Date: 2016-04-01 07:00:00+00:00
Description: From the author of the Age of Dawn series comes the fifth installment, A New Light. When the seal of the Age of Dawn broke, Asebor was once again released upon the world, and with him came the scourge of his Death Spawn army. Walter's fate had been snared to their brutality after the first raid upon his village. They killed his parents, tortured his friends. Nyset has his heart, reunited after escaping the clutches of the Shadow Realm. The Shadow Realm is a plane of misery for the dead, ruled by the Shadow god. After taking the Silver Tower, the Death Spawn ravage the western lands with the Wr

A New Light

Book 5 of The Age of Dawn

Everet Martins

Contents

DRM

Dedication

Zoria Map

Newsletter

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Copyright

DRM

The author has provided this e-book to you without Digital Rights Management (DRM) software applied so you can read it on your personal devices. This e-book is for your personal use only. You may not print or post this e-book, or make this e-book publicly available in any way. You may not copy, reproduce or upload this e-book, other than to read it on one of your personal devices. Copyright infringement is against the law.

To everyone who has helped me along the way.

Zoria Map

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Chapter One

Prologue

The market square in the Silver Tower was in shambles. A merchant’s table was split down the middle, splinters strewn over a catapult stone wedged between it. The adjacent table was scorched to a blackened husk that would crumble at the slightest provocation. Others were in a similar state, splintered, bloodied, and battered by remnants of the Tower’s siege. There was a stream of glittering jewels left on the cobbles that had spilled from another table, most of them now crushed to dust under Death Spawn boots. A crate of apples and baskets of corn wilted in a corner. The maggots burrowed deep into the rotting food and flesh with equal fervor.

Hedges around the square, once ornate, were burned or hacked into unrecognizable skeletons of their former beauty. Rot Flies had created bulbous nests on the Tower’s high walls, setting up shop for the feast of corpses down below. The ground was bristling with spears, broken swords, torn robes, hunks of stone, and great patches of brown blood. The only sounds were the endless buzzing of wings and a pair of crows dueling over a piece of fetid tissue.

The water of the fountain had lost its glorious clarity, now still and a greenish-black hue. Two bodies lay propped over its marbled side. One man lay face down into the water, the woman facing up, as if having a nice back stretch. A spear had pinned her head to the fountain’s base, passing through her eye and out the back of her skull. Her intestines were pulled from her guts and wound around her neck for good measure.

The battlements encircling the square were like sets of shattered teeth. Great sections of wall had been brushed away by the Death Spawn’s catapults. Other sections, some still intact, had fallen around the square, leaning against stairways, casting it in jagged shadows. A wizard with a long mustache had been hanged using his own robes. He was stripped bare, dangling in the wind from the battlements. Interspersed around the outside of the Tower’s walls were at least fifty wizards, their skin removed and hanging from their ankles like tattered sails. It was a warning to anyone bold enough to set foot on this side of the realm. It was also a reminder to the world that this land had been seized in the Shadow Realm’s grip.

Behind the walls were the remains of spires, jagged strips of stone standing alone like discarded spears. They loomed around the Tower in varied states of disrepair. One looked like the mouth of an ancient beast, yawning open to reveal all the contents of wizard’s dormitories. Papers, laboratory equipment, and books of all sizes had fluttered to the ground around it. A gust came and swept the torn pages from an ancient tome into the air. Another spire was reduced to a single tower of stones; the mortar struggled to keep it upright.

Tower’s gardens, where the most renowned artists in the realm once came to ruminate, was now reduced to a burning trash heap. The fires had burned for months, tended by a pair of Cerumal, whose skin had been permanently blackened by soot. They jabbed at the fire with their spears, stirring it up when the embers needed air. Into the blaze went everything the Tower held dear. Priceless paintings, sculptures, books, and drained magical artifacts went into the tireless conflagration. A black tendril of smoke curled into the air, veering off to the east and out to the Far Sea. A bush clipped in the likeness of the Phoenix stood in a forgotten corner, untouched and in defiance, its clean edges now filled in by unruly sprigs.

A crow peeled a strip of skin from a bloated face and tossed it into the air before catching it, the snack sliding down its gullet with a squawk. It pried open a pair of blue lips and started nibbling at the black tongue inside. A crack split the air, echoing from the walls and sending the crow screeching into flight. It landed in an arc of stone wall that had been melted by Dragon fire.

A violet spear of light rotated counter-clockwise, revealing a world of night and ruby on the other side. Asebor fell through the swirling violet portal, back to the land of the living. The sun seared his eyes and he raised a hand to mute its vicious glow. He growled, his hands moving to clutch at the gaping hole in his armor. Glowing blood spilled through his fingers onto the square’s cobbles. He took a staggering step to catch himself.

“I should not bleed,” he hissed. His portal snapped shut, leaving a wisp of smoke curling in the air from the corpse’s chest it had carved through. He bellowed out with a laugh. How long had it been since he’d been wounded?

The Breden boy.

Every time it was the dual-wielder. First in the conduit between this world and the Shadow Realm, when he had removed the Cerumal’s armor and almost took his head with an axe of the combined powers but had escaped with a mar on his neck. The second time when he had superheated his chains here, in this very courtyard. And now, Asebor looked at his bloodied hand.

“He escaped mother’s world. It should not have been possible,” he mumbled. But he had. Asebor did not deny the truth. Was the boy dead? Would his body be resurrected? Perhaps he was someone’s minion now; like the dead Alena raised. He hated to admit to himself that he didn’t know what would befall the boy. None had ever escaped the Shadow Realm before. Time crashed over this world, carving out new furrows. His gut shuddered with a spasm of pain and dashed away the line of thought.

He already missed the Shadow Realm. In there, everything made sense. The reds were easy on the eyes, the moon a sallow globe, the sky black as coal. This world was forever foreign. The life clinging to the shallow soil, the fragility of men and their endless needs were tiresome innovations. What he missed most of all was his mother and his newborn sister.

The Shadow god’s fingers would gently brush his face, her touch magnificent and everlasting. He remembered how it felt when she met his eyes. It was as if every cell in his body crescendoed in an orgasm to mark the ages. When would he next be allowed to return home? When would he see his mother again? Perhaps when his work was done here, when men were fully bonded with the children of the Shadow god.

The dual-wielding boy would have to be returned to mother recompense for the trouble he caused. Asebor would make him suffer for eternity, flaying and healing him in an endless cycle of pain.

Asebor shifted into mist as he walked, passing through the fountain, as if never there. The mist knitted the wound in his gut in an instant, flesh and armor made whole again. The healing sent an icy chill waving up and down his skin. He drifted down the empty halls of the Tower, quiet as emperor’s graves.

Asebor’s boots clinked as he stomped up the polished stairs. He passed by priceless paintings torn to shreds and irreplaceable vases smashed to shards. The war was progressing well this time. The wizards of this life were weaker, their gods forgotten. How quickly their fickle minds abandoned the notions of the Dragon and the Phoenix. One thing never changed about man: the ease in which the masses were manipulated.

He’d been captured and imprisoned by the wizards in the last eon. He would love to watch them bleed if he could find them now. Most were likely bonded as Cerumal, or in the great beyond. The world where the soul is not. The thoughts sent his chains uncurling from his arms, rasping on the arched ceiling, scraping and showering down with sparks.

He had promised the Shadow mother that he would not fail again when the seal of the Age of Dawn had broken, for failure meant a doomed eternity he couldn’t imagine. How had he come into the fold of such circumstances? It didn’t matter. What mattered was doing what had to be done.

The dining chamber’s walls were a sky blue marble with veins of red. Carvings of the false gods were inscribed within the tiles. A few of them were a spider web of cracks, most gleaming as bright as the first day of the Tower’s siege. A procession of windows marched along one side of the room. The carpets were raised in scrunched waves, torn and bloodied. The massive dining table had been split apart down the middle, now propped up by a series of tables underneath. Cracked plates and a pile of silverware collected on the floor, left where it had broken.

Dressna stared out a window, veined arms crossed behind her back. The back of her bald head shone with wet; the skin the color of a choking man’s face. Her leathery wings were folded against her back and their ends curled against the carpets. Four horns wound around her head in bony segments. They were sharp as spears at the ends.

Alena sat back in an ornate chair, carved to resemble hundreds of Dragons in flight, swirling around one another. One gilded boot was propped against the table’s edge, emeralds on the cuff glinting like stars. She held a red melon in one hand, gently scraping its soft skin with golden nails. The polished wood on the table reflected the green glow of her eyes.

Marcine sat on the opposite end, or rather Alena had likely placed herself as far from Marcine as possible. Her skin was ashen, covered in a mix of red-green sores and bits of earth. Half of her face was covered in dark leather, one eye matted with pus. Her torso was a mishmash of leather and rotting cloth, pulled tight over her bony form. A fuzzy spider, the size of a man's hand, scurried along her outstretched arm, around her fingers, and up the underside of her arm. “He is beautiful.” She grinned.

“Children,” Asebor said from the entryway. A loose stone popped out from the archway, cracking in half at Asebor’s side.

Dressna whirled towards him, wings hissed open, muscular arms drawn for combat. “Master?” She relaxed at seeing him.

Alena crushed the melon between her fingers, launching a stream of red juice onto the top of her breast. “Great lord! You’ve returned to us.”

Marcine slowly rose to her feet, her grin showcasing her black teeth and inflamed gums. “My savior.”

Alena strode over to him, her hips jingling with gold chains and emeralds the size of pigeon’s eggs. “Great lord, are you hurt?” She reached to touch him and he raised his hand. She recoiled and took a step back. Her bare legs flexed, the skin puckering with goosebumps.

How had she known? Her eyes were always keen.

“Do not fear, Alena, for you have served me well. Without your forces, we’d never have been able to take the Tower. You are in my favor.”

Asebor had no qualms about taking her in front of the others. He wanted her and he would have her later. There were, however, more pressing issues at hand. His chains hung limp from his arms and trailed behind him, daggers at the ends tucking themselves into the tops of his boots.

“Thank you, thank you, great lord.” She bowed deeply and inched farther away, backing into a window frame.

“I would bestow you my true favor if—” If he hadn’t felt like he’d need every scrap of power to face the dual-wielder again. “I am drained from visiting with the Shadow mother.”

“Of course, master, I live to serve.” Alena stared at the ground, her hands balled into fists.

His generals, the Wretched, had dwindled. They were a dying species, clinging to the last light of their legacy. The tide of war could always change in a heartbeat, he knew. The Shadow princess had initiated her scourge upon the other realms from the other side. This was only the start of the Shadow’s touch.

Asebor’s face was a mask of shadow, revealing only slits of violet light for his eyes. He had always worn the conjured mask, as his true form was too terrifying for most, even for his loyal followers. He dreamed of an age where he could bear his true countenance, where even his most devoted followers wouldn’t piss themselves at the sight. He had to wear this mask to mold with his masses.

He sauntered around the table and fell into a chair. He’d heard rumors that the bodies of men would be drained in spirit and strength by invoking the power of the false gods. Perhaps this is what they felt like. He’d only traveled between the realms a few times; each time more exhausting than the last.

He sucked in a breath through nostrils shrouded in shadow. “Marcine, how are the forests of the west? Have you encountered resistance there?”

“Oh!” She clapped her hands together. A bloodless wound in her shoulder parted open, and the spider slipped inside. Its numerous obsidian eyes peered out as the wound slowly closed. “It’s wonderful, great lord. Just wonderful. The roots blacken, the leaves fall, the rot spreads deep. The Woodland Plunge is mostly mine, the rot spreads along the coast, its tendrils claw at The Great Retreat. The Shamans will know it soon. They will retaliate. They will—”

“Will you be prepared?” Asebor cut her off.

“Oh, why, of course.”

He stared at her, narrowing his eyes to deadly slits. She looked down and swallowed with a gulp. He grew tired of wheedling reassurances, tired of empty words, tired of endless failures and endless disappointments. “Of course, of course. That’s all I ever get from you cretins.” He rose up and smashed his fist through the long table, the legs of a supporting table splitting apart underneath. “Let’s review the failures of your brethren, shall we?”

He put his arms behind his back and started pacing. Ragged tendrils of his scarlet cape twisted up to the ceiling. “Hilanda told me she, of course, had Bezda, the Arch Wizard under control. The Tower would be ours for the taking, the gates opened to us when we arrived. How did that turn out?” He cast his eyes around the room, all of their’s were wisely lowered.

He growled. “Terar assured me that the bearer of Blackout was under his dutiful care. The prophecy stated that the bearer of Blackout was to lead the armies. The one bound to the blade was to have the wisdom of thousands of wars at our disposal. Destroyed by his own pet, a pity. A grievous failure.”

Asebor stopped behind Marcine and placed his bladed talons on her delicate shoulders. Her back stiffened and her arms quivered in his palms. Wounds covering her flesh yawned opened and closed, the insects within peering fearlessly up at him. “Darkthorne assured me that the Chains of the North, some call it Bonesnapper, were hidden from all eyes. I forgave him once, but the second transgression, losing such a precious artifact, could never be forgiven.” He lowered his head, whispering into her ear. “How will you fail me, Marcine?”

Sweat beaded on the back of her neck. “I will not, will not, master,” she stammered.

His talons gently drummed on her shoulders, dotting them with her blood at every touch. “Good.” His arms dropped from her shoulders and fell behind his back. He resumed pacing, his chains softly clinking together. “And finally Malek, the arrogant swine. He went rogue and stopped obeying his master. Do you know what happens to those who do not obey?” He bent over, saying it into Alena’s face.

She nodded with fury, her face going pale, eyes transfixed upon on the floor.

Asebor bellowed into the room. “First, I took Malek’s hands, for they were no longer any use to me. Next I stripped him of the strength of the false gods, made him mortal.”

Alena yelped and drew in with a breath as if she’d been struck.

“Be wise with your words, for they matter. Do not tell me a thing unless you know it as surely as you know the Shadow god. Now,” he returned to his chair, creaking as he sat. “Dressna, tell me of work in the Nether.”

She stomped up a pace beside him, the floor vibrating with her incredible mass. “We found the Black Furnaces. The last of the Scorpions have been obliterated,” she hissed. “They were most cooperative. All but a single child escaped us.”

Asebor snorted. “A child? How?”

Dressna’s eyes, white as milk, searched the room for an escape. “I believe I was poisoned.”

Asebor nodded, silence filling the air. “No matter. She will likely rebuild their ranks and try to take the furnaces back. They’re a vengeful lot. Be prepared, fortify the defenses when you can. The Black Furnaces are in working order then?”

“They were all in pristine condition master. The Scorpions held their oaths, as you said they would. In a year’s time, all of our forces will be outfitted with Dragon forged weapons and armor.”

“You must work faster. No sleep. No rest. Drive the smiths to death if you must. The Midgaard assault must proceed within the next three months.”

“I will do as you command, great lord.” She bowed, the air stinking of mold around her.

“Do the resurrected witches obey your command?” Asebor turned to Alena. They would need the dead witches and the strength of their false gods.

“It…” she swallowed hard, “has been challenging. Many do not return, but those who do fight as strong as the day they defended against our glorious siege. I must say,” she tapped a golden fingernail to her lip, “they’re formidable weapons. All of their earthly powers seem to return when they survive the resurrection.”

“This may be just what we’ll need to turn the tide,” he conceded. “Stay at it, Alena. If either of you find the dual-wielding boy, Walter of Breden, bring him to me and you will be justly rewarded. Preferably living, but skinned, dismembered or burned is fine too.” Asebor’s wounds had healed, but the pain still lingered. It coursed through his stomach and up and down his spine. He rose up, glad for the mask of shadows obscuring his wince. “Alena, you have sent the armies to the Great Retreat and for Helm’s Reach?”

“Yes, great lord. The horde should be arriving at the Shaman’s gates within days. We are prepared to crush the last cornerstone supporting Midgaard.” She punched her gemmed fist into her open palm. “As instructed, a small group was sent to Helm’s Reach, likely razing the city as we speak. Their defenses were in an abysmal state. It should provide a place for the horde, enough men to feed them for months.”

“If you fail at the Great Retreat, Alena, do not return to me. It would be wise for you to take your own life. And do be wiser than your peers. Do not try to run from me, for I will find you.”

The corners of her eyes drew down, lips curled into a frown. “I will not fail, master. If I do, I will die fighting our enemies, this I guarantee.”

He almost smiled at her, but she didn’t deserve that. “Your loyalty is appreciated. It seems to be a dying notion in this age. Your loyalty will be proven by your actions.” He swept from the room, retreating to the highest room in the only remaining spire. He would have to rest, lick his wounds, and pray to the Shadow god for the strength to slay his enemies.

Chapter 2

A Victorious Day

“Hope can be a force of nature. It is not imbued by the gods, but hope is a light stronger than any magic.” -The Diaries of Nyset Camfield

“Hold!” Nyset roared. Her sinewy arm held her Breden stamped short sword overhead. It shone with a dull light, the sky obscured by a blanket of gray clouds. The sleeve of her blood red silks collected in a ruffle at her shoulder. A line of sweat trickled down the center of her back and slid down the crack of her ass. “Hold!” she commanded. Her stomach was rigid with tension, every muscle braced for war.

The defenders lining the walls were mostly the Helm’s Reach guard, a few of the surviving armsman from the Tower, and Grimbald’s Falcon soldiers. Interspersed between them were apprentice wizards, and between those, the few veteran wizards she had recruited. Nervy faces exchanged unsure smiles. Bow strings were tested with buzzing twangs. The fingers of soldiers drummed on newly wrapped leather coiling around sword hilts. The scarlet plumes atop the Falcon soldier’s heads swayed in a gentle breeze.

The mass of Death Spawn swept across the desert’s sands, kicking up a curtain of dust thick enough to cast them in shadow. Their shrieks carried over the scrubland, penetrating the heavy silence on the wall. They had broken off into three separate groups, each with the biggest and ugliest Cerumal leading the charge. Some were as wide as Grimbald, their ghastly mouths fixed open with their horrible screams.

They ran with an insatiable fury, smashed their spiked shields with the weapons of nightmares. Some held scythes, barbed spears, twisted swords, hooks to pull riders from their mounts, broad machetes, and wicked axes. She would never get used to their war cry. She would never forget the first time she heard it in Breden during the Festival of Flames. It was an easier time, but she never asked for an easy life. She remembered Walter, letting him beat her at knife throwing. Men had such fragile egos. The thought would have brought a smile to her face any other time.

“Hold!” she bellowed again.

“They draw near, Mistress,” Senka said, stating what was all too clear. She wore what she’d always worn, an unadorned cloak covering padded leather armor. On her hips were a pair of daggers secured to a belt of Fire Lizard skin. That was only what you could see. On her person were countless hidden weapons.

Claw stood to her left, his mouth grinning with rapturous glee. His hands were pressed onto the battlements as he leaned over the wall and stared out. “A glorious day draws upon us,” he whispered. A gust drew over the wall, pushing his white hair over his shoulders.

“They’re too close. We can shoot them from here!” an archer cried.

“On my command, damn it!” Nyset shouted.

“Yes, Mistress,” the man grumbled.

The center group of Death Spawn broke off from the other two. The two slowed to cover their rear flanks. But why? There weren’t any ground troops to fight. “Keep coming, keep coming damn it,” she hissed.

There was a wide swathe of hay about one-hundred paces out, about as wide as a couple cars and brushed with enough to earth to blend it well enough with the ground. “Hold!” she screamed again, her voice cracking. They would come. It would work.

She caught the shocked expression of a gaunt-faced Cerumal as the ground gave way under it. It fell with a scream. A spear plunged up through its gut and out its back, the tip tearing through its armor. They were falling into the spear trap. The hay dropped away and the lethal ground invited them into its embrace. The group behind the first fallen ten or so tried to stop, but their mindless brethren plowed them in.

Shrieks of agony carried out from the trap, bodies squirming and writhing on top of each other. One Cerumal stepped on another to avoid a spear, driving it deeper into his kin. The one being stepped on grabbed onto the leg and dragged the body down into the den of spears. The floor and all the walls of the pit were covered with the deadly blades, tipped with Senka’s poisons. The spears jabbed at their bodies, a slippery mess of mud and blood. The point of one inched through a Cerumal’s neck, pushing down as it tried to free itself, bodies crushing it from above. They pushed on until the entire group was swimming in the pit, bodies struggling to get out and dragging each other down before escaping.

A few made it out with minor wounds, but only stumbled about ten steps before collapsing onto their snarling faces. It was a miracle no one in the city had fallen through. She thought for sure even with all the warning posters, someone would get curious and find their way in there. The people had finally listened to her.

The two groups at the rear went wide of the pit, leaving their dying kin behind. Their screams thundered with hate when they saw what happened. They leaped over the low fieldstone wall, naught but an annoyance to their powerful legs.

“So fast,” Senka said with awe. A hand lazily scratched the back of her short hair.

“Wizards! Fire!” Nyset roared, chopping down with her sword to give the signal.

There was a series of red painted sticks lining the ground for their targets, marking where the oil had been spread last night. A spark was all that was needed and all most of these wizards could conjure. Fireballs and sparks flew, some striking Cerumal, forgoing the targets, but enough striking near the wooden stakes. Flames burst alight from the ground and spread like lightning in a wide arc about fifty paces before the gates.

One group was caught in the molten arc. Flames burned through boots and superheated armor, cooking them like raw meat. Some were wise enough to try removing their armor, but not getting out of the conflagration first. There was a Black Wynch at the back of scorched monsters, darting across the grounds in great leaps to join the other group. Cheers erupted from the battlements and she felt some of their tension turning into bloodlust. More Cerumal clawed their way out of the spear pit, staggering on wobbly legs before crumbling to the ground.

“Archers! Everyone! Shoot at will!” Nyset yelled. Arrows zinged and spears were hurled down from the battlements. The sky burned with trails of fire, some striking true, most going wide of their targets.

The Death Spawn closed the gap between the fire and the wall, not more than ten paces away. Arrows thudded into chests, one struck an eye, another hissed through a throat. A spear landed through a Cerumal’s boot, pinning it to the ground. Nyset watched with grim expectancy as it jerked its foot free, splitting it down the middle and painting the earth with its blood.

She was hoping to conserve her powers in case one of Asebor’s generals arrived, a Lord of Death, or even worse, Asebor himself. It seemed the time for conversation was at an end. The Death Spawn slammed into the main gates, their armor screeching, the walls rattling with their tremendous force. Massive rocks were dropped over the wall’s edge, splashing the contents of an armored head onto the cobbles. Senka was loading darts into her gun as fast as she could, hissing as they slipped between armor and into flesh. The buzzing of Claw’s bowstring stung her ears.

“Leave this place, creatures of the dark world!” Nyset roared.

“Die beasts of shadow!” Senka yelled.

The bottoms of Nyset’s silks fluttered open with hot air as she let the Dragon fill her. Her yellowy hair whipped up into the shape of a horn. Balls of fire sprang to life in her hands, casting her sharp cheeks in their incredible glow. With both hands, she hurled them down into the dark mass hammering at the gates and watched as one took an arm, another splitting a heavily armored beast down the middle.

The stink of rotting meat made her wince. Twenty darts of fire sparked to life, drawing into a line along her head and stacked up into the sky. She thrust her arms over the wall and splayed her fingers, amethyst ring glinting. The darts hissed down towards the screeching mass, curling through the air, each following its own flight path. They thudded into their gnashing bodies. Some skipped from the hard edges of armor, others bit through shields and tore through helmets. This was good, they would survive this day with few casualties.

A few Black Wynches were scaling the wall, their talons finding easy purchase in the crumbling mortar. Two reached the top at one side, working together to carve and whirl through the defenders. One ducked a blow and rammed its bladed helm into an apprentice’s stomach, sending her screaming and blood streaking the air as she tumbled over the wall. She fell into the remaining Death Spawn. Gray skinned legs rose and fell, stomping the life out of her.

In a continuous snake-like movement, the other Black Wynch sliced through a neck, another’s thigh, and opened the guts of a man foolish enough to have not donned armor. Spears stabbed and swords darted at its writhing body, always in motion and curving around their blows, as if fighting children. One of them wore an ugly, satisfied grin and the other’s lips curved down with hate. The two Black Wynches worked in tandem, as if a single being. When one struck low, the other stabbed high, ravaging through defenders and leaving a trail of broken limbs and bleeding bodies. She had to get to them.

The memory of the Tower’s gates ripping apart came back in a flash. The white glow that had blinded her eyes and left her stunned. “Not again,” she stammered, watching them rip through her new apprentices. “Not again!” she screamed it this time. “Claw, Senka, get them off the wall.” They ran as if they had been eagerly waiting for the order. “Be careful!” Claw pushed through defenders aiming for the mass at the gates, unaware of the battle waging on the wall.

“Now, for you.” She narrowed her eyes and a Cerumal with a pig’s nose and a toothless mouth stared up at her. Its wrinkled brow drew down, speckled with tufts of white hair. The beast’s black lips curled back into a snarl and it hurled a spear up at her. Nyset jerked her head back, but the barbed spear grazed her face. It cut a line up from the bottom her jaw, along her cheek and forehead, thankfully missing her eye. Blood spattered onto her shoulder and trailed along her neck.

“Burn!” she screamed.

The pain spread across her face, making her wince and driving the pain deeper. She flared the Dragon in her chest, willing its fire into the horde below. The gate would be likely ruined, but she couldn’t give them a chance to get through. It would not happen again.

The ground erupted in a wall of fire, shrouding the mass in its licking flames. They shrieked and stumbled away, pushing past each other and rolling on the ground. A few that had stood their ground had their flesh burned to chars, their armor melting into pools of molten iron.

Whooping and screams of victory roared from the battlements. She extinguished the fire as quickly as she could to avoid causing additional damage to the gate.

Most of the Death Spawn lay screeching on the ground, their limbs blistered and bleeding. Bone showed through a twisted leg in the tangled mess. A charred arm rose out from the bodies, one finger left unburned and twitching.

“The Arch Wizard will destroy all of you bastards!” someone shouted.

“Lady Camfield!” another added. The cheering spread across the battlements, all but on the left side where the defenders struggled to kill the pair of Black Wynches.

“Open the gates,” a soldier called. The order was echoed down the wall and wheels started turning, clinking as the heavy chains began extracting the portcullis from the singed earth. They were still working, that was good. Men standing behind the gates, the last bastion of defense if they were to fall, slithered under the portcullis. Some cried out as they were burned by touching the heated metal. They bellowed out with a war cry as they made their way out, ramming spears and blades into the dying Cerumal. Mercy or the desire to kill? The latter, she guessed.

Everyone wanted to be remembered as a hero when the worst of it was over. It was easy to brave when death was a far off possibility. It took true courage to fight when you could feel death’s icy breath on the back of your neck.

Nyset worked her way over to Claw and Senka, tried to get a view of them between all the gleaming heads. Defenders parted to let her pass and eyed her with curiosity. They shuffled along to get away from the Death Spawn cutting down the men on the wall. “Damn it!” she yelled, her voice swallowed in the din of cheers. “Why aren’t you helping them?”

“Get them! Don’t let the bastards run!” A man with swords in each hand yelled.

“Kill those fuckers!” a woman added.

A group of six Cerumal, who had escaped Nyset’s fires, were sprinting from the wall, squawking and shrieking. She realized the defenders weren’t letting her pass to get to the Black Wynches, but moving so they could get down the stairs to chase the routed Death Spawn. The battlements emptied in minutes and a swarm of men and women poured down the steps out of the front gate. It didn’t feel right, but she couldn’t see a good reason to stop them.

No matter, it made it easier to reach her friends. Two more soldiers swept past her. She met the emerald eyes of an apprentice, her eye color stark against her ashen face. The pungent stink of fear hung on the air behind her.

Claw tried to hack into a Black Wynch’s pyramid helm, but it parried with its bladed hands, counterattacking with a diagonal slash. Claw got his blade up without a second to spare, their blades resounding with a clang. He chopped down and the Black Wynch dropped like its bones had turned to dust. It shot up with an uppercut of slashes, a few talons catching under his chin and snapping his neck back. He stumbled backwards and righted his unsure legs. “You’re a fun one!” he snarled and raised his dull blade over his shoulder.

“Claw! Duck!” she commanded. He fell to the ground, loyally or stupidly abandoning his sword mid-strike. She had to be precise, oh so incredibly precise to avoid hitting them. Could she live with herself if she accidentally killed a friend with the power? She wasn’t sure, but she had faith in her control of its direction. Nyset’s whirling discs of fire cut in from either side of the wall, one severing through its wiry neck and the other splitting its head in half. It’s misproportioned head halves rolled off the edge of the wall like stones. Its body crumpled against a shield, neck spurting blood over its embossed image of a sun, the symbol of Midgaard.

Senka had been backed into a corner, daggers twirling in her small hands. The Black Wynch was covered in cuts and knicks where armor left exposed flesh, none mortal. “Fall,” Senka urged. The Black Wynch seemed unsure, its talons flickering with a fraction of their usual zeal. The beast raised its talons for another strike and its arms fell by its side, its body rigid, as if crystallized in a block of ice. The Black Wynch fell and teetered towards Senka. She grinned and stepped aside as it seesawed over the wall’s edge, armor squealing on the limestone.

“Wha-what did you do?” Nyset smiled at her.

“Silver Leaf, Mistress. Stops the heart muscle when it enters the bloodstream.” Senka shrugged her daggers into her Fire Lizard belt, scales the color of tangerines, and peered out at the defenders chasing the fleeing Cerumal. “Where are they going?”

“To release their pain upon them, I’d say. That’s an incredible skill you have there. Are you alright?” Nyset breathed.

Her charcoal cloak was shredded at one shoulder and the bottom had a section that was torn into tattered strips. Blood oozed from wounds that cut from her shoulder and across her chest. “The shadow one could withstand an incredible dose, more than any man. I am fine, Mistress.”

“They’re powerful creatures. That doesn’t surprise me. Claw, can you heal her? Are you well?” Nyset regarded him.

A mix of old dirt and sweat congealed into muddy droplets on his face. He snatched his curved blade from the ground and frowned down at it.

“Claw, something wrong?”

“No.” He exhaled through his nose. He turned his arm over and opened his palm. He brought his blade down on his hand and dragged his blade across his skin. Bright blood welled from the wound. He tilted his head back, wincing and drawing in air.

Nyset gasped. “What are you doing?” He was truly mad.

“Ghostwalker must taste blood when he’s been drawn. Or else.” Claw flipped the blade over so she could see the name etched on the side of the blade. In was in a swirling script that only a true artist could create.

Nyset’s stomach rumbled with the memory of fighting the demon within, somehow linked to Juzo’s weapon. She still wasn’t sure exactly where she had gone to fight that creature. Blackout was also a named blade and urged — no, forced — Juzo to kill. Were there others like that? Could this be one of them? “Does the sword speak to you?”

Nyset felt Senka inch closer from around her back to her side.

“Mm. I’ve known Ghostwalker for many years. Found him discarded in the sands of the Nether, by a twisted old tree. Taller n’ any o’ the others.” He wiped the blade on a dead apprentice’s robes and sheathed it. The bluish light of the Phoenix flared from his hand, stitching his skin back together. “Said he was there, waiting for me for hundreds of years. Spent many years walking the sands, many long years. Searching and waiting to find you. The Oracle told me I’d find you and I put my trust in her and the gods.” He turned to face her, a broad grin plastered on his face.

Senka and Nyset shared impassive glances, but Nyset felt they shared the same feeling. Talking swords were not to be trusted.

“Mistress!” Senka bumped into the wall, jabbing a finger into the horizon.

“What?” Nyset naturally followed her direction, seeing the defenders hack into the fleeing Cerumal. “What is it? What am I missing, Senka?”

“It’s a trap,” Senka whispered. “Look!”

She looked harder, but Nyset couldn’t see what she saw. She knew Senka had unearthly vision and a keen sense of the land, but what was she not seeing?

“No, oh no.” Her heart began to thunder, causing a roaring between her ears. She saw it now. There was what appeared to be tiny berries skirting the flanks of the defenders. Except they weren’t berries at all, but the heads of Death Spawn peering out from the ground. Had they planned this all along? Were the initial attackers merely meant as sacrifices?

“Shit!” she hissed. Nyset planted one hand on the wall and vaulted over it, conjuring a powerful gust of air to blunt her fall. It blew her silks over her face, temporarily bathing her world in sheets of scarlet. “Come, I’ll catch you.” She beckoned to Claw and Senka. Claw leaped over the wall without a moment’s hesitation. Senka followed after watching how she caught Claw in the buffeting gale. She turned back to the defenders. The heads sprung from pits hidden in the ground, dark bodies scrambling in from either side. The group clustered together as the Death Spawn reined them in like sheepdogs on all sides.

“No!” Nyset ran, jerking her silks up to her waist so she could move. The Death Spawn screamed with rage and the defenders were forced into a ring of death. There were a lot more defenders than Death Spawn, but by forcing them into a ring, it effectively reduced the strength of their numbers. Their terrible spears lanced in and out of bodies. Apprentices couldn’t use their powers unless they were in a direct line of fire, forcing them to choose either death by a Death Spawn blade or killing their own.

One made a terrible, panicked decision and a lash of fire spread out from the center, cutting down men and Death Spawn alike. The gap was filled in by Death Spawn, their circle of death ever tightening.

The world grew terribly quiet. Nyset’s breath burned in her lungs and through her drying throat. Claw’s and Senka’s boots pounded behind her. Their breaths hissed in her ears, drowning out everything else. The roaring Death Spawn and wails of the dying hit her like a dream, almost inaudible. She felt a strange grin touch her lips. She had to be there now, wanted to be there. She wished she could move through Phoenix portals like Walter could, but she knew no amount of wishing ever added up to much. They were a few minutes away, at least. Too far. Now she could only choose her targets and visualize the motions she would use in combat.

Cacti, shrubs, burned bodies, and arrows standing from the ground blurred in her vision. Her eyes locked on the squawking Death Spawn, searching the spots where their armor parted to soft skin. Nyset clenched her fists and swords of fire burst alight, leaving trails of smoke curling behind her.

With every plunge of a Death Spawn spear, a part of her felt their pain. She watched as a grizzled man was ran through with two spears, one through his chest and the other his neck. The defenders fought like trapped animals. They made reckless attacks, foolishly exposing themselves. A courageous girl in periwinkle robes ran between a pair of Death Spawn and flared fire around her form, roasting them in their armor. Their miserable screams reached her ears now. Human and Death Spawn screams of horror intermingled with screams of madness.

A Cerumal raised a jagged spear to finish a woman fighting to conjure another spark of fire. Nyset rammed her molten sword through its back, her screams tore at her throat. The Death Spawn reached back for it, cutting its fingers off as it tried to grab it, blood spurting down Nyset’s arm. She pulled the sword free, not an ounce of resistance. She swung with both blades and carved a wide slice through a Cerumal’s torso, its burning guts spilling onto the ground.

“Fight!” she screamed. “Do not give up!”

Claw slammed Ghostwalker against a blade aimed at her head and she drove her blade around him, through the attacker’s pitted armor. Claw winked at her and smiled. Black blood crawled down his face. She winked back and his grin widened.

Senka moved in wide, calculated arcs. With every acrobatic swing of her body, she cut at least two enemies, tainting their blood with her lethal poisons. She didn’t wait for them to fall, but worked her way down the arcing line of beasts, marring their flesh and moving on. A Cerumal with a bald head topped with a sprig of white hair swung at her with a two-handed axe. She deftly rolled back, producing a blow gun when she emerged from the roll. Something glinted in the light and the beast keeled over, its face splitting on its own weapon. Its jaw hung loosely from one side, dangling over the edge of the axe.

Nyset tore her silks off at the waist, uncaring if the world saw her small clothes. It wouldn’t matter if she were dead. She had to be able to move. Hadn’t she vowed to never wear these again? What she lacked in skill with the sword she made up with the Dragon’s ferocity. Blades that came at her were sliced through, as if never there by the Dragon’s insatiable fire. Monsters fell all around her, collapsing at Senka’s skillful touches.

“The Arch Wizard!” someone screamed.

“She came for us!” a man roared, baring his teeth as he head-butted a Cerumal.

A lithe creature in violet robes wielding daggers in each hand crept along the outskirts, eyeing Senka’s dancing. Its robes changed color and texture as they brushed the earth and vegetation around it, instantly matching the surrounding patterns in an almost mesmerizing show.

The entrapping circle widened as men and women fought to reclaim lost ground. A Cerumal tottered between her and Claw, bent over a wound in his stomach, its hands dark with its own blood. Nyset impatiently backhanded him with a shield of fire, splattering its head onto the dry earth.

The Skin Flayer twisted around when it heard Nyset’s howl, its golden eyes going wide, daggers flaring. One of Nyset’s swords crashed off its Dragon forged weapons, raised for a parry. Her other sword chopped deep into its arm, wrenching one of its daggers into the side of its temple before sending it spinning to the ground. The Skin Flayer lurched and tumbled sideways.

Nyset lunged in to finish the job, but then another creature stepped in her way. It was a Cerumal, but with the body of a child. It snarled at her with what looked like a mouth full of glass, its eyes a pair of smoldering coals. Its squat nose flared open, dripping with yellow mucus. It raised a primitive hatchet over its shoulder and charged, screeching like an injured bird. Nyset could never hurt a child, but this was no human. These were demons, she told herself. She jerked her head to the side as the hatchet spun wide of her head. Her flaming sword curved in the dry air and the boy-Cerumal desperately tried to block it with a narrow blade. Her Dragon fire ripped the weapon from his hand and split his face apart, shooting bits of brains into a shrub.

The edge of a twisted mace, maybe a horn, whispered at her and Nyset bent back from the waist but felt the breeze of it across her neck. Warmth spread down her face under her eye. Someone tackled the beast that had swung at her, driving savage fists into its skull. It was Claw, her always dutiful guardian. Blood sprouted in the air with each of his hammering blows.

A wide gap had opened in the screaming circle. The battle bloomed from a single ring to clumps of slippery combat. All concepts of tactics and order vanished, now a clamoring of bodies struggling for every additional moment of life. Order made things understandable, something she could wrap her head around. This was chaos and chaos was unpredictable. She turned in a circle, witnessing it all.

A Cerumal with the biggest axe Nyset had ever seen stood staring at her. She hadn’t seen many, but assumed Grimbald’s was one of the biggest. Not anymore. It had a wicked double edge and spikes on the butt. In the center of the two blades at the head was a vicious spike. It looked to have been created for a true giant, a creature that might have existed in another time. Its dull iron gleamed in a shaft of light. The beast wielding it was nearly as tall as the Lord of Death. Could this be another creature like that? She swallowed and took a cautious step back.

The creature had the look of an artist’s rendition of what a Cerumal should look like, much more terrifying than the real thing typically was. Jagged armor plates hissed over its shoulders and knees, and most of the armor was studded with spikes. Nyset felt the arrogance that the Dragon’s power had granted her drain out like the air from a punctured lung. “Fight every fight like it could be your last,” Walter once told her. Today would not be her day to die.

Nyset let out a belch that blew out her cheeks and twirled her smoking swords. The beast sprang forward, its elbow raised up for what she guessed was a sideways strike. She sent a pair of fireballs screaming at it as it ran. It fell to the ground on one leg, sliding underneath the trails of fire. She hacked with both blades as it tried to rise. It twisted to its side and dodged, counterattacking with a lunging stab of its axe. She had to fight the instinct to leap back but knew that with longer weapons, they lost their advantage once she was within range. She locked her eyes on the axe, watching its path course through the air.

She vaulted her body sideways and the spike caught on a ruffle of silks around her stomach. She felt the fabric shred on the blade and flap in the wind. She was already thrusting with her blade, but it caught only empty air as her opponent slipped away. Its speed was incredible. She blasted the ground around it in a wall of fire, but the creature dashed back into a roll with shocking speed. How could a creature this big move so fast?

The creature dashed in and Nyset screamed as she savagely sliced at its neck, but the beast snaked under it, ramming its armored shoulder into her chest, sending her sprawling onto her back. The air was blasted from her lungs, and she choked for breath. The creature raised its axe overhead for a finishing chop and Nyset sent fire spraying from her hands. The beast screamed as its skin burned and Nyset rolled to avoid the hissing of its blade.

She met its eyes for an instant. They were blood red like Juzo’s. A Blood Eater Cerumal? “Shit,” she coughed and rolled to avoid another strike. Nyset had managed to keep one sword, the other vanishing with the concentration needed for throwing fire. The beast chopped again and she rose up to her knees to meet its blow, their weapons ringing out with an arm-numbing clang as they collided. As she roared and jerked on the Dragon’s fury, a whirl of air spiraled up from the ground, launching the beast close to twenty paces into the air. Its limbs flailed in the sky, kicking and grasping. Bellowing an ear-piercing wail.

She gasped, the air just starting to fill her lungs normally again. She watched as it crashed into a cactus, splitting it apart and splashing its juices onto the earth. Its leg twitched, its axe a pace beside it. She limped over to it, something in her knee throbbing with pain. As she walked, she peered about the battle and watched the defenders work together to cut down the Death Spawn, evening the tide. When she reached the Blood Eater, its eyes sprang open and it sent an iron boot into her shin.

Nyset recovered before seeing the mighty axe coming, a shadow blotting out the sun. She summoned a block of stone blooming from the ground, sending the axe reverberating from it. The Blood Eater darted around the stone block, the axe bent on one side. It punched with a spiked fist and Nyset ducked, slashing with her blade of fire. It caught him across the thigh, sending a line of blood flying, causing its knee to wobble.

“Die!” she screamed. Time to finish it. She chopped down and hacked through its shoulder and its arm spurted out jets of blood. Another Cerumal had stepped close enough to kill her, but she hadn’t noticed until now. She blasted it in the face with a ball of fire, ripped it off its feet, and tossed it into a tangle of squirming bodies. She returned her focus the big bastard. He’d grabbed his axe in one hand, the other arm flopping uselessly at his side and hanging on due to armor alone.

Nyset found herself grinning as they faced each other again, truly understanding the thrill of battle for the first time, her fear dashed away. She pushed away the nightmarish images flashing around her. How had she learned to fight like this? Is this how the others felt? Her heart was a storm, pumping blood through her bulging veins. Reading about acts of valor was one thing, living them was something she’d never dreamed of.

The Cerumal grinned and the flesh of his arm started knitting itself back together. She dashed at it before it finished, sending a flash of fire at its head. The beast ducked as she expected it would, ramming her sword through its mouth and out the back of its neck. She grabbed the sword with both hands and ripped it up, splitting its head apart and launching its helm into the air. Blood splashed over her hands and onto her bare stomach.

The creature fell to its knees, the flesh of its head smoking and bubbling with burning blood. “No more!” she screamed at its ruined neck and doused fire over the remains of its head. The Dragon’s debt was starting to weigh on her. Its exhaustion pressed into her bones.

The remaining Cerumal moved slower and lost some of their courage, as if their endurance had finally reached its end. She guessed besting their champion had something to do with it. A few started spinning in circles, dragging weapons through the sand before being hacked down. One squat Cerumal with a long nose just started casually walking away after dropping its sword. A big man in mail ran up behind it and drove a spear through its back. Other Cerumal fought to the bitter end, running into bristling spears, felled by hacking blades.

Nyset threaded between the clumped skirmishes, tossed fireballs into unsuspecting foes. The defenders of Helm’s Reach screamed with cries of joy and wails of pain as they lay ruin to the rest. A heavy arm fell on her shoulder, almost dragging her to ground with it. A stocky woman in blue robes had a wide gash across her forehead, exposing the white of the bone underneath, her face a nightmare of blood.

“Help Mistress,” the woman hissed into her ear, her soddened cheek pressed into hers.

“I’ve got you, let’s go home.” Nyset found strength in that she had come out of this mostly unscathed. She dragged the woman’s muscular arm across her back and nudged her shoulder under hers. “What’s your name? Wait — Clara, is that right?”

The woman groaned and her legs wobbled. “That’s right, Mistress. Was in your apprentice’s class yesterday. Was my first class.”

“Yes, that’s right. I remember you now.” Nyset’s legs burned as she dragged Clara farther away from the battle. She had a pleasant smell, like blooming lilacs that overrode the rusty smell of blood and earth.

“Did I do well today? Tell me I did. Tell me I did well,” Clara gagged and a blood clot spluttered from her lips.

“Clara!” How had she missed it? There was a broken Death Spawn arrow shaft through her chest. They were brutal weapons. The entire shaft was barbed such that they went in and refused to come out.

Her coughs became ragged and body shaking. Nyset lowered her to the ground, her watery eyes searching hers for the answer to life’s suffering. “Not like this. Why like this?” Clara asked.

Nyset swallowed and squeezed her shoulders. “You did well today, my dear. You fought wonderfully, made your people and me proud of you.” The world blurred with her tears, warm and stinging in her eyes. Nyset placed one hand on Clara’s head and scratched her scalp. Her fingers were sticky with Clara’s matted hair and blood.

Clara nodded and rivulets of tears slid down her temples. Nyset scanned the battlefield, searching for Claw. He could heal her, give her a second chance. She had lost him in the fray. “Claw!” she screamed, her voice hoarse. “Claw!” she shrieked it again.

Clara’s coughing became a violent choking. She thrashed her head from side to side, blue eyes reflecting the empty sky. “I—” she managed. “Wanted to be something more.” Her mouth opened to say something else but nothing came but a soft hiss.

Nyset put her head to Clara’s chest, her heart as quiet as a block of wood. “No.” Nyset pulled her numb hand out from under her shoulder and the other clung to Clara’s bloody hair, the wet tendrils curling around her fingers. “No!” Nyset beat her fists into the ground beside Clara’s corpse with a thump.

All of this was her fault. Thump.

She let them go. Thump.

She should’ve seen the trap. Thump.

It was so painfully obvious to her now. She must have been sleepwalking. How had she missed the signs? Thump, thump went her fists into the ground.

The Cerumal never ran, even when there were few against overwhelming odds. She screamed and her knuckles split open, driving her fists into wells formed in the dirt. “How? Why?” She rolled back onto her knees, eyes closed, arms shaking. All this blood was on her hands, from her foolishness. Was this what leadership was? Living with the blood of the dead on your hands?

She opened her eyes and they found the ever-burning curl of smoke leading out from the Silver Tower. It was a stub of ruined stone on the horizon, no longer the resplendent structure that commanded fear and respect. She would take it back. They could not have what was hers. She balled her fists and screamed, driving them into the sand, grinding dirt into her bloody knuckles.

She saw Claw’s arm reaching for her, then paused mid-way. “Are you well?” He dropped into a low squat in front of her and stared.

“Can you—?” She looked at Clara’s empty eyes.

Claw put two fingers on Clara’s neck and held them there for a long minute. “Afraid she’s moved on already, Mistress.”

Senka came up after Claw, skirting around him with her arms behind her back. “We’ve won, Mistress. It is a victorious day for all.”

“A victorious day,” Nyset repeated. Her eyes turned back to the Tower looming over the horizon, always taunting her. Then she gazed down at Clara again. “But not for all.”

Chapter 3

Dicing

“There is much magic in the world, missed by our senses blinded to its majesty.” -The Diaries of Nyset Camfield

Walter let out a jaw-aching yawn and rubbed his eyes, wondering what his mother would be making for morning supper. Flour cakes perhaps, maybe some bacon to go with them would be lovely. His taste buds were eager for the touch of gooey syrup mixed with freshly churned butter. His bed felt unusually lumpy, like someone had put rocks under the mattress. Had Wiggles dragged rocks in his bed again? His face was cold with the weight of the morning’s mist.

They had set up camp just outside of Shipton before the dense forest of the Woodland Plunge. The forest was lush, green with waving grass shrubs twitching from scavenging squirrels. There was a small clearing before the bridge that crossed into Shipton. The water under the bridge was brackish, mixed with the fresh water of the Blanched Falls and salted water of the Abyssal Sea. It sent a pleasing rumble over the camp, soothing him to sleep.

Somewhere in the camp, someone’s ass roared with a wet, squelching fart. He would have laughed had not the reality of his life came rushing back then. It filled him with a great sense of dread, the kind that only departed when you were unconscious or numb with Fang Cress.

Dead Mother. Dead Father. Dead dog. Baylan, his former mentor, was dead. Lillian, Baylan’s betrothed, dead. He’d killed Juzo just the day before, said the last words not more than a day ago. All dead and back to the Shadow Realm, to suffer in the arms of the cruel Shadow god. Countless more would die, he knew. The price to be paid for ending Asebor’s reign would be insurmountable. He knew it in his gut as well as he knew the Dragon and Phoenix whirling in his chest.

He stared up at the blanket of mist cresting the tops of the pine trees and blinked. He rubbed his gnarled stump the demons of the Shadow Realm had left him with. He flexed his forearm, wondering if maybe today the palm and fingers would spontaneously reform. He found himself disappointed by the limits of the Phoenix’s healing. Why could it heal stabs, cuts, burns, and broken bones but not missing limbs? What was its threshold for damage?

He had tried melding both the Dragon and the Phoenix together to heal his mangled eye to no avail. That method worked particularly well on some things. He remembered back to when he lived in the Tower of Meditation with Malek and his friends, and how that was the only way he was able to heal a Skin Flayer’s poison. He remembered the demon’s grisly face and its savage teeth. He remembered how it felt to be forced to hack his own arm off. He shivered under his wet, miserable blanket. When he found his way back there, he would have his revenge on that one.

Juzo had fallen by his hand. How could he ever forgive himself? How could he tell his parents? How could he face Nyset? “Juzo, Juzo,” he whispered. “What have I done?” Juzo had only wanted to help in his own, twisted, misguided way. The power of the Dragon was not a trifle. It was as deadly to his enemies as it was to his friends. He had to learn that lesson in the worst way imaginable. His eyes were still sore from yesterday’s tears, damp again and red with irritation. Did Juzo know how sorry he was? Did he know it was an accident?

Every time he closed his eyes, he saw Juzo’s shocked expression and the hole burned through the side of his head. He saw it gape open and the horrible blood spilling out. Juzo’s blood.

I killed my best friend.

The thought was always there, always on loop in the back of his mind. He saw his body, unmoving against the cold earth, snaring roots poking out of the walls. He saw Grimbald heave clumps of dirt onto his white corpse. Over and over, he thought through things he might have changed, done differently, what he could’ve altered that might have left both of his friends alive. He knew it was a moot effort. It didn’t matter how many times he told himself, it was already done.

Someone got up, stumbled through the woods, and moaned with the hissing of piss pattering on leaves. Walter inhaled sharply and came back to the present, shaking his head to dash away the unrelenting nightmare. He had to be here, for his mind was an inescapable labyrinth of pain.

Beside him, one of Scab’s men tossed onto his side, adjusted his blanket, and let loose another cheek-vibrating fart. Walter crinkled his nose at the stench of old beer and rotting meat congealing in the air. Walter rose up on his elbow, his side sore from the uneven ground. “Would you go and shit already?”

The man responded with the popping of a fart and tugged his blanket over his head. He liked his own fragrance, it seemed.

“Get up you dogs! Up! Up! Up! Rise and feel the marks filling your purses,” Scab shouted across the heaps of sleeping men. Scab had his pitted sword raised in the air, saluting the first rays of the morning sun. As far as Walter could see, there were men huddled under blankets. They were pulled tight over their bodies, struggling to trap a little bit of the warmth from their stinking forms.

“C’mon now, you louts. Don’t make me get out the whip.” Scab weaved between clumps of groaning men, driving boots into asses and nudging unconscious shoulders.

“Fuck off, you fuck!” Someone shouted at him after being unceremoniously kicked from the arms of sleep.

“A little too hard, sorry,” Scab said with a careless shrug.

Scab was dressed in the only outfit he seemed to own. He wore a soiled and patched pair of navy trousers, topped with an opened coat that might have given him a regal appearance if it were ten years newer. His hair was matted with a month’s worth of grease, black and stabbing up at every angle.

“Is it that time again already?” Grimbald grunted beside him.

“Believe it is,” Walter choked out, his voice betraying him.

“How you feeling?” Grimbald rose out of his woolen blanket, shirtless. He bent his neck down and started scratching it with both hands. Walter eyed the slabs of muscle on his sides, almost as big as Walter’s entire torso. His arms were thick with ropey scars. Along his ribs on either side were a crisscrossing set of healed wounds, likely the work of a Black Wynch’s talons. He worked his shoulders around and veins popped out on the enormous peaks of muscle.

Walter had slept shirtless and bootless, black trousers billowy and hanging off his hips. He preferred to blend in the best he could, though he often failed. His balled up tunic and travel-worn cloak sat beside his blanket.

Walter looked for Grim’s latest scar and found it on his upper ribs, still pinked around the edges. Juzo had become an enemy when he plunged his blade into Grimbald. Maybe Juzo got what he deserved, but it didn’t make him feel any better about it. Everyone should have been able to make mistakes and given a second chance. But some mistakes lasted a lifetime. Some people didn’t get second chances.

“I’m alright, yourself? By the Dragon, you’re a big bastard.” Walter forced a grin. Juzo’s scarlet eye flashed in his mind. Then the hole in his head, blood hissing and bubbling out of it.

“I’m—” Grimbald bent at the waist to avoid getting slapped in the face by Scab’s sheathed sword.

“A wonderful morning, my noble employer!” Scab gestured as he passed, a mad grin pasted on his flaked lips.

Walter cleared his throat. “Morning,” he said and recoiled at his putrid stench. It smelled like he’d fallen into a latrine.

“What?” Scab lifted his arms overhead and sniffed his armpits. His jacket was torn where it met his underarm, exposing a wolf’s pelt of hair underneath. He shrugged and strode down the line of mercenaries, sending his muddy boots into men trying to squeeze in a few more minutes of sleep. “I’d like my morning elixir and two sausages soon, please get a move on,” he said to a wiry man.

“Yes, sir. Water’s already being heated, sir.” The wiry fellow paused and stared at Scab.

“Go on then,” Scab flicked the wiry man’s cheek with a dirty fingernail and he tore off, stumbling over someone’s bag then tripping on a blanket.

Walter grabbed his toes and stretched his back. It was as tight as a drawn bowstring. He caught sight of Wart, Scab’s second, joining in the waking of the men. For such a brute, he had a much gentler approach than Scab. He gave shoulders soft shakes and spoke quietly to stirring forms.

A rumbling came from Grimbald. “Sausages? Why don’t we get sausages? I could really go for some meat in my mouth.”

Walter turned and flashed him a smile. “Have you ever met a sausage you didn’t like?”

Grimbald gave his tunic a shake and bits of grass and dirt fluttered in the air. “Can’t say that I have. I like onion sausage, garlic sausage.” He slipped his shirt on. “Honey sausage, Shroomling sausage, lamb, pork, any kind, really.”

“What about his sausage?” Walter pointed to a grizzled warrior, beard trailing down to his neck and clad in armor that had seen some hard use. He had an odd gait, seeming to favor one side.

Grimbald’s broad eyebrows drew down. “Very funny,” he chuckled. Grimbald pulled his soiled handkerchief free from his pocket and flung it at Walter’s head.

“Gah!” Walter winced with disgust and threw it back with two fingers. He laughed and Grimbald tucked it back into his pocket.

“You two finding something funny?” Walter turned to see the grizzled man he had pointed to seconds ago standing over him, his face pocked with scars.

“No, we’re just—” The man reached down and wrapped his leathery hand under Walter’s armpit, hauling him to his feet. Walter groaned as the cool earth chilled his bare feet. He looked into the man’s eyes, netted with wrinkles at the corners.

Grimbald took a step forward, meaty hands balled into fists. Walter waved him down and nodded at him, then flashed a grin.

“What I was trying to say,” Walter started, turning to Grimbald. “My friend and I were joking. Just having little harmless fun.”

“You think it’s fun having yourselves a little laugh at my expense, do you?” The man tilted his head back, his narrow beard brushing against Walter’s neck. “I like funny things too.” Something sharp pressed against Walter’s ribs. “I think it’d be a rip roaring laugh to watch you bleed out like a stuck pig. Don’t you?” He leaned uncomfortably close, but Walter would not move. He caught Grimbald’s eye, saw him inching towards the old man. Walter shook his head.

Walter cleared his throat, thick with unrelenting mucus. Was he getting sick? He sighed. “I killed my oldest friend yesterday. There’s really nothing you can do to hurt me, friend.” The silence stretched out between them. The man’s breath was warm on Walter’s face. A cracked corner of the man’s lip twitched then curled into a grimace.

The old warrior dropped the knife and hid it up his sleeve. His fists came up and his legs opened into an awkward stance. He jerked his head from side to side, his neck releasing a series of unsettling pops.

“What are you doing?” Walter asked.

“Got to protect my honor. We’ll settle this our way.” The warrior beckoned to him with his white-knuckled fists.

“Your honor?” Walter scoffed. That apparently amounted to sticking a knife in an unarmed man’s ribs. Of course, that excluded the furious weapons burrowed deep within his chest, the Dragon and the Phoenix, his loyal companions. “But I only have one hand and one eye. This isn’t entirely fair, is it?”

A few men dropped what they were doing and gathered around for the entertainment. One chuckled and nudged his friend, handing him a wineskin.

“Should’ve thought of that before you dragged me into your shit, boy.”

“A mercenary with honor. Now that is a contra—” The man’s arm was a blur and pain ripped through Walter’s jaw, sending him sprawling onto his back. Laughter filled the air. He fell with a thump and blinked up at the trees. The mists were dissipating in the heat of the rising sun. It felt good to be alive, he thought. To be laying on the surface of the ground was so much better than being buried in it. He remembered the enveloping world of dirt and stone when he had returned from the Shadow Realm, fighting for breath.

Walter pushed onto his upper back and sprung up to his feet in one movement. The world waved. Trees and shrubs blurred into a mass of greens and browns. His vision stabilized and the old warrior’s grin widened. The man had a great deal of power there.

“Nice hit. Reckon that will be your last,” Walter held his arms at his side.

“The lad has stones, doesn’t he?” a bystander said.

“Not a very good fighting stance, boy,” the old warrior snickered.

The warrior grunted and charged in. Walter smashed his heel into the man’s knee, straightening his leg with a pop. The warrior fell to the ground with a thud and his armor plates clanged together. A chuckle and a cheer came from the small circle that had formed. The man groaned, both hands clutching his knee. “You bastard. Uh — you bastard. That was a good trick. How’d you know that was my bad knee?”

“Wasn’t entirely difficult to figure out,” Walter smirked. “You may apologize whenever you’d like.”

“Fuck off, you little shit.” He groaned, both hands protectively held his knee. The circle that had started to form promptly broke up, likely hoping for a longer show.

Walter could see his knee was bent far too much in the wrong direction. He bent down and tugged on the Phoenix, its icy calm filling him with a deep sense of peace. “Let me help,” Walter said quietly.

The man’s narrow brows drew down and deep lines formed on his forehead. He let out a long exhale, released his hands from his knee, and turned to face the sky, then gave a quick nod.

Walter pressed his palm into his knee, humming with the cool glow of the Phoenix. He saw the light a little differently this time. It wasn’t a cylinder of light bulging out from his palm like he’d always thought. It was thousands of Phoenix tails so tightly packed that they appeared to be a single entity. They spiraled their way into the man’s knee, flitting around like hundreds of surgeon’s blades. There was a twang, a pop, and the man’s kneecap slid back into place.

“Oh, thank you.” He moaned and grinned up at him.

Walter rose up and sniffed, shook his head at the man. He wanted to tell him he was pathetic and didn’t know the meaning of the word ‘honor.’ He turned away at the clinking of mugs and a smell that reminded him of home.

“Feels better than it did twenty years ago,” the defeated warrior muttered.

Scab threaded his way between grumbling men drying off armor, wiping down weapons, beating the water from blankets, and stowing away supplies. Behind him was his wiry servant, tottering on uneven earth and balancing a wide tray with an assortment of items for morning supper.

Scab stopped, stared down at the old warrior and planted his hands on his hips. “Well, well, well. I see you’ve met Derrik, one of the first to join the band. He has a fiery temper that often gets him into trouble, don’t you, Derrik?”

“Fuck off, Scab.” Derrik groaned.

“Oh, yes. We’ve just started to get to know each other.” He offered his hand.

Derrik reluctantly took it, cast an annoyed eye from him to Scab. Walter helped him to his feet. “Suppose I’ll start on my morning duties and all now.” Derrik stalked off, posture slumped with defeat.

Scab’s servant unfolded legs from the bottom of the tray and carefully set it down. It was a wonderful invention. He turned over three mugs, cracked at the top but functional, and started pouring beautiful, dark elixir into each one. He set the polished silver decanter down in the center of the small table. It was a piece that would have looked better on King Ezra’s table rather than in the middle of camp. Steam formed from the top of the mugs and curled into ghosts. On the tray was an ornamented plate covered by another of equal size. Walter guessed Scab didn’t acquire this set in the traditional manner. The servant turned over the top plate, revealing six sausages. Their skins crackled and the sweet aroma of basil and garlic scented the air. Walter’s stomach roared with hunger.

“That’s good, very nice. Thank you, Alvis, perhaps I won’t kill you today.” Scab grinned at the servant and twiddled his fingers. Walter watched as Alvis’s face paled before he bowed and slithered away. Had Walter just met Scab, he would’ve thought that comment a joke.

Grimbald had crept close to the small tray, staring at the sausages, as if it took every ounce of his being not to snatch one from the plate. It likely did. It reminded him of the restraint Wiggles had to use at family dinners. The hound would plant his maw on the side of the table, patiently awaiting scraps.

“Are you hungry?” Scab grabbed a sausage and tossed it between his hands. “Ah, hot, hot!” He stuck a dagger through it and blew on it.

“Very. Thanks, Scab,” Walter said.

Grimbald licked his lips and rubbed his palms together. He fished a pair of skewers from his bag and handed one to Walter. Grimbald jabbed a sausage with his gleaming skewer and took a cautious nibble. He swooned. “These are perfectly cooked! I detect lamb, basil, a touch of garlic, salt from the Far Sea, a shake of cinnamon and… a dusting of coriander. Is that right? The skin is just right.”

Scab shrugged and took a big bite, swallowing it after a second of chewing. “You sound like you’d make a better cook than a soldier. Looking for a new job perhaps?” Scab said over a mouthful of his next bite.

“Mm. Maybe a retirement career. My Pa used to, he—” he cut off, sighed, then sniffed. He looked down at his boots and lines of tension formed on his forehead.

Walter understood. It was easy to fall into speaking in a way you were accustomed too. The loss, the brutal change hadn’t quite set in yet. Time would scour us all from the realm eventually, he thought. He took a sip of the elixir, filling his mouth with its delectable bitterness.

“So.” Scab sliced through the heavy quiet. “Who wants to play dice?”

“Alright.” Grimbald nodded and tore into his sausage. “Thank you, Scab, this sausage is great. Been craving a good one for a while now.” Grimbald wiped the damp from his eyes with his free hand and forced out an awkward laugh.

“Just doing my noble duty to my noble employer. You two looked like you needed some cheering up.” Scab snorted and spat a yellow glob of mucus, almost hitting a man’s boot. It seemed like Walter wasn’t alone on the mucus front.

“The elixir is great,” Walter conceded. “Your servant knows what he’s doing.”

“He wasn’t cheap. He formerly worked for the Earl of Helm’s Reach as his first chef. That debt was paid — with him.” Scab rolled three dice in his hand and dropped them on the table. “Nine, Dragon’s Eyes.” Scab pushed the dice to Walter, who grabbed them.

Walter let the ivory dice tumble in his closed hand, enjoying their cool touch. “So he’s your slave then?” Walter let the dice tinkle onto the metal table. “Eighteen, Phoenix in flight.”

Scab whistled and peered at Walter. “You’re not stashing weighted dice under that cloak of yours, are you?”

“Yes, by the hundreds.” Walter snickered and tugged on his tunic sleeves to prove they were empty.

Scab crossed his arms. “Alvis is my servant. The word slave is so very brutish. It leaves a sour taste in my angelic mouth.”

Walter almost spat his elixir onto the table. Some dribbled from the corner of his lips. “Whatever lets you sleep at night.” We need to tell ourselves all manner of lies to live with the atrocities we inflicted upon the world for our own betterment. It was so much easier to turn a blind eye to the unfortunate.

Grimbald chuckled with genuine amusement.

“He could leave anytime he wanted.” Scab protested.

“But then the Earl would still owe you a debt?” Walter asked.

“Yes. And?”

“And the slave just changes hands,” Grimbald added.

“Well, if you look it at that way.” Scab took a slurp of his elixir. “Everyone is master and slave to someone else, right?”

“I suppose.” Grimbald and Walter said in unison.

“We’re spending too much time together,” Walter smiled at Grimbald and slid the dice over. Grimbald narrowed his eyes at his friend. “What?” Walter asked innocently.

Grimbald had a sausage in one hand and grabbed the dice with the other. His hairless head shone with an oily sheen. They clattered from his hand and spread across the table. “Three, Bite of the Sand Buckeye.” He frowned and chewed.

“This round goes to our fabled leader.” Scab poured himself another mug of elixir. His fingers were studded with rings, metal pitted and jewels a hard rap away from springing from their settings. “Remind me which decrepit, demon-filled town will we be making our pilgrimage to today?” The dice tumbled beside his mug. “Unlucky seven; seven of broken swords.”

Walter stared at the dice Scab slid in front of him. “Breden,” he finally got out. Why was it difficult to say? “It’s been too long.” The prospect of returning home felt like he might be entering a dream or a nightmare.

He looked from Scab to Grimbald, both going to work on their food. If what Nyset’s man Isa, the Tower assassin, said was true, there might not be much of a need for anything there except for putting the dead to rest. Isa went there on a scouting mission on Bezda Lightwalker’s orders, the late Arch Wizard. Walter had to go to see it with his own eyes. He had a duty to his people. Had a duty to Nyset’s and Juzo’s parents. He threw the dice. “Huh. Eighteen, again. Phoenix in flight.”

“What?” Grimbald said over his mug, his eyes going wide at the dice.

“Impossible!” Scab barked.

“You’ve got the Dragon’s own luck, I’ll tell you that.” Grimbald slurped on his mug and wiped his mouth on the back of his arm.

“It’s a good thing I decided not to turn this into a betting game,” Scab mused.

Walter snickered. That was certainly odd. It was rare to roll an eighteen in one game, never mind back to back rolls.

Grimbald tossed the dice. “Six of spears. Well, at least the sausages are good.” He skewered another and dipped it in his elixir.

Scab’s face contorted with disgust at Grimbald. “You uncouth ogre. How could you defile such a delicacy?”

Grimbald stared at Scab and started chewing with his mouth open, releasing the sounds of slopping food and smacking lips. “Mm.”

Scab shook his head. “How do you travel with this pig?” Scab said it without a hint of humor.

“Let’s not forget the nature of our relationship,” Walter said. He decided to not mention that Scab had the appearance of the most destitute of vagrants.

“My apologies,” Scab muttered and rattled the dice in his hand. “Three of… turds.”

Walter snickered.

“Isn’t it three of Shroomlings?” Grimbald asked.

Scab looked to Grimbald and his eyebrows crawled up to his forehead in disbelief. He slid the dice over to Walter. “Will Breden welcome a band of mercenaries beyond its walls? Assuming it has any.” Scab leaned across the table. “Does it?”

Walter leaned in to meet Scab, the dice rolling in his hand. “It was my home, so you’ll not be pillaging it if that’s what you had in mind. I like you, Scab.” Walter stood tall. “Besides the gleam in your lecherous eyes and questionable ethics, you’re alright.”

“Don’t forget my insatiable desire for marks, and thank you for the most generous words of admiration.”

Walter raised his mug. “Hits the spot.”

“That’s good. As long as your Arch Wizard delivers on our agreement, you won’t get any trouble out of me or my men. That I can assure you.”

“I trust you. You seem to have control of them, mostly.” Walter’s eye found Wart skirting around the men. His malicious eyes scanned the group for sleepers. He nudged a man in the back with the sharp side of his mace.

“They’re good dogs, just have to keep them sorely whipped and they obey.”

“Is that what makes a good leader? Rule by fear?” Grimbald asked, his head cocked.

“Well, well, well.” Scab planted a hand on his hip. “I forgot we had a Captain of the Falcon with us. Do tell me, what do you feel is the proper way of leading?”

Grimbald scratched the back of his neck and popped the rest of his sausage into his mouth. He licked his lips and stowed the skewer in his pocket. “Power.”

“Is that not another form of fear?” Scab asked.

“Not quite. I, we — people follow him,” Grimbald nodded to Walter. “Not because he abuses anyone, but because he can do what no one else can.”

“Which is?” Scab wildly beckoned and precious elixir sloshed from his mug.

Grimbald shuffled his feet, looking ponderously up at the sky.

Walter felt his cheeks flush. The rattling dice in Walter’s hand seemed to slow, beating like a drum in his head.

“And what’s that?” Scab poured the last of the elixir into his mug. He stared at Grimbald. “Hello?”

“Kill giants. Fearlessly stand against the demon god. Return from the dead.” Grimbald spread his arms. “Not murder his own.”

Certainly not intentionally, Walter wanted to add. Walter let the dice tumble from his hand. They spun, as if drifting through water, each edge glinting with light as they rolled. They clattered onto the silver table, the first two landing on six. The third spun on a corner for what must have been at least five seconds. They all watched it with open mouths. The die finally came to rest, six side up. Walter gasped.

Scab’s jaw hung slack.

“Eighteen again. I don’t believe it.” Grimbald grunted.

“This is shit! You’re using the power.” Scab balked. He took a step back from the table and raised his fists over his head. His cheeks quivered.

“I’m not. Swear it on my parent’s graves!” Walter said.

Scab’s fists crashed into the tray, launching mugs and plates spinning through the air. Hot elixir spattered against the side of Walter’s face. The tray flipped over and smashed Scab squarely in the face. “Damn it!” He growled and pressed a hand to his nose. Blood streamed from it and trickled into his greasy mustaches.

A few laughs came from his men.

Walter couldn’t help but join them. A mug had crashed into a man’s plate, throwing the majority of his oats onto the ground. “You slimy bastard,” the man said, squinting down at his ruined food. Scab sent all the malevolence his face could produce at them. They went quiet and turned to resume their morning chores.

Grimbald bent down and picked up a sausage coated in gravel and started brushing it off. “If you didn’t want this, you could’ve said so. Waste of a perfectly good piece of meat.”

“I know you were using the power, there’s no way that could happen!” Scab jabbed his index finger into Walter’s chest.

“So much for that needing to let go business, eh?” Walter grinned at him. “Embracing the chaos and all?”

Scab’s crusted eyes narrowed, puss flaking onto his shoulders. He groaned and then spat out a glob of bloody mucus. “Let’s get a move on. The day wanes.” His voice came out nasally and he stumbled away. “Fucking cheater,” he muttered.

“I can hear you,” Walter snapped.

Scab sneered and walked on. “I didn’t use the power, I swear on my parent’s graves,” Scab said in mock imitation of Walter.

Grimbald shrugged, bit his sausage, and smiled.

Chapter 4

Marcine

“After every sunset is a sunrise. Within pain and struggle, joy can be found.” -The Diaries of Nyset Camfield

The forest of the Woodland Plunge closed like a slowly spinning vice after entering its clutches. Most of the narrow path had grown in since Walter was last here. Back when Juzo, Baylan, and Wiggles were still alive. Before Nyset was more powerful than King Ezra of Midgaard. It used to be kept well cleared by the king’s trailblazers, a stray growth a rarity. His horse’s legs were being scratched by thorns every few feet. He eyed a dying a tree, its leaves turned the color of ash.

Walter led the group, with Grimbald trailing behind. Behind him, Scab and his tail of mercenaries followed. The sounds of clopping hooves were echoing louder than they should have been. He’d expected some of the sound to be swallowed by the trees and mingle with the singing birds.

The forest had a strange weight to it. Towering trees loomed over the path and blotted out all but a rare shaft of light. The birds weren’t singing. When he thought about it, he couldn’t remember the last time he saw any bird here. They had only been down the path for about ten minutes, but he remembered this place as an avian sanctuary. Perhaps they’d moved on to a place where fewer demons roamed the lands. Something else was off, something he couldn’t quite finger.

Something skittered and chirped from a tree, likely a squirrel.

“Hey, Walt?” Grimbald asked from behind.

“Hey,” Walter croaked, finding his voice. He ripped the cork from his waterskin with his teeth and let its cool water soothe his aching throat. Sickness was taking up residence in his throat, no doubt about it now. Shouldn’t the Phoenix be able to heal these things? There had to be a way. It didn’t seem to happen on its own like wounds had. He imagined his gravestone reading: “Here lies the last dual wielder. Taken back to the Shadow mother by the hands of the common man’s cold.” Nothing could surprise him anymore.

“What do you think it will be like coming home?” Grimbald asked.

That very question had been biting at his mind for some time now, with the tenacity of a dog to a bone just out of reach. Lots of answers came: miserable, beautiful, exhausting. “I don’t know,” he answered.

“I think that’s a good approach. I-I couldn’t stop thinking how nice it would be to finally see my Pa. All that hope,” he sniffed, “I imagined seeing him smiling at me, offering me some bacon-elixir ale. Me taking it, tasting the delicious brew only he could make right. I’d tell him about our adventures and he’d tell me how proud of me he was.” Grimbald cleared his throat and there was a long pause. Walter heard him take a swig from his waterskin. Scab barked something at his men.

They came around a bend where the forest relented, letting in a bit more of the sun. The light cut down from the sky and washed the world in glowing greens, reds, and blacks. Small insects danced in the rays, seeming to float on the light itself. Walter watched a wary Shroomling jab its spear into the mouth of a Sand Buckeye, making it snap shut. The Shroomling bent over to retrieve an acorn, its butter-yellow head glittering. It hoisted its prize over its shoulder and glared at Walter as he passed.

“Shroomlings,” he muttered.

He realized what was bothering him about the Woodland Plunge now. The colors of the leaves. They should have been only green, not turning so early. As they traveled deeper into the woods, he noticed more dead trees. Too many. He had heard of diseases wiping out entire tracts of forest, but this didn’t feel right. Ancient oaks to young saplings were spotted and blackened with the signs of decay.

“But all that’s gone now,” Grimbald continued, his voice hard. “His life cut away by Death Spawn.”

Walter knew ‘Juzo’ was what he meant to say.

“Does it ever get easier, Walt? Does the pain ever go away?”

Walter swallowed. “No, it doesn’t.” He exhaled. “The pain never leaves you, really. Think about my parents almost every day. Some days I wake up and think they’re still here. Like today, for example.” Walter twisted over his saddle to meet Grimbald’s eyes, gleaming with wetness. It was a pitiful sight to see a man so large and built for war, wading in the throes of loss. Emotional pain was the great equalizer.

Walter nodded and turned back to face the path. “Some days are better, though.” Days where you don’t have to think about your mother being defiled by a demon’s talon. He swatted away a Rot Fly that landed on his shoulder. “Days where you can put your mind on something else.” He frowned. Days where you didn’t have to see your childhood friend’s blood leak from his skull, by your own hand, no less. “Things get better, just have to keep pushing forward.” Until there was no other place to push toward.

“Right,” Grimbald said. “Thanks, Walt, uh, sorry. Well, it’s nice to talk, you know.”

“It is. Makes you sort of feel less alone, doesn’t it?”

“Yeah, it does.”

“I used to always think my troubles were mine alone. The more people I talk with, the more I think that we all suffer the same,” Walter said.

Grimbald grunted.

What made death more terrible than anyone imagined was what lay beyond the veil of this life.

“Walt. What was it like there?” Grimbald asked, as if reading his mind.

He didn’t have to ask about the ‘where’ he was referring to. Walter took a deep breath and shook his head. He deserved to know the truth, but could he handle it? “It’s unlike anything they tell us here. They tell you in school and in books that it’s a place of rest, where you go to see your family when you die. Live in harmony and all that. It’s all lies, pure speculations.” Walter rubbed the brand on the back of his neck, a raised figure eight. The Shadow god had told him it was to mark him as food for her pets. For him, it was a reminder to destroy her.

A cool breeze sighed down from the treetops. “I told the Shadow god it was supposed to be nice there. She told me none had ever escaped to tell the truth of it. Makes a lot of sense when you think about it.”

“It sounds like we’d be better off not knowing the truth,” Grimbald said. “To go through one’s life knowing only misery was on the other side of eternity would sure make it a lot less enjoyable.”

“You think? I’d rather live knowing the truth.”

“Maybe for you. But I’d reckon a lot of people couldn’t handle that. People need to believe that there’s something better around the corner. That’s what drives people, gives them hope. Knowing that their existence after death was going to be pleasant makes the hard work of life more tolerable.”

“I see your point, Grim. But just imagine the crushing disappointment you’d experience once you died and arrived in that world.”

Grimbald shrugged. “A price worth paying, I’d say. If pain was all that awaited us, nothing would ever get done. People would only drink, have sex, eat Fang Cress, and read fiction books. The world would become nothing but pleasure seekers. No buildings would get finished, farms plowed, roads maintained... like this one, for example. We need to know that our sacrifices matter, that there’s a light at the end of the tunnel.”

Walter nodded and thought about Grimbald’s words. Grimbald had a lot of wisdom he had kept hidden all this time. What else stirred below his warrior’s surface? Walter looked back at him. He swayed atop his Blood Donkey, his incredible form dwarfing the meager mount. He wore a pair of two-handed axes across his back, their butts twinkling. Blood Donkeys were incredibly powerful creatures.

“The realm needs to know the truth, for those who seek it,” Walter said.

“No — you can’t tell them. It could be a disaster,” Grimbald blew out his cheeks and it made his lips flap.

“The realm needs to know what?” Scab rode past Grimbald, then up beside Walter.

“Ah, nothing,” Walter groaned.

“Hey! What the fuck is that?” A man shouted from somewhere in the line of men. More yelling joined in, mixed with the drawing of steel. Walter pulled his horse off to the side of the trail so he could turn around. Thorns and sticks jabbed into his side. Something was lumbering through a patch of shrubs and heading straight for the line of mercenaries. Twigs cracked, branches shook, and leaves fluttered down from the canopy of trees. Walter narrowed his eye at the strange sight.

It was a mass of leaves, moss, shrubs, and plant matter of all kind congealed together in the shape of a four-legged creature. Thick tree roots made up the base of its legs, becoming broad leaves around its body. It had what looked to be chipped stones for teeth at its head and the top was studded with red mushrooms. Additional roots replaced the eyes; feeling at the air like snake’s tongues.

“What the?” a mercenary gasped.

“Kill it!” another yelled.

“Shoot! Shoot it!” someone screamed.

Crossbow bolts snapped and bowstrings twanged. Most of the projectiles struck true, but the creature lumbered on undaunted. Men tried to get out of the away as it approached, but the forest was too thick for all of them to move away. It rose up on its back legs and let out a crackling roar. It slashed with its arm and a root tendril slapped around a man’s neck, jerking him into its undulating form. He let out a terrified scream, stabbed with his sword as he was drawn in, but his bones crunched against its wood. Roots, cobwebs, and vines extended from its chest, exposing the gleam of a violet jewel within its form. They further snared the man, pulling him in and assimilating him into its body. Sticks cracked and trees swayed in the distance. More were coming and moving terribly fast.

“What is that?” Grimbald hissed.

Walter shook his head. “I don’t know, but everything burns.” They both dismounted and hurriedly secured their mounts to a tree. Walter’s horse snorted and gave him a token resistance. “Don’t worry, you’ll be alright. I won’t let anything happen to you.” He scratched the gelding’s neck and gritted his teeth at the verdant beast.

Scab pushed his way through his men, snapping out orders. The mercenaries managed to press themselves into the path, giving the beast space. Some made tentative stabs at the beast and more arrows thudded into the creature.

Walter found a way through the wood and Grimbald followed, making his way to the beast. Walter saw the man the creature had initially sucked in, writhing from its back. His boots flailed from the bottom of the creature’s body and one arm hung out. The man’s face protruded from its shoulder. “Get me out! Kill it! Kill it!” he screamed at Walter, his eyes pleading for mercy.

Grimbald drew his axes, glinting with murderous sharpness. His lips curled back into a grin that matched the fatality of his weapons.

Walter put a hand on his shoulder, pushing past him. “Let me try my way first.”

“Alright,” Grimbald breathed. “What about the man inside?”

“I’ll try to avoid harming him, but he might be done for already.” Maybe.

Grimbald snorted and Walter took a few tentative steps to the beast. Its arms were terminated with a series of roots, one longer and thicker than the others. It rose up again and slashed at a man who ducked, its root instead wrapping around a horse’s neck. The creature reared back onto its hind legs and jerked the horse towards it. The rider tumbled from the saddle and thudded onto his back. The snared horse tried to resist but was invariably drawn in. Its eyes rolled and it frantically whinnied.

Walter watched with morbid fascination. What was this? A new form of magic? Death Spawn? Some other form of sorcery? Shrieks and screams cried out from the men. The beast was bristling with arrows and spears, seeming to have done nothing to slow its pace.

It bent over the horse and more roots wrapped it up tighter, its mouth parted ever wider as it drew nearer. Its stony teeth sunk into the horse’s neck and the horse screamed. Blood rolled down from its neck and spilled around its legs. The beast shook its head back and forth as it worked to tear a great chunk of muscle from the back of the horse. Tendons snapped and muscles popped. The creature jerked the horse closer, hundreds of vines and roots cracking around its body. The horse kicked and bucked as it was pulled into the air. A ragged strip of skin hung down one side of the horse. The beast’s mouth parted and snapped like a turtle into the horse’s neck again, this time, wide and long enough to cover the whole of it. Its daggers for teeth sawed through the horse’s neck, gouts of blood spurted out, and the cracking of bones split the air. The horse’s body was drawn inside its chest, the hooves sticking out from its gut and its shoulders. The horse’s bloody head hung from its mouth, and the beast gnawed on it like a piece of sugar cane.

“Hey!” Walter had seen enough. He opened himself to the Dragon’s fury. Its fires curled up from his wrists to his arms. He hurled a fireball at its leg and it exploded in a shower of embers, tangled roots and chunks of moss. It put a wide hole in the bottom of its leg, leaving a few charred trunk-like structures holding it up at the sides.

The beast whirled on him and let out a bellowing roar. Mercenaries backed farther away, barking curses. Some cheered at Walter’s fiery show but quietened as the beast repaired itself. As they watched, spiraling roots and mushrooms creeped out around the hole in its leg and filled in the gap. It rose up on its hindquarters, both arms poised for an overhead strike. Roots whipped and hissed in the air. One of the horse’s legs protruding from its gut twitched.

Walter blinked his glowing eye and a blade of Dragon fire sprung from his stump. He punched with his other hand and Stormcaller materialized in the air, its crackling tendrils seeking to end life. Stormcaller severed through its leg at the thigh and sent it teetering over onto its side. Before it fell, Walter leaped and pushed against the ground with the telekinetic strength of the Phoenix. He shot into the air with more force than anticipated and managed to slash through the monster’s head with his blade, bifurcating it in one fluid motion.

Stormcaller and sword vanished, but he continued to soar more than twenty feet from the ground, his arms and legs flailed in the air. “Shit!” he gasped and his mind went blank. The ground rushed up and met him with a sloppy wet kiss. It felt like a sledgehammer had been driven into his jaw, boulders dropped upon his ribs. He pushed himself up on shaky arms and the glow of the Phoenix burned in his eyes. Blue light curled around his neck and jaw, snapping it back in place. He turned on his side and moaned. Pain like a nail had been inserted into his head.

He remembered now there were more than a few ways he could have stopped his fall. He could have used a portal, conjured the Dragon’s air, or used telekinesis again. He needed more practice before he used that in battle again.

He saw Grimbald and other men surrounding the creature, jabbing it with spears as its body started to re-form. It didn’t work. It was healing just as readily as he could. Walter remembered the gem in its chest.

“Grim!” Walter yelled.

He looked at him mid-swing and his axe weakly fell into the beast’s chest.

“Look for a purple jewel!”

Grimbald nodded and struggled to withdraw his axe, ensnared in winding roots. A root shot up and snapped around Grimbald’s neck. Scab hacked through the root with his sword, freeing him as a pair of vines grabbed Scab’s arms.

“Shit. Fuck.” Walter rose up and ran to the creature and paused half-way. Rolling balls of roots and leaves almost double the size of men, tumbled in from the forest and carved paths through shrubs, seeming to absorb them as they passed. They uncoiled into forms like the other creature, growling and roaring. One rose up in front of Walter, its stone toothed mouth yawned open. At least ten roots sprouted out and flew at him. Walter flared fire, hot as the sun for an instant, and the roots charred into ashes.

The creature reeled back and screamed in defiance as the charred roots fell away and turned into dust in a breeze. Walter clenched his jaw and splayed his hand, bathing it in fire. He burned and burned as the roots fought to re-form.

He finally saw what he was looking for, the bright gleam of a gem within. He reached into the flickering flames, harmless against his skin. His hand curled around the gem and pulled, ripping it free from its chest, snapping the delicate branches holding it in place. The beast fell to the ground with a thud, its limbs frozen in time.

Walter held the gem overhead and looked up at it. It glowed like an amethyst and felt cold in his hand. “This is what you need! Take it from their chests!” he screamed. Many faces followed him, but most were occupied with fighting for their lives.

Within the gem, shadows moved. He squinted up at it and saw a creature with six eyes and three mouths, each mouth clawing and scraping at the stone’s walls. “The Shadow Realm,” he breathed and his eye went wide.

He recoiled and dropped the jewel, as if he were holding a hot ember. It fell a pace away from the creature. Weeds, grasses, and mushrooms were invariably drawn to the gem, curling around it. He grabbed a rock and smashed the gem into shards until it was twinkling like stars on the dirt. The plant life around the gem retreated and once again lay motionless.

“Destroy the gems in their chests!” He ran up to the first creature they’d encountered, still on the ground and writhing against the ten men keeping it pinned with spears. Grimbald worked his axes like scythes, hewing through roots as plant matter streaked the air. The man who was first taken in by the beast had turned into a mess of squelching tissue and bloody bones. The horse’s body appeared to have been partially digested, its skin smoldering with acrid acid.

“Get it, Walter,” Grimbald said between breaths. Walter reached in and ripped the glittering gem free. Vines curled around his arm as he started to withdraw it. He pushed the Dragon through his arm and scorched the vines that snared him. A man screamed, burned from standing too close. The burned mercenary stumbled away and leaned against a tree. He held his blistered arm and took labored breaths. He stared at Walter like he was his sworn enemy. He’d heal him later, there was still much to do.

He dropped the gem and saw Scab’s sword hammer down upon it with the pommel, shattering it into bits. Scab stood and tapped the flat of his blade against his gut. “What a curious creature. I wonder if—” Scab yelped as his legs were jerked back, causing him to fall onto his front. He howled with pain. Walter saw why. He had fallen on his sword and the pitted blade stood out the back of his ribs. Blood trickled around its edges and thudded as Scab was dragged over the ground.

Walter pulled on the Phoenix. A portal flashed between Scab and the plant, severing the roots that had grabbed him. Scab started crawling and Grimbald hoisted him up under the armpits. He dragged him away from the battle, barking curses and leaving a trail of blood. Walter conjured portals through each of the limbs, severing them all in turn. The creature slithered on the ground like a snake as its limbs started re-forming, snapping at Walter with its mouth. Walter blasted its head apart with a fireball and carved a line through its chest with his fiery blade. He raised his boot up high and drove it into its chest, crushing the gem within. He never thought he’d enjoy the sound of shattering glass as much as he did now.

Walter turned as Grimbald and twenty or so mercenaries finished another beast. Something thundered beyond the forest and the towering trees in the distance swayed. Something big was coming. Worried yelps and curses came from the men.

“Now what?” Grimbald looked up at him. His neck and arms were red from snaring roots.

A horde of screaming men surrounded the last beast, cutting it up and crushing its gemmed heart.

Walter took a deep breath, bracing himself for what was to come. He had a feeling what they had seen so far was only to soften them up a bit. The mercenaries huddled together and horses screamed, those untethered sprinted off. The earth rumbled below Walter’s boots and he looked down to find the pebbles and pine needles dancing.

A vast mouth emerged from between a pair of trees, wide enough to swallow a cow in a single bite. The top and bottom of its square shaped jaw were lined with four lethal canines, each as long as a spear. The sides of its mouth had hundreds of smaller teeth, likely for sawing through the bones of its prey. It had the form of a snake, verdant skin and almost as big as Walter imagined the Dragon to be. Its back was lined with what looked like barbs and in the center of what could only be its chest was a fat, glowing gem. Could this creature’s weakness be more apparent?

The creature released an ear-piercing shriek and lunged for flesh. Bodies dove in every direction. Walter and Grim were fortunate enough to be away from its initial strike. All but one man scurried away and the creature’s incredible mouth fell on him, roaring into the ground. Walter met its golden eye, the pupil dark as midnight. Its dark eyelids narrowed around it.

“Die!” Walter hurled twin lashes of fire at its head. It sprung up faster than Walter would’ve thought possible. His lines of fire cut through a man rising up behind it, severing him into three distinctive sections. “Not again,” Walter breathed. The three sections slid and spread apart like butchered meat, burned at the edges. Blood welled out of the wounds and sloshed onto the man beside him. Walter was frozen in place and stared at the face of the second person he hadn’t intended to kill. It was likely not the last. The man covered in the dead mercenary’s blood cursed and tried to brush it off. He only managed to spread it around and work it deeper, covering himself in it like war paint.

There was more yelling all around and something grabbed his arm. It was Grimbald, his eyes wide with fright. Grimbald threw him, made him stumble a few paces back and something hammered into the ground where he’d stood a second ago. The beast’s tail was there, stuck on the hundreds of spines that studded the end. The crushing urge to survive rushed back.

Walter and Grimbald exchanged nods. Collateral damage was to be expected in war, wasn’t it? Its tail came free and threw a great clump of earth into the air. Its tail rained down again and crushed a mercenary with an arrow half-drawn. The arrow whooshed and thunked into a man’s chest at his side, gasping at the shock of the blow. The tail flew up and violently wriggled the man free from its barbs. The crushed man fell like a rag doll, his chest littered with holes, blood pumping from them in great spurts.

Arrows twanged and spears were hurled through the air, all aimed at the glowing gemstone. Most went wide or struck its sinuous body. It ignored them, as if they were pesky Rot Flies. A wiry man with a pair of twin daggers was using them to crawl up its back, reaching ever closer to the gem. The creature spotted him and its ugly maw seemed to smile.

A curve of flesh parted like a mouth on its back. Bulbous winged creatures poured out like a kicked beehive. They were violet beetles the size of Walter’s head, hovering in the air, their dark wings buzzing. They darted towards the climbing man and he hacked with one dagger at them. He struck one and a line of glowing blood streaked the air. Their buzzing wings roared and they engulfed his form. Their mouths tore into him, ripping through leather armor and chewing into his face, eyes, neck. Seconds later, they flew away in a single mass. Walter gasped. They left a limp, falling skeleton with bits of tattered flesh and cloth behind.

“Fuck! Fuck this!” A heavily armored mercenary turned and ran, tramping through the bushes and leaving everything behind. He was likely the most intelligent person here. A few others followed him, discarding weapons and throwing off helmets. “Don’t get paid enough marks for this shit,” another said.

“Stay! Stay and I’ll add fifty percent to your pay!” Scab shouted at them, propped against the bottom of a tree. He reached with bloody fingers and tried to say something else, but all that came out was a gurgle. Two men came back and took up their weapons. The rest plowed on through the thicket.

The beast rose up to its full height, reaching far above the trees. It shrieked with so much power, Walter had to block his ears. The Phoenix flared light out of his ear canals, the pain unlike anything he’d ever experienced. Pain had no end to its forms of affliction. His jaw was tight and his teeth ached. He struggled to keep his eyes open to watch for incoming attacks. He staggered on wobbly legs and fought to keep himself upright.

Walter turned to see men writhed on the ground all around, blood seeping out of ears and between fingers. The world roared like someone rang a gong in his ears. Men wailed and screamed, the fight drained right out of them. Grimbald stupidly pawed at the ground beside Walter, scratched at the blood that spattered from his jaw. Scab stabbed his fingers into his ears and looked to be moaning. He arched his back on the ground, boots kicking at nothing. The tumult was muted in his ears and screams were a backdrop to the gong’s incessant ringing.

“Back in the Shadow Realm,” he whispered. He was again alone to stand against demons that should not be here. He took a step forward, pushed his cloak behind his shoulders, and conjured a curved sword of fire from his stump. The flames cast the side of his face in its burning glow. “You can make this easy for both of us,” he shouted up at the dragon. “Put your neck down here,” he pointed to a ruined shrub, “and I’ll be sure to cut you open nice and quick, gentle even.” He grinned.

The beast rumbled with a wicked laugh. The beetles fanned out around it and their wings buzzed loud enough to cut through the ringing gong. Walter let his sword fade in a puff of smoke. They zoomed towards him, hissing through the air in all angles, homing in on him. For a second, the entire sky was violet with their round bodies. Walter spread his arms and tilted his head back. He welcomed them to come and feast on his bones. Backing farther off the trail, Walter created a ten pace distance between himself and the men. He offered himself for them to enjoy. “You don’t know what I am,” he laughed and caught sight of one their faces before it landed. It had four beady eyes and tens of tiny pincers sharpened to deadly points.

They fell on him, clinging to his skin with their barbed legs. The weight of them all dragged him to the ground, each one weighing at least as much as a short sword. They clambered over each other, biting and tearing, vying for a spot on his precious flesh. One pincer cut into his mangled eye socket, the side of his neck, shoulders, ribs, and legs. Their bodies skittered over him, pincers clacking in their own language of pain. The pain reminded him he was still alive, still fighting. He would have his vengeance.

“You don’t know who I am!” He screamed it, and a great burst of volcanic heat enveloped his body. The beetles tried to get away, but it was far too late for that. Too late when they were within five paces of him, he guessed. He enjoyed the sounds of their cracking shells, cooking innards, and pitiful little screams. When he opened his eyes, the Phoenix pulsed from his superficial wounds and stitched him back together. Their ruined bodies rolled onto their backs, tiny legs tucked in and singed. They would almost be cute if not for their carnivorous nature. He booted one and it vaporized into ashes.

He let the sword spark to life again and held it at his side, waiting. The giant bounded around a tree and curled through another, its jaws gnashing with grim expectancy. Its tail whipped into a few men as it passed, hurling them across the ground. It released its ear-shattering roar but Walter was ready this time. He pushed out from his head at each side with a telekinetic blow, blasting the air around him and minimizing the pain. The dragon’s jaw spread wide as a house and bore down on him. Walter jumped and pushed against the ground, vaulting into its throat.

The light closed around him as the beast’s jaw clamped shut behind. Walter landed on the fleshly floor of what could only be the back of its mouth. When he took a step his boots squelched on soft flesh. The dragon gagged and coughed. The world under his boots shuddered as he struggled for balance. Something big and wet slapped him against the side of the tunnel, drove his fiery blade through its neck and out the other side. It shrieked and a blast of warm, sticky air coursed over his body. He winced at the torrent of sound and the Phoenix pulsed in his ears. Sticky saliva coated his face and arms, gluing him to the side of its throat. It was humid as a greenhouse and stunk like a rotting corpse.

He slid his sword out from its neck and a beam of sun cut through the world of flesh. He dragged himself free of the curved wall and ropes of yellow saliva hung from his side. “Now you will know my name,” he hissed. He raised his stump up, the long blade flickering out. Fire burned in his eye, casting the pink tissue in its amber glow. He rammed the blade into its flopping tongue and clung to his stump with his other hand. The creature wildly bucked and shrieked. Blood spattered onto his body. The flailing beast only served to send him falling down a long stretch of the dragon, all the while carving a great burning line down through its chest.

Daylight spilled in through split halves of the Dragon above him. Blood rained and spurted over Walter in heavy gouts. His descent stopped when his feet squished into a pile of guts. He fought the pressing urge to vomit and covered his mouth, swallowing the burning sick back down. Something glowed violet below his feet under all the organs.

“The gem,” he whispered. Streams of its blood slithered inside his mouth, tasting how he imagined a turd might taste. He spat and wiped his lips, sloughed blood off his face. He stabbed at the organs and blasted them with a cone of fire. The light that had once filled the cavity was fading. He looked up to see great roots working to stitch the cut he’d made back together. “Shit!”

He had to work fast. Stab, cut, slash went his sword, working through the mess of unfamiliar organs. A bevy of vomit inducing odors burned in his sinuses. There it was, a boulder the size of his torso glowing with the light of a dying sun. There were tendrils of flesh holding it in place by the hundreds. He chopped and hacked through them and slammed his boots into the gem. It shuddered and blood sloshed onto his pants. He kicked it again, this time enhancing his foot with telekinesis and creating a Phoenix shield to protect his bones. It came free with the sound of tearing flesh and tumbled from the Dragon’s belly onto the ground below, outside its body. Something crashed into the earth and he felt its torso lurch over to one side.

Walter cut a line up through its side and stepped through its gut. He was back into the land of the living and out of the world that was much too like the Shadow Realm for his taste. Blood flowed down his back as he parted the curtains of flesh to get through. Cheering, maybe screaming reached his ears.

The gem lay a few paces away from the beast. Strings of ragged flesh hung from it and it was badly cracked on one side. It still glowed with a faint light. Walter strode to it and summoned Stormcaller for the final task. He whirled its tendrils over his head and willed them to twist together into one great lash. Chopped into the gem, it split into two halves, cracking loud as a falling tree. He stared at it, watched the glow of the gem until it winked out a few seconds later.

“Walter? Walter! Shit, you’re a madman.” Grimbald stumbled over to him, one hand pressed to a bloody ear. “Did you mean to go into that thing?”

“It seemed like the easiest way to kill it,” he muttered.

“Huh? Can you say that a little louder Walt? My ear,” he pointed at it.

Walter heaved out a sigh and turned to face the slain creature. It healed where he’d made the start of his cut at its neck, but the healing stopped about half-way to its gem. Roots and leaves were frozen in time there, crisscrossing together in a lattice where its healing had ended. It was a bizarre creature. Baylan would’ve loved to study it. The neck of the dragon had slumped over the side of its split body, its square like mouth broken against the earth.

Walter turned back to Grimbald, who had bent over with his hands on his knees and winced. Walter touched his glowing hand to Grimbald’s head, sent a sliver of the Phoenix’s touch to mend his wounds. Grimbald gasped and shuddered. “It’s so cold. I forgot how cold that feels.”

Walter turned when he felt it was done and Grimbald nodded. He heard footsteps approaching from behind and turned to find most of Scab’s men there, staring at him. A lot of men clutched limbs cut and bloodied, some bent the wrong way. He saw a trail of bodies behind them, unmoving. The creatures from earlier had caused a lot more damage than he’d guessed.

“Thanks, Walter,” Grimbald said.

“Of course. You alright?” he said over his shoulder.

“More or less. The question is, are you alright? You know, after jumping down the neck of the biggest lizard I’ve ever seen.”

Walter swallowed. “Yeah.” A smile flashed and vanished across his lips. The heavy debt of exhaustion was pressing on him. Using the Phoenix and the Dragon didn’t come without a price. Usually, it was merely a sacrifice of one’s constitution, other times they had demanded the souls of those closest to him.

Walter felt the blood and gooey saliva starting to congeal on his arms and hair, prickling his skin. He started brushing it off the best he could with his hand, which coincidentally wasn’t very good at all. A handkerchief flew at him and he snatched it from the air.

Scab grinned at him. “Need another?” Scab had a hand pressed into his gut, blood welling out between his fingers. “Perhaps you could mend my mortal wound first?”

“Probably. Have more?” He decided to make Scab wait. It was soiled after wiping his face and he tossed it on a barb jutting out from the dragon’s back. Scab’s handkerchief was likely clean as a horse’s ass, which was still cleaner than him at the moment. It fluttered in a breeze like a tiny sail from the deadly barb.

“Come here,” Walter beckoned.

Scab shuffled over to him wearing a half-smirk, and Walter healed his puncture wound.

“That — that was something.” Scab started clapping and his other men followed his lead, those that could at least. A few whoops and cheers came from the men. “Can’t say I’ve seen anything like that before!” Scab laughed uproariously over the clapping. He turned and sent approving nods at his crew. Some men who had opted not to clap seemed to reluctantly join in, likely at Scab’s keen eye.

“Well, well. Never thought my employer would be the one to save my hide,” he laughed.

“Wouldn’t be the first time!” someone added.

Scab shrugged and nodded in agreement. “Right you are, Brunwick,” Scab called to the stout mercenary. “Now what shall we do with all this mess of plant eh, meat?”

“Eat it?” Grimbald suggested.

“I don’t think that would be wise.” Walter furrowed his brow.

“Walt, I know you did it in and all. Mind if I take a trophy? Think one of those canines would make a fine spear.”

“Have at it.” Walter waved to the dead creature. Carrion birds were circling far above the trees, waiting for everyone to make room for them to get their fill.

Grimbald made his way to the dragon’s head and drew an axe. He put one arm under its fat lip and drew it up to its black gums. With his other hand, he started hacking into one of its ivory teeth.

“What do you think it is?” Scab placed one fist on his hip and the other twirled one of the ends of his mustache.

“A big fuckin’ lizard, I think,” Wart said. He had a gash on the side of his head. Blood trickled down his temple and curled under his jaw.

“Hm. A dragon, would you say?” Scab cocked his head at his second.

“A sort,” he snorted.

“No, not a dragon.” Walter heaved out a breath. “Something worse.” Was it a new breed? Or something they just happened to never encounter?

“Out with it already,” Scab gestured.

“Death Spawn. A type I’ve never seen before.”

“That was what I feared,” Scab frowned.

“They die all the same though, don’t they? Big fuckin’ targets on their chests and all.”

“Right you are, my good man.” Scab slapped him on the shoulder.

“No!” A shriek of horror called out. “What have you done?” There was a vagrant woman beside the felled monster. She placed a trembling hand on its neck and recoiled when she touched it. Her skin had the pallor of a corpse and was littered with disfiguring sores. She wore a strange mask on half of her face that wholly covered her eye. Maybe she had no use for it like him. Her sparse clothing looked like it would fall apart in the next heavy rain.

“Are you alright?” Walter took a step toward her and she leaped back. She wore a skewed circlet of beads and leather that clacked together when she moved.

“Who — who are you?” she demanded, looking from Grimbald to Walter. Her eye was milk-white; the dark pupil a swirling spot. That was not the eye of a man. This was no ordinary vagrant. Walter took a cautious step back and seized the Dragon. His eye burned with an amber glow.

“I’m Walter. Walter of Breden. Who are you?”

“Walter.” She looked down at her hand. “Walter, Walter,” she said it, as if tasting the words. “Walter of Breden.”

Grimbald stole a glance at her, then hacked through the canine he’d been working on with a final pop. “This is going—”

“You defile him!” The vagrant woman turned on Grimbald and screamed. “He has served me for thousands of years and now you defile his body.” She whimpered. “What to do? What can I do?” She tapped a curling black nail on her chin. “Can he be saved now?”

Walter peered at Scab and they exchanged raised eyebrows.

Scab cleared his throat. “Might I offer you a drink?” Scab gave her his most rancid of grins. Both of their mouths appeared to be in a similar state of horrid neglect.

“Walter of Breden, you must die for your crimes,” she hissed. She sank into a crouch and one arm twisted over her head, the other coming up from below. Green mist puffed from her hands and from it came a creature like a squid with a blood red eye. Walter’s eye went wide and he fell to the ground as it zoomed through the air, colliding with the man’s face behind him.

Walter looked back to see its tentacles wrap around the unfortunate man’s head. They flexed for an instant and the mercenary’s head exploded like tomato struck by a hammer. Men around him dove and tried to shield themselves from the splashing gore. The squid darted off to the next man, and its tendrils wrapped up another in its deadly embrace.

“Shit!” Walter barked. His heart thundered from his chest to his guts.

Their relaxation had lasted but a few minutes before chaos reigned once more. Scab ducked and awkwardly hacked at the flying squid as it hurled through the air, impossibly taking flight without wings. More squid creatures poured out of that green mist and Walter rose up, slashing at her with Stormcaller.

Her side bloodlessly split apart, and an insect the size of Walter’s torso sprang in and out in an instant. It collided with Stormcaller, sending its tendrils flailing into the air.

“What are you?” he breathed, a mix of wonder and fear.

“Lay down your arms or die!” she screamed, voice hoarse and rasping. She didn’t know who he was. Men drew weapons and gripped their spears tighter. Arrows cut through the air. A swarm of armored bugs spilled from the terrible sores on her arms. They buzzed for the incoming arrows and spitted themselves on their heads, sending the arrows harmlessly careening to the ground.

“I am Marcine, the servant of the great lord, redeemer of this land.” She grinned with a black mouth. “And you! Fight me in my home?” She cackled and tapped her fingernails together.

“It’s not human,” Scab plainly stated.

“Where have you brought us?” someone shouted.

“To hell, that’s where!” a gruff voice replied.

“Where’s the gem on this one?” another voice asked.

“Up there!” A man pointed up at the treetops with his sword. “Fuckin’ spiders!”

