Immortal Swordslinger 2

by Dante King

  He raised his left hand. His palm glowed with fire again, and he launched a torrent of flames from it. His technique hit me like a flamethrower, a fierce and unrelenting spray of heat that brought a cry of pain from my throat. My armor melted and ran off. The balustrade behind me disappeared in a cloud of steam. All that was left of my outer defenses was a black layer of ash.

  The flames subsided, and Horix stared at me, his eyes wide.

  “How did you—”

  “Ambidexterity is useful,” I managed. “Didn’t you just say that?”

  “You’ll need more than a few cheap tricks to defeat me, acolyte. The ash element is weak. It will wither before acid.”

  Horix whipped his hand forward, and ice formed around it. But before he could draw a bead on my throat, I let the power of water flow. My head spun, and my stomach churned, but I managed to envelop myself in a small Smothering Mist.

  Horix hurled his acidic spears into my thin cloak of mist en masse, but I’d created just enough to make my corner of the balcony invisible for a few seconds. I kicked off against the wall and slid back into the center of the balcony as Ice Spears peppered the ground around me.

  I forced myself to my feet, raised the Sundered Heart Sword, and gripped it with both hands. My magic tank was empty, but I still had the sword, and I still knew how to fight.

  The last of my mist swirled around me, and Horix appeared through it. The remains of his Frozen Armor still clung to him. His face was pale, drawn, and terrifyingly focused on mine.

  “You’re a disappointment,” he said as he thrust the Depthless Dream.

  I deflected the first blow, ducked beneath a second, and slid away to avoid a third. My back pressed up against the wall at the corner of the balcony, and I realized that I was out of space. There would be no sliding clear any more. No skids past Horix to safety.

  “You know nothing about reality,” Horix snarled as he battered at me. I wanted to strike back, but his blows came in so hard and so fast that it was all I could do to parry them. “You think you’re on the path to enlightenment, but you’re just one more wastrel bringing the empire to ruin.”

  I swung my sword at his chest, but he knocked it aside and thrust the trident at my throat. I flung myself to one side and almost fell over the edge of the balcony. The trident hit the wall where my head had been.

  “The path you follow is an illusion,” Horix said. “The Immortal Swordslinger is a myth, a lie, an idle dream for fools and those who seek to undermine our strength. You’re nothing but a vulgarian who will never find the true path.”

  I slammed my body into the elf as Horix pulled the trident back. But I was too slow. He spun the trident around, and its blunt end hit me in the chin. My head rocked back and slammed against the wall as my vision filled with stars.

  “Beqai has awoken,” I said and spat blood. “He’ll tear you and your Straight Path out by the roots.”

  “Our fingers are everywhere, disciple,” Horix whispered. “A local lord like King Beqai is simple enough to remove. But others of our path hover over every clan and guild in this region. The Diamond Coast is moments away from our control. Your own beloved Wysaro City buckled easily enough. You walk a failed path.”

  Horix raised the trident high and plunged it toward my head with all his strength. I lifted the Sundered Heart and caught the blow, but its force was too much for me to stand. Exhausted muscles gave way, and I sank to one knee as razor-sharp points hovered half a foot away from my face.

  My arm trembled as Horix kept pressing down. The tips of the trident sank toward my eyes as their points gleamed in the last of the moonlight. Smoke drifted out of the hall as the fire from my battle with Cadrin spread, and I heard something crash down inside. The sound of battle faded far below us.

  “You hear that?” I said through gritted teeth. “The battle’s almost over. You lost.”

  “As long as I stand, I will never lose,” Horix said. “I will kill you and then, I will bring this building crashing down, as I planned to from the moment your pathetic army arrived. The Depthless Dream is mine and with it, I will remove the undisciplined and the aberrant from the Diamond Coast.”

  Horix leaned in on the trident as sweat ran down his face. But his cold eyes never left mine for a second.

  I dropped to the floor and let his movement drive the trident into the ice beneath my sword hand. I gathered the ash from my body, produced a small spike with Compress Ash, and plunged it into his hand.

