapon, and swung it around in a great arc. A compressed wave of solid air slammed into the demon, knocking it from the sky and hurling it to the ground with a furious shriek.
The monster recovered quickly. It took to the air again then spun on wing, turning to retaliate. It opened its mouth and belched forth a roiling inferno of flames. Darien staggered, holding the talisman up defensively as a torrent of fire streamed over him. He fell to his knees, holding the glowing talisman over his head and straining with all his might to keep the shield of argent light in place.
The demon landed, spewing gouts of flame into the air. Its tail cracked into Darien, knocking him to the ground. He lost his grip on the morning star, and it flew away from him. He scrambled after it, snatching the talisman up and rolling onto hi
s back just in time, as the demon landed on top of him. He used the weapon to bludgeon the monster’s head, sending the creature cringing back in a showering spray of ink-dark blood. The demon flapped into the air with a cry of outrage, then banked sharply back toward the Circle, streaming fire in its wake.
The creature attacked, throwing itself against Darien’s shield and sending him hurling backward. Overhead, the clouds thundered their fury. Bleeding and dazed, Darien fought his way back to his feet. But the argent brilliance of his weapon was dimming, his arms sagging to his sides.
The demon let out a hungering screech, then turned to attack. This time, it penetrated Darien’s weakened defenses. The beast’s mouth closed on his chest. Darien howled, flailing in the demon’s grasp. Bringing the morning star up, he battered it against the monster’s leathery hide.
The creature tossed him into the air, flinging him across the tiles of the square.
Darien rolled to a stop at the edge of the cliff. He pushed himself up and stood, swaying, his back against the cliff’s harrowing edge.
The demon took flight, circling upward over the terrace. It opened its jaws, baring a mouthful of chiseled teeth.
Fire gushed from the creature’s mouth. Darien threw himself sideways in an attempt to dodge. He wasn’t fast enough.
The blast of flames swept Darien off his feet, hurling him over the cliff’s edge.
“NO!” Quin screamed.
Overhead, the skies strobed and rumbled their fury.
The demon alighted on the terrace and, noticing Quin, stalked forward. Quin set Naia on the ground and rose, stepping between her and the monster. The demon opened its mouth, smoke trailing from its nostrils. Its sides expanded as it filled its bellows with a great chestful of air.
Quin threw his hands up.
There was a violent gush of wind, the crackling sound of flapping wings.
The demon shrieked as it was snatched into the air by a pair of enormous talons. It writhed and twisted, squirming to break free, finally dislodging itself from the dark-scaled creature that veered upward into the sky.
Quin threw himself to the ground.
Overhead, a tremendous dragon unfurled wings large enough to dominate the sky. It banked gracefully, circling the turbulent pillar of light. Its obsidian scales looked blacker than the abyss against the awful glow of the Gateway.
Quin gawked up at the sky, shaking his head in mute denial, jaw slack in disbelief.
Darien.
The dragon tucked its wings and plunged into a steep dive. With a deafening roar, it opened its mouth and flooded the Circle with flames. The demon was thrown across the ground, rolling to a stop. It lay still for a moment, singed and smoldering.
The dragon alighted on the Circle with a graceful backstroking of wings, the wind of its landing whipping Quin’s hair like a gale. The beast advanced, stalking forward, head lowered and nostrils flaring. Cowering before it, the demon scrambled back. There was a brilliant flash of light.
The demon was gone.
In its place reared another dragon, larger than the first, its scales a dark emerald green. It took fluidly to the air, the obsidian dragon vaulting after it.
The sky thundered as the two beasts collided overhead, a writhing tangle of wings and talons and gushing streaks of flame. Both creatures screamed their rage, their claws raking scales, serrated teeth shredding wings. The ferocity of their battle trembled the clouds and shook the very roots of the mountain. Their dark blood fell from the sky like rain.
The monsters broke apart. The emerald dragon beat the air furiously to gain height, while the other soared low, favoring an injured wing. It banked over the terrace and angled sharply downward toward the valley.
The green dragon roared, wingtips parting the clouds, then threw itself into a plummeting dive. Its talons outstretched, it scooped its enemy out of the sky, dashing the black dragon hard against the cliff face.
Rock fractured. Part of the cliffside gave way, raining stone down onto the valley floor. Recovering, the black dragon roared a challenge. It pushed off from the cliff with a powerful thrust of its hindquarters, slithering after its adversary.
The beasts crashed together and locked in the air, a mass of spewing flames and clashing wings. Together, the dragons grappled with claws and teeth. Twined together in a deadly knot, each strove to rip the throat out of the other. Locked in a death-spiral, the two creatures plummeted down the face of the mountain, ragged wings outstretched, helpless to break their fall.