At least twenty spiders drifted to the ground, each almost as big as a man. They dangled on thick ropes of webbing, their hooked legs reached for the earthen floor. Their bodies were coated in a black pelt and there was a violet hourglass painted on the underside of their abdomens.

“Spiders, why did it have to be spiders?” Grimbald gripped his axes with white knuckles. His arms trembled and his knees wobbled.

“Doesn’t matter what they are, just kill them. Careful of their pincers!” Walter shouted it for the others, as if that had needed saying. It seemed like right thing to say anyway.

“Burn like your pets!” Walter planted his boot and eight red orbs of fire vaulted from his fingertips. They smoked in the air and wound to Marcine. She clawed her hands and dragged them up, as if resisting a great weight. A wall of roots sprouted from the earth at the last second and his fireballs collided with it, throwing lengths of burning fiber into the air. A piece landed on a spider and sparked its hair ablaze. The beast squealed and it fell from the sky.

“The Great Lord Asebor comes for you.” Marcine’s black lips tugged into an insidious smile. “You are marked, bound to return to her arms.”

Walter felt the brand on the back of his neck burning, as if it were inflicted for the first time. It was in the shape of a figure eight and marked him as Death Spawn food, the Shadow god had said. He would be no person’s, nor demon’s, meal. “I welcome you all to taste my fire. Bring him, bring the rest of your friends and save me the time of hunting you bastards down!” he spat through gritted teeth.

The spiders fell on the mercenaries and the wood erupted with screams of pain. He was intimately familiar with the sting of poison. It was a horrible pain, one he’d be reluctant to use on his worst enemy. “Call them off and I’ll let you live!” He pointed with his stump and his sword of fire materialized from it.

“Are you attempting to bargain with me?” she laughed. The flesh of her shoulders parted like an opening book and a swarm of hornets billowed out. They vibrated and shimmered in the air. There were hundreds of them, maybe five-hundred.

“Stop. You can’t stop me, you’re just not strong enough, Marcine. You’re too weak, too stupid, and too fucking ugly. Why do you think Asebor left you in the middle of the forest?”

She recoiled like she had been slapped and pain spread across her face. “You know not of what you speak! Die!” She snarled. The hornets formed two separate masses, black as storm clouds and buzzing towards him. Walter snapped his fingers, imagining where the insects were in flight. Fire filled the air within the twin masses of hornets in the shape of a chomping Dragon’s mouth. The Dragon’s fire crackled in the air, feasted on their tiny bodies. The hornets turned to clumps of ashes, drifting in the slight breeze. The Dragon fire was gone, wisps of smoke the only evidence it was ever there.

“What-how?” Marcine stammered. “It is true.”

“You are nothing,” Walter said and took a step toward her. “Call off your pets and I’ll let you live.”

She growled and spat. The putrid mist formed around her and new squids danced from its green abyss. One darted at him and he sliced up with his blade, splitting it up the middle. Its bloody halves collided with his chest and fell away. Another came and he cracked and slashed with Stormcaller, willing each of its tendrils to destroy the five that remained. Two made it through Stormcaller’s onslaught. He inhaled and tilted his chin up, watching them come. At the last second before hitting him, a Phoenix portal split the air and opened behind Marcine. The squids hurled through the blue portal and out the other side, latched onto Marcine’s arms.

“No!” her jaw dropped and her white eye went wide as a saucer. She had a squid on either arm and their red eyes flashed and tentacles squeezed. Her tissue ripped, bones cracked and snapped. Her head went back with a scream. Their powerful tentacles closed through the air, streaked it with her blood, and severed arms thumped onto the earth. She shrieked and the ragged remains of her arms writhed and spurted blood.

“The problem with you lot is that you never listen.” Walter walked towards her, crossing his arms around his back. “Never know when you’re duly defeated.”

Marcine collapsed to her knees and started sobbing.

“Too arrogant, my old trainer would’ve called you, had your lot not killed him.”

“I-I was only following the great lord’s orders. I had no choice!” she cried. Tears slid down her eye and out from under her mask. She shook her head. “I never wanted this, no, no, no never wanted it at all.”

“And here you are,” he gestured at her. “A ruined shell.” Much like himself, he thought. He was always one mistake away from being on the wrong end of the blade. He knew how it felt.

“Please. Spare me, I’ll do anything,” she choked out. Her gut pulsed like a wave and her shoulders shuddered.

Walter turned to see a few spiders remained. Grimbald was covered in what he guessed was their blood, leading a group against a hissing spider. “Call them off,” his voice was iron.

She frowned and tilted her head to the sky. “Yes.” She nodded and whispered something in a tongue unknown to Walter.

“Yeah! Run you bastards!” Grimbald shouted. Walter saw the spiders back off and retreat up the trees, leaving countless injured behind.

“Spare me, please. Heal me. You can heal me, can’t you?” Marcine coughed. “You — the dual-wielder. You can heal me?”

“Why do you fight for him?” Walter squatted down and met her eye. Who was this woman? How had she become so corrupted? What did Asebor give her?

She met his eye for a second and turned away. “He saved my life once. In a time before you were born, before your parents, before their parents, and the parents before. In a time a child…” she shuddered, “you couldn’t imagine.”

“You chose the wrong master,” he snorted and rose.

“But my arms. My wounds. I’m going to die if—” Walter’s boot hammered into her gut, blowing the air from her lungs. She rolled onto her side and jets of blood spattered on the dirt from her wounds.

“Walter,” Grimbald said from his flank. He ignored him.

“You.” Marcine heaved a rasping breath. “Please, mercy.” She choked.

Walter’s lips pulled into a predatory smile. He turned to look at Grimbald.

“No,” Grimbald whispered.

“Mercy!” he screamed. “Mercy? The same mercy you’ve shown to these men? The same mercy you would’ve shown them if I weren’t here? No,” he breathed. Mercy had shown him what it did to his friends. Mercy had left him alone in the Shadow Realm, never to return. He had been sent there to be food for demons. “Here’s your mercy.” His eye narrowed to a deadly slit and burned bright as the sun, Dragon a torrent in his body.

“But you said—” she protested.

A beam of fire lanced the earth near her legs. She shrieked and writhed, tried to crawl away. The line of flame traveled between her legs and up her belly. Flesh smoked and fat spattered on the roaring heat. Her screams were a distant echo in his ears. He was mesmerized by the unlikely dance partners, fire and flesh. At the ends of flickering flames, he saw a series of Dragons, clawing and biting into her. They were apparitions in the air, invisible unless you tried to find them. He wrinkled his nose at the stink of her rotting meat. The flame tore into the earth, bisected her chest, and finally split through her skull. The halves of her body squelched apart and hundreds of insects skittered out, fleeing in all directions. A green mist sighed into the air from the spot where her heart should have been.

Walter gagged and clutched his stomach, heaved a glob of bile onto the ground. It struck the edge of his line of fire and hissed into smoke. What had he become? But no, this was what he must be. He blinked and let the torrent of fire die. It left an afterimage in his eye that burned like a starry sky.

Scab frowned while brushing himself off, sheathed his sword. “Do tell me there’s no more of them out there? Not sure my fragile old soul can handle any more excitement.” He shuffled off and put his hand on Wart’s shoulder, engaging him in soft conversation.

Walter stumbled back and fell into something that felt like a tree. Grimbald grunted, shifted his shoulders and lowered him to the ground. Walter looked up at him and swallowed. Grimbald slowly shook his head at him and licked his teeth under his upper lip.

“What?”

“You said you would give her mercy.” Grimbald crossed his arms.

“Sorry, can you repeat that? Ears still aren’t quite working right.”

“You lied to her,” he said louder.

“How do you know?” Walter croaked.

“I heard you, that’s how.”

Walter rolled onto his back and stared into the sun, then closed his eye. The sun became a glimmering orb cut by a spear of darkness. “There’s no room for mercy anymore, Grim. Mercy gets your parents killed.”

Grimbald stood over him, blocking the sun. “But your word, you—”

“So I lied. Did it to save some of the men. There’d be a whole lot more dead. Do you think our word would’ve made any difference if the role had been reversed?”

“That’s not the point,” Grimbald huffed.

“Then what is the point?” Walter asked. He opened his eye, peered up at him while shielding it from the sun.

“I don’t know,” he sighed and plopped himself beside Walter.

“They’re not like us. They can’t be reasoned with, don’t abide by our rules. If I had let her go, she would have made our lives a whole lot worse by the end of the day. Maybe she’d return with ten of those snake-dragon beasts.”

Grimbald frowned at him. “I’m going to go help the wounded.” He pushed himself up and limped over to a man clutching a bleeding arm. He threw an icy glance at Walter over his shoulder.

Walter closed his eye and drifted off into a deep sleep. The debt of the powers had to be paid. He had to make hard decisions. Decisions he’d have to live with, but knew them to be right.

Chapter 5

Breden

“A stolen moment can be one of most beautiful things.” -The Diaries of Nyset Camfield

Walter gripped the frayed leather reins of his mount and gave them a tug. The horse’s hooves clopped to a stop beside the madly grinning Falcon soldier. Bits of dirt clung to his cheeks and soot trailed along the side of his neck. His lips had been torn apart at the corners and a terrible wound yawned up to his cheekbones, showing all of his teeth. He’d been smiling that way for days it seemed. A bulbous Rot Fly cleaned its legs on one his molars. His eyes had been replaced with squirming maggots and his tongue looked to have been partially eaten, shredded by crows. The charred embers of a small fire, a cook fire maybe, fought for life at his side. The forest was thinner near the village, the presence of man keeping it at bay. Squat shrubs interspersed with old trees reined in around the road leading to Breden.

Grimbald pulled up beside him and took a big breath. “The Falcon must have come here.”

Walter sucked his teeth. “Yeah. Maybe it was the other battalion King Ezra sent to the west?”

Grimbald grunted. “While we fought the Lord of Death on the Plains of Dressna?” He stared down at the dead man.

“I think so.” Walter swallowed. “Or maybe a small group had departed from the main battalion to check that everything was alright in Breden.”

“Hmm.”

The group had spent most of yesterday burying the dead and tending to the wounded in the Woodland Plunge. Walter healed damaged ear drums and the most severe wounds. The Phoenix’s debt was already starting to press on him like a yoke around his neck.

When the new day’s sun rose, they headed south to Breden. Coming here wasn’t tactically necessary, but Walter had to go. Certain things had to be done because they were the right things to do. He had to give Juzo’s parents closure and tell Nyset’s she was still well, as far as he knew. Dragons, he missed her. He felt his thoughts going to her, but he wrangled them in and dashed them apart on the jagged rocks in his mind. He had to stay focused on the present. He could think about her later.

Given the few red-plumed bodies that littered the curving path into his old village, he didn’t think there’d be much of anyone to tell anything. Maybe this was the worst of it. One could always have hope, couldn’t they? Besides his duty to his friends, he wanted to return to Breden to be reminded of what home felt like. It was like an ancient memory now, cracked in the ravages of time. Home was best kept as a memory. It would never be found quite the same.

It seemed Isa, Nyset’s Tower assassin’s words were true. Isa had said that Breden had been razed. Walter didn’t want to believe it and couldn’t until he saw it with his own eyes.

Scab’s men followed behind. The ghosts of their mutterings carried on the sea breeze, their echoes tinged with worry. A mercenary with a pointy-cut beard held a bandaged arm close to his chest. One man rode with his leg splinted with a pair of sticks, held stiffly out into the air and bumping into every stray bough. More than a few men had been poisoned by Marcine’s spiders. Their faces became the chromatic blues of a drowned man’s, shortly before hissing out their last breaths. Walter wanted to heal them, but if he healed one’s poison, he’d have to heal them all, and if he did that, he’d be too drained to defend himself. Sacrifices had to be made. Blood had to be shed. They were only the beginnings of the souls he’d lead into oblivion.

“I presume you’d like for us to enter this city with you?” Scab queried from behind.

“Looks like it’d be a good idea,” Walter nodded. He gave a hard exhale through his nostrils, trying to push out the stink of rot but only made it worse.

“Do remember this when you’re considering whether or not to give us the customary bonus payment.”

“Customary, eh?” Walter asked. He tried his best to act as though he were familiar with the notion.

“Customary,” Scab nodded and bobbed up his eyebrows, then grinned.

Walter gave his mount a name, Kez, and gave him a heel to get him moving. The Coastal Road narrowed as they drew closer to the town, maybe ten minutes away from the main gates. He missed the salty air of the Abyssal Sea, almost forgot what that icy air felt like. Kez navigated around a second body sprawled out across the dirt road. Three Death Spawn arrows were lodged in the man’s back, pierced through his polished armor, as if it were made of hay.

He remembered watching one of those arrows pass through his father’s neck. It was the night of the Festival of Flames and was supposed to a be night of merriment, not slaughter. Walter learned then that life often gives you what you least expected. What mattered was how you reacted to the arrows and cuts of this world.

He rounded a bend and his breath caught. Kez mirrored him by halting and blowing out a snort. The path leading to the Breden gates was more bodies than earth. Armor gleamed from tangled forms and red plumes swayed in a gust. A few dark carrion birds squawked with annoyance and fluttered into nearby trees.

“C’mon, Kez, you’ll be ok now.” The words were for the horse as much as they were for himself. He gave Kez a gentle kick and he reluctantly started making his way through the obstacles. A fat bird screeched at him from a waving bough. Its belly was bloated and looked to be a nibble of rotting flesh away from exploding. Walter thought it a tremendous feat that it could still fly.

A Death Spawn spear had been jammed up under a man’s breastplate and pushed out his throat. The folds of his pudgy neck opened like a book around the spear’s barbed point. Walter covered his nose with a handkerchief crusted with old blood and winced at the acrid stench of decay. There were Death Spawn corpses here too, though at least three men for every demon. Between the bodies were weapons of all manner. Broken swords, scarred shields, and blooded spears filled the path where bodies hadn’t.

Two men died in an embrace with their limbs intertwined, some bent the wrong way. Both of their heads had been smashed in by something blunt. A young man, maybe some would still call a boy, had his intestines pulled from his guts and unceremoniously stuffed into his mouth. He wasn’t a soldier, but a farmer in dirty overalls. There were women there too, and children. Flies contentedly buzzed and streaked the air.

Walter felt numb to it all, because it had to be a dream.

“Walter,” Grimbald started. “I don’t know — I. This is too much. I don’t know if I can do this again.” He pulled the Blood Donkey to a stop in the flood of dead men. Its wine-red fur was stark against the gray of the dead. Grimbald’s face was white as a corpse. Creases formed in the corners of his down-turned eyes.

Scab frowned down at a man whose head had been hammered into a fleshy paste mixed with fragments of bone.

Walter stopped Kez. Every man had his own internal war to wage, a war that could only be fought in the solitary halls of one’s mind. Sometimes you won against the demons. Other times you lost and had to turn back. “It’s alright, Grim. Wait on the outskirts, come if you feel like you can, but there’s no need if you don’t want too.” Walter shrugged and nodded at him. “I understand.”

He remembered how it felt to see a dead man and feel something besides emptiness or hatred for his enemy. What were those other feelings? Sadness? Pity? Empathy? He could imagine and remember what those felt like, but now he felt nothing.

“With my Pa and all, with Shipton. It’s just too much. I’m sorry.” He turned the Blood Donkey. It let out a blubbering bay and mercenaries parted to let him through.

Walter pushed down the sick that wanted to come up. He would plow on, there would be no turning back here. He had to face this. This was real. This was life in this world.

“Surprised he made it this far,” Scab said. His eyebrows danced when Walter looked at him.

“Why do you say?” Walter had to suppress the rising urge to knock Scab from his horse. He pictured himself leaping over, dragging Scab down, grabbing a dead man’s helmet and beating Scab’s face flat with it.

“No doubt, your companion is a tough bastard. But he’s soft as a walnut on the inside. Not like you are I. We—” He flamboyantly gestured. “We’re already dead men, living in desiccated husks of ourselves, I’d say.”

Walter snorted. The scars around his neck itched and he clawed at them with overgrown nails. The man knew very little about death, Walter reckoned. Did he know what it meant to die? Did he know what lay beyond the razor thin veil of this world? “Maybe. We’re all dead really. Just a matter of time.”

“Death comes for us all,” Scab agreed. “Earlier for most in my profession, though I do like living.”

They came upon rows of spears jammed into the ground on either side of the path. They were topped with severed heads, their mouths gaped open with surprise. Some heads still wore helmets, strapped under broken jaws. Walter paused at one of them, a familiar face.

“Hassan,” he whispered. “What have they done to you?” Walter started to reach out and touch him, but stopped himself half-way, fingers trembling. The spear under Hassan’s raggedly cut neck protruded out of the top of his head. The tip of the spear had a skewered bit of brains on it. He had worn his beard the same way, cut to a point. It seemed to have been left undisturbed despite all the other trauma.

Walter’s hand retreated to his side and curled into a fist. “Damn them, damn them all!” he growled. There was nothing he could do now, though. Anger was a useless emotion unless there was an enemy to direct it at. He sighed and felt some of the fire drain out of him. The weight of all the dead around became his burden to bear. He had chances to kill Asebor and had failed every time. There was too much blood on his hands and no amount of water would ever wash it all off.

“Every time,” he breathed.

“Eh? Someone you knew?” Scab asked.

He nodded. “Someone I knew in a former a life.”

Scab raised a crusted brow at him and continued. “Still, I like my life. I enjoy living as I’d imagine you do as well. Do you think that perhaps all of this…” he waved at the piked heads, “is some sort of warning we should heed, perhaps?”

“Go back if you’d like. I don’t think Grimbald would mind the company.” Walter and Kez started on towards the gates.

“Well, my curiosity is piqued. It’s rare that I encounter something new, it’s refreshing, really.” Scab twiddled an end of his soiled mustache.

“Never seen dead men?” Walter asked.

“More than I care to remember. I’ve never seen so many Falcon soldiers dead. The force must have been formidable.”

“Death Spawn,” Walter muttered. “You’ve only seen Cerumal and whatever it was we just fought. Just the tip of the spear, as it were.”

Walter stopped Kez at the gates of Breden. The wall stretched to the north and south, encircling the village. It was made up of long timbers carved into points at the top. Bark had been scarred and hacked off in strips from its sides and arrows bristled like spines.

The sign reading “Breden Embraces All” hung down at an angle from the intricately carved trellis that made up the archway beneath the wall. It swayed and creaked in a breeze. Beside the sign on either side of the trellis were a pair of mutilated bodies, arms and legs chopped off. They were suspended from nooses, their necks unnaturally stretched and reddened.

“Looks like they’ve welcomed us with open arms.” Scab snickered at the swaying bodies. “Cut them down!”

“Right, boss,” Wart yelled back from farther down the line.

Walter blew out his cheeks and urged Kez onward. “This was my life,” he whispered and passed under the archway, the gates left open as they traditionally always had been. He leaned over on his saddle and held his breath to avoid brushing against one of the butchered Falcon soldiers.

He moaned at the sight beyond the gates. He lifted his chin and his lips drew into a frown. Maybe Grimbald had made the right decision after all. Great lengths of carved spears studded the grounds all around. At first, he thought they were a new Death Spawn weapon, but realized they were young trees cut to points with their branches removed.

Men, women and children had been spitted on the trees. Their clothing stripped away; their flesh bare for the world to see. The spears had passed through their undersides and out bellies, mouths, and chests. Some spears held at least ten bodies, stacked atop each other, spitted through their guts. They had apparently spent more time with others. Upon one spear, bodies were laid upside down, spears going down throats and coming out asses, each person’s head stuffed into the ass of the other. Arms and legs hung limp from the great masts, some clutching each other for some sliver of comfort. Small fires burned near spears and into the distance, sending narrow towers of smoke curling through the gloom. Walter’s eye caught a figure whose flesh was the same colorless hue as Isa’s, hairless and stacked among the others.

“Oh. Oh, no, no,” Scab hissed through a hand covering his mouth. He circled around a mast where all the bodies had been spitted through the underside of their jaws. A young man and woman had torn free from the mast. Their mandibles hung loosely from the sides of their ruined faces.

“This!” Walter turned Kez around to face the men trickling under the gates. “This is our enemy!” he screamed and felt his eye fill with Dragon fire. This couldn’t be real. Was he in the Shadow Realm again? Was this a nightmare? “This isn’t real.” But he knew it was.

Scab gagged and puked over the edge of his saddle. “I didn’t sign up for this,” he said through his coat sleeve.

Walter wanted to laugh at the absurdity of his words. The corners of his lips twitched into the start of a smile.

“Something funny, Walter?” Scab’s tone had taken on a deadly seriousness. His hand fell to his sword hilt, his coat sleeve streaked with yellowish bile.

“Well, this!” Walter threw his arms open. “This is funny!” He dismounted from Kez and walked him to a pole with only a few bodies pegged at the top. His hand quivered and fumbled, dropping the lead rope when he tried to secure Kez there. He bent over and grabbed the rope, gave Kez a gentle pat along his neck. He got the rope around the giant spear and crusts of blood flaked down onto his boots. “This is all very funny, isn’t it, Scab?”

Scab watched him with a wary eye. His horse seemed to have felt the same and took a few steps away from Walter.

Walter took a few staggering steps and fell to his knees. The world blurred with his tears. “Fuck!” he let out in a long, tortured scream. “Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!” He pounded the ground with both arms. His fist struck something sharp and his hand burst alight with the glow of the Phoenix. The pain felt good; a reminder he was still alive.

He leaped up, filled with the fury of the Dragon. A sword of fire sparked from his stump. He ran to the nearest spear and chopped through it. A crack split the air and the great pole tottered over onto the ground. The bodies attached to it squelched and sprayed out with globs of congealed blood when they struck earth.

“Where are you? Fight me!” he shrieked. “Damn you!” The air fizzled as Stormcaller danced through it, tearing through the base of another spear. The mercenaries gave him a wide girth, not wanting to be on the accidental end of his rage. Walter was prone to accidents, they knew.

“Cowards!” he roared. He ran up to another pole and punched it. It exploded into a hail of burning splinters and filled the air with streaming fire. He ran from pole to pole, chopping them down and bellowing out with all of his pain. “No, no. I’ll find you, I’ll kill all of you!”

He looked to the sky and conjured a burst of air that shot him at least twenty paces from the ground. Jets of fire flared from his hand and stump, pushing him to greater heights. When he looked down, it wasn’t the fear of plummeting to his death that struck him, but the number of spears that stretched the whole mile to Breden square. “So many, so many, too many!” he cried. His body convulsed and every muscle contracted with all the force they could gather. Balls of fire burst alight around him like a cloud of anger. He kicked his legs and snapped his arms straight. The fireballs burned in every direction, streaked down in great arcs to the spears standing below. Each fireball collided with the base of a spear, blowing them apart and sending close to half of them toppling over.

“Bastards!” he yelled, but it felt weak in his throat. He had used far too much of the god’s powers and felt the energy draining from him like a pierced water skin. The air supporting him faded and he dropped from the sky like thrown stone. The ground reached up to meet him and burning spears filled the edges of his vision. He thudded into the ground and pain flared like a blade through his leg. He looked down to see his femur poking through his thigh, bone cracked and pinked with blood.

“Ugh,” he groaned and crawled away from a burning length of wood. Exhaustion beat into him like a club, begging for him to sleep right there beside the burning forest of spears. The Phoenix was there, patching his leg back together like a dutiful parent. Its cool glow hummed behind his closed eye. He’d lost himself.

“Walter. Are you alright? I saw what happened.” It was a voice he wasn’t expecting to hear then. He opened his eye to see Grimbald staring down at him and offering a meaty hand.

Walter shook his head. “This was my home. I understand — understand how you must feel now.”

Grimbald nodded, bent and grabbed his forearm, his strength a reassurance in a world filled with fragile impossibilities. Walter let himself be pulled to his feet and stand on unsure legs.

“You don’t have to do this alone, Walter,” Grimbald said. His big hand brushed dirt from his arms and plucked a twig from his shirt. “You’re not alone in this.”

Walter nodded and wiped his eye and exhaled with a great breath. “This was my home,” he repeated. “Thank you.” He clapped him on the shoulder.

Scab rode up with a big grin pasted on his face. “A great show, Walter! Can you do it again?”

“Fuck off, Scab. These were — were the people I grew up with.” Every word came out ragged.

“Ouch, my heart hurts.” Scab put a wounded hand on his chest. “What about all that talk earlier, ‘we’re all dead already’ and such?”

“Maybe now’d be a good time to just go on and lead your crew,” Grimbald said, crossing his arms over his barrel chest.

“Fair enough,” he shrugged. “Just one more thing. As you know… my men have yet to be paid—”

“And?” Walter narrowed his eyes at him. Was this the moment he’d take his men, tuck tail and run?

“Well, we don’t work for free.” Scab turned his head and peered around at his men fanning out over the path and between the masts. “Is it going to be a problem if my men take what they want from here? Seeing as nobody is living, it seems…”

Walter snorted. “They can have what they want. No one here will be needing anything anytime soon.”

“Splendid.” Scab’s fingers twiddled together and his rings tinkled. He pulled on his reins and darted off.

“But, that’s stealing.” Grimbald balked. “You’re going to let them steal from the dead?”

“The pillage is yours!” Scab bellowed out to his men. That got a few whoops, cheers and broad smiles on sullen faces.

They were disgusting creatures. It didn’t matter if they were wading in a sea of the dead, as long as there was some sort of material gain it seemed. “Doesn’t matter. We need Scab and his crew, the dead don’t need their belongings.” Walter’s voice was hard.

“But—” Grimbald protested.

“Leave it alone, Grim. There are bigger things at hand here. C’mon, come with me to the square. I get it, I do. We just have to put aside our honor for now, until the demon god is dead and all of this is behind us. Only then can we try to be normal.”

Grimbald grunted with disapproval and shook his head. “You’re acting strange.”

They followed the winding road towards Breden square. A place where he once came to get sundries for his parents, where life was simple. Memories came like waves, little snippets of a life that could have been someone else’s. He remembered staring up at falcon soaring around and around. He remembered chatting with Juzo on the way to Sid-Ho class. That memory sent a chill through his bones. He’d never talk to Juzo again. Not in this life, at least.

Scab’s men rooted through houses along the road like locusts to a corn field. They smashed through boarded up windows and kicked through burned doors. A pair of men worked together to drag out a painting, all the while arguing about who would get to keep it. A beaming wiry man came out of a blackened house with gleaming candle holders in each hand, likely someone’s family heirloom. A few men had tied up over-fattened pigs and were dragging them back towards the Breden gates.

Everything was ruined. Windows were shattered, bits of glass lining the edges like teeth. Doors sagged off hinges. The roof of a farmhouse had started to cave in, the spine of the roof forming a perfect downward parabola.

“I can’t believe you’re letting them do this,” Grimbald scoffed. “I mean, look!” He pointed at a pudgy man rolling two cheese wheels down the road and licking his lips.

“It’s already done. Let it go already,” Walter said.

Grimbald sighed and scrunched up his face. “It’s not right.”

As they drew closer to the town square, the din of pillaging mercenaries faded behind them. If only they knew the best loot was likely in the square. Scab seemed to know and followed them from about twenty paces behind. It took almost all of Walter’s willpower to pass each mast of spitted bodies without cutting them down. He wanted to see everything first, make sure the Death Spawn horde was really gone.

An all too familiar animalistic gibbering reached his ears. “Cerumal,” he breathed and nodded towards the square, not quite visible yet from around a bend of road and houses before it.

Grimbald growled and nodded at him. He dismounted from his donkey and secured him to a fence pole. Walter did the same and turned to Scab, seeing him smartly mirroring them. Walter beckoned for Scab to come and he shuffled over, holding his sword to keep it from rattling in the sheath.

“What is it?” Scab huffed like a blacksmith’s bellows.

“Death Spawn, not sure how many. Stay low,” Walter whispered.

An angry squawk came from around the bend. Walter pushed through the gate on the low fence and pressed himself against the house’s siding. It was split shakes and coarse against his arm through his cloak. Grimbald and Scab trailed behind, their bodies bladed against the house. There wasn’t anything he could see from here but a narrow band of shrubs and trees that shrouded the town square.

“Well?” Grimbald hissed into his ear.

Walter shook his head. “Can’t see, move slow.” He slipped from the edge of the house and threaded through the shrubs, careful not to disturb any larger branches. A twig snapped and crunched behind him, freezing him in his steps. His heart thundered in his chest. Why was he so worried about a few Cerumal? They were nothing to him, he reminded himself. He’d killed hundreds of them already.

“Sorry!” Scab mouthed, tendons in his neck taut as bowstrings.

Walter raised his hand for them to stop. He waited, straining to hear for the telltale signs of movement. It sounded like there were two, softly speaking in their strange tongue. He wondered if any man had ever translated their language. Walter crept forward and gently parted the leaves on a pair of branches. Needles softly cracked below his boots.

In the center of the square was a pile of bodies stacked high as a house. The empty eyes of a dead man stared back at him from within the tangled pile. His nose seemed to have been cleaved from his face and his eyes removed. The bodies weren’t complete anymore, though. It looked as if most had been ripped asunder and haphazardly thrown back into the pile. Most of the torsos wore the burnished armor of the Midgaard Falcon. Red-plumed helmets were strewn about the square, standing like nightmarish flowers. Here was the better part of the battalion that had never returned to Midgaard.

A pair of Cerumal squatted at the base of the pile. One held a severed arm in its claws and gnawed on the bone near the shoulder. The other sunk its teeth into an ashen thigh and tore a bloody chunk of flesh from it.

Walter swallowed and slipped back into wood and eyed Grimbald.

“Well? Are there Death Spawn there?” Grimbald crouched.

“You’re not going to want to see this Grim,” Walter whispered, eyes drooping with the weight of all this horror. He would see it though; there’d be no stopping him.

“Let me see,” Scab carefully pushed his way between them and peered out where Walter had. He stood there for a solid minute and slinked back over to them, face white as an apparition’s. “Brace yourself,” Scab said to Grimbald.

“What could be worse than what we’ve seen already? It couldn’t be worse. Could it?” Grimbald asked.

Grimbald started for the tree and Walter grabbed his arm. “Control yourself.”

He jerked his arm free from Walter’s grip and peered through the trees. Walter watched as Grimbald’s arms reached back and slipped his axes from their leather sleeves. He walked through the outcropping of trees and branches rasped against his armor. “Hey!” he shouted.

Walter followed behind him, seizing the Dragon and caressing the Phoenix. Their full embrace still felt foreign sometimes, peace and rage intermingling as a single entity, awaiting his command.

“So much for control.” Scab drew his sword with a ring. “Such distasteful creatures.”

One of the beasts turned to face them with an arm in its mouth, dripping blood at either end. The arm still had a bluish scrap of clothing wrapped around it. Its eyes burned like a pit of coals and it charged towards them, arm clutched between its daggers for teeth. Mid-stride, it grabbed the arm from its jaws and brandished it like a club and shrieked.

Grimbald dashed at the Cerumal, raised his axes up to introduce it to their honed edges. They hacked into its sides, splitting its torso almost in half, but getting stuck on the last bit of ribs. Red waves crashed over Grimbald and painted half of his face in its blood. He spat with revulsion.

The last Cerumal sat at the tower of flesh, intent upon finishing its meal it seemed. It tore another ragged hunk of flesh from the leg it had been working on, but dropped it and turned to run when Grimbald extracted his axes.

“Not today,” Walter said. He punched with his stump and a fireball lit the earth. It collided with its bounding form, punching a fiery hole through its wide back. It stumbled on legs short of blood and fell through the broken window of Casey’s store, impaled upon a sword of glass. Most of the store had been badly burned, but a few edges of wood remained untouched by the fire’s lick. The big wooden soup bowl that had served as his store’s sign hung over the door, the bottom coated in soot.

Walter remembered Casey, who had once poisoned the soups for Walter’s last Festival of Flames. It was his first encounter with Death Spawn, the day his parents died. Casey had made a bargain with Asebor, given a touch of his power so he could have his way with the village children in a dungeon under his shop. Walter made him pay with his life. It was his first taste of sweet vengeance; a taste he’d never forget. He remembered coming there as a child to get corn soup for his mother and had been lucky to escape Casey’s affections. He watched the Cerumal’s legs twitch over the edge of the window and turned back to Grimbald and Scab. The memory was dashed away like a broken mirror.

Grimbald snorted and stared at the pile of bodies. He held his axes at his sides in white-knuckled death grips.

Scab stood with crossed arms, shaking his head at the horrors.

Walter saw that most of the eyes had been plucked from heads, eaten most likely. It left the dead with faces that looked to be weeping tears of blood. They weren’t so much as complete bodies, but limbs hacked free from torsos and casually tossed onto the pile.

Scab cleared his throat. “These… these creatures do this to men?”

“They do,” Walter nodded and bit the insides of his cheeks.

Grimbald let out a great sigh and his axes dropped from his hands, sinking into the soft earth. “This is why your precious marks don’t matter. When these creatures roam the lands, this is what’s going to happen to you if you don’t help us.”

“I understand you and sympathize with your cause. We all have our wants and needs… and marks will always matter,” Scab’s soiled hands went for his mustaches and twirled them. “This time will pass, like many others before it. We’ll forget about it, move on and greed will reign once again.”

Walter wanted to refute that idea but stopped himself from wasting his breath. He knew that some men would never change, even when staring into the mutilated face of your potential future.

Grimbald seemed to feel the same, responding to Scab with a grunt.

“Now what?” Scab asked. “Once the men are done pillaging er — taking their share. We move on?”

“Now, we dig,” Walter sneered.

“No.” Grimbald shook his head. “We don’t have time to dig,” His icy eyes met Walter’s.

He was right. “Now, we burn.” Walter nodded gravely. It wasn’t right, wasn’t proper, but what was anymore?

“Lots of burning,” Scab sniffed.

* * *

Now that the mercenaries’ saddlebags were stuffed to the point of the seams stretching, they gathered around the square to watch the pyres burn. There were six of them in all, spread out around the square. The men had walked up beaming and joyfully chattering about their most recent acquisitions. It was expected for this lot, Walter thought. They acted as if the skewered Breden denizens were no longer there, spitted on the beams they passed. They’d hauled the possessions of the rotting bodies past them, as if they were somehow immune to that same fate. Men could choose to be blind to any form of horror.

Minutes passed and Walter watched the fires reflecting in their eyes. Faces turned from jovial to brooding, likely imagining themselves in that mix of charred wood and cooking bones. The curtain between this world and the Shadow Realm was narrow enough that Walter thought he could see a shimmer of demons on the other side of them, like faint outlines of clouds in the distance.

Walter sat on Kez and ran his fingers through his coarse mane. The sun was peeking overhead, cutting through billowing gray-black clouds. The wind tussled Walter’s sweat stiffened hair. “I have to go to Nyset’s old place. To see if her parents… are still there. Come with me?”

Grimbald turned to him. “Sure, let’s go. I don’t think I want to watch this anymore.”

“Keep your good eye open, Scab. We’ll be back in an hour or two,” Walter said.

Scab waved him off, transfixed on the fires.

“Wait. You’ll get the others? On the poles?”

Scab narrowed his eyes, brown irises circled in yellows and pinks. “I didn’t agree to be your personal grave digger, but…” he clicked his tongue, “but we’ll take what we want here and consider it done.”

“Fine, take whatever you want. Not like they’ll be needing it,” Walter said.

Scab smirked. “You couldn’t stop us all anyway.”

Walter felt the embers in his chest flare with a violent heat. “Oh, you think so?” He leaned over in his saddle, close enough that he could tear Scab’s lip off with his teeth. “You don’t know what I’ve done, what I can do,” he hissed into his face. “What you’ve seen has only been a taste.” The Dragon flared in his eye and wisps of light curled around his head. “Accidents sometimes happen, you know,” Walter grinned.

Scab’s face was unaffected, as if he were staring at a block of stone. “Relax, my noble employer!” Scab burst out with laughter. “My man, you’re a serious fellow. That’s going to put you back into the Shadow Realm before anything else will, that I can tell you with certainty. Men like you,” he scoffed. “They don’t last long.”

Walter shook his head and sighed, letting the Dragon drain out. He noticed his shoulders were aching from scrunching them up to his ears and he let them relax. He jabbed Scab’s shoulder with his stump. “Don’t fuck with me, Scab. Don’t you think that now is probably not the time for fun and games?”

Scab tugged on his frayed coat lapel. “My sincere apologies. Humor is just my way of dealing with tragedy,” he nodded and met Walter’s eye with a sincerity he’d never seen in him before.

“It’s alright,” he sighed. “Apology accepted. Don’t forget about the other people, please. Ready, Grim?”

“Mhm.” Grimbald was staring at the pyre.

Walter and Grim set off down the Quarry road and their horse’s hooves kicked up puffs of dust behind. The cornfields that had once been a forest for him to explore were burned to stalks of ash. A few had somehow escaped the fire, bright green and swaying in the breeze.

Some of the houses they passed were still smoking from fires burning deep within their hearts. Others remained unburned, but in an almost equal state of disarray. Those unburned had their windows smashed, doors torn off, and walls hacked through. There was no order to their destruction. It was chaos in its purest form. Much like the cornfields, there was an odd house seemingly left untouched. What made it so special? Had they left it as a reminder of what life was like here once? He couldn’t fathom the inner workings of Death Spawn and thought it a fruitless effort to try.

“Hard to believe how idyllic things once were here. Feels like a fabled dream,” Walter said.

“A nightmare,” Grimbald corrected. “One with no obvious escape. Where no amount of screaming wakes you up.” He smiled with half his mouth. “That about right?”

Walter snickered. “Yeah, well, take one day at a time. All we can do, right?”

Grimbald grunted in agreement. “There’s a lot of people we can help. Have to look on the bright side.”

“Yeah,” Walter said distantly.

“This seems like it was a nice place. This was near where you grew up then?”

“Sort of. This is the poorer part of the town. My parents did well with the elixir farm. We lived farther south of the square. That’s where most the elixir farmers are…” he cleared his throat, “were. It’s also where I spent a lot of my youth. Soil’s good there. This was where Nyset and Juzo lived. Feels like a life I never lived. So much has changed, like it was never real.”

“It was real, though, all of it. Don’t forget it. Don’t let the good memories die.”

“Yeah.” Walter nodded, unsure of what to say.

“Is elixir farming hard work?” Grimbald asked.

“Sure is,” Walter’s eyebrows drew down. “Still have the callouses on one of my hands to prove it. Every year we had to till the earth, put down bone meal, new seed, keep ‘em watered and keep the bugs away. We earned our marks, no doubt about it. But we also were lucky with settling down in an area with such great soil. No one was growing elixir then because no one drank it. Once people learned that it helped with concentration, it took off,” he laughed. “I remember the day we had an order for over one hundred bushels from Midgaard. My parents were thrilled. My parents said they’d deliver the order, and they did. The rest is history… the orders kept coming from all around the realm, Midgaard mostly. We hired some help, expanded and grew until all the land we owned was nothing but grounds for elixir beans.” Walter smiled at the memory. It filled him with a comforting warmth.

“That’s nice, Walt. Your parents sound like they were good business people.” Grimbald smiled at him, seeming to share in his energy.

“Mm. They were.”

“My Pa got the Hissing Gooseberry from my grandpa. He started it when Shipton was becoming a place for traders when the routes west were cleared of bandits. I guess the Falcon wasn’t doing a good job patrolling roads then, or maybe they weren’t paying their taxes.”

“Or maybe the kings before Ezra were bigger bastards,” Walter smirked.

“Maybe. Anyway, my Pa took it over. Gutted it, added a second floor, dug out a cellar for beer barrels and wine casks. Some people that came through only came through Shipton in the summer because of how cool the beer was. At that time in Midgaard, beer was still served warm because barkeeps typically put them on floors above the tavern. Can you believe that?”

“Wait.” Walter stopped Kez and stared at his dead friend’s house. He had almost passed it by without a glance. If not for being one of the houses still smoking, he would have missed it.

“The customers loved the cool, sometimes icy cold beer and wine. The tavern would be packed in the summer. Was this Nyset’s?” Grimbald asked.

“No,” he said. His best friend was dead. He was buried underground, one with the earth and food for maggots. The wound of that accident had not yet begun to heal. He’d heard people say that time healed all wounds, but that was a lie. It was just something people liked to say to try to make you feel better after a tragedy. Or maybe it was just to make themselves feel better for not knowing what to say. It was fine to not say anything, he thought.

Grimbald cleared his throat.

The house was a burned out husk with just a few blackened timbers left standing. “That was Juzo’s house. His parents went looking for him after Terar took him,” he murmured.

Grimbald let out a pained exhale and his fingers brushed Corpsemaker’s haft.

Walter nudged Kez towards the path leading up to where the steps for Juzo’s house were. The prismatic flowers of the garden, still in bloom, had been trampled under many boots or by someone who had a strong dislike for flowers. Thick stems were split down the middle, yellow roses smashed into the brown muck on the earthen floor.

Walter dismounted from Kez and peered inside the shell of a house. Two blackened skeletons were in a lover’s embrace where the dining room would have been, if he remembered it right, which he thought he did. But did that matter? Maybe they weren’t his parents. Maybe they were visitors, friends passing through. Juzo’s parents were both short, seeming to match the profiles of the bones.

“No,” he croaked. “They’re dead.” He turned from the house and felt the world sway. He reached for Kez and gripped the saddle’s pommel for support. They could not hurt him anymore, he told himself. “They could not,” he whispered.

“Could not what?” Grimbald peered at him and wrinkled his nose.

“They’re dead. They’re all dead,” Walter said. The words felt heavy as stones in his throat.

“Shit. I’m sorry, Walt.” Grimbald gave his shoulder a squeeze.

He swallowed and his throat felt like it had been coated in sand. He started coughing, his face burning with the force of it. Grimbald put an opened waterskin in front of his mouth and he gladly took a gulp. “Thanks, Grim.” He nodded and wiped his mouth. “Should’ve expected this.”

“Not something you can ever really prepare for.” Grimbald took a gulp and swished the water around his cheeks before swallowing. “Even when you know what’s coming.”

“They’ve already been burned, nothing to do now but move on.” Walter swung his leg over Kez then inhaled sharply, steadying his nerves and the quivering world.

The quarry road wound farther west towards the Abyssal Sea. The air grew cool and the salty tang heavier. The jagged tips of the Denerian Cliffs rose up, obscuring the Abyssal Sea beyond it, like a monster’s mouth trying to pierce the clouds. Just west of the Denerian Cliffs, surrounded by sea water, the familiar trail of black smoke endlessly drifted into the sky from the mouth of the Ars Volcano.

They passed the ruined shells of houses smaller than Juzo’s, some might call them shacks, but Walter called them homes. Most people in Breden had lived comfortable lives without the specter of poverty that loomed over so many in the bigger cities. These houses, including Nyset’s, were the exceptions for Breden.

“That poor soul,” Grimbald groaned. A man had been bound by his hands and feet to a rusted over laundry pole in front of Nyset’s house. His arms were stretched over his head and ankles cinched together with rope. Mr. Camfield’s skin had been removed and hung to dry in the wind beside the laundry. It looked as if it might crack at the slightest touch. Most of the clothing was on the ground now and blown up against the walls of the house. A white dress and some shirts were snagged on the dead leaves of the surrounding garden.

Walter wanted to ignore the body for the moment and found the front door. The last time he saw the door on Nyset’s house, the red paint had been flaking off. Now just a few specks of red remained, some of it blood he guessed by the brown color.

“Uh. That smell — it’s horrible.” Grimbald pinched his nose closed. “Why didn’t they burn them like all the others?”

Walter exhaled and let his eyes drift to the body of Nyset’s father. His eyes had been removed like all the others. He’d been partly eaten by Death Spawn or Coyotes. It was impossible to distinguish the difference. Hundreds of Rot Flies crawled over his exposed muscles, tendons and sinews. Most of the muscle on his calves had been torn away, leaving porcelain bone behind.

“They knew. They did it to hurt us,” Walter said. He could not be broken, he told himself.

He dismounted and made his way up the steps. The wood creaked under his boots and the hinges squealed when he pushed the door open. The odor was like a punch to the gut. His innards convulsed with a gag. He placed his hand over his mouth, as if that alone would stop the incessant spasm.

He sucked in air and his eyes followed the trail of gore up the stairs. It was as if someone had taken a bucket of blood and hurled it from the top. It looked to have dried long ago; how long he couldn’t say. He placed a boot on the first stair and something crunched under it. He lifted his boot to find a finger there, smashed flat and wilted up like an old sausage.

He swallowed and took another step, his hand on the rail and forearm pressed against his mouth. Did he really need to see the body? He told Nyset what he would do it, and his word to her was everything. He gave a resolute nod and plodded up the stairs. His boots clung to sticky pools near the top. In another time, he might have thought there was a lot of blood here. He didn’t think any amount of blood would bother him anymore, not after bathing in it in the Shadow Realm. The thought brought a bitter smile.

“Less air movement up here,” he said into Stormcaller. Its cool metal was a comfort pressed against his lips. The odor was crushing and took everything he had not to vomit up the lamb jerky he had for morning supper. He pulled his arm away from his face so he could mouth breathe, not that made much of a difference.

The door screamed as Grimbald followed him in.

Something came into view near the top of the stairs. Severed legs, cut clean at the knees and resting near the edge of the landing. That explained all the blood on the stairs. Mrs. Camfield was propped against the wall at the top of the landing. What remained of her head lolled over and rested on a shoulder. Her once beautiful face had been hammered into an unrecognizable mess. He knew it was her by her hair, matted with blood on one side while golden and untouched on the other. The bottom halves of her legs were on either side of her, skin the color of ash. A wide gash had been cut across her apron, once white, now shades of brown and pink. Her arms had protectively wrapped around the wound, doing nothing to stop her organs from spilling out into her lap.

“Fuck,” he croaked and his hand wound into a fist. He couldn’t stop staring at her ruined form. He tried to remember what her face looked like, but couldn’t picture it. Why couldn’t he remember? He wanted to remember her face. He knew she was happy, innocent, undeserving of such a cruel death.

The distant groan of wooden boards reached his ears.

He turned to face Grimbald coming up the stairs. His face was contorted with disgust.

“Why can’t I remember her face?” he asked Grimbald. “She’s dead, but I can’t remember her.”

“Walter, let’s go. You did as you said you would,” he beckoned.

“I need to remember.” He could only picture part of her visage. He remembered her smile and the shape of her chin. Why couldn’t he remember the rest? He took a step towards the stairs and sat on the edge, backside wetting with thickened blood.

“C’mon, Walter,” Grimbald’s voice echoed in his head.

A powerful hand reached under the crook of his elbow and guided him onto unsure feet. He was moving down the stairs, he knew, but it felt like drifting through an ethereal dream. He felt the ground flit away and watched the stairs flow beneath him. Grimbald’s iron shoulder jabbed under his ribs. He reached the outside and closed his eye at the harshness of the sun.

Reality came rushing back with the fresh air. “Thanks, Grim,” he stammered.

“You alright?”

“Yeah. You can put me down now,” Walter said.

Grimbald gently lowered him with the care of a new mother. The strength of his body returned, but he still could not remember her face. “Why can’t I remember her?”

Grimbald shrugged uncomfortably. “Memory fades much too fast. I know how it is… it’s like trying to see your own reflection in a rippling pond. You know it’s there, you can almost see it, but it’s just not right.”

“That’s exactly it.” Walter nodded.

“Have to remember the good times. The way you felt then, even if the clear picture you had in your mind goes away.”

“It’s like that for you then too?”

“Mhm.” He bit his lip. “Same way with my Pa.”

“Suppose it’s the same way for me too, with my parents I mean.”

“I don’t want to talk about this anymore,” Grimbald huffed.

“Good idea. Let’s bury them; at least give ‘em that.” Walter turned to look at the flayed body of Nyset’s father, wondering how they’d get him down without getting too messy.

“We have time?” Grimbald scratched his head.

“We’ll make time. I promised Ny I would.” Walter’s voice cut in harder than he’d meant. “Sorry. Hard day’s all.”

“It’s alright. Let’s find gloves,” Grimbald started towards a shed and Walter followed.

Chapter 6

The Yellow Caverns

“Only time can heal the deepest wounds.” -The Diaries of Nyset Camfield

Walter and Grimbald took about three hours to give Nyset’s parents a proper burial. The worst of it was retrieving Mrs. Camfield’s legs and putting them in the grave beside her. Some of her skin had sloughed off in Walter’s hand and sent her leg squelching down the stairs. Cleaning up the remnants of the dead was a horrible task. It wasn’t the blood that bothered him, but how cold the skin felt. They left the blood and bits of tissue behind for the carrion insects. The hard work had fallen on Grimbald again due to Walter’s missing hand, making his shoveling a laughable effort.

Back in the square, all that remained of the funeral pyres were charred timbers and a mess of bones. Walter was surprised to see the pile’s overall size hadn’t changed much after all that burning. He saw why now. Scab and his men had obeyed Walter’s request to take care of the townsfolk who’d been impaled. Long spears stuck out of the blackened remains of the pyres like dark porcupine quills. Skewered on the lengths of wood were charred bodies. Some of the corpses seemed to be contorted with pain, as if burning them wasn’t enough to end their misery.

Walter was starting to think he could rely on Scab to follow an order. He was a farmer last year, this year a leader of bandits. Life sure had a way of dishing out the least expected of surprises.

“Where’d Scab and his crew go? Think they left?” Grimbald asked and peered around the echoing square.

“Maybe. Hopefully, they’re outside the town still,” Walter pointed at the horse tracks. “There.”

“They lead out. Mm. Scab doesn’t seem like the type to quit a job without getting paid.”

“Don’t think so,” Walter agreed. He didn’t think the square could’ve possibly looked worse than after it had been razed by Death Spawn, but it did. Scab’s crew seemed to have ridden off with everything that wasn’t nailed down. They had even taken the massive wooden bowl that hung over Casey’s store.

“It’s done then.” Grimbald wrinkled his nose at the pyres.

A section of light at Grimbald’s side shimmered and distorted the world behind it. “What is…?” Walter squinted and cocked his head at the strange mirage. Something long rose up from its center. Walter gasped, filled himself with the powers, and jerked Grimbald from his saddle with a telekinetic blow to his back. Walter tracked the blade of light, fell back in his saddle as it changed course for him. The blade chopped into Kez’s neck, cracking bones, and spraying the horse’s blood over the body of his attacker.

The creature of light let out an ear-piercing screech.

“Skin Flayer!” Grimbald roared from the ground.

Walter fell into a forward roll as Kez’s legs crumbled beneath him. He came out of the roll, the sword of flames at his stump, and saw the horse had been beheaded. Blood came in great gouts from its ruined neck.

“Kez! Where?” Walter shouted, his eye scanning for the beast.

“Running!” Grimbald pointed with an axe in his hand.

Half of its body was a sheet of red, the other half waving light. Its footfalls were hardly a whisper as it tore across the square, heading the same way as Scab’s men. Walter ran with his eye locked on the red horror. Walter’s legs were filled with the strength of the Dragon and he needed every ounce of it to follow. Where was it going? Why was it running? Something felt wrong about seeing Death Spawn run. They never ran.

He hurled a pair of fireballs at it when it turned to look back. It sprinted, then dropped into a forward roll. Walter willed the fireballs to arc down, skittering into the earth and striking a tree. They struck with a thunderclap and burning splinters streaked across the air. “Shit!” he hissed. He raised his arm and brushed away scraps of burning bark.

It was almost impossible to hit the beast while running he realized, but it wouldn’t stop him from trying. He threw fireball after fireball and the Skin Flayer skillfully dodged each one, twisting like a snake. A portal split the air in front of its path, but it incredibly leaped over it, soaring at least eight feet in the air. Its robes shifted mid-leap, going from violet to the hue of the gray sky, then back to the colors of earth when it landed. If not for the blood covering it, he would have already lost sight of it. Walter heard the clopping of hooves from behind, likely Grimbald.

They rounded a bend on the Coastal Road and before them were the beginnings of Scab’s men. A pudgy man turned on his saddle and grinned at Walter, missing the Skin Flayer a few paces before him. Walter tried to get his legs to move faster, but they wouldn’t respond. His head pounded with his every step and heart pushed acid through his legs.

“Look out!” Walter screamed and reached uselessly for the man with his opened hand.

The man squinted at Walter and mouthed something. His head was slashed free from his neck and sent bouncing across the weeds. Blood lanced across the road in its wake.

“Damn it!” Walter said through sore teeth. The beheaded man’s body slumped from his saddle and thumped to the ground.

The Skin Flayer whipped past three other men on horseback and blood streaked the air from each man as it passed. Screams of pain and the ringing of a sword from a sheath followed. Two men dropped from their horses and one clutched a severed arm when Walter passed them.

“What happened?” The man with the missing arm asked with surprise, staring at the other half of his arm on the ground.

“Death Spawn!” he yelled at him and to the other mercenaries ahead. The group thickened just outside the gates, circled up in what sounded like jovial conversation. Scab’s pack looked to be figuring out what was happening. Arrows slipped from quivers and the glint of steel shone in hands. They got their horses moving and fanned out in a tight arc as the bloodied Skin Flayer drew closer.

The Skin Flayer turned on a dime, darting into the woods. Arrows hissed from twanging bowstrings and soared through the air. Walter growled and threw up a luminescent Phoenix shield that covered his side from head to thigh. The arrows weren’t for him, he knew, but he was now where the Skin Flayer was seconds ago. Two arrows struck the shield simultaneously sending a jolt through his shoulder. Phoenix shields are much like any other shield, excluding that few things could get through them and their weightlessness.

Walter followed, pushed aside jabbing boughs, eye still locked on the half-red form. His boot snagged on an arcing root seemingly designed for the sole purpose of tripping men. He caught himself before falling by getting his other leg under him in time. He took a few more staggering steps, arms waving for balance, before vaulting back into a sprint. His breath heaved in and out of his lungs and his stomach worked like a smith’s bellows. Juzo was faster. He would’ve already been able to catch it.

“Damn it,” he hissed. Even if he couldn’t see the Skin Flayer, it’d be easy to follow. It left a careless trail of broken branches and smashed plants in its wake. Its robes shimmered with the verdant greens and earthy browns of the forest.

A bulbous Sand Buckeye snapped its great mouth on a piece of the Skin Flayer’s flapping robes and jerked it to the ground.

“Hah!” Walter victoriously breathed. He snarled and three lashes of fire cut the air, each taking on the form of a semicircle and stacked a foot above the other. The Skin Flayer’s golden eyes drew wide and it pressed itself flat against the earth. One arm lay propped up in the air by the grinning Sand Buckeye’s hold on its robes.

One of the firey arcs carved a path through its arm at the bicep, splashing dark blood over the bulbous plant. The plant shook and the Skin Flayer arched its back, squealed, then sprang up with feline grace. The Sand Buckeye released its hold on the Skin Flayer’s robes and twisted down to snap up the severed arm. The Death Spawn’s eyes flashed with a malevolent glow and it ran and Walter followed. The beast’s ashen hand hung out from the corner of the Sand Buckeye’s maw, its body too small to contain it all.

The Skin Flayer jumped between a pair of dense shrubs. Walter briefly lost sight of it and leaped through to follow. Something struck his chest and pain unfurled over his body. A web of fine wires pinned him to a tree, cinching down all around and welling out with blood under each wire. They drew down tighter and tighter, Phoenix flaring to stitch the deepening wounds back together. Some kind of trap. He growled through gritted teeth, tried to get an arm under the crushing wires but only managed to trap it against his stomach.

“Shit!” he gasped. His skin had healed over the wires, but they continued to drive down and down, cutting deeper and trying to cut him into cubes. He flared fire and his body became a burning orb. Whatever mechanism had been driving the wires deeper relented, but now fine nubs of metal sprung out of his skin in every direction.

He remembered this weapon. Nyset had been hit with it in Midgaard when they chased the Skin Flayer in the king’s palace. When it had hit her it was a simple net, this was something more sinister.

“Dragons. It healed under my skin. Under my skin!” His lips contorted and he stared down at the bulges of wire under his arms and wrapping over his stump. The Phoenix could heal wounds wonderfully, but did nothing to assuage the misery of pain. “What am I going to do?” he cried.

He took a step and it felt like being stabbed by hundreds of daggers, every nerve firing from head to toe. He knew what he had to do but dreaded doing it. He reached for one of the nubs of wire sticking out of his arm, fingers trembling. He wound two fingers around it and inhaled sharply. It was better to fully commit to a thing than to do it with half intent.

“Fuck. You,” he hissed and stared off through waving pine trees where the Skin Flayer had fled.

He exhaled and jerked the wire up as hard as he could. His skin tore with red lines as the wires emerged out from under his flesh. His skin squelched and raged with pain. The wounds flared with the whitish-blue light of the Phoenix and trickling blood snakes curled around his arm. He ripped and ripped and screamed until a web of metal was freed from one arm. He heaved out a ragged breath and wound up the net of wires into a neat ball. Walter’s guts churned at the sight of seeing all that clumped up metal hanging out of his body.

He kept pulling, screaming, and healing. It was one thing to be injured by an enemy and deal with the pain, another entirely for it to be self-inflicted. The wires were stripped out from his chest, peeled up his neck, and shredded from his face.

“Ugh. That was the worst of it,” he breathed heavily.

“Walter?” Grimbald’s voice shouted in the distance.

He craned his head around the tree, the bark rough against his cheek. “Over here,” he yelled.

Walter listened as Grimbald’s boots snapped on twigs and dry leaves. He leaned against the tree and waved with his arm. “Need your help.”

“Hey!” Grimbald rounded the great oak and his eyes bulged. “What the? What happened to you? Are you alright?”

“Death Spawn weapon.” Walter bit his upper lip.

Grimbald’s hands went for his axes and he whirled around, searching for threats.

“It ran. I lost it. Rip the rest of it out, would you?” Walter eyed the gleaming bundle of wires hanging from his neck.

“Me?” Grimbald’s jaw hung open.

“Yes, you!”

“Shit.” Grimbald winced and inspected the wires. “You want me to just grab it and pull it out?”

“Please. Do it quick, like an old bandage. I’ll try not to scream, but if I do… keep pulling. I’ll heal as it comes.”

“Shit, shit.” Grimbald blew out his cheeks. “Alright, on the count of three.” He steeled himself and grabbed the ball of metal in his mighty fist. “Ready?”

“Ready.”

“One…”

Pain roared up his face, speared into his other arm, and burned through his legs. Walter’s jaw clamped down on his tongue, filling his mouth with the taste of iron. His vision was filled with the healing light of the Phoenix, stitching bloody lines of skin back together. “Whoo!” Walter yelled, pain fading like waking from a nightmare. “Aye, that was brutal.”

“Better now?” Grimbald asked with a grin. He balled up the rest of the webbing in his hands and tossed it over his shoulder.

“Should’ve expected that from you. Thanks for the help.”

“You’re welcome. Can’t believe you didn’t get that Death Spawn.” Grimbald shook his head in mock scorn.

“Ah, fuck off.” Walter jabbed him in the shoulder with his stump.

Grimbald grinned for a second, then frowned. “Think he got three of Scab’s men.”

“They’re wily bastards. The good news is that he left us a trail.” Walter nodded towards the bloody Sand Buckeye, gnawing on the severed arm, its fat green lips bloody.

Grimbald took a cautious step towards it and Walter followed. There was a trail of blood flowing deeper into the forest. “Looks like you got him good,” Grimbald said.

“Mhm. Where’s your donkey?” Walter wondered. He started off following the spatter of dark blood. The trail wound across a clearing littered with low ferns, making it easy enough to follow.

“Tied him up near Scab’s crew. Rogue doesn’t much like the woods when there’s no marked trail to follow.”

“Sounds… donkeyish?” Walter asked.

Grimbald grunted in agreement.

Walter stopped at a spot where the fern’s leaves were coated in globs of blood. “Didn’t know his name was Rogue. You recently named him?”

“Nah. That’s always been his name. You never asked,” Grimbald shrugged.

“Suppose I hadn’t.” Walter drummed his fingers on his chest. “Looks like it might’ve stopped here to tie off the wound.”

“Mm. There’s still blood, though. Just a bit less to follow.”

The trail led through the clearing and into dense thicket. Places where they couldn’t find a blood trail, they found battered shrubs and cracked boughs.

“Not very sneaky.” Grimbald fingered a recently broken branch. Blood speckled its orange leaves.

Walter peered up at the sky. It had become crimson, as if blood hung in the air. “That late already?”

“We spent a lot of time with the dead,” Grimbald snorted. “Thinking of heading back?”

“No,” he ran a hand through his tussled hair. “Want to see where it goes. Maybe it will lead us to others.” Walter didn’t like the prospect of sleeping out here, especially without a blanket. The Abyssal Sea swept in with bitterly cold air in the evening.

“Hopefully, there’s not more than we can handle,” Grimbald muttered.

Walter pushed his way around grabbing thorns. “With those axes of yours and what you did to those Blood Eaters… figured you could handle an army of them alone.”

“I wish. Curious to see where it goes anyway,” Grimbald shrugged. “Lamb?” Grimbald offered him a strip from a pouch, meat white with salt.

“Think I’ll pass for now… maybe when I’m a little less bloody.” Walter stalked on, eyed a section of trampled wildflowers.

Grimbald popped the piece intended for Walter into his mouth and grinned. “Your loss,” he said while gnawing.

They followed the Skin Flayer’s path for at least another half-hour before finally coming upon the mouth of a cave.

“You think it went in there?” Walter asked, not without a touch of reluctance.

“Where else could it have gone?” Grimbald put his hands on his hips.

Walter groaned. He hadn’t had very many enjoyable experiences in subterranean places. Thinking of his time in the Shiv’s Fang tunnels with Juzo, Walt shivered. He truly hated being underground, he realized.

Grimbald slipped out from the trees and strode toward the cave’s entrance. Walter paused at the entrance, squinted at a weather-worn sign nailed to a tree stump beside the cave. “The Yellow Caverns,” he read.

“Looks sort of gray to me,” Grimbald said.

Walter then read a smaller, newer looking sign below it, “Cursed.”

“Sounds promising,” Grimbald chuckled. “Our sort of place.”

Walter followed the line of dark blood droplets leading into the cave. “Looks like we’re still on its tail.”

Grimbald squatted down and put his finger on a drop and rubbed his fingers together. “Still wet,” he remarked. “And still oddly warm.” Grimbald rose up and wiped his hands on his armored legs.

“Shouldn’t you taste it? To confirm it’s real blood?”

Grimbald rolled his eyes. “Don’t tempt me. Though it wouldn’t surprise me if there was a recipe that called for Death Spawn blood.”

Weathered boards were strewn about the ground at the mouth of the cave. Some were broken and most were covered with dusty footprints. A few boards were still intact at the sides of the entrance, haphazardly wedged in between rocks, as if that’d be enough to prevent anyone from peeling them off and going in.

Walter took a few steps into the cavern’s mouth and was assaulted by a familiar, sulfurous stink. “Death Spawn,” he said through gritted teeth.

“Smells like there was a lot of ‘em.” Grimbald drew an axe and slung it over his shoulder. “Oh, look a rope.” He bent down to grab it.

It looked more like a vessel for fuzzy black mold than a rope to Walter. “You’d trust that thing with your life?”

“Better than no rope,” Grimbald beamed as he worked it over his shoulders and across his broad chest.

Walter could smell the mold puffing into the air and held his breath to avoid breathing it in. “Not so sure about that; doubt we’ll need it,” Walter’s voice was muffled over his arm.

“You’ll be glad I grabbed it if we do.”

“Maybe,” Walter rolled his shoulders. “Try not to breathe that stuff in, not good for you.”

Walter strode into the darkness and a ball of fire sparked to life at his shoulder, crackling in the air and illuminating the craggy walls. The air was cool and the path gradually sloped down. Resting along the walls were hundreds of mining tools stacked on top of each other and stretching into the black. Grimbald’s boot kicked a stone, sending an echo from the walls.

Walter flinched and whipped his head over his shoulder and found himself flashing Grimbald a scowl.

“What?” Grimbald asked innocently.

“Nothing,” Walter scoffed.

“Not afraid of a little darkness are you?” Grimbald raised an eyebrow.

“No,” Walter said flatly.

“Scared of a little cave?” Grimbald chuckled, not letting it go.

Walter snorted and started onward.

“No—” Grimbald stopped in his tracks. “You, Walter the fucking Giant Slayer, the last dual-wielder, returner from the Shadow Realm, boyfriend of the Arch Wizard of the Tower, killer of Death Spawn is afraid of this here little cave?” Grimbald laughed.

“C’mon,” Walter huffed. “Do you want to find where this thing went?” He knew he should’ve been able to laugh with Grimbald, would’ve any other time. He looked up at all that mass of earth and stone held up by air alone, ready to fall and crush them to death. He felt a cold sweat prickle on the back of his neck and his hand felt clammy. At least they had light, Walter thought.

“I do. Sorry, just surprised.” Grimbald shrugged uncomfortably.

“This way then,” Walter said and forced a smile that felt more like a grimace. He forced his feet to start moving, one ahead of the other. He peered down that dark path and his heart sank to his guts. It swam with darkness with hardly enough air to breathe. They had no idea how deep it went, what direction to follow, or what they’d find. He glanced up at the vaulted stones rising up overhead and gulped. Tunnels were places for Shiv Fangs and weapons that summoned portals to steal his friends.

The density of mining tools propped against the walls thickened as the path descended. There were hammers, chisels of various sizes, pickaxes and shovels all covered in a blanket of dust. If Death Spawn had once used these tools, how had they managed to keep it a secret? The path they walked went from hard packed dust to loose shingle, their boots sliding at least two feet with every step. It was as if someone had chiseled away a cliff’s worth of rock and dumped it here.

Was Juzo in the Shadow Realm, fighting for his life against a horde of demons? He was only there because Walter had sent him there. Maybe being crushed to death wouldn’t be so bad of a way to go, after all. Assuming it’d be quick if a stone got him in the skull. Walter wasn’t feeling very keen about fighting Death Spawn here, not in this inky tunnel. Walter nodded, sucking on his teeth and bracing himself as the tunnel wound deeper.

Grimbald coughed. “You’re moving too slow. I’ve almost stumbled into you three times now.”

Walter stopped and dust curled into the air. “Would you like to lead then?” Walter gestured down the path.

“No, but—”

“Fine! Then stop telling me what to do,” Walter snapped, his hand balling into a fist.

“Fine, get out of my way,” Grimbald spat, shouldered past him and stalked off down the path.

Shadows filled in around him, nothing to be heard but the scraping of his boots. Walter felt a sudden jolt of panic at being left alone and raced after him. “Hang on,” he hissed. “How can you even see?”

“Have good night vision,” Grimbald said from the shadows ahead. His armor gleamed from the light of Walter’s ball of fire as he came into view. Walter felt a bit of the tension ease from his chest at seeing him. The passage continued to slope farther down, growing ever colder. Walter let his fingers trace over the jagged walls.

Even with the ball of fire sputtering between them, the darkness seemed to somehow grow deeper and heavier. Grimbald’s armor became a fiery apparition; the back of his bald head like a faceless creature. Walter’s boot slipped on a stone and something twanged in his knee. He stopped to give it a feel, finding everything still intact.

He looked up and Grimbald was gone. The darkness fought to bury him and leave him forever alone. “Grim, wait!” he breathed.

Walter darted down the path, stumbled on sinking stones, closed his eye, and struck something hard. He felt a hand shove him in the chest, sending him onto his ass.

“Watch where you’re going,” Grimbald muttered.

“Shit, hate this fucking place,” he said and heard his voice infused with panic. He was making a fool of himself in front of someone that once looked to him for guidance. He felt like a scared child, seeking his mother’s leg to latch onto for comfort. His heart pounded in his head and his stomach heaved. What if they found Asebor down here? Was he ready for him?

Grimbald snorted. “Here, take it.” He offered his hand. Walter grabbed it and felt Grim’s big hand close around his, further emphasizing his feeling like a child. His strength was reassuring, though.

They plodded deeper down the path. Grimbald dragged him behind like an impatient parent. If only Nyset and Juzo could’ve seen him now. Walter Glade, one of the most powerful men in the realm with the Dragon, clinging tight to Grimbald’s hand. He might have considered laughing at the thought, if not for the fear of what lay in the cave might hear.

* * *

Walter’s small hand felt hot and sticky, wriggling with fear. It was an unpleasant sensation, but Grimbald knew that Walter needed him, knew that Walt would’ve done the same for him if the position were reversed. He wanted to let go but forced himself to hang on. This was what friends did for friends. It’s what he would do.

Walt’s breathing was shallow and quick in the tightening space. His footsteps were clumsy and he stumbled from behind. His fireball was sufficient to light the path ahead. Grimbald knew that if anything came, it’d come for him first. That was okay, though. Walter would take care of him if it came to that. He trusted him as much as he’d trust his Pa.

It felt like only yesterday when he’d first met Walter in the Hissing Gooseberry. He had come in dressed head to toe in armor and tried to hide it under his cloak. Grimbald thought he might have ended up being a troublemaker he’d have to throw out, but never thought then he’d one day find himself in the middle of the earth with him.

He knew when he first arm-wrestled with him that he was dangerous. No man half his size should’ve had so much strength. Grimbald had always had a hard time trusting people. Maybe that explained why he never had friends for long, he thought. He’d decided the day when he met Walter and his friends that would have to change. He’d put his faith in them then and it was one of the best decisions of his life.

He still didn’t trust many people, but he trusted Walter. Walter killed for him. He’d murdered his best friend to save his life. Was there a form of trust with deeper roots than that? Grim didn’t think so. He still felt conflicted about that day. Would he have done the same if he were put in the same position? He thought he would, but one never knew until they were tested with the pressure of a decision to be made in seconds. Juzo had made some bad decisions and the sad truth about life was that some decisions couldn’t be undone.

Grimbald owed him his life. He turned to look over his shoulder and saw Walter’s ashen face glaring in the dark, eye wide and darting around the cavern. He watched Walter’s stump trail along the walls for support. Grimbald thought he should’ve thanked Walt for saving him, but couldn’t bring himself to admit that sometimes in life he needed help. He continued dragging him onward, pulling him a little too hard and sending him stumbling.

“Lighten up,” Walter snapped at him.

“Sorry, don’t know my own strength sometimes,” Grimbald said over his shoulder.

The ground started to level out and his skin prickled with cool air. A splinter of light crept in from around a bend. “You alright now?”

“Yeah,” Walter nodded and looked to be gnawing on his cheeks.

Grimbald released his hand. “You can let go anytime now,” Grimbald snickered and looked from his hand to Walter.

Walter sheepishly withdrew his hand and wiped it on his pants. He adjusted his gray-black cloak. “Let’s get that fucker,” Walter said, the hardness of his voice returning.

Every man had some fear that was nigh impossible to overcome. For some it was water, others insects. For him, it was loneliness. He had managed to damage most of the friendships in his life by not trusting people. He had always managed to sabotage himself with the cuts of his own distrust.

Grimbald placed a finger on the side of his nose and forcefully exhaled, blowing dust filled snot onto a wall. He pushed the harnesses holding his axes in place back over his shoulders. Walter slinked towards the light and Grimbald followed behind, content with not being at the front anymore.

The light trailing out from the bend grew brighter, spreading into the passageway ahead. Grimbald hunched his shoulders to avoid dislodging tenuously held stones from a low archway. His heart was thudding in his chest, feeling like whatever they were searching for would turn up in short time. Walter bladed his body, pressed his back against a wall and put a finger to his lips for quiet.

Grimbald nodded at him. His hand went to Corpsemaker and gave its ironwood haft a squeeze. The wood was polished smooth with shallow divots worn down where he put his fingers. Walter inched his way around the bend and beckoned for him to follow.

A vast cavern opened below them, its walls were enormous carved blocks of limestone. Along the bottom parts of the ceiling the stones stabbed out in strange formations, seeming to have been melted then chiseled back. The ceiling stretched up forever, swallowed in shadows. A spear of light came down from somewhere above, casting a halo of light on the ground.

Walter’s jaw bulged with incredible tension.

“No. Dragons, no,” Grimbald whispered.

Piled in towers as tall as three or four men were thousands of porcelain bones. Some reached high into the swallowing shadows. Others looked fresh, tall as a man, with bits of flesh and cloth still attached in spots. There was a sliver of stone floor running down the center of all those bones.

“So many,” Walter whispered back. “Let’s try to keep quiet, might be a lot of them in here.”

Grimbald peered over the bones. “Don’t see anything. You?”

“No,” Walter shook his head. “Can smell them, though. Shit,” Walter breathed. “Noah, my old Sid-Ho master, told me about this place, said it had been cleaned out ages ago. Guess the Death Spawn re-discovered it.”

“Maybe how they traveled across the realm without being noticed,” Grimbald said.

“Might be,” Walter nodded. “Noah never mentioned anything about that, was cryptic about the Death Spawn too. Called them cursed beasts.”

“Human bones,” Grimbald muttered, staring at a ribcage atop a pile.

“They eat the dead,” Walter said.

Grimbald nodded. “And bones don’t rot.”

Thousands of corpses lay there unburied, their bodies defiled and never given rest. Stuck in this cold excuse for a grave for all eternity. “Death Spawn,” Grimbald growled. “Does it ever end?”

Walter shook his head. “No.” He started to rise up and Grimbald caught a distinctive unnatural shimmer of light. He reached out and dragged Walter back down. “What?” Walter settled into a deep squat, scanning the bones.

“Look,” Grimbald pointed. Up against the wall at the other end of the cavern sat the Skin Flayer, a mirage with a ragged wound poking out of the middle, the end of its arm, no doubt.

“I see it,” Walter whispered.

“What do we do?”

“I got it.” Walter’s eye became fire, burning with that bizarre glow. Seeing a man’s eye on fire and him not screaming was something Grimbald still couldn’t get his mind around.

“You sure?” Grimbald put a hand on Walter’s shoulder, wondering if he might not be up for it given his state on the way down here.

“Give me some room.” He nudged Grimbald with his elbow.

“Just making sure.” Grimbald carefully shuffled back a step and watched the Skin Flayer. He thought he could hear it taking labored breaths, or maybe that was him.

A thin band of orange light flitted from Walter’s body. He hissed like a snake and a lance of fire cut across the expanse of bones. It struck the Skin Flayer square in the middle of its body. It let out a piercing squawk before slumping onto the ground. Flames danced along its cloak.

“Nice aim,” Grimbald said.

“Thanks. Let’s go.” Walter rose up and jumped down into the pile of bones, cracking like glass under his boots.

“Wait, this’ll make it easier to get out of here… if we’re in a tight spot.” Grimbald worked the moldy rope off his shoulders and tied one end to a stalagmite and let the other drape down into the cavern. It was a good ten-foot drop from the passageway into the den of bones.

Grimbald squatted down and used the rope to lower himself to the bones below. Nothing moved. The Skin Flayer lay still against the wall and blood burped out from the wound in its chest. “Rope held me,” Grimbald said to himself and grinned proudly.

Walter’s legs sank into a towering pile, crunching through and bones clattering all around. He wobbled down the mound and onto the path running down the middle. “Damn it!” he barked. Walter turned back, looked from the rope to Grimbald and gave him a surprised nod.

Grimbald followed, sinking down to his hips and wading through the great pile. Bones scraped his arms and jabbed at his shining armor.

“Ugh,” he growled. “This is an abomination.”

“They’re bastards,” Walter agreed.

Grimbald made it down onto the cavern floor and bent down to pick a bone sticking out of a seam in his thigh armor. He stayed there for a minute and listened to the bones settling down. He stared around and grunted with disgust. His eyes found the passage on the other side and he reached for his axes, expecting, at any second, a horde of Death Spawn to come pouring through with all the noise they’d just made.

Nothing came but a sighing breeze from the light above.

Walter’s back had gone rigid, his hands coated in fire. He was looking towards the passage, sharing in his worry. “Quiet,” Walter said.

“Hear something?” Grimbald felt his skin prickle with gooseflesh.

“No, I mean it’s quiet.”

“Oh. Yeah, more than welcome, I’d say.”

Walter crunched through the bones along the narrow path, now small pebbles from all the boots that must’ve passed through. He went to the Skin Flayer’s body and nudged it over with his boot. Its robes fell away from its body and exposed its flat face. The golden glow of its eyes had faded to a sheer white. The beast’s nose was flat, as though cut from its face. Where its mouth should have been was nothing but a slab of skin. The robes shimmered and blended into the texture and colors of the bones.

Grimbald frowned down at it. “Such strange creatures. These are demons from the Shadow Realm, you said?”

The tendons in Walter’s neck went taut. “That’s what she said to me—”

“She?”

“The Shadow god,” Walter muttered. “Think their robes and the Cerumal armor are both cursed the same. They form a connection between the demons there. Lets them take the hearts and minds of men… changes their bodies like the Cerumal armor almost did to me. Remember that?”

“How could I forget?” Grimbald snickered. “You were an asshole.”

Walter looked at him with a half-smile, then gazed back down at the Skin Flayer.

“What makes the demons? How do they… exist?” Grimbald asked.

“I’m not sure. She… the Shadow god said they’re rapists and murderers. Not sure how they get that way. But what I can tell you,” Walter turned to him, his eye narrowed to a deadly slit. “There’s no shortage of them in the Shadow Realm.”

Grimbald grunted and regretted he’d asked. This wasn’t a conversation he wanted to have, he realized. He liked not knowing what lay beyond death. He’d done a good job of blocking out what Walter had first told them, but it all came rushing back now. The Shadow Realm was a place of misery and pain, he’d said.

“Wish I could tell you more, Grim. Wish I understood it all better myself. Nyset seems to think killing them might kill the demons on the other side. We can only hope she’s right.”

He shrugged and his stomach rumbled with hunger. Even the sight of a slaughtered Death Spawn wouldn’t mute his insatiable belly. “Doesn’t matter I guess. As long as they die.”

“Mm. No issue there. Trouble is, do they stay dead forever? If someone comes along and picks up this robe like I did the armor, will the poor fellow become one of ‘em?”

Grimbald stared at the robe and scratched his head. “Not if you burned it, maybe?”

Walter reached out and a cone of fire bathed the robes in its deadly flicker. “Good idea,” he beamed. They sat there for a long minute, watching the robes and the rest of the Skin Flayer burn, dark smoke reaching for the shaft of light.

“Let’s move on.” Walter leaped up and grabbed onto the edge of the passage above. He groaned as he scrambled over the edge. He turned around and offered his hand for Grimbald.

“You sure you can hold me?” Grimbald doubted it, but Walt was a strong bastard.

“I’m sure.”

“Alright.” He leaped up, grabbed Walter’s arm and fully expected to drag him back into the pit of bones with him. Walt’s body slid a few inches then snapped and held as strong as an anvil. Walter grunted and Grimbald brought his hand up onto the jagged edge, dislodging a cluster of stones. Grimbald gritted his teeth as he felt his skin yawn apart across his palm.

“C’mon, you big bastard,” Walter grunted.

Grimbald returned his grunt and bungled his girth over the edge. He rolled over into the passage, sucked in a breath, and frowned down at the wound on his palm. “Can you?”

“Sure,” Walter nodded. “Let me have it.” The familiar glow of the Phoenix pulsed from his hand as Walter cupped Grimbald’s hand in his own.

Grimbald shivered at the feeling of ice crawling up his arm, stitching his palm back together. “Thanks, Walt. Think I’d be dead ten times now without you, or maybe I’d have lost an arm from infection or something.” He chuckled. He felt the warmth of true gratitude blooming in his chest while the icy tendrils of the Phoenix’s healing faded.

Walter released his hold on his arm and stared at him flatly.

“What?” Grimbald asked, his eyebrows squished together.

“Maybe lost an arm from infection? Really?” Walter waved with his stump.

“Heh, sorry.”

Walter burst into laughter that echoed from the walls, maybe with a bit more humor than he’d expected. “Ready?” He jabbed him in the shoulder with his stump. He rose up and started off down the passage.

“Ready.” Was his iron shell cracking a bit? Everyone had a breaking point, a hardship that would ruin him. Grimbald had seen it time and time again in the Hissing Gooseberry, where men and women went to cleanse their plighted hearts. Grimbald chewed his lip to stop the question, but it forced its way out his lips. “You alright, Walt?”

“Huh?” He stopped and turned. “Alright enough for someone who’d just murdered his friend, I think.” He swallowed and forced an ugly smile. “And wading in an ocean of the fucking dead too.” He gestured back towards the cavern.

Grimbald nodded, not knowing what to say. He couldn’t imagine how it must feel. If he’d murdered Walt — he squashed the idea down under his boot, unable to even put himself in that state. He’d lost his Pa, sure, but killing your friend was something else. He couldn’t think of it. It felt like a screw was driving through the center of his chest, making it hard to breathe.

“Want to lead for a bit?” Walter sagged against the wall, as if all the strength just slipped out of him.

“I can do that.” Grimbald paused next to him and planted his hands on his hips. “Sure you’re alright?”

“I’m good.”

Grimbald looked down and scratched his neck. “Let’s get on with it then.” He walked into the shadows.

* * *

Walter was sick.

He felt strange, hungry, and the world wobbled. His vision blurred at the edges. He couldn’t figure out what was wrong. His heart hammered through his skull. His back tingled under his dusty shirt. Shouldn’t he have been wearing armor like Grim? No, didn’t really need it, he remembered. He couldn’t look weak in front of Grimbald. He needed to be strong for him, for everyone clinging to life in this dying world.

“Smells stronger,” Grimbald said over his shoulder.

The musty scent of Death Spawn was overpowering, filling his lungs with their choking stink. Walter babbled something in return. The passageway seemed to be flowing under his feet. The stones underfoot twinkled with iridescent crystals. He stifled a wince and the urge to hunch over. A bead of sweat glimmered from the end of his nose and crashed into the ground, sounding like a thunderclap in his ears.

Grimbald hissed something over his shoulder, but the words were meaningless. Grim looked at him with mounting concern, but Walter waved him off. He struggled to keep himself upright, staggering on behind. The hallway filled with the heat of a smith’s furnace and the burning stench of sulfur. He almost walked into Grimbald, but he’d moved on and Walter thudded into the wall. He snorted in air that felt all too warm. Grimbald’s powerful arms raised him up from the ground. He turned to look inside the cavern.

The world snapped into focus for a brief moment. The cavern beyond was a massive demon’s mouth with stalactites for teeth. Six black columns converged up the center, high into the swirling shadows above. At the bottoms of the columns, blood-red fires burned. The fires crackled and popped, burning their images into Walter’s watery eyes. Black smoke and exploding sparks spilled from the gaping mouths of six furnaces. Clumps of sticky iron dripped from ceramic containers, speckling the ground with hot embers. Smelted metal rolled through narrow channels on the dark stone floor.

The demon’s mouth was filled with flitting shadows. Fires winked and clawed feet scraped along the floor’s polished stone. The air was hot, humid, and doubled in weight. The beasts worked tirelessly at the furnaces, unaware of their intrusion. Chisels clanged on iron, hammers beat into shields, swords hissed on barrels of water. Walter caught the face of a Cerumal examining a sword, looking it up and down like a prized possession. The gibbering and squawking of Cerumal in the darkness beyond penetrated his mental haze.

“Fuck. Fuck. Shit,” Grimbald whispered beside him. He went on, saying more Walter couldn’t comprehend.

On one side of the room were at least fifty weapon racks, overfilled with gleaming instruments of death, reflecting the anger of the fires. Walter’s jaw hung slack and he blinked and blinked, trying to clear the water from his eyes.

Grimbald said something, but all Walter heard was the clanging of steel. He felt as if he’d slipped back into the Shadow Realm, maybe catching a glimpse of the closest thing to it in this realm. His breath came in ragged gasps and his sinuses burned with smoke. He wasn’t sure when he’d tugged on the Dragon, but welcomed its violence like an old lover. He took a sure step forward, staring at them, his eye pulsing with fire. Veins and tendons leaped from his forearms and muscles tightened.

“Stay,” he managed to croak to Grimbald in a second of clarity. A second in which he likely saved the man’s life for a second time.

His eye bulged and his jaw clamped down. His teeth felt as if they were on the verge of cracking. He wasn’t sure when he started moving. The mouth of a furnace yawned open and his flaming hand rose up, clawing around the back of a leathery skinned neck. The Cerumal shrieked, its eyes going wide. A mad grin touched Walter’s lips. His arm hammered down, smashing the Cerumal’s maw onto an anvil. Blood sprayed from its nose and hissed on the molten iron in the channel below. Walter flicked his fingers and a telekinetic push of the Phoenix sent the beast inside the furnace, shrieking as it cooked.

Shapes turned, squawked and shrieked to each other in their hideous language. A few wisely went for the weapon racks, unaware of who their foe was. Their names were already spoken for. Their blood was his for the releasing. A shape ran for him, something gleaming in its hand. A sword of fire sprang to life from Walter’s stump. He lunged forward, rammed it through its gut and jerked the sword up, splitting the creature in half from stomach to gray tufts of hair. Its blood sprayed over Walter’s face, bathing him in fresh warpaint.

He laughed and laughed, dousing the few that had gone for weapons in an angry conflagration. They would pay for what they did to him. They would know the taste of pain. Something jumped on his back, ramming steel in and out of his ribs, pulsing with blue light. He reached around his back with a new found strength, wound his fingers into its leather apron and hoisted the beast onto his shoulder. Its dagger clattered onto the stone below. Its legs squirmed and its claws raked his face, spilling blood into his mouth. He walked it over to a barrel and dashed its head against the iron reinforced side. Its head cracked apart with a pop, spilling brain matter onto the ground.

He heard a gibbering from behind a crate and waited, a fireball burning the air at his side. The Cerumal finally found its courage and leaped over from the other side, its heavy maul raised up in two hands. Walter blinked and the fireball collided with its face, turning its head into charring flesh and sending its body flopping like a doll onto the hot floor. He gasped as pain lanced through his side. He’d been run through with a spear, the end poking out.

He grinned and the Cerumal’s scowling lip twitched. He hacked through the wooden haft and his fist hammered into the beast’s jaw. He moaned and let the sword puff away. He pulled the end of the spear out the way it had gone in, sticky with his blood. He growled, hurled the broken spear and it thudded into the Cerumal’s chest. The Cerumal squawked, stumbled back a few steps, then screamed when it fell into a container of molten iron.

How long had they lived here? Were these the beasts that had raided Breden? They were so close to his home, too close. What were they doing here? Why would they do this? Questions came and would be answered with blood. A gleaming porcupine of blades surrounded him, jabbing the air and working to contain him. He let them circle him, for it would make the killing easier. He let them think they had the upper hand now, but they didn’t know who he was, what he could do, what he had seen. The madness fueling him.

They squawked with a mad fervor at their mock victory. Walter couldn’t help but let his mad grin spread across his face, showing all his teeth. Stormcaller sparked to life and reflected from its polished finish the flickering of the fires. Its fiery tendrils slapped at the stone floor, each tendril eager to deliver death. Walter held his arm up and Stormcaller’s lashes whirled through the smoking air. At his stump came his sword of fire, almost as long as a man. At its edge, he saw fading Dragons within the flames, snapping at the air with vicious mouths.

The beasts came together. Spears stabbed at him, blades cut, and hammers raised up to flatten his bones. He worked through them in graceful arcs, felt their cuts and introduced them to the Dragon’s touch. The Phoenix flashed in his body, knitted his wounds and made him calm as the eye of the storm. Dark streaks flashed through the air, splashed onto walls and spread across the floor. He ducked to avoid a spear thrust, whirled with Stormcaller. A leg and an arm floated in the air, slow as a dandelion seed on a summer’s breeze. Then came a wrist, a spinning sword, then a split shield.

The shadows of the great forges were dispelled by the trails left by Stormcaller and the Dragon sword. He twisted to avoid a gleaming point and felt another enter through his back. A Cerumal’s ashen head spun around in the air, spraying out with spurts of blood. Another head hung in the air as the body below it crumbled to the floor. He slowly exhaled and sliced through a midsection, dumping a Cerumal’s innards onto the body of his dead brethren. He closed his eye when the blood came spraying onto his face. His throat cracked with his booming laughter, reminding him of a demon in the Shadow Realm. The absurdity of that place sent his laughter up an octave, a madman’s shrieking in his ears.

A lash snared his arm and jerked his stump towards a pair of glowing eyes. He sniffed and a Phoenix portal, bright as the sun, tore the creature into clean sections from shoulder to hip. When the portal faded, the halves squelched apart, the lash going as limp as a noodle. He cracked Stormcaller and waited for the next glint of a blade. Disappointingly, none came.

“Done already?” he muttered and pressed a hand to his beating temples. No, there were more cowering in the Shadows. He sniffed and staggered to them. He could feel their fear, sense their putrid horror in the air. He felt a warm wetness trail around his jaw. Blood. His or theirs? He wasn’t sure whether or to laugh or cry. He’d been doing a mix of both, he reckoned.

“Walter?” He heard Grimbald’s voice echo from behind, as if from underwater.

Fireballs sprung up around his head and illuminated his path. A stocky Cerumal sprinted out from the dark, screaming and armed with a smith’s hammer. He sent the fireballs for its legs, blowing them apart at the knees. The beast shrieked and stumbled onto broken legs. It collapsed into a molten channel and rolled over, roaring with agony.

He sucked in the iron air, letting it burn every part of him. Burning and healing, burning and healing. This is why he lived. His boot rose up and slammed down onto the Cerumal’s head, cutting the air with a crack.

He narrowed his eye at the shallow breathing hiding in the shadows. “Come now, make this quick for the both of us. Only one of us will be leaving here… think we know who it’s going to be at this point,” Walter snorted. The Cerumal barked and skittered along the back wall, talons rasping on stone. Walter saw it and opened a portal in front of it and putting the exit before him. The creature stumbled out of the portal and bounced off his chest with a scream, eyes wide with terror. Walter’s laughter was thunder. He rammed his stump into its neck and wrapped his hand around its muscular throat. He put one leg behind its ankle and swept its feet out, smashing it to the ground. It thudded and landed on its back.

He followed the Cerumal’s treacherous path to the ground. His fingers dug into its neck, fingernails welling out with ellipses of blood. Its legs flailed and gray teeth clacked on the air as it tried to bite him. “Die!” he spat and grinned back. He raised its neck up and smashed it into the stone floor. The Cerumal wheezed and black veins sprouted from its cheeks. Walter smashed its head again and again. He smashed until its head was wet and slapping against the hot stone.

His arms were flaring with the healing light of the Phoenix. It had apparently cut his forearm into ribbons while he beat its skull. If he hadn’t had the Phoenix, he’d have been forced to let go due to the non-functioning tissue. The Cerumal stopped moving and Walter released his grip, fingers sore. He heaved a breath and slid a fiery dagger from his stump through its chest, just to be sure. The creature’s blood sizzled on the tireless flames when he withdrew it. He blinked at his destruction. It lay there motionless. Its neck was crushed flat on one side, blood pooled under its head, and a charred hole smoked on its chest.

They had to learn to fear him, he told himself.

He started to stand and the world swayed. He plopped back onto the ground, dizzy, sweaty and once again covered in the blood of demons. “Shit,” he breathed and sloughed globs of blood from his brow. A congealing strand clung to his fingers and he flicked it off with disgust. He shook his head, laughed at himself. How had he gone from farmer to mass murder? Would he become a demon when he died?

“Life is strange. Unpredictable,” he whispered to himself.

“You still with me?” Grimbald came up to him, his axe dripping with dark liquid. His burnished armor was streaked from shoulders to legs. “What the hell happened?” He grabbed an oily rag from the edge of an anvil and used it to wipe down Corpsemaker.

Walter nodded and caught a second rag Grimbald tossed him. “I think so. When we fight them I… I tend to lose myself sometimes.” He wiped his face with the rag reeking of Death Spawn. “This anger, terrible rage takes me over. Just wanted to make sure I didn’t hurt anyone. Didn’t have any more accidents.”

“Well. I appreciate the concern, but couldn’t let you have all the fun. That’s all of them I think,” Grimbald peered around. The furnaces softly hissed. A few loose stones dislodged from the ceiling above, tinkling against the iron piping trailing up into eternity. “Can’t believe this was down here. Smart bastards.”

“Me either. Makes sense, though. They’d have to hide this sort of operation somewhere. What better place than underground?”

Grimbald looked down at him, his blue eyes shining with fire. He offered his hand and Walter took it, springing to his feet with the force of Grimbald’s pull. Walter swallowed at all the gore. Not because it bothered him, but because his throat was dry. The part of him that should’ve felt something was gone. Cut out of him. Left to rot in the Shadow Realm.

Grimbald’s eyes grew hard at the mess. “Dirty work.”

“Mhm.” Walter did his best to brush off some of the clumping mix of soot and blood from his shirt and cloak. “Dark work.”

“Let’s have a look around. We — er, you — should destroy these when we’re ready to leave. Make it harder for them to rebuild.” Grimbald gestured at the columns winding up into the shadows above.

“You read my mind. This smoke is killing me; let’s make it quick.” Walter balled up his cloak and pressed it against his face to filter out some of the smoke. He started for the back of the chamber and Grimbald followed beside him. “Are you okay?”

“Fine, just a few scratches. Got five of them. Heh, not so tough without their armor.”

Walter nodded, reached out with his stump and gave Grimbald a friendly nudge. “Good, good. Their armor gives them strength, maybe they lose it when they’re not wearing it.”

Grimbald grunted. “Must be… look another tunnel at the back.”

“I see it,” Walter said. A pit of darkness spread open at the back of the cavern, swallowing the dim light of the furnaces. Walter sparked balls of fire to life as they drew closer. The path seemed to trail deeper into the earth and muddy boot prints lined the floor into the expansive cavern.

“Lot of footprints,” Grimbald grunted.

Realization struck him like waking to a bucket of cold water in the face. “This… this was how the Death Spawn traveled the realm without being noticed! How else could they have gone from the Silver Tower to here without anyone knowing? This tunnel must run under the whole of the damned realm.”

“Wait! Didn’t you, or was it Nyset?” His eyebrows furrowed in concentration. “Anyway, didn’t you say you thought Asebor or the Wretched were using portals to move ‘em?”

“That was just a theory. But this makes more sense. It would take an incredible amount of power, not to mention risk, to transport that many soldiers through portals.”

“Mm. Not following you,” Grimbald frowned.

Walter squatted down, brushing a boot print with his fingers. “Looks fresh. When a living being moves through a Phoenix portal, it’s relatively safe in short distances, according to Baylan.” They shared sideways smiles at the mention of his name. Walter exhaled heavily and continued. “As the distance increases, so does the risk of disfigurement on the other side, and it increases exponentially. My guess would be… even with Asebor’s level of power, it wouldn’t be a safe method to move his troops.”

“So this might not be the only one. Maybe there’s a whole group of tunnels with caves for exits.” Grimbald scratched at the beginnings of a beard. Flecks of blood fell onto his chest plate.

“Shit, that’s very possible. I hadn’t thought of that.” Walter rose up.

“Wait.” Grimbald shook his head and raised his palms. “Didn’t the Falcon fight the Death Spawn in this part of the realm? We were there when they returned to Midgaard. They came back with almost half the battalion. So, they had to have won, right?”

Walter nodded, itchy to get out of this shit hole. “They did. The raid on Breden was recent, only a week or so ago given the state of decay of the bodies.”

Grimbald twisted his torso around from side to side and winced. “Right… sorry, but how in the Phoenix do you know so much about dead bodies?”

Walter swallowed. “My mother. She was a surgeon before she met my father. Filled in for the Breden surgeon when he traveled. She used to take me with her and I wanted to learn. Seemed like a useful thing to know.”

“Ah, I knew that. That’s how you knew how to fix my shoulder after the battle of Dressna.”

“Mhm,” Walter nodded, uncorked his waterskin with his teeth and took a mighty glug. It was incredible how easy it was to take water for granted when you didn’t have any. He, fortunately, had been prepared. He offered it to Grimbald, who accepted. “The Death Spawn must’ve re-grouped in the Tower… marched through this fucking tunnel here, now making their way to the Great Retreat.”

“We should follow it, see where it goes,” Grimbald said.

“We should, but we don’t have time. Need to intercept them at the Great Retreat, and we’ve already lost too much time.”

Grimbald grunted with displeasure. “Alright. Now what? Can you close this tunnel up, at least?” Grimbald looked up at the archway and brushed dust from his bald head.

“I think so. Why don’t you start heading back? If this buries me, it’ll only be one of us.”

Grimbald sighed. “I’ll wait over here, in the middle of the furnaces where it’s warm. I would say I’d start destroying weapons too, but think you’d be better at that than me. Don’t die on me again; don’t want to wait two weeks for you to return.” He grinned.

Tendrils of ice speared up Walter’s back at the thought of returning to the Shadow Realm. Grimbald’s boots scraped as he strode away to safety. He wasn’t sure he’d be able to survive it again.

The Shadow god wanted him back. He was never supposed to escape in the first place. Was his mother still alive there? Had he killed Asebor then? Doubtful. What was to come of the Shadow princess? He gritted his teeth at the memory of the demons defiling his mother. He remembered her eyes, pleading for mercy. Why was the Shadow princess so important? There were so many unanswered questions.

He snorted and embraced the Dragon, staring up at the archway over the tunnel. He narrowed his eye and imagined a fireball as big as a hay bale. When he opened his eye, he gasped.

There was a burning meteor of fire hissing in the air, waiting to unleash its infernal chaos. He pushed with his arms and conjured a Phoenix shield around himself. The meteor collided with the top of the archway and released a deafening roar. Dust, stone shards, and fragments filled the air, blotting out the light of the furnaces. Walter held his breath and braced himself against the stones thumping against the shield. His ears were lanced with pain from the crushing noise. It felt like someone had stuck a nail inside his eardrums. Grimbald, had he protected his ears? The light the Phoenix worked to restore his hearing and seal up his ruptured eardrums. He should have thought this through a bit more.

Walter threaded his way towards Grimbald and away from the choking dust. “Grim?” he shouted and winced at the lingering pain in his ears, remembering a time when his body couldn’t spontaneously heal. How had he made it this far without the Phoenix?

“Ugh,” he responded.

“Shit!” Walter hissed. He scrambled his way over to him. Grimbald’s hands were pressed over his ears and he was laying on his back. “Sorry.”

Walter pulled on his arms, signaling for him to move them and he relented. Luminescent tails of the Phoenix curled into his ears, restoring his hearing, casting his face in its cool glow.

“Could’ve warned me,” Grimbald groaned and muscles in his jaw flexed.

“Ugh, Yeah. Didn’t know it’d be so loud. On the bright side, it looked to have worked spectacularly well.”

Grimbald sat up and followed his gaze, shook his head. The tunnel’s entrance was a smoking wreck. There were a few hunks of stone stabbing into the air, each almost as big as a tavern. Wedged between them were smaller stones, but still heavier than any man or beast could move. It would slow them down, at least.

“Good.” Grimbald nodded with satisfaction. “Before you do the furnaces… let me get far beyond the bone piles. I like my ears not bleeding.”

Walter snickered, cheeks hot. “Will do.”

Chapter 7

Tower Secrets

“What is left out shows what is left in.” -The Diaries of Nyset Camfield

The morning sun speared the sky with blades of gold. Senka sniffed and gently placed a hand on one of her belt daggers. She felt a sliver of comfort with her hand there. She stared out from between a pair of shrubs at the Death Spawn aimlessly milling about the mouth of the cavern. They had searched the forest west of the Tower and around the volcano for almost a week, and had almost given up today, concluding there was no other way for the Death Spawn to cross the realm other than Phoenix portals. She was glad they hadn’t stopped searching.

The shadow ones looked bored. Her father taught her that inattentive people were easy targets. She guessed these beasts were much the same as men. There were nine that she could plainly see. How many remained hidden? She was unfamiliar with the methods of subterfuge the shadow ones used, if they used any at all. Surely there must be some hidden somewhere, she thought.

Isa squatted beside a bush with orange flowers a few paces away from her. His milk white scalp was hidden under a billowy hood. He wore a loose cloak around his body, dark as night and melding into the shadows. Senka noted the bulges of weapons poking out from his hips and back. He, at least, knew how to stay quiet, a rarity for whiteskins.

Senka distrusted him, but would obey the Mistress’s command and work with him. Trust was earned, not given. The Mistress told her that he was a Silver Tower assassin and that he could stand on his own. It seemed he would soon have the opportunity to prove it. He wasn’t a big man like her father was, but tall and wiry. She knew from her own short stature that size was the worst way to judge the strength of a foe. Man and beast alike were vulnerable to at least one chemical. She might be able to carry Isa back to the new Tower if he fell, but she was hoping she wouldn’t have to.

She caressed the needles under her bracers, a gentle reminder of her strength. There were seven under her left forearm, the tips violet with the essence of Acontium petals. Under her right bracer were five coated in yellowy Windroot oil. The needles each sat in their own individual hardened leather sheaths, tips down so that they couldn’t accidentally pierce her skin while going about her day.

The Acontium tipped needles had worked to paralyze the great shadow one named Dressna. The one who had killed her father and almost killed her. Windroot oil worked wonderfully for killing men. The poison would stop the heart in seconds once it entered the bloodstream. Windroot didn’t seem to have much of an effect on the shadow ones. They were dirty, vile creatures that should not be, she thought with a shiver. There was a place for many animals in the realm, but not for these.

She’d spent days searching the land for an Acontium bush. They were incredibly rare here; plentiful in the sands of the Nether. She had finally found it and they would know the taste of her blades. She narrowed her eyes at their quietly gibbering forms, her jaw clamping down. The shadow creature Dressna would pay for the atrocities inflicted on her father and her people. The shadow ones would all pay. She knew it was unwise to have vengeance in her heart, but she didn’t care. Oblivion was all that seemed to wait for her, the last remaining Scorpion. The best she could do for them now was avenge their untimely deaths.

She missed her father. He had rarely given her the approval she always sought from him. He had always criticized her poisons. They either had too much substrate, not enough water, or her workstation was too sloppy. She was never enough, but it didn’t stop her from missing him. It would not stop her from claiming the debt they owed her.

Isa hissed, grabbing her attention and breaking her reverie. He nodded at her and pressed a porcelain finger to his right nostril, giving her the signal. She returned a confirming nod. His bow gently creaked as he pulled his bowstring taut, drawing an arrow and pointing it at the ground. Senka’s deft fingers found her blowgun under her cloak and loaded an Acontium tipped needle. She couldn’t help but let a grin spread across her face. She had spent her whole life training for moments like this. She wasn’t trained with a sense of honor or fairness in mind, but only for the most effective means of slaying her enemies.

The tip of her blowgun emerged from a bush, the needle tip imperceptibly glowing with violet. She eyed three Cerumal hunched over and squawking about something. Senka inhaled a mighty breath and held it in her cheeks. A Cerumal backhanded the one beside it in the head then snatched a dropped human arm. Her training hadn’t prepared her for this.

Senka’s eyes went wide and her breath leaked from her lips. She felt the blood drain from her face and was overcome with dizziness. She carefully withdrew her blowgun from the bush and placed a hand on the ground to steady herself. The Cerumal took a bloody bite from the arm, tearing free a ragged hunk of bicep muscle. Its brethren jealously shrieked.

Isa hissed at her again. He shook his head at her, his face tight with bitter contempt. Perhaps he felt the same way she felt about him at that moment. She would prove herself worthy. She steadied her breath and brought her hammering heart rate down to a manageable level. She nodded at him, thick eyebrows knitted. She inhaled again and found her first target.

The needle struck the eating Cerumal in the back of the neck. The needle glinted in the light, hardly visible unless you were looking for it. She loaded her gun and blew again, the needle striking the next in the thigh. She eyed her third target, blew, then it started to rise up. The needle hit it in the eye and it roared, pawing at its face and angrily spinning about.

The others turned to face the screaming Cerumal, alerted and snatching up discarded weapons from the ground. Isa sprouted from behind the shrub. His arrow hissed and thunked through a Cerumal’s breastplate. It stumbled on weak legs and collapsed, running itself through the gut with its own sword. Arrow after arrow came with shocking speed, taking down two others, one with a shot through the neck and the other in the chest. Senka matched him, loading and shooting two more Cerumal with needles.

The three she had initially hit started towards Isa but crumpled to the ground after a few steps. One saw her and shrieked, its face like a drowned man whose skin had never decayed. It hurled a spear at her and Senka rolled to avoid the clumsy weapon, thudding into a tree behind her. She darted forward, twin daggers hissing from her scabbards.

It drew a sword with jagged teeth on one side, raised up overhead. She closed the gap before it could swing, stabbed it in the gut and jerked her blade across its abdomen. The blade almost tore free from her fingers when it hit a rib. With her other hand, she made a vertical cut, followed by another horizontal cut below it, making the shape of an ‘I.’ The Cerumal’s burning eyes stared at her, its sword hissing into the dirt from dying fingers. Offal spilled out from its gut onto the ground, the stomach flesh spreading apart like an opened book. It groaned and slumped to the ground.

Senka pressed her arm against her nose to mute the biting odor of rotting flesh. Its innards were wrong, organs looking as if they’d been dead for weeks. “Vile creatures,” she snorted. She wiped away a line of blood trickling its way down her cheek on the back of her hand.

“The Mistress was right, it seems,” Isa drawled with his strange western accent.