  Horix screamed and jerked his wounded hand back. I smashed both of my feet into his gut and shot him back over the slippery ice to the balcony. I grabbed hold of the trident and wrenched it out of my hand. Then, I stood with the Sundered Heart Sword in one hand and the Depthless Dream Trident in the other.

  “Well played, lo Pashat. But you’ve only bought yourself a moment longer.” Horix removed the ash spike I’d created with a swift tug and tossed it behind him. It sailed out into the night and vanished from view.

  He wrapped his good hand around the injured one. Fire flashed between them and when they parted, the injured hand was charred on front and back. Blood had blackened around the wound and sealed his fingers into a single curled fist.

  I swayed drunkenly as I fought to control my wobbling limbs. My vision blurred and refocused from one moment to the next.

  Horix shook his head in disdain and flung his arms up. Sickly green clouds swirled as a storm gathered above him and daggers of acidic ice rained down. They didn’t seem to touch the guildmaster, but the ice around him became dotted with tiny craters as the acid melted holes where it fell.

  “I might not be the Swordslinger yet, but I have two Immense Blades now.” I held the weapons out in front of me. Power ran through them, ancient forces of fire and water far deeper and more powerful than anything I’d ever worked inside myself.

  “They are nothing! The Swordslinger is a lie!” Horix ripped his arms forward as he yelled. The Toxic Blizzard crossed the space between us and melted the surfaces of walls and balcony to leave steaming green puddles in its wake.

  I took a deep breath and found the last of the strength and Vigor left within me.

  “Sweet man, what are you doing? You have nothing left to give.”

  “This ends now,” I told Nydarth.

  I instinctively called forth the power of the weapons. Flames curled around the Sundered Heart. Water streamed off the floor in a huge torrent and focused around the steel of the Depthless Dream.

  I called upon the two elements of fire and water. Their channels were almost completely empty and threatened to crumple. I focused on the pathways for two techniques with the last remnants of the Vigor within me. The internal threads of Untamed Torch and Crashing Wave spiraled around each other and joined together into a sizzling route that seared my insides.

  I gritted my teeth, crossed the weapons, and held them toward Horix. A house-sized column of superheated steam erupted from the ends of the spirit weapons and slammed into him. His feet vanished from the floor as my dual techniques obliterated his defenses and blasted him off the balcony.

  The elf screamed an earsplitting-note that echoed throughout the guild house. Skin and flesh evaporated beneath the fury of the blast, and his bones shattered like glass as his corpse twisted into the sky. The guildmaster’s ashes fluttered in the breeze of the ocean, and the Toxic Blizzard dissipated.

  The blasts of fire and water died as the last vestige of Vigor left my body. The last of Horix’s storm of acid faded. I stood alone and exposed on the balcony, and my eyes looked out across the ocean beneath a gray pre-dawn sky.

  The weapons fell from my exhausted hands and clanged on the ground. I sank to my knees and closed my eyes. It was over. I could rest.

  “Stay awake, Ethan,” Nydarth begged. “You must. Do not fade into the darkness.”

  But I had no strength left to stand. I barely even had enough to open my eyes.

  The notes of a song somewhere beneath the crashing of the waves and the crackle
of flames drifted from the hall behind me. Something cool and wet touched the back of my head. It flowed across me, drew out my aches, and restored small pockets of my energy.

  I took a deep breath, raised my head, and looked up. To the east, the sun was rising over the mainland. Its glow seemed to set the strait alight and turned water to gold.

  A hand settled on my shoulder. I turned to see Kumi kneeling beside me. She chanted and swayed. Water streamed out across my body and restored a trickle of strength. It was enough to stand, maybe, but I doubted I could even call up enough magic to light a match.

  The light caught Kumi’s face, and she smiled; it was the brightest, most beautiful thing I’d seen in a long time.

  “You won, Swordslinger,” she said as she helped me to my feet.

  “We won, your Highness,” I replied. “Horix has fallen, and his guild will fall leaderless to your father’s men.”

  “All thanks to you.”

