The Heir of Ænæria

by Thom L Matthews

  “Relax, she’s a friend,” Ben said. He hurried over to Sierra and gave her a good scratch under the chin and behind the ears. She barked excitedly and licked his cheek.

  “I missed you too, girl.”

  The scouts exchanged fearful looks. Draka said something ugly in Orkish and then something louder to the scouts which seemed to silence them.

  “Keep it controlled,” she said, pointing at Sierra.

  Ben nodded and continued his way forward.

  The path narrowed, and they formed a single file line. Liv was close behind Skalle and Draka, chatting their ears off. Four scouts followed behind, and Darius walked behind them with Mandi and Gus. Ben and the remaining six scouts and Sierra held up the rear. Mandi had tried to walk by Ben’s side, but even after calling them back to help, Ben wasn’t too interested in talking with either her or Darius. No emotions. Just prepare for what may come.

  “It’s just down here,” Skalle said, pointing down the path. The path narrowed even further, leaning close to a precipitous edge and a drop into the vicious basin below. A dozen or so yards down, the path twisted and led directly behind the nearest of the immense waterfalls.

  Suddenly, Hüginn cawed sharply and landed on Ben’s shoulder. It opened the motion block on its forehead and showed Ben something terrible.

  Just before he could warn the others of what Hüginn had seen, something snapped, and a shiver crept over him. It leapt down from the cliff above, baring its fangs with an ugly snarl.

  Ben pushed Gus out of the way and drew the Voidsweeper, squeezing the hilt and letting through a hint of green light. He slashed off its arms and burned the wounds to halt the bleeding that would attract more of its kin.

  “Ferals!” Ben yelled.

  Everyone drew their weapons, looking all around them for signs of attack. He’d fought off dozens in the trial of the Cursed Grove. If only there were so few here. Hundreds of beady eyes reflecting the light of the moon and stars staring greedily at the ground of fresh meat.

  “Go, go, go!” Ben yelled. They ran along the path as fast as they could. Liv slipped, and a feral landed from the overpass just next to her. Skalle lifted her out of the way and decapitated the creature with a swing of his blade. Hideous screams carried over even the deafening roar of the crashing falls.

  Draka staved off many with her spear, twirling it around with graceful yet deadly mastery. The other scouts weren’t nearly as skilled, but they carried their own well enough, demonstrating years of hardened experience.

  Like water from the falls, ferals poured over the cliffsides and poured onto the narrow path. Many fell from the congested path, their wails swallowed whole by the Mouth of Ney’s call.

  The Voidsweeper roared into a massive green fire extending several feet beyond the sword’s broken edge until it took the shape as a full-length blade. Across, up, diagonal; every which way the blade sliced the air and flesh alike. There was no time for regrets against these creatures. They weren’t human anymore—all too far gone through whatever sickness the Enochians had inflicted upon them.

  They kept rushing in. Down from the ledges above, from behind where the path still fit four or five abreast—far too many to face in this narrow of a space. They’d be torn apart, eaten alive, or thrown off the ledge and into the water. Even from this height, Ben doubted the others could survive from such a height. The only safe path was forward, and there the ferals could reach them if they ran just a tad faster than Ben and his friends or jumped from above. They needed to be cut off and slowed down.

  He squeezed the hilt of the Voidsweeper, extinguishing the green aura. He slashed against the nearest feral, letting the cold black steel spill the creature’s blood, unhindered by the cauterizing properties of the activated Voidsweeper. The cut went for the feral’s neck, and red sprayed all across Ben’s armor. He winced at the gore and death but bit his lip and reminded himself to agonize over it later. He slashed another feral’s throat, and another and another, until he saw red not just from blood but from the lust within his inner Nephilim mode trying to break free.

  Beady eyes and hungry stares turned to Ben, the ferals’ focus on the abundant smell of blood. He was soaking wet in the cursed ichor, a snack the pitiful Orks couldn’t resist.

  “What are you doing?” Gus screamed over the din of their surroundings.

  “Distracting them. Get behind the falls—I’ll meet you all there!”