“Yes,” Senka said, only because it seemed like the right thing to do. She’d learned that Westerners grew uncomfortable if you were too quiet. She bent down and cleaned her Milvorian daggers off on the dead Cerumal’s ashen flesh.

Isa slung his bow over his shoulder and produced a skinning knife from his belt. Squatting down, he started cutting into the flesh around his arrow. When he pulled it free, it squelched out with a hunk of flesh attached to its barbs like skewered meat. He hacked flesh from the arrow’s tip and slipped it back into his quiver.

It was a curious gesture. “Why not just leave the arrows?” Senka asked him.

“These are not ordinary arrows made by a common fletcher. I make these myself so they fly true.” He slipped his dark hood off and adjusted it over his bony shoulders.

Senka understood. The weapons one made were vastly superior to those purchased. She made her own needles in the Nether. She understood their character, weight, and feel. They were uniquely hers. She started to smile, snatching up her needles from the fallen beasts and slipping them back up into her bracers.

“You find their deaths comical?” Isa asked. She couldn’t get used to his grating voice. It sounded like the whisper of steel on a whetstone, soft, deadly, and sharp as his arrows. She wondered if he could kill with his voice.

“No,” she looked up at him, felt her eyes go soft at meeting his. They were a striking cobalt, swimming with an almost burning intensity. They were the most beautiful eyes she’d ever seen. Her heart felt as if it stopped for a second, then thundered a few beats to make up for the pause.

“Then… why do you laugh?” He furrowed the area of flesh where eyebrows should have been. His head was hairless as far as she could tell. He was a bizarre figure with his strange light eyes and milky skin.

She snickered uncomfortably. “No reason.”

Isa shrugged and started working to cut out another arrow from a dead Cerumal.

Senka paused to take in the scene. There were a few iron bound barrels full of water at one side of the cavern. She grinned at seeing such a guarded treasure. Water was precious in the Nether. Beside the barrels were the mutilated bodies of what she guessed was once a man and woman, judging by their frames. She walked towards the bodies and peered down. Their faces had been eaten, eyes, nose, lips, cheeks and all. It made them look as if they were smiling, but she guessed they didn’t die happily. “Vile, vile shadow ones.” She gritted her teeth.

Was this the fate that had befallen her village? She had run like a coward and left them to die like this. Her hands found her dagger’s hilt, pressing into the scarlet leather. She realized then that when she escaped from the Black Furnaces, she’d left her father’s body to the shadow ones. He was like these people, reduced to food for the dirty creatures.

Isa came up beside her, his steps quiet as a stalking cat. “If you ever find yourself captured by them, end yourself. They like to eat the flesh while the victim still lives.”

“Never.” Senka exhaled, mastering her breath. “The sun has set on today and tomorrow brings new warmth,” her father’s voice said in her head. Senka nodded at Isa. “Thank you for the advice, Isa. It sounds… wise.” It would be a coward’s death, but she knew that excruciating pain had a hasty way of changing one’s mind about a subject. Men always pounded their chests, invincible until the bleeding started and the poisons did their insidious work.

Senka walked into the mouth of the cavern, squatted down and eyed the muddy boot prints. They looked to be going in both directions. So many shadow ones. No, they’re known as Death Spawn here, she corrected herself. Could there really be this many? She felt her throat going as dry as sand.

“They use this cavern to travel across the realm,” Isa growled, examining the boot prints.

“We have to get back to the Arch Wizard.” Senka coughed. “She’ll want to hear her suspicions were correct. Never would I have guessed that the Shadow ones could be so clever.” She took a sip from her waterskin and corked it. Her eyes were invariably drawn to the pair of barrels filled to the brim with rainwater.

Eying the barrels again filled her muscles with tension, feeling like an invading tribe might come to commandeer them at any moment. Those days were long past, beaten away in the scourges of time — like her, like her people, and like her legacy.

“You mean the Death Spawn? No, they’re not this intelligent.” Isa peered around, his eyes keen. “They’re lead by Black Wynches usually.”

“Black Wynches?” Senka quietly repeated the words so she wouldn’t forget them. They were strange, new words that felt odd on her lips.

“Make things a little harder on them.” Isa raised his boot and pressed it against the side of a water barrel. He pushed it over and it fell with a thump, spraying and glugging water out onto the dirt.

“Wait!” Senka reached out, her voice a spear of panic. It was too late to stop him and already done.

Isa dropped into a low crouch and his hands sprung out of his cloak, clutching a hatchet in one hand and short sword in the other. He whirled around, hatchet raised across his chest and sword behind his back. “What is it? Enemies?”

“You wasted all that precious, invaluable water.” She pointed and frowned down at it. She cocked her head at the large stones that had rolled out the barrel, fanning out in different directions. But they weren’t stones at all. They were human heads, she realized with mounting disgust.

“The brutality,” Isa trailed off, his arms falling to his sides, the blackened weapons like shadows.

Senka stared down at a bloated head, the skin shredded, eye sockets empty. Her chest tightened like she was being crushed by a boulder. Something rustled in the wood and every part of her screamed for her to turn, but she couldn’t take her eyes away. Her peripheral vision blurred with flitting shapes. She wondered dreamily if this was how rot flies felt when seeking decaying flesh.

“Senka!” a distant voice roared.

How could they taint the water like this, the most precious of all the world’s gifts? It was the giver and stealer of life. It would have been a priceless amount in the Nether, enough to induce the tribes to bloodshed.

Something slammed into her side, sending her sprawling onto the dirt. Dry earth fanned across her cheeks and pushed into her nostrils. Fire tore through her shoulder and the world snapped back into focus. She looked up and saw a dark shape with talons as long as daggers raised up to strike Isa. Senka scrambled to her feet, fishing for her daggers and missing their hilts with nervy hands. She blew hard through her nose, expelling crusts of dirt.

Isa screamed and stabbed with his sword, following up with a hatchet swipe. The beast unnaturally twisted in the air like an eel, dodging his blows with ease as if it lacked bones. It countered with furious slashes, catching Isa’s robes and throwing out a swathe of dark fabric. Isa fell back into a roll, came out of it and hurled his hatchet. It collided with the Black Wynch’s pyramid shaped helm, thudding with a dent. It advanced with clacking talons glinting sunlight.

Senka started towards it with her daggers now tight in her hands. She’d open this beast up, make it taste her edges.

The Wynch’s narrow mouth dropped open with an ear-piercing shriek.

She dropped her daggers to cover her ears, the sound making her wince with pain. The Shadow one took great leaping steps to close the gap between it and Isa. It slashed, and he blocked with his sword, metal on metal clanging in the air.

Senka snatched her daggers up and sprinted to the creature. Its attention shifted to her and slashed out with shocking speed. She dropped to her knees, skidding across the dirt. Air sighed across her cheeks from its missed cut. She grinned, ramming her daggers into its thighs, aiming for the femoral arteries. She pulled them free and its blood spurted onto her chest. It hacked down at her, and she raised her daggers to block. Isa’s sword stabbed the air, blocking its strike.

Isa’s lips parted in a feral grimace, his arm swinging at it with a hammer. The hammer crunched into its helmet, punching through the dent he’d made earlier. The Black Wynch stumbled back, one hand whipping daggers for fingers, the other wrenching the hammer from its oversized helmet. Dark blood bubbled down the side of its pyramid-like helm, pattering onto its jagged shoulder plate. A pool of blood was forming around its feet from Senka’s inflicted wounds. It tore the hammer free and Isa was upon it, slashing high, low, then stabbing, giving it no rest. It dodged with ease, though blood shot out in grisly spurts now that the hammer left the wound open. It wasn’t the brightest move.

Senka had scrambled onto her feet, about to strike from its flank, but stopped a couple paces before it. Isa mirrored her, creeping back and joining her side, sword held up. The Black Wynch hissed and mindlessly whipped its talons through the air. Its strikes slowed and became lazy, arms sagging with weakness.

“A poison?” Isa asked.

Senka let a cruel grin slip over her face. “A very painful one. Daughter of Fire makes all the nerves tell the brain the body is on fire while turning the nerves to paste.”

“I like it.” He turned to her with the beginnings of a smile. He winced and took another step back from the dying Black Wynch, then sheathed his sword.

“Are you well?” Senka joined him, facing the Black Wynch with Isa at her side.

He was hunched over, arms holding his side. “It cut me,” he swallowed. “Badly, I fear.”

“Can I?” She eyed his side. He met her eyes for a what felt like a long minute. He seemed to now be deciding whether or not he could trust her. Perhaps she was correct in her suspicions that they’d felt the same about one another. “It’s alright.” She nodded encouragingly.

He snorted and slowly brought his bloody arms down by his quivering side. She peeled back his blood matted cloak and fought the urge to wince. Wincing only made the other person feel worse. There were four deep cuts going from his upper ribs down to his hips, weeping blood and showing pinked bones. The Black Wynch’s blades had turned his leather armor into strips at the wound site.

“It’s bad?” he asked.

She sniffed. Trying to dislodge some of the dirt made her sinuses itch. “It’s bad, Isa. Sit down, take off your cloak,” she said with an air of command. “You won’t make it back if we don’t patch you up now. Put your hands back on the wound and apply pressure while I get my supplies.”

The Black Wynch writhed on the ground, moaning like a dying child. She knew the sound well from when the Death Spawn had raided the Scorpions’ village. It haunted her dreams every night, an echo that would never die.

“Ssh,” Senka whispered, squatting down beside it. Her dagger rasped from its sheath, the sound of murder in her ears. She used it to draw a red line across its throat. The last of its corrupted blood pumped out, mixing pinks with the spreading water.

She went back to the bushes where they’d been hiding and found her satchel where she’d left it, propped up against a tree. She opened it and grabbed a cotton bandage, clips, Ribwort oil, and a vial of crushed Mercy’s Mint.

Isa sat hunched over on a rock and stripped off his torso armor, the blood bright and severe against his pale skin. His muscles were sinewy without an ounce of useless tissue on his frame. Red trickles rolled over his belt and wound down his thighs. She had to work fast.

She uncorked the vial of Mercy’s Mint and sniffed it, ensuring its freshness by the sweetness of the aroma. “This will help with the pain and help to prevent rot.”

He nodded and tension waved in his jaw.

She shook out a small pile of the chopped green herbs into her hand. Senka snorted, coughed, then slowly let a long string of spit dribble on top of the pile.

“What are you doing?” Isa asked, eyes bulging from his head.

“Relax.” She furrowed her brows. “You’ll be alright. It needs spit to activate.” She stuck a finger into her palm, mixing and turning the spit and herbs into a green paste.

“Thought you… the Scorpions only made poisons?”

“No.” She continued working the spit into the Mercy’s Mint. She snorted and added another glob. The consistency wasn’t right.

“No?” He gestured expectantly.

She stopped mixing and frowned, not understanding why he repeated what she’d said. Once a thing was said it didn’t need to be said a second time. She worked the green goo into a ball and gently pressed it into a wound.

Isa hissed and the tendons in his neck leaped out.

“Sorry. Did I hurt you?”

He gave her a ‘what do you think?’ look, but shook his head. “It’s okay.”

“Alright.” She spread the mixture along the wound channel, sealing it up with green paste. Given the amount of scars on his body, she wondered if he was carved to life by a dulled axe. Some were old while some looked fairly new. A newish line of thickened skin traveled from his shoulder down to his navel, glowing with an angry red. “How did you… come to work for the Silver Tower?”

He turned to look at her, eyes hard. She met his stare for a moment, bit her lip, then looked back at his cuts. Had she been too direct? She didn’t understand why people didn’t like some questions. If she wanted to know a thing, shouldn’t she simply ask it? A corner of her lip twitched up as she started spreading more Mercy Mint over his wounds.

“Mm,” he moaned. “It’s working to reduce the pain. What is it? It’s amazing.”

“Mercy Mint, Isa,” she smiled. “It’s one of my favorite salves.”

“Haven’t heard of it. From the Nether, I assume?” He exhaled with a shaky breath.

“Yes. You don’t have it here. I’ve looked… haven’t found any yet.” She decided to let the slight pass. He didn’t know better. No one did. Her people didn’t like that word, the Nether.

She removed the cork from an amber colored flask. Within it sloshed Ribwort oil, clear and viscous.

“And this is?”

“Ribwort oil. Keeps the wound clean, aids healing, prevents further infection. The Scorpions, despite our name, make more than just poisons, Isa. We make antidotes, salves, healing oils of all kinds. Small settlements often bring, used to bring… their worst wounded to us when they couldn’t determine the solution to an ailment.”

He solemnly nodded. She put a few drops on her fingers then delicately brushed it over the Mercy Mint paste.

The wind howled, tunneling with fury through the swaying trees. She enjoyed the angry wind, finding it refreshing. She waited a minute for it to wane, then unfurled a length of cotton bandage. “Hold this,” she motioned to a spot above his wounds. He pressed his fingers over hers, warm, rough and tingling with life. She slipped hers out and he pinned the bandage there. She uncoiled the bandage, wrapping it around his back then over his fingers. He let them slip out as she drew it down tighter.

“The Tower has secrets, dark secrets. What I tell you, you must not tell another. Is that clear?” Isa cleared his throat.

“Yes, Isa.” She nodded. Did she want to hear what he was about to say? Were there secrets the Mistress did not know?

“I was born there and brought up within the Tower’s walls. Lived there until my twenty-third name year.”

She leaned close to him as she brought the bandage around his back again, doubling each layer. She slowly inhaled so he wouldn’t notice her taking in his scent. He smelled like sweet earth and leather. She fumbled the bandage and bumped his wounds.

Isa grunted.

“Sorry,” Senka muttered and shook her head. You’re a damned fool, she told herself.

He smiled weakly. “I was never allowed to leave the Tower until sufficiently broken.”

She met his eyes then broke off to avoid hitting his wounds again while she worked.

“I was raised there. Had a sword put in my hand as soon as I was old enough to hold it. Some weren’t strong enough, had to drag it around the practice yard like a strange doll,” he snickered. “I didn’t have a regular child’s upbringing, no. Assumed everyone was raised like this until I spent some time away. Thorne, our trainer, drove us hard, eight to ten hours a day every day. Training, death marches, pushing us to our limits at least once a week. Gave us new limits all the time. If we hiked ten miles one day, the next week it’d be twelve and so on. Pushing, and pushing, and pushing it went.”

It didn’t sound like a bad life to Senka, much like hers actually. She liked hearing him talk.

“Had no family, no motherly love,” he said with a touch of scorn. “Thorne was the closest thing to a parent I had. Anyway,” he swallowed, “not sure why I’m telling you this…”

“It’s okay, Isa, go on.” Sometimes it was just nice to have someone there to listen to you, regardless of the meaning or purpose.

“Had my first kill when I was twelve. My first assassination, I mean.” His cheeks flushed. “The Arch Wizard sent me to a village on the outskirts of the Tower to kill a bandit leader. His house was along the coast, a beautiful spot, a shack really. Could easily see why he’d ended up on the path he’d chosen. Crept into his home in the cover of night, slid a blade through his neck beside his sleeping wife.” Isa wiped his palm from his forehead down to his mouth and held it against his chin.

Senka eyed him and kept wrapping him up, just the last quarter to go. The dark hair on Senka’s arm prickled with goosebumps, and it wasn’t because the air had grown cold.

“I slipped out of their room, left him bleeding out beside his beautiful wife. She was beautiful.” He said with a few confirming nods as if seeing her face. “A child came in from outside, from the privy as I was leaving. He opened his mouth to scream… and I stopped him.” His throat worked with a tremor. “I had no choice, you see? No choice, no choice. Left the mother a widow and without a child. My doing. My hands. You’d think I’d have become okay with it by now, but I still remember the faces. The faces of everyone I’ve killed.”

Senka bit her lip, watched him suffer through the memories, wishing there was something she could do to take away that pain. She knew there was no escaping it, excluding death. It was once thought that, in death, the scars of life were erased. From what she’d heard about Walter’s return, they only grew worse. She pulled the bandage tight around his chest. “Hold here.” She pointed at the end of the bandage. He held it and she secured it with tiny iron clips.

“That was just the beginning of my career in the Tower. We were told if we tried to run or escape, we’d be tortured. I saw what their torturers could do…” he shivered. “We were… no, we are slaves. People fear us if they know who we are before they see our blades. But we can’t run, don’t know anything else. What can we do? Where would we go?”

Senka stared down at her boots, unsure of what to say. Was she merely a slave? Someone’s dog to do the dirty work?

“Thank you, Senka. Your work… is expertly done. You’ve had a wonderful trainer.” He brushed his hand up and down his bandages. He started working his leather armor back on, tightening buckles and cinching down straps.

“The shadow ones killed my father, my trainer, as you say.”

“Sorry for your loss, and about the water,” he said without a shred of pity in his voice. The shaft of light that had emerged through a crack in his iron wall had been patched up with his wounds. Was the world west of the sands always this callous?

Isa limped over to the dead Black Wynch and snatched up his hammer and hatchet from the ground. He slipped them into metallic rings on his belt. Beside his weapons were three daggers, easily concealed in a palm, and his short sword. He made his way back to the shrubs and draped his bow and quiver over his back. “We should be going.” He pulled his hood over his bone-white head.

“Right.” She nodded and exhaled, feeling a great weight forming between them. She pulled her hood up, blocking out the world.

* * *

Nyset peered over the expansive practice yard. Their area was demarcated by a low fence that formed the shape of an enormous rectangle. It was divided into halves by a well-worn path running down the middle. There was one half each for both the Phoenix and Dragon apprentices. There were only a handful of veterans. They worked on a plot about one-third of the size, behind the great mound of earth built up in case the girls missed their targets.

“Slower. Slow it down.” Nyset crossed her arms and eyed the fire dancing in the air. It was about the size of her fist, flickering and waving as if it were burning underwater. “Control,” she breathed.

The red-headed apprentice scrunched her eyes and balled up her fists. Her hair was tussled and hung over her tanned cheeks. The fire she controlled drifted towards a practice dummy suited in Milvorian armor. Milvorian armor was used due to its ability to resist the ravages of Dragon fire. Upon its head was a Death Spawn helmet with three spikes.

“Now release your strength into the target, Joy.” Nyset pointed.

Joy bit her upper lip and grunted. Her fire puffed into wisps of black smoke, dissipating in the scouring wind. “I’ll never get it right,” Joy sniffed and pushed her hair out of her eyes.

A fireball exploded into the practice dummy beside Joy’s, throwing sparks and embers into the air. “Woah, Dragons!” the apprentice beside them called out.

Nyset suppressed a sigh and smiled. The dry air made her skin feel tight. She walked up behind the frowning girl and gently placed her hands on Joy’s shoulders. “You’ll get it. Keep practicing, you’re doing great,” She stared at the ever-burning smoke drifting out from the Silver Tower on the horizon. Was there really that much for them to burn? They would not keep her from taking the tower back. It was rightfully hers, everyone’s.

“Really? You think so?” Joy turned to look up at her, blue eyes glittering with youthful optimism. Nyset wondered how long her optimism would last after encountering Death Spawn. These were hard times for children. Was it right to bring a new babe into such a cruel existence?

“I do. I see a lot of potential in you, you’re a special girl.” Nyset nodded at her. She bent over with her hands on her knees beside Joy and looked at the practice dummy.

“You’re just saying that.” Joy furrowed her brow.

“Ssh. Come now, try again, will you? I’ll guide you through it.” Nyset gave her shoulder a gentle squeeze.

“Yes, Mistress,” Joy said, resolute.

A mighty gust pushed a veil of sand over the new Silver Tower’s practice yard.

“Ah!” Joy squinted. She coughed and brought the neck of her robe over her mouth. Nyset closed one eye, the other narrowed to a slit. She tugged one side of her shirt over her nose and mouth.

Nyset’s office was technically within a large house built by Grimbald, Juzo, Walter, and some hired help. Everyone took to calling it the new Silver Tower. It was the Silver Tower as far as she was concerned, at least until the true tower was reclaimed.

The wind tore into the earth and hurled sand with an almost cutting amount of force. The minute of quiet gave her worries room to bloom. She felt her heart lurch for Walter, yearning for the touch of his roughened hands. Where was he? Was he still okay?

She missed looking into his eye, his face, uncaring of his recent deformities. She missed his scent. It reminded her of feeling safe, protected, like she was home again. She loved him, she knew. She hadn’t mustered up the courage to tell him yet. Why was it such a difficult thing to say? He could’ve made it easier on her by saying it first. Damn him, she sighed. She wished she hadn’t left things so bitterly between them when they parted. It was a stupid argument. She needed to see him to make everything okay again.

She thought about Juzo and his Blood Eater surrogates. Could Walter and Grimbald handle them? It wasn’t right for him to make more. How many lives had he ruined with his curse? It was a vicious ripple that spread out over the ponds of eternity.

Her jaw tightened at the thought of her parents back home. Were they well? Did they wait for her? Had they heard of her new position? They would be so proud. She felt warmth spread in her chest. She had always wanted to raise them up to a higher station in life. Now she had the means to do that. Once the Tower’s coffers were filled with marks, she could buy them a new house. It would be a house where doors properly fit into frames, windows would open, and the roof wouldn’t leak. No more wondering if there’d be enough marks for elixir each year. She nodded to herself. She would be able to take care of them, finally.

Nyset wore a loose blood-red silken top, trimmed with golden thread around the cuffs and neck. The sleeves came down to her elbows and hung low to let air in. The neckline dipped low between her breasts. It was flamboyant and showed more skin than she would have liked, but comfort and freedom of movement were more important to her than fashion now. Half of her shirt was tucked into rugged trousers that hugged her hips and showed the lithe, muscular curves of her legs. The untucked half flapped in the wind and a rivulet of air cooled her back. She wore a dark leather belt with her Breden stamped short sword on one side. The other side of her belt was studded with three pouches filled with herbs and four vials filled with prismatic liquids.

She sold all but a few of her expensive silken robes, swapping them for tops and pants. It was something she’d been meaning to do for a long time since she’d taken on the role of Arch Wizard. Some people preferred robes, wizards and the gentry of Helm’s Reach mostly. They were fine for walking, meetings, but not for riding a horse, and certainly not for fighting.

The gust settled down and she sighed. She bent over to Joy, who was scratching her head and brushing the sand out. “Now, you need to remember that using the power of the Dragon is a lot like learning how to consciously move a muscle, or more accurately, make your body perform a movement it is unfamiliar with. Learning to back-flip would be a good example.” She tapped a long finger to her lips.

“But, but, I don’t know how to do a back-flip!” Joy protested and wrung her hands.

Nyset snickered. “It’s okay. You don’t need to know how. That was merely an example, child.” Child? What was she becoming? “The point is this: you don’t learn to back-flip with just a few tries. It takes hundreds if not thousands. Don’t be discouraged by a few failures. Anyone who does anything notable in life fails… a lot.” Her eyes wandered back to the Silver Tower.

“I see.” Joy nodded and tugged on her hair.

“We’ll try again together. Go ahead and conjure your fire.”

“Right.” Joy grinned and her waving blob of fire danced in the air.

“Good. Now hold it there, affix it in your mind. Make it as real as the ground you stand on.”

Joy closed her eyes and her mouth worked without producing sound.

“Hold it… good, then use your mind to move it the same way you would a ball.”

The burning mass started drifting towards the dummy. “I’m doing it! Wow!” Joy shouted.

“Concentrate, Joy.” Nyset wished she could go into Joy’s body and somehow show her exactly how she did it. It was something each person had to learn on their own, as each person felt the Dragon uniquely. “Maintain your hold on the Dragon’s fire, don’t let it go. Then add the final push.”

“The final push,” Joy repeated.

Nyset folded her arms and watched Joy’s fire. She remembered the patience her parents had shown her when they’d discovered she was given the Dragon’s touch. Every night, they had dutifully taken her to the Woodland Plunge to practice out of the view of unwelcome eyes. It was only a year ago, but it felt like tens had passed. It was a time when people of the west were wary of those touched by the gods. The world had forgotten about Asebor and Death Spawn. They could not forget now.

Joy’s fireball zoomed towards the dummy, went wide and struck the earth built up behind it with a boom. A clod of earth bound by weeds shot into the air, spinning.

“Yes!” Nyset cheered.

“I did it!”

“I knew you had it in you.” Nyset laughed.

Joy crashed into Nyset and wrapped her arms around her. “Thank you so much!” she squealed into Nyset’s shirt.

“You’re welcome, dear.” Nyset patted the back of her head. “Keep practicing until the hour is up.”

Joy pushed away from her with crimson cheeks. She cleared her throat, looking up at her with wide eyes.

“What is it?” Nyset asked.

“Sorry, Mistress. I’m not sure what just came over me.”

“But what are you sorry for, silly?” Nyset planted her hands on her hips.

“Oh — for hugging you like that. It’s a bad habit, mother never liked it. Said I shouldn’t get into people’s space so much.”

Nyset snickered and grinned. “Well, I’m not your mother and you may hug me whenever you like.”

Joy beamed up at her and tucked a red lock of hair behind her ear. “Thank you, Mistress. I’ll go practice now.” She hopped back to face the dummy. The roaring of Dragon apprentice’s fireballs struck targets all around. There were about forty practice dummies set up, one for each student. Some dummies were brandishing Death Spawn weapons and others wearing their armor.

Claw stood on the outskirts of the Phoenix practice yard, still as a statue. His lean arms were crossed over a leather jerkin. He had his curved blade Ghostwalker sitting on his hip, his long gray hair swaying in the breeze. He looked like he was sleeping with his eyes open, but Nyset knew he was always scanning for potential threats and watching his students. He was a strange man. She had tried to crack his cryptic shell more than a few times, but he gave her very little besides his unwavering loyalty.

He had proven his loyalty by saving her life and throwing himself into the enemy’s spears at her command. His life was hers, he had told her. She had decided that was enough for her. Some men preferred to keep their wounds hidden, she supposed. Maybe it was better for some people to keep their pain bottled up, but no one could stay that way forever without it creeping out in some way. It was only a matter of time.

Nyset started to walk down the line, watching as the apprentice women worked to lay waste to their targets. Fireballs burned towards the immovable warriors, some exploding and others fizzling out before making it to a dummy. Occasionally the armor the dummies wore would fail to stop the penetrating flames and they would have to be replaced with fresh wood.

Nyset and her assistant Vesla had spent months recruiting apprentices from Helm’s Reach. An inordinate amount of people born in the city were blessed with the touch of the gods. The city was well known for its strange abundance. Some feared Helm’s Reach, a minority hated it, and some loved it. Nyset was starting to enjoy it, despite its schizophrenic weather. The evenings were icy and the days scorching. Nyset had always wanted more variety in her life when she lived in Breden. That all changed after the Cerumal raided Breden during the Festival of Flames. She longed for the simpler days but felt the path she walked now was the right one for her. She tilted her chin up, nodded at an apprentice whose fire struck true.

Those they recruited, who were touched by the god’s powers, had been gifted in the traditional manner. Women were gifted with the Dragon’s ability to destroy, and men the ability to heal and protect. There weren’t any dual-wielders in Helm’s Reach, not to her knowledge, at least. Walter’s gift was incredibly rare. She had read in the histories that typically only one dual-wielder is born per generation. There were two in her generation. She learned in the Tower that Asebor had killed the other, a girl.

Walter had to live, for only he had the strength to challenge Asebor. The more she thought about it, the more she thought Walter should be locked in a prison, only to be unleashed to face Asebor, but that wouldn’t do. People weren’t weapons, right?

The corner of her lip twitched up in the beginnings of a self-amused smile. Her new station as the Arch Wizard was inflating her head with hubris. She knew it and was aware of it most times. She found it difficult to inoculate herself to that swelling pride. The way the apprentices and people of the city looked to her for the right thing to do forced her to be this way. Men wouldn’t follow someone whose commands wavered, even if she was a quivering mess on the inside. If they knew the truth, would they still obey her?

Something flapped under her boot. She peered down at the paper pinned below it and snatched a corner before lifting her foot so it wouldn’t blow away. The paper had an image of a Phoenix in flight with an X crossed through it. It read in large print: Phoenix worshipers are heretics. Do not trust. Their weakness is our weapon. Nyset softly growled. It seemed someone or some group was stirring up the hive in the city. She didn’t need this right now. She rolled it up and placed it in her pocket.

An older apprentice, maybe even her age, struck a target square in the chest with a fireball. She wore blood-red robes, the traditional color of all female apprentices.

“Nice work.” Nyset smiled at her. She felt herself flush at forgetting her name.

“Thank you, Mistress,” she replied. “Is there anything I can do better?”

Nyset stopped to think. Her aim was true, fireball swift. “Try two.” She grinned.

“Two? You mean at the same time?” The apprentice’s mouth twisted with distaste.

“I do.” She pursed her lips. “Remember, if you can conjure two at once, you can join the veterans and learn more advanced spells.”

The apprentice blew out her lips. “I’ll try.”

Nyset drew up close beside the apprentice and remembered her name. She spoke softly. “Trust yourself, Bria. Trust the Dragon. Let all your anger, your rage, all the broken dreams and false hopes fill you up.” Nyset felt her guts squirm and suppressed the tears that wanted to break free from her eyes. “Feel them in your gut, heart, in your bones. Suck in the sadness. Let them out. Let the fury of the Dragon take you and then you’ll find its infinite wells clear and open for you.” She inhaled sharply. “But you must be careful. Remember, if you take more of the power than you can control, it can burn you to embers, turn your mind into a ruined shell.”

Bria turned to face her and blinked her narrow-set eyes. She slowly nodded with understanding, her hazel eyes gleaming with the light of the Dragon.

Nyset took her hand in hers and squeezed it. She met her eyes and time seemed to stretch out, though only a few seconds passed. Within those seconds, she felt thousands of words were spoken through their gazes. Nyset released Bria’s hand.

“Good luck.” Nyset bobbed her eyebrows and turned down the line of Dragon apprentices. She deeply inhaled, letting the arid air burrow deep within her lungs. They were doing well on the whole. It had been two weeks since Walter had marched west with Scab’s men. They should be arriving at The Great Retreat soon, maybe today, certainly tomorrow. She bit down and pain spread through her fingertip.

“Ow!” She withdrew her hand from her mouth and stared at her cracked nail, unsure of when it had found its way into her mouth. A few girls looked at her with concern. She smiled wanly. She had to get control. He’ll be back. Her parents were fine. Everything was fine, she told herself. They had survived what she guessed was a probing attack from the Death Spawn. Could they survive another? Would Helm’s Reach be ready?

She got her feet, moving farther down the dividing path between either side of the practice yard. The men were huddled around Claw now, hanging on his every lecturing word.

“…feel the Phoenix, revel in its magnificence!” Claw wildly gestured with his hands. Nyset snickered at the worried looks on the newly recruited faces. Those that had been here since the beginning were used to his enthused speeches and rolled their eyes, likely waiting for him to get to the point.

A pair of figures crested the horizon on horseback. It was Senka and Isa. She knew their forms, even at this great distance. She felt a thrill of excitement course through her.

“Ah! The Arch Wizard is here now. Come on over and meet the new recruits, would you?” Claw roared and beckoned toward her. The men, some boys, turned to look at her. Some met her eyes for an instant before turning down, a few felt as if they were stripping her bare, probably imagining how she looked without her clothing.

She crossed her arms. A man with a round face licked his lips at her and she narrowed her eyes at him. Claw’s hand drew back and slapped the back of his head with a thump. “Have some respect, would you?” Claw growled at him. Claw had hit him a little too hard for her tastes, but it did send a clear message.

“Sorry,” the round-faced apprentice muttered, staring into his hands.

Nyset walked up to Claw and eyed the downcast group, sufficiently cowed from his show of discipline. “Would you please watch my girls? I’m going to go meet them.” She nodded to the distant plumes of sand and dirt drifting into the air from Senka and Isa’s horses.

“Of course, Mistress. I’ll keep my good eye on them.” Claw winked and nodded with far too much enthusiasm.

“Thank you, Claw.” Nyset started for the end of the practice yard.

Claw’s voice trailed off. “When you’re weaving Phoenix shields, remember that they can’t block everything. Some people, like the Arch Wizard, can pull enough Dragon fire to cut through it…”

At the end of the practice yard, her gray mare pawed at the ground and snorted when she approached. She removed her lead rope from a fence post and deftly hopped on the saddle. She lightly heeled her into a gallop and air coursed down her shirt, working to peel off some of the day’s sweat.

She grinned as Senka and Isa grew larger, finally coming into clear view. “Hey!” she waved at them.

Isa slowed his horse then dismounted and dropped into a low bow. “Mistress,” he came up with a wince. Senka followed after him, giving a curt bow.

“Are you alright, Isa?” She put a hand on his shoulder.

“I’m well. We encountered some Death Spawn resistance. A Black Wynch got lucky…” Isa glanced to Senka and back to her. “Senka patched me up.”

Senka beamed. “My pleasure. I am still surprised to see that a Silver Tower assassin can bleed.”

Isa raised an eyebrow at her with the beginnings of a smile. “We do, on rare occasions.”

Nyset sighed and shook her head. “I’m sorry. I should’ve sent you with a wizard or two, to heal you if something like this were to happen.” The lack of planning could’ve left them both dead. How could she be so stupid? “Well, tell me. What did you find? Was your mission a success?” Nyset clasped her hands together over her chest.

Isa looked to Senka, who nodded at him. “Yes, Mistress. We found a cave defended by Death Spawn. We both arrived at the same conclusion… it appears they use the cavern as a means for travel. We didn’t explore the cave, however judging by the number of prints and disturbed land trailing away from it, it is very likely used to move a great number of Death Spawn troops.” Isa’s face grew harsh. “We don’t know where it leads.”

Senka rested her hands on the pair of daggers on either hip. “It looks as though your suspicions were correct. We had almost given up the search, Mistress. It was well hidden.”

“Please Senka, call me Nyset.”

“Yes, Mis-Nyset. The informality… is not what I am accustomed to.”

Nyset brushed her lips with her index finger. “So they’re not traveling by portals but by tunnels underground. It’s logical but risky. Less risky than Phoenix portals, I suppose.”

“We thought to close it up, but did not have the proper means.” Isa worked his shoulder in circles as if working out a pain.

“That’s alright. You two did well, thank you. Get yourselves some food, rest, bathe. Whatever you need, take it. I’ll send Claw for healing. He’ll make you good as new. When you’re rested, please remember to go to the map in the war room and make note of the cave’s location.”

What other tricks did Asebor have? What other false assumptions had they made? She needed time to think.

Chapter 8

Office Hours

“An opened door can be an invitation to the unwanted.” -The Diaries of Nyset Camfield

Nyset leaned over a map that swallowed most of her heavy oaken desk. It was a beautiful map with ornamental scrollwork at the edges and sweeping charcoal illustrations, designed by Claw, who she learned also happened to be an artist.

Her office door was closed and latched, deadening some of the world outside. The roaring thunder of a fireball striking a target bellowed through the wall, likely from an apprentice putting in extra practice time. After the first attack on Helm’s Reach, everyone finally saw the Death Spawn with sober eyes, not that it did anything to stop the denizens from their regular manic imbibing. The sun was an orb of pink fire outside her window, splashing the scrubland with blood.

The room was small and rectangular. Her office was in a back corner of the new Silver Tower, a house she and her friends had built. Across the main hall was a similarly sized room used for meetings and storing mainly rice, flour, wine, and elixir beans.

In her office was a bookshelf covering one wall from floor to vaulted ceiling. One shelf had been filled with tomes purchased in the city, the rest lying pathetically empty and coated in a thin layer of sand. There was something about an empty bookshelf that irked her. Bookshelves were meant to be filled. She would have to remedy that soon.

A few candles clustered together burned on her desk, casting their fluttering glow over her map. They were infused with the sweet aroma of cinnamon. On the opposite side of her desk were a few pouches partially filled with herbs, her sheathed sword, and sword belt. The anti-Phoenix pamphlet she’d found earlier in the practice yard was pinned under her pouches. She tugged on the bottom of her shirt and pulled it out from the confines of her pants.

She felt like she could breathe again with some time alone. She exhaled and her head sagged with the weight of exhaustion. She’d been teaching apprentice’s classes every day this week and each day was more draining than the last. The classes were long and grueling, spanning ten hours per day. She had to prepare the city for the Death Spawn. They could strike again at any time. She frowned down at the finger in her mouth, about to bite through a nail. Nyset wiped the saliva from her finger on the front of her shirt.

She traced her finger on the map from Helm’s Reach to the spot Isa had marked for the hidden cavern. It was west of the old Silver Tower, close enough to it to deploy troops by foot, but not so far they’d be easily detected. They were using the hidden cavern to travel, she knew it in her gut.

Her finger hissed across the map from the hidden cavern to Snowden’s Cavern before Midgaard. “Too close to the capital, they wouldn’t use that,” she murmured. Her finger darted from Snowden’s Cavern to the Yellow Caverns west of Lich’s River. “This was how they made their way to Breden.” She nodded and pressed her finger to her lips, smearing them with charcoal. “Dragons, it had to be.” She would have to send Nyset and Isa back with a veteran or two to close up the entrance. It might be a formidable risk now that it’s been discovered.

She turned away from the map and eyed the sun, now a sliver of gold on the horizon. She closed her eyes and rubbed her temples. A minute later, she opened them to see the chest adjacent to the bookshelf staring at her, taunting her. It was big enough for her to climb into, heavy and iron bound. It would take more than few men to move it, assuming they could disarm the ward without being burned to death. It wasn’t the chest being stolen that worried her most, but its lack of being filled by marks.

She had foolishly agreed. Actually, Walter had forced her to agree to come up with the funds to pay Scab and his vile mercenaries. She had conceded to herself that after Walter left, it was a necessary decision, even if she didn’t agree with it. They needed men who could fight. She had started collecting donations from apprentices who felt they could afford it after Grimbald’s suggestion, but it wasn’t enough. She wondered where Walter was now, how he was faring. Had he met her parents? Would they be proud of her? Why hadn’t he sent word of Breden yet? She let a long exhale slide through her nose, her heart slowing a few beats.

She strode over to the trunk, looked over her shoulders and out her window for curious eyes, but she was alone. One could never be too cautious, Baylan had once told her. She tugged the necklace holding the silvery key out from between her breasts. The metal was warm, almost comforting in her hand. She squatted down, inserted the key, and twisted, causing a clicking and releasing of the heavy lock. The lock was a formality. A heavy war hammer or tongue of Dragon fire could easily melt it. The real defense was unseen, even to her eyes. Juzo could see wards; she’d have to ask him what the trick was. That was, of course, as long as it had nothing to do with becoming a Blood Eater.

She uttered, “Zal dah iztus.” The circular ward symbol glowed with fire then faded away from its lid, the trap now disarmed. The wood creaked as she pushed the lid open. The bottom third of the trunk was filled with glittering jeweled marks of all denominations, casting her face in a warm glow.

There was more money than she’d ever laid eyes upon. Maybe she could load up her saddlebags with as many as the seams could handle and ride off to Eagle’s Edge now to get an early start on the life she’d always wanted with Walter. It would be enough to pay for a modest house on the coast, a few horses, and livestock. It was more than she’d ever needed or wanted. She bit her lip and rested her hand upon the lid. Her fingers pressed into the wood, hard and polished smooth. She closed it with a thud. A girl could fantasize about being a scoundrel, couldn’t she? Thinking about a thing and doing it were two entirely different worlds. She uttered the words to re-arm the Dragon ward trap and locked it.

They only had raised shy of one hundred thousand marks, but would need at least eighty thousand more to pay Scab, by her math. She couldn’t conceive of a way to get more at the moment. She could figure it out, she knew. She just had to direct her mind to work out the proper solution. Why did everyone else’s problems become hers? Because this is the burden you placed upon your back when you declared yourself Arch Wizard, foolish girl, she answered herself.

It was rumored by bandits and dreamers that the Tower had vaults filled with vast amounts of power diamond marks. Even if the rumors were true, she had no feasible way of accessing them. They hardly had the strength to withstand another attack, never mind a siege to take the Tower back.

Nyset gasped at a light yet hurried rapping on her door. Was it too much to ask for an hour to herself? This had better not be Claw trying to check up on her again, she thought. “Just a moment,” she said. She approached the door, pushing her hair back over her ears, then raked her hand through it.

She unlatched the door with a clink and cracked it open with a thump. She inwardly sighed at seeing Claw grinning at her, half his face slashed with a line of candlelight behind the door.

“Thank you for checking on me, Claw, but I assure you I’m just fine.” She smiled.

Claw’s grin grew wider. “You have a visitor, Mistress. Said she knows you. Said you’re old friends.”

“A visitor? Old friends?” Who could it be? “Well alright, let her in then.” She embraced the Dragon as precautionary measure and Claw nodded his approval at her glowing eyes.

“Come on,” Claw gruffly shouted over his shoulder and beckoned. That reminded her that she’d need to teach him a gentler way with guests. His hand fell to his sword hilt as the footsteps approached from down the hallway.

A familiar face she couldn’t place came into view. “Good evening, Arch Wizard.” Recognition dawned with her dreamy voice and wistful smile. It was Lena, the woman who had proctored her initiation test for joining the Sisterhood of the Herbalists.

“Lena! How are you? What are you doing here?” Nyset released the Dragon, came into her for a hug and Lena reciprocated. Nyset wiggled her nose at her overwhelming scent of patchouli. Her beaded dreadlocks draped over Nyset’s hands, leaving them feeling itchy.

“Oh, I’m well.” Lena scratched her nose and the wooden bangles lining her forearms clacked together. She had dark circles under her eyes as if she hadn’t slept in days. Perhaps that was how she always looked? Nyset couldn’t remember.

“So what brings you to the new Silver Tower? Do come in.” Nyset gestured into her office.

Claw wrinkled his eyes at Lena’s back. Nyset nodded to him. “Thank you,” Nyset said. He grunted, turned, heading back down the hallway with his hand still clutching his sword hilt. Claw was usually more welcoming to guests, gruff and somewhat barbaric, but welcoming. Was there something she was missing? Nyset slid a simple chair from beside her bookshelf to one end of her desk.

Lena gracefully sat in the chair with a lazy posture. Nyset sat across from her. “Moved here a few months ago. I closed the shop early today so I could come by and see you.”

“Oh, wonderful. So you have a store in Helm’s Reach? I’m glad you came. I’ve been so busy, I almost forgot about the sisterhood. Would you like some tea? Elixir?” She had to remember she wasn’t the poor girl from Breden anymore, she was the Arch Wizard of the Silver Tower, damn it. There was something about Lena’s cool confidence she found unnerving.

Lena snickered. “No, no thank you. That’s not surprising. It’s easy to forget about the sisterhood until you need something…” Her big-as-saucer eyes slowly rolled about the room.

“Nice, isn’t it?” Nyset asked, turning to admire Grimbald’s exquisite craftsmanship. The crown moldings were perfectly lined up at the mitre cuts.

“It’s beautiful.” Lena’s attention returned to her, regarding her flatly.

“What did you say isn’t surprising?”

“That you’ve forgotten about the sisterhood. It’s not surprising… since it must be a dreadfully tiring burden you’ve elected to take on.”

Nyset shook her head and blew out her cheeks. “The work never ends. I’m growing into it, though. Perhaps even starting to like it.”

“The Tower has always forgotten about us over the years.” Lena adjusted her flowing skirts over her knees.

Was she petitioning for marks? Perhaps she didn’t know how crippled the Tower was now after the Death Spawn siege. “What brings you to Helm’s Reach?”

“There are better… business opportunities here. The people less stiff, boring…” She rolled her hands, looking for the right words. “Less inhibited.”

“I suppose you’re right about that.” Nyset thoughtfully tapped her upper lip. “There’s certainly no shortage of vagrants, bandits… and whores to satisfy every form of sexual proclivity. A wonderful place for the Silver Tower, really.” Nyset grinned.

“Oh my.” Lena touched long fingers to a poorly woven shirt. “Is this speaking from experience?”

Nyset felt the blood rush to her face. “Of course not, Lena!” She laughed.

Lena chuckled. “Please do tell me, how did you come to don the robes of the Arch Wizard?”

It felt good to laugh, Nyset thought. She needed to find ways to do it more often. Fleeting horrors flashed across her mind. The first was an armsman spitted upon a Cerumal’s grisly spear. The next was of an apprentice falling through the gray sky, arms and legs frantically working to stop her descent from a flying Shattered Wing’s claws. A Black Wynch growled, raised its talons and tore open a man’s neck. His blood sprayed out onto the old Silver Tower’s courtyard, shooting out an unearthly distance.

“Nyset? Dear?” Lena was leaning forward in her chair, bushy eyebrows drawn.

“Ah, yes, sorry. Some painful memories were dredged up at remembering that day.”

“Which day was that?”

Nyset sighed and an icy wave crawled down her skin. “The day the Tower fell. I was there during the siege, helped fight against the Death Spawn. It was… a terrible day for countless reasons.”

“It must have been truly terrifying. I’m truly, truly sorry for your losses, dear. I can’t imagine…” Lena’s lips formed a hard line.

Nyset sniffed, remembered witnessing what she thought was Walter’s death, but death was no longer final. Her notions of the possible had been shattered at his return. “Thank you, Lena.” Nyset took a deep breath and leaned forward, resting her elbows on her knees and staring into the candle flames. “Arms Master Burtz sacrificed himself to save me and my friends. He was the trainer for the soldiers. We escaped through a tunnel that led out from the Tower’s practice yard. Thankfully, none of the Death Spawn went searching for us.” She looked up. “I’m rambling, sorry.”

“How very fortunate for you,” Lena said, hands resting in her lap.

“As far as I know, we were the only survivors. The former Arch Wizard was presumed dead… Earl Baraz came to meet us… I declared myself as the Arch Wizard, being one of the Tower’s last remaining wizards. And no one has objected so far.”

“Hm.” Lena nodded and beads in her hair clicked. “You’ve taken a position of great power.”

“I suppose.” Nyset’s eyes narrowed. “Why did you really come here, Lena?”

Lena gasped and cringed as if she’d been insulted. “You do realize that we’re fighting the same fight, now that we’re sisters?”

“I haven’t seen you, or anyone from the sisterhood in months. It’s just strange that you’re here now. I apologize, I didn’t intend to insult.”

“Oh dear, don’t be sorry.” Lena eyed the anti-Phoenix pamphlet on her desk. “I see you’ve found some of my work.”

“What?” Nyset arched an eyebrow. “This?” She wriggled the paper free from under her pouches and stood, holding it. “This is your doing?” She felt her heart thudding in her chest.

“Well, not just me. The sisters too.” A wicked smile crept across Lena’s face, dashing away the dreamy listlessness. For the first time, Nyset felt like she was seeing the real Lena.

“But why? Why would you — all of you — do this? People are killing each other! Why would you try to make things worse?”

“Business.” Lena shrugged.

“Business?” Nyset’s anger welled and the Dragon filled her veins with the urge to destroy. “So you’re the ones stoking the fires of dissent. Give me a good reason why I shouldn’t incinerate you where you stand?”

“You’re the Arch Wizard. You’re supposed to be fair. You have a reputation to uphold, duty, and honor, and all that. The answer to your question… for hundreds of years, the Tower has ignored us. We’ve petitioned to join your ranks time and time again, yet every time we’re rejected like common vagrants. It’s very simple, really. When the simpletons of this city quarrel about dead gods, people get hurt. When Dragon worshipers get hurt, they come to us for healing. We ease their pain with herbs… and business is good.”

“Business,” Nyset scoffed. “You have to stop,” Her hands squeezed the edge of her desk. “There’s too much at stake. The city needs to run with some measure of harmony. What do you want?”

“The same thing you want: respect. Give us a place here, beside you.”

Nyset leaned back and stared up at the ceiling. If the Tower had denied them all these years, there had to be good reason. If she let the sisterhood in, who else would try to coerce her next and follow the sisterhood’s example? The highest rungs of the Tower were always led by those who were touched by the gods and it would remain that way. Tradition defined what the Tower was. It provided a steady rock the realm could always rely upon in a chaotic world. “I can’t do that. You can serve in the Tower—”

“We will not serve,” hissed Lena.

“If you’d let me finish, please, Lena.”

“You-you think yourself so much higher, mightier, more important than all of us. I know what you’re going to say. We can work in the Tower, like your servants and your pigheaded soldiers?”

Nyset blew out her cheeks and tilted her head. “What I offer—”

Lena interrupted. “We don’t want your pittances. We—”

“Shut up, Lena!” Nyset slammed the table and flames flared in her eyes. “Know your place and hold your tongue, or I shall burn it out.”

Lena flinched and managed to make herself look surprisingly small in her chair.

“Everything alright, Mistress?” Claw yelled through the door.

“Fine,” she shouted back.

Nyset waited a long minute, letting Lena get anything else out, but her mouth remained wisely closed.

“What I offer you — you personally — is a place with my other advisors, but you alone. I like you, Lena, I can forgive your treachery but once.”

“It’s not good enough. Expect the city to grow suddenly more restless.” Lena rose and brushed invisible particles from her clothes. She started for the door.

A disc of fire sprang to life in front of Lena, a few inches from her neck. Lena staggered back and her eyes bulged at it. “No! What do you think you’re doing?”

“Oh, no Lena. No, no, no. You march in here, try to coerce me? Has this ever worked for you before?” Lena opened her mouth but Nyset raised her hand to silence her. “You’ll take the offer and you’ll be most pleased with it. If you don’t, I will personally burn every last sister down to charred embers. I’ve killed Death Spawn by the hundreds, why not add a few old wenches to the list?”

Lena swallowed and her eyes vibrated with rage. “I accept,” she croaked.

“That’s very wise, Lena.” Nyset nodded at her, heart eager to burst through her chest. Her armpits swelled with nervy, stinky sweat. This was madness, what was she doing? Was this the right decision? Too late now. “If you try to cross me again, play any more games, do anything to make me suspect — I’ll come for you, Lena. In addition to ceasing the spread of deleterious propaganda, you’ll help us unify the city by making leaflets declaring how both the Dragon and Phoenix worshipers can work together.”

“Yes, Nyset.”

“That’s Mistress, for you.” Nyset tilted her chin up at her, palms tingling with sweat. She let the flaming disc dissipate into smoke tendrils.

“What should the leaflets say?” Lena asked, voice trembling.

“I don’t know. I’ll leave you to your creative devices, Lena,” Nyset said.

“I’ll be going now,” Lena put her hand on the door’s handle. “Oh — there’s something else I wanted to tell you.”

“Yes?” Nyset crossed her arms. There was always something else.

“During your testing to join the sisters in Midgaard, I know you cheated.” She tugged the door free from the frame.

“Huh? Wait — sorry, come back. What are you saying?”

Lena sneered at her from over her shoulder. “Don’t play with me, Mistress. One of the other sisters had an Invocation Detector during your testing. It was glowing like a burning coal when you left. The plant I used for your testing wasn’t Fairymoss, which was your guess, but Sour Nightshade.”

“I’m confused.” Nyset sat and rubbed her temples. She tugged on a wispy strand of brown hair with golden highlights.

Lena turned to face her, hands planted on her hips. “The fact is you’re a cheater, a liar. You were unable to come up with the answer to my question on your own, so you used your dead god’s powers to make me say it was correct. You have no creativity, so you just take and steal what you think should be yours, but rightfully isn’t. Just like you did with the position you hold now,” she waved her wiry arm around the room. “You shouldn’t be a sister.”

Nyset felt dizzy, like she’d gone far too long without food. “Walter…” she whispered. Had he used a Mind Eater to force Lena to say her answer was correct? No, he would never do something so vile. It was one of the forbidden spells, but did he know that? Perhaps not.

“This is a grave accusation, Lena. You’re sure you had an Invocation Detector activated, glowing during my testing?”

“My sisters would not lie to me, at least.” She narrowed her eyes and crossed her arms. “It is true what they say… the people who rise to the top have to step on a lot of bodies to get there, isn’t it?”

A Mind Eater could only be conjured by a man or someone who could use the Phoenix, and the only man in the shop with her then was Walter. She wanted very badly for him to be there so she could throttle him. “I assure you that if there was foul play, I had nothing to do with it.” She met Lena’s eyes. “If you’d rather I not be in the sisterhood and feel I don’t belong, by all means, take it back.” Nyset slipped a necklace with a simple wooden ring from around her neck and placed it on the desk. Lena had it given to her almost a year ago at the end of the initiation ceremony. It had become part of her, though her dealings with the sisterhood were rare.

Lena snorted. “No. What’s done is finished. The past is dead, the future, the now is all that exists. Where shall I move in?” She beamed with too much exultation.

“You’re sure you want to work for a liar and cheat?”

“I’m sure. Better than any offer the Tower has made us in the past,” Lena muttered. “It’s a start for us.”

“I think I know why your mind was influenced during my testing. I’ll get to the bottom of it, I assure you it was not me. Lena, you do understand the importance of the city being at peace and working together, don’t you?”

“Yes, yes. Don’t worry… my part in it is over. Besides, with all the wounded after the last battle, there’s plenty of work anyway…”

“Can you help us now? Instead of spreading hate, could you perhaps print something encouraging the Dragon and Phoenix worshipers to work together?”

Lena twisted a dreadlock between her fingers. “I’ll see what I can come up with.”

Nyset sighed and slipped the necklace back on. Truthfully, she liked being a member of another group, even if she took little part in it. It was nice to feel included. “There’s another office across the hall. No one else wanted it, so you may use it. Welcome.” She offered her hand and Lena took it.

“Great, excellent!” Lena slapped her thighs. “I’ll get my things together and set myself up here tomorrow, if that suits you fine.”

“That’s alright with me. Tell Claw on your way out; he’s the guard you met earlier.” Nyset sat and watched the herbalist leave. “The days are never dull, that is certain,” she said to herself and slumped into her chair, closing her eyes.

Some time passed, maybe fifteen minutes. Claw’s distinctive knocking struck the door, startling her from the beginnings of a nap. “Mistress?”

She groggily groaned, rose up to her feet and stretched her arms out overhead. “What is it, Claw?”

“Got another visitor.” His voice was muffled through the heavy door.

“Let her in then.” She waved, then realized no one could see her gesturing.

“It’s a man, an old one,” Claw said. “Says he knew Walter and your late friend Baylan.”

She groaned with weariness. “Let him in then.”

The door creaked open and a squat old man shuffled his way into her office. She didn’t recognize him. The man wore blue threadbare robes with brown spots, maybe wine or blood stains. He had a long beard she suspected was once white, now brown with dirt and in dire need of a brushing. The top of his head was bald with grayish tufts around the edges.

“Good evening. Nyset Camfield, Arch Wizard of the Silver Tower.” She offered her hand.

“It’s a great pleasure to finally meet the new Arch Wizard.” He smiled with a few teeth yellow as gold. He shook her hand and squeezed it with a hidden strength. “I am… heh, I suppose former House Master Grozul, of the House of the Phoenix.” He dropped into the chair across from her as if his muscles didn’t have the strength to hold him up any longer.

“House of the…” Nyset’s jaw fell open. “You’re alive. But how did you escape?”

“Eh, well. It was a perilous risk, fraught with unknown dangers. Once the walls of the Tower were broken, I sealed myself up in my chambers to… to preserve the Tower’s knowledge. I thought it prudent that someone live to tell the tale. Why not one of the Tower’s elders?”

Nyset folded her arms. Not everyone could be a hero, certainly not an old man, but wasn’t he a powerful wizard? They could’ve used everybody to defend against Asebor’s siege.

“Do you have anything hot to drink? Elixir from Breden perhaps? Tea from Midgaard?” Grozul pushed cracked spectacles up his long nose.

“Sure, just a minute.” Hearing someone say the name of her home village sent a stab of panic through her gut. Why hadn’t Walter contacted her yet? Nyset strode to the door, glad for an excuse to move and work the nerves out of her legs. She asked Claw for some brewed elixir and honey cakes.

“Where are you staying?” She thought it wise to get him talking with some simpler questions first, as he’d been pointedly obtuse about how he’d escaped the Tower.

“With the Earl, got here a week or so ago. He’s a good man, a very fine fellow indeed. Put me up in a beautiful room in his palace. Have you been there?”

“I haven’t. I’ve been far too busy trying to rebuild the Tower. Between recruiting apprentices, scraping together marks for this house, and trying to keep Death Spawn out of the city… well, it hasn’t left me much time for sleeping and eating, never mind palace frivolities.”

“Frivolities, that’s a way of putting it,” he laughed. Grozul put a gnarled cane across his lap. “How are the defenses holding?”

“They’re holding well enough for now.” Nyset swallowed and peered through the window towards the city’s walls. Torches were flickering along the battlements and marching along the walls. She turned back to face him and leaned on her elbows. “How did you escape the Tower, Master Grozul?”

“I-um. Well,” he stuttered.

Claw shouldered through her office door with a platter in his hands. It had a decanter filled with brown elixir, two mugs, and a small plate with round honey cakes. He roughly set it on her desk, mugs clattering and almost teetering over. “Anything else?”

“That’s all, thank you, Claw.” Nyset smiled at him.

He grunted and eyed Grozul with characteristic suspicion before leaving, closing the door behind him with a thump. Did that man trust anyone?

Nyset poured steaming elixir into the mugs, inhaling through her nose at the wonderfully bitter aroma. Grozul twiddled his thumbs watching her, nails yellowed and overgrown. Nyset lifted a mug and placed it in front of him. “Enjoy. So, you were about to tell me how you fled the Tower?”

“Ah, yes.” Grozul reached for his mug and raised it to his beard shrouded mouth. He sniffed, then took a slurping sip. “Mm. A wonderful roast. To escape the Tower, it was a simple matter, really. I simply used Phoenix portals.”

“Really? You must be quite skilled. I believe I read that there is a very high risk of them causing deformities over long distances.”

A drop of elixir clinging to his beard fell into his lap. “Yes, you’re correct, my dear. I slowly made my way out, creating doorways to parts of the Tower that are not well known. I was very close to freedom before I took a Death Spawn arrow to my back shoulder.” He fingered a spot of dried blood on his robe.

Nyset sniffed and took a sip of her elixir. She swished it in her mouth, allowing the bevy of flavors to fill her cheeks. “But can’t you heal?”

“Mm.” Grozul swallowed. “Of course, I did heal myself, that’s why I’m here now. The few Cerumal who saw me gave chase for a bit, but I managed to weave portals fast enough that they eventually gave up. Disgusting creatures.” He shivered. “I made my way into the forests north of the Tower. You have to remember, Mistress, I’m an old man and the wilds, the wilds, well… no longer suit me. My constitution wasn’t what it once was at your age. Took me weeks to recover my strength from all the power I used to escape, not to mention the severe lack of food and potable water in the forest.”

“Well, I’m glad you’re here. Are you interested in re-joining the Tower?” Why hadn’t he washed his clothes? He smelled like a wet dog and the odor was starting to fill the room, overpowering the pleasant aroma of the elixir. She remembered seeing him around the Tower now, though he’d always worn a floppy hat then.

Grozul slurped up another sip of elixir. “I suppose this is where I belong. I do miss my studies.” He grinned behind his beard.

“I’d love to have you. We could sure use the help…” she dropped her voice. “Claw, my guard, is excellent. However, he doesn’t have the best manner with the students. Do you think you could teach them the way of the Phoenix?”

“That would be lovely, just lovely. I do miss teaching as well.” He stared off through the window behind her, eyes netted with deep wrinkles. His eyes met hers. “I’ll just need a place to conduct my research. Things seem… a bit cramped in here. Perhaps not enough room for the both of us.”

“Certainly not in here.” The thought of sharing a room with him made her skin wriggle. “Think there might be enough room on the second floor to build another room. We’re only using it for storing supplies now.”

“That will do. When will it be built?”

Nyset groaned. “As soon as we have more marks. Since the Tower fell, it’s been difficult to find resources.”

“Oh! Well, I’m sure Earl Baraz should surely be able to help you.” Grozul nibbled on a honey cake and golden crumbs fell and clung to his beard. “He can be charitable.”

“Huh. I hadn’t thought of asking him, that’s a great idea. I’ll go to him tomorrow; it’s been long overdue since we’ve spoken. Thanks for that.”

“You’re most welcome. I’ve heard that you’ve been recruiting new apprentices in the city. Is it true?” His eyebrows drew down, so bushy they partly obscured his eyes.

“It is. How else could I have gone about rebuilding?” Nyset gestured and eyed the scars on her arms. She learned to like them there. They served as an ugly reminder of how deadly the enemy was.

He shrugged helplessly and popped the last corner of a honey cake into his mouth. “How many? The Tower had always made a point to avoid recruiting from Helm’s Reach due to their extreme, and apparently, unchanging prejudices. The Tower is not a place for such soft minds, not that I need to tell you that, Mistress. The Dragon and Phoenix must work together. We tried to show them time and time again, but the roots of their feuds had traveled so terribly deep.”

“At the last count, there were forty-nine apprentices, a handful of veterans. A few of the armsman survived the siege, they’re in the city, likely on the walls now. The Earl has a battalion of the Falcon, just shy of five hundred men,” Nyset put her mug down and grabbed a notebook from her bookshelf. She flipped it open to the page noting her most recent numbers, tracing a finger through them and confirming her accounting.

“And you’ve managed to get them all working together? The ones you’ve recruited?” Grozul asked.

“So far.” She nodded, closed the notebook, and placed it on her desk. She cocked her head at him. “Why did you wait so long to come to me? You wasted too much time.” Perhaps her tongue was a little too sharp, but she didn’t care. She needed answers.

Grozul’s jaw hung open, about to take another sip. His eyes searched the room. “Well, I didn’t know you were here, Mistress, that’s all.”

She shook her head and tightened her jaw. “You just said you knew I’ve been recruiting in the city. How long have you known?” She jabbed her notebook on her desk with her index finger.

He frowned. “Not long. Just a couple of days. I had to rest, Mistress, you understand. Using so much of the power is very draining.” He squirmed under his robes. “I wanted to be in good spirits and my constitution restored before presenting myself to you. As you can see.” He tugged on his soiled robes. “Didn’t even spare the time to clean myself up after resting.”

Nyset leaned back and watched him, waiting for him to reveal more. He looked back at her, his face as placid as a monk’s. “Alright, Grozul. Sorry for all the questions. You never know you can trust in these times.” Could she trust him not to try to coerce her? Everyone wanted something from her. What did he want?

He sagely nodded. “That’s understandable, Mistress. I appreciate your thoroughness. I believe I shall retire to my quarters now. The sun is waning and it is a long walk back to the palace.”

“Probably wise to go back before the vagrants are out in force. I’ll send Claw to go back with you.”

“No, no.” He waved her off and rose up, wincing. “That’s quite unnecessary.”

“Are you sure? It’s not a bother.” She rose up and planted her hands on her hips.

“I’m quite sure, Mistress. I’m pleased to be entering into your ah, fold. Please do send for me when I can start teaching.”

“Tomorrow.”

“Huh?” Grozul’s eyes were wide behind his spectacles.

“You can start teaching tomorrow,” Nyset said. She slid her notebook beside the pile of others on her bookshelf.

“I see. Very well, then. I’ll be here at dawn tomorrow. Good evening, Mistress.” He leaned most of his weight on his cane and shuffled his way to the door. She watched him leave through her office, hunched and shuffling down the main hallway. There was something off about him, something she couldn’t pinpoint.

Chapter 9

Kindness

“Everyone fights their own quiet inner battles.” -The Diaries of Nyset Camfield

Nyset sat perched upon a mare, its jet-black hair shining with the saffron of the morning sun. She stopped to observe the denizens of Helm’s Reach. The air was still heavy with the cold carried down with last night’s rain. She wore a heavy, dark cloak over a bright blue shirt, trousers, and leather riding boots.

Claw stood with arms crossed beside her, clad in scraggly layers of tans, grays, and browns. The only part of his outfit always dutifully immaculate was Ghostwalker, the big curved sword sheathed at his hip. He was lost in a quiet conversation only he and the voices in his head could apparently hear. Nyset hoped one of those voices wasn’t his sword. She would certainly not be entering another talking sword’s world.

Sheep bleated and a rooster roared with a mighty crowing. Mud covered people shuffled to and fro, looking less like men and more like creatures from another world. There was something about the commerce of the city that made her feel invigorated. They were in Dirt Ring, the outer rings of the city where most unfortunately lived. People were packed in tight, living in patchwork shanties, most a strong gust away from collapsing. Their dwellings did nothing to prevent the waterfall that fell from the sky from soaking everyone through. At that moment, Nyset felt grateful for the good fortune fate had given her. She was dry, clean, and well-fed. What more did a person need besides a friend or two?

People here survived on scraps, rats, and unfortunate pigeons, and whatever they could steal from their better-off neighbors. They were the terminally luckless and utterly lost. The roads were a mix of packed mud, sand, and gravel. Ramshackle pushcarts were dragged into place, forming a long column which would become a makeshift marketplace in an hour. Nyset’s wandering eye found a weed and a boot came down, crushing it flat, its stalk splintered and broken. The weed sprang up when the boot relented and another came after it, tamping it into the mud. The weed remained there, pressed into the earth like a dead body.

The wall surrounding the city had been fortified well enough for now. It was mortared where the stones were failing and topped with grisly spikes to make it harder to scale. The traps she used last had been reset, but would they work again? She gave the masons a few days off to rest, then they would start working on building a second wall around the outer. It would take weeks, if not months to complete. It was better to try and fail than not try at all, though.

A man came up to her, rattling a jar with a mark or two in it. He might’ve had nothing but stones for all she knew. “Marks for the poor? Marks for the poor?” The skeletal man had muddy streaks down his cheeks and neck. His eyes were a bright, sickly red.

Claw started for him and drew an inch of his sword from its scabbard. Nyset put a hand on his shoulder, stopping him. “No marks, but I have some food.” She reached into her satchel and offered him a round flat bread wrapped in thin cloth.

“Nah! Don’t want no bread. Got marks?” He staggered too close for comfort, reeking like drink and urine. “Marks?” The creases of his expectant hand was black with weeks of neglect.

“Why don’t you take the bread and, perhaps, a little less drink?” She smiled.

“Fu-fuck off, la-lady! Tryin’ to tell me what to do.” The man stumbled away, approaching a cart throwing up great clods of mud into the air.

The cart driver shouted at him. “Out of the way ya’ filthy fuckin’ drunk! Good for nothing bastard.” Judging by the cart’s ornate detail, he was likely coming out from the Center, where the wealthiest lived.

“Can’t help everyone, Mistress.” Claw worked a brush stick between his teeth. He snorted and spat out a hardened yellow glob. The brush stick was a twig with one side beaten and twisted into soft bristles.

Nyset groaned with disgust. “You can try, though. I see you’re finally using the brush sticks I gave you?”

“Mhm.”

“How come?”

Claw scratched the salt and pepper beard crawling around his neck. “Figured it’d be time for me to try something new.”

“Good. Keep using them. You’ve got a way to go.” She blushed. Had she been too blunt?

“Thanks again, Mistress.” Claw pulled the frayed stick out of his mouth, crusted with bits of food, and nodded. “Yeah, yeah, you told me so.” Claw stared up at the sky. “You can’t always be right, can you?”

“I don’t follow you, Claw.” Nyset twisted on her saddle to face him.

“Oh.” He laughed. “Sorry about that, just havin’ a little chat with Ghostwalker. He told me that I should’ve used them two weeks ago when you got ‘em for me.”

“I see.” The corner of her lip twitched up in a half-smile. “What else does Ghostwalker tell you?”

“All sorts of things. He’s a good friend, he and I. Nothing to worry about, Mistress. Just a harmless friend, that’s all.”

“Does he ever… ask you to kill for him?”

A young boy ran over to Claw, barefoot, shirt and pants in tatters. “Hey, Mister, got any—”

Claw bent over and growled at him, showing his crusted over teeth.

The boy’s eyes bulged open and he ran, begging from someone else a few paces away.

“Do you have to do that?” Nyset’s hands went to her hips.

“Do what?” Claw asked. He sucked what Nyset guessed was a piece of meat from the brush stick. He started chewing.

“No matter. Ghostwalker, Claw?”

“Yes, Mistress, what about him?”

She sighed. “Does he ever ask…” she leaned over her saddle, “you to kill?”

“Pah! No, no. Just likes the taste of blood’s all.”

She narrowed her eyes at him. He turned away, eyes always swiveling, always scanning for threats.

“Are you ready to get moving?” Nyset asked.

“Hm. Didn’t I follow you here? I’m just tagging along, aren’t I?”

“Yes, I suppose you did.” Nyset’s fingers went to her lips, then she bit down on a nail, cutting through the soft end. “Damn it,” she hissed and spat out the ragged sliver. Her face bloomed with warmth. She peered around and didn’t find anyone looking at her. That was good, she had a reputation to uphold after all.

She spurred her mare to a trot and Claw followed at her flank. They passed by a pile of rotting cabbage stacked high as a house. It leaned against one of the arcing walls dividing Dirt Ring from the Middle. A few women picked through it, parsing out the edible parts into baskets. It was a donation from the Middle. They would bring them food they no longer desired and haphazardly dump it. It was a sordid form of charity, if you asked her.

They started for the opened portcullis dividing the Middle from Dirt Ring. A pair of guards scowled at a pair of boys clashing with wooden swords. The hooded eyes of a pudgy guard regarded her. “Who desires to enter the Middle?”

“Nyset Camfield, Arch Wizard of the Silver Tower. This is my assistant,” Nyset said and nodded at Claw. Claw peered around his back, at the guards, then through the entrance.

“Have a Middle pass?” the guard asked and held out his hand. The fingers of his gloves looked like overstuffed sausages, ready to split open at any minute.

She sighed. She had forgotten about this formality. The Earl had given her one when she’d arrived. “No, I seem to have left it in my office. I—”

“No pass, no enter. Bug off.” The pudgy man gestured with his spear. Laughter and scuffling feet came from behind and the pair of boys wriggled between her and Claw, darting towards the entrance to the Middle. The pudgy guard’s boot struck the first of them in the gut, sending him crumbling to the ground, gasping.

The other guard, equally as plump as the first, snatched up the other boy in his big arms. “Disgusting urchins! Where do you think you’re going, eh?” He turned the boy around and shoved him into the road. The child fell onto his hands and knees and started to weep.

“What’s the matter with you? Have you lost your senses?” Nyset hissed at both of them, giving them each a taste of her vitriol.

“They’re bloody urchins,” one of them responded. “Don’t belong in the Middle anyways. Cut your purse when your back is turned. Every one of ‘em.”

Claw slitted his eyes at the second guard, then turned around and swept the boy up from the road. Claw placed the boy on his feet, slapped the wooden sword back in his hand and did his best to brush the dirt from his front. The child sniffed, head cast down, and held the sword weakly at his side.

Nyset had dismounted and protectively had an arm around the other child at her side. The boy sucked in ragged breaths, arms clutched over his stomach. His sword lay broken in half between the guards. Nyset’s nostrils flared, breathing almost as hard as the boys. “This is how you protect and serve the city, is it?” she snapped, her eyes swirling with Dragon fire.

“Just followin’ our orders. No urchins in the Middle. None enter without a pass, your highness.” The guard who had kicked the child deeply bowed and flourished his arms at his sides. The other swallowed and pressed himself against the wall.

“Who is your superior?” Nyset asked.

“My old lady, I’d say. She’s a bigger pain in my asshole than you, though,” he chuckled.

She scoffed. “You can do your job without hurting them, can’t you?”

“Maybe, not as fun, though.” The pudgy guard snorted then spat on the pace of ground between the two of them. He leaned forward, arms crossed. “Who do you think you are? This cunt thinks she can tell us what to do?” The guards shared in a laugh, the other’s notably softer.

Claw was a blur of rags and Nyset’s eye caught the gleam of his drawn blade.

“No!” she breathed.

The cantankerous guard’s eyes swiveled to Claw as the pommel of his sword smashed into the guard’s face. The guard stumbled back, dropped his spear, and fell, his armor scraping against the wall. He righted himself, shook his head, and rested his hands on his knees.

“You need to learn to show some respect, boy,” Claw said, standing over him. He placed the flat of his blade over his shoulder. He cast his hard eyes at the other guard, who innocently held his palms up, his spear wisely dropped.

Blood streamed from the guard’s cheek and onto his shoulder plate. “You shouldn’t uh done that, you stupid cunts. Earl will hear o’ this, burn you and your heretical lands to the cinders,” he snarled.

“The Earl gave me the lands you… ignoramus!” Ignoramus? Was that really the best she could do? “Now, apologize to these boys for being such a brute.”

“I’ll do no such thing,” the guard sneered with his fat, bloodied lips.

“Hey, I remember these two. Tried to catch ‘em yesterday after trying to rob that lady. Remember, Bryce?”

“Oh yeah, I remember these little bastards…” Bryce rose up and wiped his cheek, putting a line of scarlet on his gambeson.

The boy wrapped his arm tight around Nyset’s leg. “Don’t let ‘em hurt us again, ma’am.”

“Don’t worry—ah!” She winced as something bit into her hip. She looked to her side and saw a line of blood welling out through her heavy pants. Something was missing, but what?

Howling laughter sprung out from the guards. Bryce clutched his protruding gut with both hands.

“What?” Nyset asked stupidly, staring at them.

Claw growled, dashing towards something behind her. She whirled around, saw the boy who had been at her side weaving into the crowd, her belt flapping from his hand. Bright herbs spilled from her pouches, bathing the mud in blues and oranges.

“Damn it!” she hissed. “Hold him!” She threw her horse’s lead rope to the guards and bolted after Claw. She collided into a man of vast bulk and bounced from his enormous arm. Dried mud crusts fell into her hair and tumbled down the front of her shirt. She recovered her footing and spun around someone else. Her eyes were frantic, locking onto Claw’s bouncing hair. Should’ve listened to the guards. Too cavalier, too arrogant. So high and mighty. Stupid girl!

“Move, move!” she shouted, pushing her way through dirty people throwing her curious eyes. She hardly twisted in time to avoid tripping an old woman clutching a basket of eggs. There wasn’t much on her belt of notable value except for her Breden short sword. She wouldn’t have even bothered giving them chase if it weren’t for that. It was the last thing she had that still connected her to home.

Claw cut a diagonal across the road and she saw the boy dart into an alley behind a row of shanties. She bumped into someone else. “Sorry,” she said through gritted teeth. She ran in a sharp angle, aiming to intersect with Claw at the alley. An old man cursed at her and a woman yelped.

She got to the alley first, Claw a second after.

“You well?” he asked.

“Fine, just a small cut,” she breathed.

A patchwork of colored fabrics were pulled over the tops of the shanties and secured to the wall on the other side, casting the alleyway in garish colors and deep shadows. Huddled shapes of people intertwined protruded from wooden boxes and under blankets riddled with holes.

Someone groaned and a head turned to look at her. She met a white eye wrinkled with irritation. A mangy cat crept from a shadow and pounced on a plump rat and bit into its neck. The man who had met her eyes grinned at the cat, then dove for it, arms out in a poor attempt to throttle it. The cat screeched and leapt, then trotted off with its prize squirming from its jaws. A few glass bottles clattered across the cobbles. The man groaned, sighed, body outstretched across the path.

“This way, Mistress.” Claw nodded into the alley.

“Go on, then,” she beckoned. She felt better knowing he was going in first.

He stepped over the would-be cat murdered and she followed, watching for any reaching hands. The man laid there, sobbing or laughing, it was hard to tell which. The space felt tight around her and the air had a grim heaviness to it. It wasn’t the stink of refuse and urine that made her feel that way, but what — she wasn’t sure.

The alleyway didn’t travel far, going on for about five minutes before coming to a dead end. He was easy enough to find by following the trail of spilled herbs, bright against the gloomy earth. She eyed the boy clutching her belt across his torso near the end, his body glowing in a shaft of light. Not the brightest child, she thought.

Claw stopped, growling like a wolf to prey, his knuckles white with pressure.

“Please, let me.” She put her restraining hand on his shoulder. The more she thought about it, the more she realized he was much more like a dog, and not the nice kind, than she wanted to admit.

Claw let out a soft growl and nodded with resignation. His fingers uncurled. It was as if she’d just stolen his kill. She’d have to show him violence wasn’t always the solution. She wouldn’t deny the need for violence, but it left unnecessary wreckage behind.

“Hey there, boy. How are you?” she said, slowly drawing nearer to him. She hunched down, trying to do her best to make herself look less imposing.

“Go away!” he snapped.

“Well, no. I can’t do that since you have something of mine. Gave me a nasty cut, you know?” Nyset looked down at it, mostly clotted now, a gooey red trickle on her thigh.

The child huffed and wrapped his arms around her belt. “It’s mine now. Go away or I’ll cut you again,” he said, eyebrows drawn down.

The shadows to her left shifted and something stirred. A woman’s face came into the light, her skin covered in sores and hair standing out in every direction. “What’s this? What’s going on? Who are you?” she stammered, looking at Nyset.

“Sorry for the disturbance, just trying to retrieve an item that was stolen from me.” She gestured to the boy.

The woman fully came into the light, squinting with beady eyes from her to the boy. “That’s yours?”

Nyset nodded. “I’m afraid so.”

The woman raised her sinewy arm up, sneered, and gave the boy a vicious slap across the face. “Did you steal that? Are you stealing from people again? What did I tell you, you little bastard! Brought you into this world n’ every day make me want to take you out of it.” She slapped him again on the other cheek and the boy yelped, then started uncontrollably crying.

“Did you hear me? That was a question!” she shrieked in the boy’s face. She kicked him in the thigh. “Answer me, damn you! Did you steal that from her?”

Nyset swallowed and felt a sliver of the misery the child must’ve felt creeping through her guts. She was starting to wonder if this was a bad idea. She turned to look back at Claw to find him peering up at the colored fabrics making up the sky above. How could he switch himself off to this?

“Ya-ya-yes. I stoled it. I stoled it from the lady!” the child sobbed.

Nyset was going to tell his mother to stop hitting him but decided it was wiser to hold her tongue.

“Give it back to the young lady! And go say you’re sorry.” The woman pointed at her.

The child’s face scrunched up and tears washed clear lines through the mud on his cheeks. He shuffled over to her, staring at his feet, and handed her the cut belt.

“Thank you. What’s your name?” Nyset connected the cut halves with a knot on her waist.

“A-Aris,” he said through sobs.

Nyset glanced at Aris’s mother, standing with arms crossed and scowl permanently affixed to her lips.

“Aris, would you like to come work for me at the Silver Tower?”

“Huh?” His eyes bulged out.

“Well—” Nyset’s eyes flicked to her mother, seeing her expression softening. “I’m the Arch Wizard of the Silver Tower and… I’d like to offer you a job. I see a certain industriousness in you. It won’t pay much, five marks a day.”

“Five marks!” he squeaked.

Claw grunted in a tone she had learned was disagreement.

“Yes, but you’ll have to work for it. The Silver Tower is actually just a house now, which needs cleaning. You’ll sweep the floors, dust the shelves, pick up trash, help with other tasks we need done. On one condition, though…” She smiled.

“Yeah? What? I’ll do it, I swear.” Aris clasped his hands together, pleading.

“No more stealing of any sort, cutting belts, purses, or robbing people. You understand? You’ll work for everything.”

“I understand.” He enthusiastically nodded. “No more stealing.”

“Good. You know where we are?”

“Mhm. I do.”

“Come tomorrow at dawn and we’ll get you started.”

“Wow! Did you hear that, Mom?” The boy ran back to her and hugged her side.

Nyset turned and started down the alleyway, Claw trailing behind. They had walked for a minute or two until footsteps approached from behind.

“Excuse me, uh, Arch Wizard, ma’am,” Aris’s mother said. She bit her lip and a piece of food clung to the side of her chin.

“Yes?” Nyset said. “You’ve got something here.” Nyset brushed her own face to show her where.

The woman’s cheeks reddened and she brushed it off. “Uh, thank you. You were sure about the work offer for Aris? T’wasn’t just to pacify the boy?”

“No, it’s a true offer. Of course. I know it’s not much, but thought it might help…”

“Oh,” she said quietly, then burst into tears. “No one’s ever tried to help us before.”

Nyset looked to Claw, who looked at her and shrugged. Nyset didn’t really want to get any closer to her, given the putrid scent of fish billowing out from her, but it was the right thing to do. Nyset hugged her and held her breath. The woman’s arms wrapped her up in a gentle squeeze.

“Thank you,” the woman said, turned and shuffled back down the alley.

Nyset watched her go, wanting to do more, but she knew she couldn’t help everyone. The Tower was far too stretched as things were. There was also the persistent issue of the marks she had to come up with for paying Scab.

“The days never bore, Mistress,” Claw snickered.

“Indeed, my friend.”

Chapter 10

The Earl

“Worshiping the gods is easy. There are no places of worship, no special rituals. Your worship exists solely in your mind.” -The Diaries of Nyset Camfield

Dirt Ring had become a place of bustle and noise, stalls filled with people of every shape, size and color. Scales rattled and beaded calculators clattered as prices were screamed above the throng. Livestock bayed, mooed, and grunted as they were herded past. The air was heavily scented with strong spices, a cook poorly disguised the choking smell of his rotting meat. Between the muddy paths were heaps of dung, at least a week’s worth, soon becoming one with the mud.

They passed a stall selling salt in a variety of colors from pink to black. Another bearded man hocked long rolls of cloth in purple, blues, reds, and greens. A woman brandished a carved wooden tree bearing tens of polished belt buckles, screaming their very reasonable prices. They passed a table of stinking fish, heavily salted, their glossy eyes wide with terror.

Nyset and Claw made their way back to the gate leading into the Middle. The prior guards must have finished their shift as a new pair had replaced them. Her horse was thankfully still there. Her lead rope was looped over the pole of what she guessed might have been a fence before enduring years of neglect, leaving only the poles standing. The mare pawed at the ground and snorted when Nyset approached.

“There, there. You’re alright, aren’t you?” Nyset came up to the horse’s side, grabbed the lead rope, and rubbed her neck. She looked well, a little anxious perhaps, but that was understandable.

“Mistress.” A wiry guard nodded at her and turned to make room for her to pass. Apparently some people still respected the Silver Tower. It was a welcome relief.

The other guard reluctantly got out of the way to let them pass. Nyset walked the mare through the portcullis.

“Enjoy the afternoon, Mistress,” the wiry guard said pleasantly.

Nyset leaned back and stretched her arms out overhead. The sun was muted and the light misty as it passed through a layer of thick clouds.

The Middle was much narrower than Dirt Ring, as the modest houses took up most of the space between the walls, leaving just enough road for two carts to pass side by side. The roads were loosely packed cobbles, worn flat over the years. They were clean enough, with little refuse trailing along the edges of the arcing road. The stone walls had a fine veneer of stucco, giving them a softer appearance than the chiseled blocks in Dirt Ring.

What was most notable about the Middle was the thinning out of the people. The roads were less packed and yielded enough room to see farther than the next man’s back. She noticed they walked with purpose and determination here, not with the drudgery that seemed to stain the faces in Dirt Ring. People enjoyed their lives here, she thought. The dichotomy struck her then. How could they live so happily while people struggled just to acquire food and shelter on the other side of the wall? Perhaps it was easier to turn a blind eye to it with such high walls. There would be no missing the guards at the gates to the Middle though.

Blacksmith’s hammers sang on armor and echoed over the walls. The sweet scent of fresh bread occasionally touched her nose, filling her mouth with saliva. When had she last eaten? A group of men stood in a circle before a cart selling skewered meats, lost in spirited conversation.

Most of the denizens who lived here were born here. Some had managed to scrape enough marks together to escape Dirt Ring, but they were few, her assistant Vesla had told her. Vesla had grown up here and fled to the Tower to escape Dirt Ring and to build a better future. She had served as a splendid resource for getting a better understanding of the people here.

A crier waved to passersby shouting, “Get the news here, just one mark for the news from the west!” People passed him by as if he were invisible, some even using energy to toss him a scowl. Nyset supposed the people who’d made it here kept their purse strings tightly closed to remain at their station.

A strumpet with hair red as blood walked up to Claw with a smooth sashay of her wide hips. She started to place long fingers on the back of his neck, hesitated for a split-second, then rested them on his scruffy neck. “Hey handsome, want to take me?”

Claw’s jaw hung open and his fingers curled. “Take you where?” He croaked through a throat sounding as if in sudden need of water.

“Only thirty marks for a night with me.” She dropped her voice to a whisper. “I’m willing to do anything.”

Nyset reached out and peeled the woman’s silky hand from the back of Claw’s neck. “Please go away. We don’t need your services.”

“Um.” Claw’s cheeks were pinked.

“There’s no need to be rude.” The strumpet smiled weakly. “We could do a two for one deal. Forty-five marks and I’ll take on the two of you. I know how to work a young lady proper. Got lots of stamina.” The strumpet flicked her circling tongue at Nyset.

A laugh spilled from Nyset’s lips. “No, no, we couldn’t. We’re much too busy, thank you.” Nyset thought of the woman’s long fingers between her legs and wondered how it might feel. She felt her face fill with hammering blood. No, that wasn’t her at all. How could she possibly be thinking like this? She loved Walter and would save herself for him. Though life was about exploring the unknown, wasn’t it? She felt an unexpected wetness against her smallclothes.

“You sure? You’re lookin’ quite pleased at the prospect.” The strumpet licked her lips. Her eyes wandered from Nyset’s chest down to her groin.

“No!” she snapped. It was much harsher than she’d wanted.

The strumpet shrugged. “Gave you something to think about, didn’t I? Consider that free of charge.” She winked at Nyset, then Claw. She wiggled her way to a man packing a tobacco pipe against the wall.

Nyset turned her attention back to the crier. She had to stay focused on what mattered now. “Want to hear the news?” she asked.

“Not really,” Claw said, his voice sounding relieved. “Just more useless noise.”

“It’s not noise. It’s important to stay informed, Claw. You need to know what’s going on in the world to make better decisions.”

“I find… it easier to think with less. When I read, it corrupts my thoughts with the writer’s views, so I no longer read. The goings on of the realm are like clouds passing overhead.” He looked up. “Here now, gone tomorrow. Useless.”

Nyset scoffed. “Don’t read? Couldn’t imagine a life without books. Well, I’m going to get the news. Hold her for me?” Nyset handed Claw the horse’s lead rope and he opened his hand to take it.

Nyset walked up to the crier, careful not to get in anyone’s way.

“News, m’lady?” the crier asked, leaning forward, eagerly grinning and nodding. He around six feet tall and had a speckling of dark hair over a long jaw.

“Yes, please.” Nyset smiled and fished one of the twenty or so marks out from a hip pouch. She was surprised to find it felt like they were all still there. She placed it in the crier’s hand, who then jammed it into his coat pocket.

“Local news or realm news?”

Nyset tapped her lip. “Realm.”

“Realm news! Here’s the realm news!” He dramatically threw his arms into the air. “Villages in the west are burnin’. Men, women, children, dogs, cats, sheep, all murdered, raped, eaten by the Death Spawn razing the lands.” Seems true, Nyset thought, besides the sheep raping, though Death Spawn were an unpredictable lot. “Shamans in the Great Retreat are pulling out all the stops, gettin’ their best and deadliest weapons against the marching horde of demonic bastards. Something’s changed in the forest called the eh—” The crier extracted a rolled up strip of paper from his pocket, glanced at it, then tucked it back in. “The Woodland Plunge. The darkness there is gone and some say it’s safe for travel now.” Perhaps the works of her friends? “Mean old King Ezra holes himself up in his keep, never leaves anymore. Some say he’s stricken with the brain sickness.” He was a madman when she met him, nothing changed there. “There been rumors o’ Northman seen coming in from the Mountains o’ Misery,” The young man stopped to take a breath. Northman, did they still live? How could they survive in such cruel conditions?

A few people crowded around to get an earful free of charge.

“The Silver Tower burns and spreads its wicked smoke over the realm. Some say the smoke carries disease and the air close to it should be breathed through a shirt. The Sand Buckeyes south of Lich’s River have doubled in population this year. Amber Bongols have migrated south to the Far Realms for the coming winter. The—”

“That’s enough realm news, thank you.”

“Oh, good day to you then. Thank you very much for your patronage.” He tipped his wide-brimmed hat.

“And the local news?” She held up another glittering mark and put it in his dirt-creased hands.

He grinned and bit his lower lip with all of his front teeth. He puffed his chest out and sucked in a great breath.

The words spilled out. “The Earl has warned that the Festival of Flames this year will be a smaller display than usual as the city is short on resources.” Because they’re being used for war, Nyset thought. “Fang Cress addiction is on the rise in Dirt Bottom, with more becoming addicted and causing troubles for people in the Middle and the Center.” No surprise there. “The fish eatin’ Sisterhood of Herbalists have climbed into bed with the Arch Wizard, some say they’re planning to take over the city and oust the Earl.”

“News travels fast,” Nyset blurted. “Wait — did you say oust the Earl?”

“What’s that?” the crier yelled in her face. “Sorry, habit,” he lowered his voice.

“Thank you,” Nyset mouthed and walked away.

The crier continued. “The Middle is planning to raise money for a new statue of the Earl and…” The crier’s bleating blended into the din of the background.

“Did you hear that, Claw?”

He was staring up at the sky, mouth hanging open. She poked him in the ribs. “Huh?” he gasped.

“Did you hear the crier?” Nyset asked and took the mare’s reins from him.

“Someone’s crying?”

Nyset tilted her head at him “Aren’t you supposed to be guarding me and not burning your eyes out in the sun?”

“Told Ghostwalker to watch over you, not to worry, Mistress. His eye is better than any o’ mine.”

“Ghostwalker doesn’t appear to have eyes to me. How does he go about watching me?”

Claw turned his face from the sky to look at her, seeming to have some difficulty in doing so. His gray eyes went wide with a touch of madness. Nyset instinctively inched back. “Well. He… can feel things, like danger. He tells me when I should be looking out for you and where the threat is.”

“That is peculiar.” Though she had seen stranger things with Juzo’s sword Blackout. She remembered after she’d entered the weapon, it had apparently killed a Silver Tower healer and injured Walter of its own volition. “I’m glad he’s watching me, though,” she winked at him.

Claw scratched his neck and shrugged. “You’re missing out on some gorgeous clouds. Look at ‘em!” He pointed up.

Nyset put a hand over her brow, shielded her eyes and followed his gaze. She was prepared to tell him that they had to stop wasting time until she saw it. The clouds took on the shape of a galloping horse, trimmed with amber light along the belly and legs. She watched the cloud drift and one of the horse’s legs gradually extended, giving it the appearance of being in motion. “Wow… it’s beautiful, Claw.” Nyset had to exert a bit of willpower to drag her eyes away from the beauty above.

“Claw,” she poked him in the shoulder, frowning, “did you hear that the crier knew I’d let Lena join us?”

“Mhm. Yeah, I heard.”

“You did?” Nyset slightly shook her head. “Then why did you say earlier…” She sighed heavily. “No matter. Apparently, the Earl thinks we’d try to oust him. That must be only rumor… it’s absurd, don’t you think?”

“One way to find out.”

“Right, let’s be on our way then.” They started off, looking for the next gate to pass into the Center. “One more thing, Claw. I really need you to try to have a little more restraint with people. You can’t go around beating everyone you think shows a little disrespect.”

Claw stopped, swallowed hard and he lowered his head. “Alright,” he murmured and looked at the ground. “I was just trying to help,” he muttered, then kicked stone into a wall. His piercing eyes and dangerous gait fell away, leaving him looking as shameful as a child who had disappointed his mother.

“No, no. Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate everything you’ve done for me, truly I do.” She placed a hand on his shoulder. “Maybe, instead of whacking someone with your sword, you could try growling at them like you did with the boy Aris?”

He nodded and met her eyes. “Suppose I could do that.”

It was strange that he always tried so hard to please her. What had she done to deserve his loyalty? The notion of having followers was still bizarre to her and somewhat discomforting. “However, if there are Death Spawn or killers about, please do what you do best.” She grinned at him and he grinned back.

“Yes, Mistress.”

“Oh please, call me Nyset when we’re together. Save Mistress for in public… for the sake of appearances.”

He wrinkled his nose. “Think I’ll stick with Mistress, less to remember.”

She shrugged. There was no arguing that logic.

A man barreled past Nyset from behind, thudding into her shoulder and almost knocking her over. She slitted her eyes, feeling a burst of anger well from her chest and flare with the Dragon in her eyes. “Someone’s in a rush,” she said through her clamped jaw.

Claw growled and slapped his sword against his leg.

The man wore a well-tailored forest green tunic with golden filigree around the cuffs and neckline. His boots were unusually clean and he carried a leather satchel over his shoulder. He looked back and threw her a disdainful sneer. She saw his skin was dark, his face and full lips familiar, but she couldn’t remember why.

“Where have I seen him?” she asked Claw.

He sucked his teeth. “Don’t know.”

“I appreciate you not responding with violence.”

“I’m turning a new leaf, as they say in the East.” Claw bowed slightly.

They passed a merchant selling cheese and tomato filled dumplings. Nyset swooned and sucked on the intoxicating air. “I can’t resist anymore. You hungry?”

Claw shrugged. “Could eat.”

Nyset walked up to the cart. “Two please.”

The merchant beamed up at her and paused in the middle of stuffing raw dough with cheese. “Just a moment, please.” Her hands were dusted with a coating of flour. She brushed them off on her dark apron, drawing white streaks down the front.

“What do you call these?” Nyset asked. “Never seen them before. They smell incredible.”

“Oh, thanks, dear. Call it Azzip. My grandmother made them for me when I was a kid. Thought others may like it too. So far, business has been good. One for the both of you, right?”

“Yes.” Nyset nodded.

“One mark please.”

Nyset handed it to her and the merchant handed them each a dumpling, loosely wrapped in brown paper. They were still warm on the outside.

Claw bit into his like a savage animal, ripping off most of it in a single bite.

Nyset gave hers a nibble, fearing it might be hot on the inside. It was.

Claw’s eyes bulged then he spat the half-chewed hunk of dough into his hand. “Ah! It’s on fire!” He scowled and hurriedly popped the cork from his waterskin and inverted it into his mouth. Rivulets of water trailed down his jaw, washing lines through a patina of dirt.

Nyset snickered and shook her head at him. “You silly man.”

“Sorry, should’ve warned you. Azzip stays warm, er, hot on the inside,” the merchant said sheepishly.

“Don’t worry, that’s just him.” Nyset waved her off. “Thanks, they’re delicious!” She took another bite of the Azzip, savoring the depth of flavors bursting out from the cheese. Nyset waved to the merchant and started off.

The merchant grinned at her, planting her hands on her narrow hips. She then started dusting them with flour and returning to her unfinished Azzip laying on a small table.

“Now, where are those elusive gates to the center?”

“There.” Claw nodded to a guard and winced.

She approached the imposing guard, almost as big as Grimbald. She steeled herself for all the potential ways he’d deny her entry.

“Welcome, Mistress. The Earl is expecting you.” The guard sniffed and adjusted his polished tower shield so they could pass.

Nyset squeaked with surprise. “Expecting us?”

“That’s all I know, ma’am.” The guard flicked a piece of dust from the corner of his shield, sending it drifting through the air.

She looked at Claw, who stared at the guard’s mighty shield.

“Alright then.” She strode through the archway. The archway was a series of five successively layered arches, wider on the outside and going deeper and narrower as they approached the arch they had passed through.

The Center had four walled rings that followed a similar structure to others before it. The concentric rings grew ever tighter as Nyset and Claw drew farther in towards the Center. The roads here were filled mostly by enormous houses that could’ve passed for mansions in Midgaard. The stones making up the narrow roads were cut in beautiful diagonals and were immaculately clean. Nyset had yet to see a single scrap of trash. She was determined to find at least one to make this place feel somewhat real.

Each successive ring they passed through had even bigger houses on the other side of the wall. Each house seemed to compete with their neighbors in window sizes, molding details, house height, and garden variety. A few spanned four stories into the sky. It was an incredible feat of craftsmanship that Walter and Grimbald would’ve appreciated.

The path leading up to Harwood Hold was steep and straight, the next three gates clearly visible from the first they’d passed under. She wondered if it was purposeful to make it easier for the nobles to visit each other. She guessed it was no coincidence that the gates between the Middle and Dirt Ring were staggered, making it more difficult to march upon the palace. Given the state of the people in the Dirt Bottom, she guessed revolution would be the last concern of most.

Nyset veered off the path to admire a garden behind an iron fence. Phoenix heads were forged between the balusters. The garden stood before a house painted white and trimmed with what was very likely real gold, given the way it reflected the sun. There were three pink flowers the size of her head protruding between the bars. Behind them, purple vines reached to the sky. A bush with bright orange needles had a series of green mouth-like traps dangling from the sides, sharp teeth crisscrossing on the outsides.

“Hi, there!” a woman’s voice called from above.

Nyset peered up and waved at her. “You have a lovely garden.” She was an elderly woman with an exuberant smile. Nyset felt her spirits lift at seeing someone so happy.

“Thank you, dear. Look out now, going to give them some water. They’re thirsty!” she said.

Nyset and Claw stepped away from the fence. The woman reached out with a watering pail and drizzled gleaming beads on the verdant patch of land.

“Such a waste,” Claw said.

“It’s a stunning garden, but I agree with you, Claw. There are far too many people who’d kill for the water these plants are getting.”

“Hey!” Claw shouted with his hands over his mouth to project his voice.

“Yes, young man?” The woman grinned down at him from the window, her white hair as white as the house.

Claw let out a soft laugh. “Instead o’ watering these plants, why don’t you go and give some water to the people in Dirt Ring, eh?”

Nyset started. “Claw we really shouldn’t meddle in—”

“Well, well aren’t we a bit presumptuous this morning?” The older woman laughed down at him.

“Other people’s business,” Nyset quietly finished.

“Do you know who runs the only free shelter for the poor in Dirt Ring?” the woman asked.

Claw opened his mouth to say something, but nothing came.

“My family.” Her bright smile became a hard line. “We give food, water, free clothing, beds to sleep on. And what do we get in return for our generosity? Scorn from hapless youths such as yourselves.”

“Youths?” Claw balked.

“You should learn to think before your words end up cutting you, young man. Assumptions are very dangerous.”

“Uh, sorry.” Claw awkwardly nodded.

The woman’s window slammed shut. She waved them off from behind the shimmering glass.

“Hm. A lesson for both of us, I suppose.” Nyset brushed her lips with her fingers.

Claw scratched his salt and pepper beard.

They made their way back to the road and passed through the next gate. Harwood Hold was an odd miniaturized version of King Ezra’s palace. It even had the same geodesic domes gleaming from the tops of a pair of twin spires on either edge of the palace. The same architect who had built the Midgaard palace had been commissioned for Helm’s Reach. He was a good architect, but severely lacked in creativity, Nyset thought. Though, could she do better? Doubtful. She needed to learn to stop making sweeping judgments about people.

Nyset peered over at Claw, huffing as they trudged up the ascending road. He looked old enough to be her father. The mare’s hooves clopped from behind. She realized she hadn’t spent the proper time to get to know him, despite all the time they’d spent together. These times were strange. The thought made her stomach squirm with an ugly hollow sensation. Everything was moving too fast all the time. She didn’t want to feel like she was merely using people for their utility, but did she really have a choice? There were always more imminent issues that needed tending. What was life for if not for the relationships we forged between each other?

“Claw, you told me before that you had searched for me for a long time.”

“Indeed, Mistress,” he breathed.

“How long was that?” She furrowed her eyebrows.

“Years. Many years…”

“What compelled you to look for me of all people?”

“The Oracle, of course.” He grinned at her and sweat trickled down his temple.

“The Oracle? Where are you from, exactly?”

“I’m from everywhere, Mistress. The earth, the air, the stones, the stars above, just like you.”

Nyset huffed with exasperation. “I mean where were you born?” Imprecise questions get imprecise answers, she thought.

“Was born in the Far North, came here when I was a lad. That wasn’t known to you, was it?”

“The Far North… as in, you’re a Northman?”

Claw chuckled. “Aye, Mistress. I’m the King of the North. Every man’s a king somewhere, ain’t he?” Claw threw his arms into the air and shook his wrists.

Was it all an act or was he truly mad? Nyset wondered. “I don’t think so.”

They passed under the next set of gates and the guards let them through without any resistance.

Claw stopped to catch his breath. “You don’t believe me?”

Nyset gave him a wry smile.

“Just cause I don’t have my damned crown on doesn’t mean I’m not a King,” he said, laughing. “Surprised you of all men, a child in elder’s robes, would judge me by my looks so.”

“A child?” Her jaw dropped. “Well, had I realized my guard was royalty, perhaps I’d been treating you differently.”

“And you wonder why I never told you?” Claw snorted.

“You’re really from the North, Claw?”

“Really, Mistress.”

“What’s it like then?”

“Cold, painfully so. Life’s a struggle to survive there, makes men hard. Suppose much like life here, though at least there’s more you can eat…and of course, the cold isn’t always trying to bite through your bones and take your limbs during the long night.”

Nyset loathed the bitter winds that came in from Abyssal Sea during the winter months, but snow was rare here. She shivered at the thought of living in a snow-covered environment every day. “Have any family back home?”

“Nah, well, not anymore. All back in the dirt now. Killed by an invading clan who’d wanted our grains, the Poison Wolves. I’d already burned the grains, knowing the Wolves were coming. The Wolves didn’t like that…killed every man, woman, and child. Left a single survivor to tell their tale…” Claw stared into the horizon with distant eyes. “Was the tradition, anyway. Leave the survivor, usually the clan’s chief.”

“I’m terribly sorry to hear that, Claw.”

He cleared his throat.

“Why’d you burn your food? I mean… what if the Poison Wolves failed and then you had nothing to eat?”

“Was a risk I was willing to take. The enemy has to know you’re willing to do anything to hurt them, even if it means killing everything you love in the process.” He smashed his fist into his palm. “Then you’ll put the fear of the great beyond in ‘em all.”

“But your strategy didn’t work in the long run, did it?” Nyset asked, trying to sound more inquisitive than judgmental.

He wrinkled his lips. “Maybe. Not sure. I reckon they’d think twice about raiding future tribes, certainly not mine. If there were anything left to raid, that was.” He snickered uncomfortably.

Nyset let out a heavy exhale. Hardwood Hold was through the last set of gates, casting looming shadows over the path. The stones making up the path were cut to resemble diamonds, each the size of her fist.

“And you said an Oracle told you to find me?”

“Mhm. Some call her a witch, others a soothsayer. Not sure what she was, certainly didn’t use the Dragon nor the Phoenix. Men from the North go to visit her for guidance and she provides it… we listen. She helped me many a time in my life. She had some power, though not sure the source. She throws the bones of a Dragon, says they tell her futures.”

Nyset didn’t like the sound of that. Was it perhaps some latent form of the old magic? Why did the Oracle help them? She had read what she could find about the old magic while in the Silver Tower, but there was sadly little written about it. It was said the old magic was there before the Dragon or the Phoenix came to be.

“The bones of a Dragon? There are no such creatures, or more rightly there’s nothing written about them in the histories,” Nyset said. You had to suspend your notions of what was possible and what wasn’t in these times.

Claw worked his lips around and Nyset eagerly watched him. “In the lore of the North, there were Dragons in a time long before there were people in the South. There’s nothing written about it ‘cause it’s only in stories, passed ‘round by campfires. Parents make ‘em elaborate for children longing for excitement, maybe.”

“Huh. Interesting…” She tapped her lips, longing to dive into researching this matter further.

They approached the last set of gates and the guards parted to let them through. There were two guards on either side of the opened gates in gleaming heavy armor. They were brandishing spears with barbed tips and heavy bucklers. They looked like the type of men who knew how to use them, well muscled with unwelcoming eyes.

“Good afternoon,” Nyset said cheerfully to one of the men, trying to soften them up a bit.

He responded by narrowing his eyes at her. Claw followed her from behind, and she swore she could almost smell his agitation wafting on the air.

Once they were a few paces through the gates and before the mouth of Harwood Hold, she continued. “What did the Oracle say to you?”

“Afraid that is a private matter, Mistress. One I’d like to keep for myself,” Claw said.

“Fair enough. I’m glad you found me, Claw.”

“Likewise.” He grinned, showing his mangled teeth.

“Please don’t hit anyone in here if you don’t like how things are going, alright?”

“I’ll try.”

A man in a leather vest sauntered up, rubbing his hands together. “I’m the horse wrangler here. I’ll take your mare for you during your stay, ma’am. Can’t bring her through the gardens anyway.”

“Alright, here you are, thank you.” She handed him the reins with a nod.

“Don’t worry, ma’am. She’ll be fed, watered, and brushed. Someone should be with you shortly.”

“Great, thank you.”

The courtyard was modest by Midgaard standards. Low square-cut shrubs ran in continuous lines along the perimeter, studded with red berries. Birds flitted in and out of the bushes, one with a plump berry held in its beak. In the center of the gardens were two identical sets of bushes cut and planted to form the shapes of squares. Within the sets of squares were smaller gardens, bursting with prismatic colors. In the center of each of the small squares were squat trees whose lazy limbs draped over the shrubs, pinked with blooming flowers.

Adjacent to the two squares were two long shallow pools, teeming with silvery fish the size of her hand. The pools stretched along the perimeter of the garden. They had narrow channels splitting off from the main bodies, supplying the fauna with an adequate supply of water. At the back of the courtyard was a bridge crossing over the gardens with a procession of arches, allowing onlookers to view the gardens from above.