  “Does that mean I’ve proved my worthiness for a royal bride?”

  She grinned. “Perhaps. We’ll see.”

  I wrapped my arms around her and pulled her to me. A life-affirming pleasure surged into my veins as I felt her warmth and sweetness greet my mouth.

  The sun rose over a broken guild and signaled a new age for the Diamond Coast.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  We sailed back to the mainland in the same boats that had carried us to war. They were less crowded than they had been on that first crossing. Some of the previous occupants lay amid the piles of dead outside the guild house and awaited a burial at sea. Others had stayed behind to guard the prisoners, extinguish fires, and organize the spoils of the battle. Some of the guild members and many of the servants had surrendered peacefully. But there were others who resisted their new circumstances. They would have to be watched carefully while King Beqai determined what to do with them.

  Our magic craft sped us swiftly back to the docks. We were some of the first back to Qihin City and certainly the first to step into the royal palace.

  I stood with Kumi on the steps of the great hall as she dispatched servants to fetch food, water, and medical supplies. The princess directed people as effortlessly as she did her water magic as she organized the initial clean-up from the battle against the guild.

  Beqai joined us an hour later. He sank proudly into his throne as his daughter sent away the last of the court nobles.

  A set of new servants appeared. They supported a comfortable-looking litter above them. Labu stirred weakly on it as they bore him across the courtyard on the impressive stretcher. His face was pale, and blood-encrusted bandages wrapped his chest, legs, and left arm.

  “Father,” he croaked when the bearers brought him close. “Kumi. Forgive me for standing against you.”

  “It is already forgiven,” Kumi said. “I’m just glad to have my brother back.”

  She hummed and swayed, and water rose from a bowl beside her. It flowed across Labu’s wounds and soothed him as he struggled against the pain.

  His eyes met mine, and he looked uncertain.

  I reached out and clasped his hand.

  “You fought well, Prince,” I said. “In the end, you acquitted yourself as a warrior of honor and a proud bearer of your bloodline. You’ll always carry that with you.”

  “I may have dismissed you, Swordslinger, but we could not have won the battle without you,” Labu managed. “I owe you. And I’ll always owe you. Should you need, call for me—”

  “Go sleep,” I told him with a laugh. “Recover. I’m sure we’ll see each other again.”

  Labu turned to look at his father. Beqai leaned over the stretcher and whispered something in his ear. Labu smiled, then lay back and fell asleep. The servants turned and carried him away at a signal from Kumi.

  “A feast will be given in celebration of the living and fallen,” Beqai told me. “Will you join us?”

  I smiled tiredly. “I’d be honored.”

  Kumi ushered me up to my room and left me on my bed with a deep kiss and a smile. Moonlight touched the comfortable furnishings when I finally awoke again. I changed into a fresh set of plain robes and made my way down the palace stairs to find my friends.

  I followed celebratory sounds to the main courtyard where a hundred braziers illuminated and warmed the open space. Food was heaped up on tables, and casks of wine and ale sat open next to them. Servants with ladles at the ready offered me a cup as I passed them. I accepted it with a grateful bow and sipped at it. Dancers, jugglers, and acrobats dotted the battlements and performed for a raucous crowd of warriors and Wild Augmenters. The air hummed with a cheerful buzz of conversation, song, and enthusiastic drinking.

  King Beqai had wasted no time in organizing the banquet for the victory. I’d thought that it would be poorly attended, with everyone still recovering from the fight, but I was badly mistaken. Hundreds of the Qihin and their allies had flowed up to the palace in celebratory spirits. Many were still bruised and bandaged, and others leaned on their friends, but it didn’t dampen the atmosphere at all. It simply enhanced it. We’d fought and survived Horix and his Straight Path devotees.

  I walked wearily through the throng. My Vigor had taken its time to reemerge after that last effort on the tower against Horix. I’d fought fire with fire before, but it was clear to me that I still had much to learn. For all of his posturing about his power and focus, Horix had made points that hit a little close to home. It simply wasn’t enough to rely on sheer speed, strength, and force of will.