  He squeezed once more against the hilt as hard as he could, the green energy flaring as bright as the sun at midday. Ferals hissed and squealed but rushed like moths to the blinding light all the same. Talons and fangs tore into his armor. It wasn’t long before some broke through and pierced his skin to pour forth more blood for the crazed ghouls to feast upon.

  Sierra tore at the felled Orks and did her best to keep them off Ben. Though her body was practically invincible, she wasn’t immune to be slowed down by the sheer number of ferals in her way. Few tried to attack her—likely because she didn’t bleed.

  What brought them here? None of us have been wounded. No one has wounds exposed to the air for them to smell.

  He turned away from the shining green light to see his companions on the last legs of the path to the Vault behind the falls. A few ferals lingered, but not too many for them to handle, Ben hoped. He turned his attention once again to the creatures clawing away at him.

  The sword hadn’t shone this bright before; it hadn’t burned this hot. Beads of sweat evaporated the moment they formed across his brow. He was on his belly now, somehow still holding on tight to the Voidsweeper. His vision was tinted scarlet as his inner Nephilim defense mode tried harder to break free from its shackles within Ben’s mind. He only let through so much of his power—enough to cut off the sensations of pain from the ferals. He needed the rest of it for Tatanka. If it were all spent now, then this would be for nothing.

  Ben held his sword out straight in front of him. A wide arc of energy burst forth from the broken blade like an unfolding fan. The ferals in front of him didn’t have time to scream as they met incendiary demises; those at his flanks were slammed against the rocky wall to his left or thrown off the path into the basin below. All the stored energy within the Voidsweeper released at once, detonating like a bomb of bright green light that engulfed all the creatures ahead of him.

  There was silence and there was ringing. Nothing else. He opened his eye and saw the smoldering corpses of the ferals strewn out along the path. More and more he questioned the limitations of this mighty weapon. The more he did, the more he wondered where his father had obtained it. For the memories that had leached into Ben’s mind had assured him that Alphonse had not received the sword from Jean, and Mimir had confirmed that it was not of Enochian origin.

  Ben hadn’t been the only one spared of the Voidsweeper’s explosion. The few lucky ferals to his back had been spared, only knocked back from the concussing explosion. They found their footing and instead of running in fear for their lives as any sane person would do, the ferals clambered along the precipitous path and rushed at Ben, still so keen on drinking his Nephilim blood.

  He’d not come out of the explosion unscathed either. Though the fiery blast had short forward in a fanning arc, the chaotic energy was not so easy to control. Flames had erupted on his sleeves and burned through to his skin before he could react to put them out. The strain of reining in his powers to prevent losing control took its toll. He panted and tasted the iron tinge of blood in his mouth. A migraine was coming—he could feel that. No matter, he told himself. I’ll just block that pain too. He needed to keep going.

  He lifted himself back onto his feet and raised his weapon to continue the fight. His friends were no longer visible on the path. Hopefully, they’re behind the falls, waiting by the Vault.

  The ferals stumbled forward, each trying to get to Ben before the other but succeeding only in slowing another down as they raced along the narrow trail.

  He squeezed the Voidsweeper, planning to unleash a
blast of energy that would knock them off the ledge.

  Nothing happened. The blade didn’t glow. Gjoll dammit, not now! The explosion must have used the Voidsweeper’s remaining stores. It seemed the setting sun wasn’t strong enough to charge the weapon quickly. Without its power, the Voidsweeper was just a poorly weighted sword missing half its blade. Using that broken half would require him to be far closer to the denizen than he wanted. He’d sustained enough damage as it was, and he still had another enemy to think about.

  Now he felt himself at an impasse. He needed to reserve his strength and energy more than ever now that the Voidsweeper had been depleted. Yet he needed to finish off these ferals to get to the Vault and his friends.

  He reversed the grip of his sword, holding it like a dagger to stab forcefully at the ravenous ghouls. As his blade punctured the chest of the nearest feral, another gripped his sword hand and bit down forcefully against his wrist.

  Ben let out a cry of pain and slammed his left fist against the creature’s face, breaking its jaw away from his arm.