“Pretty, but a shame.” Claw crossed his arms.

Nyset was equally conflicted. “Perhaps the waters cure the blind. We shouldn’t be so quick to judge, right?”

“Yeah, right, Mistress.” Claw let out a belly laugh.

“Well, there are stranger things.” Nyset snickered. “Blue light closing up wounds, for example.”

A man and a woman turned a corner, walking arm in arm on a path beside one of the stretching pools. They wore well-tailored clothing, he in bright blues and she in shades of red. They were both lean with beautifully long and flowing hair.

On the other side of the pair was a stone wall reclaimed by lush ivy reaching for an ornamental roof at the top. A few green tendrils had started curling over the roof’s apex. The couple was in quiet conversation, but failing to hide their interest in the two of them. Their responses to each other became stiff and delayed as they drew nearer, their eyes frequently darting from each other to her.

“It’s the Arch Wizard,” the woman whispered, though not soft enough.

“Think so. Heard she came from commoners,” the nobleman sneered.

“They’ll let any sort of low-born rabble through the gates it seems,” the noblewoman said, loud enough there would be no way for them to miss it.

“Even dirt can mix in with the water for a while, until it sinks back to the floor with the other mud, back where it belongs.” The man grinned at her with his chiseled jaw.

The woman laughed and brushed jeweled fingers on her chest.

“Excuse me?” Nyset forced herself from snatching the Dragon. It was a crutch. She had to learn to handle herself without the threat of violence. What kind of example would she be to Claw?

“Excuse me,” the noblewoman replied. “This is a private conversation. If I need tea or food, I’ll let you know.” She bobbed her razor thin eyebrows at Nyset.

The couple started to pass and continue their touring of the gardens. Nyset stepped out, putting herself in front of them and blocking their path. She planted her hands on her hips.

“Get out of our way, swine!” the noblewoman hissed.

“How many Death Spawn have you killed?” Nyset asked, head tilted.

“What does that—” the man started.

Nyset snapped her fingers at him. “Quiet!” she barked. “I didn’t ask you.”

His mouth hung wordlessly open. It was very likely the first time he’d been spoken to like that.

“Why does that matter?” The noblewoman raised her chin.

“How many?” Nyset asked again. She stepped close enough to the noblewoman’s face that Nyset could feel her nervy breath on her cheeks.

“I—” The noblewoman’s eyes narrowed then fell to the ground.

Nyset crossed her arms and a snicker escaped her lips. “Should be careful about who you go about insulting, especially to those who are on the front lines… letting you live this life of luxury without enduring the horrors of war.” Nyset gestured to the gardens.

Claw leaned back on his heels. “Seems these folks haven’t got any fruits. All I’m hearin’ is lots of hot air without the stones to back it up.”

The nobleman paled. Laughter came from a young girl sitting on a bench on the opposite end of the courtyard. The sound carried exceptionally well here, Nyset noted.

“Move, and we’ll be on our way.” The noblewoman balled up her fists.

“Ah — that’s not very polite now. Use your words…” Nyset grinned with pleasure.

The noblewoman’s sky-blue eyes bulged from her sockets. She bladed her body to get around Nyset, but she slid in front of her to prevent her from moving.

“The word… I know you know it. You can’t be that ignorant, can you?”

“Why you arrogant… Do you know who I am?” she hissed.

“The word,” Nyset shrugged. “It begins with a ‘pluh’ sound.”

The noblewoman softly growled. “Please, let us through.”

“Of course, I knew you knew the word!” Nyset laughed and met Claw’s gleaming eyes. She stepped aside, letting them pass.

Claw rammed his shoulder into the nobleman’s. “Sorry about that, accident,” Claw muttered.

The man whirled around, rubbing his shoulder, staring at him, aghast. “You bastard.” He stormed off with the noblewoman through a rounded archway.

“Commoner scum.” The noblewoman threw back. “You’ll pay for that transgression. You’ll be back in the Dirt Ring before you know it.”

Nyset sank onto a simple stone bench. It was polished with smooth edges, the stone the color of cream with pink veins. She blew out a long breath, slowing her pounding heart. It didn’t seem to matter how often she quarreled with people, the result was always the same. It left her feeling drained. It was as if the conflict had taken out a piece of her that could only be restored with a good night’s rest. “Let’s hope that wasn’t an omen of how things will go with the Earl.”

“Mm. Never liked nobles. A sad way to live, a cursed existence.” Claw put his arms behind his back and stood beside Nyset, peering out at the gardens, rigid as a gargoyle.

“Cursed? Seems like an easy life to me. Servants to tend to all your needs, no wars to fight, no worries about paying the tax collector. Your principle worries must be what you’re going to eat that day, what you’ll read… how long you’ll spend in the gardens mocking the common folk.” Nyset put her arms behind her back and stretched the tightness in her chest. She winced into the tightness, twisting her hips to stretch her sides.

“All true, yes, Mistress. But it’s a curse. Never learn how to do anything yourself. They couldn’t survive if they were cast out of this refuge. Don’t know how to be industrious and pick yourself up from nothin’.”

“Fair points, Claw. However, even in the noble class, there are surely those who haven’t taken their great fortune for granted.” Nyset shrugged. “You can’t make a generalization for all of them.”

“Perhaps,” Claw sat beside her.

They sat there in silence for a time. Nyset listened to the soft gurgling of the pools against their stony sides. She watched a pair of birds squabble over a berry in a shrub of hundreds. We’re not much different than they are, are we? She thought with a smile. The wind curled down into the courtyard, making the squat tree boughs sway. A few violet petals fell from the boughs and tumbled into the pools. One immediately sank. How long could the others stay afloat, she wondered? The petals slowly turned and turned, whirling and casting shadows on the pool’s floor.

Claw cleared his throat and stood.

Nyset heard scuffing feet approaching. She stared at the remaining petals through half-closed eyes, watching them dance and twirl in the water. She could’ve stayed there all day. She understood the gardens now. She needed to connect with nature, with something green. It was fundamental to a calm and clear mind. She made a mental note to put plants in the Silver Tower when she returned.

“Arch Wizard?” a feminine voice asked. Nyset looked up to see a pudgy man with a hairless head softly smiling at her.

“Yes?” She rose up, her legs tingling.

“The Earl is ready to see you.” The man slightly bowed, hands held over his round belly, smiling with kind eyes. It was refreshing after their encounter with the nobles. He wore silken trousers and a silken shirt, both intricately embroidered with images of the Phoenix and the Dragon. His sandals whispered to the stones as he led them through one of the archways away from the gardens.

Nyset looked back at the bench, longing to stay there. It was a place where life was simple and boiled down to the musings of a pair of petals. Some of us quickly sank and some could stay afloat a bit longer. Life was always moving, time ever changing. A wish for things to stay as they were was to wish for death. She wasn’t ready to die yet. “We all move on,” she whispered.

“What’s that?” Claw asked.

“Nothing, just thinking.”

“Mind can be a dangerous place to stay for long. Good to talk to people.”

Nyset felt a chill at his cutting insight. “Yes,” she agreed. There was something about spending time with other people that made her feel slightly less alone in this mad world, she realized.

The pudgy man shot them a glance over his shoulder, hairless brows narrowed and wrinkled.

“I’ve come to like serving you, Mistress,” Claw said.

She smiled at him, but it felt forced. Her thoughts were elsewhere. Why was the Earl expecting her? Perhaps he wanted to check up on the land he’d given her. Maybe he wanted to praise her for leading the defense against the Death Spawn attack. Why hadn’t he shown his face that day?

“By the Phoenix,” Claw whispered every time they turned another corner into a new marbled corridor or through a gilded entryway. Every chamber they passed through seemed richer than the last, this one cavernous and lit with candles taller than a man. Each was probably worth more than everything she once had in her home in Breden. Everything was jeweled, adorned with textured wood and brightly painted. She saw a chair made of at least a dozen varieties of wood, striped and each a slightly darker shade than the one before it.

They turned left down a dark hallway, interspersed with triangular shafts of light cutting across the room in strange angles. It was clearly an artist’s work, as the positioning of the triangular windows wasn’t conducive to making one’s way with clear visibility. “Do you like the gardens?” the pudgy man asked, scuffling his way into a great anteroom.

“They’re lovely,” Nyset said. The room was cylindrical with light scattering like diamonds through the geodesic dome high above. “Ah, so this is what the spires are like? What is your name? Sorry, I don’t believe I know it.”

“That’s because I have not given it. Now where are my manners?” the man’s face grew red as his silks. “Elden, assistant to Earl Baraz.” He offered his knuckles as if she should kiss them.

Nyset wrinkled her nose at his expectant hand. He must be joking or insane, she thought. She shook his fat fingers with her hand. Elden let out a soft gasp. She was not kissing that man’s hand. When had it last been washed? It looked clean, but how could she know? Becoming ill was the last thing she needed, not to mention the absurdity of it. “Nyset Camfield, Arch Wizard of the Silver Tower,” she said with what she hoped was an unwavering voice.

“A pleasure to meet you finally. I’ve heard so much about you,” Elden smiled warmly.

“All positive, I presume?” Nyset asked.

Elden gestured to the high walls. “Yes, we’re in one of the spires you see from the outside here, the other is quite different. We made this one available for guests to admire. The other is currently under construction at the moment. The paintings you see here are the Earl’s personal collection, all created after the Trial of Devastation. They are a reminder of our enemies overseas, the Tigerians.”

“Interesting... enemies overseas? I thought the Tigerian’s were considered extinct?” Nyset walked up to a painting with her arms behind her back. It was a Tigerian rider. It depicted a topless woman wearing only a loincloth riding a cat like creature as big as a horse. The rider was covered in dark tattoos from neck to ankles, leaving very little of her skin untarnished. She held the cat’s reins in one hand and an oversized spear in the other. The cat’s mouth had fangs as long as swords protruding from its jaw. It looked big and powerful enough to split a man into halves.

“I see you’ve been drawn to the ‘The Zealot’ by Darkbash.” Elden strolled up beside her. “A wonderful piece with beautiful brushwork. The textures are truly a master’s work. The keepers of the histories say the Tigerian Zealots rode into battle without armor, uncaring of what injury would befoul their bodies. They would fight to the death, regardless of the odds and whether or not the death was theirs or yours.”

“They had incredible courage,” Nyset said.

“Or perhaps a severe lack of intelligence. Either way, it is written they were terrifying foes. They would feed prisoners to their cats, still breathing supposedly.”

“Armor makes it hard to move, more difficult to maneuver in battle,” Claw added.

Elden shot Claw a glance and snorted.

“Well, that’s probably why the Tigerian Zealots didn’t wear armor, that’s what I’m saying. Claw, nice to make your acquaintance.” Claw offered his hand to Elden.

Elden smiled uncomfortably and looked from Claw’s hand to an iron-bound door. “Let me check on the Earl.” He nodded, then shuffled to the door and knocked. A moment later, he softly opened it.

Claw looked down at his hand still held out, opening and closing it.

Nyset sighed, walked up to him and put a hand on his shoulder. “Pay it no mind.”

“Some things are as predictable as the wind.” Claw grinned at her.

“Think you got that one wrong. Isn’t the wind unpredictable?”

“Bring them in,” a gruff voice barked from the opened door.

Elden crept out. “You may see the Earl now.”

Nyset was filled with a spike of panic. This was almost like meeting the king, she realized. Was she presentable? Why hadn’t she taken the time to study the formal customs of Helm’s Reach? “Damn it,” she whispered, thinking of all the ways this could go poorly.

“Thanks for the translation, fat boy. What would I have done without your great intellect?” Claw muttered.

“Claw!” Nyset hissed through suppressed laughter.

Elden’s beady eyes narrowed at Claw. He shifted his gaze to Nyset. She felt her palms tingle open with sweat. “Enjoy your stay in Helm’s Reach,” Elden said without the slightest hint that he wanted them to enjoy themselves.

She started for the opened door. The Earl’s room had a pair of towering bookshelves that stretched up to the high ceilings. The ceilings were trimmed with intricately carved moldings, all straight lines and sharp angles. Nyset was stricken with envy at the vast quantity of books. She inhaled sharply, sucking in the sharp aroma of all that paper. There was a marbled hearth crackling with a low fire. Above it was a mounted trophy fish the length of her body, its bright blue eye as wide as her thumb. A series of ancient looking swords were hung down one section of wall, dully reflecting the firelight. The day was still high, but the room would have been dark without the fire. The few windows let in just enough light to put the rest of the room in grim shadows.

The Earl rose from behind a broad mahogany desk and waved for them to enter. Upon his desk was a small glass statue in the likeness of the Dragon. Its claws were black as obsidian and the flames emerging from its mouth a beautiful mix of reds and oranges. “Come in, come in, sit,” he gestured towards a pair of dark wooden chairs near a round table. He had a black square cut beard, hair trimmed short around his head, and well-muscled body. This was no old and feeble man like King Ezra. Nyset guessed he was about fifty years passed and knew how to work a sword. There was a scar across his forehead running in a diagonal, the bone behind it dented and forming a furrow.

When she received the writ for the land he’d granted her, she hadn’t actually met him, but only his messenger. “It’s nice to finally meet you, Nyset Camfield.” She offered her hand and he took it with a proper shake. Nyset was glad to see he wasn’t trying to get her to kiss his hand.

“Please to meet you, Baraz Smith, Earl of Helm’s Reach, but you already knew that,” he laughed. “Call me Baraz.”

“Nyset,” she responded in kind. This was going much better than she thought it would. Some of her nervy tension slipped from her muscles.

The Earl sat between them at the opposite side of the table. “Would you like something to drink? Eat? I have the best chef in the city.” He spread his sleeveless arms.

“No, thank you. I know you’re a busy man and wouldn’t want to take too much of your time.”

Claw shifted in his seat and adjusted the sword on his hip. He cracked his hairy knuckles.

“How about some wine? My vintner just procured an excellent pear wine from the far south. Just came off the boat today, in fact.”

Nyset restrained her fingers from reaching for her lips and pressed them into the chair. “That would be lovely, thank you.”

The Earl whistled and a young woman slinked through the door into the chamber. Where had she come from? She must have been close by all this time to have heard that. “Yes, sir?”

“Bring the pear wine, Ena. Ask Durwood for it.”

“Right away sir,” Ena nodded and slipped through the door, gently closing it.

The Earl turned his attention back to her, studying her with appraising eyes. She met his dark eyes, flickering with firelight like smith’s furnaces and waited for him to say something. He leaned back in his chair and peered down at her over his nose. He steepled his fingers, gazed at Claw, then back to her. “Where do we begin?”

“The Death Spawn will strike again,” she said. “The walls have been fortified, though there’s still considerable work to be done. We might be able to withstand another attack, but more men would surely help. There didn’t seem to be any shortage of guards on our way here. If some of them could be sent to the front…” she wrung her hands.

“Cutting right to the heart of it, I see. I like that. I appreciate you organizing the fixing of the wall and all, but I would have liked to have been included in the discussion before you took such brazen action… in my city.” He jabbed his chest with a pointed finger.

“S-sorry,” she stammered. Why hadn’t she gone to him earlier? “The reality is, it had to be done as soon as it was possible. There truly wasn’t time for meetings and discussions. They might have attacked at any moment.” The words felt like they were tumbling from her lips.

“Right, your actions were true, so I let them pass unobstructed.” The Earl inhaled through his nose. “But all was almost lost, wasn’t it? You fell into their rudimentary trap. Even a dimwitted soldier would have seen through that ruse.”

Nyset nodded. “I concede that war tactics are not something I have been formerly trained in. It would perhaps be helpful to have a tactician. Is there someone you can direct me to?”

“How many were killed by your blunder?” The Earl leaned forward, his back rigid.

“Too many,” Nyset answered, anger filling her guts with fire. She thought of Clara, the apprentice who died in her arms.

“That’s not a number. How many?” He sneered.

“Fifty-seven. Twenty-two apprentices, thirty-five from the Falcon,” she hissed. “Dug a lot of the holes myself, if you must know. I don’t recall seeing your face there.” Her breathing became shallow.

“Had you failed on the battlefield, we would’ve lost the entire city!” His fist hammered on the table, sending a figurine of a dog thumping onto the plush carpets. “You always, always, defend from a wall, from the safety of a structure, damn it!”

Claw sprung to his feet, his savage teeth bared.

Nyset put a hand on his arm and gave it a tug, but he remained standing. She hung her head and stared at her hands, then peeking up through her lashes. “You’re right. It was a mistake, one where the costs might have been catastrophic. Not to say the deaths of the brave were not. We did the best—”

“A Big. Fucking. Mistake!” He gripped the round edges of the table with veined hands, eyes protruding from his wide sockets. He pushed himself back from the table with a great sigh. “That is a mistake that you cannot make,” he shook his head.

“Apologize,” Claw growled, one hand gripping Ghostwalker’s hilt.

“For what, dog?” The Earl turned his fury on Claw. “For your highness almost getting all of us slaughtered?”

“Without her, you and yours would be in some demon’s pot. Your men were a disgraceful set of shit filled cretins, good for nothing but blocking the arrows for the real fighters. The ones she’s recruited from your precious city.” Claw scoffed. “You’ve let the Falcon become disgraced with their lack of discipline and endless sloth. Every night the taverns and whorehouses teem with your men. They have no honor. If only Grimbald could see ‘em now.” Claw folded his arms.

It was the Earl’s turn to sag with shame. “Grimbald? Who’s that? You’ve got a point there. So they were neglected, but we haven’t known war in ages! Was no need. Can you blame me, any of us?”

The tinkling of glasses came from behind. Nyset turned to see Ena coming through with a silver platter containing an opened wine bottle and three fluted glasses. Nyset met Claw’s eyes and he sat with obvious reluctance.

“There are other matters we need to discuss…” The Earl stood, pressing a palm to his forehead.

Ena politely smiled as she placed glasses before the three of them. She poured the golden wine into each of the glasses, shimmering and filling the air with its sweetness. Nyset watched a few effervescent bubbles escape from the top of her glass. She pushed a strand of whitish-yellow hair back where it belonged behind her ear.

“Go on.” The Earl gestured to the two of them. At least he could be a reasonable man, Nyset thought with a bit of consolation. He was perhaps a bit prone to anger, but who wasn’t in these times? She reached for her glass and Claw eyed her wearily. She sniffed it, noting the light floral notes opening into a honey and earthy aroma. Nyset took a sip and swished it in her mouth. The flavor was rich with notes of plum, oak, and a pleasant touch of acidity.

“And?” The Earl sipped his, moaned and closed his eyes.

Claw eyed his glass on the table as if it were a viper coiled to strike.

“It’s wonderful, thank you,” Nyset said, licking her lips at the clean finish. “We didn’t have a lot of wine growing up, but when we had it, my parents taught us to appreciate it.”

“Sounds like you had a nice upbringing. Breden, was it?” He twirled the scintillating wine in his glass, plunged his nose into it and deeply inhaled.

“Yes, Breden. That was my home once.” She set her glass down.

“Sorry for your loss. Monstrous bastards from the asshole of the world. Still can’t believe those things are real. Was your family still there?”

“I-I haven’t heard from them in a long time. I don’t know.” It felt like claws were raking across her insides. She should have heard from Walter by now.

“We’re all going to feed the gardens eventually, right?” The Earl laughed and held his glass up to the firelight, inspecting the wine’s golden hues.

“Mhm,” Claw intoned. “Shadow Realm for us all.”

The Earl sipped his wine, glanced at Claw then back at Nyset. “I’m glad you came, saved me from having to send for you,” his tone grew dark. “I don’t like the Sisterhood. I don’t like that you’ve let them join the Silver Tower.”

How had he known? She felt like this was the true reason he wanted to speak with her. “It’s already done. My word is my honor. Besides, it’s not the entire Sisterhood, just one of my friends, one of their leaders.”

“Lena,” the Earl nodded. “She’s a bottom feeder, preys on the sufferings of the people. Worse than swine. There’s a reason why the Tower denied them for so many years.”

“Things change.” She licked her lips. “And you don’t benefit from your people’s suffering? Please tell me with sincerity that you don’t benefit from the weight placed upon those in Dirt Ring?” Nyset’s fingers were pinching the stem of her glass almost hard enough to crush it.

“Did you know that Lena’s been stirring dissent among the people just so they can kill each other, then sell them her healing? The Dragon worshipers can’t heal themselves, damn it, and she charges them exorbitant sums for healing herbs. Did you know that?”

“Lena stays with the Silver Tower. There will be no further discussion regarding this matter.” Nyset’s voice was ice.

The Earl flinched as if struck. “I gave you that land. Without my generosity, you would have nothing. You’d be living with the deadened eyes of those in Dirt Ring. You owe me, you unappreciative shit!” He thumped his fist on the table.

Despise what is given for free, for nothing is freely given. Always pay the fair price. The words of Nyset’s father echoed in her head. “Was there something else you wanted to discuss?” Nyset folded her arms, her heart feeling like it was being squeezed by a slowly turning vice.

“I’ve let you run your little show down there for long enough,” The fire glowing in the Earl’s eyes gave him a sinister look now. “I’ve ignored you, let you re-build the Tower, poaching our children from our homes. But it must stop. Don’t like the influence you’re having on the common folk, giving them false hope in a world where only misery awaits.” The Earl had a far off look and stared into his glass.

Nyset shot up to her feet. “Are you insane? Without me, this city would be in ashes. Everyone who’s joined the Tower’s ranks from Helm’s Reach has come voluntarily. I’ve not forced my hand upon anyone; they’ve all joined quite willingly. Ask anyone who’s seen the lines stretching through the market at my recruiting tables.” She pointed towards the Middle.

“More Tower lies,” Baraz snapped. “The Silver Tower is the tower of lies, so my old Pa used to say. Seems he was right.”

This wasn’t about the Sisterhood, she realized. He didn’t have a care in the world for the people. If he had, he wouldn’t be living in such opulence. He felt threatened by her rise to power in the city. He was trying to get her to oust Lena to reclaim some sense of control over her. “Fine.” She feigned defeat and slouched into her chair, doing her best to look resigned. It was time to test the idea.

“Fine what?” the Earl growled. He leaned over the table with both hands splayed, shoulders heaving.

Nyset looked up at him, lips pressed into a line. “I’ll get rid of Lena if you get me the men we need to make a proper defense against the city.”

“I knew you could be agreeable, Arch Wizard. You’ll get your reinforcements by tomorrow morning. I will personally bring them to you, under a condition, of course. How does that sound?”

“And the condition is?” Nyset tilted her head. “You think I’d agree without hearing it?” She narrowed her eyes.

“A simple one, Nyset. You’ll include me in future decisions. We work together to fight against the Death Spawn. The people seem to like you. I see the change in their faces, the dim light of hope in their eyes. I don’t want to quarrel with you, but you don’t own this city. Do you understand?”

“I understand. That’s fair, thank you. I don’t want to quarrel with you either. The only ones we should be quarreling with are living in my Tower. Help me get it back.” She could hide Lena’s involvement in the Tower easily enough, couldn’t she? “You don’t have to worry about Lena stirring the seeds of dissent in the city anymore. I’ve taken care of that also.” She grinned.

“Oh? And how did you manage that?” The Earl started to slowly pace.

“Quite easily, actually. I told Lena if she didn’t stop, I’d burn her and everyone in her Sisterhood into ashes.” It was partly true. The main reason being that she and Lena had agreed she would work for the Tower and in exchange cease spreading propaganda.

The Earl paused, looking into the hearth and slowly nodded. “I can spare about two-hundred men, no more I’m afraid. They are not to march on the Silver Tower. They will serve only to defend the city against attacks, are we clear on that?”

“Perfectly. We can worry about reclaiming the Tower later when we have more defenders. They will do nicely. I’ll introduce them to the other generals.” Nyset stood to leave. “Thank you for having us, but I must get back to the Tower to teach class now.”

“Very well. I’m glad we could come to an agreement, Arch Wizard. See you on the morrow.”

Nyset started for the door and Claw followed.

“Just one more thing, Nyset.” The Earl stroked his beard.

There was always ‘just’ one more thing with this type of man, she thought. “Yes?”

“Do not try to play games with me. If you do, mark my words, you will come to regret it,” Baraz said gruffly.

There was something about his threat that sent the words lashing out. “When I play games, I do not lose.” With that, she pushed through the door, chest thundering like a storm cloud. She wondered if this was how Lena felt after leaving her office yesterday.

Chapter 11

Standoff

“When you try to fight fair, you lose.” -The Diaries of Nyset Camfield

Senka stabbed down at Isa, teeth bared and grit on her cheek. Isa’s arm came up sharp, his elbow held at a ninety-degree angle, blocking her wrist while ramming a punch into her ribs. Senka grunted, raked his face with her other hand, fingers held like claws and tearing red streaks down his jaw. Isa groaned, fell into a back roll and sprang up, creating a few paces between them. His white fingers traced the scarlet on his jaw and he stuck them in his mouth. “Nicely done.” He grinned at her, his tongue working in his mouth.

Senka smiled back at him and twirled the dulled sparring dagger in her hand. She beckoned for him to come again, her eyes wide with concentration.

Isa took a lunging step and leaped through the air, knees at his chest, then one leg extending with a vicious twist of his hips. His leg was like a spear directed at Senka’s chest. Senka’s torso swayed in a wide arc to duck, Isa’s leg passing harmlessly over her back. Before he landed, she stabbed up, her broad-tipped dagger hammering into his back near his kidneys.

Isa stumbled on what looked to be weakened legs and held his palm to his back. “Likely a fatal blow,” he said through a tightened jaw, then nodded at her.

“This cannot be your full capacity. Are you merely playing with me, Isa?” Senka put her fists on her hips.

Sitting on the Tower’s porch, Nyset watched the pair. She sat at a square table with Claw, Lena, the figurehead of the Sisterhood of the Herbalists, and Grozul, former Master of the House of the Phoenix. She inhaled the bitter aroma of her morning elixir, the steam soothing and mild scent of chocolate reminding her of Breden. She eyed the small blobs of the bean’s oil glimmering at the top of her mug. It might have been made with Breden beans given the taste, but she was no elixir connoisseur.

Wind lashed the earth, drawing up great spikes of dirt and sand into the air and hurling it over Senka and Isa. A dead shrub tumbled by, crunching and bouncing on the hard-packed earth. Nyset closed one eye, the other watching them spar, and covered her mug with her hand. She felt invisible granules of sand ricochet from her knuckles, caressing her cheeks.

“A most distasteful form of combat,” Grozul muttered.

“You think there’s no need for it?” Nyset scoffed. “Have you forgotten what’s happened to your former home already?”

Grozul paled behind his immense beard. “No. I just wish there was a better way. I suppose the basic tenants of man will never change.”

“And we’ll always be stuck with cleaning up their messes.” Lena twirled a beaded dreadlock between her fingers. In her other hand was a round sweetbread, half of it eaten, its innards swirling with cinnamon. One of her ears was pierced in at least six places by a fine wire that continuously ran through it. Why anyone would do that was a wonder to Nyset.

Had she been a fool to welcome Lena? The woman had tried to extort her way into the Tower, after all. Everyone deserved second chances, and there was something about the woman she liked, despite her questionable business practices. Everyone had a time in their lives where they might not be able to take the high ground to survive. Sometimes ethics had to be thrown by the wayside for food and water. Nyset knew hunger, though the times were brief. She would not forget the feeling of going almost a week without food after the livestock had dropped dead overnight from an unknown disease.

Claw leaned back in his chair, eyes crinkling with amusement. He stretched his arms out overhead then folded them, watching Senka and Isa. Nyset sipped her elixir, turning her attention back to her warring friends.

Isa was straddling Senka, his hands locked in a death grip around her throat. Her dark face was blushed in angry reds. She choked out a sound and her legs squirmed. The muscles in Isa’s sinewy forearms wriggled and flexed with crushing tension. Why wasn’t he letting her go? Nyset put her mug down with a thump and shielded her eyes from the sun, getting a better look. She felt the others mirroring her worry.

Senka’s eyes went from tight with pain to the relaxation of unconsciousness. Isa’s hairless head glinted with a thin layer of sweat. Nyset’s guts clenched with panic. She embraced the Dragon, eyes filling with red fire. Isa let her go and rose up onto his haunches.

“Isa! Is she alright?”

“Fine, Mistress.” He slapped her across the face, but she remained motionless, her head flopping uselessly over. His brows drew down and he stood up. He shuffled back to her legs, grabbed her ankles and brought them up to his hips. Senka’s eyes snapped open, mouth parted in a triumphant smile. Her leg jabbed up into Isa’s jaw, sending him staggering back.

“Bitch!” Isa grunted.

“Surprised that worked on you, Isa.” Senka arched onto her upper back, then sprang up to her feet in one motion. They were on each other again, arms and legs blurring, interspersed with grunts of pain and limbs crashing into bodies. Senka cried out as she was somehow thrown from Isa’s hips, thumping into the ground.

“A barbaric art, I say.” Grozul bit into a honey cake and golden crumbs clung to his beard. “Hand to hand combat is a strange thing. Two people trying to kill each other by throwing their bones into one another’s bones.”

“Interesting way of saying it,” Nyset said.

“Ah, young love,” Claw grinned.

“What?” Nyset laughed.

“No, he’s right. Look at them, they fight for an excuse to touch each other. Look at the eyes.” Lena dreamily smiled.

Nyset shook her head, watching their eyes. She saw it now, the soft creeping of smiles when they were almost close enough to kiss. Why wouldn’t they just do it already? Maybe they had. “A strange way of showing one’s affections.” Nyset snickered.

“Not the strangest I’ve seen, Mistress,” Grozul said. “I’d like to discuss the defenses you’ve erected around the city.”

“Alright.” Nyset peered at him over her mug, a tendril of steam briefly masking his face. “What did you have in mind?”

“Most of the men are on the walls now. I believe some should be sent out as scouts, to watch and report of potential incoming attacks.”

“How many were you thinking?” Nyset asked.

“Maybe a hundred or so men should be sufficient,” he squinted into the wind.

“That would considerably reduce the numbers on the walls.” Nyset wrinkled her nose. “Claw, have you any input?”

Claw was wordlessly talking to himself, or more likely to Ghostwalker. “What didja say, Mistress?”

“Master Grozul is suggesting we take men off the wall and send them out as scouting parties. I know you have some experience with war in the north, Claw. I wish you’d speak up more often, I could use your advice. Do you have any input for this idea?”

“A terrible idea!” His leathery hands went to his chair’s arms. “Who’s was that?”

“Mine.” Grozul’s eyes narrowed behind his cracked spectacles.

“And what sort of experience do you base this idea on?” Claw rose to his feet, leaning over the wizened wizard.

“Hundreds of years of experience, you mongrel dog.” Grozul’s eyes burned with an icy blue.

Claw sniffed. “Tower wizards…what war have you fought in? Oh, I know. You mean books, don’t you?”

Grozul looked away and swallowed hard. “Perhaps.”

Claw chortled out with a belly laugh and squeezed Grozul’s shoulder. “You’re a funny man. I like you. Stick to spells, war’s for men of physical learning.”

“It wasn’t a joke,” Grozul fumed. “Get your hand off me, you’re hurting my arm.”

Claw released Grozul’s arm and scratched his mangy beard. “You’re meaning that for all seriousness. You know our numbers and you’d send half out on scouting missions? Have you lost your brains?” Grozul unsuccessfully tried to inch away from Claw’s reach and he rapped Grozul on his spotted pate.

Lena shrugged helplessly, eyes relaxed and lips fixed in the start of a smile.

“You can’t deny the knowledge of our forefathers. What was the purpose of transcribing their knowledge if not for future generations?” Grozul balked.

“He has a point,” Nyset said.

Grozul crossed his stick arms and peered off into the distance, clearly ready for a conversation change.

“Can’t learn war from no books. Sure, sending a few scouts is a fine idea, one we’re already doing.” Claw snorted. “But half the men on the wall? Well, that’s just fucking stupid.”

Lena snickered and tilted her head to the sky.

Grozul shot her a glance. “Do you have something to say, Herbalist?” he said the last word with a touch of venom.

Nyset thumped the table with her hands, rattling mugs. “I need you all to work together. Disagreements, debates are fine and good. In fact, we should always be disagreeing. I don’t want you all complying with me like blind sheep. So please, debate the ideas, but we must work together. Don’t forget where the enemy looms.” She pointed to the old Tower, a speck on the horizon.

Lena turned to Claw, a dreadlock wrapped a few times around her ring finger. “Yes, you are right that you can’t learn war from books, Claw. But there are other things of value to be gleaned from them,” she said with a drawl.

“Like what?” Claw shuffled his feet and cocked his head.

“Like this, for one dear…” Lena reached over the side of her chair and into her satchel, her small mouth working as she fished for something. She produced an amber colored wine bottle filled with a clear liquid and corked with scraps of cloth.

“What is it?” Nyset’s posture perked up.

Lena lowered her voice. “Well, it doesn’t have a name I’ve settled on yet, but I think I’m going to stick with ‘Glass of Fire.’ It’s quite remarkable, took me weeks of preparations and experiments, researching oils, a few almost killing me in fact…” Lena paused for dramatic effect, peering around the intent table. “The oil you see floating on the top is the essence of Silver Tulip, the petals only.” She used her fingers to point out the inch or so layer of oil floating above the rest of the liquid. “Fortunately, Silver Tulip grows well here and are quite resistant to desiccation. The rest is a mix of olive oil and lard.”

“Fascinating. An interesting use of Silver Tulip’s volatile oil.” Nyset tapped a finger against pursed lips.

“Volatile oil?” Grozul asked.

“Silver Tulip bushes can spontaneously burn if it gets hot enough,” Nyset explained. “Their oil being the combustible component when isolated. What a brilliant idea, Lena!”

“Thank you, Mistress,” Lena cooed, her ringed hands tapping against the glass bottle.

“So you’re saying this thing could blow up?” Claw asked, backing away from the table.

Nyset narrowed her brows at Lena.

Lena inhaled, started to speak, then stopped, seeming to gather her thoughts. She heard Senka grunt and Isa let out a laugh. “The color of the bottle matters. These brown glasses appear to prevent spontaneous explosions. I’ve tried other bottle colors, green, clear, red…all have exploded when left out long enough. So not to worry, dear, er, Claw. The brown bottles have been stable.”

“What’s the other oils for? Lard and olive oil? In case you want to have a meal of it instead?” Claw asked.

“It would be unwise to consume the bottle’s contents once the Silver Tulip has been added.” Lena frowned. “The olive oil is merely a carrier oil. The lard is a bit of a nasty addition. It helps the oils cling to the target and burns with a blindingly dark smoke. Perhaps I can demonstrate?”

“Wow, I’m stunned Lena. I didn’t know herbalists were typically making such destructive concoctions,” Nyset crossed her arms. She and Senka might have a lot in common, she realized. They should work together and combine their knowledge sets.

“Well, all discoveries are to be shared with other Sisters. Remember your vow you took so long ago in Midgaard, when you joined our ranks?”

“I do. But they’re not Sisters.” Nyset gestured to Claw and Grozul. “Not that I care if they learn of this, of course.”

Lena scratched her cheek, smudging bright orange pollen down her face. “I had assumed they would learn of it eventually, but you’re correct in assuming we keep the oaths. That is good, dear. My folly, of course. It should have—”

“It’s fine, Lena,” Nyset cut her off. “Can we see it in action?”

“Of course, dear. I saw your practice yard. Shall we use it?”

“Let’s go.” Nyset groaned as she stood, muscles tight from sitting too long. Nyset peered through the door cracked open behind them. It led into the main hallway and she saw Aris enthusiastically working a broom and sweeping up yesterday’s sand. She was glad to give the boy from Dirt Ring a job and hoped that eventually she would have the marks to employ more people.

The group made their way around to the side of the Silver Tower’s house and down the path leading into the cleared land of the practice yard. Grozul trailed behind, balancing an overflowing mug of elixir in one hand, a few honey cakes in the other, the gnarled cane tucked under his armpit. Two apprentices were in the practice yard, working derivatives of fireballs and air blasts into armored dummies. Bria, the apprentice she had helped a few days ago, was one of them, now conjuring a twin pair of fireballs roaring into a target. It looked like her practice had been paying off wonderfully.

“Morning, Mistress.” Bria curtsied at Nyset.

“Beautiful work, Bria. Your skills have really improved. I think you’re ready to train with the veterans now.”

“You think so?” Bria wiped a sheen of sweat from her brow.

Nyset nodded. “Find Vesla in the veteran’s yard in the late afternoon.”

A few apprentices worked to build up the dirt mound on a currently unused half of the yard, throwing shovel fulls of earth back on top. They stopped to wave at her, resting on their shovels. It had to be done every day, as so much earth was thrown about from missed projectiles. The high bar of earth served to prevent stray fireballs from hitting unsuspecting victims. So far, it had been working well.

A pair of Armsman were shirtless, their hammers thudding into a skeleton of a woodshed behind the Tower. A man dressed in the padded armor of the Falcon sat perched on the Tower’s roof, bow and quiver slung over his back. His watchful eyes peered out over the land, legs dangling off the edge. He was under Claw’s orders, no doubt.

Along the other side of the Tower, a garden was being tilled and invasive roots excavated by apprentices and soldiers alike. They had planted rows of beans, melon, squash, and corn for the warm season. Nyset nodded approval at the workers, enjoying seeing the Tower transforming into much more than just a house for meetings. It was becoming a place where people could live, eat, and work. When they finally reclaimed the old Tower, this could be an auxiliary Tower she thought. Soldiers marched in pairs around outskirts of their land. The patrols were there night and day, dutifully protecting the Tower from drunks and greedy vagrants.

“Which one should we use?” Lena asked, clutching the Glass of Fire in her arms. Nyset gave the bottle a distrustful eye, but if Lena didn’t seem to have a care, why should she?

“This one will do,” Nyset pointed to a wooden dummy whose limbs were already blackened and charred, its Cerumal armor melted in some spots.

“Would you like to do the honors, Mistress? Not much of a thrower, I’m afraid,” Lena softly drawled, offering the bottle to her.

Claw grunted and huffed. “I’ll do it, against my better judgment.” He snatched the bottle from Lena’s gripping hands. She frowned at him.

“How is it lit?” Grozul asked through a mouthful of cake.

“Could use Dragon fire, though it doesn’t matter. I’ve been using fire strikers since I haven’t been given the Dragon’s gifts.” Lena crossed her arms over a roughly woven hemp shirt.

“You’ll might want to step back, I suppose. If this starts burning me, I’ll only have myself to heal,” Claw muttered.

Everyone took a few steps away from him and the apprentices turned to watch the spectacle.

“Mistress?” Claw held out the bottle for her to light it.

Nyset embraced the Dragon, felt her posture go rigid and muscles quiver with the urge to move. It was difficult to down-regulate how much of the power one drew. It was like trying to pull a needle out from a jumbled stack of them without touching the others around it. She held her breath and a sliver of Dragon fire emerged from Nyset’s fingertip like a narrow snake, curling in the air and inching for the strip of rags. The rags burst alight and the snake of fire puffed away.

Claw grunted and hurled the burning bottle into the air, spinning and sloshing its way towards the target. His aim was true, the glass bottle cracking over the top of the dummy’s helmet, bathing it in flames. The air filled with dark smoke, flickering flames darted in and out of the armor’s arms and neck holes.

“Effective.” Claw grinned. “This could be a devastating weapon. How much work is it to make one of these?”

“It takes me a few hours, but I’m sure with all the help we have here, we could find a way to make it faster.”

Nyset watched the oil burn with increasing intensity. It spread out over the ground below the first target and reached the neighboring dummies, scorching the earth below them. “Lena, work with Grozul between his classes on figuring out a way to produce as many of these as we can. This might give us the strength we need to match the Death Spawn’s numbers. This would be a powerful tool for the defenders on the wall.”

“Oh!” Lena squealed. “I wanted to show you this, Ny-Mistress.” Lena went red.

Lena was taking to calling her Mistress, showing her proper respect. Even if she didn’t respect her, she made a passable show of it. “Yes?”

Lena produced a scroll from her back pocket and started unfurling it. “What do you think?” She held the top and bottom of the small rectangle and thrust it before Nyset’s eyes. The pamphlet depicted an image of a man and woman shaking hands and smiling. Above the man was a small image in the likeness of the Phoenix and a Dragon above the woman. The headline read: “Unite: War is coming.”

“It’s a start, Lena, thank you for following up with this.” Nyset met her eyes, glittering like amethysts.

She beamed. “I’ll see what else my printer can come up with. She’s quite talented.”

Nyset imagined where a new structure could be built on their property, perhaps behind the Tower. “We need to get you a workshop here, a place where you can work on more projects like this.”

“I’m not sure that’s wise, Mistress,” Grozul said between taking a big swallow of elixir.

“And why is that?” Nyset asked.

“Well, well it’s just that.” He laughed nervously. All of their eyes turned on him and sweat beaded from his brows. “The Tower has a tradition to uphold. We’ve never let the Sisterhood into the Silver Tower in the past; can’t have all our secrets revealed, after all.”

Nyset shook her head at him. “It’s too late for that, Master Grozul. Lena has been given a place in the Tower, much like you. The Sisterhood—”

“What!” His long fingers gripped her shirt. “You can’t! Years of tradition—”

“I can.” She disentangled his fingers and gently pushed his arm down. “Tradition is the only reason I’ve discovered as to why the Tower prevents the Herbalists from living among us. Tradition is a prison for the mind Grozul, you must realize this. Tradition keeps you locked into old, dead paths. It’s an illusion, a way to exert power over people for no purpose but its own. There’s no room for mindless tradition in the Age of Dawn.”

“But tradition,” he moaned. Grozul’s eyes flicked from Nyset to Lena. “I’ll be in my quarters, or more accurately the attic.” He trudged off towards the house. “This is no condition for a master wizard! No condition at all,” he grumbled, finger jabbing at the sky.

Nyset turned, staring into the sputtering flames consuming a dummy. What a stubborn old fool, she thought. Not that Nyset would go back on her word, but she had questioned her decision to let Lena join them all night. There was strength in unity. What secrets could be stolen when the Tower was in the hands of a demon god? Grozul’s reasons were groundless. It didn’t matter any longer; the decision had been made. There was wisdom to be gleaned from elders, but none here. One of the dummy’s stout arms cracked and lanced into the ground at an angle, burning at the top like a discarded torch.

Three sharp whistles pierced the air from the new Silver Tower, breaking her reverie.

“Mistress,” Claw’s voice was spiked with urgency.

Nyset turned to see what he saw. A dark mass had boiled out from Helm’s Reach like a kicked hornet’s nest, fanning out over the greasy horizon. “Must be the men the Earl promised us, glad to see he delivered on his word.” Why did it make her heart beat like she should be preparing to fight these men?

Claw’s man on the roof whistled again and frantically waved. Claw waved back at him in acknowledgment and whistled. Nyset’s ears rang for a few seconds from the sharpness of it.

Senka and Isa rounded the bend skirting the house. Their boots pounded down the path to the practice yard, puffing dirt into the air. Nyset raised her arms, palms out in a calming gesture.

“Soldiers march, Mistress,” Senka breathed.

“Bearing weapons,” Isa added. Sweat trickled from the tip of his bone white nose.

“It’s alright, we’re expecting them,” Nyset said. “I’m sorry, I should’ve told you. I met with the Earl yesterday, he’s giving us more men for the city’s defenses.”

“Told the patrols and most of the guards last night, so not to worry Mistress.” Claw winked at her.

“Good, good, Claw.” She squeezed his shoulder. “Come with me to meet them.” She cast her glance to Lena, Senka, Isa, and Claw.

The Falcon soldiers swathed the scrubland in shining armor. Their spears glinted in the morning sun. Nyset marched out to meet them, her companions following behind.

“There’s something off here,” Claw came up, muttering beside her.

“Nonsense, Claw. Your dislike for the Earl is clouding your judgment,” Nyset said.

His gray hair waved in a gust. “No, something ain’t right. Can feel it in my bones, Mistress.” Claw glanced back at Senka and Isa, who were donning their real weapons. They secured belts and tightened clasps, checking blades, hammers, and needles were properly positioned. Nyset wondered how many ways of killing were contained between the four of them. Far too many, she thought.

“Alright, Claw. Everyone, keep your eyes sharp.” Nyset nodded at him. She felt a bit of their tension creeping into her gut. Perhaps he was right to be a little worried. You could never be too cautious. She gripped the torrent of the Dragon, letting its roaring flames simmer in her chest. She betrayed her words with her actions, she knew. Claw grinned at her, seeing the glow of her eyes reflected in his.

The soldiers formed into long columns, eyes locked on the horizon and mouths hard with the rigor of discipline. The Earl trotted out on horseback from between a pair of columns, his wine-red cloak trimmed with gold flicking in the wind. He wore light padded armor, glowing with golden thread. Nyset stopped and smiled at him. He dismounted from his horse and handed it off to one of the soldiers. He strode over to them, chest puffed out. His eyes were hooded and bloodshot like he had a rough night at the tavern.

“Arch Wizard.” He slitted his eyes at her.

“Good morning, Earl Baraz. How does the day fair?”

“See you're holding the Dragon, Mistress. Don’t trust me?” He stroked his square-cut beard.

“No, no. The Dragon for me is sort of like putting on my trousers. Don’t leave home without it.” She forced out a nervy smile.

“What a gift!” The Earl clapped his big bear paw hands together. “You’ve brought me the bottom feeder of Helm’s Reach, Lena the herbalist scum, stirring the seeds of dissent to profit off the wounded.”

Lena’s tiny mouth fell open.

“Lena, Lena. You insult me. You don’t really think I’m dumb enough to have missed that you’re the only shop in the city with a printer?” He held out one of her old pamphlets, the corner ripped and image smudged, showing a picture of the Dragon and Phoenix warring in flight.

“You have no idea what it’s like—” Lena started, tugging on her flowing skirts.

“You’re coming with us, scoundrel.” The Earl cut her off and loomed over her. “Knew you’d gotten your dirty dreadlocks into the Tower somehow. Never knew you were this close, though. Thanks for bringing her, Arch Wizard.” He started towards her and Lena’s eyes widened with terror.

“I will be handling Lena’s punishment, thank you, Baraz.” Nyset’s voice sliced the air. She widened her stance, blocking his path.

“You will?” Lena squeaked.

“Her crimes are against the city!” The Earl balked. “You’ll do no such thing. Don’t forget when you’re in the city, you’re under the law of Helm’s Reach, Mistress.”

Nyset felt Senka and Isa fanning out at her sides, their fingers twitchy and eager to reach for weapons. Nyset lowered her palm at them for peace.

“I thought you came to bring me troops to defend the city, not to squabble over a matter already settled?” Nyset sighed. She didn’t have the capacity for this.

“Oh, you’re right about one thing, Nyset. It’s been settled.” His lips parted in a murderous grin. “Seize them!” He threw up his arm. “Your games here are over, Arch Wizard.”

Twenty or so men spilled out from the front of the columns, boots pounding and armor clinking. They lowered their spears and pressed Nyset and her friends into a ring. Their eyes were implacable and hard.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Nyset demanded. She made the fire in her eyes pulse enough to give the soldiers pause.

“Your little show has gone on long enough, Mistress. Can’t have too many rogues running about, understand?” The Earl planted his big hands on his hips.

“But you have no qualms about scoundrels like Scab and his mercenaries living in your city?”

A few of the soldiers turned suspicious faces to the Earl.

The Earl tilted his chin up. “They weren’t causing any problems. They’re good for the economy.”

“Good for the economy.” Nyset nodded and her lips made a hard line. As long as you all don’t mind your daughters getting poked by his disgusting savages playing at men, then well…” she gestured to the Earl, “it’s great for the economy. Great for the city, men defecating on the street, robbing your merchants and anyone without a blade to defend herself.” Mutters washed over the columns of the Falcon.

The Earl took lumbering steps toward her and soldiers parted to let him through. “A mere distraction. That’s not the point of this.” The Earl stabbed his finger into her chest. Claw predictably went for his sword, but she pressed his arm for him to stand down. Nyset glanced sideways at Senka and Isa, who followed her direction with Claw.

The Earl started. “It’s time for the Silver Tower to set sail on new lands. Helm’s Reach is no place for you. You’ve given this bottom feeder protection from the law, pillaged our children to build your armies.” He shouted it loud enough so his words would carry. That got grumbles of agreement spreading across the men. “Well, what are you waiting for? Put her in chains, damn it!”

“Wait.” She raised her palms and the few soldiers bold enough to advance on her stopped in their tracks. “This isn’t you. Who’s behind this? I’ve been here months without an issue. Now this? Why the sudden change?”

The Earl’s face brightened with a triumphant smile. “Well, if you must know, don’t see any harm in telling you now. Amand!” He shouted into the ranks of men.

She needed time to think, time to figure out a way out of this.

A man on horseback trotted from around a column of soldiers, his face burning with blood. He stopped beside the earl, his horse snorting. “I told you to leave me out of this, you ungrateful bastard. After all the marks my father’s given you!” Amand hissed.

“But, but,” the Earl stammered.

“Too late now,” Amand said vacantly.

Amand. Where had she heard that name before? She let the name roll around in her head, searching for the source. There were so many names to keep track of now, too many people she’d met. She vaguely remembered the name, something from a month ago maybe.

“He ran into us yesterday,” Claw said beside her. “I can’t forget that scowl and those unnaturally clean boots.” Claw nodded at Amand’s boots wedged into stirrups. Nyset nodded, but there had to be more than that?

Amand pulled his horse up in front of her. He wore an overlapping vest in carrot orange, trimmed with golden beads with forest green trousers stylishly wrinkled at the knees. He certainly made no pretense at blending in. “You don’t remember me, Mistress. But I shall never forget you for the rest of my days.” His voice was sharp with haughty eloquence.

“Please, refresh my memory? I’m sure this is all a mistake. We can work out—”

“No,” he cut in, his voice hoarse. “It’s too late for that now. You embarrassed me in front of the common people of the Middle.” He bared his teeth at her. “I am of noble birth, of the highest rings of the city. Do you have any idea of the irreparable harm you’ve done to my reputation?”

“Truly, I don’t know what you’re talking about, Amand. How have I wronged you so?” she pleaded.

Claw sighed. “Haven’t got time for this shit,” he said under his breath.

Nyset jabbed an elbow into his ribs. “Ssh.”

Senka snickered.

“You think this is funny!” Amand shrieked at Senka. Nyset caught one of the Falcon soldiers stifling a grin. Senka’s fingers twiddled under her bracers, likely brushing the end of one her deadly needles.

“Are you going to tell me what I did to make you so angry?” She inhaled slowly, trying to calm the frantic nerves wriggling in her stomach. Claw growled at a pudgy-faced soldier that had inched too close. How quickly a friend can become an enemy, Nyset mused.

Amand stared at her and his lips furiously worked. Nyset waited with a raised eyebrow, staring back. Someone coughed at the back of the ranks of soldiers. Amand grunted and dismounted, then brushed a scrap of plant matter from his thigh. Somewhere a dog yelped in pain.

Amand strode up to her and leaned into her face. She held her ground; she would not show weakness. His skin was olive, pockmarked, and appeared to be stretched over his bony face. “Remember me now?” he hissed, his breath infused with the tang of garlic.

She wanted to back away to be safely clear of the onslaught that was the man’s breath. “I’m afraid not,” she said with forced listlessness. But she did remember now. The memory came rushing back. It felt like flipping over an old stone, only to discover to your surprise you had hidden something there. She had made him apologize to a poor woman who he had shoved to the ground at her recruiting table line. Nyset had narrowly diffused the tension in the crowd before it had become an all out brawl about which of the two gods were better. She had thrown both the woman and him into the air, putting enough fear in them to replace their anger. It worked. Yes, she remembered him well now. She wanted him to feel small and as insubstantial as a turd to be scraped from her boots. Egos like his needed to be crushed.

“You don’t remember me?” Amand snorted.

“No,” she said, then lowered her voice so only he could hear. She slid her face close as a lover’s beside his ear. She could see the beads of sweat welling out from his scarred cheeks. “You’re just another face in the crowd, swine. Nameless, unmemorable, a gnat to be swatted away, a rat to be squashed under my heel.” His jaw worked with fury. “Help me save this city, or go back to the hole from whence you came.”

Amand jerked back as if punched. “You fucking bitch!” His arm wound back, palm opened for a slap. “You’ll get yours, you—’” Isa’s arm was swift as the wind, snatching him around the wrist. Senka’s leg came after, side kicking him in the ribs and sending him sliding across the earth with a grunt.

“Kill her! Kill her!” Amand shouted from the ground, one arm wrapped around his side, the other stabbing his finger at her as if it were a weapon.

Blades rasped against leather, whispering the language of death. Isa had a hammer in one hand and what looked to be a heavy butcher’s knife in the other. One of the Falcon soldiers gaped at him, his face going white as Isa’s. “The fuck?” the gaping soldier croaked, eyes shifting back and forth between Isa’s brutal weapons.

Senka dropped into a crouch, daggers gleaming from each hand. Claw stepped in front of Nyset, the wide and curved blade of Ghostwalker drawn, notched from years of hard use.

“Do as Amand says,” the Earl said with what might have been reluctance.

The soldiers leveled spears at them, sharpened to menacing points. Shields came up behind their spears, forming a wall of steel, and behind those were eyes shrouded under helmets.

“No! No, no.” Nyset pushed her way in front of Claw and he begrudgingly moved aside. “Lower your weapons, everyone!” One man gladly lowered his spear. Others seemed to be tightening their grips on their polished wooden hafts.

She could tell the Falcon soldiers didn’t want to be doing this. They must have known of Grimbald and that he was her friend. Perhaps her messages about staying focused on the true enemy had finally penetrated their psyches, or maybe some liked what she had been doing in Helm’s Reach. Either way, their reluctance gave her the opening she was looking for.

“Soldiers of the great Midgaard Falcon!” Buttering them up a bit sure couldn’t hurt. “Defenders of the stalwart walls of Helm’s Reach!” She did her best to project her voice. “If you do not know who I am, remember me now. I led you against the Death Spawn that attacked your walls just five days ago.”

A few mutters came. “A severe fuck up!” a voice shouted out from the back. Other men shouted in agreement.

“Shut her up already,” another soldier said.

“Wait! Hear her out,” a gruff voice replied.

Nyset shouted over them. “I know I’ve made my mistakes. But who here hasn’t? Did someone else climb up the wall and fight with you that day? Was it Earl Baraz? Amand?”

“Up in their rooms in the fucking palace, cowering like babies!” someone said, producing a wave of laughs down the lines.

“I shit worms tougher than those two,” someone else said.

“You should really take a trip to the surgeon.” Nyset laughed and pointed at the man she thought said it.

“Aye, Arch Wizard,” the worm shitting soldier chuckled. A few hands jovially slapped his shoulders. She fought down the urge of her lips to curl in disgust.

The Earl’s fists balled up and his cheeks flushed in shades of red. “You’ll pay for this, Mistress,” the Earl barked. “Get! Her!” No one dared to move.

Nyset started to pace down the line, palms tingling open with sweat. This could be settled without violence. It had to be. “What about the wealthy and ferocious fighter, Amand?” She pointed at the man rising up from the ground, wincing. “Think we all know how the nobles think of anyone outside their precious Center, don’t we?”

“Fuck the nobles!” someone said.

“What I do is for you and you alone though, you must know this. I’m not up there in the Center, don’t even have walls to protect us. No precious jewels to be guarded.” She gestured back to the house she called the new Silver Tower. The heads of the men were nodding now. “The real enemy here is not me, but the Death Spawn ravaging our lands, damn it! Don’t be led astray by these clever ruses trying to undermine us! The truth is, the Earl only brought you here to take me in chains because he feels I have too much influence on you, what he thinks is his city. This is our city!”

The soldiers roared in agreement. Fists punched into the sky and shields banged against spears.

“You dirty snake cunt!” The Earl’s lips curled into a snarl and he marched towards her. A pair of spears crossed in front of him, stopping him in his tracks. “What?” he gasped. “Stand down at once!” he snapped to the pair of men. He started to press the spears down and another was thrust between them, pointing at his gut. “You’ll all hang for this treachery!” The Earl whirled around to face the columns of soldiers, his eyes wild, fingers opening and closing.

“Kill the heathen bitch!” Amand pointed with a stubby finger. “Kill her! Kill her! Kill hurhg—” He was cut off with a gauntleted fist to his mouth, sending him staggering into a line of soldiers. Blood streamed from the corner of his lip and his legs looked wobbly. He coughed and spat out a couple of dislodged teeth. He was pushed into another column and a spear butt was rammed into his ribs, sending him reeling then collapsing onto his hands and knees, his breath heaving. She thought she should stop them, but couldn’t if she wanted to win them over.

The Earl jerked on his beard, storming around in a circle of men tightening around him. “Traitorous dogs! King Ezra will hear of this insurrection. He’ll send the bloody Black Guard to take care the lot of you. You must respect the king! The Arch Wizard is a usurper, the Tower doesn’t respect you. They only want your babies to turn them into instruments of war!”

Nyset’s eyes were ablaze, roaring with all the hatred and anger boiling forth from the Dragon filling her bones. She pushed her way through muscular bodies, spears and shields parted as she reached the Earl. “You—” Her heart thudded in her chest and she leaned in close, blood throbbing in her temples. It felt like all the anger, all the frustration she had bottled up over the weeks was finally uncorked. “You are but a figurehead. The only reason you sit on your high perch is because I’ve let you. Magic rules the realm and always will. You are the food I choose not to eat,” she hissed. Nyset turned around, making her way back to Claw, watching with his blade resting across a shoulder.

“You are mine! Mine! You serve me, back down immediately!” The Earl’s voice cracked with a tremor and his arm lashed out, whipping across the air. “What are you doing? Attack them! Get her!” Tears streamed down his ruddy cheeks and were swallowed by the coiling hair of his beard.

Nyset stared at the Earl, her jaw clamping down and teeth grinding together. Her fingers curled around the bottom of her shirt, ripping the sides free from within her trousers. He brings men to me, not for defense of the city, but to bring ruin to all of my hard work. He brings death to his people with his treachery. He would destroy everything, betray my trust, tear it all down for his own petty games of power. Men will never change. You know what must be done, she thought. There was an unfamiliar harshness to the voice in her head.

“Kill him!” Nyset commanded and chopped down with her hand, a blade of fire springing to life in her fist.

“Mistress?” Claw said with disbelief beside her.

“Wh-what? Nyset?” the Earl said, his mouth hanging open.

Nyset tilted her chin up, staring iron at the blubbering Earl. “Do it!” She regretted the words soon after they left her lips, but it was already done, and with some decisions there was no turning back.

A soldier snorted, brought his spear back, grunted and jabbed it into the Earl’s side. He screamed, clutching his back where a jet of blood streaked the air, painting the earth in red. “No, you can’t do this!” He took a step towards her. Another spear came, lancing him in the thigh and dropping him to a knee. A man cleared his throat and spat on the Earl’s face. “You’ll not touch the Arch Wizard, dog.” The soldier spat again.

Blood rolled down the Earl’s leg and over his leather boots. He reached a bloody, trembling hand to her, imploring her help, but help would not come. He had been one foot in the grave long ago, she realized. When he had decided to stay in the palace rather than fight beside his men on the wall.

“Death is all that awaits those who betray the Tower!” she screamed, the fiery blade thrust into the sky. The Dragon flared in her chest, burning bright as furnaces through her eyes. She wanted to see blood now, needed to kill to make everything wrong in the world right. Was that her need, or the Dragon’s?

Two more spears thudded into the Earl’s back, spurting out with blood. The perfectly clean spear tips came out gleaming like red stained glass. Baraz screamed and twisted on the ground as more barbs came. She would not turn away. She would face the consequences of her decisions. The spears came like arrows, stabbing and ramming into his bleeding body. They plunged in and out, men all crowding around to wet their spear points. The soldiers were in a blood rage now, all their hatred, failures, faults, and endless disappointments pouring out through the stabbing of their spears. A merciful spear sank into the Earl’s neck, cutting his screams short. She almost wished he had suffered longer.

Nyset’s world vibrated at the edges, shimmering spears and shining armor blurred with splats of scarlet. There was a dull roar in her ears as if through a pillow. The sun reflected from a pair of wizened and grinning eyes, an arm coming up and hammering a spear into a bloodied mess below. The thudding of iron on bone and squelching through flesh replaced the screams in her head. Something shook her shoulder, throwing her off balance, almost sending her tottering onto the ground.

“Mistress? Mistress?” Claw’s voice repeated, his hands gripping her shoulders, steadying her. His face was in her line of vision, staring into her lost eyes. The world snapped back into focus, sound taking on its regular forms. “Are you well?” Claw asked.

“Yes? What?” She pushed away from Claw and took a few hesitant steps back. Spears were still raining down on the Earl’s mutilated body. “Stop! He’s dead already, stop!” She conjured weak blasts of air to push soldiers away and putting herself over the Earl’s body. “It’s done, he’s dead,” she barked. A bead of sweat trickled down her jaw. “It’s done. What-what have I done?” she whispered.

A soldier started to say something, then his mouth duly closed. Blood speckled his stubbly chin. Other men responded in kind, seeming to get a hold of their senses. Eyes became downcast with shame, boots becoming infinitely more interesting than anything else. “It’s alright, it’s over now,” she said with a long exhale

She looked down at what remained of the Earl’s body, a pool of red surrounding sodden and matted clothing, thick with his blood. It took everything she had to prevent the contents of her stomach from pushing up through her throat. “It’s over,” she whispered and nodded.

She was the butcher. This was her doing. She might as well have been wielding a spear herself. She had let the Dragon take too much of her. She let the thrill of its rage fill her, its force willing her to destroy life.

“It had to be done, didn’t it? Tell me he left me no choice.” Nyset said, knowing Claw would be near.

“He… left you no choice, Mistress,” Claw said from behind, but his words were empty as a new grave.

Nyset snorted back the tears that threatened to well in her eyes. She stole another glance at the Earl’s corpse. “Damn you, why did you make me do this?” She sniffed and a tear slid down her tanned cheek. He was a bastard. Why did she care? Maybe because she knew he was a good man at heart. Maybe because he was only doing what he thought was right. Maybe because she’d made a terrible mistake.

“Arch Wizard,” a soldier grunted, then dropped to one knee, bloody spear held high at his side. One of his hairy knuckles was topped with an oval of blood.

“Arch Wizard,” another pounded a fist on his chest, then followed the first, kneeling before her.

“But, why?” Nyset swallowed.

Men went down like dominoes, muttering words of fealty and taking knees. It felt like watching the stoutest of trees drop. Hundreds of men were kneeling now, wind sighing over their wooden forms. She was at a loss for words for what felt like minutes. She must be their strength, she thought. Everyone needed a beacon to follow, a light in the black. But who would be hers?

“Rise!” she brought her arm up, palm flat. “Fight with me. Fight for your land. Fight for unity. Stand against the Death Spawn!”

Cheers erupted like a thunderclap. Nyset sent approving nods over the cheering mass, some looking like butchers. Some managed to keep their hands clean. Hers were clean in the physical sense, but her heart felt as if it had been bludgeoned.

“Nicely done, Mistress,” Claw said beside her, arms folded.

“Not like this. Not how I wanted this to turn out,” Nyset muttered to him.

“Even with the best of intentions, there is always suffering,” Claw said. He squeezed her neck and she leaned over, pressing herself against his side. “I’m glad you found me, Claw. You’re a good friend.”

Chapter 12

Elixir Beans

“War implies killing and war doesn’t only hurt the enemy.” -The Diaries of Nyset Camfield

Dear Nyset,

I’m sorry it took me so long to write you. The journey west has been trying and I haven’t had the strength to write the words that needed writing. You’ll soon understand why. You deserve to know and here I am rambling. The truth is, I’ve been procrastinating because the wounds have not yet all healed up. Not wounds of the body, I mean. Where do I begin? I guess with the beginning.

My travels have been fraught with tragedy. I don’t know how else to explain this in a letter. Juzo Pulling is dead. He fought valiantly against the enemy in a terrible battle in Shipton. He fell giving his life for the realm. Charles, if you remember him, Grimbald’s Pa died in the fray. There is more to this, more I must tell you in person. Take a breath, for the rest of this only gets worse from here.

Your assassin, Isa’s news was proven to be correct. I don’t know how else to tell you this… so I’ll just go on with it: our home is in ruins and embers. We made our way to your house. Your parents have fallen to the Death Spawn. Grimbald and I gave them a proper burial. I’m sorry. I wish we could have been there sooner, done more. We’re well, on the whole. The Blood Eaters have been taken care of.

I’m rambling again and running out of paper. Nerves, really. We march for the Great Retreat, reports have come in that the Death Spawn have reached their gates. We’re only a half day's march away, camped by the Blanched Falls. Wish us luck.

I miss you. I wish I could hold you and inhale your scent. I want to swallow your pain. Remember us if we fail. You won’t be able to write me back. I’ll come to you soon.

I love you,

Walter

P.S. We explored the Yellow Caverns and found a tunnel there we suspect leads back to the Tower. We’ve since closed it. Send scouts, search for the other side.

Walter leaned back and let a great breath stream out through his nostrils, staring down at the letter. It had words crossed out and scribbled over in wet globs of ink. He had spent more than his share of time at the writing table, trying to form them right and they still looked wrong. He felt somewhat relieved to have finally put those words on paper, though. He gently lowered the quill beside it, listening to the scratchings of quills working on letters to his left and right. He swallowed and pressed his palm into the table.

“Gimme’ some room, man,” a mercenary to his right muttered and sent a soft elbow into his side.

“Sorry.” Walter tucked his elbows by his hips. The parchment was in poor form, wrinkled and torn in half. He wasn’t in much of a position to ask for something better and resources were scarce. He carefully rolled it up, unsurprisingly difficult to do with one hand. Once rolled and pinned it under his stump, he grabbed the stub of burning candle from the middle of the squat table and let the yellow wax dribble on an edge. He lifted the small stamper and pressed it into the hot wax, leaving the impression of a pair of axes crossed over a skull, Scab’s seal. Hopefully, she’d open it. Where are you, Nyset? He wondered.

Walter rose up from the table, meeting the baggy eyes of the next mercenary eagerly clutching his scrap of blank parchment.

“All set, Walter?” The heavy-lidded man asked, his voice harsh from years of smoking tobacco.

Walter nodded at him, not knowing his name. “All yours,” He didn’t want to know it either. He didn’t have the look of a man who’d survive the next battle. Pudgy gut, weak arms, soft eyes, hardly getting enough air from walking. One could never tell, though, and the moment for fumbling greetings had already passed.

Walter walked up to the courier, tapping the rolled up letter against his stump. Baskets of letters destined for various places around the realm were strewn about the floor. The courier towered over the small table, neck awkwardly craned over as his head almost touched the top of the ragged tent. He wore a leather jerkin over a heavy shirt, shoulder and knees covered with reinforced armor.

“Where to?” the courier asked.

“Helm’s Reach, for the Arch Wizard.” Walter tried to smile, but it felt like it came out with little friendliness.

Likely it had, by the way the courier narrowed his scarred brow at him. “Arch Wizard’s dead. Fell during the Silver Tower’s siege… sorry, lad. Anyone else it’ll go to?”

Walter shook his head. “There’s a new Silver Tower. Just outside Helm’s Reach, the courier there, almost everyone will know of her.”

“Alright. Haven’t been there a while myself. Give it here.” The man held his hand out for the letter. “Have friends in high places, do you?”

Walter started to put the letter into the man’s hand but froze mid-way. She has a right to know. You said you’d send word as soon as you could, he told himself.

“C’mon, give it here,” the courier demanded. “What are you about?”

“Right.” Walter thrust it into his hand, glad to be free of the weight of those words.

“You’re a strange man, aren’t you?” One side of the courier’s lips raised and he marked the letter with a strange shorthand notation.

Walter shrugged. “Aren’t we all?” The courier slipped the rolled up scroll into a basket of others, marked with a small sign that read ‘Helm’s Reach.’ “Thanks,” Walter said. The courier beckoned for the man behind him to come, but Walter stood there staring at his letter beside tens of others.

“C’mon, outta the way. You’d had your fill already,” the waiting man said.

Walter nodded, turned, and pushed through the tent flap, his face met by a curtain of cool mist. It had left everything dampened, clothing difficult to put on, smallclothes wet and fruits icy. Armor would have to be wiped down and swords oiled to prevent them from rusting. It made fires hard to start the traditional way with fire strikers, so Walter had helped everyone out by starting them with Dragon fire.

The mist came up from the Blanched Falls, a roaring echo from the canyon, not more than a quarter of a mile away from where they set up camp. It was nice to have a source of fresh water to bathe and drink, not so good for everything else. More than half of Scab’s men had declined baths by Walter’s estimation, opting to go on stewing in their own bodily juices for another month. To the north, the forest shrouded the land in a mix of cypress, pines, and new shoots emerging from the ground. He hoped this forest was good and dead and lacked dragons made of roots.

Walter returned to their campsite, finding Grimbald tying down straps, securing sundries on his Blood Donkey. “Got your letter written for Nyset, then?”

“Mhm. You… write anyone?”

Grimbald grunted and shrugged. “No one to write too.”

Walter bent down and grabbed a pot beside the dying embers of last night’s campfire. He used the wooden spoon left in it to scrape off the charred remnants of this morning’s sausages. They had been slightly overcooked, but still better than eating salted jerky and nuts. Walter sniffed. “Could write to Nyset, sure she’d like to hear from you. No other family?”

“Nah, no others. Had an aunt moved, set up a shanty over on Eagle’s Edge after my uncle died. She’s long dead now, I’d reckon, but not sure. Nyset, maybe. See her when we get back I guess.” He started brushing the knots out of the Blood Donkey’s tail. A mercenary tripped on something and started stumbling towards the donkey, arms full of junk. The donkey let out a sputtering bray. The man caught his balance before stumbling into it, muttering curses and stalking off. “Calm, calm,” Grimbald said into the donkey’s twiddling ears.

“So, who’s ready for some killing?” Scab asked, walking up with hands planted on his hips, fetid mouth beaming at them. Walter thought he could smell the acrid stench of his breath from a few paces away.

“Scab, you realize—” Walter drew up close to him, despite his better judgment and lowered his voice. “You realize that this might not go well, that lots of us, your men, may die? This… this isn’t a fucking game.”

“Woah, woah, down boy! What happened to your sense of humor?” Scab sniffed.

“Left it in the Shadow Realm.” Walter stepped away from him and picked up a bucket of water, slowly pouring it over the fire’s last coals.

“Well, I thought of that. But is there anything more enjoyable than killing? Especially those Death Spawn bastards. Not to worry, Walter. The promise of a great fortune after this trip drives us all onwards.”

“You’ve got a point there. It’s satisfying watching those fuckers burn,” Walter said, a touch of a smile reaching him now. “Have to admit, starting to feel like I’ve found a latent talent in killing them.” He was built for murder and not much else, he thought. Why else would be given the ability to heal and destroy at the same time? At least he’d found his purpose. How many lazed through life without ever finding theirs?

“Killing for marks, a strange way to live,” Grimbald said, adjusting the strap on his saddle. The sun reflected from his recently shaved head, beaded with droplets from the constant mist.

“Oh? And what did you do that was so noble?” Scab scratched at an angry rash forming between his fingers.

“Here we go,” Walter snickered.

Grimbald shrugged uncomfortably. “Worked a tavern with my Pa, but you already knew that. Didn’t you?”

“I had an inkling…” Scab peeled off a strip of dried skin from between his fingers and flicked it on the ground. He looked up and grinned. “So, you think facilitating the ruining of bodies and brains through drink is a worthier pursuit, do you?”

“Not everyone came into the tavern to drink themselves to sleep, though I’m not sure you’d understand the notion.” Grimbald winked and scratched his mangy beard in need of trimming.

“Perhaps not.” Scab gripped the lapels of his ancient coat, threadbare and burned in spots. “But your occupation profited from the occasional bout of debauchery, did it not?”

“Maybe, Pa was good about not giving people more than they could handle, but some could’ve slipped through his eyes,” Grimbald said. “He did know how to run a tavern, best of the west I’d say.”

“Ah-ha!” Scab hopped, one finger victoriously raised in the air.

Walter groaned. He didn’t want to be listening to their bickering right now. He had to get his mind right, prepare his heart for battle.

“So you admit that serving drink could effectively… indirectly lead to murder?” Scab asked, thrusting the side of his face out, the eye rimmed with pus.

“No,” Grimbald sighed with annoyance. “Well, I don’t know. Don’t really want to talk about that right now. Can you understand that?”

“Is everyone ready for a fight, Scab?” Walter asked before Scab could answer. “Are you ready?”

“Always ready for a fight, my noble employer! That and marks, whores, and drink of course. What more could a man ask for, really?” Scab unsheathed half of his pitiful sword, rusted all over like a strange disease.

“Can’t imagine,” Walter muttered.

“And look at you! Woke up all high and mighty this morning did you?” Scab smirked.

“Go fuck yourself, Scab.”

“A swell idea…” Scab peered down at his palm. “Hand’s still a little sore from the plant, eh, things. Not working quite right yet.”

Grimbald chuckled. “Could give you some oil for the blade, Scab.” Grimbald nodded at his weapon.

“No, no. Like it like this. Gives it character, increases lethality.” Scab drew his blade, admiring its iron sores.

“How do you figure?” Walter asked. Scab mainly spoke of nonsense interspersed with gems of knowledge. He thought this might be one of those moments where a gem floats to the top of his verbal shit pile.

“I’m no alchemist, herbalist, whateverist — but it seems that when men are cut by my rusted weapons, over time, they seem more likely to become infected from the wounds. I’m not sure, though. It’s purely anecdotal and that’s enough evidence for me.” He slapped the blade back into his sheath.

“Interesting. Nyset and Baylan…” Walter grimaced and felt his face grow warm. “Nyset would want to hear of that.” Long dead, stupid. The memory of Baylan’s limbs tumbling down a slope of laughing skulls flashed across his mind. Images of the Shadow Realm flitted across his vision in a torrent. Great mouths gnashed in the black, claws hacked through bodies and hundreds of dead lay in a lake of blood. Nyset’s perfect lips grinned at him from under the sharp-edged mask of the Shadow princess, reveling in Asebor’s violent thrusts, fucking her with all measure of sanity abandoned.

Scab reached into his mouth and flicked something yellow onto the ground. Scab was everything we pretended we weren’t, Walter distantly thought. Everyone went through their days forgetting even the most beautiful among us spent some time sitting over a hole in the ground with brown paste coming out of our asses.

“How is the Arch Wizard anyway?” Scab asked as he wiped his finger on his pants. “Haven’t heard much news from the east, besides the attack on Helm’s Reach.”

Walter gasped, visions and thoughts dashed away upon the rocks of the present. “Huh?” His guts felt like they dropped into his toes. “There was an attack?” he croaked.

Grimbald’s face turned a ghastly hue and he stepped closer. “Go on.”

“You didn’t hear?” Scab wiped his hands on his pants, fingers catching on a hole. “Don’t worry, friends! It was just a small attack I’ve been told, warded off by your lady’s magnificent fighting prowess.”

“So the city’s alright? Casualties? Is Nyset alright?” Walter hadn’t realized what he’d done until he saw Scab’s big bloodshot eyes widen. His hand was balled around Scab’s crusty collar, his eye hissing with Dragon fire.

“I-I don’t know. If you kill me now, the men will abandon you. Might be better to wait until after the battle, eh?”

A strong hand gripped Walter’s shoulder. “Hands off the boss would you, fire boy?” Wart, Scab’s second scowled, more scars than undamaged flesh pinching together on his cheeks.

Walter swallowed. Get yourself together. “Sorry Scab, think I’m just a bit nervous about this fight. Not sure why, though. Don’t even know if there will be a fight, do we?”

“Not a problem.” Scab brushed himself off and a made a point of straightening his rumpled lapels. “Glad to hear you’re starting to accept that you can’t control everything. Makes life much easier, trust my word on that.” Scab let out a sigh. “Might want to learn to control your emotions a bit better, might get you into trouble someday.”

“Thanks for the advice.” Walter turned around to see Grimbald had loosened the strap on Corpsemaker, one hand hanging onto its haft over his back. It was nice to know someone was there to watch out for him. Walter shot him a grateful nod and he nodded back in understanding.

“Well, just wanted to say good morning to you all. I’ll be on my way, have some things to tend to. Should be ready to depart in twenty minutes or so. Finally, get to do what you dragged us all the here for, eh? You’ll see the band here is worth the hefty cost.” He bobbed his eyebrows up.

“No doubt. I’ve seen them against a few Death Spawn we encountered on our way here, remember?”

“Mhm. Yes, yes I do. I’ve got to be going now. Time doesn’t stop for anyone, not even dual-wielders.” Scab winked and stumbled off, almost tripping on someone’s bag. He slapped a man on the ass as he departed.

“Shit, he’s a crazy bastard that one,” Grimbald said.

“Yeah. You think you’re ready for another battle?” Walter asked. Damn it, why do you keep asking that?

“Ready as I’ll ever be,” Grimbald grunted, his hand brushing the Donkey’s mane.

Walter blew out his cheeks, his hand rubbing at the gnarled flesh on his stump. “Need to meditate, really need to get my head right. I’ll be back before we leave.”

“Enjoy. Try not to stumble on any Blood Eater graves this time, would you?” Grimbald said.

“Blood Eater graves?” Walter asked, scratching his head.

“Last time you went off from camp to meditate, you found Blood Eaters killing some farmers, remember? Or do I have it wrong?”

Walter nodded. “No, no. You have it right. Can’t think right.” He wrapped his cloak around his shoulders, heavy with wet and sticking to his soddened shirt. “I’ll do my best.” He smiled and started off. He tried to blink the mist clinging to his ruined eye socket, but the eyelids only twitched against the balled up skin pulled over it.

Walter worked his way from the campsite and onto a patch of ferns coated in fluffy layers of fog. A few trees loomed beyond the ferns rasping against his boots, darkening the thickening wood beyond. The sun had been obfuscated by greasy sheets of cloud and mist draping above the trees. His boots squelched through mud, threatening to be sucked off of his feet with every step. Roots snagged at his ankles as if the forest were trying to snare him and make him food for the wolves. He reached the edge of the fern patch, making his way into the icy air of the wood. The difference was stark out of the bleak sun. He found a nice looking boulder after a few minutes, the din of the campsite thankfully swallowed by the forest.

Walter sat down on it cross-legged and closed his eyes, resting his hands on his knees. He shivered now that he wasn’t moving. He opened himself to the Dragon, just a sliver of its fire burned in his chest, enough to make him warm as if he were sitting beside a tavern’s hearth. The little things made a world of difference. He slowed his breath, swallowed it deep in his chest. The sounds of the world died away and with it, thoughts came.

How would they pay Scab?

How was Grimbald holding up after the death of his father? He was so quiet now, brooding and closed up.

Did he have to kill Juzo? Juzo had left him no choice, no choice at all. He might have been able to heal Grimbald, might have been able to do something differently. But why am I torturing myself with these questions? These are merely what is within, he answered himself. This is why you’re doing this. You must be empty to fight true. He thought maybe he could have hit them both with air and thrown them against the back of the Hissing Gooseberry tavern. Maybe he could’ve practiced his aim with shooting fucking fire out of his eye before using it against Juzo.

If only he had tried to cultivate the ability he knew was there when he was younger, all of this might have never happened. Maybe he could still smile at his mother, feel his Dad’s touch. This path is dark and leads to nowhere. He brought his attention to his breath. All that remains is… the breath. He sat there breathing for a while, ten minutes maybe.

Sounds came from beyond the forest, men squabbling maybe. Fighting over what, though? And why here the opposite way from the camp? Walter opened his eyes and attentively listened.

“Damn it,” a voice sounding much like Scab’s carried over the trees.

Walter slowly drew to a crouch. He felt for weapons he thought should be on his hips, remembering that he had all the weapons he’d ever need locked in his chest. He stalked towards the voices, doing his best to avoid stepping on twigs that would give him away. Pine needles ground like sand under his boots.

“This is all you’ll be getting. Your job’s easy, you fucking leech,” a voice dry as old leather snapped.

“This wasn’t what we agreed too. There’s—” the voice trailed off, muffled.

“This is all you’re getting!” the voice returned.

Walter could see the figures now, two men standing on a narrow strip of dirt worn down over the years, likely a goat path. They were far away and obscured by plants, but, as sure as he was missing his arm, he saw Scab there, standing with his distinctive swagger. What was this? Had some things to tend to, did he?

Walter was tempted to interrupt but had to get closer to hear everything. What he heard before were shouts, given the distance. Scab seemed to be shaking his head and stalked off down the goat path, his stride determined. Walter cut a path through the trees, aiming to cut him off as he made his way presumably back to camp. Scab seemed to pause as Walter thrashed through the thicket, likely expecting a bear given all the noise.

“Scab? Hey Scab, Walter!” He waved through the trees

Scab sheathed his half-drawn sword, eyes squinting. “By the Phoenix, you’re going to give me a heart attack my man! Never know where those damned Death Spawn will turn up, do you?”

“Sorry about that.” Walter forced a smile. He had to assume the best of people, but could a man in his line of work be trusted? He’d proved himself trustworthy so far. The past wasn’t always a good predictor of the future. Walter brushed around a bush, needles jabbing at his neck and cheeks. He nearly stepped on a Sand Buckeye, letting out a breath of relief as he lunged around its giant maw. He stepped onto the goat path, glad to be in a place where he could see more than five feet.

“What brings you to the forest?” Scab asked, gesturing up to the trees, mist glistening from his inflamed skin.

“Just came to find some peace before we head off,” Walter started to cross his arms, but forced them down at his sides. “And yourself?”

“Just taking in my daily constitutional. It’s not easy to look this good all the time, you know?”

“Uh-huh,” Walter nodded. “Who was that you were talking to?”

“You heard that?” Scab’s eye twitched. “I… was hoping that would be a surprise,” he peered down at his boots. “I was trying to get us a shipment of elixir beans. I thought it would be nice little something to give the men, improving morale and all of that nonsense.” He laughed.

“Really? Some elixir would be great right about now. Starting to get headaches from not having it, I think…” Walter imagined that wonderful aroma touching his nose.

“Yes. Either that or pretty ribbons. I thought the elixir would be more welcome with my men, however.”

“Ribbons?” Walter asked.

“Mm. Ribbons. I heard a story of a former mercenary leader who discovered that by giving his men little strips of colored cloth as rewards for acts of valor, they would be much more likely to do the irrational, save a dying man under the hail of arrow fire for example. Of course,” Scab flamboyantly waved, “these only have value if they’re scarcely given, add some type of ceremony with it to make it feel more important… and then one man fights like five. Truly maximizes the man’s utility, don’t you think?”

Walter shook his head, but he had to admit he thought the idea might work. “You are a bastard, a clever one, though. When is the elixir arriving then?”

Scab swallowed. “Just after the battle at the Great Retreat, so he assured me.”

Something about this story didn’t add up. He had to keep digging. “But why meet out here? Strange place to discuss food, don’t you think?”

“Well, the merchant didn’t feel safe around all my men. Understandable, isn’t it?”

Maybe. “But aren’t merchants used to dealing with all sorts?”

“In the confines of the city, around city guards, yes of course, but not unprotected,” Scab shrugged. “We should be on our way, according to my scouts the Death Spawn have just engaged their walls.”

Walter nodded. “Let’s go then.” They started moving down the path towards the camp. “It’s strange. I’ve never heard a merchant scream so harshly at a potential customer as that man did. He must not like making money, surprised you gave him your business.”

“These are desperate times and one must capitalize on rare opportunities, my good man.” Scab put his arms behind his back.

“Rare opportunities?” Walter scoffed. “Didn’t sound like any business dealings I’ve ever had.”

“Yes, rare opportunities.” Scab stopped. “Do you see any other elixir merchants out here?” Walter carried on along the path and Scab jogged to catch up. “I’m starting to get the feeling you don’t trust me, Walter. Is there something you’d like to say? Accuse me of? Have I given you any reasons to doubt my loyalty?” Scab’s sing-song tones became edged with violence.

“No,” Walter said. “But don’t give me one. Your reticence is… alarming.”

Scab let out a great belly laugh. “Reticence? This conversation is starting to smell like a turd. My friend, you’ll thank me when the beans come in. Can we not leave it at that? Can you not let it go?” Scab pleaded.

Maybe he was right. Maybe it was nothing, maybe it wasn’t. For now, Walter didn’t have much of a choice. He needed Scab and his crew. “Alright. Let’s go kill some Death Spawn. Try to stay alive, will you?” Walter grinned at him, letting his tensions ease. There was something about marching to where you knew the enemy was that made him feel like he was sticking his neck under a guillotine.

Chapter 13

The Great Tree

“A lesson for those who do not believe in the gods: a lack of belief doesn’t make them any less real.” -The Diaries of Nyset Camfield

The shrieking of Cerumal that would have cut the air fell short, dampened like a whisper across the expansive bog. The Great Tree loomed like a giant of lore over the forest, giving the regular trees the appearance of being mere blades of grass. It was as wide as the Midgaard palace at its base and fanned out at its apex with a series of limbs clawing at the sky, each big as the largest of trees studding the forest. In its center burned a roaring fire, known as the Elder’s Fire, casting the tree limbs at its apex in a grim glow. The limbs at the top curved back into the Great Tree, forming a dome of leaves below the Elder’s Fire. Hundreds of shadowy figures milled about a curving edge at the top, the size of ants at this distance.

A silky blanket of fog lazed over the Great Tree’s massive roots, which traveled for miles underground. Huts as big as Nobel’s houses spiraled up and around the tree’s trunk, connected by bridges and climbing vines. The huts were supported by rickety looking scaffolding, seemingly constructed by a blind man, Walter thought.

Small settlements spread farther north and around the Great Tree, making up the whole of the Great Retreat. It was the linchpin of their community. They met here to trade, socialize with other settlements, and debate the decrees of the Elders. Walter’s mother had told him they were a quiet sort of people. It was considered offensive to pry into another man’s business, yet storytelling was encouraged during their communal meals. The strangest thing he remembered his mother, Isabelle, telling him was how both men and women alike would roam the forest shirtless, their bare breasts exposed to the forest’s barbs. At any other time, he would have laughed at that thought, maybe his loins would have swelled at the prospect of seeing such a varied assortment of breasts all at once. The dark shadows at the tree’s base gibbered only death, shattering potential fantasies and sending Walter starkly into the moment.

A few foot bridges led to the Great Tree’s base, keeping one’s boots from the bubbling bog below. It would serve well to slow potential attackers as it appeared to be doing so now. Torches burned along the bridges behind cascading layers of fog, glimmering with amber halos. The torches blinked with the silhouettes of Death Spawn darting past.

It was mid-afternoon, Walter knew, but the sky was so heavy with black clouds it could have been near sunset. The treetops of the parting forest behind the Great Tree were so mired in fog, it was impossible to tell where they had ended and the sky began. Dead vines hung like corpses from the forest’s edge, invading all but the Great Tree’s domain. Botanists never discovered what it was about the area that had stopped the invasive species, wilting over the bog. It was the only place that had. The creeping vines were a persistent nuisance for farmers on either side of the realm. There was a new invasive species the Great Tree had to contend with now, one whose roots were in the Shadow Realm. This species knew nothing of quarter, mercy, and did not take prisoners.

Walter’s boot thumped onto the footbridge above the bog, making the blisters on his heels scream with protest. The water was speckled with bright pink flowers emerging from their lily pad hosts. A frog chirped and leaped into the dark water, frantically swimming away. That frog was perhaps one of the wisest creatures here, Walter thought.

“Death Spawn,” Walter hissed, his heart jumping at finally catching clear sight of them as a curtain of fog slipped away. Small fires burned like angry sores along the Great Tree’s roots, wide as houses rising out of the water. Some spots were blackened as if the fires had been burning for days now. Maybe they had. Everything was slick with wet and would be difficult to burn.

“Biggest tree I’ve ever seen. Just wow… stunning,” Grimbald said. “Would have been nice to get here without having to go to battle to see it, though. Maybe without Death Spawn.”

“When this is all over Grim, you and I are going to do some traveling,” Walter said, staring as the Death Spawn fanned out from the bridges and into the bog. The water was black between the lily pads and reached up to their demon’s hips in some places.

“When this is all over,” Grimbald repeated. “If we manage to get out this alive, we’ll travel alright.” He winced with an unseen pain.

“Why aren’t they doing anything?” Scab asked, his hands planted on his hips.

“Who?” Walter asked.

“The Death Spawn and whoever is on top of that enormous tree.” Scab gestured.

“The Great Tree,” Walter said. It was his first time seeing the place where his mother was raised. It would have been nice to be here with her, he thought with a hard sniff.

Scab started biting one of his jaundiced nails. “Don’t see what’s so great about it. Long way to climb to go home.”

“A defensible position,” Grimbald added. “Can shoot, throw rocks and whatever else from above.”

“As long as your enemies don’t have fire,” Scab countered.

“Tough to light things that are wet, though, as we know from trying to start campfires last night,” Grimbald said.

“Ha! I knew there were some brains between all those muscles.” Scab slapped Grimbald on the back, making him flinch.

Grimbald grunted and regarded Scab flatly. A corner of his lip twitched up giving him the look Walter recognized as a volcano being tempted to blow.

“What happened with the both of you? You used to enjoy a bit of fun.” Scab looked from Walter to Grimbald, a pleased grin pasted on his cracked lips.

Walter looked away from Scab and set his gaze on the Death Spawn at the Great Tree’s base. “Maybe they’re waiting for something, but what? Looks like we might’ve arrived after an attack had been warded off, judging by the fires… or an attack about to start.” Walter peered back down the path they came in on, seeing heads bobbing along the narrow road. Some mercenaries had ventured into the forest lining the bog to try to get a good look at what lay beyond. “All this for a fucking tree?” someone said. “Unbelievable…”

“This is bullshit,” another man replied. “Gonna get me a warm and juicy cunny after this shit is done with.” That got a few chuckles from the mercenary’s neighbors.

“Doesn’t seem to be that many. The Great Tree looks to be doing an excellent job defending itself. Not sure they even need our help. Maybe we should go on back a mile or so, set up camp, wait them out?” Scab said, brushing a bit of crust from his collar.

“No. Are you insane? No, no, don’t answer that. I already know,” Walter said, raising his palm and swallowed. “What’s your plan, Scab?”

Scab snorted. “We are really doing this, aren’t we?”

“This is what we’re paying you for.”

“I don’t like getting wet. Tired of being wet. When do we get paid again?” Scab asked.

“When we return to Helm’s Reach, damn it.” Walter thought he should feel a greater sense of urgency, but the Death Spawn around the tree didn’t seem to be getting very far. Walter saw why now. Archers stood on the huts and the bridges, shooting down at them. There were about two hundred Cerumal by Walter’s guess, and behind them were Black Wynches, likely giving them telepathic commands.

“Why is this place so important?” Scab sighed, half-smiled and looked back at his men.

The truth was, Walter didn’t know why. But what he did know was that anything the Death Spawn wanted to destroy, he wanted to protect. Baylan and Nyset had said it was one of the main footholds of the realm. The others were the Silver Tower and Midgaard. The Silver Tower had already been taken and another couldn’t fall. “Because I said so.”

“Touchy, touchy.” Scab snickered.

“Knowledge,” Grimbald grunted. “The Shamans who live here know the old ways, know the Old Magic. I heard it was similar to the Tower, but instead of writing things down, they practice and pass things on through stories. People that avoid reading books sound like a people worth saving to me,” he muttered.

“Huh.” Walter crossed his arms. “Interesting.” Walter did indeed find the subject fascinating but was growing weary of all this useless prattle. “Scab? Let’s go. What’s the plan?” Walter watched a few of the Black Wynches waving their spindly arms, talons reflecting the light of sobering fires. A wave of lion’s roars carried over the bog. The Cerumal were screaming and scrambling up the Great Tree like rats fleeing at the sight of fire.

“Looks like they finally found their courage,” Grimbald said, exhaling with what must have been all the air in his lungs.

“Alright, listen closely. I’ll send half of my men around the other side with Wart, my dutiful second, he’ll take the other bridges. It looks like there’s a set like these two on the other side.” He peered into the fog.

“What?” Wart asked from behind a few men, pushing his way through and shouldering past them. “What am I doing?”

“Take your men, bring ‘em round the other side. We’ll attack here. When the Death Spawn flee, you rout them from that side.”

“Yes, sir,” Wart snapped. “I’ll get those dogs moving.”

“Head off down the path a bit and wait for my signal before the…” Scab coughed, “the mobilization.”

“Right you are, Scab.” Wart trudged off.

“Death Spawn don’t run,” Walter said.

“Doesn’t matter.” Scab waved him off, his gloves reeking like they’d recently been used to wipe his ass. “If they don’t run or try to out maneuver us, come in at them and we’ll squeeze them in a brutal pincer formation!” He used his thumb and index finger to form a claw. “Then we’ll crush them!” He dramatically snapped his pincer closed.

“Sounds reasonable.” Walter nodded. “Grim?”

“Hopefully, they don’t mistake us for the enemy. Don’t want to get burned by whatever they were—” An explosion roared over the bog and flames leapt from the tree’s roots. Walter caught the glint of glass tumbling in the air. He tracked the glimmer, watched it collide on a root and burst alight in a torrent of fire. A few Cerumal were caught in the conflagration, screeching and diving into the bog, likely forgetting how shallow it was. Their bodies crumpled when they struck the water, their shattered limbs settling into unnatural formations. Soft ripples reached the mud where he stood, lapping against a tree. Walter reckoned you’d forget a lot of things when your skin was cooking.

“Suppose there’s that answer,” Grimbald said. “Least the fire is from something you can see.” He had Corpsemaker in one hand, his father’s axe, Lovebleeder, in its holster on his back.

Walter felt his forearm sore with tension, muscles in his stump firing in a fury of confused contractions, knuckles bone white. He couldn’t stand here idle any longer. It had taken all his willpower to remain as long as they already had. “We’ve wasted enough time already. Let’s get moving while their backs are turned.”

“Wait—” Scab gripped Walter’s shoulder, his eyebrows pulled together in a deep frown. “Grimbald had a fair observation. What if they think we’re the enemy? I never planned to die by fire.”

“Should’ve picked another profession, c’mon!” Walter pushed his hand off and started down the bridge, wisps of fog curling around his legs.

“All things are eventual, I suppose,” Scab muttered, then issued a series of sharp whistles, snapping his men into motion.

“What’s that fucking whistle mean?” someone asked. “I forget. Whistles to us like we’re a bunch of bloody dogs.”

Walter’s boots thudded against the mossy wood, muffling someone’s reply to the man asking about the whistle. Grimbald followed behind, narrow bridge screeching at his bulk. The cool and humid air spiraled through Walter’s sinuses, soothing against his throat tight with tension.

Walter spared a glance back and saw that Wart was starting to lead a large group off to the other side. Scab hadn’t yet got his men moving on down the bridge, but they were shuffling into some type of formation. It didn’t matter now. What mattered now was scrubbing this filth from the world.

Walter sucked the Dragon in, reveling in its hate and ageless rage. His legs filled with strength, the pain of the blisters in his feet faded like a scorched cloud. The nervy tension he had felt writhing in his guts was dashed away upon the spire of revenge. His boots hammered on the wood now, boards bouncing under his feet and pressing him onward. The bridges leading to the Great Tree seemed to endlessly stretch over the water, growing longer and longer with every step he took.

“Stay nearby, Grim, but not too close. I’ll keep you up,” Walter threw over his shoulder. “Let me know if you’re wounded. Damned bridge is longer than it looks.”

“Right,” Grimbald huffed, pounding along behind. “We’re no good at judging distances.”

“Yeah,” his voice trailed off. Walter’s fiery eye found the first to die. The gigantic helmet of a Black Wynch danced back and forth behind the scrambling mass of Death Spawn. It threw its talons up and kicked a reluctant Cerumal towards the mounting ascent up the Great Tree. It let out a few high pitched barks, its talons raking the air.

Walter squinted his eye, conjuring fire in the space the beast occupied. The Black Wynch froze and its body exploded. Chunks of burning flesh soared through the air in all directions, blooming out like a flower of rotting flesh. Howling filled the air. His own, Death Spawn, or the defenders of the tree, he wasn’t sure. Stormcaller cut swirling lines over his head and a sword of fire burst alight from his stump. Water splashed onto the backs of his legs as Grimbald plopped into the bog.

At least twenty Cerumal waded around to face him, eyes like coals going wide and razor bladed mouths dropping open. He raised his blade up over his shoulder. “Run, leave now and I’ll let you live!” he screamed, his voice weak and cracking. He would do no such thing but merely wanted to see how they would react to such an option. Could Death Spawn be reasoned with if they knew their foe? Could they handle this many? Would he fail Grimbald like he had failed Juzo? Grimbald was a few feet away from him in the bog, axes in both hands, their lethal heads dipped into the top of the water. “Got a whole fucking army behind me to slaughter the lot of you!”

“Walter,” Grimbald choked out. “Walter!”

“What?” Walter barked.

“Scab. Something’s wrong.” Grim’s voice sounded distant.

Walter groaned and peered back at Scab to watch him beaming with malevolent pleasure, arms folded over his narrow chest. Scab’s legs weren’t moving, nor were the legs of the men standing behind him. “No,” Walter whispered, his flesh crawling with icy cold. The way the corners of Scab’s lips raised into wicked points said all that needed saying. It was a betrayer’s grin. The mouth of a man whose words were empty.

Scab flamboyantly waved as if parting ways with a dearest friend. His back faded into the woods, his men following behind with eyes hard as stone. “Fucking elixir,” he moaned. How could he have been such a fool?

“What’s wrong, Walt? Why isn’t he coming?” Grimbald said with a frantic note in his voice.

“Stand or run?” Walter asked. He thrust his flaming sword forward and three balls of fire coursed through the air, tearing through armored bodies in front and a few of the bastards behind them. It was a mere warning to them, as he knew what would come.

“Fuck. He left us,” Grimbald stammered. “He left us. Why’d he leave us? Why—”

“He’s a traitor! Stand or run, Grim? Which is it?” Walter yelled.

“He was our friend,” Grimbald said heavily. Walter watched the muscles in his face twitch, working through the pain of betrayal. “Stand!” Grimbald growled, powerful legs thundering through silty water, splashing for his enemies.

“He was never our friend. His only friend is money. We stand,” Walter crouched. “Or we die!” Arrows hissed into the water from above, clanging off armor, some piercing flesh and causing Death Spawn to stumble and fall. Glass shattered behind the mess of Death Spawn, throwing up gouts of fire onto the climbers. A half second later, the peristaltic vibration of a shock wave hit him. The fires flashed up like spikes, throwing a burst of amber light over the murky waters.

He did not fear death, for he knew what lay beyond this life’s illusory veil. Death was another opportunity to pour hate upon his enemies. A spear whooshed over his shoulder, twanging into the bridge’s boards. Walter ran, swallowed down the spittle filling his mouth. Spears collided from the Phoenix shield springing to life at his side, throwing him off balance and landing in the water. Icy cold spilled over his boots, working its tendrils between his toes and under his arches. If he survived this, Scab would pay. Scab would come to know pain. The pains he would endure today would be inflicted upon Scab in triplicate.

A Cerumal dashed at him, its nose like a hog and mouth a twisted canyon of teeth. Its heavy iron boots jangled and threw up sprigs of water with every step. He slashed with Stormcaller and its amber tendrils curled through the beast’s knees, dropping it face first into the muck with a screech. Jets of blood spurted out of its severed legs, mixing with the abyssal water. Walter took a few lunging steps forward, his heel coming up and stomping on the back of its neck with a resounding crack. Hissing escaped from piggy’s lungs, another image added to the gallery of Walter’s nightmares.

“Bastards!” Grimbald screamed, axes throwing up sheets of water as they crashed into the mud below, tearing through both shoulders of a Cerumal whose body had the round shape of a turtle’s. The beast staggered into its brethren, ragged shoulders pumping out with its life essence.

Dark shapes advanced upon him and Walter spared another glance over his shoulder. The only soldiers who remained where he had stood with Scab just moments ago were the trees, always vigilant and unable to flee from the oncoming horde. “You’ll pay for this Scab, damn you!” he screamed towards the bog’s edge, even though Scab couldn’t hear him. Maybe it was for himself. Maybe for Grimbald. He would find a way to hurt him, make him pay for his betrayal. How could he have been such a damned fool?

“Should’ve listened to Nyset, idiot!” he barked. An arrow plunged into his shoulder, hammering into bone and vibrating down to his fingertips. Its fletchings were a strange leathery leaf, wood roughly carved. He looked up to see a man staring down at him, sitting on a long tree limb at least fifty feet in the air. He regarded Walter with curiosity, then gave him a nod. The Phoenix flared around his shoulder, ejecting the arrow from his body with a few drops of blood. It had to have been an accident, he thought. One more accident and he might accidentally throw a fireball into the archer’s guts.

A brick wall collided with his chest, throwing him into the arctic water. Goosebumps tightened up and down his flesh, puckering around his neck. He sucked in a breath, choking on muddy water. A twig found its way inside his cheek. An iron tip glinted from torchlight behind his blurred vision. He rolled, heard the spear hiss into the water at his side. He slashed up with his fire sword, carving a glowing line through a Cerumal’s plated body. Hot and bloody organs fell onto his side, squishing down his back and neck.

“Ugh!” Walter coughed with disgust, flinging the twig from his mouth and throwing a ropy organ from his neck.

Grimbald let out an agonized scream. Walter pushed himself up onto his knees, saw his friend on his back, clutching a spear haft between his palms, the axes discarded at his sides. The Cerumal’s ashen hands tore the spear free and blood jumped from Grimbald’s gut. The bony-faced creature brought the spear up for another savage strike, its teeth gleaming like silver. Walter punched with Stormcaller. Its tendrils stabbed the air like a nightmarish claw. One wrapped around the spear tip, cutting it off. Another pierced through its gut, another encircled its head and hewed it off while another snared its thigh and split a leg into bloody halves, bone splinters flying.

The Cerumal around Grimbald backed off, sending spear thrusts at the slapping tendrils of fire. They were part of him, a natural extension of his own body. He didn’t have to exert his willpower over its tendrils, they merely responded as if wiggling a finger. Sweat mixed with water and trickled along the back of his neck. Walter gritted his teeth, tugged on the Phoenix and sent it into Grimbald, rising up. Walter could feel Grim’s wound stitching up and sealing over as if he were there threading the needle himself. That was a new, strange sensation. He’d never felt that close to the Phoenix. The essences of the gods swelling in his chest was enough to split his mind into shards. It was as if there were two other beings within, each vying for control over his body. The Dragon’s energy wanted blood, fire, burning, and death. The Phoenix wanted life, peace, love and comfort.

“Thanks, Walt,” Grimbald said, grabbing his axes and beating them together with a vicious clang.

Walter’s breath caught a nearby movement, instinctually ducking. Air scraped over his head, talons like daggers brushing together. A Black Wynch’s narrow, toothless mouth snarled open at him. Its breath was warm as a furnace and had the tang of old urine. Its talons whipped open, slashed again at him. He laughed and raised his stump, blocking its arm with his fire sword, hacking it off at the bicep. Its grin fell from its mouth when its severed arm struck the water, dark blood streaking over a jagged stone. Walter’s hand snatched it around its bony neck, hand a crushing vice. His fingers ground into its flesh, snapping through tendons and wrapping around its vile throat. It’s daggers for fingers stabbed at his forearm, clanging from Stormcaller’s Milvorian alloy. Laughter pounded in his head and roared in his chest. He watched its futile attempts at freedom, talons raking across his bracer and throwing up sparks.

“There is no escape!” his voice boomed. He was the torrent of a waterfall, crashing through a cup held right under it. He raised it off its squirming feet, fruitlessly kicking at the water. “You shouldn’t have come here, you shouldn’t be in this realm.” A Cerumal with what looked to be machetes in either hand charged at him and he met it with a bolt of fire between its beady eyes. It fell on broken knees and slapped into the water at his feet, blood welling out around Walter’s ankles like an oil slick.

“Let’s see what’s inside that big fucking head of yours.” Walter slashed up, cutting a line through the Black Wynch’s great pyramid-like helmet. Blood swelled from the iron like a cut wineskin. Walter cut another line beside it, then sent a telekinetic jolt of the Phoenix to tear it free. A strip of metal peeled up, revealing a mass of flesh like roots from a diseased tree, bloody and severed like some bizarre organ. “Ugly—”

Spears stabbed and Walter twisted, using the dead body of the Black Wynch to block. Now probably wasn’t the right time for experiments, he thought. He reveled in the blissful calm of the Phoenix, bringing a grin to his lips. The spears plunged in and out of its ancient flesh, squelching and thudding on bone. The Cerumal that had been climbing up the Great Tree around them started falling and splashing into the water like hurled boulders.

He would not die again. He would not be sent back to the Shadow Realm. “Kill the Black Wynches!” he screamed to Grimbald and saw him extracting the great sickled edge of his axe from between white bones, cracked and deep within a beast’s chest.

“Why?” Grimbald yelled and grunted, working his implements of destruction through another armored body. Grimbald’s axe aimed for a head, but the Cerumal ducked, but not fast enough. A broad strip of flesh was flayed from its face, showing the white of bone underneath, falling with an agonized shriek.