  I’d need to innovate and find new ways to implement my existing techniques. Vesma had displayed ingenuity by using Untamed Torch to make a flaming weapon. I already had a bunch of techniques, and they were the fundamental building blocks of others I could invent.

  From time to time, someone would draw me into a group, and we would drink a toast together. My shoulder was slapped so many times, it started to feel sore, but I wasn’t going to complain. Every one of those gestures was an acknowledgement of the battle I’d helped these people win. It was only right that we celebrate together.

  I found a pile of barrels and refilled my wine cup for the fourth time. Faryn appeared out of the crowd and beamed at me as I knocked back a deep pull of the Qihin’s imported wine.

  “Shouldn’t you be out there with the others?” she asked. “If this is anyone’s victory, it’s yours.”

  “And I’m happy to celebrate,” I said. “But they haven’t developed a technique to refill your cup with wine just yet. Is there a combination of wood and water that makes wine? Are there wine Augmenters?”

  Faryn laughed. “I’ve never heard of such a thing. But if you discover it, be sure to share it with me. I’d love for you to educate me in the art of wine Augmentation. ”

  “Who’s the teacher now?” I grinned. “Have you seen the others?”

  “They’re on their way, I’m sure. But before they get here—”

  She pulled me close and kissed me. Her lips were tender and lingered on mine as her tongue slipped into my mouth. She reached for my crotch and gently brushed her hand against me. The sensation was gone almost as soon as it began, and I looked up to see Faryn smiling deviously.

  “I don’t want you getting too distracted by all these youngsters,” she said. “We haven’t had a moment alone since this mission started. I think we’ll need to rectify that as soon as the opportunity arises.”

  “Sounds like a plan,” I said as she led me back into the bustle of the party.

  I followed her and headed for a table piled high with cakes. I was just about to pick one up when a hand grabbed mine, and I was dragged into the shadows of an alcove beneath the walls.

  “Where have you been?” Vesma asked.

  “Drinking. You, too, by the smell of it,” I said as I poked her. “I was going to eat, too, but I think you’ve got different ideas.”

  “You’re damn right I do,” Vesma told me. “

  She pushed me up against the wall and kissed me hard. Our b
odies pressed tight against each other in a warm exchange of skin and racing pulses. There was something fierce and territorial about it, but I was happy to be swept along in the moment as I wrapped my arms around her wiry body.

  “That’ll do for now,” she said. Then, she pushed my arms away, flashed me a grin, and made a beeline for the wine barrels.

  I shook my head. The women in my life were a little intense at times. But I wouldn’t have had it any other way. I set out in search of Kegohr and found him slumped on a pile of cushions in the corner of the courtyard. A plate piled high with seafood lay next to him, and he was holding a tankard the size of a small keg.

  The crowd parted as I strolled toward him, and I saw the full picture. Kegohr’s other arm was around Veltai. The powerful warrior woman sat snuggled in close to him as one of her hands stroked the fur of his thigh. The two of them chomped through a small mountain of food and interspersed it with big gulps of beer and brief pauses to grin at each other. It was heartwarming to see my friend so happy, but I didn’t want to get too close. The big guy had fought as hard as anyone. He deserved some space.

  “Ethan, over here!” a sharp, nervous voice called out from over to my right.

  I looked around and saw Yo Hin sitting at a table with a goblet of wine in front of him. A pair of women sat on either side, shapely Qihin beauties with long dark hair and just a hint of silver scales running down their necks. They leaned in close and gave all of their attention to Yo Hin. His cheeks flushed as his eyes darted from side to side.

  I walked over and raised my cup. “Good to see you’re making friends, Yo Hin.”

  His eyes begged me to help him, but it was all I could do to keep a straight face.

  “Oh, yes,” said one of the women.

  “We’re going to be such good friends,” the other said as she draped an arm around his neck. “After all, you were quite the hero at the guild island.”

  “I don’t know about hero,” Yo Hin said.

  “And such a mighty Augmenter,” the first woman said as her hand slid under the table. “So… powerful.”