  Another dozen ferals raced toward him. He pulled out the blade from the still feral’s chest and readied himself for more battle when another snarl came from the ledge above and pounced on the next group of crazed and bloodthirsty creatures. Sierra’s fangs punctured their throats, and her claws swept at their bellies just as quickly. She charged forth, knocking feral after feral off the narrow ledge.

  With a short running start, Ben vaulted onto Sierra’s back. “Forward, girl,” he commanded. She barked and picked up speed down the remainder of the narrow slithering path. Moss and lichens clung to the cliffside, wet and glistening from the splashing torrents rushing just a few feet beyond the path. The pouring water echoed liked tumultuous waves through the tunnel as Ben and Sierra arrived behind the falls.

  His friends and even a few of the scouts cheered at his entrance, though Darius also had his glowing orange sword raised and ready for another fight.

  “Put that down, will you?” Mandi said, shoving Darius’s sword arm down. “I think it’s safe to say the ferals were dealt with if Ben and Sierra are here.”

  Darius cursed. “You’re really going to get us killed one of these days, Benedict Limmetrad.”

  Mandi elbowed Darius in the shoulder. “He’s gotten this far, huh? Give him some slack.” She turned to Ben and winked. “But not too much.”

  “Ben, I already put some salved bandages on the others while you were out there,” Gus said. “Let me take a look at your wounds before we go any farther.”

  “No, save the supplies. I heal fast enough.”

  Gus rolled his eyes and shrugged. “Suit yourself.”

  “I do not understand,” Draka said. Ben and the others looked over at her.

  “What?” Ben asked.

  “Augustus examined us after the attack. None reported wounds from before. Why were we attacked?”

  “Because them things are crazy!” Liv said. It wasn’t a bad argument.

  “Draka is right. They should not be so active in the daylight. Especially if none of us were bleeding.”

  Ben had a bad feeling about this. “Gus, are you sure no one was wounded before this?”

  “Of course, I’m not sure. If someone was freshly bleeding before the attack, I’d have no way of telling the difference between new wounds. But everyone swears they weren’t bleeding. I believe them.”

  “It is the wolf,” Draka said. “They followed it.”

  Ben shook his head. “They have no reason to. She doesn’t bleed.”

  Draka’s brow furrowed. She looked at Skalle and asked him something in Orkish.

  “What is it?” Ben asked.

  “She asks if she misinterpreted your tongue. She does not understand how a wolf cannot bleed.”

  The scouts grumbled among themselves in Orkish, probably agreeing with whatever Draka had said.

  “Take a look at her,” Ben said to Draka. “She doesn’t have a single scratch on her. All the blood is from the ferals.”

  Draka looked at Skalle curiously and then back at Sierra. It didn’t look like she believed him.

  Ben let out a deep breath. He picked up the dun Voidsweeper and nodded at Sierra. She approached him and turned her side to him. He slashed against her coat. Draka and the other scouts gasped. Even Gus and Liv looked on with disbelief.

  “See. Not a drop.”

  “I do not understand,” Draka said.

  “I don’t have time to explain. But I do think I have an idea why the ferals attacked us. Whatever or whoever is in the Vault sent them. They knew we were coming.”

  “If what you say of these Vaults is true, then perhaps you are right about this too,” Skalle said.

  “Then there is a way to heal ferals?” Draka asked.

  Ben frowned. He didn’t want to make empty promises. This was little more than a hunch. “Maybe. The only way to know is to continue onward.”

  Darius smirked and nodded. “Let’s get going then, shall we?”

  They advanced slowly, each of them on edge after the surprise attack from the ferals. They must have known to guard the Vault. Why else could there have been so many clustered together just outside the falls?