“Because…” Walter spitted a wiry Cerumal on an arrow of fire, shield and notched blade slipping free from its gnarled fingers. “They’ve given them commands. If you kill ‘em, they don’t know what to do.”

“Right.” Grimbald’s axe gleamed from the bog, water trailing behind like a string of diamonds, hanging in the air. The Cerumal on the receiving end raised a crude wooden shield, sword drawn back for a thrust. A crack split the air, wood bits skipped across the bog as the shield broke like glass. Grimbald’s axe was the wind, penetrating through the next layer of its ineffectual armor, driving heavy iron into its stomach in a crippling dent. He rammed the spiked pommel of Corpsemaker in his other hand into its furious eye, raining out with bright scarlet.

Death Spawn backed off around them, forming two partially formed circles along their flanks and pressed back against the base of the Great Tree. The arrows from above came down in a flurry as the Death Spawn were clustered in tight around the tree. They were rabid dogs that needed to be put down.

“Burn!” Walter roared, eye smoking light and fire. White dragons spread up from the water, starting at their center and spreading out to the far edges. Ghostly images of dragons formed in Walter’s vision, blinking flaming wrath over his enemies. Water vaporized into boiling steam, marring skin and heating up their spiked armor. “I don’t need a fucking army! I am the army!” he screamed. His lips curled back into a mad smile.

He fanned his fingers and tens of flaming darts hissed over the water, piercing through chests and burrowing fiery holes through limbs. They were trapped between the fires burning on the Great Tree behind them, between them, and the fire Walter hurled at their front lines. For a second, he started to feel what might have been concern for how it must feel to be burning alive. Then he thought about what they did to Breden, to his home, to Nyset’s family. Everyone he knew was dead and gone because of them.

The ripping teeth, ravaging claws, and mindless fury of the Shadow Realm filled him up with a rage that eclipsed any sense of compassion for those in the conflagration. Fire was the tool of his trade, his carpenter’s hammer, his smith’s ingots. Boiling bodies stumbled for him, cloaked in flames, armor molten. The acrid stench of burning flesh filled the air. When would that smell become sweet? he wondered.

He slashed with both arms and arcs of fire cut bloody swathes through their shrieking forms, dismembering limbs and spilling out with offal. A Cerumal staggered on wobbly legs, its eye hanging from its socket, blood burning and smoking on the hissing water. Fire filled his world; ruining their demonic shells becoming his true purpose.

Pain sprung to life within his flesh from unseen weapons, a background note to the madman’s laughter beating through his chest. Weapons fell from blackened hands, charred flesh crumbled into dust. Grimbald seemed to have created a wide distance between them, standing at least fifteen paces away now.

Walter caught sight of something strange standing out from his body. “What are…?” He stopped, seeing thorned Death Spawn arrows bristling from his chest, arms, and legs. He eyed the curved thorns lining an arrow’s shaft, making them nearly impossible to remove without causing terrible damage. “You think this will stop me?” he screamed. Tears of pain spilled out from the ragged shell of his missing eye, curling down his cheek. The Phoenix could heal him, but nothing would stop the pain from reaching his nerves.

“Oh, my, Walt! Are you alright?” Grimbald yelled from somewhere nearby.

The world seemed to slow as if trudging through molasses. Walter swallowed, saw Grimbald’s mighty arm hacking down through a Black Wynch, splitting it from shoulder to narrow hips. Both of its halves violently squirmed, arms slashing at the air with its dying shriek. Rivulets of blood streamed between the muscular furrows of his veined arms, readjusting for his next opponent. He was marred and nicked, no fatal cuts that Walter could see. That was good because he had a lot of healing to do.

“Walter,” Grimbald stomped up beside him, booted a severed leg out of his way. “You- you’re hurt.”

“Watch out,” Walter managed to croak, pain boiling over his body and cinching down around his throat. “Protect me while I focus on healing, I’ll keep the fire wall up.”

“You got it, Walt.”

Walter closed his eyes, heard Grimbald charging through sloshing water and metal clanging on metal. Never thought I’d see the day where closing my eyes to meditate was advantageous, he thought. The Phoenix swirled in his mind, encircled within the incredible jaws of the Dragon. The Phoenix was made of an ethereal bluish light, dispelling the darkness around it. The mouth of the Dragon was encased in flames that lapped at the edges of his mind’s eye. A soft crooning sang out from the Phoenix’s parted beak, melding into a calming song. Do you present us a sacrifice? The voices of the Dragon and the Phoenix asked in unison. A sacrifice for great power. Power to slay your enemies. Make them return to oblivion.

No, Walter answered in his mind. No sacrifices, unless you can take them, he projected to the gods the images of the Death Spawn burning before him. Take them.

Not a sacrifice. Do not toy with us, mortal. What has been given can be taken, the voice of the Dragon roared with a hidden violence.

What has been done can be undone, the Phoenix softly hummed.

Why… how am I here? he thought.

You request the healing of mended life, the Phoenix responded.

How is this time different than any other time I’ve needed you to heal me?

It is not, the Phoenix said.

You summoned us to hold palaver, the Dragon rumbled.

I’m sorry. I don’t know what — why I did, Walter thought.

We are one, the Phoenix hummed.

Death bonds us, the Dragon said. Open your soul windows, for harm falls upon the host.

The host? What—?

Walter’s eyes snapped open, the world of fire and screaming returning with renewed clarity. He was a pincushion of blue beams of light, ejecting at least twenty Death Spawn arrows from his body and sending them tumbling into the bog.

“You’re back?” Grimbald rammed his shoulder into a Cerumal’s, sending both of them stumbling.

Walter waved his arms in front of his eye, marveling at the shrinking shafts of light closing up all the wounds. Whooping cheers erupted from the branches high above. Walter looked up and thought he might have seen fists punching the air. The light streaming from his flesh reflected from the water like glass in the sun. He grinned down at it and thought he might have been able to see the Phoenix’s feathers whirling in the light.

“Walt!” Grimbald slashed with one axe, missing and thudding into sludge. He hacked down with the other, bouncing from a massive sword lined with saw-like teeth. Grimbald kicked, throwing the Cerumal splashing onto its back. “Get it together!” Grimbald’s arm slapped him hard on the back.

The hypnotic trance of the Phoenix’s healing broke, injecting the reality of war into his body. “I’m back, sorry.” He shook his head, righting his mind.

“Not many left. Don’t think we needed Scab and his crew with you here.”

“I’d be dead without you, trust me on this. And it’s not over yet…” Walter said, nodding at the dark forms spreading out from the other side of the tree. There seemed to be just as many Death Spawn spilling out around the Great Tree as there were on this half.

“Shit,” Grimbald breathed. “How you holding up?” Corpsemaker drew an arc in the air, chopping into the midsection of the downed Cerumal. Blood sprayed out over Grimbald’s face and armor. The Cerumal writhed and shrieked, hands trying to push its split torso back together. Its spilled intestines hung out in red, dangling coils.

Walter spat a glob of foamy spit. “Tired. Healing took a lot out of me. Didn’t even see the arrows come before they hit me.” Walter threw himself into the water to avoid a thrown spear. From the ground, he hurled a fireball into a running Cerumal’s leg, blowing it off at the hip and sending it tottering over. The creature angrily squawked and thrashed at him from the bog, its eyes pulsing with a hot glow.

“Not surprised. You went into that damned blood rage you’re so fond of.”

“Blood rage?” Walter let the wall of fire fade, as all that remained now were roasted bodies and a few staggering forms, soaked in fire.

“Let’s talk about it later?” Grimbald asked, resting his weapons by his side. He leaned on an axe haft, his barrel chest heaving for air. “Not the best time for a discussion, you think?”

“Mhm,” Walter nodded at him. “The rest are coming, get ready. No resting yet.”

Grimbald chuckled. “Thanks for the keen advice.”

“Anytime,” He grinned. It was a stupid, pointless conversation, he knew. It served as a reminder that he was still alive, still in the land of the living. Maybe it did something for Grimbald too. Walter met his eyes for a couple seconds and they exchanged nods.

“We’re a couple of mad men, you know?” Grimbald threw his axes up to rest over his shoulders, stared out at the Great Tree. “Right fucking mad.”

“Suppose we are. Walter Glade and Grimbald Landon… the plaques will read: ‘two crazy fuckers thought they could stop an army of Death Spawn single-handedly.’”

Grimbald let out a rumbling belly laugh. “It is fun though, isn’t it? Never thought I’d say that this… this is living.”

Walter snickered.

The water bristled with smoking bodies, dropped weapons, and streams of blood swirling about their boots. Sweat, mud, and blood speckled their faces in a grisly mix. It was an odd moment, waiting for your enemy to circle around and face you. There was nothing to do but wait, though. A smoking form leaning on a spear collapsed into the water like a crumbling statue. They could’ve gone and met them head on, but that would be a waste of precious energy and would leave less time for arrows from the Great Tree to thin the herd.

“More!” a voice shouted from above

“More come!” another voice cried out from the Great Tree.

“Where do the vile creatures come from?” someone shouted.

“You don’t say?” Walter muttered.

“Must have a good seeing eye lens up there,” Grimbald smirked.

The Death Spawn formed into two masses of dulled iron on either side of the Great Tree’s base. They roared at seeing their fallen brothers, smashing swords, hooks, blades and spears against their armor in a furious din. Four or five pink jets of light stabbed down from above, striking the massive roots near the Death Spawn. It looked like it could’ve been the light of the Phoenix, but he knew it wasn’t.

“Pretty,” Grimbald snorted. “Magics?”

Walter narrowed his eyes. The ground rumbled. Trapped air bubbles welled up to the bog’s surface.

“What is it?” Grimbald asked.

“Don’t know, maybe magic,” Walter said.

The Death Spawn looked just as perplexed, squawking nervously and making space around the roots hit with the strange light. One of the roots vibrated for a second before springing from the ground, throwing up a heavy sheet of mud over the Death Spawn and tossing a few to the ground. The root was more than thirty feet long. The end of the mossy root was lined with smaller roots as thick and long as men. The smaller roots waved in the air, lashing out at Death Spawn and snaring them around the neck, body, and legs. They shrieked, their screams almost loud enough to injure. Walter remembered the first time he’d heard their terrible screaming. It was the day they had spilled into his village during the Festival of Flames, screaming, killing, taking them all by surprise. It was incredible how one short string of events could change the course of your life, he thought. The root snatched a few more Cerumal in its grasp, plunged back into the bog with at least ten Death Spawn coiled in its snares.

Death Spawn hurled spears and stabbed at the wood, seeming hard as iron. The ground vibrated under Walter’s boots again as another incredible root ominously rose into the fog. The beasts screamed. It was a new sound he’d never heard them make before. It might have been terror if he thought they could feel such an emotion.

“What do we do?” Grimbald asked, letting out a heavy exhale.

“Let’s try to pick them off around the edges, stay well clear of those roots. Don’t think they’ll be able to tell the difference between friend or foe.”

“No. Why even try to get close? Let’s just let those roots finish ‘em off, wait it out over here. You’d have to have a broken brain to go near those things.” Grimbald backpedaled a few steps from the Great Tree.

“Shit. Maybe you’re right,” Walter peered back at the bog’s edges, nothing but shadows, vines, and trees. When was Scab’s betrayal written? How long had he kept up the guise? Walter turned back and a group of Death Spawn were sloshing towards them, ignoring the roots. They were led by a Black Wynch at the back, shrieking murder.

“Looks like they did they the deciding for us,” Grimbald said.

“So it does.” Walter tilted his chin up, tugged on more of the Dragon. “Axes, I like your style.” Walter’s sword of fire became an axe the size of Corpsemaker, its edges flickering with Dragons biting at the air. An unexpected feeling of dread washed over him.

Something glimmered in the air. A ball of violet light hovered over the bog in front of the advancing Death Spawn, casting its beautiful glow upon the water’s surface. The beasts stopped in their tracks. Even the Black Wynch halted its incessant talon whipping orchestration. The orb stretched into a razor thin line of purple fire, white at the edges. The end points started spinning in a counter-clockwise rotation, revealing a world of shattered stones, crumbled spires, and burning fires beyond it.

“What—” Walter said, his voice going dry as sand.

“Portal,” Grimbald grunted.

“Shit,” Walter hissed. “Now what?” His throat itched like fingers clawing at his neck.

A feminine figure shining in gold and emeralds stepped through the portal and into the bog, though not without a touch reluctance at placing her shining boot into its waters. Her skin was white as a dove’s. Walter saw she wore intricately woven golden wire securing emeralds over her round breasts and hips, the rest of her mostly bare. Over her shoulders was a heavy fur cloak that trailed to the bottom of the bog, darkening at the bottom where it drank up the water. It was secured by a golden chain with an emerald at the clasp the size of a pigeon’s egg.

The woman took a few steps towards him, her face impassive. She stopped and placed a hand on a wide hip, kicked out to one side. The start of a triumphant smile touched her lips. Her leather boots rose up to her knees, trimmed with golden filigree. Her eyes glowed with a soft violet light he associated with one place alone, the Shadow Realm. Her face was narrow, jawline hard, mouth small and lips plump. Her straight obsidian hair trailed down to her backside, shining with the light of her eyes at the edges.

A root plunged into the water behind her and this group of Death Spawn, attacking those foolish enough to try to fight it. It crashed down with their puny forms writhing in its clutches, cutting off their screams with watery graves. An ashen arm and a leg squirmed above the water, thrashing at lily pads.

“What-what is she?” Grimbald stammered, taking a courageous step forward, axes held across his body.

“Not sure. Not a friend, I’d guess,” Walter said as casually as he could muster. Someone had to be the glue that would hold them together.

“At last, we finally meet,” her cool voice said. “You have brought pains for the Great Lord Asebor, the ruler of this world.” She took a few steps closer through the bog. Globs of mud found their way onto her porcelain thighs. “I shall give you the chance to bow before me. Submit and yield to the demon god and you’ll not be made a Norm, rendered powerless as the sheep of this world. You could even, perhaps, join us if he could forgive you.”

Walter sucked the foamy spit from the sides of his cheeks and tried to will it to cover his throat so he could speak. “Who are you?”

“Why? Well, it doesn’t matter.” She licked her lips, giving them a glistening sheen. “I am the Death Stealer to some, Alena to some in this age. I have had many names over the ages… many forms.” She traced a hand between her breasts, fingers partially covered with strange gold rings molded to look like talons. A red line bloomed under her skin around the flawless edge of a breast.

“You’re responsible for Scab?” Walter nodded back to the spot where Scab had left them.

“Who? Oh, the mercenary cretin? The one who traveled with you?” Alena grinned. “A most distasteful fellow. I suppose that sometimes we must put aside our notions of who we should parley with.”

Walter folded his arms and she stepped closer, less than fifteen paces away now. “Stop. Don’t come any closer.” Walter flared the fire in his eye, flashing with brilliance reflecting from all of her gold. She must have had all manner of tricks and he needed to keep her distant. She kept trying to bridge the gap between them. A step here, a step there, and before he knew it, those talons would be in his neck.

“My apologies. Can’t we speak… as friends? We’re a lot alike, you know.”

“We’re nothing alike,” Walter growled.

“More than you’d know.” Alena grinned, blinking her hooded eyes. Her eyebrows were razor thin and arched up at the ends. She gestured with her white arm. “We both serve masters much more powerful than ourselves, we’ve killed hundreds that have stood in our way, we both have an insatiable hunger for vengeance, to inflict our pains upon the world. Does that sound… familiar?”

“I-we’re nothing like you. All we want is peace, but you can’t have that.” He shook his head. “The time for peace has long passed. Passed the day you and these fucking creatures attacked my village,” Walter said.

“Creatures, men… all the same, really.” Alena pushed her cloak back over her shoulders and puffed her chest out. “Yes, you can’t blame your bandit man, though, can you?” She tilted her head and a string of black hair crossed over her white stomach. “You weren’t going to pay him and we… could, much more than you agreed to, I might add. He wasn’t entirely too difficult to dissuade.”

Walter and Grimbald shared a glance. Grimbald’s icy eyes were wide, his massive jaw squirming with tension.

“We should have expected that. Stupid, really. I’m glad he’s happy, though. Truly, it makes knowing who should be on the receiving end of my wrath that much easier.” Walter tried to mirror her casual tone, but it came out all warbling

“Oh, he is. He’ll have enough marks to drink.” She brushed the mud from her thighs. “And fuck away the rest of days, I gather. Going to get himself a nice place in Eagle’s Edge.”

Walter grinned, knowing where Scab was filled him with its fire. There will be a nice place for Scab in Eagle’s Edge, burning on my sword. “You marched through a small village to the southwest, Breden. Didn’t you?”

“We did,” she drawled. “An idyllic little settlement. It was such a cute place. Maybe I’ll have children there someday, perhaps, if my womb wasn’t already a dried out husk.”

“That was my home,” Walter said, teeth grinding together. It took everything he had not to carve a bloody hole through her beautiful face.

“Yes, yes. Everything was your home,” she pouted. “What is it with your kind and placing so much value on dead wood? Home is where you are.” She laughed as she said the last bit.

Walter’s skin burned hot as fire, mist hissing around him. His fingers cut bloody ellipsis into his palms. “You—” He couldn’t speak for fear of spewing out the vomit lurching in his guts. “You killed them,” he whispered, staring into the swirling water. A rot fly landed on a lily pad, using its wide proboscis to vacuum up spots of dark blood.

“We had fun with your village. You’ve been there since then? Oh, I can see that you have! Oh yes! Are you pleased with our work?” She clapped her hands together. “We found novel ways of putting men to the pike. I think my favorite still is through the backside and out the mouth. It leaves the piked in such a wonderful state. Tough to get the spike through the guts without piercing out through the abdomen, though some of them are quite good at it now.” She used her thumb to gesture back at the Cerumal. That elicited a few barks and squawks from them.

Her words were like iron nails, each driving harder than the last through his bones. “Thank you,” Walter said, slowly bobbing his head.

“For what?” Alena asked, regarding him with a savage hunger as if she were preparing to eat him. Perhaps she was, he wouldn’t put the idea of cannibalism past the Wretched. They must have earned the name for good reasons.

“For coming here, of course.” Walter shrugged and Alena’s neck twitched.

Grimbald grunted, partially turned to face him with a furrowed brow of confusion.

Death Spawn softly gibbered as the ground boomed. Another root hammered into the earth, crushing the remains of the group still trying to slaughter the animated wood. Walter watched a Cerumal fighting to free its neck from the root’s coiled hold. Its bald head popped free from its neck, splashing into the mud below. The root raised up again, still holding the limp body of the Cerumal. Arrows arced into the air, harmlessly thumping into the root.

“For… coming here?” She cast a glance over her shoulder, eyes shifting from the roots to him.

“Yes,” Walter said flatly. “For saving me the time of having to hunt you down. For making the task of tearing you apart limb by bloody limb that much easier. No, I think,” he swallowed. “I think today I shall learn how to put a woman on the pike.”

Alena melodiously laughed and started to turn away from him, walking towards the Death Spawn. “You’d fit well with us. You have violence in your heart. I like you. Do you like me?” She turned back to him, licked her lips, tugged on her top to reveal the deep curve of her breasts.

Grimbald grunted. “Can we shut her up already?”

Walter thought he had lost some of himself over the past year. It paled in comparison to this woman’s madness. She implies the bedroom after speaking about torture in the same breath. “Have you heard from your woman in Woodland Plunge lately? The one with the dragon made up of plants?” Walter asked.

Alena’s head whipped over her shoulder, eyes flashing with violet. “What do you know of her? You?”

“Me.” It was his turn to smile and turn the knife.

“What did you do?” she snarled, flashing ivory teeth sharpened to points.

A laugh bubbled free from Walter’s mouth. He nodded as more laughter stumbled out of his throat, booming in his chest. It was the laugh of madness, the laugh of a man who had become what he hated. But what other choice did he have? They created this.

Grimbald took a step back from the two of them, snorting and licking his lips. “Walter?”

“She begged me for mercy!” Walter said between laughs. An unprecedented rage boiled in his veins. “Mercy! Can you believe the audacity? There is no mercy for the Dragon!” He dropped his voice. “There will be no mercy for you, Alena.”

Alena seemed to shrink, her shoulders and back drawn in. “You-you’ll pay for what you’ve done, mortal!” She screamed with desperation, stabbing golden fingers at him. “Attack! Kill them! You’ll be flayed for years, boy!” Roars and shrieks filled the expansive bog from the Death Spawn. They pounded through the water, spilling in around Alena and shrouding her with their bulk.

Walter thought he heard Alena chanting with unfamiliar words. Nyset might have recognized them, he thought. A violet beam lanced the fog and pierced through the veil of clouds. The beam shattered into hundreds of smaller fragments, each crashing back down into the bog and striking individual Death Spawn as they charged.

The Death Spawn changed. Their bodies swelled in size, both flesh and armor almost doubling. Their skin took on a soft glow, eyes shimmering with amber in the middle and violet around the edges. Their roaring magnified as their heads grew, echoing through Walter’s chest through his gaping mouth.

There was a fatal flaw in their charge. They didn’t know the force they marched against. They ran in a line, the beasts at the back screaming at those in the front. Walter grinned. “Brace yourself, Grim! Some will get through, cover me!” Walter focused on the strength of the Phoenix. Its cool touch was less familiar to him than the Dragon’s rage. Its sense of peace was a surprising sensation in the heat of battle, but it allowed him to think, gave him room to breathe. Anger could be channeled into something useful, but most of the time it only served to punish the angry.

Walter blinked and six horizontal portals sprang to life at hip height of the sprinting Death Spawn. They lined up from end to end, forming a razor-thin band of blue light that cut across them like tripwire. He wouldn’t have noticed them had he not created them and that was what made it so beautiful.

“Shit! What is that?” Grimbald said. He was always a keen observer.

“Portals,” Walter hissed. “There will be blood.”

“Oh!” Grimbald said, banging his axes together. “C’mon, you bastards! Come and taste my steel!” he shouted.

They were drawing closer to the peacefully glowing portals, a second or two away. The portals opened into the Silver Tower’s practice yard. A pang of worry struck Walter then. What if something saw them and came through on this side? They were a few strides away now. Not to worry, if anything did try to come, they would soon be met with surprise.

“C’mon!” Walter yelled. The concentration required for keeping so many portals up at once was tremendous. He felt like there was a three-hundred-pound weight on his back trying to press him into the mud. Sweat beaded down his temples and the center of his back. His heart thudded like an axe hacking into wood.

“You shits!” Grimbald screamed.

The doubly large Death Spawn collided with the portals with a terrible shriek of pain. The portals cut clean lines through their thighs, knees, hips and sliced savagely through midsections as if their armor were mere sheets of paper. Broken bodies fell into the portals, heads and shoulders not fitting at the edges and falling to the bog in bloody chunks. Racing legs removed from knees rolled into muddy water. Their ruined bodies fell into tangled heaps, limbs falling every which way interspersed with glowing weapons.

Some of them realized what was happening and tried to stop, digging their heels in and grasping at their brothers pushing them from behind. A Cerumal whose nose and lips appeared to have been amputated turned to run in the other direction. The one behind him had lizard’s scales crawling over his cheeks and shoved him forward, unaware of Walter’s trap. The front most Cerumal fell between the edges of two portals, slicing both of his arms off and leaving just a sliver of his torso remaining. Lizard face bumped into a portal’s edge, cutting half-way into his thigh. The beast screeched and fell onto the ground, blood welling out from the wound.

Never would have thought a transportation spell could be so destructive, Walter thought. He wondered if the Phoenix knew, or cared how he used the portals.

There were at least three more rows of Death Spawn stomping into the portals. A few had made it around the insidious trap, pounding towards them with renewed fury.

“Grim!” Walter said, his jaw muscles aching.

“On it!” Grimbald lunged forward, raised his axes and chopped at the glowing Cerumal. Its curved sword flashed up, clanging off Grimbald’s axes in a lightning fast parry. It sent a massive fist into Grimbald’s face, bones popping. Grimbald grunted, ducked a savage backswing, sword throwing a glittering line of water through the air. Grimbald thrust his pommel up into its jaw, dislodged a few upper teeth and sent them tumbling like pebbles into the water.

A few more Cerumal tried to stop themselves from being pushed into Phoenix’s portals, reaching out to grasp its edges, unaware of the futility. Walter watched as one beast’s hands were cut clean through the palms, its body vaulting into the portal, its exit hovering about fifty feet above the practice yard. Its severed fingers thumped on top of the mounting pile of limbs, the only parts of its body still remaining here.

Behind the Cerumal marching into the portals, beams of violet light lashed out from Alena’s whipping arms, her cloak flapping behind from an unseen wind. The fog around her flashed with violet brilliance. She hurled them at the animated roots, blowing out ragged pieces and throwing splinters, moss and leaves in every direction. Arrows rained down from the Great Tree, turning to ash before striking her and drifting away in a gentle breeze. She pushed another beam of light through a root, severing it at the base. It groaned and snapped, crashed into the bog, threw up a wave of mud over herself and the few remaining Death Spawn. She turned her attention up at the tree, raking down with clawed hands. Bodies were jerked from limbs, screaming and flailing. They slapped into the mud, spraying out blood from the impact.

“Shit, shit.” Walter grimaced, squinting into the fog.

Two more oversized Cerumal advanced on Grimbald, one with a lash and another brandishing a pair of sharpened hooks the length of daggers. Walter was torn between helping him and keeping up the portals for a few more seconds. “C’mon, Grim,” he hissed.

Grimbald backed up and the Cerumal fanned out at his flanks. One wielding a sword had been cut across its belly, blood rolling down its dull plated thighs. Walter helplessly watched, his feet rooted to the ground in intense concentration. The one bearing hooks darted in, raking with cat-like swiftness. Grimbald blocked one hook with his gauntlet and the other lanced through his hand and tore one of his axes free. The other Cerumal cracked its whip, snapping over Grimbald’s head and splitting it open in a grisly line. The hook bearer jerked the hook in Grim’s hand, dragging him to the ground, palm snared in a rusty loop of iron. He screamed in pain, dropped Corpsemaker, grabbing his hooked palm with his other hand.

Grim’s screaming ripped at him. Sometimes friends had to die to destroy your enemy, he thought with iron. Walter dropped the portals as the last line of Cerumal stopped at their edges, seeing the trap without being forced by the mindless at their rear.

Walter grunted, pushed with the Phoenix, slamming the Cerumal wielding the hooks into the one with the sword. The sword clanged through the hook wielder’s ribs, shooting out broken loops of chain mail, the sword point emerging through the other side of its torso and letting out a high-pitched squeal.

Grimbald howled in agony, clutching his hand to his chest on a mound of mud. Walter tossed a fireball into the sword wielder’s face, head ripping apart and throwing out bits of burning tissue. He ran for the hook wielder before it could get up, recovering from the shock of watching its brother’s destruction. “Die!” He stabbed at its gut with his stump, sword of fire springing out and lancing it through its chest. Fireballs would drain him much faster than conjuring fire weapons. He had a feeling he was going to need every last shred of strength he had today.

Something bit into Walter’s arm, sent him reeling on unsure legs. A long strip of leather coiled around Stormcaller, a lash he realized, jerking him towards an opened mouth with gleaming wolf’s teeth. He remembered what Juzo had done to him so many moons ago in their Sid-Ho dojo. The teeth snapped at his face, jerked his neck back, felt the beast’s spittle strike his eyes and used the momentum to throw a knee into its gut. What he forgot was that this creature was wearing armor. His knee bounced from its iron gut and bolts of pain radiated up his leg. He put his leg down and felt something pop in his knee, sending him plopping into muck. The Cerumal dove at him, carnivorous jaws gaping open. Walter pushed himself to roll, but his arm only sank deep into icy mud.

His world went black for an instant. Violence rattled in his head, smashing his skull and yanking on his neck. Red spots bloomed in his vision, face covered in hot wetness. Pain exploded in his face, feeling like a vice grip crushed down around his temples. Walter’s eye flared, pushing the Dragon’s hate through the socket. The Cerumal yelped then the tension on his skull eased. Hot blood spilled over his face and into his mouth, overwhelmingly metallic. The creature slumped onto his chest, pushing the breath out of his lungs. The Phoenix flared around his knee, neck, face and back, stitching up wounds and putting ligaments back in their proper places. Back to the Shadow Realm, he thought. He coughed and spat out the Cerumal’s revolting blood to his side, cheek scraping on cold mud. He groaned and sent a blast of air to push the beast off of him, rolling into shallow waters at his side.

Grimbald was shouting somewhere in a mix of pain and a war cry. Walter dragged himself up, heavy with mud clinging to his clothing. “What happened?” Walter looked him over, ears ringing. They had a few seconds before the remaining ten or so Cerumal would be on them and they looked unusually angry.

“I’ll be alright, you okay?” Grimbald had Corpsemaker hanging loosely in one hand, the other a ragged mess held to his chest. His hand had been torn in half up the middle, dividing his fingers into two bloody sections. Flesh hung in jagged flaps, sliced away as if it had been mistaken for a pig roast ready to be served. His blood was dark with mud.

“Shit, the hook. Oh! I’m sorry! I did that,” Walter stammered, grabbed Grim’s hand and pressed the Phoenix’s healing into it. Walter felt more of himself drain out with that. He realized then that healing someone else was significantly more taxing than healing himself. Exhaustion sank its claws deep into his psyche. The shattered bones pulled together, melting as if turned to liquid and fusing together. New skin started pulling over the wound and the tendons hanging out of his palm slipped inside like scared worms. Layers of flesh knitted over his hand, painting what remained of the wound with fresh baby’s skin.

“That’s amazing… incredible,” Grimbald said, staring at his flexing fingers. His eyes whirled up to the approaching enemy. “Haircuts for everyone!” Grimbald screamed. With bloody hands he chopped into a lash bearer, splitting it through the helmet and skull, throwing out bits of brains and bone fragments.

Walter was frozen. How could he have done this to someone he called a friend? It was careless, stupid. This was how Juzo died. This is how a man murders his friends. Walter dragged his eyes from Grim, smashing aside the self-pity threatening to bury him. Walter was forced into the present by a giant scythe glinting and aimed down at him. Death would not take him today.

He didn’t see the face of the creature that had chosen to die next. He dashed in, scythe crashing into water at his back, pressed his stump to its gut and willed a fireball to be there. It saved him a bit of energy not needing to be thrown. The fireball materialized inside its stomach, internally scorching its guts. Its great scythe fell from uncurled fingers and plopped into the bog. Walter snatched the weapon as the beast collapsed, blasted the weapon with a Phoenix thrust and sent it spinning through the air and hammering through a Cerumal’s chest, pinning it to the ground. A portal winked between a pair of massive Cerumal, slicing them in half at the chest and sending their squelching bodies rolling into each other. Walter shook his head at their tumbling bodies, wondered if the demons on the other side felt their pain.

Grimbald chopped through an arm and a knee in one continuous show of power. His axe came around in a mighty arc, hammering down from overhead and freeing the beast from its skull. Blood sprayed over his face, a demon’s mask of scarlet and mud. “This is for my Pa!” he roared, teeth bloody and grinning like a barbarian from the stories.

Walter heaved a breath, saw Alena stalking towards them. The fog around her glowed as she sloshed through water, her body covered in dripping mud, the once luxurious hair now a matted rat’s nest against the side of her face. “Shit.” He felt like his well of strength was already starting to come up empty. But there was always more, wasn’t there? “Always more,” he grunted. He slashed with Stormcaller, tendrils reaching up and cutting the throats of two massive Cerumal holding axes the size of Grimbald’s. Their blood pumped out with gurgling jets, spraying across lily pads.

“Get her, I’ll finish these.” Grimbald thumped into his shoulder, almost throwing him into the mud.

“You sure?”

“I’m sure,” Grimbald huffed, blood trailing down his jaw from his head wound. Walter pushed a bit more Phoenix healing into him, saw the wound starting to knit.

Walter met Alena’s glowing eyes, pulsing with the light of the Shadow Realm. They both stopped with ten paces between each other, her hands balled up by her sides. Rivulets of mud curled down her chin and between her breasts. “You can’t win,” she snapped. She dragged her talons through her hair, combing it back in deep valleys. “It’s time for you to return to the Shadow mother, I’m told she misses you.”

“Never! I’ll never go back… and if I do it will be for one reason, to cut the whore’s ugly head off.” Walter felt the humid air enter through his nostrils, spiraling deep into his lungs. He saw her hand twitch before it came up, grinning. He jerked a legless Cerumal corpse from the bog, hurled it at her. The body collided with her violet beam, turning to ashes and fluttering to the ground.

Walter gritted his teeth, countered with a volley of the three fireballs, arcing up and crashing down where she stood. She flicked her golden fingers up and bodies of the fallen Great Tree’s fighters sprouted from the ground, leaping like puppets for the fireballs. They exploded in a hail of embers, burning flesh hissing into the water. “I like this game,” she smiled, tilted her head up at him. “We’d make a lovely pairing you know.”

“Alena,” Walter laughed. “The only thing you’ll be paired with is a pike through your ass.”

“Children can’t be reasoned with.” The corner of her lip rose in a smirk.

The mud rumbled below his boots and Walter’s eyes searched for a root he might have missed. Something cinched around his ankles, throwing him off balance. He looked down and saw bones. Long dead hands were wrapped tight around his ankles. “What is—”

Hot pain cut through his gut. Alena was before him, his blood streaking across her chest. She slashed at him again with her golden talons, glowing with trails of violet. He raised his gauntleted arm, talons releasing a shower of sparks as they raked down Stormcaller. “Die, bitch!” He sprayed a cone of fire from his stump, but it traveled around her as if striking a Milvorian wall. Some type of shield, maybe. The bony hands around his ankles crumbled into chars and he kicked them free. Walter punched with his other arm, snatching a rock the size of his head from the muck and sending it smashing into her. The rock bounced from an invisible shield and Alena grunted. The rock threw up a spout of water as it struck the bog some distance behind her, tossing her onto her back from the impact. It put some distance between them, gave him a second of breathing room.

His movements aggravated his gut wound, irresistibly forcing him to hunch over. Snakes of pain traveled down to his legs, making his quadriceps quiver. He looked at his gut and saw the Phoenix glowing bright as the sun, fighting to patch up the three deep cuts she’d made. They weren’t healing, though, and his blood continued oozing out. This was what Asebor had done to him, how he’d been killed. The thought sent a shiver through his arms. There was something about her power that he couldn’t heal. Was this how the other dual-wielder had been killed? “Shit,” he breathed, looking up as Alena crawled up to stand. He couldn’t take more damage from her or he’d bleed out before he could finish this.

She let out a triumphant laugh. “Your power is no match for the Shadow god’s gifts, you sad, pathetic farm boy. You and your kind are sheep for slaughter.” She plunged a bloody finger into her mouth, leaving some on the corner of her lip. “You… taste sweet.” She smiled with her shark’s teeth.

It wasn’t possible, was it? The Dragon or the Phoenix had to harm her. He had injured Asebor in the Shadow Realm. But maybe things were different there? He could kill her, damn it. She had to pay for her crimes, one way or another or he would die trying.

Her body became violet light, blinking out of existence and materializing a foot in front of him. Walter gasped. She slashed at him. He blocked her wiry arm with his stump and punched as hard as he could. He felt his knuckles crunching against her jaw, sending her reeling back. Alena’s cocky smile fell away, replaced with the twisting of pain. Something shimmered in the air around her. The shield? A chance. He flared fire, shooting a beam from his eye trained on her chest. “Burn!” His voice rasped in his throat.

She dove for the bog and Walter followed, a beam of fire cutting her through the hip. She wailed from the ground and blood ejected from her white flesh. She jabbed a finger into the smoldering wound, blood pushing out around it.

“No match, you say?” Walter lunged forward, raised his boot and stomped on her knee, snapping it in the wrong direction. “You’ve spent too many years relying on your powers, forgetting you could be harmed by a farm boy’s fist.”

She whipped her arm out, world filling up with violet and white. Walter threw up a shield in time, but the impact of her strength sent him rolling back, tumbling legs over head and slopping through the bog. Sheets of cold mud burrowed up his shirt and down his pants, freezing his fruits. The muddy world filled in around him, collapsing over his form sinking in the sludge. He tried to push up on his stump and gritted his teeth at its useless length. He rolled over onto a stone, choking on shallow waters. “Shit!” he spat and coughed, sloughed off the heavy mud coating his eye with his hand.

He blinked, saw Alena standing over him like a creature formed of mud. Her untarnished skin and gleaming gold were now mud habitats. “You could have been something more,” she murmured. She started to raise her palm. Walter growled, kicked her in the shin, throwing her leg out, sending her collapsing on top of him. Walter wrapped her up in a crushing embrace. She smelled like ancient earth and strawberries. Her body was soft as babe’s, weak as a child’s. Walter felt her exhale and squeezed down harder before she could get another breath. Her mud heavy hair fell on his face. She squirmed, but her arms were pinned against his stomach. He wrapped his legs around her ribs, squeezing as hard as he could. It might have appeared to an outsider as if they were the opposite of enemies.

“Let me go!” she demanded, wriggling in his grasp.

“No,” he whispered into her ear, staring at the clouds parting to let a beam of light lance through.

Her talons tried to work into him, biting like flies. Her breasts were soft against his chest, inviting, if not for their murderous owner. Her hips gyrated against him, trying to create space between his crushing thighs. Every time he felt her soft breath against his ear, he squeezed further, reducing her airspace.

“This is where it ends for you,” he whispered. He felt a quiver go through her.

“Please,” she sobbed. “He gave me no choice.”

“Die,” Walter said, his voice iron.

“Fuck. You!” she hissed.

She twisted her head, trying to bite his neck. He snaked his hand up higher, wrapping it up around her neck and driving it over his shoulder, pressing her face into the inch or so of water cooling his back. She started blubbering in the mud, every muscle of her body fighting to survive. Her body started to blink with violet light but Walter engulfed his in fire, shattering her concentration. She screamed in his ear, her flesh smoking and blistered, stinging his nostrils. He drove his palm into the back of her head, further pressing her face into the pool of water. Something clicked in her neck, covering her nose with earth. She kicked and carved furrows in the mud, screams bubbling out. He held her there, listened to her muffled screams, staring up at the ever widening light beam. Eventually, her fingers stopped scratching, legs kicking, and screams silenced. He gave a final squeeze, pushing out the remaining air lingering in her lungs.

He unwrapped his arms and legs, laying spread-eagled. He took a long breath, uncaring of the corpse pressing down on him. How many more people would he have to kill? How many more screams of the dead would haunt his sleep? Would he ever sleep peacefully again? Tears pushed through his eyes, cutting salty lines through the mud. Alena’s last words resonated through his skull. He gave me no choice. She hadn’t given him a choice either. What was it about man that compelled him to live, despite the horrors of life? He wondered.

“Walter!” Grimbald trudged through shallows, then onto the muddy bank. “No!”

“I’m… alright, I think.” He started to push Alena’s body off, then Grimbald tossed it aside like a piece of garbage. Her body flopped like a doll’s from the mound of mud and rolled face first into the water, gilded ass left up in the air.

“What happened?” Grimbald reached under his shoulders and dragged him to his feet. Walter’s world lurched and would have collapsed had Grimbald not been there to hold him up.

“She’s dead,” Walter nodded at her. “One more of the Wretched scratched from history.” He turned to him and smiled wearily. “You alright?”

“Been better,” he forced a laugh. Walter saw there was a dagger sticking out of his side.

“Go on, remove it. I’ll take care of it.” Walter moved back a step, shook his head and regained his focus.

“I can’t.” Grimbald frowned. “Would you?”

Walter blew out his cheeks. “Alright.” He wrapped his hand around the dagger. “On three.”

Grimbald nodded, lines of worry creasing his eyes.

“One…” Walter jerked the dagger out and immediately sent Phoenix healing into it.

“Damn you!” Grimbald moaned. “That’s my trick.”

Walter smiled at him. “Here’s a souvenir.” He handed him the dagger. It had spikes on the guard, the blade wide as a hand. The world went black at the edges. “Think. Think that’s it for me. Not recovered from… yesterday.” Walter collapsed into Grimbald’s arms, felt him catching him. The light of the world faded and Walter fell asleep in the man’s great arms.

Chapter 14

The Elders

“I wait for Walter’s return. I feel him draw nearer, like a hollow in my stomach closing up, a deep longing.” -The Diaries of Nyset Camfield

Dismembered bodies littered the lake of blood. Ancient spears stood out from the ground, ringed in a series of browns and reds along their hafts. The rings on the spears were markers from times when the bloody lake had reached new heights during times of war, famine, and disease. There were days where men nearly scraped themselves clean from the map, days when the Shadow god’s pets greedily drank from their vessels.

A great hand stood out in the center of the lake, made up of strange red stones. Skulls, Walter remembered, watched them take on the shape of a man’s head. They were laughing at him, or maybe they were crying. They had no teeth. Where had they all gone?

Nyset’s hazel eyes stared down at him from the edge of the incredible hand, her face as emotionless as stone. She wore wine red armor, seeming to be painted over her skin. Her hips were sharp and stomach nearly concave. She was still as a corpse, watching him like he was a worm crawling through soil, like she was a hawk about to swoop down and snatch him up for a morning snack.

“Nyset?” Walter asked, bare feet crunching into the gravely bones. One of them cut his foot, but he didn’t care. “Nyset!” he screamed, but she only stared. “What’s wrong? Why? Why don’t you come down to me? Why aren’t you coming? Why?” he pleaded, felt his chest twisting with anxiety and want.

Nyset’s head tilted, almost imperceptibly. The blood-red moon shone from the side of her carapace like helmet.

Walter swallowed. “Wait. Where am I?” he whirled around, realizing the significance of this place. “No. I can’t be back. I-I didn’t die. Did I? Please, oh please no. But I won… I killed her. Didn’t I? You’re… the Shadow Princess.” He reached his stump up at her, muscles firing in a string of pain. He jerked his arm back, holding it to his chest. “What did you do?” he demanded.

Something shifted in the endless shadows. Demonic faces came into view. Snarling tongues, twisted legs, great pincers, and fat, hanging jowls appeared all around. “No,” his throat clamped down. “No!” he screamed, reaching for the Dragon’s fury, seeking peace in the Phoenix.

A demon with the face of an old crone grinned at him, chin studded with hairy warts. She had what could only be children’s arms and legs, hanging limp from a giant pouch worn over her belly. It was a soggy red at its bottom. “Had you come earlier, you might’ve saved the children,” the crone laughed and stroked the dead limbs like a pet. “Now they’re mine for the keepings. You failed them.”

He gave me no choice. You could have been something more, Alena’s crisp voice said in his head.

“This is where it ends for you,” his voice said, sounding like it was someone else’s.

The world of shadows dashed away. His eye snapped open, screaming cut through his ears, seared his throat. It was him, he realized and stopped. He sucked in a few labored breaths, staring at the tongue of fire that burned at his side. It was a lantern. “Where am I?” he croaked? He rose up onto his elbows, staring about the strange room. Pain spiked through his gut, making him wince. It all came back now.

He must have been in the Great Retreat, perhaps the Great Tree. He was in some sort of wooden structure, round with a conical roof. He was lying in a bed of leaves, each as big as his head. Where was everyone?

“Grim? Grimbald?” he asked the darkness. The darkness did not respond.

The lantern merrily hissed on a chamber of yellowy oil. He threw a roughly woven blanket from his body, tossing it onto the floor. He moaned at the pain in his stomach greeting him again. His neck ached, head pounding like there were Shroomlings in there building a house. He brought his legs over the side of the bed, crudely made from logs that still had bark and lichen covering them. They scratched at his calves. He massaged his temples with thumb and index fingers. He still had pants on he saw, rolled up, and feet bare. Ellipsis of dirt arced under his toenails.

There were pinking bandages wrapped around his bare stomach. It was Alena that had wounded him, but she was dead now. There was some sort of dark paste on his wound, spilling out around the bandage, a salve of some sort he guessed. They wouldn’t try to hurt him, would they? No, otherwise they would’ve already done worse, or maybe he’d be in chains. If he were dead, he’d be in the Shadow Realm. He wasn’t there, was he? “No,” he whispered and nodded. “The land of the living.”

He closed his eye and noticed the sounds. Voices were engaged in soft conversation somewhere. Wind rustled through branches, whispering through slits in the hut. Chimes sang in soothing tones, beckoning for relaxation. He felt the warmth of his body heat drifting off the bed.

He rubbed his eye and flicked a piece of grit out from the corner. His fingers went to his missing eye and delicately traced around the ragged socket. It felt like a crater of flesh, bumpy around the edges where the demon who’d taken it had chipped away a bit of bone. Skin had been pulled over the spot where his eye should have been, tight as a drum. He had never taken the proper time to inspect it. It must have been a revolting sight, not that his looks mattered much anymore anyway. He could look like the ugliest of Cerumal as far he cared, as long he eventually got his hands around Asebor’s throat. In the end, nothing else mattered.

He opened his eye and snatched the lantern from the table. He rose up, stretched back, lantern swinging from his hand and throwing light around the hut. His clothing hung from the ceiling on hooks, cleaned and seeming to be drying. He sniffed his hands, smelling like a strange fruity flower. He was well purged of mud, not an ounce of it still on him. He’d have to thank who did that. It had been a long time since he had a proper bath and must’ve smelled like a hog who had rolled in shit.

He tugged his black shirt from a carved wooden hook, put the lantern on the floor, and slipped it over his head. It had been mended where Alena had cut him. His chest was gripped with a sudden tightness, transfixed by the lantern’s dancing flame. There was still much to be done. He had to get back to Nyset, try again to get help from that bastard King Ezra, kill Scab. He growled. “Damn you, Scab.” The lantern’s fire shrunk down as he said it, maybe even fearing his words.

He needed to figure out how to kill Asebor. He had harmed him the Shadow Realm, hadn’t he? There had to be a better way. Maybe Nyset had figured something out. She was always the smart one. She would know what to do.

Maybe Juzo knew something — no. He shuddered. He was long dead. Dead by his hands. Dead by his uncontrolled fire. “Fucking idiot,” he balled up his fist and tightened his eye, opened it, fire blurring with tears. An image of Juzo flashed in the flame and the room went away. A hole was burned clean through his head. Then there was blood. So much blood came through that smoldering hole. His white hair was red with it, his coat bathed in blood. It was his fault his friend was dead.

Something inside of himself, tucked away and long covered, felt as if it had just broken through. He felt an empty desperation seize his throat, making it hard to breathe. The image would be with him forever, he knew. Whenever his mind wandered, it returned to his ruined face like a cyclically abused wife, always going back for more. Perhaps it wouldn’t be enough until it killed him.

He was nothing. He was a murderer of those dearest to him. He brought a quivering fist in front of his stomach, hesitating and watching it as if in dream, a living nightmare. He rammed his fist into his gut at the wound site, splitting whatever had been healed into ragged halves. “Your fault!” he hissed, pain sprouting through his body in vicious blooms. “He’d be alive if you weren’t so reckless,” he said through sobs.

He dropped to his knees, staring at the fire, the only friend he could never kill. He punched the wound in his stomach again and again. Blood soaked through his bandages and formed a dark spot under his shirt. He collapsed against his knees, pressing his face into the floor, wetting the coarse wood with tears. “Juzo, Juzo,” he moaned. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, sorry.” The wood cut his cheek, Phoenix lightly sparkling in his eye and bringing him a measure of peace.

He fell asleep there for some time. He wasn’t sure how much time passed, but when he woke, it was still night, hopefully, the same day. The light of the Phoenix faintly glowed from behind the weave of his shirt, fighting in vain to patch up the product of his self-flagellation. He lifted his shirt with a wince, pressed some of the disturbed salve back into the wound.

He felt a bit of the pain ease down, but it still burned like the embers of a dying fire. He liked the pain. It was a throbbing reminder of his mistakes and the fragility of life. He wished he could tell someone how much he liked it, but some secrets were better kept sealed. Some secrets were contagious and he feared this might be one of them. He rubbed his eyes, sore from crying. “Get it together, Walt,” he whispered. His missing eye could still produce tears, the only part that still seemed to function.

Where was Grimbald? Was he well? He rose up and slipped on his boots, still damp with wet. That was good, that meant he hadn’t been sleeping for days. What was bad was that his strength was still severely drained. At this point, a few fireballs would lull him into another day’s sleep. All debts had to be paid eventually.

He left his cloak hanging, still heavy and needing more drying time. Where was Stormcaller? He looked under the bed, on the table, inside his satchel filled with sundries, but it was gone. Perhaps it had been ruined by Alena’s attack. He sighed and blew out his cheeks. If they had found his satchel, then they had found his mount, which he’d named Kez again. He was a good horse and was glad someone had likely taken care of him.

Laughter split the air, carrying in through his parted door. It made him smile with inner warmth. When had he last heard genuine joy? People still could be happy, even in the midst of this enemy’s clutches. He went to the door, gently laid his hand upon it. He licked his lips, felt nervy flutters in his stomach. He pushed it open with a creak.

The glow of an enormous fire cast the world in amber. A great roar of laughter came from it. A narrow bridge led away from his hut towards the fire, half of it cast in shadow. He loosely gripped the fraying rope handrails, boards below his feet swaying and bouncing as he walked. Walter stopped mid-way along the bridge and braced himself to look down. He felt his stomach lurch at peering down from the perilous height. “I can fly if I need to. Right? Right, okay,” he answered himself. “Just need to use a bit of fire and air…”

Torches burned like fireflies through the haze on the ground. They were likely some type of magic, always burning. They marched in sinuous paths marking where the bridges were that led over the bog and to the Great Tree. It was hard to believe that these people could live in such a dangerously high dwelling, but you could get used to anything, he supposed. The fog below seemed to stop at an unseen ceiling, like a cloud cut with a razor. He started off and reached the end of the bridge, trusting that it carried on through the air in the shadowed half.

He reached the edge of a sturdy platform in the center of what must have been the Great Tree. It was round, with a fire burning in the middle with close to fifty people seated around it. The fire clawed up, reaching at least ten feet into the air. It illuminated trees that curled over the fire in a verdant dome, big as those seen in the forest.

His boot thumped down a step he didn’t see, pounding more loudly than he’d intended. He’d hoped to join the others around the fire unnoticed. The laughing and spirited conversations stopped. Heads turned and fingers pointed at him with unrestrained curiosity. Whispers and mutters passed over the seated figures, cast in the firelight. He made out some of the words.

“The demon killer,” a painted face said.

“Killed the devil witch,” someone hissed.

“The man of both the old gods,” another voice whispered.

Walter swallowed and sheepishly looked down at his boots, cheeks filling up with warmth. He grunted and started to turn back to return to his hut. He didn’t want this, didn’t need this now. He was tired of being special and tired of being noticed. But one had to embrace and feel grateful for the gifts life had given them, didn’t they? He turned to the faces still watching him and looked up.

“Walter!” Grimbald waved and stumbled over to him, glass bottle spilling over his hand. He looked like a demon in the glow of the fire. Cavernous shadows formed around his face, made his eyes look like black pits. He had a new pinched up scar that cut down his scalp, stopping above his eyebrow.

“Hey.” Walter smiled at him, took a careful step down towards the fire.

“Look at you.” Grimbald slapped him on the back. “You’re alive! We’re alive, let’s celebrate!” He thrust his bottle into Walter’s hand, wet and smelling like strong alcohol and ginger. Grimbald wrapped him up in a hug with one arm, smelling so strongly of booze that his breath might have burned with a spark. Walter barely got his hand out of the way, avoiding Grimbald knocking the bottle free with his embrace.

Walter felt an unabashed grin creep across his mouth. “That… sounds like a fantastic idea.” He tilted the bottle back and took a draught. Alcohol burned down his throat, leaving a sweet and gingery aftertaste. “Woo! Now that’s good stuff. They make that here? It’s incredible, all of this built on a single tree.”

“Mhm.” Grimbald nodded and chuckled. “Plenty more, plenty mores all around for all. Come on, come and meet the Elders. Haven’t stopped asking me ‘bout you. Tired of answerin’ ‘em to be truthful.”

“How many of those have you had?” Walter raised the brow of his empty eye socket.

“Not nearly enough.” Grimbald belched, stinking like a bad combination of fish and booze. He stumbled down the steps between rows of chattering folk and Walter followed behind, trying to make himself look small and unnoticeable, but it was entirely too late for that.

In every eye Walter met, he found them burrowing into his guts, inspecting him from the inside. Their faces were painted white as ghosts with heavy black around the eyes and curling up onto their foreheads in sharp triangular patterns. Men and women alike sat shirtless as if it were nothing at all. He had to fight to keep his eyes from lingering disrespectfully low. He had never seen such a magnificent variety of tits all in one place. It was wonderful, yet felt all wrong to look, and yet they were there. What did it matter if he stole a look? The people wore overlapping layers of leathery skirts over their hips that trailed over their knees. At least they were somewhat covered. He wasn’t sure how long he would have lasted without his flowing pants becoming uncomfortably tight in the groin.

People resumed talking, but in the way that made you sure they were watching and listening to you. Words lost their depth, tones became superficial and disinterested. Laughter was forced. It must have been an interesting sight to watch him fighting Alena from up here.

Grimbald hadn’t seemed to notice. He bent over a basket, gleaming with amber bottles and grabbed one in his enormous paw. He flipped the lid off with a pop and tilted the brew back for a slurping sip. “Come on then! What’s the matter with you?” Grimbald beckoned for him to come. “Aye, hey, what the fuck you did to your damned stomach? Looks like you got into a fight or something.” He let out a belly laugh.

Walter groaned. “Haven’t been able to heal her attack, much like Asebor’s I think.”

Grimbald gave him an over exaggerated wink. “Maybe you’ll just have to heal the old fashioned way. C’mon, let’s join the others.”

Walter snickered, plodded down the steps, gut wound cringing with every step. He nodded and tried to do his best to smile at curious faces. It wasn’t that they were unwelcoming, there were just too many at the moment. He felt like he was a fish in a bowl being casually observed. He supposed he should learn to get used to it, given his station.

Walter reached the roaring fire, scenting the smell of cooking meat. “What’s for dinner?” He peered into the fire.

“Nothing worth eating. Burning the fallen here,” Grimbald said soberly between sips. He gestured with his bottle and slopped a fat droplet onto a bench. “They dragged ‘em all up while you were sleeping. How they send off the dead, I reckon. Get used to the smell eventually, you’ll see.”

“Strange place to do it,” Walter muttered.

“Stranger people. You see all the… eh, women?” Grimbald said into his ear. “Not bad, eh? Haven’t had myself a lady in far, far too long…” He nodded at a woman with short cropped hair and a round face, grinning at him from a bench higher up on the platform. Grimbald belched while taking a sip.

“Impressive skill you got there. No, how could I have missed it?” Walter said.

Grimbald laughed. “I like this place. I like it a lot. What the hell happened to you anyway? Vanya patched you up didn’t she?” Grimbald bent over to look at Walter’s wound. His form became shadows in front of the fire.

“Get out of here.” Walter pushed him away. “You trying to blow me?”

Grimbald let out an uproarious laugh, clutching his gut and leaning back. “Nah, you’re not my type. You’re cute, though.”

Walter found himself laughing with him, finding its contagion cracking through his iron shell. “Oh shit,” he said between laughter. “I… fell off the bed, opened the fucker back up.” It was a lie, but some demons had to be kept in their little boxes. If they were let out, who knew what damage they could spread.

“Ah, you’ll be alright. Always are, aren’t you?” Grimbald inverted his bottle and golden ale trailed around his lips.

“Always am.” Walter peered around, saw that it seemed like most had had their fill of looking at him now and regular conversation was resuming.

“Why’s your hand bloody?”

“Huh?” Did he know? Was he spying through my door? “Must have accidentally brushed it, don’t worry it’s fine now. Speaking of hands, how’s yours?”

“It works.” He flexed fingers opened and closed to demonstrate. There was a thick white scar on either side of his hand, stopping at his wrist. “Thanks again Walt, don’t know what I would’ve done without, uh, sorry, Walt.” Grimbald’s eyes flicked from his stump to his eye, then gave him a sympathetic look.

“Don’t worry about it. Glad to see it’s healed up.”

Grimbald furrowed his brow at him. “Uh-huh, another scar for the collection. Well c’mon, suck that drink down. You of all people, too damn wound up, you need to figure out how to relax,” he said with a burp.

Maybe he was right. Walter took a few big glugs from the bottle, so big that they were painful and felt like they were stretching his throat. Warmth followed, radiating from his stomach and up his throat. The world shimmered at the edges and he found himself laughing at the flickering flames.

“Hey! That’s the spirit!” Grimbald cheered. A few of the others cheered too, a strange shrilly whooping. “Don’t worry, you’ll get used to that,” Grimbald said, reading his expression of concern. “Tree Folk are an odd lot.”

“What they call themselves?” Walter asked quietly.

“Mhm,” Grimbald grunted.

Walter eyed the spot of bench beside Grimbald, groaned and sat.

“Only the Elders may sit by the fire,” a voice rumbled.

“Oh. Sorry about that.” Walter started to rise up, searching for another spot. There was a place between two well-fed women behind him, enormous breasts flaring out from their ribs.

“Nonsense, Arl.” A woman with a narrow face placed her hand against the man’s wrinkled shoulder. “Without him, the Great Tree may have not survived this day. Please, Walter, you’re welcome to our fire, our guest for the evening.”

Arl grumbled something to the wizened man beside him, their headdresses a series of intertwining twigs, leaves, and feathers swaying as they spoke. Walter noticed only those sitting nearest to the fire wore the strange headpieces, likely indicating their status in the group.

“Walter.” He extended his hand to hers to shake it.

“Thalia Treeborn.” She took it in both of hers, uncurled his fingers and pressed his palm to her bare chest, making him go wide-eyed. He felt her heart thump through her warm and clammy skin. She moved his hand and kissed his knuckles, then released it.

“Um.” Walter nodded and stubbed his foot into a massive stone in front of the fire. “Damn it,” he hissed at the rock, smiled at Thalia and sat. Rather than her entire face painted white like the others, she had a pair of thick lines traveling down from her forehead, over her eyelids, down her neck, around her perky breasts and presumably traveling onward under her skirts. Walter imagined what it might look like down there. “Thank you for taking care of me, I must have smelled terrible.” He met her eyes, greenish-blue maybe, hard to say in the firelight. She was almost his age. Perhaps age wasn’t a factor with becoming an Elder.

“T’was Vanya.” Thalia sniffed and seemed to point with her nose at one of the other Elders. Walter tracked where she looked, saw a reedy woman squint over at them at hearing her name.

Vanya shuffled over to them and Grimbald turned his trunk like thighs to the side to let her pass him. She appeared to be his mother’s age, maybe a few years older. He conceded he wasn’t all that good at guessing ages. “Was there something you needed?” she asked Thalia.

“No, no. You’ve met Walter?” Thalia asked, twisting her body and pointing at him with her nipples.

“Not formally. I have met his body during the mending.” She shuddered and a moan escaped her lips. Walter saw her leg was bandaged and quivering, colored with the same greenish paste as his wound.

Walter felt blood surge up from his neck to his forehead. “What?”

“Told you she took care of you.” Grimbald nudged him.

“Wait. You’ve seen… all of me?” Walter said, gesturing at himself with the bottle.

Vanya and Thalia shared glances. What was said between them, Walter had an idea. They thought he was mad, ridiculous even for worrying about such a trifling thing.

Vanya smiled in understanding. “I apologize if I offended your…” she looked up at the trees, searching for the word, “sensibilities. I had to look you over, make sure there were no wounds not salved. The waters of the bog are highly infectious and wounds have to be properly treated.” Vanya found a spot beside Thalia and sat beside her, pressing their shoulders together, snickering with what might have been mockery. “Not to worry, though, all is intact… and I found the worst of them. Not to worry, not worry… you’re not the first man I’ve seen.” She laughed.

Walter sighed, hoping it would push down some of the hot blood pulsing in his cheeks. He was thankful for the luminous half-darkness, hiding his shame. He was in their home and needed to abide by their customs. He was acting like a fool. He realized why he’d probably stood out so much earlier, the only one with a shirt on. Even Grimbald was shirtless he finally noticed. He slipped his off and tucked it into his pocket. He felt a measure of comfort exposing himself to the fire. Fire was something he knew well, something he could rely on. He wondered if regular fire could harm him. He put his bottle down and started to reach for it.

“I see you’re not unfamiliar with the sword’s bite,” Thalia said, looking him up and down like he was horseflesh for sale.

He jerked his arm back from the fire and its apparent heat. “No,” he said, thankful for the subject change. “Not just swords either. Most of these are from Death Spawn.” He looked down at his stomach, waves of muscles with skin painted over it. Life on the road wasn’t for the faint of heart; it made you hard as wood. On either side from his hips to his ribs were sets of long scars angling down towards his groin. “These were from a Black Wynch’s talons. Here,” he pointed to bite marks on his shoulder. “A Cerumal bit me, had a mouth like a dog’s,” he snickered. “That was from a Death Spawn arrow… bastard of a thing to get out.” He tapped a spot of mangled up skin on his chest.

“Bah! Merely scratches!” Grimbald yelled in his ear, making Walter wince.

“You’re going to ruin my ears with your screaming.” Walter elbowed him.

“But I’m not screaming. Am I? Mm,” Grimbald tipped his bottle up and emptied it down his gullet. He turned to the Elder beside him and the man visibly cringed at Grimbald’s swiveling gaze.

“Fascinating…” Vanya said, leaning over Thalia’s legs to get a better look “They’ve healed remarkably well.”

“Yeah, but the worst of them all, though. Well, this one you won’t believe.” Walter leaned on his elbows, hunched over towards the women.

“Try us.” Thalia grabbed a bottle of alcohol from the shadowy floor. She took a delicate sip, a sly smile touching her plump lips. Full and ripe for kissing, Walter thought, mirroring her and taking another swig from his bottle. He wanted to lick them. Nyset was so far away, too far. “I like him,” she whispered to Vanya, but not so softly that Walter wouldn’t hear. Vanya’s eyebrows raised up, seeming to be climbing for her headdress.

Had he heard her right? It didn’t matter, really. Walter raised his chin and jutted his neck out to the women. It was encircled in ragged scars, twisting ropes going around and around like a fleshy necklace. “These… were from Asebor’s chains.”

Gasps and frantic whispers sprang out from the Elders, supposedly deep in their own conversations. No, he realized. He was the main attraction tonight, the strange animal they all wanted to observe in a foreign habitat.

“It’s not possible,” Vanya said with disbelief. “How could you be here? No one could survive that.”

“We don’t speak his name here,” Thalia snapped.

“Why?” Walter asked incredulously.

“It makes him real,” Thalia swallowed, eyes finding the fire.

Walter leaned in close to her, close enough to savor the smell of citrus wafting from her skin. “He is real, real as the demons at your door today.” Walter turned towards the fire, saw the faces of the other Elders intent upon him. They wore masks of fear and trepidation.

He turned at heavy footsteps, saw what must have been guards skirt in behind Thalia. There were two of them with hands on broad machetes tucked into belts. They were heavily muscled and scarred much like him. They must have picked up on something he’d missed. Thalia gestured to them with a series of rapid hand signals. They said something back in their hand language, then stalked off with what Walter gathered was disappointment. He didn’t want to fight anymore today and was too tired to give them a second thought.

Grimbald had stood, staring at the guards between sips as they made their way farther up the platform around the edges, circling the perimeter for threats. An Elder who had been enduring him seized the opportunity to tread off away from the fire.

Walter frowned at the women. “You think I lie? Think I wanted his souvenir?” He didn’t truly care what they thought because he knew the truth. His friends believed. They saw him die and return. They couldn’t deny the truth because it was self-evident. There wasn’t any point in denying it, even if you had to wade through the blood of loved ones to get to it. The truth was the only relic worth the sacrifices. If you denied it, you only proved how unworthy of it you were.

“From where do you hail, devil killer?” Thalia asked.

Maybe she had been wise enough to get a sense of his conviction. There had to be a good reason why she was allowed to sit by the fire at such a young age. “Breden,” Walter said, but it was a hard thing to say. Memories of his pillaged town passed in the fire. The word made him glimpse a past that would never exist again.

Thalia reached out to touch him and Walter instinctively recoiled, seizing the Dragon. Flames burst to life from his eye and light swirled like smoke up and over his head.

“What is this?” One of the Elder rose, hand clutching a rattle made from a turtle’s shell and drawing it like a weapon. Perhaps it was. Something had to have animated those roots today.

“Peace.” Thalia smiled, her hand hanging in the air. It was a pretty smile. She flashed some hand signals to the man, which sent him promptly back onto his seat.

There was something different about her. Why did they pay her deference? Walter took a closer look at the headdresses of those sitting around the fire, they were more like circlets with rows of bright feathers standing up like weeds. Thalia’s was a great mane of feathers, flaring out around her head and trailing down to her ass in sharp rows. Shit, he thought with an internal groan. She was probably their damned leader and he hadn’t even noticed up until now. This was what exhaustion did to you. It was no wonder the guards were ready to carve him up at her shift in body language.

“Hard day.” Walter nodded, letting the Dragon go, staring at his boots. Her hand caressed his neck, then started gently rubbing. A pleasing shiver went down his back. He knew he should stop her, but it felt so wonderful to be touched. How long had it been since he’d seen Nyset? Thalia’s powerful hand squeezed, massaged his neck muscles, knowing all the right spots. He felt some of the tension in his body he didn’t know was there melting away. The affections of Great Retreat’s ruler was probably not a complexity he wanted to add to his life. And here he was, the subject of her carnivorous eyes.

Grimbald thumped an empty bottle onto the floor. “Need another one, Grim?” Walter asked. “Think mine is empty too. I’ll get you one.” He turned to meet Thalia’s eyes, greedily looking him over. He forced a smile at her and gently lowered her hand. “Going to get another ale. What do you call these anyway?”

“Ginger root tonic. Careful, they’re strong for the uninitiated. Think you’ve earned it today, though.” She grinned at him. “There’s no need to go.” She whistled and threw some hand signals, thwarting his best attempt at escape.

There was some commotion at the back and the tinkling of glass. The guards lumbered down the stairs, each man grasping a handle on one of the great baskets brimming with bottles. One of the guards had a scar going from forehead to cheek and glared at Walter, setting the basket down with a thud. Thalia flashed her fingers again, sending them plodding off.

“Help yourselves,” Thalia said, sharp eyebrows bobbing up.

“Well now this… this is living!” Grimbald reached in and grabbed two bottles, one in each hand. He popped the latches from both with his teeth and took sips from both, apparently all for him. “Mm. Could drink this all night. We’re fucking heroes Walter! Heroes!” Grimbald bumped him in the shoulder, almost tossing him from the bench, had he not braced himself against a stone with his legs.

Walter didn’t really want another, but he couldn’t decline it now. He reached into the basket, popped the lid on the bottle, producing a soft fizz. He took a refreshing sip. It burned at first, then left a smooth aftertaste. “To living.” He raised his glass and Grimbald clinked his two against it.

“A strange ritual. And what land does your ward come from?” Thalia asked.

“My… ward?” Walter sipped, alcoholic warmth flowing through his legs.

“Your protector, your guardian, him.” She gestured to Grimbald.

“Me?” Grimbald threw his arm around Walter’s shoulder and leaned against him.

“Grim!” Walter snapped. Pain jumped through his gut, using his abs to stabilize his spine against the man’s uncontrolled bulk.

“Sorry, Walt. Forgot,” he said ponderously.

Walter sighed, sucking in deep breaths and trying to quiet down the pain. The wound Alena had given him throbbed like a second heartbeat, out of synchronization with the blood beating in his skull. Maybe he should find some water.

Grimbald tried tipping one of his tonics into Walter’s mouth. Walter swatted him away, spilling it on his pants. A deep laugh roared from his cavernous chest. “Open up, time for a drinky drink.” His arm wavered in jittery circles.

Walter turned to Thalia, smile sprouting out through the pain. “See what you’ve done to my ward? This is all your fault.”

“What’s a ward?” Grimbald asked, a moment of clear-headedness gleaming through the drunken fog.

“She means you, thinks you’re my guard,” Walter lowered Grimbald’s circling arm still poorly aiming for Walter’s mouth as if it had taken a mind of its own.

“Well that’s just about the craziest thing I’ve ever heard in my life,” Grimbald leaned over Walter’s leg, saw the sheen of sweat glistening from his neck. “This man here, well… he’s a real friend. Best friend, only friend really, I’ve ever had. And I’ve tried to have some, sure have. You need someone to watch your back, this one’s the man for it.” Grimbald’s bottle started to laze around in tremulous circles again. “Need demons killed, bastards slain…” Grimbald turned to face him, eyes seeming to have trouble focusing. “Careful of his fire, though, sometimes he misses.” He threw his head back with a laugh, tinged with wanton desperation. It was too loud and his eyes flitted to the back of his skull. The curtains shrouding his demons had been briefly parted then. Others noticed it too, shifting uncomfortably and trying to slough off his frenetic energy, but he continued with that mad laughter.

He drinks to forget, not to celebrate, Walter thought. Walter’s lips formed a line, nostrils flaring open with a sharp exhale. Grimbald had not forgotten about his accident with Juzo. He couldn’t blame him. Walter had carved himself a dark path, littered with the broken bodies of friends and enemies alike. It changed everyone he dragged down it. But Grimbald was still here and he had to be grateful for that. He was still here. Walter forced himself to smile, saw the women shooting Grim looks of worry. He had stopped laughing, was staring into the fire now. A few folk had risen to chat with other people higher up the stairs.

“Perhaps you’d like some water, Grimbald?” Vanya asked. The rhythmic beating of drums carried from somewhere nearby.

“Nah. Tonic’s got water in it, don’t it?” He took another glug and belched. The drumming drew closer. Grimbald shot up to his feet, squinting. He grabbed Walter’s shoulder with a hard squeeze, bordering on the line of painful. Walter met him with a wary eye. Grimbald bent down, looking him squarely in the face. “Forgive yourself, Walter.” He released his shoulder and cast his attention on the approaching sounds. He let out a blubbering cheer.

Grimbald’s words were a knife in his gut. He’d found the seam in his armor, muting all the chatter of the world. Was it that plain to see? Had he done something to give himself away? Maybe he would forgive himself eventually, but for now, the wounds still bled. Bile crept up his throat, a searing mix with the alcohol. He supposed besides Nyset, there wasn’t anyone else who would know him better. Friends saw what the world missed.

“They have arrived,” Thalia perked up, tilting her regal chin towards the platform’s edge.

Walter twisted around to see there were four men at the top of the platform’s stairs, each painted head to toe in white. One had a set of hide drums resting on his rotund belly, supported by thick straps around his shoulders. A man with a small wooden flute inhaled, filling his cheeks up like a squirrel preparing for the long winter. He blew into it, producing a series of shrill notes and mixing in with the drumming. Another man joined in with a pair of corrugated sticks, rasping them together and adding another dimension to the music. The last man held up a pair of thick horns by the sharp ends, shaking what must have been stones trapped inside.

“Oooh-eh! Oooh eh!” A woman, thin as a weed, slipped between the drummer and horn shaker, spiking the song with her strange shouts. It was unlike anything he’d ever heard before but found it surprisingly pleasant. “Oooh-eh!” She danced around in a circle, wiry arms shaking and raised towards the dome of trees.

People stood up in droves, some clapping, bobbing heads, and others snapping fingers to the beat. They started swaying back and forth, hips working and finding the proper timing. Some held hands, couples, Walter guessed. He was intrigued to see that there were more same-sex couples than there were mixed.

“Gotta find her, where is she?” Grimbald scanned along the stairs, found his short-haired beauty waving at him and overtly pushing her chest out.

Some things never changed, Walter grinned at the thought.

“Don’t drink too much without me, eh, Walt?” Grimbald bent over and squeezed his ass, made Walter flinch and laugh, spilling ginger tonic over his hand.

“Go get her you big oaf,” Walter snickered, smacking Grim’s ass as he started up the stairs.

Something was looming over him from the corner of his eye. He looked, saw into Thalia’s perfect navel. He audibly swallowed. His eyes drifted up at her puffy breasts inches from his head. He felt his mouth filling up with saliva. It was an animalistic hunger he couldn’t deny. His eyes traveled up to her face, softly smiling down at him. Her headdress gave her the silhouette of a cobra’s hood. She was a lioness, licking her lips and eager for her next meal.

No. She wouldn’t want to dance with him. Would she? Of course she would, that would be just his luck. He steadied his nervy breath, guts churning with anxiety. Anything but dancing. Oh, Dragons, anything but dancing and caves. Why did it have to be dancing? In fact, he would’ve preferred traveling to subterranean depths against a horde of Black Wynches before that.

“Dance with me devil killer,” Thalia said with an air of command. The drums grew louder, thudding over the revelers, whirling like living shadows. She held her delicate hand out for him to take, glowing in the firelight.

Shit, Walter thought, blood draining down to his legs. His world swayed for a moment, fire blurring at the edges of his vision. He wanted to blame the alcohol, but knew it was a lie. She was a beautiful woman, what was the harm in a little dancing? He just had to pretend she wasn’t topless. And that she was a hideous creature from the Shadow Realm.

“It is a great honor,” an Elder with a scratchy voice said into his ear. “Go on.” The Elder nudged him.

“Do I have a choice?” His voice came out weakly, staring up at her. Her eyes glimmered with beads of fire.

“No.” She shook her mane of feathers and he stood, already knowing the answer. “I did save your life, cleaned you up, fed you, nursed you.” Her voice was silken.

“Nursed me?” Walter balked, took her hand in his, felt sweat prickling out from his underarms. He didn’t know what to do with his stump, so he held it uncomfortably by his side. He looked scornfully down at that rounded piece of flesh, a constant reminder of the demons that would know the taste of his fire. Images flashed in his vision. An armsman of the Silver Tower, split in half in a demon’s mouth. Asebor’s hips hammering into Nyset’s form. The lake of blood in the Shadow Realm. He sniffed, quivered, images gone as if never there.

“Took care of you, made sure you were cared for, put in one of the best of our homes.” She took a step closer to him, and he felt the warmth radiating from her body.

Walter noted there was a subtle vanilla scent behind the citrus. Why couldn’t she just smell like Scab? “You? But didn’t… I thought Vanya…”

“Not without my command.” She pressed herself against his chest and side, soft in the right places, warm as a slept in bed. Her hand cupped his stump. “You are safe here,” she said into his ear, her breath hot.

“Who are you?” Walter subtly leaned back so he could see her, breaking their bodily connection, but he wanted it back.

“I am the Mother, the ruler of the Great Retreat, of course. You… did not know?” she gazed at him with disbelief.

“Of course, I knew, just… confirming,” Walter’s cheeks gave him away, hot with his pounding blood. “So you saved me, did you? I think it was Grimbald and me doing all the saving today.” He had to do something to laugh, to smile, anything to push the weight of the Shadow Realm from his back.

“Ha!” she laughed, extending her arm, Walter naturally mirrored her, not knowing what else to do. She twirled under it, bounding to the beat of the drums, feathers waving up and down her headpiece as if they were alive. He laughed with her, back in the moment.

“Weh! Weh! Weh!” The shrilling singer sang on the beat.

She spun as she moved into him, grasping his hips with her hands. “Without our magic, without the Tree’s protection, you and your ward would be one with the bog, devil killer,” she pushed away from him, started hunching over, then standing erect, repeating the movement to the beat.

Walter held his arm out for her return, starting to enjoy the show. He felt some of the tension slide from his muscles like a dam that had longed to break. Her form was alien behind the fire, shifting from shadowed to brightly illuminated, twirling round and around. Walter saw some of her body paint had been smeared onto his chest. He tipped his bottle back, emptied it, warming his stomach. He put it down and grabbed another from the basket while Thalia danced. He deserved to have a little fun. When had he last laughed without fear and pain? He couldn’t remember.

“What is your magic? Which god?” Walter asked into her ear when she returned, wriggling with energy. Walter swallowed the first sip from his new ginger tonic.

Thalia drew into him, sliding her thigh between his legs and up against his fruits. “The old gods of the old magic. They’re long dead.” She slipped back and away into an odd stepping dance, the warmth of her leg lingering against his. Walter started to mirror some of the Tree Folk, those who’s movements weren’t more than swaying arms and hips. It felt good to move. He tilted the bottle back, letting its burning ginger course down to his belly. “So you all can use this magic? How do you use it?”

She returned to him, hips swaying, arms held up over her head. She was sweating now, musty, yet a welcoming mix with her other scents. “Not all, devil killer. Only the Elders are taught to use the relics of the long past, to bring life to the Great Tree, life to the forests. How we use the relics… is our secret.” Her lips curled into a mischievous grin. “Now you must answer my question,” she ran a finger down his chest, “how did you survive your encounter with the demon god? If what you say is true, your scars appear fatal…”

“They were.” Walter tilted his head up, gandered at the sky burning bright with stars. “I have been to the Shadow Realm, seen the Shadow god,” he said into her ear, knowing full well the commotion it would cause if the others heard. Thalia seemed strong enough to handle it.

She stopped as if she’d been struck, stared at him with her small mouth hanging open. “But how have you returned? You do not lie?”

He shook his head, torch light leaving streaks in his vision. He sipped his drink, noting how it no longer burned, but lightly tingled. “How I returned is my secret.” He grinned at her.

She wrapped her arms around his neck, swaying in time to the beat, her warmth brushing against him. He held his arms by his side, almost reached up to push her away, but didn’t. He liked everything about her but wished he didn’t. This was only dancing, wasn’t it? She was close. She was here and Nyset was far.

“You must tell me, you must be very powerful,” she pleaded, eyes intent.

People probably should know how he’d escaped from the Shadow Realm. It was a historical event, Nyset had told him. Nyset, he had to remember her now, keep her in his mind. Everything was mired in a boozy haze, internal restraints loosened. And Thalia was a light he couldn’t ignore. “You saw what I could do today, didn’t you?”

“I know what you are. Embracer of both the gods, yes?” Thalia looked up at him, blinking.

“They… saved me, helped me get out, return to my body. Wish I could explain it better, but I truly can’t. I used a portal. Do you know what that is?”

“You mean a doorway?”

“I think so. Glows bluish, lets you travel a short distance,” Walter said.

“I know of this thing.” Thalia nodded. “There was a time when the god’s touched our people. They have long abandoned us within the last few generations.” She frowned, her eyes never departing from his. “We console ourselves with the old magic and ultimately, we are born to serve the Great Tree. To make the wheel turn.”

Walter tore his eyes from hers, feeling her probe him from the inside, maybe seeing more of him than he wanted. “Don’t worry. I’ve been told their gifts are inherited and even then, can be whimsical. There were only a few of us gifted from my village. When we have the Silver Tower back, you can go and train there, when the gods touch you and your people again.”

“I have not been so graced, a fascinating tale. What is it like there?” He thought her cheeks were reddening in the fire, but her skin was so dark it was hard to tell.

The beat of the drum slowed and the other members of the band followed, filling the air with a languid song. Walter caught Grimbald out of the corner of his eye. His boots thumped up the platform’s stairs, following the extended hand of the woman he’d been dancing with. She turned to look at Grim, flashing him what looked like a nervy laugh. Walter snickered, turned back to Thalia.

“Something strikes you with humor?” she asked. She made a slow twirl to the new beat, back facing him, hips gyrating and showing off her backside. Walter bit at the insides of his cheeks, trying to stifle the warmth flowing into his groin.

“Looks like my friend is about to go have a romp with one of yours, I’d guess,” Walter nodded at Grimbald’s fading form, cresting the platform.

“It will be a great honor for her to serve those who have defended the Great Tree this day.” Thalia looked at them departing, returning to him and taking his hand in both of hers. “Tell me, what is it like at the Silver Tower? Is it true that the demon spawn have taken it?”

“It is true and this is why my friend and I came. The Tower thought it would never fall, that it wasn’t possible. Well, I can tell you that even the best walls can’t keep them out. You were lucky today that there weren’t any Shattered Wings.”

“Shattered Wings? I do not know this name.”

“A terrible, flying demon spawn, as you say. Asebor.” He dropped his voice when he said his name. “He has the Tower, there were very few survivors.”

Thalia slowed her dancing to a stop and solemnly nodded. “Thank you for bringing me these tidings.”

“What is the Great Tree? How old is it?”

Thalia narrowed her eyes at him, her body picking up the beat again. “They do not teach you these things in your village?”

“They probably did but wasn’t the best student” Walter freed his hand from hers, his neck demanding to be scratched.

She stopped twirling and swaying, and sat down. “Come, have a rest.” She tapped the section of bench beside her, polished and shining. He promptly sat, though he was starting to enjoy himself, almost understanding why people danced. There was something freeing about moving for movement’s sake.

Thalia took a long sip from her bottle, then licked her lips at him. “The Great Tree has been here since before man. Its life force is the seed of all plant beings.” She swept her arm in a wide arc. “If the Great Tree would have fallen today, the realm, the life of man would have collapsed with it, for there would be no food, no air to breathe, no clean water. All depends on its existence. Southerners and city folk forget this, forget about the importance of our domain.”

“I see.” Walter nodded. He never cared for much besides wasting time with Juzo and practicing Sid-Ho. He never knew how badly his ignorance would hurt him.

Thalia peered into the bottle resting in her lap, eyes flicked to his. “Thank you, Walter, truly.” She slid the bottle aside, sounding as if it were already emptied. “Had you not come to help us… I’d rather not imagine the consequences. What puzzles me is how… and why you have you journeyed this far alone?”

He slowly shook his head. “Didn’t come alone. Traveled with a mercenary band, they were supposed to help us. In fact, they had helped us up until we got here. Alena paid him off, I think, the one you call the devil.” He beat his stump into his fist, instinctually embraced the Dragon, fire sparked to life behind his eye. “He’ll pay for his betrayal,” Walter said as if Scab were already tied up, awaiting the guillotine.

Thalia gasped and inched back. She flashed hand signals to the guards, forestalling their movements.

“Sorry, it’s part of me.” He let the Dragon’s rage slip from his grasp.

“I think I see,” she slid close to him, bridging the gap and her features softening. “I am glad you did not lie to me.”

“Wha-what do you mean? Why would I—?”

“My scouts followed your group since you crossed Lich’s Falls, past the Woodland Plunge. Then the… Death Spawn arrived. We did not know why you came, if you were friend or enemy… then it didn’t matter. I watched them leave you. Watched you continue to march on against overwhelming foes. Your enemy is my enemy, and thus, we are allies.”

“That’s it, then? You are resourceful,” Walter said. He felt lightheaded, sure he would be dizzy if he stood then.

She was stunning, half her face cast in fire, lips parted and waiting for his. He leaned towards her, the sides of their legs pressed together and warm. Blood swelled in his prick. Her eyes seemed to glitter with excitement. He was split between abject sexual hunger and feelings of guilt like a tiny bud drowning in ginger tonic.

“You, you look so familiar,” Vanya said, shuffling up to them. Walter pulled back from her. What was he thinking? “I know you… from somewhere.” She adjusted her headdress, ducking down and inspecting him.

Thalia snorted with annoyance, but Vanya either missed it or ignored it.

Walter cleared his throat, took a breath to gather himself. “You do? Don’t believe we’ve met before today.”

“I knew your mother.” She sat down beside him, smiling softly. “Isabelle. Am I right?”

Walter’s throat tightened up, swallowed. “Yes! Yes, you are. But, yes. I should have asked earlier, the exhaustion and… my father met her here, long before I was born, of course,” he laughed awkwardly, hearing his own words coming out in an ugly mess. The change in emotions was like a bucket of cold water to the face. He looked at Thalia, leaning over her knees with interest, breasts forming a wonderful furrow of cleavage. He didn’t think he’d ever get used to that.

“She was my apprentice.” Vanya peered into the fire, seeming lost in memory. “She was one of the best students I ever had. A pity she had to go. She could mend a dislocated shoulder like no other; excellent at running sutures.”

“But how did you know I was her son?” he asked. There were so many questions spilling through his pickled brain.

Her mouth formed a series of wrinkles with her smile. “Boy, you are her. A little more masculine, but you have taken on her face.”

“Wow,” he breathed. He hadn’t known there was any connection left to his former life. Had he spent more time asking them about their past and actually listening, he might have avoided this. He groaned and pushed his regrets into a corner of his mind.

“How is she?” Vanya asked with a touch of excitement, gray curly hair tracing around her jaw.

“Dead,” Walter said flatly. “Death Spawn came to Breden almost a year ago now. They killed her and my father.” He could almost say it now without getting choked up, maybe with the help of the alcohol.

“That’s a shame. She was a wonderful surgeon; one of the best we’ve had in some time.”

Something was off with what Vanya said. “You said she had to go. Why did she have to go?”

He remembered then how his house in Breden had been ransacked, the apparent reason for the Death Spawn’s raid, according to Baylan. The Chains of the North, also called Bonesnapper, were supposedly once in a chest and buried in his cellar. It was the one relic that was known for its ability to harm Asebor. It was written that it had been forged in the Black Furnaces of the Nether after the seal of the Age of Dawn was erected, locking Asebor away in a Milvorian prison for ten thousand years. No one dared to try opening the seal to test the weapon, but the Tower wizards were convinced it would work. The trail to finding it had gone cold long ago. He had partitioned off that memory as something no longer useful. Every time the mystery of its whereabouts emerged, he’d pressed it back down. He wondered if maybe, just maybe there might be something here.

Vanya crossed her arms. “I-I’m not sure. They, your mother and her betrothed… maybe your father, but I’m not sure, said they needed to leave after returning from a sabbatical to the Far Islands.”

“Aiden? You knew my father too?” Walter asked, his heart thudding with excitement.

“Yes, that might be it,” she nodded with a frown. “Aiden, he is — was — your father?” Vanya corrected. “I never met him, only saw them leaving the Great Tree.”

“Yes.” Walter watched her, saw her eyes nervously scanning. Or perhaps the alcohol was skewing his perception, he couldn’t be sure, but it couldn’t hurt to dig deeper. Walter blew out his cheeks. “Did they… return with something?” He didn’t want to say the words, in case there were ears that shouldn’t hear it. He thought of the Metamorphose, taking on the shape of anyone. “Something old, something forged in ancient times?” She knows something, he thought.

Vanya’s eyes burned with a hidden intellect, a keen knowing. “Come with me. I think you would like to see the Mother’s hut.”

Chapter 15

Discoveries

“Life is an endless experiment. Find a laboratory, dispel the illusions, put your heart into what works.” -The Diaries of Nyset Camfield

“Thalia?” Vanya asked.

Thalia stood, eyes hard, and gestured for Vanya to lead. She sent signals to the guards, ordering them to stay to their obvious displeasure. The three of them marched up the stairs, Vanya in front and Thalia behind him. He thought he felt a hand brush his ass, but when he looked back, Thalia grinned at him and blinked her eyes with failed innocence. He would have laughed at her had he not been overwhelmed at the prospect that some answers about his family’s past may finally be revealed.

They walked in silence, striding to the platform’s edge where the band played a melancholy song. They reached a suspension bridge that swayed as they walked, the tension of the agonized waiting was almost too much to bear. He wanted to stop Vanya right there, grab her shoulders, make her spit it out. But he could wait. He could control himself. He had waited this long. What was another few moments?

The music and conversations faded down the bridge, sound swallowed in the abyss below their feet. The bridge was long, taking at least a few minutes to cross. A harmony of chirping frogs replaced the celebrations, carrying up from the bog. The wood creaked against the rope supports, vibration coursing through his body with every step. He hadn’t realized how much heat the fire was producing until they were well away from it. The cool northern air washed over their bare skin. Goosebumps prickled up and down his arms. A pair of torches burned at the other side of the bridge like a set of hellish eyes.

It wasn’t surprising that he might find answers here, but it felt oddly serendipitous. He had traveled a lot of the realm now, but never visited the most obvious place, his mother’s home. Fate had swept him along on its perilous winds, struggling to survive and never having time for reflection. He was here now though and hoped he’d find what he needed.

Vanya grabbed one of the torches from a sconce and used it to light another along their path. No one spoke. Walter felt a heaviness in their breathing. He stepped off the bridge, glad to be back on solid, unwavering wood. Thalia followed behind like a natural shadow.

The bridge squeaked, sounding like it came from the other side. “Wait,” Walter whispered and held his hand out to signal to the women. They had already paused though, slid past him. Thalia’s face was stricken with alarm.

Vanya stared into the darkness, unflinching. “Maybe a guard. Just a guard,” she said softly, sounding like she was trying to convince herself of it.

Walter squinted into the enveloping shadows but didn’t find anything amiss. He inched his hand onto the handrail, vines intertwined to form a rugged rope. He closed his eye, feeling for the telltale vibration of someone grasping it. He sat there, eye closed, listening and feeling for a minute. The bridge swayed in the wind, gently creaking. The sound was relaxing, almost hypnotic. If he didn’t open his eye soon, he might slip into the arms of sleep.

“Think it’s alright,” he said finally, taking in a steadying breath.

“Slinking off in the night tends to make the senses over heightened, I think,” Thalia said.

“The forest makes many peculiar noises in the hour of night. Are you satisfied now?” Vanya patiently smiled at him.

Walter nodded, feeling like a fool.

They approached a hut that was quite clearly built for a ruler. Its roof vaulted up in a steep angle, covered in wide overlapping leaves. It was almost as tall as a tree. The hut was wide, big enough to comfortably house at least twenty people, he guessed. Rows of Sand Buckeyes formed columns on either side of the entrance, serving as decorations much like the nobles did in Midgaard. What was it about a carnivorous plant that we all found so fascinating? he wondered.

Vanya lit the last of the torches studding the path to the hut’s entrance, then stopped, waited.

“This way,” Thalia broke the next stretch of quiet, entering first through the hut’s entryway. She took the torch from Vanya, lighting a torch inside. Light bloomed and illuminated the hut’s curious innards.

They entered a small antechamber, hallways going to the left and right. There was a painting on the wall depicting the Great Tree, speckled with blood red blossoms. The walls were a series of tightly packed bamboo, the gaps sealed by what looked to be a hardened mud and fibrous mixture. The building materials were primitive, but there was an attention to detail in the craftsmanship that Walter appreciated. He could see that the wood was carefully selected, free from mold spots and other blemishes.

“The Great Tree flowers?” Walter asked, following them through the stubby hallway, spilling out into a circular room. Vanya walked around it, touching the torch to iron sconces melted into the shapes of trees.

“It does. It is a sight to behold. It blooms in summer for just a week. Perhaps you will return to see it?” Thalia asked, hands on hips.

“I’d like that.” Walter smiled. He had the feeling that once he left the Great Retreat, it would be a long time before he would return.

Vanya put the torch she carried into an empty sconce and closed the heavy wooden latch on the front door.

“Why did you do that?” Thalia asked with bewilderment.

“There is a reason for my strange actions, child,” Vanya said, coming back to the room.

“Come, sit,” Thalia gestured to a table as high as his knees with nothing to sit on around it.

Walter scratched his head and half-smiled. “Hm.” He was exhausted, his vision going blurry whenever it had the opportunity to rest.

Thalia snickered, dropped into a low squat in front of the table. Thankfully she did ensure her skirts kept her covered, he certainly wouldn’t have been able to focus on anything else otherwise.

Walter squatted down on one side of the table, lost his balance and keeled over onto his back with a soft thump. The world swam, colors spinning. He looked up at the trusses marching along the roof line. They fanned out like the broad tail feathers of a bird, each spoke carved in dizzying patterns. “Nice carvings,” Walter said with drunken wonder.

Thalia giggled, showing a part of her Walter didn’t know she had. Vanya trudged over to him, dragging him up onto his bottom. “I’m fine, really, I’m fine,” Walter protested. The torches swayed, leaving streaks of amber in his vision. “Wow, the torches… they’re so pretty.”

Vanya glared at Thalia, maybe giving her some type of scolding.

“No, no.” Walter reached out with his hand. “This is,” he belched. “This is my fault. That gingery whatever goes down too well. Please remind me… what are we doing here again? Oh, wait. I know!” He raised his index finger above his head. “You’re going to tell me something?”

Vanya was on her knees, staring into his eye. How long had she been here? How long had he been here? “Walter. I need you to focus, embrace the powers of the gods if you must.”

“Focus, right,” he said with mock sternness. He embraced the powers. They both felt muted and almost in harmony. It was an unfamiliar sensation. He’d always felt them both there when he reached for them, but the Dragon was always the overwhelming presence for him. Maybe there was something about the alcohol that evened out some hidden anger and pain.

“Good,” Vanya said. “Are you with me now?”

Walter nodded, the graveness to her voice penetrating through his alcoholic film.

“Resuming our last conversation, about your mother,” Vanya nodded.

Thalia shifted and sat on her hands, watching Walter.

“Right,” Walter said, remembering the conversation thread. It felt like it had been hours ago.

“Your mother did find something in the Far Islands.” Vanya let the words settle on the air. A few crickets chirped in a dark section of the room, behind a potted fern he thought.

“Well?” He knew what she was going to say, but he needed to hear it.

“They found…” she dropped her voice. “A weapon. I know not the proper name, but I believe it was what practitioners of the Sid-Ho style call a lash. It had three chains attached to a single handle.”

“The Chains of the North,” Walter whispered and felt like ants were crawling over his neck. He even went as far as scratching, finding nothing but his puckering skin.

“What is the significance of this?” Thalia asked, her brows drawn and mouth working to ferret out the meaning.

Vanya shrugged at Thalia. “I don’t know, but your mother did, perhaps your father as well.” She turned to Walter. “She told me it was a relic, and that she had to go and hide it, but told me no more. Said for my own safety.”

“She knew what it was,” he said distantly. “All this time, all my life, one of the most valuable treasures in the realm was sitting in the earth below me.”

Thalia and Vanya shared curious looks.

“You know more about this relic?” Thalia leaned over the table.

“Y-yes,” Walter said, his throat dry. “Baylan, an old friend, said it’s the only weapon reputed to be able to harm, to kill Asebor.”

Thalia shook her head with exasperation, the feathers on her headdress swooshing against her back.

Walter continued. “Only someone like myself can use it to its true potential, a dual-wielder as we say, someone who has been gifted with the touch from both of the gods.”

Vanya opened her mouth to speak, hesitating, then started again. “She said something about that weapon that’s always been with me over the years, some memories never shake away and all.” Vanya met Walter’s eyes. “She told me that it was lethal.”

“Of course, lethal to—”

Vanya cut him off. “The wielder.”

The room went quiet. He would not die again. He knew he wouldn’t survive another trip to the Shadow Realm. They would be ready, waiting for him. “Maybe there was another way. I’ve harmed Asebor before with my power,” Walter protested.

Thalia hissed. “Do not say his—”

“Or I may find you,” a voice rasped from behind the door. The familiar voice cut through him like the sharpest of blades. It pinned him to the floor, paralyzing his body and scrambling his mind.

A loud crack split the air as a dark leg plunged through the door. Ragged splinters hit the wall. Walter gasped, dug deep and embraced the fury of the Dragon. It was like pulling a weed from the bottom of the bog, roots buried in pounds of fermented ginger. The leg wriggled out, arm reaching in and unlatching the lock with startling precision. The fingers were black talons, shimmering like obsidian.

“Shit!” Walter leaped up onto trembling legs, cold sweat sprouting from his skin. Not this. Not now. Not here.

Thalia was on her feet, a broad dagger in her hand, held in an overhand grip. Where had she found that?

Vanya turned to the wall, eying a set of spears standing in a bucket carved to look like clouds. There were weapons all around, he realized. Swords mounted on the wall, a pair of boleadoras sitting on an end table, dagger between fruit in a basket.

“Who are you?” Walter stammered. “Show yourself!” he shouted, getting his mind into battle mode. It couldn’t be him, couldn’t be, he told himself. His gut wound hammered, re-opened and wet with blood. He stepped forward, putting himself in front of the women. Had he been found?

The figure pushed through the door, shadows swirling around a towering form, melting and reforming like liquid. A tattered blood-red cape hung in the air behind it, drifting as if weightless. “You know who I am, boy.” Asebor planted his spiked boots, eyes glowing with violet fire.

His mind couldn’t comprehend it. Questions flashed like lightning. Scab? The women’s superstitions came true?

“What do you want? Have you come to die?” Walter felt the strength of his body returning, the numbing effect of the alcohol vaporizing in his mind. His threats felt empty.

“Give me the Chains of the North and I will let you live,” Asebor demanded, hand outstretched.

“Never!” Thalia yelled, her forearm muscles wriggling with tension.

“We don’t have them,” Vanya said at the same time.

Music from the fire seemed to grow louder, reaching through windows. There was something different about Asebor. What, Walter couldn’t say. “I have them,” he said with violence hanging on his breath. “If you want them, you’ll have to take them from me.”

The shadows encasing Asebor’s head shimmered, split in half across his eyes. The two halves peeled apart like an eyeball, whickering over his head and under his chin. There was an incongruously large wolf's head behind the shadowed mask, growling murder. Its eyes glowed with the same violet, giant mouth hanging open, black tongue lolling.

Walter took a step forward, closer towards his nemesis and into the gauntlet posed by crippling fear. What was different about Asebor struck him then. There were no chains. Asebor had always had chains that moved like vipers. This was not Asebor. “Come on, then,” Walter beckoned, sitting back into a fighting stance.

“Give him what he wants!” Thalia hissed at him.

“No! You’ll get nothing from us, you’ll have to kill us all!” Vanya croaked, jabbing a spear at the air.

“You pathetic mortals!” Asebor boomed, his voice ethereal. “Give me Bonesnapper now and I won’t slaughter every single living thing in the Great Tree.”

Walter folded his arms, puffed out his chest, and smiled. This was certainly not Asebor.

“Now!” Asebor screamed, gesturing with clacking talons. “Your defiance will be re-paid with a lifetime of torture.”

“Walter. What are you—?” Thalia’s words faded as his world narrowed down. There was nothing else, no one else but him and this creature purporting to be the demon god.

He was the dominant power here, he knew. If it had been Asebor, he wouldn’t have wasted this much time with words. Asebor’s preferred communication medium was pain. And he wouldn’t have entered the room through a door. Walter thrust his arm out, flicked his fingers and blasted Asebor with air.

Asebor’s form folded up like crumpled paper, tumbling backwards through the antechamber and into the opposite room. Walter surged after him, legs filled with the strength of the Dragon. Asebor rose onto his elbows, rubbed his wolfish head, his form shimmering like a mirage in Helm’s Reach. His body flickered from its true form for a second, a chrome headed Metamorphose.

He gritted his teeth, the fire from his eye glowing. “Knew we were being followed.” He grunted, sending a fireball into its tiny leg, shearing it clean off at the hip. Blood and burning bones skipped across the padded floor. The form of Asebor vanished entirely, replaced with the Metamorphose’s shrilly screams. The Metamorphose was squat and lightly armored, its head a silvery reflective orb.

Footsteps padded in behind him and held his stump up to stop them. He marched over to the bastard, his hand pinning it around the neck. “Asebor, eh? Don’t look much like him to me.” Walter pressed into the creature, putting all his weight on its neck.

The Metamorphose squirmed. Its tiny boyish hands weakly pried at his, crushing down around its neck. “Who are you?” he barked. “Where is Asebor? How did you get here?”

The creature gibbered in its Death Spawn tongue, unintelligible. It’s wriggling grew weaker, the stomping heel going limp. The hammering of its arteries under Walter’s hand grew tired, his thigh warm and sticky with its black blood. It was losing too much blood and would soon be dead. He released his grip from around its neck, thought maybe there’d be something to glean from it if it could speak.

“But you can speak,” he thought out loud. “If you make yourself human.” He tugged on the Phoenix, stump glowing with a disc of blue light. He touched it to the Metamorphose’s leg, but it only burned and smoked on its flesh. The creature shrieked under its helm, writhing renewed. He settled down onto his knees beside it with a sigh, staring it up and down. “Hm. Phoenix doesn’t work on you, but hurts you…”

The women filled in around him. The Death Spawn’s flailing settled down, breathing going shallow. Vanya was nervously gripping the spear, gave the creature a soft jab with the point and dinging off its armor. Its breath caught in a last token resistance.

“What is it?” Thalia asked, her tongue running hurried circles around her lips.

“We should kill it, give it mercy,” Vanya said.

Walter almost laughed, but snorted instead. There was a time when he might have held some sense of pity for them. Cutting down Death Spawn was no different than chopping wood. “Death Spawn,” Walter said, resigned. He eyed a chair, stumbled over to it and slumped into its surprisingly soft confines.

“This is no Death Spawn. We saw Death Spawn today, not like this, no.” Vanya jabbed it again with her spear. It growled and Vanya cried out. It caught the spear, its hand clawing for her face.

Before Walter could stand, Thalia sank to the floor. He was up, saw her dagger sliding under its neck. She wordlessly extracted the blade, blood whispering from its wound. “A different kind of Death Spawn?” Thalia asked him, steadying her breath, shoulders heaving.

Walter’s heart relaxed a few beats. “You alright?”

“Fine,” Thalia said and stared at her hands, rimmed with wet.

“There could be others. How do we find them?” Vanya asked, leaning on the upturned spear.

“How did it get here?” Thalia asked. She dropped the knife beside the Metamorphose, thought better of it and kicked it away. The dagger spun across the floor, leaving scarlet arcs behind. Someone had lit the torches, but Walter missed it. She flicked blood from her hands and found a cloth. She started vigorously rubbing her hands. “It won’t come out,” she muttered.

There were too many questions. Walter found the chair again, sat on its edge. Adrenalin faded from his body, gut pain and deep fatigued returning with a vengeance. He rubbed his temples. “You’ll need water, a lot of it. Blood’s unusually thick. Not like ours.”

“Water,” Thalia repeated. She found a mug, inverted it over her hand and scrubbed. “It’s not coming out,” she said frantically.

Walter watched the blood pool around the base of the Metamorphose’s neck. “Sorry about all the mess.”

Vanya shot him a worried look, found another cloth and started helping Thalia clean her hands.

“We need to leave tomorrow.” Walter stared into the ruby disc under the Metamorphose’s neck. His eye went wide at the shapes flitting within the blood. Shadows clawed at its spherical edges, trapped in a bloody prison. Giant mouths with teeth sharpened to points bit at the curving wall. Something struck his neck. Walter winced and jumped from the chair.

“What is it?” Thalia said, spinning to face him.

His neck burned as if someone had placed a coal onto the back of it. His fingers reached for the pain, brushed at the incredible heat, burning fingertips. “Damn it!” he yelled.

“I don’t understand,” Vanya said, scanning around and leveling her spear.

“What can we do?” Thalia peered at him, wringing her hands.

“I will have you back,” the voice of the Shadow god echoed in his head. “You do not belong there.”

Walter marched to a bed, ripped a blanket free from it, threw it over the Metamorphose’s body.

“Walter! Something on your neck… it glows,” Vanya said, her face pallid.

“I know.” He gritted his teeth, waiting for the burning to subside. No amount of healing would touch its pain. His hand formed a tight fist. He had to wait, suffering in silence. The ember-like glow of the figure-eight scar on the back of his neck faded with the covered blood. It only happened with the blood of Death Spawn. It was like a portal, a conduit to the Shadow Realm. Thankfully it seemed the demons couldn’t pass through it. It was as if the demonic blood offered them a window to this realm. At first, he thought it was a hallucination, but after seeing it a few times now, he knew it was very real. “We’ll need your help,” he finally managed. “If you could offer any.”

Thalia stepped towards him, a pace away, bloody rag tucked into the top of her skirt. “What do you need?”

“An army,” Walter scoffed, not at her, but the near impossibility of the request.

“For?” Thalia crossed her arms and kicked out a hip.

“Taking back the Silver Tower, ending the demon god.” And what that entailed, Walter could only guess.

Her lips pressed into a white line. “I have no army.” She shook her head, tugged her headdress off and laid it on the bed. Her hair was long he thought, coiled up into a voluminous bun. “I have about two hundred fighters a few casualties today. If it weren’t for you, well, we’ll go with you.”

“They will? Wait. You’ll come too?”

“I will, and they will follow me,” she said resolutely.

A bit of his overwhelming fatigue relented. “You will?” he asked again, thinking maybe he heard her wrong.

“We will help you take back the Silver Tower. I think I understand its importance now,” she said it softly, smiling at him.

“Should I tell the War Chiefs?” Vanya asked, her eyes like shadowy pits in the torchlight.

“Tell them we march at dawn,” Thalia said, turning from Walter and approaching Vanya. She placed her hands on the frail woman’s shoulders. “You will rule the Great Retreat in my stead.”

“I—” Vanya’s mouth hung open.

“You’ve trained for this. Don’t worry, it won’t be long.”

“Yes.” Vanya swallowed and gave a curt nod. “I’ll be off then.” She opened the ragged remains of the door and padded away.

“I should go and rest now. I’ll tell the guards what happened?” Walter asked, rubbing the back of his neck, fingers tracing the figure-eight.

“No need,” Thalia waved away the notion. “Vanya is likely on her way to them.” She walked towards him, hips swaying, eyes narrowed with that predatory look. “You can stay here.” She reached out and he gently, somewhat reluctantly, caught her wrist.