Quin sprang toward the cliff’s edge, halting just in time to witness the dragons break apart. The black dragon tumbled away, coming to a rolling stop on the ground. The emerald dragon slammed against a rock outcrop then dropped, broken and lifeless, to the valley floor.
Above, a horrendous grating noise filled the night. The mountains lurched as if convulsed.
The spear of light erupted violently. The pillar shivered and distorted, caving in on itself. The green spire roiled like a frothing geyser, collapsing into the mountainside. The clouds above it slammed together with a shocking fury that showered the night with jagged streaks of lightning.
Shaking, Quin pushed himself back from the cliff’s edge and stumbled back to Naia’s side. He dropped down next to her and pulled her into his arms, clutching her tight.
“It’s over,” he assured her, stroking his fingers through her hair.
42
Damned
Darien hadn’t expected to wake.
He had a feeling he’d been floating somewhere between full sleep and full wakefulness for quite some time, like a man drowning in the ocean, groping for the surface. He cracked open his eyes, blinking against a riotous glare of light that stung his vision. He was shivering. Shaking. He couldn’t control it. The air was stale. Cold. He burned from within. Beyond the light, the world was an obscure haze, as though he were looking out a window through a pane of mottled glass.
Something wet touched his face. A rag. It made him shiver harder.
“Where…” he whispered. It was all he could do to get that one syllable past his throat.
“You’re in Glen Farquist. You’ve been unconscious for ten days.”
He licked his parched lips. His eyelids felt too heavy to hold open any longer. He closed his eyes and drifted back under.
The next time he surfaced, he felt a bit better. He opened his eyes. He was still shivering, just not as violently as before. There was movement. And a voice. He tried to focus.
“Naia…”
“I’m here,” she said. She was holding his hand. “Quin’s here too.”
The room was so cold. So bright. A raging fire burned inside him, greater than he could ever endure.
“Try to stay awake,” she urged.
He couldn’t. It was too hard. He was too tired.
He drifted for a long time, floating on a tide of muddled dreams. The next time he awoke, he felt stronger. The room wasn’t so bright, the air not so cold and stale. He’d stopped shivering. But the fire within him still raged.
He fought to sit up.
“Careful. You are still very weak.”
Hands caught him and helped him upright. Someone stuffed a pillow behind his back. Darien looked around, squinting, at last recognizing where he was. In the Temple of Death. In the same room they’d lent him two years before.
“Here.” Naia draped a blanket over him, her face tight with concern.
“What happened?” he asked in a raspy voice.
She glanced back over her shoulder. Looking past her, Darien saw Quin lingering in the doorway. Holding his hat in his hands, he approached the bed and sat down in a chair beside Naia. He kept his eyes averted and didn’t say a word.
“Kyel and Quin destroyed the Well of Tears,” Naia informed him gently. “You killed Zavier Renquist. The portal collapsed.”
The flood of relief Darien felt almost washed him away. He closed his eyes. “Where’s Kyel?”
“I’m sorry, Darien. He didn’t surv
ive.”
That hurt. It hurt deeper than he’d thought it would. Darien took a deep breath, feeling a knot tighten in his throat. Kyel had been more than just his acolyte. He’d been someone Darien respected and admired, the most honorable man he’d ever known.
Naia patted his hand. “You need food. I’ll bring you some.”
Darien shook his head. “I’m not hungry.”
“You must eat.” she insisted. “You need to get your strength back.”
“For what?”
Darien saw in her face that Naia didn’t have an answer to that question. Neither did he. He could feel all thirty-two tiers of power raging inside him, burning him up from within. He couldn’t survive that kind of assault, and she knew it. He saw the pity written in her eyes, and even Quin couldn’t look at him. They both knew as well as he did that there was no point.
Naia said softly, “There might be something we can do.”
“No.” Darien shook his head. “Whatever it is, I don’t want it.”
Naia squeezed his hand. In the consoling tones of a priestess, she said, “It is your choice, of course, how you wish to die. I do understand the predicament you’re in. It’s not enviable. But you do have options.”
Darien looked up at her uncertainly.
“You can stay here,” she told him. “The priests of Death would care for you the rest of your days. They would be honored to do so, for the great service you rendered their goddess. Or you can come with Quin and me. We are going to Rothscard to build a school for mages. Nothing like Aerysius. But we could certainly use your knowledge and experience, as long as you are able to provide it.”
It was a worthwhile endeavor, and it made Darien glad to hear. But he knew he wouldn’t be around long enough to make a difference. He shook his head.
Quin blew out a heavy sigh, then finally turned to face him. “What are you going to do?” he asked in a dismal tone.
Darien shrugged. “I’m damned,” he said, stating the obvious. “I don’t want to go back to the Netherworld, and I’m denied the Atrament. My only recourse is Oblivion.”
Darkfall Page 34