  Darius had tried to keep Legate’s Bane up high for the light, but Mandi was quick to chide him for wasting the weapon’s power, and instead, he used it to fashion a torch. It wasn’t long before they didn’t need the firelight. After their final turn, a light bright enough to illuminate the passage all its own shined from the end of the tunnel. A bright, deep blue in the fashion of that familiar, almost comforting symbol. The one he’d grown up staring at on the back of his father’s watch. Mimir had called it a mandala. Long before seeing the Vault on Svaldway, it represented the mystery of his father, who in turn had it tattooed over his heart. It was a symbol of his love for Jean. Alphonse knew who the Enochians were, but he made it a symbol of the Miners Guild. It was no longer just their symbol. It was the symbol of progress and discovery. Of humanity. Whether the Enochians liked it or not, their Vaults were being used against them to rebuild humanity. To arm them with the secrets of the Old Days. Their hubris would be their downfall.

  Liv, Gus, and the Orks all gasped at the shock of seeing the glowing mandala. They’d never seen such powers before.

  Ben came to a halt and smeared a bit of his blood from the encounter with the ferals across the Vault door. The mandala changed from blue to bright green. The walls and floor rumbled as the door separated down the middle, opening the Vault.

  All the others looked at their surroundings with awe and reverence. It must have been the grandest thing any of them had ever seen. It wasn’t all that impressive to Ben. From the first corridor, it was clear this Vault was far smaller than the Grand Vault. Like that Vault, this one had a sign at the end of the first corridor with a map of the chamber’s layout. There weren’t any extra hallways or floors like in Svaldway, but it was large enough for Tatanka to work on something for so many years.

  A hall to a greater chamber lay in the back, with four rooms in between. According to the map, the back chamber was ostentatiously larger than the other rooms. Ben walked quickly, nearly at the pace of a jog. He didn’t have the time to gawk at everything around him as he knew his friends had wanted to do. Though he did stop by one room, which had a healing bath nearly identical to the one in Svaldway. Healing takes hours. We can’t afford to sit around in here without first scouting the place.

  Ben led them out of the chamber and back to the central corridor, and Hüginn glided ahead of them to keep watch. They continued their pace down the hall until they reached a sliding glass door that separated the corridor from the massive central station.

  Ben took in a deep breath. “You guys ready?”

  They all nodded, and Sierra offered a low bark of affirmation. Ben exhaled and slid the glass door open. On the other side was a high-ceilinged chamber with a wide pillar that looked like one of those towers reaching to the sky from the Old Days on the outskirt
s of Ney. He couldn’t comprehend how such a tall structure could exist in the confines of the Vault. Especially underground.

  At the base of the inner tower was a chair with its back to Ben and the others. The chair sat, or rather, floated, before a series of motion block terminals and various keys and levels. As soon as the door behind them slid back to a close, the levitating chair turned around. Resting in it like a king in his throne was a creature more horrific than the ferals. A skeleton with bones as black as soot, laid out over dark crimson muscle that shined in the blue and white lights of the chamber. Its head looked like a crowned skull, with five jagged points sticking out a few inches above the forehead. And its face. Oh, its face was horrendous. A detailed skull with a mouth curved into a sinister smile.

  The creature stepped down from his chair and tilted his head ever so slightly to the side. He stood straight, looking to be even larger than the seven-foot-tall Skalle by their side. A deep and chilling voice came from the man, though his bony smile did not move.

  “Ah, you must Erma-Jinn’s half-breed I’ve heard so much about. Quite the gnawing insect you are. The plagues I’d sent weren’t enough. Nor were my pets outside the falls, hmm? I suppose I will have to make more to replace the ones you discarded.”

  Ben clenched his fists hard in an attempt to stop his hands from trembling. His nails dug into his skin and drew blood.

  “Who are you?” Ben asked.

  A hollow, echoing laugh boomed from the black and red skull. “Surely you know who I am if you’ve made it this far. I am the healer of this land. The god of those base people in that shambling city.”

  “Tatanka.” Ben had whispered to himself, but the skeleton creature seemed to have heard him.

  “Yes, that is what they call me. Named for their precious bison spirit. Though I am the true origin of their tales.”

  “So then it’s true, the curse is from Tatanka,” Skalle said with defeat in his eyes. “Why then? Why did you curse my brother?”

  Tatanka’s skeletal face was expressionless, unreadable. But Ben sensed something coming from him. Something dark and dangerous. He didn’t like it.