“No,” Walter said. “I can’t.” He eyed her hand, fingernails ringed with Death Spawn blood. Even after everything that had transpired, she still wanted to bed him. “There’s someone else.” He smiled awkwardly.

She wrapped her other hand around the back of his neck. “She doesn’t have to know. My lips are quiet…” She tried to press closer, but he stopped her with his stump.

“I would know.” He met her eyes, flashing with a wince as if in pain.

“This is only dancing, but closer,” she whispered.

“Sorry,” he freed himself from her hands. “You’re beautiful, stunning really. I just… couldn’t do it to Nyset.”

“Nyset?”

“My other, she waits for me.”

“Very well,” she said coolly. Thalia folded her arms over her breasts. She cleared her throat, turned her back to him. “We march at dawn then.”

Walter nodded at her back. “At dawn. Good night.”

Chapter 16

Traveling

“When you discover new places, they become part of you.” -The Diaries of Nyset Camfield

A cool breeze coursed over the bog, making the seed pods dangling from oversized ferns sway like hanged men. Walter and Grimbald were at the bog’s muddy edge, where they had come in yesterday. It was the spot where Scab had joyfully smiled at Walter, turned, and left them all to die. He had sentenced them to watery graves for marks.

It was sad, Walter thought. Some people’s lives were so empty that they thought marks could eventually fill in that mighty void. He was starting to realize that nothing could fill that empty spot in men. It was always there, haunting during those few moments before drifting off to sleep. Those moments where you were forced to turn inward, meeting the burning eye of your demons up close. The sun would rise again, though, providing new light until sleep loomed again.

“Grim? There’s something I need to do.” Walter turned to him, saw him securing a latch on the pouch of his Blood Donkey. He heaved out a sigh. When this was over, when all of Asebor’s blood and the blood of every Death Spawn beast darkened the earth below his boots, he would spend a month doing nothing but sleeping and eating. He hoped that the only reason he would ever feel this exhausted again was due to spending too much time in bed with Nyset.

“Yeah?” Grimbald said laconically. Walter saw he had the Death Spawn dagger they had removed from his ribs yesterday tucked into his belt. It had grisly spikes along the guard, making punching with it particularly nasty.

“I’m going to go on ahead of you and the soldiers. I need to see Nyset, I can’t wait any longer,” Walter said, bracing himself for some sort of resistance from him.

Grimbald frowned. “I understand, Walt. That’s alright, got Elora to keep me company.”

“Elora?”

Grimbald chuckled. “We had a nice night, slept very little.” He bobbed his eyebrows up and down a few times, a grin crawling up his cheeks.

“I see,” Walter snickered. “So that’s her name. She’s… a fighter then?”

“Mhm. A fighter indeed.” He turned around, jerked the leather armor around his back down to expose some skin, showing fresh scratches. “What happened with you and Thalia?”

“Nothing.” Walter shrugged.

“Nothing?” Grimbald rubbed the donkey’s neck. “She sure had eyes for you, that she did.” He laughed, then burped. “Ugh. Ginger tonic still rumbling around in my belly. Think it’s gonna burn a hole through it by the end of the day.”

“She is pleasing to the eyes, but I couldn’t do it, my friend. All I could think about was Nyset.”

“Huh. What about Kez? Aren’t you going to ride him? Might need a saddle if you’re planning on heading off so soon.” Grimbald pointed over his shoulder using his thumb, directed at the horse.

Walter turned to Kez with a wry smile, watched him drink from a long wooden trough between two mares. There was a great section of land cleared out along the bog with stables for at least fifty horses. He had somehow missed it yesterday, likely from his focus being on more critical matters. “No, going to try using portals to get to her. Think it will be good practice too. Could always use more practice with the powers. Phoenix is less exhausting than the Dragon at least.”

“Portals.” Grimbald chewed on the word. “Aren’t those dangerous for long distance travel? And shouldn’t you be resting?”

“They are, haven’t had any problems so far, though…” Walter saw half of his billowy black shirt hung out the top of his pants, the other half tucked in. He sort of liked it like that. He brushed his stump against Stormcaller.

To his annoyance, some of the Elders who studied artifacts had taken it for investigation when Vanya nursed him. They had returned it to him this morning. They hadn’t told him anything he didn’t already know, though, that it was indestructible and only responded to men who were touched by the Dragon. After having it back, he was glad others had a chance to look at it. Its existence needed to be recorded in the histories, Vanya told him.

“You’re right, though,” Walter sniffed, sucking back the mucus burrowing down his throat. “I want to rest, should rest, but I need to push myself. Need to get comfortable with being uncomfortable. It will only be a matter of time until we fight the real Asebor again. Need to get stronger with the Dragon too.”

“There has to be a better way to detect those shape-shifting Death Spawn.” Grimbald flicked a black fly feasting on his scalp.

“Yeah. Maybe Nyset has an idea. I don’t know. I’ll try to remember to ask her.” Walter trailed off, his attention grabbed by motion on the Great Tree.

Figures streamed down from the bridges winding around the astonishing girth of the Great Tree. They looked like termites emerging from a disturbed nest. Bright spots of color stood out against the browns and greens of the tree. They made no attempt at camouflage, much like the Midgaard Falcon with their absurd red plumes.

“Still can’t believe he betrayed us,” Grimbald muttered.

“Thinking of Scab too?”

“Was almost starting to like the smelly bastard,” Grimbald said. “Made us elixir, good sausages even. Surprising more than anything else. It’s good you’re practically an army on your own,” he said with what might have been a touch of scorn. “Otherwise, we’d be one with the bog, as the Tree Folk say.”

“Would’ve been dead without you. I need you, Grim. The realm needs you,” he said. Walter looked him in his chill eyes, the words feeling almost shameful. He wasn’t used to prying himself open to someone, not even a little bit.

“Thanks, Walter. It’s nice to hear you say that,” Grimbald said, his eyes almost looking to be swimming with tears.

Walter turned away, giving him time to pull it together. It felt good to tell him how he felt. Perhaps he could deem it a successful experiment. “Should’ve listened to Ny. She warned me about him, about Scab.” Walter spotted Thalia marching down one of the curving bridges over the bog, leading the pack.

“She could have been wrong, though.” Grimbald rubbed his eyes with the back of his hand. “Scab had helped, fought against the other Wretched in the woodlands with us.” He bent down, inspecting the donkey’s hooves.

“Yeah. Think I know when it happened… caught him making what sounded like a shady deal. Should’ve trusted my damned instincts. You’d think that after making the same mistake tens of times, I would have learned by now.”

Grimbald shrugged. “You’re only human. Don’t worry about Scab; we’ll find him.” He nodded as if he were already captured, his fists balled up like he was thinking about what he’d do to him.

“I know. He’ll get his.” Walter met his hard gaze, the look they shared only when fighting together.

Thalia strode up to them, boots clopping against the moldering footbridge. She wore her long midnight hair down and falling behind her shoulders. On her head was a thin silvery circlet replacing her headdress. Over her eyes was a broad stripe of red going from temple to temple. Her lithe arms were wrapped in leathery cords from shoulder to wrist, bony spikes jutting out from between the windings, her torso covered from neck to waist in blackened leather armor. On her hip was a wide sheath, the blade curved and almost longer than her. She looked like a terror he wouldn’t want to meet on a battlefield. How could she even swing such a huge weapon? He had almost expected she and her warriors to fight topless, but that was a stupid thought.

“I see you’ve found your way down our bridges,” she said to him, her expression reserved.

“Wasn’t too difficult,” Walter said. He smiled at her with some effort. Everything in his body ached, fatigue still pressing on him. He met her eyes, a deep brown with greens at the center. He thought of her pressed against him last night, felt his prick fluttering to life.

Walter saw Thalia’s dark olive throat flutter with a swallow. “Where is your mount?” she asked. Her soldiers continued on around her, passing her on either side and starting off down the southern path. Some sent Walter grim stares, a few respectful nods.

They wore a mishmash of leather armor interspersed with bright peacock feathers. They carried sets of spears, about five per warrior, tucked into big quivers slung over their backs. Some had crude hatchets, broad short swords, others slings hanging from their belts.

“Over there.” Walter gestured to Kez. “Will you ride him for me? Want him in good hands.”

Her eyes went wide, mouth open. “I have my own horse, waiting down where the path widens. Are you not riding?”

“No, going to go on ahead on my own. Have some things I need to take care of.” He decided to leave out the Nyset part, avoiding adding salt to her wounds. “Going to try to use portals to travel, a spell I can cast using the power of the Phoenix.”

She frowned at him, rested her hands on a heavy belt securing her leather riding skirts.

“Please, Thalia? I wouldn’t trust anyone else.” The truth was, he hadn’t really gotten to know anyone else here. And Grimbald already had his acerbic Blood Donkey to deal with.

She gave him a bitter smile. “I will do you this honor. I am in your debt.”

“Thank you.” He reached out to hug her, but she did not reciprocate the gesture. There was a pleasant smell to her, different than last night, he could not put a name to it. It was faint, but made his heart thump with extra beats. She was dangerously attractive and he was glad she made no effort to touch him now. It made parting that much easier.

“I guess I should be going then,” he said to Thalia. Her eyes met his for a second, then broke away, stoically watching her warriors. He saw then that the heat between them last night was now dead as ashes. In the long run, it was for the better. It seemed only ruins were left in his wake, better not to drag more people too close to it. There was, of course, Nyset to think about. It felt like it had been years since he’d seen her. She felt distant, and not just geographically. It was like the part of him that knew her was slowly atrophying like a geriatric muscle. People often said that ‘distance made the heart grow more affectionate,’ but Walter thought that was wrong. Distance made the heart die a slow death.

“Wait.” Thalia reached out, her hand hanging between them for a second, fingers closing on the air, then her arm retracted. “Where will we meet you?”

Walter looked at Grimbald. “Helm’s Reach.” He nodded. “At the new Silver Tower. Grim knows where it is. You remember how to get there?”

“Mm,” he grunted. “Got a map anyway.”

“You know how to read those things?” Walter asked.

“Very funny,” Grimbald said flatly.

“Not to worry, our navigators can find anything,” Thalia added.

“Aye. Tell Ny, Senka, Isa… and the others I said ‘good tidings’ or something like that.” Grimbald scraped the last of the packed dirt out of the Blood Donkey’s hoof with the Death Spawn dagger. He tucked the dagger into his belt, sauntering over to Walter, armor gleaming in a pink ray of light. A broad grin spread over Grimbald’s dimpling face. He opened his big arms and wrapped him up in a bear hug. “Take care, friend,” Grimbald said. Walter hugged him back, feeling like a child against his mammoth chest.

Walter’s eye caught the bright Midgaard Falcon pin shining from his collar “You too, Captain Grimbald, you big fucker.” Walter smiled and Grimbald sheepishly chuckled. Walter pulled away from him, looked him in the eye with a nod, then slapped him on the shoulder for good measure.

“Take care of yourselves; the wilds should be safe now, I think.” He blew out his cheeks, looked from Thalia to Grimbald one last time. “Alright, safe travels. Keep an eye out for Scab’s men too, don’t know where they’d be headed.”

“I’d love to run into him,” Grimbald said under his breath.

Walter turned away from them and stared down the southern path. The Tree Folk warriors walked in groups of three, some having the unfortunate place of marching through snaring weeds. Leaving them was more difficult than he thought it would be. It was as if there was an unseen force tugging on his chest and drawing him back to them, but he had to go.

Walter walked into the forest’s edge, stepping wearily and watching for snapping Sand Buckeyes and chewing bushes, whatever those were called. Nyset would know. He slid the clasp on his satchel strap, tightening it across his chest. Vanya was up early and had given him pouches filled with sundries packed with dried blueberries, ginger root, squirrel jerky, and globs of lard. It certainly wasn’t decadent, but it would keep him sustained if he was dying of hunger. Not much appealed to him besides the blueberries. He squeezed his filled water skin, gurgling against his palm.

“Alright, here we go,” he whispered. He scanned around, making sure no one was near him. No more accidents, he thought. Had to be more cautious with the powers.

He blinked and inhaled the strength of the Phoenix. A calming sense of peace washed over him, assuaging all those niggling anxieties he hadn’t known were there until they were gone. Would Grimbald be safe without him? Did Thalia hate him now? Would she abandon them like Scab had? How would he find Bonesnapper? These questions, among tens of others, had been churning in his guts. He never felt truly relaxed. The Phoenix shut them up though, and for that he was grateful. He thought it might be helpful to draw on more of the Phoenix when he used the Dragon.

He imagined the portal in space, willed it to be there the way one would will one’s muscle to flex. A blue line of light cracked the air, endpoints turned counter-clockwise and opened an oval shaped portal. A few of the Tree Folk shouted with surprise, calmed down by others who had remembered and recognized him. Through it was where he guessed a tenth of a mile farther down the path would be. It looked about right, could see the path through the other side. He would start with shorter distances and gradually increase them as he felt more comfortable. As long as nothing went wrong. The portal hummed, waiting. The earth at its bottom edge hissed, tiny leaves on weeds sliced and turned to dust.

He looked back and saw Grim, waved at him. He waved back, now mounted. Thalia looked to be shouting at someone, cringing at being the subject of her scorn. Walter was glad to have avoided that fate.

He leaped into the portal, bringing his arms in close to avoid the portal’s deadly edges. Air whooshed over his ears, icy wind coating his skin. One foot found solid earth through the other side, the other a loose rock, his ankle rolling and spiking with hot pain. “Damn it,” he groaned, hobbling on his good leg. He felt the Phoenix flare in his ankle, cooling and tightening up the stretched tendons. He shook his head. “Have to be more careful.”

He looked back through the shimmering portal behind him, saw the marching men waving like mirages. He let it snap shut, fizzling away with a spark. It felt like a sliver of his strength was left behind with its closing. His muscles felt weaker and there might have been a little fog creeping in at the edges of his thoughts. There wasn’t any sign of Thalia’s soldiers on the path, which meant he had traveled a fair distance. He strained his ears, listening for voices or boots. He heard the distant roar of the Blanched Falls drifting over the forest, birds chirping in a nearby tree, and a pair of squirrels dueling over a precious acorn. He inhaled deeply, crisp forest air filling him with lost vigor.

He felt his face, inspected his body up and down. Everything was intact and he felt good on the whole. Baylan told him that, at the Silver Tower, there was once a wizard who had developed a specialty in the use of portals. He was always extending the distance until one day he emerged through the other side with three cocks hanging from his face. Walter snickered at the thought, but also couldn’t help but feel a little bit of terror at the possibility of such a deformity. He still had one cock, though and in the right place. Time to get moving.

He had to use places he remembered well, images crystallized in his mind. He thought of the bridge they had crossed near the Blanched Falls, willed the portal to life a few paces before it. He stepped through this time instead of jumping, made it close behind him. His boots fell on well-nourished moss thriving on the rocky embankment.

The falls thundered over the edge from uncertain cliffs, crashing down onto rocks polished smooth from the water’s relentless pounding. Thin streams of mist swirled through the cool air, rising up to the verdant trees hanging over the falls. The light of the morning sun dappled through the waving trees, casting jets of light over the bank, making slivers of mist glitter like diamonds. The foot bridge was covered with a sheen of wet and yellowy mushrooms grew out the wood on one side. To the far east, he could almost make out a line of black smoke trailing out from the Scalded Peak, the biggest volcano in the realm.

He could’ve sat there all day reading a book and having a picnic. He thought of his favorite tale, Thieves of Gold. It was his Dad’s favorite story too. It was a story of a band of thieves who had decided upon robbing a wealthy baron, only to discover the baron was colluding with the mad king to burn each and every wizard on the stake. Life was often stranger than the stories, he thought. Perhaps in another life, another time, he would sit and read again. A new portal sprung open and he stepped through.

The air was different here, less humid, warmer. The portal closed, taking a little more of his vitality with it. He thought he could almost feel his skin cringing at the sudden change. The Midgaard palace stood in the distance, the size of his thumbnail. It towered over the capital city with all the ostentation King Ezra could produce. The palace’s walls reflected the sun, gleaming with an opalescent brightness, almost difficult to look at now. Behind him was the last bridge leading into Shipton.

Shipton was Grimbald’s former home, now a ruined shell, ravaged by Juzo and his Blood Eaters. It was difficult to revisit that memory, but here it was, pushing through his brain like an irrepressible volcano. It was the place where he had murdered his friend. “An accident,” he scoffed. It was the memory that would always come back in times of quiet, wrapping its scaled hands around his neck and trying to choke him with grief.

He sniffed, felt tears push out from his eyes and fall over his cheeks. “I’m sorry, Juzo” he croaked out. Even his scarred up, broken eye could still weep, not good for anything else. They were useless thoughts, useless emotions. They wouldn’t help him now, but would only make this path harder to tread. He stuffed those emotions deep inside, dashed apart upon the blade of vengeance. He knew he was made for one thing and one thing only: cleansing the world of the Shadow Realm’s malevolent touch. Nothing else mattered.

His head throbbed. He wrote it off as a symptom of dehydration, poor sleep, and a body ragged from combat. He sucked down some water, hoping it would pass soon. He produced a strip of salted lamb jerky from one of the pouches in his satchel and started gnawing on it. “Mm. Good.” He nodded at the plants.

People would go back to the village eventually, he hoped. Maybe after the survivors forgot about what happened there. It would take generations perhaps, but folk here were a hardy lot. The stories would always live on, though.

Honeybees buzzed on a bush with bright pink flowers, darting in and out of petals with hair-thin spines. Walter watched one unfortunate bee spend too much time harvesting its nectar, petals slowly closing down around it like a screwing vice and locking it between its sticky clutches. Walter heard the bee furiously buzzing from within, pleading for release. But no help would come. The hive would carry on, writing it off as part of the day’s losses.

Walter set his sights on Midgaard again, thinking of the king’s audience chamber. That wouldn’t do though. He had the mind to try the king again for help, but knew it would be as useful as trying to convince a stone to fly. He thought of the gardens around the palace, the spot where he and Nyset first kissed. He remembered the taste of her mouth. It reminded him of being home. That sent a warm tingling in his stomach, fluttering as it had the first time. It was a long distance, much farther than he’d ever traveled, a few miles at least. Was it worth the risk of potential ruin? “Yes,” he said to himself with iron resolve. “It was.” He had to test his capabilities.

The portal opened, showing him the rolling grasses of the Midgaard palace’s gardens. “That’s a good start,” he said to the portal. He stepped through, wind caressing his cheeks and whisking away his tears. The portal closed and the flattened world warbled.

His guts spun with nausea. His eyes went wide, stomach furiously gurgling, throat spasming and mouth torn opening with a stream of vomit. He hunched over, stomach compressing and ejecting his morning supper of blueberries and elixir.

“Shit,” he gasped, staring down at the puddle of black between his legs, vomit trailing down the sides of his boots. His stomach wrenched again, pushing out with more vomit. He fought for a breath, but his stomach revolted, putting him on his knees. His guts crushed down again, but all that came out from his lips was a hanging line of spittle. “Shit,” he breathed, rolled back onto his ass. “Too far.” He sat there for a few minutes, catching his breath and waiting for the nausea to pass.

Tall Cypress trees formed manicured columns, marking the garden’s gravel filled paths. Bright flowers were arranged by color to denote paths that branched off from the main path, organized by associated colors. Walter’s eye traced a golden path that wound over the vibrant grasses. It started with sunflowers and daisies, becoming yellow dahlias and then transitioning into rows of blond roses. He spotted a few happy-faced couples walking arm in arm along the idyllic paths, likely ignorant of the evils outside their walls. They were right to enjoy it while they could, for only the scarlet world of the Shadow Realm awaited them.

In the distance, he could see The Wall, trailing along the landscape like a pale snake. Beyond The Wall was the Tigerian Bluffs, a series of plateaus flattened out at all the same height like a shattered plate. He wondered how the landscape had formed in such a peculiar way. It looked like a dust storm was brewing on the horizon, a sheet of swirling browns. The storms crawled from east to west from the Nether, usually dying out in the Plains of Dressna. They occasionally made their way to Midgaard, bathing the city in sand, sometimes bringing a dose of volcanic ash with it.

To the far north-east were the Mountains of Misery, white-capped, the peaks reaching above the puffy clouds. He wondered what lay beyond the mountains, felt his skin clamming up at the thought of all that bitter cold. Supposedly, some people lived there, Northmen, who thrived in that unforgiving landscape. Breden folk were hardy from living by the Abyssal Sea, cold one day and warm as summer the next. Walter thought weather made men tougher. Having to live in a harsh environment would change you. He couldn’t imagine the kind of folk who would be forged in those mountains.

He could almost make out the Silver Tower, a glimmering speck on the southern landscape. Most of its tallest spires had been laid to waste by Asebor’s catapults. The impenetrable walls of the Tower had been duly penetrated. Nothing was secure, nothing was sacred, and everything made could be unmade.

“You lost?” A gruff voice called from about ten paces away.

Walter flinched, flicking his eyes from the distant Tower to the sound. A soldier dressed in shining steel plate stared at him with wary eyes, his spear propped up, a pair of red feathers waving from its tip. The man stepped towards him, head cocked and brows furrowed. “You’ve got a familiar face.”

Walter scrambled to his feet, staving off a wave of dizziness. “That was much too far,” he mumbled, pressing his palm to his temple.

“What’s that?” the man asked. The Midgaard Falcon soldier had a pointy beard, maybe old as his father.

“I think I know you,” Walter said, unable to place the man.

“You do… I remember you now. You and a lass came by my guard house, maybe a year ago. Looking at our logs and such business. Orders from the king, you’d said.”

“Stacks?”

“General Stokes,” he grinned, smile lines forming around his mouth. “Never got to talk with you after, but heard you had stopped.” Stokes counted on his fingers. “Three assassination attempts on King Ezra. Takes a lot to impress me, but I’d say you did it.”

“Was it three? My head’s a mess at the moment.”

“’T’was. First was a Death Spawn thing. Second was the traitor Malek, his former advisor. Third was his barber.” Stokes rose up on the balls of his feet.

“You’re right about the first one.” Walter pointed at him. “The others were Death Spawn too.”

“They were?”

“Mhm. Malek, well the thing posing as Malek during the assassination attempt at the Falcon’s send off, was a shape-shifting Death Spawn, call ‘em a Metamorphose.”

“And the barber?” Stokes leaned on his spear.

“Another Metamorphose.” Walter frowned. “You guys need to do a better job of interviewing new palace employees. I think that’s your best bet at keeping them out.”

The corner of Stokes’ lip twitched up. “Not my duty, but I’ll pass the message along. What brings you to the lovely palace gardens, White?”

“Walter,” he corrected. “Just passing through, making my way to the Arch Wizard.”

Stokes frowned. “There’s no Arch Wizard anymore. Dead with the Tower, sorry lad.”

Walter shook his head. “The lass who was with me, Nyset Camfield, she’s the new Arch Wizard. We were at the Tower during Asebor’s siege.”

“You were?” Stokes’ mouth fell open. “How, uh, sorry. Must have been bad, eh?” He scratched his beard.

“Very. I should be going.” Walter popped the cork from his water skin and took a sip. He offered it to Stokes, who raised his hand to decline.

“Anything I can do to help?” Stokes said, gesturing with an opened palm.

“Yeah. Send us some soldiers. Tried with King Ezra, wouldn’t spare a single man for the war, holed up here like a scared turtle.”

“How many?” Stokes sighed and brushed a speck of dirt from his thigh plate.

“As many as you can spare.”

“I’ve got a battalion of about two-hundred and fifty. Where and when should we march?”

“What’s your angle?” Walter sent him a sideways glance. “What about Ezra demanding the Falcon stay in Midgaard for its defenses?”

“Fuck the king and fuck his mandates. He’s a coward. He’d rot in a hole in the ground before he stuck his neck out again.” Stokes’ face was tomato red and almost shaking. “I’ll ask one more time. Where do we march?” His voice was steel.

Walter reached out his hand. “For Helm’s Reach. You’ll find the new Silver Tower on the outskirts, near the whorehouses and taverns.”

Stokes took his hand with a resounding shake. “We’ll leave at once.”

“Shit, that was refreshing.” Walter was filled with a burst of energy; what he’d lost summoning portals restored. The sun on his back felt warm and the wind brought in new, crisp air.

“What’s that?”

“Nothing, thanks for the help. But there’s just one thing. Your men need to know this isn’t any ordinary enemy. These are Death Spawn. They take no quarter, no prisoners. You don’t want to know what they do to those they capture.”

Stokes snickered. “Falcon doesn’t take prisoners either, least of all this kind. We’ve fought them before, remember? Well, generations long past have too, killing them is in our blood. Defending the realm from any invader is our birthright. From demons, pillaging men, the Tigerians… we’ve fought them all.”

“Right.” Walter nodded. “See you at Helm’s Reach then. There may be a big group of bandits roaming the land, don’t ask me why I know, it’s a long story. Just keep an eye out for them.”

“The boys like skewering bandits on their spears. We could only be so fortunate to run into them,” Stokes put his spear over his shoulder and started towards a path colored with shades of red flowers.

Chapter 17

An Old Spot

“Teaching magic is difficult. Each person must experience it to understand it.” -The Diaries of Nyset Camfield

Walter summoned portals, hopping over vast stretches of land, traveling no more than a quarter of a mile at a time. That seemed to be his distance threshold before nausea started creeping back in. It began with a subtle headache, the first sign he’d gone too far, the sign he had first ignored. He felt for that now, scanned for that subtle hammering down the center of his corpus callosum. He wasn’t going to test himself again, as the scent of vomit wafting up from his boots was trying to wrench another gag from his throat.

He traveled to the Lair in the wizard’s quarters of Midgaard, surprised to find his wizard’s tower, formerly Malek’s, hadn’t been razed. The rooms were coated in a thin layer of dust, left much the same as he last remembered. There were still brown spots of blood on the ceiling of the central room where Baylan and Grimbald had fought against the Silver Tower’s assassins. There were no signs of footprints or looting. Perhaps his reputation had finally developed traction in the city. His portal had sliced through the stony floor, a razor thin cut left behind as evidence of anyone recently setting foot behind its walls.

Order was still well maintained in Midgaard. The city’s denizens lived in their own sort of hell. They were cloistered and protected from the horrors occurring beyond the outskirts of their walls. They lived in abject fear. Most of the farms outside the city had already been pillaged, burned down to ashes and charred timbers from Death Spawn raiders. Midgaard patrols no longer marched beyond the walls, for most no longer returned.

Those who dared to leave, traders usually, were never seen again. Small hordes of Death Spawn freely roamed the lands, flaying and eating bold travelers and setting fire to carts. Some Death Spawn would rape both men and women to the death, though those grisly stories were rare, and often kept bottled to avoid a general upheaval of the citizenry. The stories that did find their way into barrooms were quickly drowned in spirits. Alcohol was running on short supply. However, the demand magnified. The main producers were beyond the Plains of Dressna, the region where the plains met the sands of the Nether. What Midgaard didn’t know was that most of the plantation’s producers were rotting on pikes. These were perilous times.

Walter poked his head through one the Lair’s windows, leaned on his elbow, taking in the sprawling city. Wizards towers reached up like spears, looming over modest residences with gable and hipped roofs. He wondered how many other wizard’s towers lay unoccupied. His eye gazed up and down alleys as far as he could see, looking for men in white, the Purists. He saw no sign of them. Perhaps they’d finally given up their fool’s crusade. Perhaps King Ezra finally saw that the monsters inside their walls were a bigger threat that those outside them. Either way, it was a problem King Ezra would have to contend with.

The king did seem to care about his people, or perhaps he just cared about himself. New archer’s towers had been erected, rising up over the battlements like prairie dogs watching for prey. It seemed more than half of the city was dressed in gleaming steel and sprigs of red, the attire of the Midgaard Falcon. The new sets of cascading walls that were in the midst of construction last time he’d visited appeared to be completed, making the city seemingly impenetrable from ground attack. Did the good king know there were Death Spawn who could fly? Walter had told him so, but had he remembered?

A few farmers pushed bouncing, clopping carts over the cobbled road alongside the Lair, nearly empty, hawking partially grown vegetables. Walter could feel the stress hanging over them, a dark cloud of hunger. He spotted the gauntness in their faces, the bony arms of malnourishment. A boy with scraped knees sat shaking a rusted can, pleading for marks from passersby. A pair of Falcon soldiers turned a corner, one shot a glance at Walter, then saw the beggar. They sauntered up to the child, barking curses, jabbing their spear butts into his ribs. But the boy only sat there. He was numb to their insults and stared up at Walter, shielding the sun from his eyes. Walter turned away. The view was too much. He had to stay focused.

He summoned a portal into a desolate alley he remembered in the city. He wasn’t sure how he remembered it, though. It might’ve been a memory from the time when they’d first arrived in Midgaard, when he had worn the armor of Cerumal. The thought of that sent a quiver through his intestines. What if he had become like them? The enemy could’ve been anyone he once knew, even friends.

He moved on, following the path to the Wall in a series of blinking portals. It had felt endless the last time he’d walked that way. He had been heading for the Silver Tower with Baylan, Nyset, and Grimbald. It was an exciting time, terrifying, yet had presented a world filled with wonders unknown. He stopped where the path started curving north, peered south towards Helm’s Reach, then looked east to the Tigerian Bluffs. It might be worth a visit, but it had to be brief. He would only go there because he had the capability for it to be brief.

He cast portal after portal, reaching the outside of the Tigerian Bluffs, the place where he found Juzo after he’d vanished into Terar’s terrible hands. He noticed that the more portals he cast, the less they drained him. He was becoming more efficient, he thought.

He started by following a craggy channel that wound between two enormous plateaus. The path was studded with cacti, polished stone, and thriving weeds that had burrowed down into a hidden source of water. Almost as soon as he’d arrived, he asked himself why he had come. He didn’t have time for this, nor the excess energy to squander. The sun burned away any clouds threatening to prevent it from beating upon the stony land, disintegrating all but a few smoky wisps.

He didn’t need to stay on the channel as long as he could picture where to place the portal. He looked up at a plateau, long shadows cast over its stratified wall, stone varying in amber hues as it rose up. The portal opened, and as far as he could tell by looking through, seemed like as good of a place as any other. He stepped through.

Walter’s breath whooped, the sky spinning around. His internal organs reached for his screaming throat, boots flailing at the vast stretch of air between him and the ground. Air! He fanned his fingers, tumbled head first toward a wall of stone. He grabbed the Dragon, blasted the approaching surface with a burst of wind. The opposite force was enough to slow his descent, and he was able to get his legs facing down, dropping into a deep squat, muscles snapping and bones cracking. He tumbled over in a series of fumbling rolls, sharp stones stabbing at his back and punching his ribs. He came to a stop, sprawled out on his back. Dust filled his mouth, sucking up every ounce of saliva. Something was wrong with his left quadriceps, twitching like a dying animal. The Phoenix went to work on torn muscles, minor fractures, and a torn ligament in his ankle. A moan escaped his lips, his lungs heaving like a split bellows.

He blinked at his portal hovering in the air at least thirty feet up like a bizarre monster’s eye, part of himself still clinging to it like the last thread keeping him alive. He moaned, pain filling his wracked body and let the portal vanish with a fizzling spark. The sun seemed to pulse with heat, stone uncomfortably hot under his back, sweat trickling down his sideburns. He lay there, staring up at the sun for at least five minutes as the pain subsided. He groaned, pushed up onto his elbow, spat out dust and even a few stone fragments. The sun had burned a dark orb in his vision, making it hard to see clearly.

“No. Please, not teeth.” He looked where he had spat, tonguing around his mouth for broken teeth. “All intact.” He snickered with a wave of relief. “Shit, that was fucking unexpected.” A nick sealed up over his high cheekbones, leaving a razor-thin white scar under his eye. He shook his legs side to side and flexed his knees, the pain slowly slipping away with the Phoenix’s mending. “Thank you,” he whispered, wondering if it could hear him. “What’s wrong with me? Careless, need more sleep.”

Search for what you seek, the voice of the Dragon said in his head, an ethereal roaring.

Search and find, the Phoenix crooned.

“What?” Walter stammered, scanning the empty plateau. He knew the sources of the voices uncomfortably well now, though they still startled him when they spoke.

Find it, the Dragon boomed.

End the demon god, the Phoenix said.

Destroy, the Dragon said.

It is here. Use your last soul window, the Phoenix commanded.

I sense its power, it is here, the Dragon hissed.

“But there’s nothing here,” he protested from the ground. He rose up to his feet, brushing himself off. There was a gaping hole torn through his knee, the tattered flap of skin hanging over the hole, new skin already patched over. “Just weeds, rocks, dust.” He blinked something from his eye, vision blurring with tears and finally sharpening. He drew a touch of the Dragon and a needle of fire emerged from his fingertip. He carefully worked it through the flap of skin, falling to the ground and lightly smoking. “Huh. That worked,” he said, covering his mouth with his hand.

Search, they both said together, though with a bit less conviction. They seemed to fade back into the background of his mind, there, but in the shadows.

Search. Find. Even to himself, the words were like madness to his ears. Was he going mad? Was madness hearing voices in your head you knew were there, but could never prove their existence to anyone else? He supposed his powers were a fair defense against any accusations of insanity.

There was something about being alone in the wilds that always seemed to make him feel the grip of madness. The lands seemed to draw on the feral urges in man. When the facade of civilization fell away, our roots emerged. What was it about having another person to travel with that assuaged that fleeting fear?

He shook his head, gathered up his satchel and waterskin, torn free from his body during his graceless tumbling. The waterskin’s cork had been blown off, precious water staining the light brown stone, rapidly evaporating. He peered around for a few seconds looking for the cork, guessing it was down in the ravine between the plateaus. He slung the empty waterskin and satchel over his shoulders then looked inside the bag. Walter sighed. The foods once separated by pouches were now all mashed together, congealed by the gooey white lard. Finding water would now be his primary concern.

Search! The Dragon bellowed. He supposed its wishes were his new primary concern, he thought with a mock grin.

“Right.” He nodded. He started towards the rim of the plateau, walking its perimeter. As far as he could see, he was in a maze of these of monstrosities. He could see their heights varied from up here though the differences were slight. From afar, they would look much the same. He kicked a stone, sent it clattering onto rocks below, echoing as it nestled its way into a new home between two boulders. He snorted. “What do you expect me to find here?”

The voices were quiet as graves.

Walter realized that this was the view that Juzo had of he and his friends when they had walked these ravines, searching for him. How long had Juzo waited upon these strange flats before showing himself? Walter finished the circuit around the plateau. “Shit. This is a waste of—” Something caught his eye.

It shone like a diamond through a haze of weeds and stone. He squinted at its glinting, strode over towards it. This was something important, could feel it in his thundering heart. He squatted down, parted a ball of scraggly weeds, pushed aside a pair of overlapping stones.

This, this, this, the voices were a torrent of whispers.

“What the?” There was a big leather bag sitting in what looked to be a chipped out alcove. There was a tear through the side, a tiny metallic point sticking out. Walter felt his tongue sticking to the roof of his mouth, throat going tight. He slowly untied the pouch and carefully inverted it. Metal softly clinked against metal. Chain links spilled from the bag and into a neat little pile, followed by a gleaming handle, molded with indentations for fingers. Ornate engravings of the Phoenix and Dragon entwined together spiraled around the handle.

“Bonesnapper,” he whispered, his eye wide. What else could it possibly be? How did it get from his house to here? Some questions could never be answered and had to be let go. “Doesn’t make sense.” Few things did, he thought.

There were three chains, each terminated with a curved edge as long as his hand. He reached for it, then stopped mid-way. Could it hurt him somehow? Was this another trick like the Cerumal’s armor? He narrowed his eye, resolute, and seized the grip. To his great relief, nothing happened. What struck him as odd was how cool the metal was as if it had been sitting in ocean water all this time. The grip felt like a natural extension of his arm.

He rose to stand, chains clinking by his side, gleaming with the white fire of the sun. There was a central chain bonded with the grip that split into three smaller chains after about a foot. He held it out to his side, a straight line from shoulder to the first gleaming chain link, the rest hanging limply by his side. This was a lash, a weapon he was intimately familiar with. It had been far too long since he’d last held one, but the feel of it came back in an instant. A smile crept across his lips as he raised the Chains of the North behind his shoulder. Its weight was perfect; it felt as if it had been built for him.

He whirled Bonesnapper, the Chains of the North, around his head. He cracked it towards the stone and Stormcaller sprang to life, fiery tendrils intertwining between the chain’s links in the same instant. They flashed with an amber brilliance. A great Dragon’s roaring penetrated the air, echoed through the ravines and boomed in his chest. The burning chains struck the plateau’s surface, throwing up ragged chunks of rock and debris into the blue sky. Walter closed his eye, stone chips hissing across his cheeks.

He laughed and sucked in dust. “That was amazing!” He tugged on Bonesnapper, jerking the chains back to his side. They were light, their return almost effortless. He examined them for damage, unsurprisingly finding them glinting and without a scratch. Three burning scars were left in the plateau, stone a molten red, edges blackened and smoking.

He whipped Bonesnapper around his back and over his head again in a diagonal slice, Stormcaller binding with the chains without his beckoning. He focused on Stormcaller, willing its Dragon fire tendrils into a single unit. The chains of Bonesnapper complied, twisted together, blades at the ends whispering pain. He growled, dragging them down hard against the plateau. They tore through a great section of stone, screeching and cutting out a wedge large enough to crush him flat. His mouth dropped, watching the stone slab slide away from the plateau’s edge. It turned in the air, splitting in two against the jagged rocks at the bottom, a deep crack carrying up.

He felt the chains, expecting some heat, but they were still cool. He inhaled deeply, hefted them in his hand. He felt a sense of vigor course through his body, mind refreshed, muscles energized. After all this time, after so many deaths, after all the struggles, he’d finally found them. It was a small victory, one he felt that should be celebrated. Water would be a good start. He felt for the cork on his waterskin, remembered it was empty and frowned. “Damn it.”

Something shifted in the corner of his eye. He swiveled his head, meeting a pair of blood-red eyes on a neighboring plateau. A pale-faced man stared at him wearing a threadbare and badly tattered shirt and pants. His beard was thick from years of growth, likely a lice breeding ground.

“Hey!” Walter called. It probably wasn’t the best greeting for something looking at him like he was its next meal.

The man’s mouth opened, tongue nervously flicking at his lips, rimmed with what could only be blood.

“Blood Eater,” Walter hissed, winding Bonesnapper around Stormcaller in a few twists of his forearm. “Come on! You want a taste?” Walter raised his chin, showing his neck. “Why— how are there Blood Eaters here?” he said to himself.

The Blood Eater hesitated for a second, turned and scrambled on all fours in the opposite direction, kicking up dust.

“Where are you going?” Walter said to himself. He drew in a breath and a portal split the air. Without hesitation, he leapt through, landing on the plateau where the Blood Eater was, the height appropriate this time. He ran, following its tracks to the other side. He slid to a stop at the edge, arm waving for balance, saw it scrambling along a winding ravine. It looked up, yelped and sprinted over the craggy path, dodging towering cacti.

“Shit,” Walter whispered, glanced south towards Helm’s Reach, then down at the ravine. He jumped, opened a portal below his feet, came out the other side about six feet above the path, landing with a thump. “That worked.” He grinned, mentally patted himself on the back. Running, he followed the trail of brown dust curving around a bend. “Where are you going?” he shouted. “Not hungry today? Scared of a mortal, are you?”

He heard it scrambling on stones around another bend, rounded it, caught sight of its legs trailing down a fork. “Fuck,” he barked, leg slipping out from under him and catching himself from smashing his face with his arms, stump splitting open against something sharp. His head snapped up, growled, expecting the Blood Eater to be on him to take advantage of his fall. He stumbled up, wove a portal to bridge the distance between them. He jumped through, hurling a flickering ball of fire.

The Blood Eater turned to look over its shoulder, scarlet eyes going wide with terror and letting out a shriek. The fireball collided with its shoulder, threw out a spray of blood, fireball skipped off and exploded against a wall. It was a graze, but it was enough. Walter’s breath heaved in his lungs, paused to watch it stagger through a narrow opening in a plateau.

Walter shook his head, staring at that darkened entrance, a black slit into the bowels of the realm. Every part of him said that this was a bad idea, but his curiosity overrode those voices. If there was a chance he could learn something about Juzo, he had to take it. For Juzo’s honor. For Walter’s endless repentance.

His heart pounded in his temples and he started with a cautious step towards that dark spot. His boots became leadened with every step, cold sweat beading on the back of his neck. “Damn caverns, why did it have to be fucking caverns,” he muttered. A coyote howled from nearby, followed by the bellowing of other howls echoing all around. It was hard to tell exactly where they came from.

He squared up with the entrance to the plateau from ten paces away. It was most certainly man made by the way the stone had been cut. It was an archway, perfectly smooth and forming a point at the top. “Strange.”

Something snarled. A wolf with a sandy coat emerged from a rock, slipping behind another. More moved from behind him, quiet as the wind, the scraping of paws on gravel giving them away. Walter turned to face where he guessed most of them were, shapes matching the colors of stones and darting between them. He let Bonesnapper’s chains clink to the ground at his side, his eye burning with the fire of the Dragon.

“Turn back! I’d rather not hurt you,” he called, knowing full well the futility of it.

The wolves emerged from hiding, fanning out and circling him, drawing in. He counted at least eight. All the noise he’d made earlier chopping up rocks must have brought them.

The biggest of them all had to weigh over a hundred pounds, bristling with quivering muscles, white teeth showing through a sea of growls. Another wolf feigned for a leap, Walter swiveled to face it, it slid to a stop, snarling with frustration. A bark came from behind, head whipped over his shoulder, stabbed up with this stump. Something dragged against his sword of fire. He had cut the beast from neck to tail, the body split into ragged halves twisting in the air and bouncing off a cactus, painting him in gore.

A wolf yelped at the body of his pack-mate squelching against the ground beside him. The alpha’s growling became a series of furious jaw snappings. The growling grew softer and the wolves backpedaled, retreating behind rocks and shrubs. Walter heard some, but they were whispers. He watched others slink away at the alpha’s behest, wise enough to know they should search for easier prey.

He waited until he was sure they were gone. He thought of his old dog Wiggles. It felt like he had died over ten years ago. Walter had sacrificed him to the voices that beat in his head, to grant him the strength to smite his enemies. The metallic stink of the wolf’s blood filled his nostrils, face painted in a drying swath of scarlet. He wiped his face on his shirt, scrubbing the skin until it was an angry red. The scent of blood lingered in his nostrils, eye and lips rimmed with it, a grisly mask, not unlike a Blood Eater.

Walter raised a stone the size of his fist from the ground with the Phoenix, hovering and humming in the air. He sent it into the archway, testing for traps. He intended on it going through, but his aim was off and it struck the bottom. Script on the floor flashed with a sky blue. It was a ring with triangles of various sizes within it. He flinched back a step, Phoenix shield sparking to cover his front. The air around the archway filled with a bright orange gas and billowed out like a cloud. It crawled up the archway and over the plateau’s side, hissing. Insects he didn’t know were there dropped from the sky, pattering down like pebbles before the archway. A moment later the gas dissipated. Hundreds of upturned bugs were dead or dying upon the archway’s entrance.

Some type of ward trap, he surmised, like the one Baylan had placed on the Lair. It was fortuitous that he had used a portal to enter the Lair rather than climbing the stairs. Perhaps he would’ve been like one of these insects, limbs frantically twitching with his last breaths.

He stepped through the archway, air cool and heavy. There was a dark and shiny spot of blood on the floor between a few ancient stones. There was more blood trailing down a set of jagged stairs that curved down and around an endless cylinder. Some of the carved blocks making up the steps had shattered down the middle, others were missing entirely, and some badly cracked. He took in a tremulous breath, first step sending pebbles bouncing from the edge. He held his breath to listen for them striking the bottom. No sound returned. Breath slowly escaped his lips.

He looked back through the archway, a bright sliver of light in a sheet of black behind it. It looked like the entirety of the plateau been hollowed out, like it was only a facade of a plateau. Why do I continue to do these things to myself? He thought, setting his gaze on the treacherous stairs. He carefully started on, summoned a ball of fire by his side to illuminate the shattered steps. He kept one hand on the curved wall, cold as dug earth and barnacled as if once submerged in ocean water. He eyed sconces on the walls, lacking torches or signs of ever having being lit. “Magic, but what kind?”

After a few minutes of navigating the ever spiraling steps, he approached a section of stairs that had crumbled against the endless march of time. The gap was nearly ten feet across to the next section. “No problem,” he said, feeling his spirits perk up a bit at knowing the solution. He dismissed his fireball and a portal split the air between the gap and he went through, cautiously stepping.

There was a muffled crack. His leg plunged through a section of brittle stone, stopping at and cutting into his thigh and blooming with a ring of pain. “Shit!” he hissed, arms spreading to distribute his weight, breath gasping. “Shit!” His other leg, knee high and awkwardly placed on the next step, slipped off. A great cracking roared in his ears, the ground heaving underneath him. He reached out and caught hold of the next step, Bonesnapper’s chains rattling. The step he was snared on popped and ripped free from the wall before it fell from his thigh, thudded against his ankle and into the void, snatching his boot off with it. He heard it smacking on and off the tubular walls as it plummeted.

His fingers wriggled against the step’s edge, slick with sweat, tendons screaming, stump uselessly flailing in the dark. His legs kicked at the wall, finding only air. “Damn it!” Every muscle in his body writhed and contracted, fighting to live.

He tried to pull himself up, but he wasn’t strong enough to do it one handed. “Think, think.” He swallowed. One finger started to slip and he squeezed down harder but was still slipping. Terror pierced his gut and his arm jerked free, his hand closing on empty air. “No!” His eye went wide, dark whooshing, tears streaking his brow. Portal!

A portal snapped open, aiming for below his descent, but he heard it fizzle open above. Again! His aim was true, falling through the beautiful blue disc, opening beyond the yawning stairs. Fire ripped at his shoulder, a wall of glowing stone trained at his face. Not again!

He screamed, put his arms up to protect his head. Sharp edged stairs beat against his neck, stabbed at his ribs, tore at his legs, thudded on his bones. He spun around and around and around. His back slammed into something flat, blasting out the air from his lungs. He fell onto his side choking, gasping, writhing for breath.

He padded around with his hand, tried to grasp and felt a finger, maybe some toes bent the wrong way. He let out a hoarse cry mixed with choking. Hot tears sprang from his eyes, his breath a frantic heaving. The enveloping darkness surrounded him in its silent, strangling embrace.

His body was fire, shoulder screaming. Light filled his eyes, Phoenix flashing with blinding brilliance. He saw he was at the bottom of the stairs, at the start of a long hallway. The Phoenix flared a bluish-white, knitting up cuts, patching up bruised bones, righting his twisted finger. He felt his finger snapping back into place, cringing at the clunking sensation. His shoulder was missing a great chunk of tissue, cleanly cut and showing the white of bone through oozing blood. “Must’ve struck the portal’s edge,” he thought with a shiver.

The Phoenix continued working on his shoulder. Skin and bone knitted over it as if a pair of unseen surgeons were painting on new bone, muscle, tendon and skin. He fought to watch it, a blend of fascination and excruciating pain, lips twisting, eyes blurred with tears. He put his head back against the cold wall and closed his eye, waiting, listening. Water dripped somewhere. He clutched his stump over his stomach, quietly sobbing, sick burning in his throat. The wound he’d taken from Alena screamed.

Panic suddenly stabbed at his mind. Blood Eater! He snapped his eye open, the fireball sputtering to life in the black. He waved the fireball around like a torch, illuminating the long hallway, scanning. It was empty as far as he could tell, but his light only went a few feet. He pointed it up the stairs. He thought he could see the spot where they had broken away and where he had come through his portal. It was a miracle he hadn’t fallen off again, he thought. He must have rolled against the curved wall as a guide until he landed in the hallway. “Fuck,” he breathed. He sighed with a wave of relief at seeing the Chains of the North tightly wound around Stormcaller, handle pointing out like a strange new metallic cock.

He rose on wobbly legs. He gave them a few shakes, loosely kicked them, got them back under conscious control. “What am I doing here?” he asked the gloom.

Something skittered from the blackness beyond his light. Air whooshed by his head with startling speed. He wove a Phoenix shield facing down the hallway. A stone thudded from it near his head, skipped over, and tumbled into the cylinder winding into the earth. Blood Eaters, incredibly strong, he remembered. The creaking of metal on metal rang from the hall.

Walter growled, hurled his fireball down the narrow passage. He squinted his eye to try to see what lay beyond, tracking the fireball’s path. The hallway was lined with colorless statues that looked like snakes. A few appeared to have been broken, crumbled blocks sprawled out on the ground beside them. The fireball struck something made of wood, a door. Burning chunks of it clattered along the ground. The wood sputtered and hissed on the stony floor, throwing out a ghastly light. A furious buzzing joined in the tumult. The floor was polished smooth, cool against his bare foot, light flickering over shining obsidian.

He started down the passageway, sparking two more balls of fire by his side. He passed by alcoves, stopped to look inside of one and saw they were subterranean mausoleums, stacked with ageless sarcophagi, dust motes inches thick. Ancient cobwebs fluttered against the heat of his fire. “What is this?” He pushed against the mausoleum’s icy walls, turning back out into the hallway.

The acrid stench of decay hit him like a blacksmith’s sledge. He wrapped his cloak over his mouth, but it was a moot gesture. He waded around the decidedly human bodies on the ground, overripe with decay. There had to be at least ten of them. He caught sight of a caved-in face, flesh stringy and dry as boot leather. Bones and teeth showed through a broken cheek, maggots wriggled in an eye socket like living roots. Strange, rusted instruments lay on the floor between them. There were hooks, hammers, pliers, and ancient swords strewn about.

The air was thick of with the buzzing of rot flies. There were so many that they occasionally obscured the light of the burning chunks of door. They were incredibly bulbous and it was a feat of strength that they could still fly. They feared fire and stayed clear of Walter though, thankfully avoiding trying to sample him. Some dared to get close, but let out a squeak as air left their incinerated bodies.

He stopped to look at a section of wall leaking earth into the hallway where the stone blocks had been torn free from their mortared prisons. There were deep gouges higher up the wall from what he guessed were claws and a few spots where the stone looked to have been punctured clean through. There must have been a serious fight here, Walter thought. He swallowed, scanned back through the burning door’s remnants, no sign of the Blood Eater. The smoke was starting to sting his eye, trailing over the ceiling and finding its way to the great stairwell and out to the surface.

He approached two great mounds near the last third of the hallway’s length, cast in shifting shadows. Pools of sticky liquid surrounded them, groaned as it wormed between the toes of his bare foot. As he drew closer, he saw they were covered with shaggy hair and had mouths the size of doorways, lined with rows of carnivorous teeth. There were crumbled arachnid legs along the sides of the bodies and slumped over humanoid forms perched on top. One of them was missing a head, the other littered with what he guessed were stab wounds. They were beasts of the Shadow Realm, Walter thought.

“Could-could it be?” his throat felt dry as sand. “Could this be where Juzo had been? From where he had escaped?” Sick rose half way up his throat; he coughed and swallowed it back down. He squeezed around the hairy beasts, stopped between one of them, stomach heaving at the choking odor. His eye caught the glint of metal, a sword hilt standing out from the top of one of the rotting mounds. A bolus of vomit tore from his lips, made him hunch over, puke slopping into the sticking pool. “Damn it!” he coughed and wheezed, eyed the darkness beyond the scraps of burning door. If there were Blood Eaters here, he had to pull them out by the roots.

He marched through the doorway with harsh determination, intent on murder. The octagonal room was empty of life. He spun around. There was old brown blood everywhere, no bodies, though. A chair seemingly made of bone lay toppled over in the middle of a raised dais. Beside it, someone or something had bled a lot. Juzo said he thought he killed Terar, but never found the body, mentioned his throne of bones. Walter couldn’t believe that he was here now.

He caught a note of frantic whispers. He turned towards it, spotted a door almost imperceptible and colored to match the black stone. He walked over, grabbed the great ring and tore it open, the rusty hinges screaming. He paused and whispers silenced.

He started down the steps, no signs of dust, well used. The air was a horrific blend of festering mold and tangy urine. “Show yourself!” he called. The hissing of a rivulet of stone dust raining down from above answered. Every step he took echoed, giving his position away for miles. There would be no act of subterfuge in his approach.

He reached the bottom of the stairs, saw the room was wide and circular with a thick column in the middle. His guts spasmed and he would have puked again if there were anything for them to push out. “Where are—” his voice cut off, fireballs setting light upon the swimming shapes pressed against the back wall. He sent more of the Dragon into them, making them brighter.

His jaw fell open. There were at least twenty haggard men and women, cringing with terror, eyes red as rubies. Some were nude, others partially clothed. Their skin was smudged with dirt, eyes sunken, teeth missing, limbs sharp and bony. He saw quivering hands covering faces, fingers browned with blood and dirt. He let Bonesnapper clink to the ground, chains unfurled at his side.

“Wa-Walter?” one of the figures stepped forward, tangled hair swept over half its face. It let out a muffled growl at one of the Blood Eater’s creeping away from the wall, a shambling corpse. The beast grumbled, fell back in with the rest of the cowering line.

“Who are you? How do you know my name?” Walter asked. It would only be fitting after all, that someone in the colon of the world would know his name.

The figure, a man Walter guessed by the voice, spread arms that lacked hands. “You-you-you don’t remember me?” the man stammered, expression awe-struck.

Walter took a cautious step away from him. There was a familiarity to his voice that he could not place. “No…”

“I trained you. You still do not remember?” The man pushed his hair over his face, showing the sly eyes he faintly recognized. Then it came to him and with it, a lance of anger.

“Malek, you traitorous dog. But— what are you doing here?”

Malek’s shadowy mouth twitched up into an ugly smile. “The story is long. You don’t like this home? My friends? No, no no.” Malek hunched over, stabbed a stump into his forehead. “He doesn’t care, doesn’t care. No one appreciates the things you do,” he screamed into what should’ve been his hands.

Walter watched him with a wary eye, saw his threadbare robes were soiled with blood and years of what could only be his shit. He was gone, his mind turned to mush, Walter thought.

“Your friend did this to me, you know. He did this to me!” Malek’s scarlet eyes went wide with rage, his arms and shoulders shaking.

“What? Who?”

“Juzo! Juzo did this to me!” he wept. “The endless hunger for blood, never ends, never, ever.”

It could’ve been true and Walter had no way of truly denying it. “Liar,” he found himself spitting.

“The great lord has not forgiven me, has not. He took my hands, made me passive!” he hissed, lunging at Walter. His jaws opened wide as a snake’s, stumps reaching for his neck. Walter flicked his hand, bones filled with ice. The fireball blew apart against Malek’s face, burning neck hole streaking the shadows in blood.

Shrieks of terror roared over the group, crouching low, fumbling over one another and trying to use each other as shields. “What to do with you?” he muttered. He’d thought they would have pounced on him after his aggression and he was ready for it. He backed up, his bare heel pressed against the first coarse step. They seemed to relax as he stepped back, their screams becoming a soft gibbering. How did they get here? Who were they? What had they endured under Malek?

He couldn’t let the Blood Eaters leave. If he brought ruin to the stairwell, collapsing it, they’d starve to death. “Starving… not a good way to die.” But was fire any better? He could make it quick, make it hot as the Ars volcano. Not much of a choice.

“Please! Stop!” A boy with curly hair writhed on the ground. Bare, uncaring feet crushed his tiny body.

“Don’t hurt us, no, please don’t hurt us. We mean no harm,” an elderly woman prostrated herself, eyes shining like stained glass.

“I’m sorry,” Walter croaked. He was the butcher and they were the meat. He had to do what needed to be done. Starting in the middle of the tangled mess of Blood Eaters, a blade of fire split the earth. In a second, the blade became hundreds, fanning out into a white wall of fire. Piercing shrieks roared over the flames, flesh hissing in the conflagration. Bubbles formed on arms, burst open with blackened bones and cooked blood. It was over in under five seconds, wisps of choking black smoke crawling for the stairwell. The stone surrounding the back wall waved from the heat. The iron gates propped open from cells were puddles of molten iron, those not fully melted sagging like limp pasta.

Walter crouched down as the smoke flitted over him, avoiding the worst of it. He stared at the pile of red embers, flesh, bones and connective tissue reduced to a heap of coal. There wasn’t anyone or anything that could touch that old spot in his chest, deadened and broken, made of Milvorian steel. He would do what must be done, regardless of the cost.

Chapter 18

Reunited

“There is always time for trust, for love.” -The Diaries of Nyset Camfield

It was a world slowly falling into the hands of a demon god, but still stunning and gloriously beautiful. The sky was a vast, bright azure bowl going out into the reaches of infinity. It was granted depth by swollen clouds of pure white crawling out to the limits of Nyset’s vision. They went up and up like towers reaching for a universe beyond their realm and understanding. The sun warmed her skin, filling her with energy. The energy of life spilled out from that golden orb, made everything grow despite the dark forces on the lands. Nyset knew that someday she and the plague on the realm would be gone and only the plants would remain.

Something flickered on the endless stretch of dusty horizon, an oval of blue light. It vanished a second later, then appeared again, only slightly larger. It was coming toward her, she realized, watching it wink out again. A figure marched from the fading light, across the sands, draped in billowing black. Light glinted like a star from its form. Nyset rose to stand, legs tingling from sitting too long. She set her warm mug of elixir on top of a saucer with a clink.

“It’s a man,” Senka said, bluish-black eyes flicking to hers, then back out to the horizon. Senka put one hand on the rail marking the porch’s edge and vaulted over it. Spots of light swept over her lithe body from the trellis covering the porch. The porch had been recently built, wrapping around the Silver Tower for outdoor seating.

“A powerful one.” Nyset started to smile. Could it be him? She raised her hand to shield her eyes from the sun.

“A wizard approaches from the north,” Claw stated the obvious. He came around the side of the new Silver Tower, his shirtless, grizzled chest beaded with sweat. He drew his sword from his hip sheath, barked a series of orders to a pair of apprentices, but Nyset didn’t hear him over the beating of blood against her temples.

She uncoiled a cream colored scarf wrapped around her neck, letting it fall by her side. The meteorologists predicted a sandstorm today. They were right. However, the storm was in her chest and not on the plains.

“Walter,” she saw it was him, knew it by his gait. She blinked away the tears filling her eyes and ran, wood thumping. “Call off the alarm, Claw! It’s fine!” She threw over her shoulder, watched him send her a confused squint. He ran after her, huffing.

“Mistress, wait! We don’t know for sure. It could be anyone, anything,” Claw panted from behind.

“It’s him, I know it.” She drew on the Dragon, legs pounding with energy.

A handful of violet lizards hissed and darted for shadowed holes. The wind whipped at her shirt, sticking to her sides. There was so much to tell him, so much to do. Air pulsed in her nose and all the sun’s fury wicked the moisture from her throat.

“At least, let me catch up to you, Mistress,” Claw shouted.

“You can’t always protect me,” she said

“I can try, though.” His voice was muffled in a gust.

She saw another portal, shining with the bright light of the Phoenix. A grin pulled at her cheeks and spread up to her eyes. She gasped and slid to a stop as the air was filled with a sudden humming. The other side of the portal cracked open in a twisting line of blue light a few paces away. Walter stepped through. The portal snapped shut, sand below it a blackened line.

“Nyset,” he beamed, browning blood flaking from a sunken cheek. “I thought that was you.”

Her heart beat like a drum, taking him in. His brown hair had grown, tussled and almost down to his ears now. His piercing eye glittered from deep within the socket, distant maybe, surely hard as stone. Around Stormcaller was a series of chain links, interspersed with mirror bright blades. He looked gaunt, as if he hadn’t had a proper meal in months. His high cheekbones were higher, his prominent nose sharper, beard in dire need of a shave. He looked tired.

“Walter-I,” She only had time to open her arms as he swept her into an almost crushing embrace, brushing the fine line between pain and pleasure. She almost told him to stop, but couldn’t and wouldn’t. His lips pressed against her neck, soft. They traveled up to her cheek, nuzzling along the path to her mouth. “You’re alive,” she breathed. “I received your letter.”

A tremor waved through his body. His lips pressed against hers. They felt dry and chapped, and his breath was horrid, but she didn’t care. She felt the hot warmth of tears roll down her cheeks, the floodgates held back for too long were finally free to open. They collected where their faces met, sticking to his cheeks. His tongue lapped at hers, gentle at first, then powerful, ravenous licks. She pulled away from him and grabbed his shoulders. She licked her lips, tasting his saliva, looking into his red-rimmed eye. “They’re gone then. They’re truly gone?” Her voice wavered like a lamb’s. She was the Arch Wizard, the Earl of Helm’s Reach, but nothing else mattered now.

Walter’s throat rolled, head slightly shaking. “They’re gone,” he said, head lowered, his forehead pressing against hers.

“How?” she whispered, wiping her eyes. “Please tell me, I must know.” She might have collapsed if she weren’t held by his powerful arms.

“No. You don’t want to know,” he said through a clenched jaw.

“Please, Walter. You owe me that.” She felt her brow squirming with tension, doing her best to sound commanding.

“Don’t make me re-live it. Don’t make me go there now.” He met her eyes, darkness flitting behind his.

“Tell me!” she hissed, new tears swimming in her eyes, her lips forming a bitter little smile.

“Fine,” he snapped and dropped his arms. “Your father,” he croaked, shaking his head. A tear streamed down his cheek and washed a clean line through at least a week’s worth of dirt. He sucked in a deep, quivering breath, looked down at his bare foot, and slowly let it escape his lips. The waiting was killing her. Why wouldn’t he tell her what she wanted to know?

He steeled himself, hard lines forming around his mouth. There was danger in his stare, might’ve been the same one he gave to his enemies, she thought. It sent an icy chill down her back. “Your father was skinned alive and eaten by Death Spawn. Your mother, disemboweled and dismembered, battered. Like everyone else who decided to stay in Breden. They were tortured for sport, for the fun of it. Some were put on pikes through their guts, others through their asses. Some through their—”

“Enough.” She put her hand over his mouth and he closed it. “Thank you. Thank you for giving me that.”

Walter looked at something over her shoulder. She turned saw, Claw awkwardly milling about, kicking a dead shrub.

Claw flinched at being noticed. “Guess I’ll catch up with you later, Mistress. Walter,” he nodded.

“Claw,” Walter nodded back. Her heart stopped ramming blood through her ears, and she felt herself starting to relax to be in his presence again. She heard the scuffing of Claw’s boots fading behind her.

A long silence hung between them. Wind lapped at their clothes. Walter shuffled his feet. “Thank you for that,” she said again. “I knew it would be something like that but… but not like that. Not for them, not like that.” Her hands wound into fists, legs going soft. The blues of the sky magnified with stratified shades, the white of the clouds whiter. The texture of the sands popped with undulating shadows.

She fell, choking on new tears. Walter lunged, scooped her up under her armpits. She wanted to fall to the hot earth, almost wanted to never get up again. She sobbed against his chest, sagging in his arms. She thought she had already emptied herself of that pain, but here it was again, wounds torn anew. “Why?” she cried.

He embraced her with his damaged arm, fingers running through her hair. “I don’t know.”

Tears leaked out of her, body spasming with the weight of that pain “When will it stop, Walter?”

“It never stops,” he whispered. He was warm, his muscles hard as stones, touch gentle. “Have to remember the good times.”

“I don’t know if I can handle it like you. How do you do it?”

She felt a harsh laugh in his chest and then she understood. All this time, he had lived with that pain but kept it buried down deep. She supposed that was what one had to do in order to function. But wouldn’t that eat at you? Change you?

He held her tight under the sun, for how long she couldn’t say. Her sobs eventually subsided and she felt a bit better. There was a sort of catharsis at seeing him, her only living tie to her former life. She found herself biting her inner cheeks, wondering what he’d think about what happened with the Earl. Would he respect her? Hate her? She still grappled with that day, but treachery could not go unpunished.

Walter released her and took her hand, rough with calluses. “I hate to be a bother with so much catching up to do…but do,” he coughed, “do you have water?” He patted at his empty water skin, licked his lips. She saw they were badly peeling. His saliva was thick at the corners with bits of white foam, a sign of dehydration.

“Of course, this way.” She guided his hand, careful of the new strange weapon hanging from its side. “What is that?” Her insatiable curiosity brought the question forth, the pain of loss muting. There were so many questions.

“Bonesnapper,” he said, his voice hoarse.

“You must be joking? Delirious are you?” She gaped at him.

He shook his head, deadpan.

She smiled. “Let’s get you some water, food, and a bath. Then we can talk. How’s that sound?”

He nodded, eyebrows bobbing and softly laughing. “The day has been long.”

“I can only imagine.” Nyset strode up to the porch and Senka fanned out from her flank, drawing towards her. She had apparently followed Claw, or more accurately followed her.

Nyset approached Lena the Herbalist, peering out from the Tower’s doorway. “Get me a pitcher of water, tell the apprentices I’ll need a double portion of supper for him, and have them prepare the bath in my quarters.”

“Yes, Mistress.” Lena shuffled away, her long skirts swooshing.

Walter strode straight to the chair in which she’d been sitting, snatched her mug of elixir from the table and inverted its steaming contents into his mouth. He moaned with satisfaction, dark lines of elixir winding down his neck. “Elixir,” he snickered, then wiped his sleeve across his mouth.

“What of it?” Nyset asked.

“You were right to be worried about Scab. He betrayed us.”

Nyset tapped her lips with a long finger. “How? What came of him?”

Lena swept in from the main hallway of the Silver Tower and set a ceramic pitcher beaded with condensation on the circular table.

“Thanks,” Walter said to her with a nod. He grabbed it from the table and started chugging it. Rivulets of water streamed down his neck, washing away the lines of elixir.

“I will return with cups,” she said, eyes widened at Walter. “Though there is something that troubles me.”

“What, Lena?” Nyset’s voice grew hard.

“I must tell you that my duties do not fall under servant. I am a mere researcher, an herbalist only. I would appreciate it greatly if—”

“Lena,” Nyset’s voice cut in. “If you want to stay in the Silver Tower you will obey my command without complaint. Do you understand?”

Lena narrowed her bushy eyebrows. “I think I understand,” she said in a tone that sounded as if she didn’t understand at all. Lena turned and stormed down the hallway, the beads on her dreadlocks clacking together.

“I’m not sure what came of Scab. He left us. Let me tell you what happened.”

“Wait. Have a bath first, then we can talk. Take some time to rest.” She tilted her head at him.

Walter nodded. “Can’t argue with that.”

* * *

Walter stood beside a window on the renovated second floor of the Silver Tower, elbow pressed against the wall. Rather than just exposed wood, it was now beautifully finished with oiled oak. Half of it had been made into her quarters, the other half a properly furnished room for meetings. There were some benefits to being the Earl, deep coffers were one. She wondered how King Ezra would take the news. Likely with the same cloistered indifference he paid to the outside world, according to Walter.

Half of the window was opened, the other half closed with slitted shutters. The window framed him in, giving him the look of a painted hero straight out of the stories. He stared out, outlined in black, with a pink edge that trailed over his curves from the wounded sun. It traveled along his square jaw, veined shoulders, striated muscles drawn up his waist, and faded at the top curve of his bare ass.

Walter cleared his voice. “How did you get the marks to make the Tower so nice? Seems to be well built.” He ran his fingers along the wall.

“I’m the Earl now, remember?” She felt a smile forming at that, thinking of how proud her parents would have been. Perhaps she would have kept the part about the Earl dying of hundreds of puncture wounds out.

He didn’t turn to face her and he didn’t smile, but only stared out. “Dark work,” he muttered.

“Dark times,” she countered, knowing the past always had to be rationalized away in order to carry on with a clear head.

He grunted with what sounded like agreement.

“Think revenge for your parents is what still drives you?” Nyset asked, placing a hand on her bare hip and felt her cheeks flush with blood at revealing her bush, coils of light brown hair bare for his eye.

“It’s all I’ve been able to think about, besides getting back to you. It’s my fondest wish, to watch Asebor, the Wretched, the Death Spawn… lay dying. Something that drives a lot of men to war, I think.” He wrinkled his brow, iron heaviness to his voice. “It’s a bitter taste, though. I had another taste with Alena. There isn’t anything nice about death.”

“Think you’ll feel better? Think it will make the pain go away?” Nyset cocked her head.

Muscles twinged on the side of Walter’s face. “Not sure. Suppose I’ll find out eventually.” His eye went to the Chains of the North draped over the front of her ornate bed frame, the blades shimmering with pinks. “I would have liked to take up what Noah might’ve called a righteous path, defending those who can’t defend themselves. It wasn’t my path, though. I had to come to hate them and you well know why. They need to be stomped out, like the rot fly biting your neck. I know the wheel will keep turning either way… getting my revenge, your revenge. It might not answer any questions, sure won’t make the world any less cruel. But there’s a chance I, we, can peel off some of the darkness, make right on our parents at least.”

“We’ll have our vengeance, scour them clean from the realm,” Nyset said. “It will certainly taint us if it hasn’t already, but I think you’re right. The realm will be better for it, but then what?”

“Then… you remember how I had described the Shadow Realm to you?” he asked.

“Yes, I think.”

He shook his head. “It’s too terrible a place to exist. I can’t imagine you there, Juzo… anyone. If men knew the truth of it, the hearts of the world would turn cold as the Abyssal Sea in winter. Something has to be done.” There was something about the hardness to his expression she hadn’t seen before and hadn’t expected, now of all times. “I want to purge it of the demons, make it a place where men go to rest, the way it was supposed to be.” There was a desperate, frustrated tone to his voice. He let out a long breath and turned to face her.

She knew he would never let what happened with Juzo go, but could she if she had been in his position? “You have to forgive yourself with Juzo. You did all you could. Anyone would’ve done the same.”

“Did I? Did I do all I could?”

There was a long moment where they simply looked at each other. Nyset was sprawled out on the bed, smiling at him. “You did.” And she meant it.

She didn’t weep when he first told her. Juzo had been dead to her for a long time. Once she knew he was a Blood Eater, she knew it was only a short time before this day would come. There wasn’t a place in this world for men who drank the blood of other men. She, of course, kept these thoughts to herself.

She put her arms overhead and stretched the muscles from her fingers to her toes, tension slipping out of her as she sunk deeper into the mattress’ confines. She put one hand behind her head, the other over her tanned and flat belly. “Seems like the only way to get there is through death. Not a good way.”

“Perhaps not. Not enjoyable in the least.”

She gazed at him. “I won’t let you go there again.”

He was grinning in the shadows of the fading sun. “Think you could stop me if you wanted?”

“You know, I just might be able to. I’ve developed my powers quite a bit since I last saw you. You might be surprised at what I can do now.” She winked at him and pushed up onto her elbows, chest stretching. “Did you ever think we would go from farmers to warriors? Quite a career change.”

“Can’t say I had any idea.”

“We didn’t really have much of a choice, did we?”

“There’s always a choice,” Walter said. “The easy one and the right one.”

“The choice to live or die, not much of a choice at all.” Nyset contemplatively pursed her full lips. She swallowed. “Think I did the right thing with the Earl?” He had left her no other option, but she needed to hear it from someone else.

“I don’t know, wasn’t there, but I trust your judgment. You have to do what needs doing.” He shrugged, his expression was flat and not the least bit comforting.

She supposed that was the best she could ask for. This chat had gone on long enough. She slid from the bed, felt the warmth of the sheets melting away. She sauntered towards him, narrow shoulders drawn back, trying to look confident in her bare skin. She felt awkward, felt his eye looking her up and down. But wasn’t this to be expected? “Let’s not dwell upon our past, our mistakes.”

He nodded with a quick smile. “They’re endless.” He reached out and closed the other half of the shutter, casting the room in lines of pink and orange. “I try not to think too much on them, starts to make everything hurt.”

She reached out to his face, brushed her thumb over the puckered scar that remained of his eye.

“Our wounds will heal in time. Everyone has them.” Walter wrapped his hand around her hip, traced the back of his hand up her stomach. She felt goosebumps prickle at his touch, her stomach tightening as if preparing to take a blow. He pulled his hand back an inch, looked at her, eyebrows going up and grinning. She forced herself to relax, slowly exhaling.

“Some don’t heal,” he said, casting a sour glance at his stump.

“They don’t change who you are.” She put her hand over it, then traced it up his arm and over the raised crisscrossing scars that ran up his chest. She avoided the wound over his gut left by Alena, yellowed with puss. It was healing, but the healing was slow.

“Not even this one?” He turned his face, putting his ruined eye close to hers. It was raspberry of flesh, bumpy, red, and tipped with white.

“Not even that one.” She ran her hand along his arm, gently closing over his stump, feeling spots of bone where the flesh loosely covered it. She didn’t care.

He wrapped his big hand around hers and found herself flinching at first. It had been too long since she’d felt his touch. Relax, there is a first time for everything, she told herself. His fingers pressed between the bones of her palm, massaging it. They traveled to her fingers, gently squeezing and pulling. It felt surprisingly good. She closed her eyes, let her mouth fall open with a pleased moan.

She felt him shift closer, felt the warmth emanating from his body. He was warm as a furnace, his breath hot against her face. He smelled like a mix of old leather and her lilac soaps, an odd combination. She wondered what she smelled like to him? Did she smell nice?

His cheek skimmed against her nose, skin rough, despite shaving an hour ago. He inhaled sharply against her neck, nuzzled his nose against the bottom of her sharp jawline. She found herself involuntarily smiling, neck tingling, inching her chin back, exposing her neck for his mouth.

He released her hand and she placed it on his lower back, sliding it down onto the curve of his ass, giving it a squeeze. He snickered, felt his laugh against her neck. His hand slid under her breast, fingers running back and forth over her nipple. She felt a shock go down to her toes, his hand traced up to her jaw and wrapped around her head, gave her hair a gentle pulling. She felt her hands prickle with sweat.

She had read enough romance novels that she knew the gist of what to do next. With her free hand, she reached for his cock, lightly caressing it. He was already hard and stiffened further at her touch, shooting her with a thrill. She grinned as he moaned. She wrapped her hand around it, and stroked, the skin soft in her palms. She watched her fingers slide up and down the shaft, the tip appearing and disappearing. It was a nice size, she guessed but had no experiences to draw upon.

She lifted her leg to draw it around him and he caught it under the elbow of his bad arm, spreading herself wide. He met her eyes with a mischievous twinkle. He pressed his palm against her stomach, over the apex of her hip, brushing her hair, and finally finding its home between her legs.

She released the hand holding his ass, grabbing his neck for more support. It felt like clinging to an immovable boulder. She tugged on him a little quicker and he responded in kind, deep waves of pleasure spreading over her abdomen. She pushed her face against his and slipped her tongue into his mouth. He tasted like a foul mix of onions and wine, remnants of their earlier supper, but nothing would stop her from lapping her tongue against his and nibbling at his dried lips.

He drew her tight, pressing himself against her, skin against clammy skin. She fought down the wriggling thoughts of her dead parents, managing a city, the Silver Tower, and the war against the Death Spawn, and focused on the two of them. She concentrated on pleasing him. Giving and taking from him in turn. Her hand tightened, moved faster, harder as his finger slipped deep inside of her. She moaned, ecstasy driving her hips into his. Flutters of pleasure crawled through her with every in and out of his finger.

“I want you inside me,” she whispered into his ear, his breath hot against her jaw.

“Yeah,” he said hoarsely. He clumsily hooked both of his arms under her thighs and lifted her. He walked her to the bed, sitting her on the feather mattress. The wood squealed when she slid back from the edge, giving him space to join her. He crawled up her body, settling between her legs, fiercely kissed her as if it were his first and last time.

She felt his cock stab against the inside of her thigh, then the other, then lower, between her round ass cheeks. “Er, wrong hole.”

“What the…? Sorry,” he said sheepishly. “Let me try again.”

Nyset suppressed a giggle. “Let me help, a little higher…” Her fingers wrapped around him again and she raised her hips, directing him to the right spot. “There.”

“Mm.” He moaned as their body’s connected and hers slowly absorbed his. His thumb ran across her nipple, rough and calloused against her satin skin. She felt herself warming down there, parting for him.

“Oh, yes,” she moaned in return, arching into him. “There it is.” She felt herself getting wetter, welcoming him.

He started with shallow thrusts, each slightly deeper than the last. He ran his hand up her chest, cupping around her firm breast, giving it a gentle squeeze.

“Ah,” she moaned.

“Mmm.” Walter ran his hand over her thigh, down her knee and around her ankle. He traced it back up, hips working in small circles, and wrapped his hand around her ribs. He gave a hard thrust.

“Gentle!” Nyset winced, placing her hand on his stomach to slow him down.

“Sorry,” he whispered and continued to move in and out of her body, more gently this time.

She felt herself relaxing, a little less tight and with a bit more lubrication. She slid her hand between their bodies, touching his thrusting cock. It was slippery between her fingers.

“Ah,” he moaned, his head back.

She pulsed when her finger found her bundle of nerves and began rubbing herself with her index finger, working around and around, intense waves of pleasure pulsing through her body.

Walter put his arms above her shoulders, driving himself deeper, she moaning in kind. They found a good rhythm, building up speed as they went.

Nyset looked up at his face, saw him looking down at her, eye maybe glittering with a touch of Dragon fire.

She felt herself doing the same, drawing on a little of the Dragon as a latent urge to consume all of him bloomed out. They both grimaced, driving into each other’s hips.

Walter opened his mouth and wrapped it around hers, bit and tugged on the bottom of her lip, dragging his teeth across it. She slumped back flat, letting out a pleased gasp. She wrapped her hands around his ass, feeling his muscles contract and relax with every thrust.

Faster they went, wet skin slapping against wet skin. Their moans became grunts as the sounds of their lovemaking filled the room. He slid his arm under her hips, a big hand wrapping around an ass cheek, squeezing and pulling it apart from the other. His fingers slipped inside her ass crack, getting a better grip that was almost painful.

The bed frame creaked with every thrust, each more forceful than the last. She wrapped her legs around his hips, feet dangling in the air. He reached his hand out from under her, dragged his fingers through her waving golden hair, tugging her head back. He pressed his face against hers, hot with sweat. She opened her mouth, sucked on his tongue, licking and nibbling. She was wet with his saliva and he hers.

“Ah, ah, ah!” A tsunami of ecstasy came over her, stomach clamping, legs crushing his hips. “Oh, oh!” she cried and moaned between grimaces. She was a kite in a hurricane, trying not to crest, to make it last longer. She never wanted it to end.

“Ah!” he moaned in turn, thrusting himself deeper, harder within her.

She cried out, her fingers digging into his back as she found her release. It triggered his. “Oh… Dragons, shit.” He moaned with the pure primal pleasure of his seed transferring from him to her. Driving thrusts slowed as he milked himself into her body.

Sanity returned and he lowered himself on top of her, draped his arms by his sides, his face pressed into her throat. “That… was amazing,” he breathed against her skin. “You are amazing.”

“Mm,” she grunted in agreement. She drew herself back and waited until he looked at her, watching the light fading in his eye. “I love you, Walter.”

“I know.” He grinned at her.

She knitted her eyebrows, staring at him. “You’re an ass.” She slapped him on the shoulder, laughing.

He snickered. “You love it.”

Maybe she did.

He kissed her then. Kissed her completely, passionately, and deeply. She never knew lips could be so soft.

She ran her fingers up and down his back, gently scratching, then massaging his back the best she could from her position on the bottom. She felt him deflate and slip out of her. He took long, deep breaths, face pressed against the side of hers and nestled on her pillow. Within the next few minutes, she felt his body grow limp against hers. A soft snoring shortly followed.

Nyset stared up at the ceiling, the last of the sun leaving the world cast in black. I can see why people become obsessed with sex, she thought.

Her worries came rushing back moments later, but muted. When would they take the Silver Tower? How long until the Death Spawn tried to take the city again? They were mixed into a bed of relaxation. And for the first time in a while, she could observe her worries without the feeling of near crippling anxiety coming along with them. The thoughts melted away and with them came sleep, Walter being her blanket.

Chapter 19

Preparations

“Magic toes a fine line between new discoveries in alchemy and herbalism.” -The Diaries of Nyset Camfield

The following two days were a blur for Walter. They consisted mainly of long needed rest, helping apprentice wizards, and getting himself re-acclimated with the new Silver Tower. Nyset had been busy while he was gone. There were three new houses built along the Tower’s grounds for apprentices and followers alike. The practice grounds had been well built, the fields plowed and starting to yield crops. She was a leader he’d willingly follow. How she had time to manage it all and stay sane, he couldn’t fathom.

There were almost a hundred apprentices now and almost as many veteran wizards. Their testing wasn’t nearly as strict as what they would’ve gone through to become a veteran at the old Silver Tower. She thought book learning didn’t matter much in times of war, but what you could do with the powers did. Nyset had said that would change when the realm was stabilized. He couldn’t argue with her logic.

She had elected to stay in the Silver Tower, leaving the Earl’s palace to his distasteful heirs. No doubt they would soon be plotting their vengeance, but they had bigger problems to worry about. Grimbald and Thalia arrived late last night with her soldiers, thankfully they brought carts full of supplies and tents for setting up camp. The Tower’s stocks were thin as it was, and she could only take so much from the coffers of Helm’s Reach in good conscience. They had brought baskets of amber plum berries, apparently a treasured rarity this far east and commanding a high value in the marketplace.

Shortly after Thalia Treeborn’s men settled in, naturally came the Midgaard Falcon battalion lead by general Stokes. Walter had been surprised to find that he’d lived up to his promise. Perhaps he had to learn to have more faith in people, but Scab’s betrayal had left him deplorably sore. They mixed in the with apprentices, filling the bunks and getting along well enough. The rest crammed themselves into makeshift tents and rooms in the surrounding brothels and taverns, most seeming not too displeased with their quarters, especially those holed up in the brothels.

Walter leaned back in a chair with Dragons carved into the armrests. The Silver Tower’s meeting room, across from Nyset’s office, was an entirely different spectacle since he’d last been here. Back then, there was still sawdust on the floor, sand in the air, wall planks exposed, and the windows covered with potato sacks.

The walls had been finished in a deep cherry, ornate crown moldings fit for a person of Nyset’s stature adorning the ceiling. Walter wondered if there had ever been an Arch Wizard who was also an Earl, likely a new note for the histories. The windows had glass fitted into them now, the clearest sort Walter had ever seen. They were propped open and let the cool morning air curl down into the room.

The group sat around a great circular table nearly four inches thick. Strewn about were a few decanters of steaming elixir, a plate of hissing sausages, a bowl of bright plum berries, a few apples, browned bacon, a few jugs of cool water, mugs, glasses. A fine meal before marching on to slay one’s mortal enemy, Walter thought.

He looked at the faces around him, chewing on a strip of bacon. His eye went around the eclectic group, putting them all in categories to get some perspective. He started with Nyset, his love, the Arch Wizard and Earl of Helm’s Reach. Beside her was Claw, her ever dutiful yet mad guardian. Next to him, Grimbald his loyal friend, then Senka of the Nether, last of the Scorpions, and Isa, a seemingly part crazed Tower assassin. Between Isa and himself sat Thalia, dangerously seductive one day, fearsome warrior the next. And to Walter’s left sat Grozul, ancient wizard of the Silver Tower. He tried to sort out their thoughts, motives, wants, and needs, but decided another piece of bacon would do instead.

Walter gazed at the paintings hanging on the walls, two you would expect, one of the Dragon and the other the Phoenix. They were intricately detailed, bursting with colors that almost seemed to glow. The third set his heart beating against his chest. This painting, the grandest of them all, depicted a bloody hand reaching, clawing out from the earth, a tombstone cracked behind it. It wasn’t the image that he found so disturbing, but the name inscribed on the tombstone, his name.

“Nyset?”

“Yes, Walt?” The energized chattering of everyone else sitting around the table softened as she spoke. Nyset’s hair was twisted up into a bun, sprigs of hair sticking out like hay. She wore a low cut, cream colored tunic that split between her breasts, secured by a strip of crisscrossing cloth stopping at her sternum, the bottom tucked into dark leather pants. On one delicate wrist were three wooden bangles, likely Lena’s doing.

He pointed at the painting, mouth hanging slightly open. “Really?”

“Well, it’s not beautiful, I know.” She folded her arms. “It had to be documented, this is of course not the only account. Your… rising has been noted in a book I’m working on,” Her cheeks seemed to be pinking as she spoke.

“A bit morbid.”

She raised a disbelieving eyebrow at him. “Says the man capable of all manner of horrors on the battlefield.”

He shrugged. “That’s different.” It was a bizarre sight that left him a little unsettled. There was no point denying reality, though. “What’s your book called?” he asked, slurping on a white mug of elixir.

“Well—”

“Chronicles of Walter Glade, of course,” Claw gruffed from beside her. Claw’s outfit was similar to Nyset’s, except his shirt wasn’t crafted to show his tits and had about a week’s worth of stains on it. His salt and pepper hair had grown a considerable length, draping over his shoulders and falling over a disheveled beard. Claw’s beady eyes gleamed and his bushy eyebrows bobbed with amusement. “A fitting title, Mistress. You’ve a hero in your ranks, indeed.”

Walter felt his cheeks burning with blood. He became sharply aware of the lull in conversation, felt the eyes of all the others sweeping over him.

Grimbald stretched out, snatched a sausage with his fork from a pile of them, skin blackened and still crackling. With his other hand, he grabbed a golden honey cake, chasing his sausage with a golden bite. “Mm. Vant ta read dat one,” Grimbald mumbled through his overfilled mouth. He wore a gambeson secured with buckles straining to prevent his tremendous bulk from spilling out from between the seams. His head looked to have been freshly shaved and oiled, reflecting a white spot of sun coming in through a nearby window.

Nyset half-smiled at him from across the table, glared at Claw, then reached for the elixir decanter. “More, dear?” She smiled at him.

Walter grunted and held out his cup for her to fill it. He shouldn’t be surprised, he knew. It was surreal, sometimes still hard to believe that this was his life. He watched the elixir swirl into his mug in oily shades of brown.

“Everyone about ready to get down to business?” Nyset asked, her expression grave, the decanter thumping down on the table.

“Can’t believe we’re finally doing this.” Walter nodded, felt a flutter go through his belly.

“Mistress, er, Nyset.” Senka leaned forward in her chair, sharp elbows resting on the table and fingers twiddling.

Walter looked at her round face and innocent cheeks, doing well to hide her deadly skill. He thought he might have caught the gleam of one her poisoned needles from under a leather bracer. She wore a black as coal cloak hanging loosely over the hard ridges of leather armor. He would need to find himself some armor, he thought. The more energy he could save from having to heal, the more he’d have for spending on Death Spawn obliteration.

Nyset regarded her. “Senka?”

Senka’s midnight eyes rapidly blinked at Nyset. Her narrow mouth opened and closed without producing a sound. She frowned down at the crumbs on her plate.

Nyset patiently smiled at her, put a hand on her wrist. The girl flinched at that.

“The furnaces,” she squeaked, gathered herself. “Could we… when will we…”

“After. When we get the old Tower back,” Nyset said.

Senka beamed at her like a child who had just received the greatest of approving praises. “You understand my oaths, my people. We must protect the Black Furnaces. I must keep watch over them. My failures do weigh on me, my duties…”

Walter fought down the urge to tell her that the feeling would pass but reached for a honey cake instead. He dipped it in his elixir, felt the sweet glaze sticking to his fingertips.

Grimbald gave him a thumbs up and did the same, moaning at the elixir soaked bite. “Good idea.”

“What are these Black Furnaces?” Thalia asked beside Walter, shifting in her chair and looking uncomfortable. With her movement came the subtle scent of citrus wafting into Walter’s nose, drawing his eye to her like a bear to honey. She was thankfully somewhat clothed now. She wore a broad strip of leather over her breasts showing a deep furrow of cleavage, a flowing skirt over her hips, and a necklace with shining red beads the size of a small fist. Under her eyes and down her cheeks were spots of dark paint, almost the same color as her skin. Her hair shone like raven’s feathers, worked into a strange configuration and nestled into her bright headdress.

He remembered her stripped almost bare in the Great Retreat, pressing her hips against him, breasts occasionally brushing against his chest. He felt his prick stiffening up. He glanced at Nyset, met her narrowed eyes, then flicked his eye up at one of the paintings, cheeks burning. He felt a glimmer of guilt but reassured himself that he’d done the right thing in the end. Did Nyset have an inkling of what almost happened? No, she couldn’t. Should he tell her? He looked back at Thalia, found her dark eyes meeting his. She gave him a forlorn half-smile, nodded, and turned her attention to Senka.

Senka cleared her throat, voice reedy at first, then steadying. “The Black Furnaces aren’t merely forges, but special, old. They’re hidden deep within the sands of the Nether, lit by ever burning Dragon fire, lit by wizards before the Age of Dawn. Weapons and armor made in these forges are nigh unbreakable. They are similar in quality to the weapons brought to Zoria during the Tigerian invasion.” She drew a dagger from her sheath with a soft ringing and placed it on the table. The metal shimmered with waves of light. “My weapons were made there. They do not dull, do not break.”

“Milvorian steel,” Isa said flatly. He was seated close beside Senka, almost shoulder to shoulder. His well-muscled arms were crossed over his chest, not an ounce of useless tissue on his frame. The Tower assassin’s face was still bone white, despite sparring in the sunny practice yard most of yesterday. The complete lack of hair on his head gave him a foreboding look Walter hadn’t yet grown accustomed to. His expression was deadly serious and hard as stone. He had the look of a man who didn’t understand humor. How did he come to look this way? Did other Tower assassins look the same?

Grozul, the former House Master of the Phoenix cleared his throat, his white beard like a cloud over his mouth. “The forges can be used to produce alloys of essentially the same structural strength, weight, and chemical integrity that the…” he slurped elixir from his mug, making a brown spot on his mustaches, “the same armor that the former Silver Tower armsman donned.”

Walter’s eye went to the pair of statuesque armsman outside Nyset’s office, admired the pearlescent sheen of their armor. The only two that survived the Silver Tower’s siege. The only alloy that didn’t melt under the Dragon’s incinerating fires. There was something about the wizened wizard that niggled at Walter’s guts. Some ancient memory that he couldn’t recall. Small, frustrating gaps like broken teeth had formed in his memory since his return.

“Clearly incredibly valuable,” Nyset said, reached out and squeezed Senka’s wrist. “That will be our next target, should be easier to take once the Tower has been reclaimed.” Walter felt himself admiring her voice, silky smooth and commanding respect. He then remembered her moaning last night, grinning at his knowledge of the stark contrast. He knitted his eyebrows, wondering if anyone else heard them.

Senka nodded a few times, eyes swimming with tears. “Thank you, thank you,” she said, sounding as if she were on the verge of falling apart right there. “I’ll kill her for what she did.” Her small fists thumped against the table’s edge. “S-sorry, Mistress,” she stammered, dark cheeks going darker with an influx of blood.

“It’s alright, Senka. We’ll find Dressna too; she will pay,” Nyset reassured.

“Dressna?” General Stokes asked, leaning against a wall, puffing on a wooden pipe. He wore the gleaming armor of the Midgaard falcon, bits of blood-red leather showing through between plates. Somehow Walter had missed him entering the room. Tendrils of smoke curled into the air from his pipe, filling it with a sweet fragrance.

“One of Asebor’s last remaining generals, as far as we know. Call themselves The Wretched,” Walter said. “Never seen her, only heard of her. Senka, care to explain?”

Lena skirted in between the guards, shimmying a chair between Walter and Thalia, despite the lack of room. The room was starting to feel cramped, her strong patchouli scent overriding Thalia’s more enjoyable one. Walter nodded at her, but she gave him an intense and feverish stare. Walter turned away. What was her problem?

Senka started. “She’s a foul creature, has horns, wings that don’t seem to work. The gray flesh of a dead man, big white eyes, incredible strength, hands of a giant…”

Walter caught a soft growl coming from Lena. “Is something wrong?” he said, turning to face her.

“Have you fessed up to your crimes, boy?” Lena spat, planted her hands on the table and leaned in toward him. Walter did not move. Her tone contrasted with her stunning amethyst eyes. Walter once again felt himself the subject of everyone’s eyes. Was this how Nyset felt?

“I’m not sure what you’re talking about.” Walter glanced at Nyset, whose lips had formed a hard line. Grimbald’s spoon tinkled against his mug, stirring a pat of yellow butter into his elixir.

“Not now, Lena,” Nyset hissed, shaking her head.

“The Arch Wizard’s testing in Midgaard. Does that help you recall your treachery?” The herbalist said through a clenched jaw, hair beads clicking together.

Walter searched his memories, found nothing in how he might have slighted the mad woman. “No?” he said in a questioning tone. “My memories aren’t what they once were.” He truly couldn’t remember. He even felt like appeasing the woman in obvious turmoil. “Perhaps you can enlighten me.”

She rose from her chair, leaned closer. Walter couldn’t help himself and stole a glance down her shirt, admiring the curve of her porcelain white breasts. She growled, face filling up with red anger. “You—” she seemed to have trouble speaking it. “You used a Mind Eater on me, a forbidden spell!”

Nyset sighed.

The spots of Isa’s face where eyebrows should have been arced up.

“Magics,” Grimbald muttered, continued stirring and shrugged.

“What?” Grozul gasped.

Claw frowned down at a sliced piece of sausage.

Thalia folded her arms and leaned back in her chair, regarding him flatly.

Stokes looked confused, poured himself a mug of elixir then started for Nyset’s bookshelf.

“But why did you use a forbidden spell?” Grozul asked, wrinkled hands pressing into the table. “Did I not teach you this?”

“Answer the man!” Lena hissed.

Walter met Nyset’s eyes, who gestured for him to go on.

Walter groaned. “You did teach me that, Master Grozul. But this was long before I had ever set foot into the Silver Tower. I learned the spell from seeing, er, copying Malek.”

“The Malek?” General Stokes said, a book clutched in one hand.

Walter nodded. “Yes, the Malek. Speaking of Malek.” He took a deep breath. “Lena, Nyset I apologize for what I did. I know it was wrong, but, well, I just didn’t want you to fail. I knew how much it meant to you.” He bowed his head, then looked at Nyset.

A smile started to form on Nyset’s lips, dashed away by Lena turning her furious scowl on her. Lena heaved out a sigh and some the rage melted from her face. “Well, since you did not know, I can forgive you. Even if you would’ve failed my testing, dear, I would’ve let you in, you know.”

“I know,” Nyset said.

“Sorry, Walter.” Lena shrank back into her chair, pulling on a tube of hair. “I’m not sure what came over me.”

“So you were the reason for much of the conflict in the city?” It was his turn to bite back. “The Arch Wizard told me all about you.”

“Walt,” Nyset said. “Enough.”

“How many died squabbling against one another to fill your pockets? How much blood is on your hands, Lena?” Walter’s voice was a dagger.

She snapped from her chair, arms crossed over her chest, hands wound into fists. “I’ve made my penance to the gods and they have forgiven me.” She spun around, pulled her shirt up to her shoulders, exposing her bare back.

Walter’s eyes widened. Her flesh was laced with at least ten long, weeping wounds. How she sat there without a complaint was a mystery to him. She was tougher than she looked. Someone cleared a mucus-filled throat. “I’ve made my share of mistakes, we all have,” Lena said, pulling her shirt down. There were a lot of old scars there too, in various stages of healing. “Have to move on from them, though.”

Was that some type of self-punishment? He was too ashamed to say he’d been down that road and had an inkling of how she felt. “Right,” Walter said awkwardly, unsure of how to feel now. “Sorry,” he finally croaked.

“You mentioned something about Malek. A member of the Wretched, if my memory serves me well, which I believe it does. Was there something more?” Grozul asked, curling a length of white mustache around a finger.

“Yes. Thanks for the reminder. I found him.” Walter said.

“You found him?” Nyset asked, jaw dropping.

Claw grunted. “Malek?”

“Long story for another time,” Nyset said to Claw. “Another member of the Wretched.”

Grimbald groaned. “Hope you took good care of the traitor.”

“I did.” Walter nodded at Grim. “He won’t be bothering anyone, ever.” Walter frowned, remembering that madman’s pleading. Remembering Juzo.

Nyset frowned. “He did teach me a lot once. A shame things had to be this way.”

Walter started. “He said something strange. Said Asebor made him passive. Anyone know what that means?”

“Shit,” Nyset whispered.

“It was only a rumor. This confirms it,” Grozul breathed. “That means he has the capability of cutting you off from the god’s powers, their luminous gifts, taken from you until the end of your days.” The house master placed his mug on the table, knuckles white.

“Sounds worse than losing an eye,” Walter smirked. Much, much worse. “Some sort of spell, I’d guess? What’s the counter?”

Walter, Nyset and Claw’s eyes hung on the house master’s breath. “Well,” Grozul gave a helpless shrug. “There isn’t one.”

“Shit.” Walter sighed.

“Not that I’m aware of at least,” the housemaster added.

“Let’s just hope he doesn’t use that spell on any of us,” Nyset said, her olive skin gone pale.

“Hope?” Walter balked. If Asebor could use that ability on him, well, he didn’t want to dwell on those nefarious consequences.

“Let’s get back on task, everyone. We can’t worry about every possible item that can turn against us,” Nyset said, standing and leaning over the table. Silence. “It’s time we reclaim what’s rightfully ours. It’s time we take the Silver Tower back. We’ve got the forces and at least two-hundred wizards. Their numbers have to be weakened now after the failure at the Great Retreat.” Nyset glanced at Thalia, her arms crossed. “We need to strike before they recuperate.”

Walter nodded, felt cold sweat spring from his palms, and with it, a surge of nervy energy. “Time for Asebor to die.” The words bubbled out of him. He caressed the Chains of the North hanging over his chair. He thought he might have felt them hum at his touch.

Grimbald grinned. “Time to give some Death Spawn new haircuts.” His pitiless axes lay propped in the corner nearest to him, no more than an arm’s length away.

Nyset started sliding dishes and mugs down to one end of the table. Others joined in, following her lead. She unfurled a wide swathe of parchment detailing the layout of the Silver Tower. It was a crude drawing, but would serve well enough for their needs, Walter thought. He came around her side, wrapped one arm around her hip and gave it a squeeze.

She flashed him a smile. “There are two ways into the Tower. The bridge that leads to the Milvorian gates and the hidden tunnel we took during our escape, assuming they haven’t found it and closed it up. Tunnel’s entrance is here.” Her finger traced a line from the Silver Tower’s practice yard to a spot on the plains. “The bridge is wide, big enough for a few carts to ride along simultaneously.”

“A natural choke point,” Grimbald muttered. “We’ll be bugs crawling into a Sand Buckeye’s mouth there.”

“If you have a better suggestion, I’d like to hear it.” Nyset tucked a strand of golden hair behind her ear, bright eyes intent on Grimbald.

Grimbald grunted with a nod. “Let me think.”

“Bridge is still in good shape then?” Walter asked.

“The bridge holds,” Isa said. He tapped a spot near the main gates. “Lots of damage near the gates from our defense. The main structure is Milvorian steel. The earth below it is likely to erode long before the bridge crumbles.”

“That rules out any possibility of the bridge being blown,” Nyset added.

Grozul narrowed his eyebrows and sagaciously nodded. “There is a third way into the Silver Tower.”

“A third?” Grimbald asked.

“Portals.” Walter grinned.

“Indeed, portals,” Grozul said. “But who among us can use them for traveling such distances?”

Walter bit the inside of his cheeks, caught sight of Thalia, Grimbald, and Nyset eying him. “I can,” he said reluctantly.

“And so can you,” Nyset said to Grozul.

Grozul flinched. “I suppose you are correct in that regard. However, I do not have the capability to fight once through the other side.” The old man shrugged under his robes, opening his spindly arms.

“Grim, you’ll come with me, won’t you?” Walter asked, his heart thudding with panic at the idea of entering the Tower alone.

“No doubt.” Grimbald slapped him on the shoulder. “Someone’s gotta keep you alive.”

Walter looked him in his icy blue eyes. “Thank you. There is some risk with traveling with them—”

“I’ll go,” he said flatly, squashing any further discussion on the matter.

“Alright.” Nyset blew out a breath and tapped her lips. “Walter and Grimbald will infiltrate the Tower via portals and get the gates opened for us. Think you guys can do that?”

“We should be able to manage that, right, Grim?” Walter asked. “Wait, didn’t Tamia blow the gates?”

“She did,” Nyset said. “They’ve been rebuilt, a patchwork of Milvorian steel, but gates nonetheless.”

“I see.”

“I remember how they work well enough. The chains holding them conveniently aren’t Milvorian, you’ll have to burn through ‘em, or we can try working the wheel but it will take a while longer,” Grimbald said.

Nyset nodded and licked her lips. “Good, good. I’ll lead the apprentices and the veterans over the bridge for the main assault.”

“And I’ll be at your side,” Claw mumbled.

“There is, of course, the issue of Asebor and Dressna. Doubt either of them will be outside the Tower’s walls,” Walter said, feeling anxious sweat forming in his armpits.

“Ah! You must not use his name,” Thalia hissed.

Nyset raised an eyebrow at her. “Who’s name? Asebor’s?”

This again, Walter thought.

“You call bad luck upon us by using his name,” Thalia said.

“Nonsense superstition.” Nyset waved the idea away.

Thalia started pacing, arms crossed and fuming.

Walter was curious to see how this power struggle would pan out, though the victor was already clear.

“I’m sorry, Thalia, that was rude. However, it is important we call things what they are for the sake of clarity,” Nyset said, squinting at her. “I can assure you, there is no danger in,” Nyset huffed, “using his name.”

Thalia nodded, lips pressed together. “I accept your apology, Arch Wizard. I will try this new way.” She dropped her arms with defeat.

“Good,” Nyset said. “Walter, Grim. You won’t be alone for long.”

Senka cleared her throat. “Dressna led the force against us. She led the Shadow ones, er, Death Spawn. I think she likes being at the spear point. She seemed to enjoy being covered in the blood of my people.”

Nyset snorted and gave a few quick nods. “Okay. Dressna on the front lines.”

Walter was torn. He didn’t want to have to fight them both, but he didn’t want Nyset to fight either of the two. He had to be realistic. Realistically, Dressna would likely kill many before she was taken down. Maybe even people standing in this very room. He and Grim would be in dire straights against Asebor along with a member of the Wretched. Walter swallowed. “Perhaps Asebor will make a showing on the front lines. Have to be prepared for it. We’ll have to cause enough destruction to lure him back, something I should be able to handle.”

Silence hung on the air with the weight of the soon to be dead. How many would Death’s grisly scythe take?

“Senka, Isa… you two seem to be working well together.” They shared a glance, both of them almost seeming to smile. “You’ll take the tunnels. Your number will be small, but you should be able to cause some damage along with Lena’s Glasses of Fire and with the element of surprise.”

They nodded both at Nyset, then at each other.

“We will meet you and Grimbald in the courtyard here.” Isa’s perfectly trimmed fingernail stabbed the spot on the Nyset’s map.

“If there are any siege weapons, catapults, ballistas, we’re relying on you on the inside to dismantle them,” Nyset said.

“And what of the Tree Folk?” Thalia asked, one hand resting on a long curved dagger on her belt. He saw there were other blades there, at least three others in varying lengths and curves.

Walter watched Nyset, thought he could almost hear her thoughts running through countless possibilities. “Can you swim?”

Thalia shifted her hips, feathers on her head swaying. “What type of question is this? We live surrounded by water; the River of Blood is but a half a day’s walk from my home. We are the realms best swimmers, Arch Wizard.”

“Dragons. This might sound insane, but I think it may work. We don’t have time to build boats. West of the bridge leading up to the Silver Tower is a waterfall that flows into the Far Sea. If you start at the base of the bridge, swimming it hard, it should take you to the shore on the eastern side of the bridge. Once there, part of the wall is thick with ivy. The only reason the ivy is there is because the wall has been neglected, pitting with what might be makeshift handholds. Even if the ivy had been pruned, the holds should be there unless the wall was repaired.” She grinned. “Death Spawn don’t strike me as the gardening type.”

“We are very good climbers too.” Thalia ran her tongue along the tops of her teeth, like a wolf preparing for a meal.

“And the Falcon?” General Stokes asked, packing his pipe with tobacco, some spilling onto the floor.

Nyset eyed the tobacco on the polished wooden floor and the muscles worked in her jaw. “General, you and your men will mix in with the wizards, provide melee support.” Stokes caught the signs of discontent, started working the flecks into a pile with his boot. “We’ll need your archers to thin whatever they’ll have on the battlements and your shields to pair off with Dragon wizards. Phoenix wizards will work among the assault, providing cover shields and healing.”

“And me, Mistress? What shall I do?” Lena asked in a wheedling voice.

Not wear so much patchouli oil, Walter wanted to say, but held his tongue.

“You’ll be at the back of the lines with Grozul, tending to the wounded.”

Lena moaned. “I suppose that will do. But what if the monsters attack us from behind?”

Nyset’s nostrils flared. “Then you’ll have to draw a sword, Lena.”

“She has a fair point,” Stokes added. “What if they come out from that burned village before the Tower? Assuming that’s where we’ll start our assault.”

Nyset licked her lips; they started to look raw and pinked. “I’ll put a few veterans and a handful of apprentices at the back to cover our flank. Isa.”

“Yes?” Isa’s voice was a rasp, laced with danger.

“Send scouts for the Tower’s village, have them check for potential ambushes before we arrive,” Nyset said.

“And when exactly do you want to arrive?” Walter asked. It felt like asking what time he would be marching up to the gallows. How would the weather be then? Would it be a pleasant day for killing? People often took the weather for granted, missing all of the beauty held in a clear day.

“Tomorrow.” Her voice struck like the judge’s gauntlet, hard and final. “We leave at dawn.”

“Tomorrow,” Thalia repeated. “We will be ready.”

“Tomorrow it is,” Stokes mumbled between drawing on his pipe.

The conversation around him became a blur of sounds that didn’t make words. Walter saw Asebor’s glowing eyes hovering over him, his brutal chains sawing scarlet lines through his neck. He saw Juzo’s head punctured and spraying out blood, flames licking at his brains. His flames.

A black arrow lined with thorns soared through the air in a great arc, hissing, curving down toward his father’s terrified eyes. The air filled with his mother’s screams and the roaring of the Cerumal tearing her apart. Blood on the walls, blood all over the kitchen. The arrow struck true, thudding into the wooden Phoenix behind him, passing through his father’s neck like it were made of cotton. Dark blood gurgled out of that wound, eyes rolling up inside his skull showing only whites.

“Will you be ready?” a voice sounding as if it were spoken through a pillow said in his ear. Something shook him. A hand. Warm, and strong. Nyset was looking into his face, her expression dark, her hazel eyes glimmering in a shaft of light. “Walt? Are you back?” she whispered.

He bit the inside of his lips, nodded. “I’m back,” he said, forcing a smile. “I’ll be ready.”

“Good,” Claw murmured.

Grimbald shrugged, bit into another honey cake. “Good.” Walter felt a pang of jealousy at his carefree attitude. Was it a mask? How could he be so relaxed before a war? Walter’s guts churned harder, threatening to push out the contents of today’s morning supper.

“This probably doesn’t need saying, but I’ll say it anyway. You might want to prepare letters for loved ones, say your final goodbyes. Just in case,” Nyset said, sending a flinty gaze around the table. The morning was bright with light, but the room held the gloom of an oncoming storm.

Stokes grunted, gave his pipe a long drag, and turned for the door.

Grozul frowned down into his elixir, entranced by the wisps of steam.

Senka and Isa shared a glance, rose up, and strode out without another word.

Nyset started carefully rolling up the map of the old Silver Tower and its surrounding grounds. A pair of apprentices of the Phoenix in sky blue robes shuffled in, started piling soiled plates on top of one another. Had they been waiting all this time only to clean the room? Nyset had put some impressive systems in place, Walter thought. No, this was not the farmer’s girl he remembered growing up.

And with that, the meeting promptly broke up. Everyone else filed out of the room, boots clicking and thumping against the wood, leaving only he and Nyset alone.

“I should go and practice. It will help me get my mind right,” Walter said, stood up and felt the muscles in his legs tugging on his hips.

“Sore?” Nyset grinned at him with a predatory smile.

Perhaps that lingering pain was indeed from last night’s workout. “I think so,” he said smiling. The wound Alena had given him still hadn’t quite healed either, crusted over with pus.

“I’ll see you at dinner. I have a lot to do,” Nyset sighed. She walked over to him, placed his hand on her hip. Her pleasant scent of lilac washed over him. She rose onto her toes and pressed her soft lips against his, sucked on his upper lip for a second. She grinned, pulled away, leaving his lip wet with her saliva.

Chapter 20

Reclaiming The Lost

“Being with Walter felt as if my heart was on fire and the brightness of the sky lived in my skin.” -The Diaries of Nyset Camfield

They had marched for the Silver Tower in mostly resigned silence, each person thinking what might be their last thoughts. The odd word or two broke the gloomy clopping of hooves and squealing of carts. Each man and woman figuring out their strategy for survival. A blade of pink cut over the gray-blue of the morning sun, bathing the world in its bleeding light.

Everyone’s nerves were predictably on edge, swords hissing from scabbards, lashes unfurled at the slightest sound. A group of birds taking flight, a twig snapping under a deer’s hoof in were enough to elicit shifting eyes. The wind howled through narrow crags, hissed over desiccated brambles. The air was cold, driving in from the Far Sea. It tunneled through chinks in armor, cutting through spots of warmth under riding cloaks.

They hadn’t seen a single living Death Spawn on their march. It was unsettling. Either they were lying in wait, or all dead. If Walter were a betting man, he wouldn’t be betting on the former.

Nyset naturally rode at the head of the pack, head held high in the fierce wind despite the tears being wrenched from her drying eyes. Her bright hair was a flag, a beacon of hope for everyone to follow. Walter rode beside her, holding tight to the Dragon, destruction but a thought away. The Dragon warmed his body and a little draw on the Phoenix allowed him to weave a shield just strong enough to mute the wind.

Nyset had ordered her smith’s to make him a set of Milvorian armor, custom made for his form. She had the smiths darken it to his liking, how they did it was a mystery to him, but the fit was perfect. A layer of the shoulder plates were elongated into grisly tips for ramming. Along the skirt was a flowing sash red as Dragon fire. He wore everything but the helmet, preferring visibility over additional protection. He wore a flowing dark cloak over it all, pushed back over his shoulders by the wind.

Walter’s gaze fell on the southern volcano. Its boiling mouth billowed with dark smoke, tingeing the air with the stink of sulfur. It was like an infernal eye in the pinking sun rays. It watched them, waiting for the opportune time to blow its ruinous payload.

The landscape undulated to the far east. The plains gently curved up into yellow-brown sand dunes where the Nether began, some rivaling mountains in the west. Walter spotted a few adventurous trees, leafless and white. The last of the shrubs vanished outside of Helm’s Reach.

The sky became an unimaginable crisp blue. A dark line of smoke rose out from the Silver Tower, frozen in the sky. Carrion birds circled above the marching column, ample wings occasionally making shadows flit along the path.

They passed an abandoned campsite with four tents, fabric torn and stained with splotches of brown. Blood, dirt, shit, which he wasn’t sure, maybe a combination. Walter caught sight of an ashen hand sticking out the side of a tent flap. The flesh was missing from the owner’s fingers, eaten clean, bony spires reaching at the beautiful sky. Walter shook his head and steered Kez on.

He got some salted lamb jerky from his satchel, offered some to Nyset, who declined. He nibbled on a strip after sucking off the salt.

They passed a narrow valley near the southern volcano, unnamed. It was filled with the wreckage of hundreds of carts and wagons, the wood ash white and wind-worn. He wondered if this was a wagon graveyard, where they all dragged themselves to die.

A pair of houses stood over the wagon graveyard. Each had a pillar proudly protruding from their roof lines. He wondered what their function was. Maybe they had once added a touch of beauty.

One house was badly charred and looked to be a gust away from falling over. The other looked to be in decent shape until he made his way past it, saw one of the walls had been ripped apart, showing its disheveled guts.

They rode over a ramshackle bridge with a silty river flowing underneath. It was likely an artery from the Lich’s River seeking the sea. Walter chuckled at a hand-scrawled sign declaring it The Silty River. At the other side of the bridge were four dead trees covered in choking vines, which gave them strange human shapes. Maybe they were witches, preparing to tell him of his glorious success in battle. He gave them a wry smile as he passed.

His eye swept over Claw, clad in burnished armor, his big curved sword bouncing from his hip. His gray hair curled around his sides of his helmet, all hard angles. He seemed to be lost in a conversation of his own, soft as lover’s whispers in the wind. Walter thought of Juzo and how he formerly had conversations with himself, wondered if Claw’s weapon was demon bound. Demon bound or not, he was good with a blade and that’s all that mattered today.

Grimbald gave him a grim nod, icy eyes twinkling in the sun. His pauldrons shone, layers of overlapping plate wrapped snug over his mountainous shoulders. The handles of his twin axes looked as long as an average man’s spears, polished with a meticulous glint.

Senka and Isa were dark specks on the horizon, breaking off and making their way for the plains towards the hidden tunnels. Walter closed his eyes, wishing them the Dragon’s luck.

Lena and Grozul trailed farther behind the column in spirited conversation. Grozul wore heavy dark blue robes secured by a simple rope belt, his great beard splitting around his hollow cheeks. Walter squinted at what might have been the house master giving Walter a dagger gaze.

Walter spotted Thalia, thick furs in a spotted pattern of browns and whites hung loosely over her shoulders as if the cold hardly touched her. She wore leather boots wrapped with furs, stopping at the knee. His eye traced a line up from her bare thigh, along her shining skin to the crest of her hip, remembering those lovely curves. He caught a glimpse of her abdomen, muscle flexing as she rode. His eye continued up and over the curves of her chest, lingered, then went to her face, which was grinning at him.

“Shit,” he hissed and turned back to face the road, cheeks burning red hot.

“Why do I so often find you ogling her?” Nyset asked.

Walter’s body flexed, surprised to find her riding beside him. “I wasn’t ogling her.” He fixed his gaze on the horizon, watching the Tower creep ever closer. Perhaps he had stared at Thalia for a bit too long. Idiot, he thought, shaking his head.

“No.” She put an arm on his neck, squeezing and massaging. It felt incredibly good. “It’s alright, Walter. I know you’re going to occasionally look at other women. That means… well, I’d rather you look at me. You can look at me. So, I shouldn’t give you a hard time when you do.”

“Wow. So, you’re beautiful and you have the capability to be logical, a rare quality in a woman.” Walter grinned.

She elbowed him in the shoulder.

“Ow! What was that for? Is that how you repay a compliment?”

Nyset raised a thin eyebrow at him, shaking her head with a smile. “What will I ever do with you?”

“Drop down on one knee and offer a marriage knot?” He winked at her.

She laughed with a note of desperation.

He continued, “We wild men. You do know you need to get your claws in us to hold us down, don’t you? You don’t have to do it now, though. Wouldn’t want to embarrass you in front of everyone and all. Need to keep up the fearless leader, Arch Wizard appearance.”

She laughed harder as though she needed it, clutching one hand over her belly. “Oh, you’re ridiculous.”

“Me?” he scoffed.

“You.” She reached over and squeezed his thigh, her hand quickly running up and over his prick.

“Oh, hey alright. You should probably let me focus, someone has to protect you, prevent ambushes and other things like that.” He mumbled, finding words strangely difficult to put together.

“Of course.” She put her hands back on her reins, held them loosely. “On a serious note.” She frowned. “Please don’t do anything too reckless. I know you like your heroics. I’d like that we all came home much the same as we are now.”

He shrugged. “So would I. Could say the same about you.”

She snickered. “We’re partly insane, do you know that?”

Walter nodded and half-smiled. “I sure do.”

The wind finally relented once they drew nearer to the Tower, softening into a welcome breeze. They rode the rest of the way in quiet contemplation.

The afternoon sun became blinding, made the Far Sea twinkle in the distance. It made him think of the Abyssal Sea and that made him think of his former home.

The Silver Tower loomed into a full and unobstructed view. Clusters of black birds in flight quested back and forth around the tallest of spires, specks of grain against the cobalt sky. The sun began its lowering phase, casting the land in a warm light. At least six hours of sunlight remained, Walter guessed.

Thalia snapped orders, Stokes ushered soldiers into positions, and Nyset led apprentices into staggering lines.

Walter looked at the sinuous bridge, curving around jagged peaks of rock and passing under the Silver Tower’s main gates. It was a husk of its former beauty, a dilapidated shell and speckled with the remnants of war. Few of the bridge’s great stone baluster’s remained, side rails cracked and hundreds of hunks of stone were strewn about the path going over. A catapult stone split into ragged halves narrowed the bridge’s path about a hundred paces before the gates. It was a choke point, one that would have to be removed.

The path was littered with heaps of decaying bodies. Rot flies buzzed in a furious din of green masses. The carrion birds had already had their fill, most of the bodies picked clean. Wriggling maggots emerged from a crater that had been burned through a Cerumal’s chest, though the skin looked dry as boot leather. A pair of human legs protruded from a barrel, one arm sprouting out from between the legs, body folded in half like a doll’s.

Scores of Death Spawn were sprawled out every which way, over the rails, on top of one another, hacked off limbs functioning as garnishes between them. Around the bodies, discarded weapons dully glowed beneath a patina of rust and neglect. Spears, hooks, axes, and blades of all sort bristled between stony chunks. For every handful of Death Spawn bodies there was at least one form that was recognizably human, but most seemed to have been torn to pieces, clothing tossed aside, and likely finding their way into a Cerumal cook fire.

Closer toward the main gate were piles upon piles of charred forms, pushed into tangled heaps, glittering with what might have been pieces of Milvorian armor. Walter swallowed at the sight on the battlements, anger spiking up in his guts. With it came searing acid.

“Bastards,” Walter said through an iron jaw.

He had mentally prepared himself for the contents of the bridge, but not this. Hanging from the stretching parapet were hundreds of bodies, swaying from the ends of nooses. A grisly warning for anyone bold or foolish enough to tread near. Most had been stripped bare. Some still wore their robes, tattered and bright with the sun faded reds and blues of apprentices. Above the hanged wizards, behind the wall were spikes and upon them it was clear, even at this distance, they were studded with heads. Their limp hair hung on the wind coursing in from the Far Sea, mouths opened wide as if screaming.

The Silver Tower retained few smudges of its former glory. Great spires were reduced to stony spears, only the strongest of mortared bonds keeping the piled stones together. He remembered wandering those endless halls, exploring, finding himself in ancient spaces cloaked in dust. He found the tendril of smoke winding out from behind the wall. It was always burning, a constant reminder of their failure to prevent the Tower’s siege, always there for the realm to see. The silver infused stone making up the walls and the spires glittered in defiance, shining through the Shadow Realm’s hold.

He remembered when he’d first laid eyes upon this scene. That time he still had both eyes, both arms. He hadn’t yet murdered any of his friends. It had been a sight to behold, filling him with wonder and a fresh sense of adventure. The only thing that had remained the same was the near perfect weather, perfect for slaughtering Death Spawn.

The roaring falls crashed under the bridge, but it was a soft rumble at this distance. They washed out to deltas and into tributaries, fanning out to the Far Sea like a tree. He once thought the river a marvel when he was on the battlements of the Silver Tower and peering out. Things looked much different when you were the one doing the sieging. He stared down into the water, spouting out from between clefts carved in the stone below. It was a perilous torrent. White frothy tendrils reached out to choke and drown and smash your bloated body upon its rocky teeth.

The village south of the Tower had been reduced to ruins. It was nothing but a heap of gray coal, blackened timbers, and piles of ashes. Farms were burned, leaving the soil coated in blankets of ash. Brick chimneys stood alone like ancient sentinels, watching over burned out house frames. It was a wraith of a village, haunting the ashen grounds.

Some houses had miraculously stood, dodged the engulfing conflagration. The few survivors had windows shattered, shutters hanging from a single nail, as if their eyes had been gouged out. Black doors yawned open like mouths fixed to a permanent gape. If you searched long enough, you’d spot the remains of blackened ribs and stoved in skulls, the tiny skeletons of children wrapped in a timeless embrace. Death Spawn did not take prisoners. Death Spawn knew no mercy.

Something was wrong. Why were there no living Death Spawn to be found? Could they really be this thin on numbers? He squinted, saw no signs of life along the Tower’s walls. He spotted a cat with three legs and missing patches of hair. It awkwardly tottered along the bridge, fumbling at a mouse. A long muzzled dog emerged from behind a pile of rotting corpses, chased it off the bridge and into the ruined village.

Men and women were dismounting, stowing horses to charred trees, frantically arming themselves and tightening down armor buckles. Many were already prepared for battle, hands white-knuckled around hilts. Wizards adjusted robes, flared fire, and flashed shields. Some had discarded their robes for armor, others preferring the freedom of cloth.

There were about three, maybe four hundred Walter guessed. A formidable force, at least a third of those wizards. There were proud women with glittering short sword hilts hanging from their belts, smudged-faced men with spears shining with bright tips. There were veteran wizards with a lifetime of scars and newly minted apprentices who’d never spilled a drop of blood in all their lives.

Walter craned his neck, stood on his tiptoes and peered back down the snaking column. Metal shone in the sun. He caught the scent of someone smoking tobacco. It was a sight the world hadn’t seen since before the first seal of the Age of Dawn had been cast. Soldiers of the Midgaard Falcon, Tree Folk, and wizards all standing together against the same foe. Walter wished it could’ve been for something more enjoyable. Perhaps a wedding or a banquet, rather than a war.

“The Arch Wizard speaks!” Claw shouted from the back of a jet black horse. He sent it galloping up and down the lines forming at the precipice, some peering down wide-eyed at the watery death far below.

Walter watched Nyset ride out before the group, a few bright patches of grass defying the Shadow Realm’s grip before the bridge, the familiar cedar spreading its wispy branches out over the canyon.

Soldiers of the Midgaard Falcon cheered, wizards whooped, and the Tree Folk let out an impressive roar.

Nyset raised her arm into the air, sleeve falling down to show the whites of the long scars along her forearms, marks left by a Black Wynch. The wind twitched at her blood-red sleeves. She had the look of a woman who knew neither fear or mercy for her enemies. Here was a leader that any wizard would be proud to follow to the grave.

The crowd became murmurous, quiet slipping over it. A sword of fire burst to life in her hand, flickering bright red, almost seeming to pierce through the gates from his perspective. “Who stands behind our walls?” she roared into the crowd. “The demon god Asebor, his Wretched, the Death Spawn have taken what is ours! We are the men and women of Zoria. This world is not for these creatures.”

Walter caught Thalia wince. She made her way up front, a few paces away.

That got another round of echoing roars, pounding feet and beating shields. She rode up and down the line. “The demon god murdered my parents, Walter Glade’s, the dual-wielder, wielder of Bonesnapper, murdered his parents too. Asebor sent him to the Shadow Realm, and here he stands before you again! Ready to lay waste to our enemies! If we don’t stop him today, who will be next? Whose parents? Whose babies? Which village will next be reduced to ashes? It’s time we become the wolf!” Her voice cracked as her eyes met Grimbald’s, red-rimmed and brow creased.

Shrieks and howls of anger rolled over the warriors. Thalia’s soldiers bared sharpened teeth, bodies bristling with blades and spiked armor. Walter couldn’t help but stare at their fearsome mouths with grim fascination, his jaw hanging open. Walter raised his arm, Chains of the North wrapped tight around Stormcaller and throwing out beams of light.

“In their arrogance, they have taken what is rightfully ours!” Nyset called. “We have the claim, we have the men, the numbers, to die in battle than in chains! How long will we let this scum stay in our lands, pillaging our farms, eating our children? Not a day longer!”

Their roars split the air with hungry anticipation. A wizard let a fireball loose into the air, burning up like a star. Nyset’s eyes and her sword flashed bright as the sun, so bright Walter had to look away for an instant. “Let us honor the Dragon and the Phoenix who have granted us their gifts, their strengths to make this a bloody day for Death Spawn! Time to take our walls back. Walk tall. Before the sunset, we’ll have the heads of our enemies above our gates!”

“Today is the day,” Grimbald said into Walter’s ear, his voice almost lost in the din of cheers.

The cheering slowly died down and Nyset rode up, stopping between him and Grimbald. “How did I do?”

“You’re incredible,” Walter said, beaming at her sweat-streaked face.

“Really?”

“Really,” Walter said. He meant it.

“Mhm,” Grimbald grunted in agreement.

There was a long, weighty silence. The falls thundered and seagulls called from the distance.

A disturbance swept from the back of the line, people shuffling off to the side of the path leading up to the bridge through the village. Spears were raised up, a few blades hissed from scabbards.

“What is it?” Grimbald asked, scratching his stubbly chin. Walter had been struck by how young he looked without a beard but found himself getting used to it.

“Children. What are they doing here?” someone muttered.

“How had they survived?” A wizard in blue asked. “Stow your blade,” he said to a Tree Folk warrior who responded by flashing his teeth and a machete.

There were close to twenty of them, dirt smeared, their clothing threadbare and soiled. Their small feet were bare and blackened. The column parted into a narrow channel giving them room to pass, the expressions of the soldiers awestruck. They went to men and women with open arms, eyes swimming with dirty tears, hugging them.

A boy stumbled over to Walter and Nyset, eyes sitting deep in his sockets, cheeks bright pink. His shirt was once white, now a mix of browns and blacks. He wore a belt fashioned of fraying rope.

Thalia’s blade was drawn, the arm relaxed, but her forearm rigid with tension. Her keen eyes tracked the child.

“Dragons. What are we going to do with them?” Walter asked.

“Get them to safety, obviously.” Nyset glared at him. She dismounted, spread an arm to sweep him up. “Come here, child.”

The child’s expression darkened, his shadowed eyes flickering with a mad touch. Screaming came from the back of the column; sounded as if from a dream. The child stumbled to Nyset as a soiled arm reached for his back to grasp a dagger, its sharp tip glinting.

Walter’s voice caught, but his hand snapped out and a shield split between the child and Nyset. The child stabbed anyway and Nyset gasped, fell back. The blade bounced harmlessly from the shield, and the child turned its feral rage on Walter.

It lunged with inhuman speed and sank its dagger into one of Kez’s front legs. The horse wildly bucked, hurling Walter from the saddle. Walter hit the ground with a thud, felt the air expelled from his lungs. He tried to suck in a breath and let out a ragged cough, grit in his mouth.

Something warm slapped across his face. He blinked away the burning. Blood. A blurred Tree Folk warrior held a child around the neck in one hand, ramming a blade through its belly with the other. The boy cried out, dropped his dagger, the hilt standing upright between cobbles. The warrior dropped him to the ground, collapsing into a scarlet heap. Ash puffed into the air.

Walter started to rise up, heard Kez squealing in pain, saw him clopping into the village of nightmares. Lost. The warrior peered down at him, head dotted with spike like feathers. “Are you well?” It was Thalia’s voice, her face obscured by the brightness of the sun, the tears clearing blood from his eye.

“Yeah,” Walter said, taking her hand and she pulled him up. She jerked him to his feet with surprising power. Rivulets of blood streamed from her wide blade, pattered into the ashen ground, streaked across her spiked armor. The boy lay on the ground, neck slit and stomach carved open.

Walter turned, saw Nyset bright with the Dragon. “Death Spawn!” she hissed and raised her arms as another child squirmed on a gust of air clutching a butcher’s knife. She cut her arms in a downward chop, dashing the girl’s head apart on the edge of an upturned battle axe, the other end wedged firmly in a moldy crate. There was sickening pop as its skull split, bits of brains spilling over the wood.

“Death Spawn? But—” Walter saw it now. The child Thalia had slain was changing, the guise melting away like a passing cloud. The figure had a metallic sphere for a head, body squat and wearing chainmail. It was a Metamorphose, a shapeshifter. “Shit!” Idiot.

Walter spotted a soldier of the Midgaard Falcon on the ground, sputtering, choking, and kicking. He had one bloody hand pressed against the side of his neck, red spurting between his fingers. His bright chestplate was streaked in shiny blood. A boy twitched, skewered through the mouth upon the end of the man’s spear, the point through the back of his neck. The carving knife he still held was madly slashing the air as if it had a brain of its own. Walter narrowed his eyes at the tears in the child’s eyes. It was a damned near perfect disguise.

Walter knelt beside the soldier, hand glowing with the icy touch of the Phoenix. He reached for the dying man. “I’ve got you.”

“Tell my wife—” he gurgled, eyes whirling into the empty sky. “Tell her—” And then nothing. His hand dropped from his neck. His breath wheezed out with a final rattling.

Walter growled back at the child. “Children! You use children?” He screamed at it. He flicked his fingers using the Phoenix, sent the Death Spawn body tumbling into blackened shrubs. The soldier’s spear was driven half-way down the haft into its mouth. He pulled on the Dragon, washed the writhing body in fire.

Walter slowly rose up, hunched. He felt sick, felt the world pushing down on him with waves of heat. He peered down the column and around the precipice, the last of the Metamorphoses cut down.

A few more soldiers writhed on the ground, tended to by those around them. The frantic whispers of the dying wasn’t something one grew accustomed to, no matter how many times you heard it. The stink of burning Death Spawn flesh reached his nose. He inhaled hard at it, sucked it in, savored the scent of his enemy burning. They would all come to know the taste of his fire.

“Time for you to go, Walter.” He started, saw Nyset’s narrow hand on his shoulder. He swallowed and turned to face her, Tower behind. He wiped his forearm down his face, streaking it with the deep red of the Death Spawn’s blood.

“In a bit. Let me just—”

He saw it before he heard it. She said something else, but it was as if his ears had stopped working. “Look!” was all he could manage.

Nyset swiveled on her feet. “Wizards! Archers!” she roared. Burning discs crackling with Dragon fire filled the air above her.

A great piercing shriek carried out from the Silver Tower, booming across the bridge. Walter’s heart was a smith’s hammer, smashing against his temples. Even the best-laid plans could be brought to ruins. Screams of terror passed over the warriors, heads turning up at the swimming shape.

A great beast crested through the air, its massive wings whooshing and buffeting. It was an enormous Shattered Wing, carrying something in its crab-like talons. It came into focus. A barrel. But why? There was an imperceptible sparking in the air below it. A wick. A wick leading to a barrel, Walter realized.

“Oil bomb!” he screamed and the Dragon instinctually bloomed in his chest, a raging torrent, compelling him to destroy. Walter welcomed the return of his dear old friend, ravenous anger. He had come to know it well and found in it a particular fondness he felt in no other.

“What?” Claw screamed in his ear, his chipped blade Ghostwalker faintly glowing and bleeding at his side. It was most certainly another talking sword.

Panicked bowstrings twanged, crossbows snapped, arrows hissed in a haphazard volley falling short of the target. Most plummeted into the gorge, others clattered against the bridge, piercing through dried out corpses.

A harmony of terrible shrieking came. Three more Shattered Wings roared into the air from behind the wall, filling the air with their demonic forms. They had four sets of wings, pincers for legs, featureless humanoid heads, bodies covered in a densely scaled carapace.

“Get back!” Walter ran off the side of the path, clearing himself space. He flared fire, skin warping the air with its heat, six fireballs coursing through the salty air. Tearing winds came in from the Far Sea, flapping at his cloak. He grunted, forced the fireballs at the lead Shattered Wing. The Shattered Wing folded its wings against its back, dropping from the air like a stone, barrel dragging it down.

“Damn it,” he snarled, watched the spiraling sextet of fireballs trailing black smoke where they should have struck the creature. He directed his attention further back at a pair of Shattered Wings following behind the leader. Walter split the group of six fireballs into two sets of three, whizzing like meteors.

A pair of his projectiles sheared through the wings of one. It shrieked in pain and sent them spinning like plucked petals from a flower. The last fireball of the set collided with the Tower’s wall, exploding in a shower of flames and chunks of stone.

The other set of three fireballs crashed into the neighboring Shattered Wing’s gut, sending it into a sideways spin. Coiled intestines trailed from an enormous wound, blood spraying, slabs of burning flesh dropping down, catching and sagging in its grabbing pincers. Perhaps it had thought to stuff its organs back in, he thought with a sadistic smile.

The pair of barrels caught in their clutches roared against the rocks far below, throwing up gouts of fire before being swallowed by the falls. The leader was almost upon them, screeching with its broad mouth agape, curving horns set to gore.

Walter fired again. Arrows, bolts, fireballs, and discs filled the air. Its wings whooshed, body twisting, ducking, agile as a cat. Arrows tore through its wings like paper. The weight of the barrel sent it wide, almost clipping its payload off on a sunken roof. It screeched an ear-splitting sound and rose up with a furious flapping of wings.

“Ny!” Walter pointed at the last one coming in. “Get it!”

“On it!” She gritted her teeth, amber light trailing over her brows like smoke.

Walter fixed his attention on the Shattered Wing rounding back in a wide arc. “Shit! Shit!” It was sweeping for the village, aiming for the end of the column. The wick was near its end. Screams came from the back of the column, some running, some standing and shooting bows. A few dropped to the ground and made themselves flat.

His jaw clenched and blood thudded in his skull. He blinked, sending a single fireball ripping into the blue. He willed it to curve through the air. It would strike true, he thought and clamped down on the sides of cheeks in concentration until a metallic taste filled his mouth.

The Shattered Wing dropped low. Walter’s fireball collided with its head, but it didn’t matter. He watched the wick meet the wooden barrel’s edge, winking out. It moved through the air like passing through a wall of honey. The barrel roared apart, threw out globs of burning oil and splintered wood.

“No,” Walter whispered, stumbled back onto the main path. A wave of icy defeat stabbed down his back. Shrieks of pain split the air. Men and women writhed, bathed in bone melting oil. The Shattered Wing’s ruined body fell into a death roll, hit the ground and rolled over at least ten warriors. Bones cracked and armor squealed.

“Move, damn it!” Claw rammed against him, shouldering past and running for the back. His hands were already glowing the healing light of the Phoenix.

Thalia whistled a series of commands. Her soldiers fanned out, taking knees and drawing arrows. Their bows were spiked at the ends, doubling as melee weapons.

Grimbald stared wide-eyed at the men and women burning, Corpsemaker trembling in his grip.

Walter spotted Grozul’s flapping robes, dropping down to administer healing spells.

General Stokes was barking orders, trying to keep some semblance of control in the midst of burning chaos. Walter had come to know that in battle, chaos reigned.

Walter started for the back of the lines to help Claw. A powerful arm grabbed him, stopping him in his tracks. He spun, saw Grimbald staring at him. “What are you doing?”

“We have a mission that needs doing.” Grimbald leveled his stern eyes at him.

“Shit.” Walter nodded. He was right. “Let’s get on with it then,” he growled.

“You must go, now, Walter!” Nyset was beside them, eyes glowing. She looked back down the column, lips pressed together until they were white. “We didn’t expect this.” The words spilled out. “Didn’t plan for this.”

He leaned in to kiss her, but she pushed her hot hands against his chest. “Not now. Go!” She snapped, giving him a fierce scowl.

He let out a heavy exhale. “Gates will be opened soon.”

“Thank you.” She caressed his cheek and forced a smile. He was rooted to the ground as he watched her run for a pair apprentices, issuing commands. He shouldn’t have expected more from her, but for some reason, the interaction had left him feeling hollow inside. He didn’t want to leave her. She wasn’t a defenseless lamb, but he couldn’t stifle the feeling that he was abandoning her.

She was right, he knew. He had to stay focused on the task. Lives depended on it. The truth was, he’d let them all burn if it meant saving her. He shook his head. “Ready?” Walter asked Grimbald.

Grimbald grunted with displeasure at having to use a portal.

He thought of his favorite place in the Silver Tower, a hallway lined with the statues of ancient warriors. Was it still intact? His portal cracked the air, buzzing and rotating to reveal the hallway. “Brace yourself, could be Death Spawn on the other side.”

“Right.” Grimbald nodded with determination.

“Come here.” Walter wrapped his arm around his massive side. “Careful of the edges.”

Walter gasped, stopping them in an awkward embrace, a step from the portal. A series of violet portals sprung open near the Tower’s gates. Death Spawn boiled out of them like bees from a kicked hive.

Grimbald dragged him on and it took a tremendous strength of will to let him. “They’ll have to deal with it,” Grimbald said into his ear. He smelled like fresh leather and honing oil.

They squeezed through the portal, leaving the world of burning men behind.

Chapter 21

Infiltraton

“War only ends for the dead.” -The Diaries of Nyset Camfield

Walter’s boots softly echoed from the polished stone lining the stale hall.

“Where are we?” Grimbald asked, his voice a whisper. His hand twitched for his axe, but there was no need. The hall was quiet as a grave, the only enemy choking dust. Walter’s portal softly fizzled on the tiled floor, triangular stones burning with molten heat.

“Above the veteran’s quarters in the main spire,” Walter replied and let the portal vanish with a hiss. “I think.” He swallowed. The moisture in his throat felt to have departed and he had to fight off the scratching urge to cough. He strained his ears, softened his breathing, listening. Grimbald mirrored him. His heart thumped behind his eye at the spot where an eye used to be.

They were in the middle of the hallway, layers of dust covering the floor. No prints. Armored statues depicting ancient warriors guarded the walls. They brandished halberds and spears forming a series of crisscrossing arches. A procession of semi-circular windows marched along the top of one wall, facing the main courtyard beyond the gates, throwing white light across the curved ceiling. The floor was cast in gray shadows.

“Now where?” Grimbald asked, breaking a long silence. He licked his cracking lips and peered over his shoulder. “Never made my way up this far… being a soldier and all.”

Walter sucked in that dry air, pulled his shoulders back, and clenched his fist. He beckoned with his stump. His memories of his time in the Tower came tumbling free from a patched over part of his mind. He started down the hall, black cloak trailing behind, dust eddies circling around his boots. With every step, he felt himself filling up with an iron resolve. To do what must be done. He would open the gates for Nyset and anything standing in his way would know pain.

“Careful, their weapons are sharp.” He ducked his head to get under a pair of interlocking spears. A distant roar of men and beast alike came through the windows. He paused. The sharp clang of metal against metal followed a second after. He huffed out a breath, trying to push down the desire to be there with her. He had to stay focused.

They shared a glance. Grimbald winced, nodded at him to go on.

The shadows ahead shifted around an alcove where the hallway turned to the left. Before the alcove, a beam of light cut down through a skylight, showed strings of dust dancing on the air. The shifting was slight, as if it were an oil slick that had moved an inch. Walter stopped, cocked his head, narrowed his eye and seized the Dragon. Shadows did not move. It had disguised itself as part of the wall, given away by another shimmer.

“What is it?” Grimbald whispered. Walter caught the scent of his nervy, stinking sweat. He heard Grimbald stumble, grunting and collecting his footing, likely narrowly avoiding mowing him over.

“Death Spawn.” Walter’s lips formed a thin, murderous grin. “Skin Flayer!” And with a burst of strength, he lunged forward, his sword of fire springing alight from his stump. Before the Skin Flayer’s form had fully materialized from hiding beside the wall, he rammed his blade into it. It tore into its gut, rasping out a breath. He dragged it up, easily splitting it from chest to waving coal hair, fire hissing on its blood and flesh. Scarlet splattered over the walls and spattered onto the ceiling. Its body sagged to the floor with a slopping squelch. A pair of glowing blades clattered onto the stone, rang throughout the empty halls.

Walter wheeled at a scuff. Shadows glimmered. “Behind you!”

Grimbald snorted, pivoted, drew his axe in a flash of light. “Haircuts for all!” he roared, Corpsemaker chopping in a vicious down stroke. Walter saw the skull mounted on the end of the Corpsemaker’s haft, ruby eyes shining with delight. His strike only caught the floor, sent splinters hissing against the statues, metal ringing with the din of violence.

The Skin Flayer fully materialized, its swirling violet robes hung on the air as if underwater, eyes slitted in a malevolent yellow. It stabbed with a glowing rune lined blade. Grimbald twisted, blade squealing against his shoulder plate, clanging off a statue. Grimbald growled, dragged his axe up. The skull on the bottom crunched against the bottom of its jaw, sent it staggering back.

Walter, fearful of burning Grimbald, ripped the sword free from its grip with the Phoenix. The Skin Flayer hissed, hand snatching at the fleeing weapon. The blade soared over their heads, scraped the ceiling, banged against the end of the hallway. The Skin Flayer drew another sword from under its robes, twirled it in a confident flourish. Blood trailed down from the bottom of its mouthless jaw.

It leaped, stabbing at Grimbald’s chest. He parried it with his axe, his momentum surging forward. It punched, cracked his head back. His legs carried him on, rammed it with his great shoulder, dropped his axe, grabbed it around the waist and drove it into the floor. It let out a gasp when it struck, blade falling from surprised fingers.

Walter swallowed, frustrated at being unable to help Grim in such tight quarters. He spared a glance over his shoulder, scanning for an expectant horde of Death Spawn. Nothing but dust. Motionless shadows.

Grimbald was standing with his crushing hands wrapped around and pressing into its squirming neck. Its face was scarlet, eyes wide, nostrils flaring, fingers wriggling in a feeble attempt to peel his off. Grimbald bellowed out with a haunting laugh, carrying it over to a statue, legs flailing for the ground. Walter saw a dark enjoyment in his grimace. Was this how he appeared to him?

Grimbald rose up onto his toes. “Die,” he hissed through his teeth. It let out a muffled shrieking. He inched the beast onto the point of a spear through the back of its neck. The spear was held by a stern-faced warrior, dutifully holding it to do its part in protecting the realm.

Grimbald removed his hands as the spear emerged through the front of its ashen throat. He booted it in the chest, sending it sliding down the haft and crashing against the statue. Its hands clutched at the wet haft, scraping and frantically clawing. It grabbed the haft, started dragging itself hanging by the neck up toward the spear point, wood groaning under its weight. It made it about a foot before its arms and legs went limp, blood pattered onto its boots and pooled on the floor.

“Now that’s fighting ‘til the bitter end, eh?” Grimbald said, bending over and dragging Corpsemaker from the ground.

Walter blew out his cheeks. “Whatever else is still inside likely knows we’re coming from all the noise we just made.”

“You think.” Grimbald cleared his throat, wiped blood from his cheeks. “Think Asebor is here?”

“He has to be. He wouldn’t miss a chance to kill more of us.” To kill me, he thought. Walter glanced down at Bonesnapper, still there.

“Think it will work?” Grimbald asked, bouncing his eyebrows at the gleaming chains.

“This?” Walter rattled the Chains of the North. “It has to. If it doesn’t…” Walter trailed off. They would all be fucked.

Grimbald grunted. “If you see him, kill him, Walter. Don’t go worrying about me. In the long scheme, my life is a trifle if you don’t end him.”

Walter opened his mouth to protest, but Grimbald stopped him with a strong squeeze of his shoulder, bordering on painful. “Please. Walt. Tell me you’ll do it. Do it for my Pa.”

Walter drew his gaze up from his boots, looked into Grim’s vibrating eyes. “I’ll do it.”

“Good. Hope to make it out of this, of course, but just wanted that plain and said. Just in case it came to that. No doubts, no hesitation.”

“It won’t come to that. Come on.” He slapped Grimbald on the arm, turned for the end of the hallway.

* * *

Senka tore at the sticky cobwebs matting themselves over her nose, mouth, cheeks, and eyes. A rivulet of sand coursed down from the tunnel’s low earthen ceiling, spilling into her hair and down the back of her armor. The sand had worked its way down her back, under her arms, between her breasts, in her crotch, and between her ass cheeks, grinding her flesh raw with every squatting step.

The rotting wooden supports lining the passage were tenuous at best. She half-expected them to come down at any moment, leaving them crushed in this tomb and one with the sands. At least, she wouldn’t be alone, she thought. She wondered if there was a fate worse than dying alone.

Isa scraped up against something behind her. “This is not a place for those gifted in height,” he spat with annoyance. He grunted.

“Almost there, Isa. I think we’re near the end.” Senka had no idea how much farther it was. She stabbed her sputtering torch into the dark, illuminating an extra foot or so of the endless night. The Mistress had told her the tunnel stretched on for about a fourth of a mile. They had to have traveled more than that by now. Could they have perhaps missed the exit? This was their last torch.

“What will you do when we get the Black Furnaces back?” Isa asked. The multitude of weapons bristling from his belt chimed together. Too many weapons, she thought. Needles for long range targets and daggers for close combat was all one truly needed. Bows were only for hunting.

Roots dragged at her hair, clawed at her forehead. “I—” she frowned into the dark. “I’m not sure.” Something snagged her toe, leg kicking out. She stumbled, gasped, falling. Hands grabbed her. One on her shoulder, the other around her stomach. Isa’s hands. He was pressed against her, rigid as a pillar. “Thank you,” she breathed over her shoulder.

He sniffed, let her go. She wished he hadn’t. His warmth lingered on her shoulder.

Isa cleared his throat and pebbles skittered below his boots. “I could go with you. That is if the Arch Wizard would release me from my duties… and if you wanted me to join you.”

She set the torch between a pair of stones, twisted around, brushing sand from her hair. “I’d like that.” She grinned at him. He was a ghost in the glow of torchlight.

“Good.” He blinked at her, throat working.

“Yes. It would be.” She felt her cheeks filling with the warmth of blood. Her breath caught staring into his eyes, black sockets in the fading light. She took his hand in hers, rough as leather and squeezed it hard.

His ivory mouth grinned at her, gave her a gentle squeeze in return. “We should go,” he said. “Our light soon ends.”

“Mm,” she forced a smile, released his hand, turned back down the path and grabbed the torch.

She wondered if she would ever have the chance to feel his hand again. Would she live through this day? Would he?

Since the Black Furnaces had been lost, her life had become a meaningless shell. But she had found a new purpose, a new direction, a new meaning. The Scorpions had always served the will of the Tower and here she was, doing well by her name and serving the Tower proper.

She had other reasons too. She would live to carry on the way of the Scorpions. She would not let her sect’s art die. Perhaps another reason was fumbling around behind her. She stifled a snicker, smiling at Isa’s cursing.

Her father, Sinred Graves, might have even given her one of his rare approving nods had he known of her resolve. She liked to think he would. She was filled with a pang of longing, wishing he was still above the sands. A child’s wish, she admonished herself. He would not like her wishing for things to be other than what they were, she frowned into the flickering torchlight.

She remembered his last stand, remembered the Shadow One Dressna breaking him. Dressna’s arms were red and wet with the blood of her people. Her callous white eyes falling upon her as if she were a rat to be crushed under her heels.

“What do you see?” Isa hissed.

She slid a few feet where the path curved down into the earth, paused and narrowed her brows at him. “What do you mean Isa?” She saw then what he had likely seen, a pair of needles clenched between her fist. She hadn’t even realized she had drawn them. A potentially deadly mistake. “Sorry,” she stammered, carefully sliding them into tiny sleeves sewn in the bottom of her bracer. “Just thinking.”

He slowly nodded at her. “I understand.” He slid down to meet her and she shifted back a few steps, making room for his landing.

New sounds reached her ears. Muffled squawks, shrieks and the pounding of boots.

“We’re close,” Isa said against her neck, her breath soft. She liked him close, wanted him closer.

Senka ran deft fingers along the ceiling. “She said it was — ah!” She squealed with excitement, pawed at the square of wood making up the overhead door. “This is it!”

Senka grabbed the rusted handle and tried to push it up and open. It didn’t move a single iota. She tried again and gritted her teeth. Her shoulders strained and legs quivered against the immovable door. She gave up with a defeated grunt. Had they come this far to be defeated by a block of wood?

Isa slithered against the wall, dislodging stones and pressing himself against her, hardly enough room for two in the narrow space.

“Together,” he said and flashed her a smile.

“Slowly and carefully.” Senka nodded. “On my three count. One… Two… Three.” they awkwardly heaved their shoulders and arms against an incredible weight. The hinges groaned, sand hissed down from above, and the door inched open showing a razor-thin band of light. The light seared in her night adjusted eyes and the back of her head throbbed while she blinked away tears.

“Wait,” Senka said, but he’d already stopped pressing, rubbing his eyes with the back of one hand.

They listened to the squawking of Death Spawn while their eyes adjusted, the world above painfully bright. Senka’s bones were filled with a sudden ice at hearing a familiar voice. It boomed above all the others, deep and feminine. Her mouth went dry, tried to speak but no sounds came.

“You recognize something,” Isa stated. “What?” He gazed at her and she heard him popping the cork from his waterskin. He brought it up near her mouth, gesturing for her to drink.

She took a quick sip. “Thank you,” she breathed. “It’s the voice of Dressna, the Sha— Death Spawn who murdered my father.”

“Dressna, one of the Wretched,” Isa said, the muscle in his jaw working. A bead of sweat trickled down his hard-angled temple.

Her vision finally came into focus, the light no longer hurting. There were hundreds, no, thousands of Death Spawn lined up into at least ten columns. Hundreds of Cerumal were herded by Black Wynches, screeching what must have been orders. Behind them all her eyes leaped to Dressna, a tower in a field of children, at least twice as tall as any other. She was chopping her carapaced arms through the air, pointing at Black Wynches and kicking the backsides of malingering Cerumal.

Her enormous wings lay propped against her back and trailed down over her bull’s legs. Four horns twisted around and around from the back of her hairless head ending in fierce points. Her skin was the color of a rain cloud, shoulders bare. She wore great overlapping plates starting at her tremendous breasts and ending at her ankles, leaving her talon feet exposed.

Senka’s eyes drew wide. She was more terrifying in the daylight than she’d ever been in the gloom of the Black Furnaces. Dressna had a weakness, however. One Senka discovered during their first encounter. Her hand went to her wrist, rubbing the spot where Dressna had crushed her bones. She had been preparing, waiting for this day every day since they first met. Every needle under her bracers and every dagger in her belt had been laced with essence of Acontium flower. This was her chance to avenge her father’s death, to honor his sacrifice, to fulfill her oaths.

The trepidation that held her captive for the past ten seconds released its hold on her and was replaced with boiling anger. Everything around Dressna became a blurring of colors and sounds.

“Look. They’re going through portals,” Isa said.

“What?” Senka snapped, turning a dagger gaze on him.

“The time is not right for your vengeance, child.” Isa narrowed his sunken eyes, not even bothering to look at her.

Child? The disrespect. His impudence. Did he not know that vengeance was her right? She inhaled sharply, had to get control. She slowly exhaled, letting her vision relax, broadening, taking in the whole of the scene. He was right. There were too many of them. It would only serve for a quick death. “Portals. But if there are portals there must be something, something—”

“Who can cast them,” Isa finished her thoughts. “There!” he hissed, pointing with his eyes.

An abyss of living shadows stood beside the tens of portals, gleaming chains and blood-red cloak hovering in the air above it. It was the demon god, Asebor. Senka’s resolved melted like wax, wanting to shrink into the earth. His hands glowed like violet suns, using his powers to keep the portals opened, she realized.

“We need to do something,” she said weakly, entirely unsure of what. She felt despair at seeing her chance for vengeance slipping away. They would be twigs in a sandstorm.

“There is no sense in throwing ourselves upon the sword, Senka. We wait.” He gripped her shoulder, both of them slowly lowering themselves and letting the door gently close over them.

Her heart thudded against her chest, the earth cold at her back. “We wait,” she repeated. She let her head drop back against something with a sharp edge. “Dragons,” she barked, rubbing at the bump forming at the back of her head. She felt at the wall, found a rock as sharp as a knife where she had laid her head.

“Are you well?” Isa tightened his belt, his face wrinkled with concern as he checked his weapons.

Was his concern for his weapons or for her? Perhaps it was only nerves. Senka watched as the last of the torchlight winked out then, leaving them in total darkness. “I’m well,” she muttered. What was happening between them? She had never had much time for leisure, for ‘wasting days’ as her father called it. She didn’t know what to call it, but she liked being near him. She shifted her bottom a few inches closer to the door above, between Isa’s legs and slowly lowered her head against the earthen wall, soft here.

She heard Isa shift and sniff. His armor creaked, boots scraped on loose stones. She furrowed her brow, wondered why he couldn’t manage to stay still lest their position be revealed. She understood it was a foolish thought, as sound could not travel very far at this depth. The careless man gets the Fire Lizard’s bite, her father always said.

She felt Isa’s breath, close and warm. Her heart hammered in her temples. Something pressed against her lips. His mouth. She grinned and opened for him, moaning as his tongue flicked at her upper lip. She licked his mouth, his tongue, inhaling his wonderful sweat and leather scent. He wrapped a hand around the back of her neck, pulling her close, and she felt her small breasts pressed against his rocky chest. Her hand traced his elbow, over his bicep, slipped under his armor so she could touch his skin.

Something boomed from above.

Her breath caught and her hand jerked back. Isa gasped, pulled away, hand still holding onto the back of her neck. Metal hissed from their sheaths. She licked his saliva still moist on her lips, gripped her drawn dagger in clammy hands. She stared into the dark, imagined where in space he might be.

She started. “What—”

“Shh,” Isa said, nearly inaudible.

Hinges roared. A giant square of blinding light. Black shape darting down. Isa screamed, his hand torn free from the back of her neck.

“I thought I heard mice.” A demonic form towered over the opened door, blocking out the worst of the sun. Senka shielded her eyes. Isa squirmed in its grip. Dressna peered down into the tunnel, horns like black snakes. “Ah, another little mouse.”

Senka twisted, avoiding her grasping black talons. Senka growled, wrapped both hands around the dagger’s hilt and stabbed, driving the blow with all of her body weight. It pierced through Dressna’s carapace, sticking into bone. The great arm jerked from the hole with a warbling scream. She heard Dressna stumbling back, Isa cursing.

She jumped, threw her arms over the hole’s edge, and rolled out into a fighting stance. She scanned the environment, expecting to see an army behind the horrible woman. All that remained of it was an ocean of prints. Thankfully, no Asebor.

Dressna roared. “You! I know you!” She pointed with a gleaming talon, Isa flailed from her other fist, held by his flexing arm. “The cunt from the Nether!” She turned her ivory eyes on Isa, drew her veined arm over her chest to throw him. A hatchet shone in his hand, teeth pulled back in a snarl. She snapped her arm out and Isa’s hatchet collided with her wrist, dragging through it as he was tossed. She hissed as bits of broken carapace fell free from her forearm.

“Isa!” Senka fruitlessly reached for his tumbling form, rolling end over end and throwing out plumes of sand. His sword spun from his side, mirror bright in the sun.

Dressna pounded towards her, plucking Senka’s dagger free from her arm as if it were but a fly. A line of blood trickled from the wound. “Now you will pay for your defiance. Should’ve been a good little cunt and died like your daddy.” Dressna flashed a mouth that was all gums and broken teeth.

She remembered the wound Dressna had given her father. She punched a hole through him like he was nothing at all. He had taunted her in his last stand, giving Senka precious seconds to run. She realized then the only reason her father had led the Shadow Ones to the Black Furnaces was to give her a chance to flee. Since then, Senka’s mouth had been left with a strange mix of bitterness at the betrayal of his oaths and longing to avenge his death. Within the confines of the furnace chamber, Senka had the chance to escape through the hidden door. And she had. She left him there. Dead. He betrayed his oaths to save her, a final act of fatherly love. Senka’s eyes swam with hot tears, blinked them away, stepped back as Dressna advanced.

“Come here. I can make this quick, child. Just like your daddy.” Dressna flexed her arms and chest, striated muscles pulling taut. Her flesh was ribboned with what must have been the scars of hundreds of battles.

Senka ground the ball of one foot into the sand, cool against her soft boots. “Taste my sting Shadow!” Senka loaded a needle into her gun, raised it to her lips.

Dressna grimaced, wings rasped open, making her look twice as large. Senka narrowed her eyes, pursed her lips around the narrow tube and pushed the needle with a burst of breath. Dressna’s wings encircled her in a leathery shield, needle glinted from a wing. With an astonishing surge of power, she lunged at Senka, head dipped, horn tips shining.

Senka dove, fell into a roll, air whooshed against her side. She rose up on a knee, reloading her blowgun with shaking fingers. The needle fell, gone with the sands. Senka swallowed, fumbling for another under her bracer. She licked her salty upper lip.

Dressna let out a low, rumbling laugh. She dashed at her like a bull and Senka started to dodge. Dressna changed direction at the last second, catching Senka across the ribs with the side of a horn. Senka cried, hurled from her feet, legs thrown up. Something popped in her chest, breath choking out from her lungs.

Colors spun. Her guts lurched. The ground went away. She saw the cool blue of the sky. The glittering stone of the Tower. Her eyes widened. She let out a ragged croak, ground rushing horribly up. Seconds passed. She gripped the blowgun as hard as she could. Don’t let go, she told herself. She had the sense to get her feet under her, death beckoning for her to land head first, to spread her blood across the pale earth.

The sand welcomed her back with what should have been soft arms. But pain filled her world. Fire roared through her knees, muscles molten, tendons twanging. She rolled over onto her side and tears of agony streamed from her cheeks. She sucked air in hard through her mouth, drew in a clump of sand. She spat and coughed, sand coating the sides of her cheeks, under her lips, over her tongue and teeth. When you’re out of water, the sandstorm comes. Her father’s words thudded in her skull.

She stared at the ground, her vision fading in and out of focus. She watched as the mix of her spittle and blood was swallowed in those golden granules. Some granules were tiny shells, others were diamonds. Some were translucent shades of purple, green, yellow, and there were even pink bits. There was a hidden world there she had never learned to appreciate. How long had she carelessly walked over all this beauty?

The sand darkened with a looming shadow. A cloud? “No,” Senka whispered, knew it for a false hope. She flailed around to face her enemy.

Dressna was grinning down at her, eyes a terrible, pure white. “You are resilient. Now the wheel stops turning for you.”

Surprising herself, Senka dropped a needle into the gun on the first try. She shot. The needle hissed into one of Dressna’s breasts, the upper part of one gray tit spilling out over her armor. Senka started to wobble up to her feet, one of her legs not working properly. Any second now, Dressna would be a babe in her hands. Victory was within reach, vengeance hers for the taking. This beast would not die slowly.

Dressna plucked the needle free, examined it between her unnaturally long fingers. “Your trick will not work on me again. Every day since we last met, I’ve been consuming Acontium petals. My resistance is quite strong.”

“You lie!” Senka didn’t want to believe her, but knew in her gut she spoke true.

Dressna’s smile widened, edges of her black lips almost reaching her eyes.

“No!” Senka loaded and shot again, needle striking her scarred cheek. She brought no other poisons she realized with icy horror.

Dressna flicked the needle off with a growl and slashed at Senka. Senka dropped, and the talons whipped over her head. Senka drew her last dagger and sliced in one motion, aiming for a crippling strike. She watched her dagger cut true. It dragged through the upper part of Dressna’s forearm and traveled so deep she felt the tug of tendons.

Dressna shrieked, wings flapping and blasting sand at Senka. She held her bloody arm in the other hand; the fingers on the wounded hand uncontrollably twitched. “What have you done?” Dressna cried. “My hand!”

“Know my sting!” Senka screamed into the sand pelting her cheeks, uncaring of what more got into her mouth. Her legs burned, ankle throbbed, ribs stabbed at her. She felt a trail of wet trickling down her chest and over her stomach. She trudged into Dressna’s storm. And then it stopped.

Dressna screeched. Isa withdrew his sword from the back of her thigh, her back arched, her arm grasping at him. Snakes of blood pumped out from between overlapping plates. Somehow he’d managed to masterfully slip his blade between them, she thought with adoration.

She had to take the opening. She snatched a needle from a hip pouch tipped with a canary yellow gel, the essence of Angel’s Moss, and rammed it into her own neck. She gasped. Her pains were wiped away and her energy soared as if she had feasted and slept for days. She had about half a minute before the effect would wane, leaving her far worse.

“Worm!” Dressna swung her flopping arm at him. He easily ducked to avoid it, might have even been smiling. In a flash, her other hand clamped around his neck, one of his arms wedged between her palm and his throat, the sword trapped and stabbing the air. Isa abandoned the blade, drew a hammer from his belt with his free hand, awkwardly bashing it against Dressna’s iron arm. She growled and Isa’s face turned red as blood, eyes bulging out.

Senka sprinted. Her knee roared with pain beneath the haze of Angel’s Moss. She twirled her dagger around into an overhand grip. She leapt, one arm reached out, fingers clawed and hooked onto the top of Dressna’s backplate. Dressna lurched, head whipping back.

Senka raised her blade, her lips peeled back into a wolfish grimace. In a burst of strength, she jerked herself up with the clinging arm, shrieking with the pain of her slaughtered village. Her dagger found home in the side of Dressna’s neck. Her flesh was wonderfully soft here.

Dressna threw her head back, dropping Isa, and reached for the girl, but Senka would not let go. Thinking of her father, she closed her teary eyes and waited for the inevitable plunging of talons through her ribs and lungs.

Senka’s eyes snapped open at a sudden shifting of weight. Dressna was tottering over, a gray hand falling by her side. Senka held on, riding her back as she fell with a thud. Was it over? She stared at the gouts of blood spurting over her sore dagger hand and up her arm.

Dressna’s legs twitched, her back waving with sputtering breaths. She groaned, started working a hand out to push herself up. Senka saw Isa, a mirage standing in front of Dressna’s head. He had his brutal hammer in one hand, bloody sword held like an extension of his arm in the other. He gave her a sharp nod.

All the struggle surviving the desert, searching for the Arch Wizard. All her hate for the Shadow Ones. All her pain. She closed her eyes, felt the salty breeze cool the sweat on her upper lip. She thought of how proud her father would have been. The years of enduring his cruel tutelage had only been to prepare her, not to make her life hell, she realized.

“For my father!” Senka screamed. She grabbed her dagger in both hands, fingers wet and sticky. She ripped her blade up, carved a line of scarlet up to the back of Dressna’s neck. Her life essence came out in waves, soiling the beautiful sand with her dark blood.

“Never! Again!” Senka sawed her dagger on, cutting through vertebrae, muscle, and tendons, just like how she’d done with the hogs. She gripped one of Dressna’s spiraling horns, leaned forward to work her dagger through the remaining flesh. She dropped her blade, her arms bloodied up to her elbows and gripped a pair of horns. “For my people,” she yelled as she tore Dressna’s head from her neck, listening to the strings of flesh twanging as they were torn free.

She raised herself up and stood, holding Dressna’s weeping head into the air. Blood pattered onto her boots. She screamed and screamed and screamed, tears filling her eyes. She screamed until she could scream no more and her voice cracked with the effort. Her stomach heaved and she dropped Dressna’s head, hissing into the sand. She fell to her knees, all her pains returned with a new and unrelenting fury.

She let her chin drop onto her chest, sobbing, staring at her red hands, red bracers, red dagger. Revenge was finally hers, but it did nothing to ease the pain of her loss. Nothing changed. She had hoped some of it would go away then, but it only seemed to grow worse.

She bit her lip. Pain traveled up her body like lava. She consoled herself with the fact that she had done well by her people, her father, and her acts would make them proud in the great beyond. She nodded at her hands, at Dressna’s ruined body. She flinched as something touched her shoulders.

“Isa.” She gazed up at him.

He smiled at her, the gesture weak. “Let’s go sit someplace… different.”

“I-I’m not sure I can move.”

He slid his arms under her armpits, dragged her about ten paces away from Dressna. Senka saw one of her horns was chipped at the end, wondered if the other piece still sat in the Black Furnaces where it had happened. “You should go. You need to meet Walter and Grimbald. Leave me, I’ll find a place to hide until…” she winced at the pain throbbing in her chest. She started working open buckles on the side of her armor. Her fingers slipped on the first few tries, wetting the buckles in thickening blood.

“Nonsense. Leave you like you’d leave me?”

She smiled at him, despite the pain, and nodded. She gently parted her chest piece, pried apart a pair of overlapping leather flaps. Her coarse shirt underneath was blotched with blood.

“Let me see.” Isa bent down next to her, his bright eyes focused. She saw the side of his head was blazing red against his white skin. Bits of sand were nestled in an abrasion going from his ear to the top of his head. Blood oozed from the top of his ear where a notch had been removed. He cut her shirt, peered at her chest and she watched one of his eyes twitch.

“How is it?” she breathed, each breath more painful than the last.

“You’ll be alright, but you shouldn’t move.”

“What do you see?” Senka asked, grinding her teeth. She didn’t want to look.

“You’re lucky. Three broken ribs.”

“Lucky?” Senka made a face.

“Lucky. Lucky your ribs punctured your skin, pushed out rather than through your lungs. You would not speak otherwise. Have to support the bones before we move, find Walter and get you healing.”

“Do you know how to do this, Isa?”

“Mhm. Tower taught us how to survive for long stretches alone.” He removed his cloak and spread it over her side where her armor parted. He tugged a pouch from the back of his belt, opened it, produced strips of creamy cotton. “Feel better at having your revenge?”

“Yes, lighter. The air tastes sweet,” she lied. She wasn’t sure why she lied. Perhaps if she said it enough times, she could convince herself it was true. Perhaps the memory her father’s death would one day be less painful.

Isa paused, brows wrinkled. He looked at her, and she knew he saw how she felt. But he left it alone and, very gently, continued to patch her up.

Chapter 22

The Gates

“Sometimes fire can only be put out by hotter fire.” -The Diaries of Nyset Camfield

“Down, Mistress!” Claw’s hand jerked her by the shoulder, pulling her behind his translucent shield. Arrows thudded from it, some soared back, others deflected into the roaring gorge and to their sides. A few screams followed from behind. Nyset looked to her left, saw a thorned arrow standing out from a man’s cheek. He ignored it, too busy clashing blades with a snarling Cerumal.

The bridge was about twice as wide as a cobbled road in Helm’s Reach, maybe forty paces across. There were so many snarling, growling, clawing, and spitting bodies it was impossible to see either side from the middle. Men and women rained down steely blows, threw gouts of fire, weaved glowing shields, and hurled bodies with telekinesis. Armor was coated in a shining mix of beading mist and speckled with blood.

More arrows came, chattering on wooden shields, flicking overhead. Someone cried as a shaft found a new home in their lung. Another arrow had pierced through a plump woman’s lower abdomen. She stumbled back into a soldier of the Midgaard Falcon, threw off his jabbing spear, collided with a Cerumal’s shoulder plate with a ring.

“Can I still have my baby? Will he be okay? Is it okay?” she frantically asked him, rubbing her stomach around the arrow, hands glistening red.

“Gods!” the man screamed. “Healer!” He gripped her under her breasts, dragged her to the back of the lines.

“I can still fight!” she protested and tossed a fireball into the mass of Death Spawn, sending a body burning and flying over the edge.

The Cerumal, the soldier had been attacking lunged, its razor-thin lips drawn back over a face riddled with weeping infections.

“No!” Nyset reached and closed one eye, the spear of fire blazing out from her palm. She was too slow. A second of hesitation. The Cerumal’s jagged sword ripped through the woman’s gut and the soldier’s, skewered them both, the bright red tip emerging through the man’s back. The Cerumal turned as Nyset’s spear tore a flaming hole through its head, showed the falls through the wound for an instant before it slumped over.

A pregnant woman, here. On the front lines. Nyset’s eyes trailed them, her world slowed and doubt pierced her chest. But why? What had she done? Because you asked for everyone who could fight, she answered herself. She started to scold herself for not building in the proper exceptions, rules, and conditions. Pregnancy for one, but she had to push the thought away.

A Cerumal, built like a bear and almost as hairy, lumbered at her. It grimaced with rows of stony teeth, its pitted axe drawn back and aimed for Nyset. She flicked her wrist. A red disc whizzed across his neck, and its head separated from his body with a wet click. His momentum brought him on a few steps before tripping and falling on one of his burning brethren, head rolling from the bridge’s rail and spinning through the misty air. It might have been a terrifying attack a year ago. Now, it was just another body preventing her from reaching her goal.

Men with spears crowded behind men with shields, and behind them were a mix of archers and Dragon casters. Farther back were archers and Phoenix users, mending wounds and giving soothing words. Those without shields would plug the gaps when those with shields fell. Countless men would die here today, but would their sacrifices go in vain?

“Arrows, Mistress!” Claw screeched and she saw them coming, the thorned lines sailing up, warbling on the wind. An arrow clattered down onto the stones near her feet, dark flights flickering. She wondered how much of a wind change it would have taken to place it squarely through her heart. She might have died here under this clear sky and never seen Walter again, or what remained of Breden, or what she had built. She wasn’t sure even someone as powerful as Walter could heal a ruptured heart. What she did know is that she did not want to find out.

Between shifting Death Spawn, she glanced at the patchwork of Milvorian steel making up the gates. How much longer until they got them open? Were they still alive? Her throat went dry and the gates were blotted out by dark armor and gibbering figures.

Nyset gasped at an impact, she and Claw staggered back a half-step, then leaned forwards, driving all their weight into his glowing shield, boots scraping on wet stones. Claw’s sword darted over the top, nicked the edge of an ashen neck, enough to bring the beast down scrambling at the wound. Metal rang against metal, arrows against wood, fire against flesh and armor. A maelstrom of punishing sound.

Something dinged against the metal rim of the shield from the man next to her, and she saw him ducking out of the corner of her eye. A wide demon’s blade came crashing down, tore the shield from the man’s hand, sending splinters onto her face. The soldier let out a fiend’s broken voice, shrieking, half his jaw hanging by a strip of tattered flesh.

Nyset stepped around Claw’s shield and sent arcs of fire cutting down the Cerumal. A few more waded in behind it. Limbs burned and coiling intestines spilled from a body cavity. Partially digested meat splashed out from the end of one of those pink tubes, laid a stinking cloud of filth over the violent air. A black dagger, long hook for tearing down riders, and a fearsome scythe that Death himself would carry clattered onto the bridge from dead hands. More came to replace them. The horde seemed to stretch on without end, a shrieking mass of angry war cries.

“Hold the wall!” Nyset roared. She heard sounds wood and metal grating together, the wall of shields both magical and metal forming up.

Nyset’s force had made it about a half way down the winding bridge, charged the columns of Death Spawn that had spilled through the portals, thankfully closed now. Hopefully not opening again anytime soon.

One step at a time, she told herself. She hurled streaks of glowing of fire. Sweat and blood burned in her eyes. One step at a time, they had gained ground, slaying Death Spawn, claiming each square of stone as theirs. “Forward! Push! Do not let them claim ground! Take what is yours!” Nyset screamed, her voice raw. She almost slipped and fell onto her face mid-scream, boots slick on blood and offal.

There was a great push from the Death Spawn. They surged forward, hooks and spears collided and scraped against a wall of Phoenix and metal shields. The Black Wynches behind them were furiously stabbing with their lethal talons, spurring them on, coating stragglers with ruthless cuts. A hollow pit formed in her gut, remembering that, at one point, these were men. But no longer. Now they were only targets.

“You do not belong here! Ghostwalker welcomes you to his domain!” Claw shouted in a strange mix of a laugh and a scream. His gray hair was matted to the side of his face, a tangled mix of blood and sweat. His sword was poetry in motion, cuts swift and crippling. He rolled around the shield he left for her, the glowing blade swirling with blood.

He slipped his blade over the top of a bald headed Cerumal’s chestplate, driving it into the back of its neck. It gave a ragged gasp, desperately pawing at the blade. In one fluid motion, Claw extracted his sword and dropped low. Ghostwalker chopped through the knees of a Cerumal, falling forward, shouldered it over the edge before it hit the ground. He growled at his next victim, teeth drawn back. His strike hacked through a wooden spear haft, backswing splitting its ashen throat wide. Its neck squelched apart, head tipped back with the sound of a wet fart.

Nyset spread her arms and made a pair of flaming discs crisscross in flight, splitting a Cerumal wide as barrel into two diagonal sections, wicked blades dropping. The halves fell apart, sprayed any bit of unmarred stone with blood. Another one came after. Its eyes burned like coals and went wide with terror at meeting hers. With a cold thought, she took his sword arm. His blade spun free. Dark streaks cut the air. Next, she freed him from his legs, torso bisected across his hips, ruined sections flopping to the ground. The Dragon was a ferocious ally, fit for the darkest work.

Nyset ground her teeth as she fought on, slipped behind a tower shield. She saw a woman tumble screaming as a spear ricocheted around a Phoenix shield and ripped into her thigh. She kept on, throwing fireballs until she fainted. She heard the spitting growl of a Cerumal, so clear in her ear, the enemy the thickness of the shield away. She snapped up, stabbed down with a blade of fire again and again, heard a grunt and a gurgle. A sword squealed around the broad shield held by the man beside her and he howled. Nyset popped up, sent whips of fire cutting through a Cerumal with the bill of duck for a mouth.

“Die! You bastard devils! Die!” Nyset screamed.

Someone’s shoulder plate caught her on the chin. The taste of blood filled her mouth. Stone dust was flicked into her eye, half-blinding her, half-blinking away the stinging tears. She heard snarling and cursing and something shoved into her side. They were driving their enemies back, thinning them down by the handful now.

“Death comes for all!” Claw roared, cleaving into a shrieking beast.

A Cerumal was on the ground, biting through a man’s neck and tearing off strips of flesh. The man’s hands beat against its iron chest, weak as a new babe’s. Claw hacked through an arm, twisted around, dagger flashing in his other hand and stabbing another through the cheek. A Falcon soldier ducked low, dropped his shield and swept it through a pair of charging legs, sent the Cerumal tumbling into waiting spears behind the shield wall. The point of a Death Spawn blade came out the back of a woman’s robes, red tip almost perfectly matching. Something bounced off Nyset’s shoulder. She saw with a scowl that it was a severed human finger.

Who would die next? She knew it was only a roll of the dice. Who would live and who would die in the fray of battle was only a matter of luck. There was no skill. No dueling champions, but only whirling chaos. Calculating tricks, gambits, and courage were all but useless. The battle was a storm, carrying you where it pleased.

“Duck!” someone yelled. There was a screeching clamor of twisting bodies.

A spear whistled past her ear, and she cried out as pain bit into it. Lightning tore across the side of her head and down her jaw, vision narrowed. She stumbled back on numb legs. Nyset reached quivering fingers for her ear, jerked back at feeling the greater half of it had gone missing. A line of hot blood trickled down her jaw, slipped down her neck and under her armor.

Her head felt like it had been filled with sludge. She let out a wordless croak. The din of war grew quiet like someone had stuffed cotton in her ears. The world became a pinhole and she became weightless. Something grabbed at her sides.

“Got you, Mistress,” Claw hissed, arms wrapping her up tight. “I’ve got you.”

Claw had her. But why? “Wha-what happened?” She looked to the sky. Spears, arrows, and unidentifiable objects streaked past.

“Got a small cut, heal you up right, Mistress. Just getting us out of harm’s way.”

“Wait.” Her senses returned, muscles flexing with new found strength. She rose up and Claw released her. “Do it here. Don’t want to be too far. I need to get back.”

“Fine.” Claw sheathed his blade, ever obedient. She saw that he held something else in his blade hand. Something made of flesh and blood. The other half of her ear.

She winced, gritted her teeth, pain hammering away with every beat of her heart. He brought his hand holding her ear up, faintly glowing. She watched the sky, saw a crow violently flapping.

She looked below the bridge. Thalia and close to fifty of her best swimmers reached the embankment, the last man leaping from a rope ladder. She gestured for them to follow her, gave a whoop, then placed a long knife across her mouth, the edge padded with a strip of cloth. The others did the same, keeping their arms free. Thalia dove into the water first. She fiercely battled against the water’s rampaging force, swimming for the other side.

“Such courage,” Nyset said and sucked in a quick breath.

“That’s strange,” Claw muttered, gray brows furrowed.

She felt her ear knitting to the severed piece. It tickled and almost made her laugh. “What’s strange?” She let out a sigh of relief as the throbbing faded a bit. She shook her arms and legs, ensuring they were well under her control again.

“Your ear. I healed it, but—”

A shaft of terrified screams drowned out his voice. They came from the front lines. Claw’s blade rasped out. Nyset touched his arm with her fingertips, watched as soldiers and wizards were bashed aside by some great rolling force.

She planted her feet, raised her chin, palms opened at her sides with hissing fireballs floating above them. A Cerumal at least twice as tall, twice as wide, and twice as fearsome in spiked plate swung a monstrous club. Its blow fell upon a cowering wizard, crushing him into a mess of shattered bones and scarlet. Arrows bounced harmlessly from his plate, fireballs ricocheted, and spears of fire went spinning off.

“Dragon forged,” Claw hissed.

“A Lord of Death?” She breathed and felt the blood drain from her cheeks.

“Just have to find the weak spot,” Claw said and charged.

“Right,” she said weakly, following after him.

Nyset willed two discs to cut at its club, drawn back for another attack. One ricocheted into the air, the other bounced at Claw.

Not like this. Not him. She pulled it up. He dropped, neck tilted and looking back at her. It skimmed over his arched chest, hissing through leather armor and leaving a line of amber in the air. Blue light flared from his chest. He grinned and gave her an upside down madman’s smile.

“Shit!” she hissed. Had to do something. She saw the Cerumal’s eyes were flat and red as blood behind its thick helm. A Blood Eater. She eyed a few chunks of stone big as a head, sent them for the Cerumal with the Dragon’s strength. She didn’t like using its grip on stone. She felt weakest with that dimension of its power and found it incredibly draining.

The hunks of stone smashed into its head in rapid succession, each resonating with a dull clank, sent it staggering back a step. It shifted its confident gaze from Claw to her. Blood Eaters can see magic, she remembered Juzo telling her. She growled, raised her clawed hands, sent a pair of stones simultaneously smashing it where its hooked nose protruded out.

Its nose vanished, replaced with a patch of blood and pinking bone. It screamed, swung its giant arm at Claw, who rolled past and behind it. The back of its spiked hand caught a soldier on the side of the head, caved in his gleaming helmet, body falling limp. It ran for her, giant legs pounding on the bridge.

“Bastard!” Nyset yelled and sent another stone ringing from its head.

Nyset pushed her arms out, splayed her fingers and sent a gust of cutting wind, careful to avoid catching her allies. Those who felt the start of it were wise enough to get out of her way. The Cerumal slowed, eyes closed, hand drawn over its mouth. Lines of flesh peeled back showing red where pebbles had whipped up and sliced its exposed cheeks.

Claw sprinted at it, slid between its legs, and drove Ghostwalker straight up. It roared with pain. Blood rained over Claw, struggling to get up, hand and foot slipping. The Cerumal raised its steel bound boot to stomp the life out of him.

Claw’s mouth fell open as the Phoenix shield bloomed around him. Its boot crashed into his shield. Claw cried out, blood pressing out of his mouth with all that weight.

She eyed the catapult stone twenty paces off. It would severely drain her and would open the choke point that had slowed the Death Spawn. No choice. Nyset’s eyes flashed bright as the sun. Her body smoked with wisps of light. She went inward, drew on as much of the Dragon as she could handle without feeling like it would burn her alive. She saw it swirl in her mind, circling and blasting the world in gouts of fire.

The great stone lurched into the air while the Death Spawn behind it squealed with fury. Claw screamed and blood was ejected from his nose in spurts. “Drown!” she cried and sent the stone smashing it from the side. The Cerumal soared through the air, eyes wide with surprise, leg awkwardly still held up to crush Claw. The stone spun over the bridge and Nyset gladly released her grip on it, exhaustion piercing her bones.

“Damn it!” she hissed and threw fireballs to clear out a pair of Death Spawn greedily running at Claw. It was her turn to scoop him up. She dragged him behind a few Midgaard Falcon soldiers who fanned around her to provide protection.

Her back ached with the effort, muscles twanging. “You need to lay off the honey cakes.” She grinned at him. He looked at her with delirium in his eyes. She almost wanted to sob at seeing him in such pain, but there wasn’t time for that yet. Something caught her eye.

A giant hand clung to the side of the bridge. “Get him healing!” she shouted to a man and put Claw in his arms. She ran to the edge of the bridge, peered over. The giant Cerumal turned its head up to grin up at her, gnashed its sharpened teeth as if to bite her. Fat droplets of blood floated through the air from under its helmet and into the gorge, some pattering onto its shoulders. The water below twinkled like stars.

“What are you?” she asked, surprised by her own question.

“The end comes,” it croaked and started to swing its other arm up. She put her hand on top of its hand in what might have been a friendly gesture. She super heated it with roaring Dragon fire, turned its exposed fingers to chars. It fell without a sound, the other hand came up closing on air. She knitted her brows, watched it crash upon the rocks standing up like obelisks, a swath of red spraying out. The roaring water engulfed it, dashed it all away as if never there.

New shrieks came and she spun around. “Not another one.”

A dark figure loomed at the head of the pack of Death Spawn. Its hands sent pillars of violet fire cutting through Phoenix shields and bodies. Chains tore through armor and hoisted writhing men and women into the air.

“Asebor,” she breathed.

* * *

Walter crept down a flight of ruined stairs leading into the courtyard behind the main gates. Grimbald followed. His breath was shallow and quick, like he was having trouble getting a full breath. The din of battle carried over the wall, set Walter’s heart pumping hard, his stump throbbing with the force of it. His feet were wet with sweat, and the insides of his boots were becoming a swamp.

“We’re close,” Grimbald said. His foot slipped and sent a stone bouncing down the remaining dozen or so steps.

Walter’s lips formed a hard line as he glared up at him.

“Sorry,” he mouthed, bald head glistening with sweat and drying blood. He wiped his bracer under his neck, smearing blood from it onto his beard.

Walter swept his burning eye over the parapet searching for alarmed Death Spawn. None turned. Nearly fifty archers loaded and fired over the wall, working quick and not seeming to pick targets. Their bows sang an endless chorus of twanging strings and hissing arrows. A pair of Black Wynches marched back and forth, hard angles of their pyramidal helms reflected the sun’s rays. It took an enormous feat of willpower to not unleash everything he had right there and then, burning them all to cinders. He had a feeling conserving his strength might be the wiser approach. Was that a sign of maturation? He wondered. Baylan might have been proud.

Walter nodded for them to go on. “Slow,” he whispered and approached a section with a few missing stairs, tiny nubs of stone sticking out the side of the wall. He sucked in a breath and leapt over it, deftly landing on the other side, arms outstretched for balance. He went down a few steps and waited for Grimbald to follow.

Grimbald wagged his head at him.

Walter sighed and angrily beckoned, felt his heart beating with impatience.

Grimbald shook his head again, used his hands to point out his bulk.

Walter exhaled through his nose, nodded and found himself flashing Grim a smile. “Be quick.” A portal split the air before Grimbald, exiting at the bottom of the stairs. He stepped through and Walter let it snap shut. Grimbald shuffled into an adjacent archway. Walter stalked down the stairs, met him in the shadows of the archway. Through the short tunnel on the other side were the Silver Tower’s gardens, formerly a glorious spectacle. They were now a mess of choking vines, ruined bodies, smashed shrubs, interspersed with the defecation of war.

“What’s the plan?” Grimbald asked, hunching down to his knees.

“Take the walls first?” Walter said, squatting low.

“Sounds good to me. Sure they’ll be happy for the relief,” Grimbald said, his arctic eyes scanning up.

“Might be hard to open the gates while being turned into a living pincushion.”

Grimbald grunted in agreement.

“Walter? Grimbald?” A familiar voice hissed from the gardens.

Walter started for the gardens, bladed his body against the wall as he moved through the archway. The air was cold, sounds of battle swallowed. “Isa?” Walter called.

“It’s me. Come quick!” the voice said.

Walter met Grimbald’s narrowed eyes, his hand resting on Corpsemaker. He slipped out the other side of the archway, stomach churning, sword of fire flickering to life.

Isa stood propped against the adjacent wall, ivory head bloodied. He held a scarlet hatchet by his side, dark blood dripping from its narrow head. His armor was scraped up and a few pieces were missing. “Help her!” He nodded at his side.

A pair of legs were out next to him. Senka’s legs. Her back was against the wall, her chin sagging onto her chest.

“What happened?” Walter rushed in, dropping down in front of her, the Dragon fire blade dismissed in a puff of smoke.

“We had a run in with Dressna. Can you help her? Heal her?” Isa’s normally placid voice waved with worry.

“Move over,” Walter beckoned. Isa did.

Senka opened an eye to look at him, the other matted shut with blood. “Walter? Is that you?”

“Mhm.” Walter embraced the Phoenix, held his glowing hand over her. It filled him with a sense of inner peace, calm even with the storm beyond the archway.

Grimbald stuck his head into the archway, peered back for followers.

“No. Don’t. Save your energy,” Senka protested and put a weak hand on his chest. Walter watched as hundreds of spaded tails of the Phoenix wound through the air from his hand, slipping under her armor, caressing her face, knitting wounds and forging bones anew. He put his stump on her hand and she wrapped her small hand around it, her back arching up at the icy healing.

Senka moaned, eyes closed, and a soft smile spread across her cheeks. “Thank you, Walter.”

Isa nodded at her, then nodded at him.

“Don’t thank me yet.” Walter offered his hand and she took it, drew her up to her feet.

“The wall?” Isa had slipped his bow from his back, arrow held at the ready, hatchet stowed on his belt beside his torturer’s weapons.

“The wall,” Walter said with a swallow. He saw there were five or so fresh Cerumal bodies strewn about the gardens, likely marking Isa and Senka’s path. One was missing both of its arms, hacked off at the shoulder and spurting out trickles of blood. The ornate fountain in the middle no longer gurgled water, it was now a putrid greenish-black. His eye shifted to a vulture staring down at him from the high wall, obsidian eye gleaming and waiting for them to leave.

Senka fiddled with her blowgun and loaded a needle. She clutched two daggers in her other hand, hefting their weight.

“Wait. Did you say, Dressna? As in Asebor’s guardian?” Walter asked, his hand going over his mouth.

“It was most certainly her,” Senka said, dark eyes hard.

“She’s dead,” Isa said flatly.

“Shit! Nice work.” Grimbald slapped Isa on the back, who grunted in surprise.

“Very nice work. That only leaves the last of their leadership,” Walter said. They all left his name unsaid. Isa tugged on his cloak and cinched down a dull buckle securing it around his neck.

“Everyone ready?” Walter asked. “Need healing, Isa?”

Isa waved him off.

“Grim and I will go up the stairs to the left. Our left once we’re facing this way.” He pointed at the back of the wall. “Senka, Isa, take the right. Clear the wall of Death Spawn.”

“What’s there?” Senka asked with a sniff. She bent down to stretch her legs.

“Archers mainly. Should be easy targets,” Walter answered. “Have the surprise part on our side.”

“Until they know we’re here,” Isa said.

“A couple Black Wynches too,” Grimbald added.

“I’ll do my best to cut them down once we’re noticed. You shouldn’t have to deal with them. So, everyone got the plan?”

Nods went all around. “Alright then.”

Walter spared a glanced back at the ravaged gardens. A shrub vaguely resembling the Phoenix had been split in half, one wing overgrown into a fat rectangle. Another that had once been carved into the shape of a man had been beheaded. Green sprigs pushed out from the middle of the neck as if it were frozen and mid-bleeding. Bright green vines crawled up the wall leading to the Tower’s western side, speckled with deep purple flowers the size of a fist. Between the vines, the stone shimmered with bits of silver. He remembered this place had once been immaculate, tortured into shape by the hand of man. The grass was once tight as a blade against the narrow walkways, tree limbs carved into perfect boughs.

“Going to be using the Chains of the North, don’t get too close once I get going.” Walter gave Bonesnapper a rattle. “Let’s go.”

His boots padded against the dirt; he felt it shifting beneath his feet. He jogged for the archway. Grimbald shuffled up by his side, slapped Walter on the back, chest thudding with the force of it. Walter glanced at him and admired his enormous size. “Said it before and I’ll say it again. Glad to have you at my side, Grim.”

“Likewise,” he rumbled, eyes fixed ahead.

The archway seemed longer this time, the stones underfoot uneven. Ornamental carvings of the Dragon crisscrossed on the ceiling above. They breathed stony streams of fire that extended down in varied lengths, though the roof was high enough to avoid snagging on the hair of even the tallest of men. The cool air within washed down Walter’s back. Senka and Isa fell in behind them, weapons softly jingling, breaths wispy. They entered the courtyard filled with soft light.

Shrieking, clanging, twanging and fiery explosions tore at the air. The sun was casting long shadows from the demons lining the wall, making dark towers form along the earth. The courtyard had a pair of mirrored stairs on either side of the main gates. They were made of enormous pieces of stone that could only have been moved with magic. The stairs drew up about ten steps in a diagonal against the wall, stopped at a landing pad, then proceeded straight to the top of the wall, twenty or so steps in all.

Walter’s heart rate slowed, but each beat throbbed against his ears. He eyed the Black Wynches, one on either end of the parapet. Don’t look, don’t look, he willed them. All of their backs were turned, focused on the dark work of warding off the attack.

Walter broke off in the center of the courtyard, heading left and making a line for the stairs. Walter caught Grimbald starting after Senka and Isa. He reached out, grabbed his pauldron and jerked him back. “This way,” he hissed.

Grimbald’s cheeks burned with crimson. “Shit, sorry,” he whispered and shook his head.

Walter’s boot struck the first step leading up. His legs surged with the strength of the Dragon, cloak flapping, and started taking them three at a time. There was no other feeling quite like charging into your enemies. Rolling the dice on your will, strength, and luck. He tore up and up, bouncing off the steps, chest heaving fire, arms burning.

He heard the creaking of drawing bows, saw them release. He looked over his shoulder, saw Senka and Isa on track. He unfurled the Chains of the North, clinking against the last few steps as he made his way up. His jaw muscles crushed against his teeth. Fireballs hovered at his shoulders. He stared at a Black Wynch, heard it squawking orders at a Cerumal’s back. Its rotting stink penetrated his sinuses.

“Die!” he bellowed, fireball zooming. It ripped through its giant helmet with a squawk and sent its flailing body tottering off the parapet. A few Cerumal turned at the disturbance. The Chains of North hummed, glowing bright with Stormcaller’s amber tendrils. Had to be careful. Walter willed each of the three chains to snare their heads. Around and around went Bonesnapper and with a tug of his arm, their heads were torn free. One spun over the wall, another squelching onto the battlements, another tumbling into the courtyard.

“Grim!” Walter pointed at the parapet’s far corner to his left. “Grim, go that way! I’ll go for the middle.”

“Aye!” he called, double-sided axe gripped in both hands.

Grimbald released a mighty roar. A Cerumal turned to face him, bow drawn and leveled at him. It shrieked at seeing him, released, Grimbald’s axe falling. The arrow dinged from his chestplate, soaring wide. Grim hacked him through from shoulder to breastbone with a vicious pop. He held Corpsemaker with one hand, still wedged in a sternum. He brought his neighbor up into the air, hand wrapped around its quivering neck. He dashed its head upon a corner of the battlements, face first and bathing it in blood, turned and jerked his axe free. He raised his axe up in a two-handed grip, an edge caught light, and cleaved through a hairy Cerumal arm pawing at a barrel of arrows.

At the other side, Senka and Isa were a blur of shining blades and streaking blood. A pair dark figures tumbled off the wall on either side. Senka spun in a sinuous dance of blades, cutting while in constant motion.

She held one dagger with a reverse grip, the other the regular way. She ducked a sword swipe and slashed at a Cerumal’s exposed inner thigh with one hand, rose up and slit its gray throat open with the other. A jet of blood shot out at an angle, taloned hand pressing on its wound. Before it could fall she kicked a squat Cerumal’s knee the wrong way, slipped around its side and rammed her dagger under its armpit. She eyed her next target, lines of spattered blood cut across her face.

Isa’s hammer came up with a grunt, smashed into an eye followed by a chop from his hatchet, cutting half way through a neck. He kicked the beast over the edge with a growl, tumbling into the churning waters. A spear stabbed at him, and he twisted around it, drove his arm up and down in a hard angle, smashing his hammer into a horned helmet with a clank. Blood sputtered from the stoved in metal, the Cerumal crumpling against a barrel of arrows.

A Black Wynch in the middle of the wall sprinted for them. Something struck Walter’s side, thudded against his hip bone, vibration coursed through his leg. An arrow stood from his cloak pinning it, encircled in wet. A Cerumal with the dried face of a long dead corpse scowled at him, teeth yellow, hand reaching for another arrow. And then it was engulfed in Walter’s fire, falling into the archer next to it. It writhed in a futile attempt at putting out the endless, uncaring flames. Walter pushed with the Phoenix, hurling both of them down onto the unforgiving rocks. His fire held no quarter for friend or enemy, that he knew.

Walter dashed across the wall, arrow singing pain as it was ejected by the Phoenix, flaring with icy blue light. Now he had some room to work. He spared a glance at Grimbald, saw him making progress, bodies flying and limbs throwing out red. The Cerumal were so focused on shooting, they had entirely missed the enemy at their backs. It was almost too easy.

The Chains of the North whirled over his head, whooshing and passing through a pair of knees. A length of chain snatched an arm, drew the body shrieking over the wall and into the gorge. Another pierced through a gut, jerked out and splitting through a torso made ragged. Screams spread over the wall and most of the archers had stopped, struggling to find and draw weapons for melee combat.

A wide-eyed Cerumal stared at him, mouth slack. Walter’s pitiless chains slit it open from crotch to throat, cutting a ragged line through its armor. It fell across the parapet, blood gurgling and bubbling from its neck. Pain would be their only ally here. A few arrows flew at him. A Phoenix shield sprang up, sending them bouncing away like tossed stones. He laughed and tore through Cerumal three at a time. He severed bodies from limbs, running them through with Bonesnapper, searing them in Dragon fire, cutting holes through useless armor with fireballs.

Senka ducked the slash of the last Black Wynch, talons whipping. Isa’s sword darted like a snake over her shoulder, parried with its talons. Senka slashed, cutting an ugly gash through a spot of its exposed stomach. Isa lunged at its flank, hammer slamming into its arm with a crack, its arm bent the wrong way at the bicep. He followed up with a boot to the side of its knee.

Walter ran up behind it, wrapped its neck up with Bonesnapper, jerked it onto its back, wiry legs kicking out. Senka fell, driving her daggers under its jaw. The Black Wynch let out a soft hiss, jagged armor glistening with dark blood. She looked at him, her face spattered and dripping with a mask of red, and gave a sharp nod.

She almost reminded him of the Shadow Realm then. But he was not there now. No, he was in Zoria, he reminded himself.

Senka re-gripped her daggers, head swiveling for enemies. She dropped her arms, let out a tense breath, and finally sheathed her blades.

Walter looked back. Grimbald chopped through the neck of the last writhing Cerumal, its head gently rolling off the wall. “Could’ve saved some for the rest of us,” he muttered.

“Plenty more,” Walter snorted, squinted his eye at the horde fighting their allies in the distance. The gray mass of Death Spawn had shifted to the middle of the bridge, maybe quarter of a mile away, mixed in with the bright colors of wizards, Tree Folk, and Falcon soldiers. His saliva went thick as cotton, fingernails cutting into his palm. Men and demons alike flew from the bridge, some burning, others waving arms in an almost comical attempt to fly. But there was nothing humorous about the rocks rising out from below the bridge, sharp as a Blood Eater’s mouth.

“Grim—” His breath caught at a figure towering above all the rest, glimmering tendrils darting around it. The scar on the back of his neck in the shape of a figure eight burned. He found his fingers clawing at it and wanted to force them down but kept scratching.

We will have you back, the voice of the Shadow god crooned in his mind.

He shook his head. “No.”

“No what?” Grimbald asked, peering out beside him.

“Look. Could it be?” he asked. “Hard to tell from here, but who else could it be?” His throat was a furnace.

“You must stay focused, Walter.” Isa grabbed his shoulders. Walter allowed himself to be turned. “Do not let your emotions rule your decisions. Come, the Arch Wizard gave us orders. We must complete our task.”

Senka’s chest heaved. “It’s what she would have wanted.”

Walter opened his mouth to protest then closed it. They were right. He ran his bloody hand through his hair, pulling as he went.

“They’re right,” Grimbald echoed his thoughts. “Let’s get the gates opened and we can strike them from the back. Can’t do much from here anyway… not without taking undue chances.” Grimbald beckoned for them to follow. Was that an insult? Grimbald stepped on a headless Cerumal, kicked aside a dark blade and sent it clanging down into the courtyard. “C’mon, I know how to open it.”

Walter looked out over the bridge again and swallowed. The sounds of war carried over the thunder of the falls. He thought he might have been able to see Nyset’s bright red robes. Maybe it was a trick of the light. It could’ve been any Dragon apprentice, but he knew it had to be her. It was her.

The others were making their way to the stairs, leaving him, knowing he’d follow eventually. He jogged to catch up to them, hopping over a severed arm, bodies, avoiding puddles of blood and discarded bows. Their bows were massive and spiked at the end with heavy lines of bowstring. Grimbald was likely the only person among them who would have the strength to properly hold and draw them.

A few carrion birds had already swept in and started on the feast, red with blood from beak to neck, uncaring of his passing. One boldly hissed at him, obsidian feathers bristling, as though he were about to pilfer its meal. He almost set it aflame, but thought better of it. He’d need the energy and everything had to eat.

They reached the bottom of the stairs, courtyard eerily quiet now. Everyone looked at each other, waiting for Grimbald to carry on.

“Hm,” Grimbald muttered. He scratched his head, peering about and biting his lower lip.

Walter saw Senka’s daggers had the molded shapes of snarling Dragon’s heads at the pommels, crosspieces worked like a pair of claws, blades long and straight. The hilts were intricate, metal grips molded to look like scales. The Dragon’s heads even seemed to have teeth gleaming behind blood. “Nice blades,” he nodded at them hanging from her scaled belt.

Senka’s hands went around them. “My father’s work. He was a master sword smith.”

“They’re beautiful.”

“Thank you.” She gripped them tight.

Walter turned his gaze to the pearlescent sheets of Milvorian steel making up the gates, seeking out the mechanism that would draw them open. There were no chains or gears that he could see. A sinking feeling penetrated his gut. A surprising sense of hopelessness settled in. “Grim?”

“Ah. This way!” Grimbald went around the stairway, heading for the wall on the other side of the stairs. “Sorry, had to get my bearings. Been a while and all.”

Walter was filled with a great sense of relief, as if the worst of the battle had just then been won. He knew the real battle had yet to start, however.

They followed him. Isa walked backwards with his bow at the ready, arrow nocked. Grimbald pawed at a section of wall facing out towards the bridge. “Here somewhere.”

“What are you looking for?” Senka asked.

“There’s a stone that opens a hidden door when pressed,” Grimbald said to her while tapping stones.

“Haven’t got all day, Grim,” Walter said. It came out harsher than he wanted. He stood a couple paces beside Isa, caught the scent of his clean, leathery sweat, scanning the courtyard for Death Spawn.

The grass had been churned into mud in the courtyard, a few bits of green remained at the edges between all the muck, struggling for life. The squat trees that had once lined the paths to Dragon and Phoenix spires had been burned to black husks. A few were crushed by hunks of stone, sprigs of green pushing out around the ragged boulders. Ornamental pillars were shattered nubs. Cracked planks, broken arrows, slaughtered bodies studded the once immaculate image.

“I know, I know. I’ll find it. Only saw it once. They don’t show many people for obvious reasons.” Sweat beaded on the back of his neck. “Where is that damned stone?”

“Here,” Senka said.

“Ah! You found it! I’m sure glad you’re here, Senka,” Grimbald said sheepishly.

The rubbing of stone against stone came from behind mixed with the clicking of gears. It was some sort of mechanical device beyond Walter’s understanding, beyond any wizard’s of this time. He turned to see a hidden stone door half-open, slowly sliding open under the stairway. The bottom was on a corrugated iron track, spots for gear teeth, he guessed. The doorway was round at the top, sides straight.

Grimbald slipped inside and Walter backpedaled from Isa, peering into the open door. Shafts of light cut down from the stairs above, fanning out to provide lighting. Grimbald reached for a shiny handle, polished smooth from the hundreds of hands that had pulled it over the ages. He dragged it down.

Screeching came from the other side. Walter ran around the stairs to watch the gate. Nothing happened. The squealing of metal against metal resonated from somewhere deep. He strained to listen. The soft squealing became a sudden clunk. His heart was loud against his ears as he stared at the gates. “Open you white bastards,” he growled. “Open, damn it.”

It complied with his demands, opening an inch and then promptly stopping. A clang rang out, followed by a squeal and a high pitched grinding. The grinding abruptly stopped. Silence.

“Keep going, c’mon then,” he willed the gate. Nothing.

“Something’s wrong.” Grimbald looked at him from the other side of the stairs. “They always worked just like that.”

“Well, no shit. Something’s always wrong isn’t it?” Walter snapped. “Let’s see if we can urge them along.”

Walter marched for the gate and everyone followed. Isa slung his bow over his shoulder. Senka spat into her palms and rubbed them together.

“Any idea what it is?” Walter threw over his shoulder at Grim pounding up behind him.

“Do I look like a fucking engineer to you?” Grimbald growled with a note of panic in his voice.

Walter grunted at the mishmash of Milvorian plates welded together with what he could only guess was more Milvorian steel, given the color. Dragon fire wouldn’t touch the metal. They had no choice but to move it open.

The bottom of the gate emerged from a slot in the ground, parted up a few inches before grinding to a halt. The bottom was lined with spikes sharp enough to split a man in half if he were unfortunate enough to be under it when it fell. He guessed it would close much faster than it would open. There was another gate behind it, patched up just the same as the first.

“Let’s give it a lift.” Walter put his back to it, wrapped his clammy hand around one of the spikes, about the size of a sword hilt. The others did the same. “On three, remember to drive with your legs.” Nods went down the line, settling their backs against the cold steel and getting a grip on the gate.

Walter took in a big breath. “One… two… three! Lift!” They grunted, groaned and strained against an immovable wall. The gate silently mocked their feeble attempts. They would not fail from a mechanical failure, could not.

“Again!” Walter growled, this time drawing deep on the Dragon. His body was strong, but not strong enough. His eye glowed with smoking light, body shaking with strength. “Lift!” Walter screamed and with every ounce of his being, he directed it into dragging that gate up. He could see it in his mind. His back twanged, tendons, veins and arteries in his neck stood taut.

“Lift!” he screamed again. Pain tore at his palm. Warm and wet. He pulled and heaved, wetness between his hand and the bar going slick with blood, his grip fleeting. He squeezed harder, stuffed down the screaming pain, drew more of the Dragon and held it as tight as a lover. “Lift! L—” His hand slipped free, falling onto his back. There was a hollow clunk and the deep whir of gears.

The gate was moving. He laughed in disbelief. His hand was wet with blood, flesh glowing bright, a hint of bone showing for a second across his palm before the skin and muscle knitted it up. He pushed up to his feet, brushed a smear of dirt from his arm.

“It’s working!” Senka said between breaths. She looked into her upturned hands, quivering, palms bright with blood blisters.

“Give me your hands, everyone. You’ll need your grips.” No one complied, just watched the gates slowly parting. Isa fingered his bow, Grimbald his axe and Senka her daggers. “Please. Let me help you, I’ve got some strength to spare.”

Isa eyed him for a long moment. “Alright, but just my hands.” He flipped his over and put them in front of Walter, tried to hide his trembling fingers by locking them out straight.

Walter sent a sliver of the Phoenix into Isa’s hands, lightly bleeding where his blisters had broken. Walter made them fresh as they were when he woke this morning. The others followed, Grimbald more reluctantly.

“Get ready,” Walter said. “The Death Spawn are on the other side. Treat them like your worst enemy, fight as if it may be your last.” Because it very well may be. He drummed his fingers on his chest; whispered a prayer to the gods that Nyset was still alive.

They stood there watching the gates lower, four anxious warriors bathed in the bloody warpaint of their enemies. It they fell today and men lived on to tell the histories, it would be a glorious day to die.

Chapter 23

Asebor

“Obliterate your enemies entirely, for even an ember may bring fire back to life.” -The Diaries of Nyset Camfield

Upon the Silver Tower’s bridge, chaos ruled. The steely clash of blades rang in Nyset’s ears. Shrieks of rage and screams of agony. She growled like a famished wolf, hungry for Death Spawn blood. She threw herself to the ground, felt the hair prickle up on the back of her neck as a line of violet fire ripped through the air. Piercing screams came from behind. She didn’t have to look back to know there’d be a trail of carnage in the fire’s wake. She knew there was no stopping Asebor’s fire, cutting great swathes through all it touched.

She wondered where Claw was. They had been separated in the fray when Asebor first appeared. Maybe he was in Shadow Realm now. Maybe he was clinging to life among the wounded.

She gritted her teeth, looked up at Asebor, a metallic snake of blood winding down from the corner of her lip. He laughed as he snatched a soldier in his hand, twice the size of a normal man, and tore his chest plate off with a flick of his wrist. It whirled into the cloudless sky. With his free hand, he jammed his talons into the man’s chest with the crunch of bones. The man’s neck arched back, his screams ragged. In one motion, Asebor drew out the man’s internal organs, mercilessly flinging them onto her men, streaking them with his blood.

Part of her wanted to cry. The bigger part wanted him to burn. She rose up on a throbbing knee, the padded leather torn.

“You march on my gates! My Tower! My lands!” Asebor boomed, his voice echoing in Nyset’s lungs like an explosion. An apprentice in blue writhed upon his gleaming chains, bloody through the front where he’d been impaled. Another chain whooshed into the air, slashed at his head and held him up while his lacerated throat sprayed and gurgled. “You will all pay!” He was tossed away like a butchered carcass, one eye closed, tongue lolling out a broken jaw.

“You bastard!” A soldier bellowed and hurled his spear. It hit Asebor, slipped harmlessly through his shoulder made of shadows.

“Kill him!” A veteran wizard screamed, hurling fireballs one after the other, each skillfully deflected, slapped away by his chains.

“Release! Draw!” General Stokes roared from the back of the screaming mess, doing his best to maintain some sense of order. A volley of arrows hissed in a great arc, pelting the Death Spawn at the back of their lines. A few fell, the weakened stepped on and over by their peers, left to bleed like stuck pigs.

Sweat burned in Nyset’s eyes, her fiery discs relentless. A few had struck true, but each time, they passed through him as if he was just air. One caught him through the side, throwing out bits of shadow, reforming as if it were congealing water. It seemed to make him slow at least. Her hits and the magical strikes of others were doing something. If they weren’t, he wouldn’t have even spared the energy to try blocking them, Nyset surmised.

How could they possibly stop what could not be injured? Walter had hurt him before, but that was in the Shadow Realm. If they could whittle down the Death Spawn, they’d be able to focus all of their attacks on Asebor. Maybe there was a limit to his healing, to how many attacks he could handle at once.

“Load!” Nyset screamed at the back of the lines. The command echoed down the column and carried by different voices. Apprentices of the Phoenix shuffled to the front, ducked behind heavily armored Falcon soldiers holding tower shields.

The shields were almost as big as a man and almost as heavy. Most of the soldiers were glad to be holding the shield wall as long as they didn’t have to run with those enormous hunks of iron. As long as the man next to you did his job, held his shield, stabbed his spear at Death Spawn who made it through the hail of wizard fire, you’d have a reasonable chance of making it out of this alive. That was until Asebor arrived, punching holes through their ranks as if they were leaves to be swept away.

The apprentices wore blue robes, a blue so bright against the gray backdrop of Death Spawn that it seemed to be glowing. In their hands, they held wine bottles, half-filled with sloshing liquid and corked with bits of shredded cloth. Nyset watched a young boy with flat cheeks and eyes tip his bottle at a woman in red, sparking the rags alight on top of his bottle.

“Throw!” Nyset commanded, flaming short sword raised up. It gleamed in the creamy light of the fading sun. Amber bottles spun through air, rags ominously burning. At least twenty glass bottles fell, popping and shattering around Death Spawn feet. Flames roared over the ground in waves, spreading, fanning out and shooting up in gouts.

“Burn!” Nyset screamed, voice hoarse, eyes wild. A few bottles struck near Asebor, but the fire did not touch him. He walked through a burning wall of it, violet eyes swiveling to face Nyset.

Her eyes went wide, nostrils flaring, guts squirming at his terrible gaze. She inhaled sharply and forced her eyes upon him, to not look away. She dragged on every shred of the Dragon’s strength she could hold.

A Cerumal with an upturned nose, squat legs, and a chin speckled with hundreds of warts snarled at her. It ran in a series of leaps, dashed in front of Asebor, dagger in one hand, black sword in the other. Something stopped it mid-stride and dark blood sputtered from its scowling lips, blades clanging against the bridge.

“She is mine!” Asebor roared. He backhanded a Black Wynch, struck its helm, sent it spinning around onto its side. The Cerumal fell to its knees, burning amber eyes going black. It thudded onto its chest, armor split in half at the back, spine standing out in ragged sections and pinked with blood. The Death Spawn cowered away from him, gibbering with fear.

Nyset swallowed, hands sparking to life, her eyes searing brilliance.

“Mistress!” Claw came from somewhere, caught himself before stumbling into her, Ghostwalker brandished in bloody hands. It was hard to tell if it was his blood or someone, or something, else’s. His armor was dented and scarred with deep slashes over his abdomen.

Asebor stopped, back arching up, and twisted his dark shadow of a head to look back at the Silver Tower. The only indicator of where he looked was a vague outline of a head, the glowing eyes most telling. His careless chains whipped through an apprentice a few feet from Nyset, the head gone in an instant.

Joy’s head rolled and stopped against her ankle, the apprentice she had helped just weeks ago. Nyset’s eyes went wide as saucers. “No,” she whispered and saw Joy’s eyes were fixed in a look of surprise. She supposed that’s how it’d feel. Her eyes filled with tears, chest swimming with rage. She growled like a feral animal.

“The gates!” Claw’s hand clawed her arm, but she tried to shove him off. She saw it as he said it. “Look, they open, Mistress.” The Milvorian gates were half-lowered and lowering even farther. Recognizable figures stood behind it like mythical statues. “Walter,” she breathed.

Asebor made a sound that sounded like a muffled grunt. He raised his arm and his palm snapped open. A warbling oval of violet cracked the air and Asebor stepped through.

“No!” Nyset released a twin pair of beams of fire from her hands. The portal closed with a sizzle, missed her target and tore through five Cerumal crouching behind him, throwing out a mess of burning flesh, spinning bits of plate armor, and smoking entrails. That got a surge of cheers from hoarse throats.

“Can you lead them?” She turned to Claw, gripping his shoulders. His pale eyes scanned her face as if she’d gone mad.

“What? Can I lead them?” he repeated, his jaw hanging slack.

“I need you to lead them, Claw. You’re my second. I must help Walter. Do you understand?” Her voice took on a frantic tone.

“But…” the madness, the iron strength seemed to slip out of him then.

“Just like you used to. Lead them like you lead your village in the North. Do what must be done.”

“Like the North,” he nodded, eyes shining with that mad twinkle she’d come to love. Everyone she loved had a touch of it.

Something caught her eye over Claw’s shoulder, their backs to the front lines. An apprentice of the Dragon clutched a fireball in two hands, hunched over towards them, arrow standing out from her sinewy neck. Her sunken eyes rolled back into her skull.

“Claw! Shield!” Claw complied, glowing shield warping the air. Nyset wrapped her arm around his neck, using all her weight and the Dragon’s strength to shift him over to the shield he put beside her.

The apprentice collapsed. Fire filled her vision. A tremendous force sent her rolling over. Claw screamed. Pain battered her shoulders, back, and face. She sucked in a breath. On the ground. Claw’s back thudded against her chest, blasting the air out from her lungs. Her cheeks burned, hair stinking and smoking at one shoulder. She coughed, blinking away the tears of pain. Had to see.

“Mistress.” Claw’s voice was a sigh. “Are you well?” he asked as he rolled off of her. “Your hair!” He drew a dagger and wrapped his fingers into a length of it.

“What about it?”

He jerked her head to the side, gasped at seeing it still burning. Muscles strained in her neck.

“Claw? What are you…”

He stretched a chunk of her hair out, started sawing it off. He flung her cut golden hair to the ground, still smoking and burning.

“Oh. I — don’t know,” she coughed, words coming out wrong. Pain lanced through her mouth. She put her hand to her cheek, felt charred flesh flake off onto her fingers. “Oh, oh no. Oh, no.” She still had both eyes, though filling with hot tears. “Something is wrong. Something is happening.” She didn’t know how to describe it. Something deep within her chest felt different. Something new, something strange, like a long yearning finally quenched.

“What are you? Is someone?” Claw stammered, sitting on his knees and watching her. He picked up Ghostwalker and laid it across his thighs. It was a miracle neither of them had been run through in their tumbling.

“What is it?”

She felt her cheek again, flesh smooth, charred skin seemingly gone. The pain was still there, though, like a knife cutting under her face, trying to peel the flesh from her bones. It was an incapacitating, mind ruining pain. By the Dragon, it was fading, but not fast enough.

Nyset saw they were up against the bridge’s rails, legs strewn out, elbow propping her up. “Have to get to Walter, Claw.” She stood on sore legs. “Lead them. Make me a portal.”

“A portal? But I’ve never done it,” She saw the muscles in his neck working.

“But you must know how!” She screamed, didn’t mean too. Cool mist swirled up and over the bridge, kissed the back of her neck. “I’m sorry, can you please try?” She thought she saw Asebor near the gates now, but it could’ve just been the glint of light. But where else would he have gone?

Claw growled a curse, sheathed Ghostwalker and leaped up. The air hummed, hands glowing with the whitish-blue of the Phoenix. A line of light split the air, twisted around to reveal the opened gates. “It worked,” he said with a tone of surprise.

“It did.” She swept her eyes over the chaos, watched a Cerumal take a spear through the eye, crumbling like its bones had become dirt. “Finish it, Claw!”

The courtyard behind the Tower’s walls flashed as if a storm of the ages had just opened up, flashing with spears of lightning. And with that, she leapt through.

* * *

There were two sets of Milvorian gates dividing the courtyard from the once magnificent Tower bridge. The second gate finished lowering with a dull click, showing the world beyond the Tower’s wall. Walter clenched his fist, tendons in his stump flexing as they attempted to do the same.

The bridge was a ragged shell. Hunks of stone were missing in spots and showing the lethal waters below. The falls spilled out with curtains of mist that draped over the bridge and bubbled into white foam at the edges of its craggy cliff face. There were a few stony outcroppings on the cliff side bearing vibrant bushes in oranges, reds and blues. Overfed Sand Buckeyes swayed with the torrent, mouths hanging open for an unsuspecting meal. A few wisps of black smoke twisted up from the burned out village, insatiable fires consuming every last combustible morsel. Beyond the village, the Far Sea shone like priceless gems, waters below the surface dark as night. Above the Far Sea, the sun was a golden coin hanging onto the cloudless day, bright with its last few hours.

Walter and his companions stood before the broad gateway, gates now deep within their hidden slots. Walter looked at the twisting lines of steel making up the bridge’s support beams, six in all. Thousands upon thousands of spiraling tendrils of shining metal reached around and around and down through the water’s white rapids, latching onto stone at some unknown depth. How they had stood the test of time unmarred, steel bright as the day it was created, was a mystery to all. Who had created the bridge and with what magic had been lost to the Tower, along with countless other documented histories during the Tigerian invasion.

Walter’s gaze finally settled upon the bridge’s surface where the battle waged on, for once seeming to go in their favor from this distance, seemingly less Death Spawn than men. Pillars of fire, fireballs, and shimmering projectiles filled the air beyond like a strange dream. A nightmare. But it was Zoria and not the Shadow Realm, and that was good.

“Let’s finally end this, shall we?” Walter said, looked at Grim by his side. Grimbald was nodding like he couldn’t stop, hand massaging the skull pommel of Corpsemaker on his back, eyes fixed in an unblinking blood trance.

“There are only four of us. There are hundreds of them,” Isa said. “I understand flanking, but we won’t last long, even at their backs.” His jaw clenched and unclenched, muscles working. “Don’t misunderstand me. I do not fear death. But would we throw ourselves under the enemy’s heel?”

Walter looked over his shoulder and into Isa’s colorless eyes. “Do you have a better idea?” A salty gust whooshed over the courtyard, sent debris tumbling against the wall adjacent to the parted gates.

“No, no,” Isa said with a sigh of frustration, looked down at his soft-toed boots. “The way I’ve always survived, on my own, was through caution. But I see now is not the time for caution.”

“Now’s the time for killing,” Grimbald said, blunt as the flat of his axe.

Senka looked at Isa, perhaps with adoration. “A little caution is never bad. Maybe we—”

Footfalls pattered onto the wall above. Walter took a few cautious steps back and peered up, heart thumping hard. Not more Death Spawn, he hoped. Thalia and her warriors were fanning out over the wall, long daggers bordering on swords brandished in wet hands. Men and women alike wore tight fitting loincloths only, war paint smudged down cheeks, necks, over breasts and muscular chests. They were ready for a battle and Walter was almost sad to disappoint them.

“Didn’t leave any for us?” Thalia called, grinning down at him. She was bent over and her full breasts swayed over the parapet.

“Not here, no shortage out there, though.” He nodded through the gates, then took a good eyeful of her body. “How was the swim?”

“Invigorating to say the least. Glad to say everyone made it.”

“Can you teach me to swim like that?” Isa called, hand shielding his eyes.

“Maybe. But you would have to go outside to learn, get some sun on your pale flesh,” Thalia’s smile became a frown as she squinted beyond the courtyard, behind them.

Walter turned. Something happened behind Isa near the middle of the courtyard. Senka said something, her words blurred in his mind. The air shimmered there. A violet orb took shape, ever widening.

Walter’s eye burst alight with Dragon fire, chest filling up with cold rage. The sort of rage that could only be tamed by the Phoenix’s tempering. He stepped past Isa, shouldered him out of the way, twisted past Senka, eyes fixed. “Asebor,” he hissed, and felt his friends bristle with tension at the name, heard weapons rasp free from leathery confines.

“Where?” Grimbald turned, grunted at seeing it.

How many moons had passed? How many nights had he spent watching the stars burn, waiting, begging for this moment? Was he ready? Could he do what needed to be done? Walter stalked towards the portal, felt the world moving as if through molasses, stopped ten paces away, waiting.

A black leg slipped through the oval of violet light, edges lined with whitish-purple flames. The portal widened even more, making room for his towering form. His chains darted through like snakes, ruby with the blood of his allies. A violet pair of eyes set in a shadow went narrow as blades. Tattered ribbons of his scarlet cape floated on the air, light as feathers. “Have you come to die again? To return to the Shadow mother?” Asebor laughed, a vicious, cruel sound.

Walter squared his hips to Asebor, but still stood about five hands shorter. Asebor’s portal closed with a sizzling of violet sparks. Walter settled into a fighting stance, legs parted a little wider than his hips, one back and the other a step forward. He ground the ball of his back foot into the cold earth. A cloud of blackbirds rattled into the sky from the band of forest surrounding the Tower. They twisted up in a line, swirled against the golden sky and making for the Far Sea.

Had to distract him, to protect his companions. Walter did not hesitate, did not speak, for his words were fire. A cone of white Dragon’s fire roared from his stump, dousing Asebor in the conflagration.

Asebor let out a mocking laugh, chains whipping down, cracking in the air. The skin of the Death Spawn bodies touched by his fire crackled, the stink of rotting flesh filling the air. A pair of chains came at Walter, two snakes with shimmering blades for heads. He stabbed with his stump and pulled on the Phoenix, stopped them mid-flight and freezing them in the air. His stump glowed with the cool blue of the Phoenix.

Another chain lashed at Grimbald. Walter could not stop it. The chain clinked as it doubled around Corpsemaker’s haft gripped in his mighty hands. A whipping length of cape snared him around the ankle, jerked him over onto his side with a heavy grunt.

Isa leaped and rolled. Asebor’s chain aimed for him, cutting deep into the earth and throwing up dust. A piece of his cape darted at him, Isa cut, slashing it in half the long way. The halves twisted mid-flight, slipped around Isa’s neck, letting out a croak. His fingers wriggled against the crushing cloth, alabaster face flashing blood red.

Senka danced, weaved, dodged and tumbled in a wondrous flow, narrowly avoiding the crippling strikes of his bladed links. She hissed out a dart from her blowgun. It bounced off his armor, all hard edges and severe angles. A pair of cape tendrils wound around her wrists, dragging her into the air with a shrill screaming.

“You will return!” Asebor bellowed, hands pulsing with violet fire, dark shadows quivering. Asebor’s gaze shifted to the Tree Folk warriors piling down the stairs for the courtyard. He grinned.

Then there were screams, shrieks of the most horrible sort. Walter twisted back, saw a river of violet fire roaring up the stairs. “No!” he screamed. Warriors fell with flailing limbs burned to black chars, turning to dust on the air. Thalia leaped and a few of her guardsman courageously followed before the fire reached them, plummeting down. The stone where the fire burned turned into red magma, bodies vaporized.

Walter screamed and felt like his mind was splitting in half. He held Asebor’s chains and drew more of the Phoenix, made a portal cut the air where Thalia fell. It had to be wide, wider than any portal he’d made before. He saw it flash, Thalia and her guards vanished, dumped out on the path leading up to the other side of the bridge. It had worked, but it wasn’t enough.

More Tree Folk warriors followed their lead, but he didn’t have the strength or the time to save them. He winced as they fell screaming, bones crunching against the cruel stone below. “No! Bastard!” More followed before the river of fire engulfed them, bodies coming one after another, bones cracking and bodies squelching against hunks of jagged stones. Walter saw a woman’s head dashed apart into halves, a man falling onto an upturned spear, another woman’s bones poking out of her thighs. At least forty men and women, slain in an instant. Men who he had broken bread with and shared in celebrations just shy of a week ago.

He wasn’t strong enough. He wasn’t enough to save them. Deep within his chest, an anger unlike any anger he’d felt before blossomed to life. He made a sound unlike any sound he’d made before, a sharp high pitched whistle working out between gritted teeth. Walter felt a strange calm slip over him, like he’d just spent the better part of the day in quiet meditation. It surrounded his mindless rage, allowing him to think. The acrid stink of burned flesh reached his nose, made him want to wretch.

Asebor grinned wide, showed his cascading rows of shark’s teeth descending down his infinite mouth. “Your strength has grown, but it will not be enough. Your place on this tapestry comes to an end, boy.”

Walter saw the slightest twitch in his eye. A chink in his armor? He worked to regain control of the pair of chains Walter held firm. It felt like he was clinging to a piece of driftwood, trapped on the cusp of the greatest of waves. One wrong move and he’d be swallowed forever, drowned in the Phoenix’s strength.

Walter wore his bravest face, but his wriggling stomach and trembling legs showed the truth, showed his wrenching terror. But he would not let it touch his face. It was a herculean effort to hold his chains in place, quivering, clinking against an unseen wall. “You’ve gone weak as a new babe, a lamb ripe for slaughter,” Walter growled, hoping it came out a threat and not a whimper.

Asebor’s eyes became slits. Violet plumes of fire flashed, Phoenix shield instinctively sprang to life. Not again, Walter thought, panic lancing him like a knife. He drew hard on the Dragon, saw an image of it swirling together with the Phoenix. It was a ring of tails and claws, in the middle an avian beak and a roaring Dragon’s mouth. His eyes went wide, shield shifting from blue to blood red in under a second, a swirling hybrid of colors.

Asebor’s fire struck, reflected from his shield and throwing violet streaks across the sky. It worked. He held them both in his mind’s eye. Asebor’s mouth drew open in a slight parting, then bore down in a grimace.

“It’s time for you to die,” Walter said, plain as if it were but a chore that needed doing. He let The Chains of the North, Bonesnapper, unfurl from his arm. The links softly clanked in a pile beside him. Stormcaller burst alight, tendrils winding in and out around the links.

Asebor’s chains retreated from waging war on his companions, drew in defensively tight like a cage. He dropped his elbows and the shadows around him shuddered. The tendrils of tattered cape twisted free from his friends, drew in close and wove together like a pair of bucklers. “You have it!” Asebor’s arm drew across his neck, elbow down tight against his ribs.

“I have it,” Walter said, body flaring with Dragon fire, wisps of light springing out his skin like tiny volcanoes. He whirled Bonesnapper overhead with a deep, chest vibrating whoosh.

Asebor stepped back. “It will not be enough. You are not enough!” he said with a desperate note. His chains sprung into the air in all directions, blades stabbing at him.

Walter let the Chains of the North snap free, darting in a blur, cutting between Asebor’s chains and aiming at his body. The triplicate of chains cut in different directions. One shimmering end stabbing, another slashing, another parrying his metallic attacks. The Chains of the North became white fire, brighter than the sun, cutting three lines through his shadowed form.

Asebor screamed a scream of four voices at once, his chains retreating mid-strike and wrapping around his torso. Violet blood streaked down from his gut, his crotch, and rolled over his thighs, pattering onto the dirt below. The walls surrounding the Tower seemed to grow taller, looming, reaching to trap Asebor in. His chains wrapped his wound up tight, bleeding between links. His cape tendrils darted at Walter, at least ten of them.

Stormcaller snapped the chains back to him, sent them into a whirling disc of fire. Asebor’s cape was cut to shreds upon the disc, bits of red spraying into the air like celebratory confetti. The last half, his cape went soaring back, snapped away with the sound of a whipping flag. “You are not enough!” Asebor screamed, his body shimmering into gray mist.

“You are not a god!” Walter roared back. He struck again, chains hissing harmlessly through the mist. Asebor’s misty form fell towards him, violet eyes the only semblance of his previous form. Walter ran for his friends. He didn’t know what this mist form was, but knew enough to not let it touch him.

Walter slid to a stop between Senka and Grimbald. They were recovering, rubbing at sore limbs where Asebor’s cape had snared them. Around Isa’s throat was a necklace of deep bruising, Senka’s wrists bled and Grimbald winced, putting his weight on his back leg.

“What do we do?” Senka asked.

He didn’t know what to say. “Try to distract him, avoid my blades,” Walter breathed.

“Can we hurt him?” Grimbald asked, knuckles white against Corpsemaker.

“Don’t think so.” Walter shook his head. Asebor’s form was re-materializing. The mist pulled together like freezing water, reforged into shadows. His wound was gone, patched up anew. “No, it can’t be.”

“But it is,” Asebor rumbled.

Walter felt a worm of hopelessness trying to wriggle its way between the armor of his mind. “No!” he screamed. He charged, Bonesnapper springing up, whirling with trails of light.

In an instant, Asebor’s body shifted. His legs became spiraling tornadoes, throwing bodies, weapons, stones, and dead twigs up and around him. The whipping air around his legs became a black storm cloud at his chest, his arms sizzling and sparking as if they were made of lightning, head glowing in a halo of violet. He thrust his chest out, arms spread wide and doubling in size, air rumbling as if the very ground were about to split in two.

Walter staggered to a stop, jaw hanging open, chains falling lifelessly by his side. “What is this?” he croaked.

“I am the redeemer of lost realms. The ruler of man, for none stands above me. I am infinite. I am time! You will be crushed under my heel, child.” Asebor’s voice roared with a crackle.

The world filled with a blinding light. Walter felt his body go weightless, legs thrashing at nothing. Hang on, he told himself. Don’t let go. He saw his hand gripped around the gleaming handle of Bonesnapper.

An image flashed in his mind of Noah, his old Sid-Ho master. It was a time after training, after being sorely beaten by another student. He had his grizzled, scarred face leveled at him. They sat cross-legged across from each other in the spartan dojo.

When you attack, breathe in calm energy, dash in quick. Do not stall. Constantly attack to crush your enemy, do not give him room to think. No enemy is invincible. No enemy can possibly conceive of what would make him so. Noah said the words, but his lips did not move. He only stared at him with his hard, unblinking, steely eyes.

Walter crashed into the ground with a gasp. The cracking of bones split in his ears. A thread of cloud lazing in the sky snapped into focus, golden and pinked at the edges. He twisted, writhed on the earth, fingers desperately pawing at the dirt. He screamed and screamed, agony wracking his body with knives. Lines of smoke curled up from his skin as his muscles uncontrollably twitched.

Eruptions of color exploded across his vision in blossoms of crimson and amber, throbbing and hammering each with a life of their own. The pain in his arms, legs, torso grew in increasing degrees of intolerability. His heart boomed in his chest, hammered against his ribs, labored to pump the blood through his aching body.

His breath came in short gulps, sucked in clumps of dirt. The ground felt rough against his burning skin, scorched with Asebor’s lightning. The chill wind on his healing skin make him shiver, flesh down his back prickling as the Phoenix mended him.

Get up. Or Die. The Dragon and the Phoenix said in his head. Get up. Or Die. Get up. Or Die.

He willed his body to move. A familiar hued light flashed in the corner of his vision, the world suddenly coming back. How much time had passed? Seconds? Minutes? Hours?

A familiar figure in blood-red robes fell through a blue portal. Tens of fiery discs hissing to life in the air around her, long golden hair pushed back in a gust. It was Nyset. But what was she doing here, he thought dreamily? Nyset. Asebor. He wriggled to his knees, screaming as burned flesh tore open again, blood spiraling around his body in hundreds of trickles.

He tried to speak, to tell her to run but his tongue had gone dry as skin. He pushed the ground away and drew himself up, trying to right the warbling world in his throbbing skull. His muscles shivered with more violence than he thought possible, twitching his guts in convulsive shudders. It felt like his body had been cut by hundreds of blades, the wounds almost invisible now from the Phoenix’s healing, but the pain almost unbearable.

He croaked a sound, saw Asebor’s body crackling bright for another lightning strike. He saw the glint of metal from his arm, Bonesnapper still clutched tight in his fist. He hung on, he thought, almost sobbed at seeing it.

Crush your enemy, do not give him room to think, Noah repeated. He licked his cracked lips and sandy tongue and drove on, forcing his legs into motion.

Asebor’s hand of lightning pulsed in sparkling brilliance. Nyset slashed the air with arcs of whipping fire, cutting through his body and seeming to slow him down the briefest iota.

Stormcaller ignited again, guttering for a second before bursting alight and intimately weaving into Bonesnapper’s links. Walter saw his other companions strewn about the yard, writhing in pain, bodies smoking. They’d been struck by Asebor’s bolts too, he realized, though it seemed like it must have been from fringe portions of his attack, as they were already rising up, rubbing at heads and torsos.

Walter made his legs move, and a portal split the air, opened about five paces before Asebor. He jumped through, chains cutting down in a vicious arc, the portal closing behind him, aimed at Asebor’s turned back. They ripped three ragged lines through him, threw up great spurts of blood. Asebor screamed, arched his back and stumbled onto a leg that had reverted from a spiral of air to swimming shadows.

Asebor twisted around, eyes going wide as almonds, his crackling hand raised. “Why won’t you die?”

Walter struck again at Asebor’s shadowed leg, threw out bits of shadow like shattering armor. Asebor roared with what could only be pain, his sparking hand shifting to shadows, black clouds making up his body dissipating. Walter grinned. He whirled Bonesnapper around, ignored the ragged lines of pain tearing through his arms. He struck again, and again and again, each time Bonesnapper flashed with brilliance as it cut through him, throwing out streaks of violet blood. Asebor fell to his knees, one pleading hand reaching out at him, eyes seeming to dull. Mercy was a virtue he no longer knew.

“On your knees, coward! Die!” Walter screamed, voice cracking from screaming with all he could. Walter found himself liking the color violet, wanting to paint the world with it. He caught Nyset out of the corner of his eye, watching him with eyebrows furrowed and mouth hanging slack. “Stay out of my way!” he growled at her. She inched back, pressed herself against the back wall of the courtyard. No more accidents.

He inhaled sharply through his nose, chest heaving like bellows. After all the struggle, all the misery, he would finally have his vengeance. Walter thrust his arm, Stormcaller catching light and twinkling, the chains of Bonesnapper spiraling together. The curved blades cut across Asebor’s face, slitting across his eyes and wrapping around his head. He dragged on the Chains of the North, cutting ragged lines around Asebor’s face.

“No!” Asebor screamed, head bowed, blood raining down from his dark silhouette of a face. He let out a piercing shriek, his broad back shuddering. Asebor’s chains and cape were limp at his side, trembling as if they too were limbs.

“Yes,” Walter whispered. He walked a few paces closer, legs felt like lead. “Now for your arm. What you’ve taken from me, I will take from you. You are not a god, but a dying beast, no different than your pets.”

Asebor’s body started to shimmer, edges of his form shifting into mist. “No, you don’t!” Walter willed Bonesnapper to wrap tighter around Asebor’s head, the chains quivering from the tension, then jerked them towards himself, dragging off Asebor’s shadowy flesh with it. It tore off like a glove, scraping lines of violet from the form underneath.

Walter’s breath caught at the revealed horror. His head was like a wolf’s, ears standing up, his mouth the size of Walter’s head. It yawned open, the scaled tongue lolling free. “What are you?”

Asebor’s tongue drew in, body dropping down and legs clambering under his hips. He lunged at Walter. He easily sidestepped the monster, his aim off and the giant mouth clamped on the air.

Walter almost felt a shred of pity for him, but it didn’t carry weight against the force of his memories. “Now, for that arm…” He snapped Bonesnapper around his shoulder, dragged Asebor to the ground, thudding against his giant’s jaw.

Walter saw his friends form a wide girth around him and his rival, watching. He swept his eye over them, swallowed, and gave a savage pull on Bonesnapper. He willed the chains to start sawing. Blood streamed out from Asebor’s shoulder, his scream rending the air. Asebor reached for Bonesnapper with his other hand, his flesh hissing and smoking on its fire. He jerked his hand away and clawed into the dirt. Walter’s chains whipped into the air and with it Asebor’s arm came squelching free. Blood pumped in jets from the ragged wound. Asebor flopped onto his back, “The-the Shadow mother will avenge me. She will take these lands. Take you all into her arms,” Asebor choked. “She will have you back.”

Walter’s brows knitted at a strange tingling on the back of his neck. He pawed at the figure-eight scar there, tingling. The tingling became burning, burning becoming scorching heat, marring his fingertips. “What’s happening?” Walter fell to his knees, the scar growing hot as magma. He moaned in pain. What is this? “No!”

“What is it?” Nyset approached him with cautious steps, eyes and sharp cheekbones gleaming in the sun’s light.

“She comes,” Asebor hissed, blood streaming from his ruined eyes and into his mouth.

Walter looked up as something warped the air between himself and Asebor. A black oval of shadows tore at the day. Through the hovering disc, he saw a world of contorted demons, hundreds of mouths, lashing tendrils, and walls of ruby skulls. “No, no! Not like this!” he screamed. His breath came in rasps, words dashed away from his mind. He took a cringing step back.

An incalculable vortex of wind pushed against his back, dragging him towards the dark portal. “No!” Walter screamed. He sat back, weight on his heels, dragging lines through the soil as he was invariably pulled.

Nyset was hurled from her feet, thrown onto her shoulders, a tumbling blur of red and gold falling towards the portal. Walter stabbed his stump at her, Phoenix flaring bright, stopping her fall for an instant. “Please, please,” Walter begged through teeth clamped down so hard he thought they might shatter. She inched closer and closer, hovering in the torrid air, robes violently flapping.

Then she was gone. And Walter let go. He let out a feral scream, rage and pain and fear living on his face. He leapt for the dark portal, tucked his arms and legs against his body, and was drawn back into the world of endless night.

Chapter 24

Night

“Scars are the signs of a well-lived life. Some scars don’t show on your skin.” -The Diaries of Nyset Camfield

Walter screamed as he fell, limbs flailing, clawing, grasping at nothing. An endless red mirror loomed below him, eye spreading wide. “Ah!” He closed his eye, shut his mouth tight, breath held. He twisted around to get his feet under him, landed with a splash in a bog of blood. His legs sunk into something gravelly, grinding, scraping up to his knees. Hot and sticky blood clung to his face, rolled down his body, burrowed between his boots, and laced his flesh with its horrible touch. He flung blood from his hand, dragged it down his face in streaks of pink, tried to blink away the burning from his eye. The blood was a clumpy mix. Some parts were partially clotted while some had the smooth texture of having just been removed from a body’s veins.

“No, no,” Walter stammered. “It couldn’t be, couldn’t be.” He swallowed and pushed out a rattling breath then peered around. A deep sense of dread weighed on his heart, made it hard to breathe. His legs were fire, thigh muscles twinging with fury.

The blood-red moon shone from the ocean of darkness above, pitted with craters giving it a sadistic demon’s visage. Surrounding the pool of blood were waving valleys of ruby skulls, stretching as far as the pale light would reveal. The lake of blood was filled with bodies in various states of decay. Between them were ancient weapons, priceless, and long forgotten. A claymore stood out from the blood from between a pair of crumbling ribs, its hilt lined with emeralds and gilded in bright silver. Spears crisscrossed like warrior’s graves, metal pitted and speckled with brown blood. Heaps of tangled armor were caked in layers as if it had built up over the years with the rise and fall of the lake, much like a lake in the world of the living.

A groaning figure lay prone, shining bubbles surrounding it. It was a few paces away, Asebor, motionless on his side, half of his body submerged in blood. “Heal me, mother,” he moaned.

Where was she? “Ny? Nyset!” Walter whipped around, up to his knees in blood. “No, no,” he moaned. “So much blood.” He tore his cloak off, heavy with wet, and grabbing onto the edges of his armor. He knelt into the blood, breath frantic, lips forming a disgusted scowl. He dropped onto his hands and knees, hand pressing against the bed of sharp bones below. “Ny!” he screamed, crawling and padding for her. His hand struck something sharp and stinging, cutting his hand and stump with every grating movement.

Something heavy fell into the pool, throwing out ripples and globs. Grimbald rose out of the blood, coughing and choking.

“Grim!” Walter almost wanted to smile. His boots slipped deep into swallowing bones, sucking at his ankles as he pushed onto his feet. He trudged over to him, swinging his arms to drive through the grabbing bones.

“Am I dead? Is this death? Where am I?” Grimbald yelled, his face a scarlet ghost. “Walter?” He held his axe across his chest, arms trembling. “Is that you? What is this place?” His head swiveled around, mouth held open, eyes twitching with horror.

“The Shadow—” Something soft snagged on Walter’s toe, sent him fumbling for balance and falling. He fell on his stump and growled at the blood washing over his back in waves. He choked on a bolus of thickening blood, spat out a curse. He heaved on all fours, regaining his breath, blood coating his lungs in viscous layers. His stomach wrenched, squeezed out a mix of blood and bile. He heaved again. “So much blood.” A thin tendril of red saliva hung from the corner of his mouth, swayed and tore free.

He reached below to push himself up, met Grimbald’s stricken eyes, felt a bit of round flesh below. It felt like a breast, an ass maybe. “Nyset!” His hand clawed at the soaked cloth, dragged her up, red robes matted against her small frame. Her eyes were closed and head hanging limp. “Help! Nyset? Ny!” Walter shook her in his arms, lightly patted his palm against her face.

Grimbald squatted down beside him, his wide jaw dropping open. “Is she? How long have…” He seemed to have trouble making words.

A couple more splashes came, throwing out waving ripples from the expansive pool. One came from behind him, the other off to his right.

“Walter? Is-is that the Mistress?” Senka’s reedy voice came from behind, legs thrashing through blood.

Grimbald slowly rose up, eyes bulging and dropping Corpsemaker with a hiss. He put one arm defensively across his chest and his other hand clamped over his mouth. He made a strange animalistic cry, muffled by his hand.

Walter brought his knee up, carefully laid Nyset’s chest across his thigh, face down. “Grim. Need your help.” Walter shook her again and her limbs lolled like a corpse. He raised a pair of trembling fingers to her neck, swallowed, and pressed them against her hot skin. He exhaled with the smallest measure of relief at her thready pulse. He put his ear to her nose, heard her gurgling breath. Her throat quivered, spasmed. Something unnatural poked at it from the inside. “Grim?” Walter looked up to see he had moved farther away from them, maybe ten paces. His carotid arteries stood like cords from his neck. “Grim. Please, I need you.”

A wet, squelching shuffling came from behind as Senka drew close.

“I—” Grimbald shook his head, started gnawing on his fingers, then sank to his knees. “No,” he said distantly.

“What can I do?” Senka was beside him, biting her plump lower lip. Rivulets of blood curled down her cheeks and around her neck. Her eyes were wild with life and determined strength. Seeing that made him feel less alone for a moment.

Walter nodded at her. Isa dropped down beside her, sloughed a clump of blood from his porcelain head, peered over his shoulder at Grimbald.

“Grip her under the ribs, hold your hands together and give a hard thrust and squeeze, hurry!” Walter said.

Senka straddled Nyset, wrapped her arms around her ribcage and gave it a soft squeeze. Nothing.

“Harder, much harder,” Walter hissed. He saw then that on the back of Senka’s neck was a strange scar. It was in the shape of a figure eight. It was the same as his, he realized, and felt ice crawling up his spine. Her scar flared bright as if it were burning and Senka screamed in pain, squeezing Nyset’s ribs like bellows.

Nyset’s body heaved with life. She gasped and choked, eyes wide with terror.

“Again!” Walter slid her up, getting her in a downward angle, watching her throat roll with a stretching spasm.

Senka complied, head thrown back in a scream, arms thrusting at Nyset’s stomach.

Grimbald was roaring, hands pressed over the side of his neck. Walter felt it too, the pain impossible to ignore, like being branded with a hot iron. Walter gasped at something protruding and wriggling from Nyset’s mouth. He replaced his stump with his hand on her back, grabbed at the dark shape. There was an angry hissing, whipping body between his crushing fingers. “What? Bastard!”

Senka fell onto her bottom, her hand going to her throat. “By the Dragon what is it? What is this pain?”

Isa’s sword was raised high. He had circled around to Walter’s side, seemingly untouched by his brand’s burning.

Grimbald was a blur in his vision, hunched over on his knees and rocking.

Walter jerked the writhing shape free, sliding it out of Nyset’s gagging throat, at least four feet in length. It was a snake with a cobra’s hood, eyes glowing like coals. He slipped his hand up to its bloody neck as its mouth hissed open, the long fangs seeking flesh. It spat something that hissed on the blood, made it boil and smoke where it landed.

“Hold it,” Isa said, calm as a breeze and still as the deepest water.

Walter got his foot on its winding tail, stretched it out. Its powerful muscles thrashed. Isa’s sword came down, chopped through its head. Its body wriggled in protest for a few seconds and Walter turned his attention back to Nyset, wrapped in Senka’s arms.

“Are you okay? How do you feel?” he asked, squatting down.

She looked up at him, blood drying around her scanning eyes. “What’s happening? Is this the Shadow Realm?” Walter was surprised at how aware and together she was, almost like nothing had happened at all.

“Afraid so,” Walter said. “Can you touch the Dragon?”

Welcome home, my pet, a voice said from nowhere and everywhere all at once.

“No!” Grimbald howled, hammering his fist into the pool and throwing up a geyser of blood.

Isa upturned his head at the blood moon, lips pressed into a firm line. “Is there a way out?”

Nyset furrowed her brows and Senka helped her to her feet. Nyset rubbed at her neck and swallowed. “I can, it’s there, the Dragon, I mean.” She gave an affirmative nod. “We have your scar now.”

“We’re marked now. Might need the Dragon, hang onto it and don’t let it go.”

Asebor stirred and one of his chains lifted above the blood like a strange proboscis, feeling at the air. Drops pattered from the bladed end.

“Help, Grim, need to finish something…” Walter said, eyes shifting onto Asebor. His world twisted and swayed for a second, reds and blacks swirling. He almost thought he was going to fall over. He got his footing and the world recovered, snapped back into focus.

My son! My precious son. What have you done to him? the voice said, followed by a snicker becoming a shrieking, becoming an echoing madman’s laugh.

Nyset flashed him a frown, grabbed Senka around the arm for support. They staggered over to Grimbald. Nyset stole a long look over her shoulder at him.

Senka looked up at the pink moon. “Where is it coming from?” she asked Nyset.

“I don’t know,” Nyset said, her voice filled with worry.

Walter looked down at Asebor, neck twinging with pain. Asebor wriggled around, turned to face him, violet eyes glowing like dying candles and glossed over with blood. Glossed over with the blood of Walter’s dead dreams. “Mercy,” he croaked.

A scoffing laugh escaped Walter’s lips. “You dare? You ask me for mercy? You?”

The hard shadows making up Asebor’s armor evaporated in wisps of smoke, showing a hulking wolfish beast. Thick hair bristled from his body between gaping wound channels showing his bones. Asebor’s limbs were at least twice as long as his and twice as muscular as Grimbald’s. “I had no choice. She made me into what I am,” Asebor’s long muzzle yawned opened and closed as he spoke, moving out of time with the words, long teeth clicking.

“You’re pathetic. The great beyond awaits your arrival.” Walter cracked the Chains of the North into his legs, shearing them off at the knees. Asebor jerked his ruined legs into the air, spraying out with jets of glowing violet blood, a swirling mix in all the red.

“I cannot die! You are but a worm! You cannot escape!” Asebor screamed in a harmony of shrill voices. “Mother!” He turned, facing the blood moon. “Please! Heal me!” His chitinous talons reached up at the black sky, arm quivering.

“Walter. Something comes,” Isa whispered, the voice a background note in his throbbing head. Isa plodded some distance away, sword in one hand and hatchet in the other hanging by his sides.

Walter’s heart pounded as if it would burst through his chest, wondered how much more abuse it could take. His knees wanted to shake, wanted him to run, jaw tight and gums sore. Had to finish it once and for all. He swung Bonesnapper around his head, chains glowing with bright fire, lashed tight around Asebor’s neck.

“No!” Asebor croaked, big fingers trying to wriggle under the chains, his talons hissing and melting. A strange burning scent wafted into his nose.

“Die!” Walter screamed. “There will be no resurrection! No more sealing! Only the timeless death!” He gave Bonesnapper a vicious pull, watched the chains sawing through Asebor’s neck in a savage twist. Asebor’s once terrifying face looked soft, weak, eyes almost watery. His Death Spawn had slaughtered his parents and countless others without an ounce of pity in them. Why should he feel anything for them? He didn’t, couldn’t.

Asebor’s screams became a bubbling gurgle. He violently shook back and forth, thrashing with his thighs. One arm slammed into the blood with a final moot strike.

Walter screamed back until his voice broke, jerked the chains as hard as he could. They sprung free with a crack, floated up at least ten feet into the air, steaming on cooking blood. His eye was wide, smoldering with fire and staring as Asebor’s head lobbed below Bonesnapper’s chains, falling with a splash of gore. Walter stared at his dead body for what felt like hours, waiting for him to move, for something to happen. For all of this to go away. Violet blood came out in soft jets from Asebor’s tattered neck, all flesh and hair. The glow of his violet eyes from his severed head winked out and went dark as the sky above.

“It’s over,” Walter breathed and felt the start of a smile touching his lips. “He’s dead. Dead! See? Even gods can die!” Walter spat on his hairy corpse. “This is my domain!” he screeched into the black. “Mine!”

All he’d wanted was revenge for the past few years and finally had it.

“You alright?” Isa asked from nearby. Walter turned his sore neck to look at him. Something might have moved in the shadows beyond the blood, but it had to be his mind playing tricks. He was tired and needed rest. So tired.

“I—” Walter wasn’t sure he felt much of anything beyond the pain scourging his body. His parents were still dead and he was still mangled. He stood there scowling at Asebor and couldn’t find a reasonable answer worth speaking.

“Did you hear me, Walter?” Isa said, louder this time and in front of him. Isa cocked his head. “Something comes running. Listen.”

“Let them come.” His grimace was hard as stone. He knew what else lived here.

Grimbald trudged over to between Nyset and Senka, his expression blank, eyes downcast, Corpsemaker dragged limp from one hand. “Sorry Walt. I… got scared.”

“We’re all scared,” Nyset breathed.

A child’s feminine giggling warbled through the black air and everyone hunched down, formed a circle, like it was a crushing weight they had to support. Walter tried to wear his most fearless face, but his shuddering body betrayed him.

“Can we leave now?” Nyset hissed, her hand clawing at his stump with frantic strength.

“Suppose that’s wise.” Walter nodded, then thought it was a stupid thing to say. He swept his gaze around the vast hills of rolling skulls and over the motionless blood lake. He tugged on the Phoenix, felt its reassuring calm still there. He remembered the last time he was here, unable to touch the god’s powers until something had changed. Something had happened. Something had broken him. The memory was distant, like trying to see the bottom of a murky lake.

It will not work again. You cannot escape, a silky smooth feminine voice crooned.

“Did you hear it too? The voice?” Walter asked.

Sharp nods went all around. Nyset stiffened beside him, and he heard Grimbald give a soft grunt. Senka murmured a breathy prayer.

“Who-what is it?” Nyset asked, eyes leveled at him.

“The Shadow god,” Walter croaked.

The blood drained from Grimbald’s face. “It can’t be,” he said, stepping away from him as if the distance between them would make it less true. “Can’t be, can’t be.”

“Grim.” Walter met his eyes and put a reassuring hand on his bicep. “We need you. Need you to be strong.”

Grimbald nodded, steeling himself, seeming to be doing his best to smash down the crippling fear.

A heaving scream sounded from the distance. Panting, panicked footfalls sloshed through blood. The darkness swam. Walter swiveled to the sound, drew in the fury of the Dragon, saw a figure emerging from the darkness. The figure’s arms pumped, long hair wet and pinked, tangled around a hollow face. The face had an eye red as blood, a gaping wound at the temple. His eye went wide at meeting his.

Juzo stopped in his tracks, his jaw going slack and showing his bladed teeth. A smile of disbelief flickered on his face. Blood sprayed out from the force of his stopping. “Walter?” he mouthed.

“Juzo!” Walter screamed. “Juzo!”

“Run!” Juzo roared back.

And then Walter saw why. A score of demons loomed over Juzo like a rolling tsunami. Pincers were held high, endless mouths yawned open, showing snared bodies. Limbs studded with bony spikes were shining with the threat of pain.

Memories of this place cracked opened in Walter’s mind then. He thought he had sealed them up, but not well enough. He remembered the lashing tendrils, thousand legged beasts, hundreds of gnashing mouths. They were endless, unstoppable.

“What? What?” Grimbald stammered, knuckles white around Corpsemaker.

“Juzo!” Walter ran for him. Nyset was at his side, flaming discs guttering to life. Isa and Senka ran after them, breath wispy in his ears. Walter was struck by how easily Nyset could cast spells here. He had suffered the Shadow Realm’s unimaginable cruelty before they were once again available to him. He might’ve even felt jealous had Juzo not been running toward them.

“Wait!” Grimbald followed, legs splashing like felled trees.

“What are they?” Isa hissed.

“Demons,” Walter threw back. “I don’t know what happens if you die here. I can tell you the pain is very real, affects you on the other side.”

“Other side?” Senka panted, nimbly leaping over a body.

“Land of the living,” Walter said.

“Make a portal, Walter!” Nyset said, her voice hoarse.

“I tried that already, damn it. It’s not working,” he snarled. “Don’t you think I would if I could?”

“By the Dragon,” Nyset whimpered.

Juzo drew nearer. His long coat was ragged and tattered as if he’d been running for a long time. He looked ten, maybe twenty pounds lighter, skin pulled tight around his sharp cheekbones, chin narrowed and eyes sunken into shadowed sockets.

“A trick?” Walter asked aloud. A trick of the Shadow Realm? Could it really be him? “Things aren’t always what they seem here!” he shouted and leaped over a spear angled over a yellow maggot infested body, strange bull horns emerging from a humanoid skull.

They were twenty paces away and Juzo launched into a sprint. Walter narrowed his brows and his guts churned with worry. Juzo had a bloody sword, shining with a dull light, drawn back to strike. “Juzo?” Walter slid to a stop, arms outstretched.

Juzo mirrored him, five paces away, tears streaked through blood speckling his sallow cheeks. “Is it you? Really you?”

“It’s really us, Juzo,” Nyset pleaded. At least four more discs burst to life, circling around Juzo’s back.

Juzo raised a wary eye at her discs.

“Protection, for all of us, come. They won’t hurt you,” Nyset beckoned.

“Prove it, prove it, prove it,” Juzo raved, took a threatening step forward, his tongue circling his mouth. “How long have I been running?” He peered up at the grinning moon. “How long?” He screamed at it, then let out a sharp laugh.

The tower of monsters fanned out around them, gibbering, growling, pincers snapping and opening, seeming a bit fearful of Nyset’s fire. Maybe they still had a glimmer of the memory when Walter was last here, remembering what fire could do. Fire burned their flesh, introduced them to pain.

“You saved me from a Lord of Death, we trained together in Breden. I kill-killed you in Shipton. What more—”

“You killed my Pa!” Grimbald blubbered, pointing at him with the spike between the blades of Corpsemaker. Grimbald started for Juzo, but Walter put out his arm, barring him. Grimbald stood there, chest pressed against Walter’s arm, sobbing. “Why did you do it? Why? Why not make him into a Blood Eater like all the others?”

Juzo’s sword slipped from his fingers, fell on the broad side with a slap into the blood. “It-it’s really you. Did you all came back for me?” His lips turned down, throat quivering. “Grim, I didn’t know who he was. My mind was all twisted up with hate and pain and misery. Thought I was doing him a favor by not turning him.”

“A favor. That’s what you did? Gave him a favor? Not sure how much more of this I can take, not sure,” Grimbald trailed off.

Something roared from behind, but Walter didn’t spare it a glance. Nyset threw up a wall of fire, bursting in a flickering circle around them, smoking on the blood.

A bulbous monster big as a house and shaped like a potato with mouths for eyes bumped into a beast seemingly made of flesh and spikes. The spiked monster bristled, spikes standing up, and then the potato-shaped monster’s mouth yawned open, dropped down, and swallowed the spiked monster with a belch. A second later, the monster was unceremoniously spat from the potato’s mouth, dripping with thick saliva.

Walter shook his head. “Asebor brought us here.”

“Asebor. How do I know that name?” Juzo scratched at his jaw, a salt and pepper mix of scraggly hair. Dried blood flaked from his fingers.

“The demon god, leader of the Death Spawn,” Walter said. “Remember? Remember what happened in Breden? The Festival of Flames?”

“It feels so strange to not be running,” Juzo said distantly and looked over the wall of fire, flames cresting up almost six feet high. A tentacle reached out to test it and wilted as it drew close. Its owner shrieked and jerked it back. “I think it’s been years, tens of years. I felt him here, but I don’t feel him now.”

“Him?” Nyset asked.

“The one you spoke of.” Juzo’s eyebrows rose up and a broad grin came over his face. “The demon god,” he squeaked. “Don’t feel him anymore. Is it over then? Finally?”

“Can’t hold this forever, Walter. It’s much harder here. We need a plan and need it now,” Nyset said through clenched teeth.

“But how did you survive? Why aren’t there any others?” Walter asked, ignoring Nyset.

Juzo shook his head, brow furrowed. “All this blood. It gives me the strength to fight. Without it, I’d be gone like the rest.”

Senka let out a pained grunt.

Walter swallowed. The disfigured demons circling them became a riotous mob, stretching on and filling the rolling mountains of skulls. They were drawn to the fire like bears to honey. On and on they went, bobbing mouths, reaching tendrils of flesh tipped with spears and mouths, blinking eyes of all sizes, some the size of his head.

I will not let you leave again. You cannot, will not, the Shadow god’s all-encompassing voice said. And the demons parted like clouds after a storm, yielding a narrow channel where a figure walked down from the top of a nearby hillock of bones. Unlike the bright sun that came after a storm, the world where this figure walked only seemed to grow darker, even the light of the moon swallowed in her wake.

Her shadows for robes swished open as she walked and fell from her shoulders, showing all her hairless nakedness. Her skin was white as bone, her head lined with hundreds of hissing snakes, eyes shimmering with violet. Her legs were long and slender, arms thin as reeds. Her broad hips pleasantly swayed as she walked. As she made her way along the channel, demons fumbled over one another to give her as much space as they could manage. A narrow forked tongue circled her scarlet lips.

A feeling of endless disappointments and unrequited hopes burrowed deep in his chest, crushing his soul like a vice. He wanted to cringe, wanted to make himself small before this uncanny force. Was he ever enough? Did his friends trust him? Had he brought them on a fool’s quest? Spears of self-doubt went through him as if he were made of straw. He had hoped this would have been easier. He’d hoped he could’ve slain Asebor without coming back here. But that’s how things went with hopes.

The Shadow god smiled the broadest of smiles. Her full lips unnaturally and bloodlessly split at the corners and traveled up to the bottom of her eyes. She set her perfect toes before the blood’s edge, tipping her big toe with a dot of red.

“Don’t. Don’t look,” Walter croaked, averting his eye. But it was much too late for that. He turned his head, saw everyone transfixed upon the Shadow god’s endless mouth, stupefied. Within her maw glowed an infinite sea of fires. He remembered seeing into those fires once, remembered seeing Lillian, Baylan’s betrothed trapped in those infernal flames. Nyset’s flames winked out with a hiss, her eyes relaxed, arms down at her sides.

“You cannot resist me,” she said without moving her lips. “I am everything you hate, your anger, your darkest desires, your secret fetishes. Your journey ends here. You have come a long way. Longer than any dual-wielder has come in any time, since I have been bound in time. It amuses me to see you have bested my son, but he was never my favorite. I think you remember my daughter, perhaps were even infatuated, if I recall.”

Out of the corner of Walter’s eye, there was a shuffling amongst the horde of demons, allowing another shape to come forward. The figure was tall and humanoid, covered in seamless skin tight armor the color of red wine, the face cast down so he couldn’t see it. The armor gleamed with hundreds of reflections of the blood moon as it walked. It had broad leathery wings attached at the wrist and folded around its sides, wingtips trailing on the skulls like an oversized cloak. The figure looked up as it drew up behind the Shadow god and regarded him with his mother’s face. The Shadow princess had his mother’s face. But how?

Never show your enemy your pain, your weakness, Noah’s voice echoed. “No,” Walter breathed, wanted to weep, wanted to cry out.

The Shadow princess blinked at him, her face expressionless and hard as granite. She had his mother’s angular cheeks, broad jaw, and golden-brown eyes. It couldn’t be her. He remembered the last time he was here, this particular memory branded into his mind forever. The Shadow princess had worn the face of Nyset then. This was a trick, like a shape-shifting Metamorphose.

“You are not her.” He shook his head and a grin sprouted on his lips. “You are just another who will taste my fire.” A strange, unexpected joy rose within Walter then, and he started to laugh. It was a deep laugh that came from his belly, booming and made him weep hot tears. He laughed at the Shadow princess, at the Shadow god. He laughed at the demons, the endless nightmare. The Shadow princess took a step back behind the Shadow god like a scared child.

The sky cracked with a bolt of lighting so bright it almost felt like an assault on his eyes. He stumbled back a few paces behind his friends with a mad cackle. Something rose up from the pool of blood. It was a strange cloud. Thousands upon thousands of bits of bones, some small as sand, others fully formed limbs.

He was struck with a bolt of panic. “Look out!” He sent a burst of the Phoenix out, pushing his companions stumbling farther away, his eyes still locked on the Shadow god. They started spinning up and around him, cutting into his flesh like knife blades. They whirled with incredible force, stripping him of his armor in an instant, the dark plates tumbling high into the air. Next came his clothing, torn away in ragged streaks, made his flesh bare for them all. He did not care, but only found himself laughing harder, his throat flexing and guts throbbing.

His friends stood affixed to the ground, bodies rigid, lost in the nightmares swimming in the Shadow god’s mouth.

The whirling bones tore through his skin, shredding through muscle, cutting him down to the bone. A strip of flesh hung from the side of his cheek, whipping like a sail. Screams roared in his ears. His screams. He no longer felt the pain because pain was part of him now. It belonged to him and he belonged to it. They had become allies, friends, in this struggle to survive.

He laughed harder then. Laughed as blood washed out from his naked skin, laughed so hard he thought his skull might shatter from the force of it. He had never felt so much elation in all his years. He was alive. He was dying. And if he did die now, he thought it might have all been worth it for this lunatic moment.

He felt like he lived forever in that storm of bones, blood, and pain. The world filled with red. The faces of his parents flitted across his vision, painted in bones and blood. The sky rumbled and thundered so loudly it overrode the sound in his screaming throat.

He felt like he was burning. Then he felt like he was freezing. He thought he heard the beating of drums in the sky or was that just the thumping of his heart? Pain swirled in his mind with bright colors. He saw the red of the Dragon, the bright green of the Sand Buckeye, the brown of a Shroomling’s mushroom capped head. His skin felt like it was on fire. Maybe it was. Pins, needles, blades wracked his body.

He saw his life in the whirling mix of blood and bones. Various times were laid out on this surreal tapestry. He saw himself pulling elixir cherries on his parent’s farm, laughing with Juzo in Breden square, training with Noah, meeting Baylan and Lillian, Baylan losing the lower part of his arm, his first time kissing Nyset in Midgaard. He saw the Lord of Death, Juzo stabbing him with Blackout, saw Nyset donning the robes of the Arch Wizard, saw himself losing to arm wrestling with Grimbald, meeting Senka in Helm’s Reach. He saw demons taking his eye, ravaging his mother, taking his arm. He saw something shatter in his chest, exploding with blinding light, the blood moon high above. It was the time when he’d re-connected to the god’s powers in the Shadow Realm.

He met Nyset’s eyes, shining and twinkling with excitement. It was the day of their wedding day. She was perfect. The day that would not happen.

He laughed with bleeding, tattered lips. His upper lip had been split into two halves, showing his front teeth below his nose. The world was bright, a glowing sphere encased in cascading blues, clouds merrily passing overhead. Red flowers fell from the sky, one catching on her sheer, white veil.

“Why are you laughing, darling?” Nyset asked him, her hands holding both of his. It was nice to see it had finally regrown. When had he learned that spell? He couldn’t remember.

“Our wedding day. After everything that happened, we finally made it,” he said, a tear streaking his cheek, gleaming like a diamond.

“Do you remember when I let you beat me at knife throwing at the Festival of the Phoenix?” she asked him.

“Of course, I remember. I would have beaten you if I hadn’t trained that day.” He laughed.

“I loved you so much, even then. I couldn’t stand to lose, but my mother taught me how fragile men’s egos can be.”

“Well, that was nice of you. Your mother was always a wise woman,” Walter snickered. He kissed her then, but her lips felt hot, sticky, and tasted metallic. This was a hallucination, he realized.

It became difficult to breathe. The bones cutting his body to ribbons became an incomprehensible concept, like magic when he’d first heard about it. The stinging taste of blood coated his throat. He felt like he was becoming the whipping wind, he and it rattling the world. The blood moon reeled, winding around overhead. Stars burned, flashed, glittered, then vanished in a sheet of darkness.

A moment of clarity came. He felt himself coming back into his body, his mind righting itself like a once capsized boat. He tried to close his eye, wished he could shade it from the burning light of the moon above. It would not close for some reason. Why wouldn’t it close? he thought with waves of despair, then he knew. His eyelid had been torn free. He snorted and sobbed. He just wanted to close his eye.

“Why won’t you die?” he heard the Shadow god ask.

Destroy. The Dragon whispered in his ears, dragged out the word with its ancient voice. Destroy our enemies. This is the place.

This is the time. Bring us back. Make us whole. Make us one, the Phoenix hissed. A sacrifice.

You owe us. A sacrifice, the Dragon rasped, its voice like crackling flames.

“A sacrifice,” Walter tried to say, but his jaw and his tongue would not work and came out as a slobbering grunt. He went inward. I can’t choose any of them. Don’t make me choose. His vision became sheets of blacks and reds. Sounds went away.

Your body, the Phoenix twittered.

The end of time, the Dragon said.

I understand. Spare my companions?

It will be done, they said.

I choose myself. I will be the sacrifice. His elation waned and a great void replaced it.

It is done, they said in unison. We are you. You are us. We are one.

Walter’s vision returned, his body hovering a few feet above the blood, back arched and head lolled back. He saw the Shadow god’s gaping mouth, his friend’s faces stupefied in its hypnotic fires. How much time had passed, he could not say. Time would no longer be a concern, he knew. The swirling bones stopped in mid-air then, frozen in place. Droplets, globs, and streaks of blood were crystallized in time.

Then he was fire. He went brighter than a thousand suns. The Dragon spread its broad wings of fire, stabbing into the darkness. Each of its burning wings was big enough to reach the apex of the Silver Tower’s tallest spire. Walter was an ant between its body, a black speck in its writhing form. Spines of fire traveled up and down its sinuous body. Its eye was made of a fire of pure red. The Dragon’s tail was fire of the finest white. Its mouth was made of fiery teeth, broad enough to swallow the moon.

The Phoenix pulsed from his chest, screeching into flight, tail feathers as long as spears. The Phoenix soared into the air, a shimmering form of translucent blue light, bordering on white. It circled around the air like a gull at sea searching for prey. It completed a loop, let out an ear-piercing shriek, and dove down into the Dragon, cutting through it with its angled beak.

They became one form. The Phoenix’s endless tails spiraled around the Dragon’s glowing, hollow innards. Around and around went the blue of the Phoenix, a coil of light within the Dragon. Walter stood at the center of all of this, watching with wonder.

We are yours. You are ours. Lay waste to our enemies, the Phoenix and the Dragon said in his head.

“No. You can’t be here!” The Shadow god screamed, her fiery mouth closed up tight. The bones hanging on the air dropped into the blood with a series of soft splashes.

He was a fair distance away from his friends, at least twenty paces. The gods had kept their word at least. He took them in, wondered if they had any idea where he was, what he was doing. Could they even see him? Would they know what happened?

Walter saw them collecting themselves, regaining control of their bodies. They were unharmed, it seemed. That was good, he thought soberly.

“The dual-wielder has made the last sacrifice,” the gods roared above him. Their voices echoed in the emptiness, making the demons cringe and gibber. They crowded behind the Shadow god, tumbling over one another to get close to her.

Walter couldn’t say how he did what he did next. He thrust out his stump, saw it had been reduced to bone and sinews, and the intermingled Dragon and Phoenix sprung into the air. They were a mammoth beast in flight, streaking trails of blinding light. The Dragon flitted over the vast mob of demons, grinning with a giant’s mouth of fire. A torrent of fire raged from its mouth, split into thousands of tendrils half-way towards the demons. The Dragon’s tendrils merely touched their bodies, igniting them like barrels of oil.

The world became geysers of fire behind the Shadow god as she watched her minions burn. They shrieked and roared, their tendrils and mouths chomping with mindless anger, finding nothing but each other to let their fury out upon. The bodies burned in a tower of fire so great the darkness all around was briefly dispelled. The skulls making up the landscape took on greater dimension, showing the dents, scars, and scratches making up their texture. The Shadow god’s shoulders heaved as she turned to face Walter, the muscles under her petite breasts working to contain her fury. Even with all that light, she was encased in a globe of darkness.

Walter sauntered over to her, blood warm against his bare legs, his cock bouncing between them, surprised to find it still there. He’d hoped to feel the satisfaction of having won the war, watching them burn and paying for their crimes. But he felt nothing. No hate, no anger, no sadness. Only an expansive emptiness. Dying wasn’t so bad after all, he thought and smiled.

The Dragon poured fire on the demons in glowing meteors, waves, and cones. They burned bright and fast, their shrieking cut off before it was given the chance to cry out a proper death. He thought he would have liked to hear them scream longer. But you could only ask for so much from the gods.

He met the Shadow god’s eyes when he was close enough to see them. They shone with a terrible, violet beauty. Her knees hammered as her legs shook with an uncontrollable rage. “Th-this cannot be,” she said, smoke curling around her lips like a pair of chimneys.

The blood around his legs became shallow, left him with gory stockings from thigh to ankle. His wounds were gone, he saw, his flesh made anew. As he stalked past his friends, he wanted to look at them one last time, but they wouldn’t let him. He tried again, but his head would not turn. His eye would not deviate from the Shadow god’s as much as he tried.

There is always a price. Our time is not infinite in this form. The price will be paid, they said in his head, a language he could understand. He somehow knew then it was not their tongue’s preferred medium.

Time seemed to go slow as honey. Walter saw the Shadow god’s body starting to diffuse into smoke, the edges of her flesh becoming immaterial. The Chains of the North and Stormcaller were still around his forearm, he saw, and he wondered how they had remained attached. Perhaps the god’s doing. Perhaps luck.

“No, you don’t,” Walter said the words playfully, the way he would have said it to Wiggles had he still existed. A spear of white fire sprang to life, slipped into the Shadow god’s stomach and out her back.

She cried out, hunched over and grasped it with her hands. Black blood sprayed out from either side of the wound. The skin around her fingers and arms melted like wax, dripping onto upturned skulls and swallowed in their parted mouths. Beneath her flesh was a scaled carapace, obsidian and glowing in the light of the flaming spear. “It cannot be,” she said, mouth twisting with disbelief.

“Even gods die,” Walter said flatly. “Your journey ends here.”

The Dragon and Phoenix darted into him like an eel, retreating into him like he was its protector. He was filled with the strength of a thousand giants, filled with enough anger and hate to break the world in half. His hand darted for her narrow throat and caught it in his unbreakable grasp. Her hands were claws, three fingers each with talons the length of swords. They rammed into his gut, but he felt nothing.

He lifted his stump and a hand of fire sprang from the end. Wrapping it around her throat, it joined the other. He dragged her down to the ground. She was screaming, vomiting blood. He bashed her pretty face into a skull, cracking it and throwing out one of her ancient teeth. He bashed her head again, again and again until it was flat and dented on one side, tongue lolling free. The snakes lining her head gave a parting quiver, then fell limp as noodles against his hand. The amethyst glow of her eyes faded to black shallows.

Bonesnapper fell from his arm, rattling beside her motionless body. He watched one chain wrapping around her throat of its own volition. The other two lengths of chain plunged into her eye sockets, burrowing like moles, spiraling and excavating out a mix of blood, flesh, and fire.

Then his mouth was forced open and words came that he did not say. “Your reign ends now, Utrix. He was the perfect conduit. The perfect time. Your arrogance would always get the best of you,” The Dragon and the Phoenix roared through his throat. His jaw was forced open, the lower portion dislocating, but he felt no pain. He was a background voice in the forces controlling his body. The body was no longer his. He knew the end was close. He knew that finality was a razor’s distance away. Let me see her one last time, he begged. Please.

Very well, the Phoenix said with a note of resignation.

He willed his head to turn and it did.

He saw Nyset looking at him, eyes swimming with tears and fire. “Walter?” she mouthed. Maybe she spoke it, but his ears no longer functioned, it seemed.

He wanted to reply, wanted to tell her how much he loved her. He couldn’t even blink. His actions would have to speak for themselves. The time ends. You were a suitable conduit, a worthy sacrifice. His head snapped back to facing the Shadow god, black blood puddling around her form. He felt like an observer in the back of a house, peering through a window that was at the front and far too narrow.

The world filled with blinding white fire, stretching out into a sheet of pure white. It became glimmering stars and amorphous shapes and then… nothing.

* * *

Nyset watched with rasping breath and bulging tear-filled eyes as a blast of white fire poured from Walter’s mouth. It bathed the Shadow god in it, cleansed the skulls of her form. The fire faded a second later, left a white streak across her vision. Where the Shadow god once lay were only ashes. A great wind came then, sending the ashes whirling into the air.

Walter’s body slumped to the ground onto his back, his jaw hanging unnaturally opened and loose. Blood streamed from his ear canals, his nostrils, his lips, and his tear ducts.

“Walter? Walter?” she shrieked his name. He did not respond. She went for him, but Grimbald held up a hand to stop her, putting himself in front of her. She slipped around him.

“Ny, let me,” Juzo said.

Her chest heaved, heart throbbing with agony at every beat. “No, no, no!” she shrieked.

Juzo knelt down slow, lips quivering, and put a pair of fingers to his throat. He swallowed and looked up at her, but she already knew. He shook his head and scooped him up in his arms.

A hand touched her shoulder. Senka’s. The fires of the demons had burned down to embers all around them, filling the sky with black smoke and blotting out the blood moon. “We should have done something. We should have helped!” she screamed, directing her dagger gaze at everyone. She threw Senka’s arm off her and shoved her away, stumbling. Nyset took a step up the mountain of skulls behind her and fell onto her side, sobbing. A half-skull was dislodged against her palm and went tumbling, plopping into the blood lake.

The blood filling the lake started to gurgle at the middle and seemed to be draining, to where was a mystery. It was as if someone had pulled the cork on an enormous tub. She watched through blurry eyes as it filtered down below the bed of skulls. Silence filled the air. Juzo stood at its edge, Walter’s body slumped dead in his arms. But he couldn’t be dead, couldn’t be, she thought.

The gleam of Bonesnapper on Walter’s limp arm caught Nyset’s eye. She rose up on legs that didn’t feel like hers. They couldn’t be because this had to be a dream, a nightmare in which she would soon wake. She met Juzo’s twitching eye, and unwrapped the bottom length of chain wrapped around Stormcaller and grasped the handle. Spiraling along the grip were fine etchings of both the Dragon and Phoenix, shining behind a sheen of blood.

Her breath caught and it felt like ice cracked in her chest, releasing a comforting presence. Bonesnapper burst alight with amber fire at her side.

“How?” Juzo asked, his red eye wide.

“I—” Her eyebrows drew down at the calming sensation swimming between the Dragon. Then she knew what it was, wondered how long it had been there. It was the Phoenix. Her heart raced and her knees felt like they’d give any second. “The Phoenix!” she cried. As much as she loved Walter, she thrilled at the prospect of bringing everyone else out, returning to the land of the living. She wanted to live. She wasn’t ready for the great emptiness. She opened her palm, reaching for the Phoenix. It felt as if she was learning how to flex a new muscle. Her hand burst alight with a cool glow. She turned it back and forth, grinning at its light.

“You can get us out of here?” Grimbald asked, licking his lips. “Can you? Can we leave?”

“We don’t belong here, Mistress,” Senka muttered.

Isa shot her an eager look, scanning around. “You have the Phoenix? Do you know the portal spell?”

“I’m not sure.” She had seen it cast enough times to know, but seeing it and doing it were both entirely different things.

She saw something strange standing out from the eye socket of a grinning skull. It was golden yellow at the top, a green stalk leading up to it. She would have recognized it in the land of the living, but here it had no context. “A flower,” she beamed. She bent down and felt herself starting to laugh and cry at the same time.

“What? Impossible,” Juzo said, squinting.

Nyset brushed her hand over it, confirming it was really there and not a dream. It swayed against her touch and a bit of orange pollen drifted from it, hanging and glittering on the air. “Oh my, it’s beautiful,” she laughed.

Sprigs of green squirmed up all around, pushing out between skulls, their empty eyes and grimacing mouths.

“What’s happening, Mistress?” Senka asked.

“I don’t know.” Nyset wheeled around. The green sprigs went up and up, stopping at knee height. At their tops, small bulbs formed, opening into flowers white, purple, pink, red, and blue. Some had a few petals, some tens. Some petals were shaped like cups, others flat and pressed back against a bed of pollen.

The bursting green spread like a wave from where they stood, where the Shadow god had fallen. The wave rolled, went up and over the mountains of skulls, dashing away the ruby reds and becoming a sea of pleasant greens.

Streams of blue water rolled down the vast hills and started collecting where all the blood once was. Behind the water, the red skulls were scrubbed clean, leaving the dull white of bone. The moon faded and a sun rose on the horizon, bathing the world in smudges of reds, pinks, and blues. Something rumbled beneath Nyset’s feet and she leaped away with a gasp, embracing the Dragon. She soon saw that it was not needed.

A mature oak pushed out of the ground, brown branches threading into the air and blooming with broad, verdant leaves. The tree went up and up, stretching golden boughs over the glittering pool of crystal clear water forming over what was the blood lake. Strange, bulbous flowers materialized from its limbs, petals closed and dripping down with beautiful strings of light. Water curled around Nyset’s boots, cool between her toes.

“It’s incredible,” Isa said, bending down and inhaling with a grin.

“Amazing,” Juzo gasped.

“A miracle,” Senka breathed.

“The most incredible magics,” Grimbald said. “Maybe magic’s not always bad after all.”

Another tree rose up with a rumble about five paces away. Long translucent tubes containing hundreds of smaller flowers merrily swayed from its limbs. Mushrooms the size of legs sprang up around the pool, caps a camouflaged pattern of reds and whites and browns. There was a buzzing at her shoulder and she saw a fuzzy bee drifting on the air.

“A bee!” she pointed. Then a butterfly fluttered onto Isa’s back, its wings scintillating in shades of blue and purple. Birds twittered and darted through the clear light, golden yellow, bright orange, and shining reds. Along the mountains beyond were winding paths dotted with narrow pines and trees of the strangest colors. One tree’s leaves were bright red, another a gradient of color from almost white to deep purple, crawling nearly fifty feet into the air, catching the light of the rising sun.

Nyset exhaled with a great sigh of relief and her eyes settled onto the man she loved, still nestled in Juzo’s arms. Behind them, life blossomed with the blood of Walter’s sacrifice. His blood pattered onto a broad-faced flower and trickled onto its small leaves. They had their victory, but there was a cost. A cost that she would never forget. A price that would haunt her until the end of her days.

Bright blue needle thin blades of grass burst around her feet, crawled around her ankles. “He wanted to do this and he succeeded. He wanted it to be a place where men would want to go to rest.” They turned to face her. She saw that there wasn’t an eye without tears in it. “He gave himself to them, for all of us. We need to remember him.”

“For all of us,” Grimbald nodded and rubbed his eyes, Corpsemaker stowed along his back.

Juzo stared down at him in his arms, his tears falling onto Walter’s chest. “Have something in my eye,” he sniffed. There was a long silence. “Glad to see this place has changed now, but we don’t belong here.”

Senka was squatting, brushing her hands over blades of grass. “It’s beautiful. What Walter has done for us…”

“A noble, courageous act to be remembered for all the ages to come,” Isa nodded.

Nyset bit her lip. “There is no longer anything to fear here.” She knew how to do it, she realized. And with that, a portal of glowing blue split the air, showing the land of the living, showing their sun.

“Wait,” Juzo said. “Someone else has to take him. I would if I could. Just not sure it’s wise.”

Nyset nodded in grim understanding. “You’ll return to your body. You were buried in Shipton.”

“Think so, if what happens to me happened to Walt.”

“Likely,” Nyset said. “Glad you remembered.”

Grimbald grunted, sniffed and held his scarred arms. “Give him here then,” he beckoned.

Juzo audibly swallowed, lumbered over to Grimbald and placed him in his arms. “Take good care of him, will you?”

“Like my own blood,” Grimbald said.

Juzo clapped Grimbald’s shoulder. “I’ll make my way back soon as I can. Might take a day or so. I reckon I might not feel too well after so much time with the cold earth. Digging my way out shouldn’t be much of a problem with my strength.”

“Took Walter a couple weeks to recover, though your bodies are different.” Nyset tried her best to regard him with a friendly eye, even forced out a smile.

Juzo went to her, looking like he might try to hug her, one arm held awkwardly open, his face unsure.

“Come here,” she said and opened her arms. “Not going to bite me, are you?” she said, only half in jest.

“Very funny,” he muttered. He came into her arms, his body all bones and sharp angles. “I’m sorry, for everything,” he whispered in her ear.

She could only nod and bite at her cheeks. She had already forgiven him but wasn’t feeling ready much for conversation now. “We’ll wait for you.”

Juzo smiled, tears filling his gleaming ruby eye. “See you then.” He swept his eye over the others. He nodded before stepping through Nyset’s portal. They all followed, leaving the Shadow Realm behind.

Chapter 25

Day

“Some voids can never be filled.” -The Diaries of Nyset Camfield

Claw screamed, his sword hacking into the side of a Cerumal neck, spraying blood into the eyes of his neighbor. The neighboring Cerumal flinched, growled, then rammed Claw with his iron shoulder, sending him sprawling to the ground. Claw’s sword was thrown from his grip, tendons stretched and pushed to the point of breaking from the past hour of fighting. He couldn’t draw on any more of the Phoenix. If he did, he knew it would put him into an indefensible sleep. The Cerumal’s bearded axe drew back, blade glinting in a chink of light, studded buckler in its other hand.

Grozul, the former Silver Tower’s Phoenix housemaster had summoned a portal shortly after Nyset departed. From that portal came a score of Black Wynches, chewing into their archers at the rear. Claw had made good progress in making his way towards the old housemaster, each step a step closer to bridging the twenty or so paces between them. Once he’d made it as close as ten paces, a handful of Cerumal stormed through the line of humans and charged for him. He’d killed most of them but this was the last, standing over him now.

How had he missed the signs of an impending betrayal? His story never did make a lot of sense. A single wizard escaping Asebor’s wrath on the Tower. It could have happened, but not likely. And why had he waited so long to come? That had somehow escaped his astute ability to detect shit slinging. It was foolhardy and the price of lives lost from Grozul’s actions were a heavy burden he would bear.

He started to rise up, but something thudded into his chest, heaving the air from his lungs. He choked on his dry throat, tried and failed to shove off a heavily armored body. He gritted his teeth, tried to push it again, but it was too heavy, too dead. His muscles betrayed him, launching into a dehydrated spasm. The axe came down. He closed his eyes tight and waited for the end. He could’ve summoned a shield, but the power’s use would leave him unconscious. Better to die in defiance than napping, Claw thought. He waited for the light to go out, wondered what the Shadow Realm would be like.

He had done well. He found the Arch Wizard as the Oracle had proclaimed he would. She had told him that by finding the Arch Wizard, he would help save humanity from a second dark age, one that would erase man from the tides of history. He could die with a peaceful heart, knowing he’d done his part on the god’s chessboard. He inhaled his last breath. He should’ve felt that hard iron biting through his by skin now. Had it already happened? Was this death?

He opened his eyes with a gasp, not his last breath after all. The Cerumal had frozen mid-strike, its gaping maw hanging open and highlighting its wolfish teeth. A drop of thick saliva fell from its mouth and he heard the droplet patter onto the stone. He heard it. But how? The axe that would have been his great undoing slipped from its hand, hitting the ground with a clang. A second later, its body crumpled beside it.

“What’s happening?” Claw stammered, muscles relenting in their furious spasm. He groaned, twisting his hips to the side, wriggled and rolled the fallen soldier off. He saw it was a Midgaard Falcon soldier with the side of his face bashed in. Splinters of bone stood out from his cheeks and jaw, the eyeball ruptured into a bloody, weeping mass. Claw frowned at the poor soldier. There was no amount of healing that could mend that magnitude of a wound. An ugly way to go, he reckoned.

The clanging of dropped steel, slumping bodies, and screams of victory cried out. Claw stood, snatched up Ghostwalker, peered down at the fallen Cerumal with his bloody fists pressed on his bloody hips. The light was fading in its eyes as if the ever burning coals had, in fact, found an end. “Huh. Would you look at that? Must be the Mistresses doing.” Claw nodded and grinned with satisfaction.

“They’re dying!” someone shouted.

“Run ‘em through to be sure,” a man with a reedy voice said between heaving breaths.

“Have to agree with that. Run em through to be sure!” Claw yelled. Claw brought Ghostwalker up and slammed it through the side of the Cerumal’s jagged armor. The sword however, did not react. It did not glow, did not praise him for another kill. He extracted his blade with a kick, heard the gurgling of air and blood escaping its lungs.

Claw tried to speak to the weapon the way he always had, a conversation in his head between he and it. Are you… there? he asked Ghostwalker

Ghostwalker did not reply. Claw furrowed his bushy eyebrows, beaded with shining droplets of blood. He reached for the Phoenix, and blew out his grizzled cheeks, at least finding that still intact.

“Where is that damned wizard, Grozul?” he growled. He scanned around, didn’t see any sign of his billowy robes and absurdly long wizard’s beard. Cerumal fell like hewed trees, frozen like statues. Cheers and victorious whoops punctuated the air. Weapons hammered, plunged, and clanged against limp Death Spawn bodies. Grozul had likely fled to save his own skin, Claw thought. Maybe he ‘d recognized the signs of the faltering Death Spawn before anyone else had.

A whimper and a groan came from the ground. He saw a young apprentice there, clutching her guts and supporting an arrow that had found its way between her ribs. Blood trickled between her fingers and pooled on the ground.

He knelt down to her and she met his eyes, blazing blue, going frantically back and forth between the arrow and his face. “Can you help me?” she pleaded.

He supposed if he fainted now it wouldn’t matter much. “Mhm, might have a little healing left in me. This will hurt.”

“Please, just get it out. I’m ready!” she sobbed through streaks of ash on her cheeks.

Claw jerked the arrow free, drew on the Phoenix and sent waves of healing into her wound. Something caught his eye then. A blue line of light split the air near the gates, about twenty paces away. It circled around and showed a strange world beyond. It was a world as lush as the North in summer. Towering trees surrounded what might have been a pool teeming with flowers of the brightest colors he’d ever seen. The water glittered like it had been filled with bits of polished metal. He thought he should have felt some sort of fear at seeing another portal open then, but he felt warmth. Thought he should’ve felt terror at the prospect of more Death Spawn, but somehow knew no more would come. He knew then that the Death Spawn were finished.

“Thank you, master Claw,” the wizard croaked, but Claw didn’t hear her.

“Sure, rest up, child,” he muttered. He rose up, his jaw hanging open. He started for the portal and the Mistress stepped through, her face blackened with smoke and streaked with tears. She appeared well enough from here. Had someone else fallen? He scanned her up and down for hidden wounds, hard to tell with all the strange wetness on her robes. It looked like blood, but there couldn’t possibly be that much.

Senka strode through after her, head swiveling left and right, round cheeks shining with sheets of blood. She brandished daggers in either hand, legs bent and poised for combat. She shuffled to Nyset’s flank. Isa leaped through next, sword in one hand and hammer in the other, his jaw muscles flexing. He skirted to Nyset’s other flank, his black armor shining with wet and missing more than a few pieces on his arms and legs.

Claw met Nyset’s eyes and flashed her a wry smile. He limped towards them, pain lancing through his thigh where a Cerumal had got him good with a spear. He twisted around a burning body, avoided tripping on a hunk of stone, stepped over a severed Cerumal’s leg. He felt heaps of gratitude at seeing her alive, standing, all her limbs intact. He was glad the burden of leadership would be put back onto its rightful owner. Glad he could go back to serving her. His leading days were long past. He thought of his former life in the North and his string of failures there. But that life was no more. This was his new life.

Next came Grimbald, his fearsome giant’s axe stowed over his back. How he could wield a weapon of such size without tiring was a wonder to Claw. He had the look of a Northern warrior, big enough to put the fear into the lads. There was a familiar figure cradled in his arms.

Claw stopped in his tracks, mouth parting as if to say something. It was Walter. Where had his armor and clothes gone? His head lolled back against Grimbald’s chest, his tongue sticking out the side of his lips like he was reaching for a stray crumb. Strips of blood coursed over his face in strange angles, almost like warpaint. It came from his nostrils, his ears, his mouth and tear ducts. Claw felt an icy chill spread through his legs, reaching up to his spine. He knew then that Walter was dead, made the last sacrifice. His bare legs flopped against Grimbald’s side as he walked. Grimbald stared up over the gathering throng, legs fighting for balance, eyes teary and shaking all over.

Nyset put herself in front of Grimbald, parting the tide of soldiers and wizards starting to crowd in around them. When she came close to him, she put a strong hand on his shoulder and gave it a squeeze. “Thank you, Claw, you’ve done well,” she said, her voice raw with emotion.

“Have I?” he asked. He supposed he had. He saw she was trying to fight it, to put on a strong face. She started on, but he grabbed her by the crook of her arm. “You don’t have to be strong today. Weep openly, show the world your love for him, for all of its beauty,” he said.

She nodded a few times, her mouth pressed into a line. Her face started to break then, her lips curling into the frown that only comes from misery of the most crippling kind. “You’re right,” she breathed, pulled away, and started on down the bridge, toward the ruined village.

The others followed him, Claw included. He peered back over his shoulder, saw the portal had remained open. “Mistress, the portal. Who—” A dark shape dashed through the portal, all blood and shadows. Its face was pale, body covered in armor, shining like rubies. It shrieked like a dying animal, leaped from the edge of the bridge, and its enormous wings hissed out and buffeted the air. “Dragons!”

Nyset whirled around. “No!” she screamed, eyes bulging, hands reaching. The portal winked out and fire burst alight in her eyes. “Kill it!” She pointed at the flying humanoid, already blurred behind a curtain of mist from the falls. It was fast as a hawk in flight, diving for unsuspecting prey.

She hurled fiery discs and the creature darted straight up into the air with a surge of flapping wings, discs going wide. Claw ran for the edge. Kicked stones skittered between a section of intact balusters, soaring and spinning into the gorge. A few wizards came up beside him, hurling fireballs, but the creature twisted and spun, avoiding the attacks. It didn’t seem to take much effort on its part. It peered back at him with Amika’s face, the face of his deceased wife.

Claw stared agape, his heart hammering, palms sweating against the hand rail. He watched helplessly as the figure flew into the twilight sky, shrouded in a band of pinking sun. Arrows twanged from longbows, falling far short of the target. How could it have Amika’s face? She had been killed during a raid almost ten years ago now. “Couldn’t have been her,” he said with disbelief. “It had to be someone else, had to be.” He knew that face, though. He never would’ve forgotten the face of his wife.

Nyset slammed into the rail next to him. “No, no, no, no!” she screamed and pulled on her hair, dragging it around her face. “What have I done? What have I done?” She grabbed Claw’s shoulder, fingers crushing into his skin. He wanted to wince but stifled the urge.

Claw shook his head. “What was it? What is it?”

She stared into his eyes, new tears swimming in hers. “I am the greatest of fools, Claw. I have made a terrible, terrible mistake.”

“What? It couldn’t be that bad, Mistress. So a stray Death Spawn got out of the Shadow Realm. It can’t do that much harm, can it?” He didn’t believe his own words. That was no ordinary Death Spawn. “What was it?”

She swallowed and shook her head. Her mouth worked like a fish, opening and closing without making words.

He wrapped his arms around her in an embrace and she fell into him. He grunted at the unexpected weight of her body, fingers clinging onto his backplate like her life depended on it.

“It’s not supposed to end like this, not like this, not like this,” she said, voice muffled against his chest. She tapped her forehead into his chestplate with a gentle thud. How had it worn Amika’s face? The thought ate at him. Nyset smacked her head against him again, harder this time. She craned her head back to do it again and Claw dropped an arm, put his hand on her forehead to stop her. He could feel the beginnings of a bump forming against his palm. “Get yourself together, Arch Wizard,” he snapped.

A shudder went through her then. “I’m sorry. You’re right,” she breathed and stepped out of his embrace, letting his arm fall away. Her posture slowly resumed its regal bolt upright position, brushed off a shard of bone from her soaked robes and fought to straighten a sleeve. “Thank you again, Claw.” She met his eyes for a long second. His armor was left swathed in blood. He wondered if it could’ve all been Walter’s.

She was like a daughter to him. She looked so very much like his own daughter. Their eyes were strikingly similar. He would not fail her like he failed his own blood. She was long dead, long ago burned on the pyre. She had fallen during the Poison Wolves’ raid on his village.

“For another day.” Nyset turned around to lead the procession that had stopped around her. She pulled her shoulders back and clenched her fists, sweeping the crowd with a grim stare as though she could make up for her feelings of despair by a show of strength. She gave a harsh snort and wiped her arm on her sleeve. She gave Grimbald an assuring nod, and they resumed their long march towards the charred village.

Claw looked back to the sky, the flying Death Spawn a bobbing red jewel over the Far Sea. A flock of gulls gave it a wide girth while it passed. The wind howled over the bridge and threw a strip of blood-heavy gray hair over his brow. He pushed it behind his ear, wet and cold, and fingered the itching of a clotting cut on the back of his neck. The sea rolled with gentle waves, making the reflecting smudges of pinks and reds of the setting sun shimmer.

Senka and Isa had slid up along the rail, nervy hands clutching at weapons and white knuckling the rail. Their jaws worked and forearms flexed with tension.

“Someone going to tell me what that thing was?” Claw asked, pushing himself between them.

Senka and Isa shared a glance. Senka bit her lip and Isa grunted.

Senka twisted her shoulders to face Claw. “The Shadow princess, daughter of the Shadow god,” she said flatly, though worry creased her mouth.

“By the Phoenix,” Claw breathed. Now he understood Nyset’s plight, her terrible mistake. “Now she’s free.”

* * *

The following day, the rain was torrential and came in relentless sheets. Nothing would properly burn. Torches wouldn’t stay lit. The day was coated in a dark, crushing gray. The sun shone behind the clouds like a cold star. Everything that could be washed away was, more or less. Piss, blood, and bodily fluids on the Silver Tower’s bridge, ash on the Tower’s walls, Death Spawn refuse in the courtyard. Nyset was glad to have some of the choking stench gone, but would’ve liked to have at least a few torches burning to have a proper funeral. Life didn’t give you what you wanted.

The village north of the cemetery was a dark haze in the rain. A few blackened uprights at the village’s border stood against the rain and a few of the chimney stacks that hadn’t yet fallen had crumbled with the force of it all. The cemetery was mud-churned ash and gravel, well-traveled footpaths drowning in pools of it. Ancient headstones stood in jutting angles, packed in tight, and the words inscribed worn flat by the sea’s scourging winds. The winds of the Far Sea swept in over the cliffs surrounding the cemetery, cutting through water soaked robes and armor, making everyone’s bones chatter.

At least five hundred people gathered around the opened grave, heads hanging, muttering complaints about the cold between prayers. People pressed in close against one another for warmth, maybe for emotional comfort, but for warmth most of all, Nyset reckoned.

Graves were being dug all around in spots of wet earth lacking headstones. There were hundreds to be buried and they would get a warrior’s proper burial. For now, the digging and placing of ruined corpses into holes had mostly taken pause for Walter. A pair of muttering soldiers lowered a robed woman’s frame into a muddy grave. One of her arms was missing and a cavity of flesh had been hollowed out of her abdomen. Nyset couldn’t conceive of how that might have happened, but there it was.

“A sad place in the best of days,” Juzo muttered beside her. His long duster was held tight around him, the neck popped up high about his jaw, clumps of earth still clinging to the bottom, likely from his own grave. His cheeks were sunken, jaw sharp, neck throbbing with working tendons. His iron-gray hair was swept back over his head and streaked with red.

“These are not the best of days,” Nyset said, feeling like she was in someone else’s body, in someone else’s life. He had found time to feed Nyset thought, judging by the fresh red in his hair, though she was sure he didn’t have much of a choice.

“Juzo, never liked that Death Spawn look of his,” Claw said to himself, but not quite enough.

Juzo’s face twitched in a scowl, but seemed to let it go, eye focusing back on the rectangular section of earth where Walter lay.

Nyset wore robes and boots black as the sky, hood heavy with wet and pressed against her cheeks. She stared into the opened grave, Walter’s body covered in a red sheet below, showing only his pale head. Most of the red had been covered by mud now, some speckling his cheeks. She kept hoping that somehow he’d rise but knew it an impossibility. The gods did not refund sacrifices.

“Ever find Grozul the betrayer?” Nyset whispered to Claw.

“No sign of him. Don’t worry, Mistress, we’ll find him if we have to turn over every stinking log in the realm.”

“I’m not worried,” she said and meant it. Grozul would have to live out his life with one eye open and his head on a swivel. That stress would wear anyone down eventually.

People made their way to the grave, drizzling clods of mud over his form and breathing prayers. An old woman knelt over his grave, her wispy hair blowing. “They took my daughters, they took my man, they took my everything,” she said over and over, sprinkling mud over him. A young boy not older than four or five years stared at the old woman and took her muddy hand after she rose. They trudged off into the milling throng.

“Didn’t think I’d ever live to see this day.” Juzo wiped his weeping nose on the back of his hand and winced.

“How are you feeling?” Nyset croaked. It was an effort to take her eyes away from Walter.

“Hard to describe, like learning how to use my body all over again.” He was gaunt and had the look of a partially dried corpse, far worse off than he’d looked in the Shadow Realm. His scarlet eye held none of the defiance it usually had, downcast and watery. “Things are mending though. By the gods, the wound Walter sent me off with hurts.” Juzo turned his head, showing her the blackened spot on his temple where Walter had burned him right through.

A handful of apprentices came up together. One had a bandaged arm, another with an ugly burn on the side of her face, a third missing a leg and hobbling on a crutch.

“Mistress,” one of them muttered, dropping her handful of mud. The others followed suit, then shuffled off making room for other mourners.

She couldn’t remember their names now. Her mind wasn’t working right, clogged up with the weight of grief.

Lena squatted before the grave’s edge, dreadlocks swaying and dripping water. “He was a good man,” she said between prayers. She sprinkled a handful of bright orange chicory powder, an herbalist’s offering for the dead. It supposedly bestowed safety upon those in the Shadow Realm, but Walter was not there. Walter’s soul, as well as his body, were dead and gone.

“Still have the curse?” Nyset shifted her eyes to Juzo, saw him wince.

He nodded. “Was hoping it would have lifted.”

“We’ll figure it out.” She gave his frozen hand a squeeze and he squeezed back before letting go.

Juzo sniffed and shuffled his feet. “There’s something I don’t understand. You saw people in her? In the Shadow god’s mouth? That place of fire in her mouth… there were people in it, screaming, in pain. Like another world, another realm.”

“I did.” She felt an involuntary shudder pulse through her body.

“Know what that place is?”

“No.” She slowly shook her head. “I think there are some things we’ll never understand. Some things are always on the horizon of our islands of knowledge.”

“There are other worlds,” Juzo said, his eye squinting down at Walter’s grave.

“Are you ready for the words, Mistress?” Claw asked from behind. She looked over her shoulder, saw his face dripping with wet. His cloak hood was thrown back despite the rain. It seemed like the lines around his eyes and mouth had deepened over the last week. She never thought he looked old, but now she did.

She swallowed and nodded. She would never be ready. She looked down at Walter’s eye, shut forever. She felt Senka’s eyes on her and met them, standing on the other side of the grave. Senka’s eyes flitted down and her cheeks flushed with hints of red. Isa stood beside her, head tilted up at the rain, his white eyelids closed. He looked to be lost in his own sort of reverie. He’d been staring up at the sky since they’d arrived.

“The Mistress speaks! Quiet down!” Claw shouted, though there wasn’t much to quiet but murmuring prayers.

She was overcome with a mix of horror at knowing the Shadow princess was still free and a crushing emptiness at seeing Walter laying in the mud, motionless. Never again would she hear him laugh, smile at her with his silly smiles. Never again would she feel his touch, hear his voice. She inhaled sharply, had to steel herself and brushed away new tears mixing in with the icy rain.

“Walter Glade hailed from Breden, same town as me. We left after our city had been raided by Death Spawn, the first since Asebor’s awakening according to the… documented cases.” Her voice started breaking and she paused to get a full breath. Where was she going with this? She hadn’t spent the time to prepare, unable to sleep, unable to do anything but stare out her window all night.

“He killed the Shadow god, did what he’d always wanted to do. He made the Shadow Realm a place where men could go to rest. You should have seen him fight!” She let out a desperate laugh. “He could fight like no other. Saved my life, saved the life of most of the people here, I’d say.”

She snorted and a chill washed through her. “Some folk take to war, combat… Walter had.” Her eyes fixed on the heaps of mud covering his body. “It seems to me that most just get through it the best they can. Most of us, we’re all just trying to survive.” Nyset’s blurry eyes scanned over hooded faces, scarred warriors, and sniffing wizards. She looked at the burned-out village, thinking that it was once some folk’s lives. “Being a warrior, it’s not all camaraderie and glory, not like the songs, nothing like the stories. This was the truth of war.” She gestured at the grave and felt a hot tear slip down her cheek.

“He sacrificed for us. Walter Glade made the ultimate sacrifice and gave himself to the gods so that we could live. He was a dual-wielder to be remembered for all the ages to come, a warrior, a hero, my lover, a son, and a friend to many. He prevented another Age of Night, prevented the near end of the Age of Dawn. Because of him, the Age of Dawn will carry on and man will continue to live in peace among the gods.”

A few grunts of agreement and a couple of sorry cheers sprang out from the crowd.

Nyset continued. “He would’ve said he just did what anyone else would’ve done, but I’m not sure that’s the case. He endured pain that would’ve broken the average man many times over. But he endured, even returned from the fetters of the Shadow Realm. Killed a god and her son, Asebor. Let it be known that Walter Glade was the slayer of the Shadow god and her kin.”

“The Shadow slayer,” Grimbald, grunted from somewhere behind her.

It felt like time rushed over her, spinning like a dust-devil. Thousands of memories played in her mind then, and all at once. She was reading a book on her stoop and Walter came by to visit. Lost in thought and bumping into him in Breden square. He was inside her and moaning into her ear. Another time, they shared a pastry in the Lair. He was screaming and breathing fire over the demons of the Shadow Realm, wondering if she would ever kiss him again. Now, she had her answer.

She hadn’t known how long she stood there in silence, staring into his pale face. She was shivering and her breath steamed on the morning air. There was a streak of blood on her palm and a red smear on her fingers, mixed in with mud. She had cut herself spreading her earth and hadn’t remembered doing it. A curtain of water lashed across her side, made her shudder and close her muddy fist.

Despite the weather, no one left to hurry back to the Tower, tents, the arms of comfort. It seemed more folk were coming in ones and twos, guards who were changing watch and given the chance to pay their respects. Nobody bothered her. She wondered if she had become invisible then. She wondered how many of these people had met him, known him, or had a passing conversation with him.

“He was a brave man. One of the finest,” Thalia said beside her. How long had she been there? She wore dark furs made black as coal with the rain, held tight around her shivering body.

Nyset forced a smile, met her hard eyes, and slowly nodded. She felt numb.

Thalia continued and looked down at his grave. “He saved my life in Tower’s courtyard. And the lives of a few of my best warriors. I- the Tree Folk will never forget him.”

“Thank you, Thalia.” Nyset reached over and squeezed her hand. Thalia squeezed back then cupped Nyset’s hand in both of hers, imparting a bit of her warmth.

She looked up as the sun broke through the clouds and a spatter of rain brushed her brow. She thought for a second she saw the light take on the form of the Dragon, twisted into the Phoenix and then it was gone. The beam of light was beautiful, showing the full color of the iron world below. It warmed her face for an instant. The clouds crept over it, once again bathing the land in midnight. Nothing can last forever, even grieving, she told herself.

“A blessing from the gods,” Juzo said.

“You saw it too?”

He nodded. “I did.”

She felt empty, though. Like part of her had gone with him, a part she could never fill. She knew that hole would always be there. She eyed a huge solitary silver-gray tree near the cliff’s edge, leafless and dead with roots like serpents, crawling out the cliff side.

The clouds opened again, showing a golden sun and bathing the world with its radiance and heat. A soft, pleasurable murmuring went over the crowd. Shades of pink and warm amber touched the gray tree.

“Want some help?” Grimbald asked.

“I’ll do it.” Juzo gave a snort and hefted a shovel. He sent the first great clod of earth over Walter and the clouds widened, the sun shining with summer brilliance. Mist curled into the air and warmed the tip of her chilled nose. The clouds were slowly dashed away and the wind quieted while Juzo buried Walter. “A blessing indeed,” Juzo smiled up at the sun.

Nyset blubbered out with a great sob. Her eyes wound shut, burned and streamed tears. Her stomach shuddered and heaved. Her breath gurgled in her sore throat. She wrapped her arms around her body, sobbing uncontrollably. Her whole face pained with the violence of her crying. There was a part of her that said this was not how an Arch Wizard should mourn.

Claw shuffled up beside her and he pulled her into his arms, held her tight. Held like her like her father would have, firm, protective. She clung to his cold cloak, sobbing against his chest, wailing with words she couldn’t comprehend.

Everyone else stood around, waited and held vigil while Walter Glade, the giant slayer, the Shadow slayer, was buried. Juzo worked methodically, each shovel full seeming to weigh him down a little less than the last.

Nyset twisted her head against Claw’s chest and watched with bleary eyes as clod after clod was tossed over him, listened to the scraping of the shovel through earth. It took almost two hours to bury what was once thought the last dual-wielder of this age. The Age of Dawn would march on, but the people would never forget the heroes of this age who’d made it possible. Nyset Camfield, Arch Wizard of the Silver Tower would make sure of it.

Chapter 26

A Familiar Face

“Happiness and triumph are only acceptable if they are shared.” -The Diaries of Nyset Camfield

Six months had passed since Walter died and the Shadow Realm had been purged of evil. Some apprentices bold enough to participate in Nyset’s experiments reported that the Shadow Realm contained a garden of the most unimaginable beauty. They said the sunsets were endless, the waters crystal clear, and the world teeming with benevolent life. How she conducted these experiments, however, was anything but benevolent.

All her participants knew, and were well compensated, for the revival experiment. She had heard stories of people seeing the Shadow Realm while walking that razor’s edge between life and death, and decided it was the only viable test she could conceive. But she had to know that Walter’s sacrifice hadn’t gone in vain.

Checking on the state of the Shadow Realm had become an obsession of hers over the past few months. If too much time passed without conducting a revival, sleep would not come. She had to know the Shadow Realm hadn’t been corrupted.

Her assistant, Vesla, had also been trained in this art, gray to her and black to others. Nyset ordered that if she died, Vesla would continue with the revivals and train her appointed second. The Silver Tower must keep watch upon the realms, even those hidden behind the veil of the land of the living.

She drowned her willful subjects in a bucket of water, just big enough to engulf a human head. Claw’s strong hand did the dark work while she would wait and wait, watching legs kick and arms flail. Even the most willing participants seemed unable to keep their bodies from fighting when thrust into an environment lacking air. She kept her notebook and stub of charcoal at the ready. Once the participant’s nervous system stopped revolting against the iron hand crushing the life from the body, she would count to fifteen.

Claw would then drag the limp body up. When the body chose life and the heart thumped and lungs heaved, she would listen. The participant’s mouth would work in a frantic stream, spilling out the images seen in the world beyond. She would smile, scratching notes about the luminous and bountiful Shadow Realm. Sometimes, the body would choose death and no amount of Phoenix healing would help it. A sacrifice of the few for the protection of the many, she rationalized.

The knowledge of these experiments was closely guarded. Only those in a simple laboratory room where the experiment was held knew of them. One young apprentice boy had told his friends, forcing her hand. She had sent Isa to silence him by taking his tongue. They knew the price for speaking of it would be high; had even signed a contract specifically stating their tongues, maybe more, would be taken if they violated it. She would protect the Shadow Realm and keep it a place where man would go to rest. Walter’s legacy would not die.

The rebuilding of the Silver Tower was well underway, though there was still considerable work to be done on the spires. It was starting to have some semblance of its former majesty. The gardens were finely manicured, merchants once again hocked their wares in the courtyard, and people streamed in and out of the Tower without fear. It had taken a few months to remove all the bodies, scrub all the blood and patch up all the marred stone. New decorations were procured, the Tower’s village rebuilt from the help of the realm, and the ancient bridge repaired. It was starting to look like a place where newcomers would view it with awe-struck eyes as she once had.

Her proudest addition to the gardens was a marble statue carved into the likeness of Walter, set in the center behind the gurgling fountain. He stood watch over the gardens, a replica of the Chains of the North held in his outstretched arm, the other with a stony sword of fire. The marble was gray with swirls of pink and reflected the sun from his eyes in the late afternoon. She had given him his eye back, wanting to remember how he looked before he had been disfigured. He loomed about the heroes of the past lining the perimeter of the gardens, those who’d made noble sacrifices thousands of years ago. She had commissioned an inscribed tablet below his knees that would tell the story of cleansing the Shadow Realm and slaying Asebor to future generations. It was an abbreviated version, but it was something. The full account could be read in a book she was working on, The Chronicles of Walter Glade.

Nyset had set off for some long needed rest. She’d purchased a modest house with the Tower’s deep coffers on the coast of Eagle’s Edge. The realm was indebted to the Tower and they knew it. Donations still came in droves. Most surprising of all, the most generous donations from Midgaard.

It was a perfect spot, the place she’d always imagined she and Walter would have lived out their days together. The place where she thought they would’ve raised children. She would make herself available for other men eventually, but that time was not yet ripe.

She sat on the edge of the bed in her smallclothes, peering at the pinched scars running up and down her arms. One arm was lit in a shaft of light coming in through parted shutters, curtains twitching open from the warm sea breeze. One scar looked like a puckered arrowhead, one long and white going from wrist to elbow, another the skin was bunched and twisted up from a burn. She liked them. They served as potent reminders of the time when Death Spawn freely roamed the lands. A thick white scar cut down from the top of her ear where it had once been severed, then knitted together with her own Phoenix healing. She reached for the back of her neck, fingers pressing into the figure-eight scar.

“Still there,” she breathed. It was a constant reminder of what the Shadow Realm once was, what it could become if it were not protected.

They had never found the Shadow princess, or heard any inkling of her whereabouts. It was a seed in the back of her mind, making her restless. Where had she gone? What was she doing? All she could do now was prepare and make sure future generations were prepared, for war would come again. She pushed the thoughts of the Shadow princess away. She was here to rest, to let her mind decompress, to let go.

The house was a long and simple rectangle with one big room. It had a few windows, a bed with a cotton stuffed mattress, a tall cabinet that served as pantry and dresser, and a small clay stove for cooking. It was a home stripped down to the bare essentials and perfect for some time away from the Tower where pomp and majesty reigned.

Here, she could let her guard down, be alone with her thoughts without Vesla urging her on to visit the nurse, her next meeting with so-and-so Duke, that Earl, and this wizard’s requisition for a new laboratory. She stretched her long arms up and yawned, her back and hips sore from riding from sunrise to sunset yesterday to get here.

A tingling pitter-patter of movement swept up from her womb and into her stomach. She smiled at her bulging belly and placed both hands around it, feeling a nudge against a fingertip. She couldn’t get used to how stretched and tight the skin felt around her sides.

“I see you too are awake, beautiful,” she said. “Lovely morning, isn’t it?” She frowned down at her swollen bare feet.

Was her baby kicking enough? Perhaps too much? She thought it might have had four legs to account for its enthused kicking. Her child, Walter’s child, would be her last connection to him. She hoped it would look like him, hoped his memory would carry on in its features.

She had let her hair grow. It now fell over her swollen chest in a tangled mess. She twisted the golden strands up into a bun, a few stray locks curling around her ears and neck. Muscles in her back flexed as she worked out a knot in her shoulder. She moaned at the warm air coursing over her back through the window. It was a pleasing change from the cool air of the east.

She groaned as she reached down at the uneven floorboards and snatched up her robe, brown and unadorned, unlike the bright red, blue, and green gilded robes she wore at the Tower. Here, she wanted to blend in, wanted to look more like a thief than an Arch Wizard. She slipped on the robe, pushed her arms through and tugged it down over her belly, the cheap wool scratchy against her skin.

She pushed through the front door and the pleasant sounds of crashing waves reached her ears. The sun was burning bright over the ocean, making the amber sand of the beach glow. She squinted at the water and watched a white gull swirl between thermals, calling out. Her bare toes were cool against the sand where the roofline kept the sand in shadow.

She started for the shore and took a great breath of the salted air. A gust sent tendrils of hair tickling her neck. The shoreline was about a hundred feet away, the sand loose and shifting, already burning hot. Her waddle annoyed her, made it hard to move quick if she needed to, though there were always portals. She reached the shoreline where the waves crashed against the sand and bathed her feet in refreshing water.

She looked out over the ocean where the razor-thin band of water met the sky. Shreds of clouds tore across the blue in a sharp angle as if they had emerged from the sea and were drawn to the sun. There wasn’t a boat in sight. The Scaled Peak, a volcano, stood from the water in a great cone, almost reaching the clouds, puffing out a line of curling black smoke. She thought she might have been able to catch the scent of its sulfurous payload.

She started walking north, watched a group of ten or so crabs skitter into the water as she drew near. She walked and walked for about an hour, snickering at her baby’s occasional kick, welcoming its company. The sun was warm against her back and the Abyssal Sea cooled her toes, now wilted from too much time spent wet. A line of sweat had soaked through her robes down the middle of her back. Seashells passed underfoot in shades of fire, some flat and ribbed, others conical and spiraling. A violet starfish bigger than her and with at least twenty arms had washed up on the sand some time ago, now a dried out husk. A spattering of violet was something that still gave her pause. It reminded her of Asebor’s hellish eyes.

She passed other houses like hers, about a quarter mile apart, but all seemed unoccupied. The houses stood before a wall of beach grass about six feet tall, shifting and swaying in the breeze. She spotted the occasional sinuous footpath that wound through the wall of grass, eventually leading to narrow roads. She had yet to see another soul, so she peeled her robe off and started walking in her smallclothes. The sea air was relaxing and even the baby seemed to wriggle a bit less.

She thought of what she would do to expand her office, where Claw should search next for Grozul, and which spell to teach the Dragon apprentices next. She thought lashes of fire might be good, perhaps a bit too advanced for her current class. The hard packed sand marched beneath her feet as she fell into her mind.

A whistle cut the air. The sort of whistle a man gives admiringly to a woman. She snapped from her mind, her eyes flicking up to see a bearded man sitting on a chair outside his door. He waved at her and she saw a grin behind his beard.

She felt her cheeks burning, remembering her robe bunched in her hand. She unfurled it and slipped it over her head, hot against her skin now. She waved back, smiled, and started walking towards him. She winced as her foot fell into a shallow hole, ankle turning with a spike of heat and pain. “Damn it,” she hissed.

“Watch out! The sands can be treacherous this time of year.” The man projected a laugh. “A most deadly landscape for ankles unsupported by boots!” He stood up, pushed his hips out, and sauntered over to her, a bottle of spirits swinging from one hand. He approached her with a drunken stagger. He chuckled after almost going head first into the ground, catching himself with a dexterous leg.

She embraced the Dragon, just enough to burn a man to ashes. One could never be too cautious, Walter always said.

“A lovely day! Look at that glorious sky, would you?” the man called. He was barefoot, navy pants rolled up above his knees, his ragged shirt soiled and unbuttoned, showed a hairy round belly bigger than hers. A gemmed sword sat unsheathed against his hip, hanging from a loop of leather. She was amazed the fellow hadn’t managed to slice himself open. An overgrown beard shrouded his face, showing only his keen eyes, sizing her up.

“It’s beautiful.” Nyset gestured back, though never took her eyes off him, and smiled. They drew close now, about ten paces apart. “I see you know how to enjoy it.”

“Indeed, I do, my lady. Would you care to join me? Not for drink of course, seeing you’re with child. I’m sure I can procure another chair from a neighbor…” He peered around, seeming unsure of where exactly his nearest neighbor was at the moment. “Or maybe we can warm each other’s beds for the evening or afternoon? Whichever it is.”

She recognized him then. Recognized those appraising dark eyes. It was Scab, the mercenary who’d betrayed Walter and taken a bribe from a member of the Wretched. She jutted her chin and stared into his face, waiting for him to recognize her. His eyes came back to hers and narrowed. He flinched, his mouth parting for an instant before deftly recovering. His eyes were wrinkled and lips cracked with sunburn.

Scab knew who she was, no doubt. Her first reaction was to seize him and put him in bindings, drag him out to the Tower for a swift trial and proper punishment. She wanted to see how he would react to her.

“I-I don’t see any other chairs now,” he said and took a sip from his bottle. He offered it to her.

“No, baby. Remember? And I like to keep my wits about me. Never know who you may run into out here, eh?”

“Ah, yes, life can be fortuitous…” he trailed off, looking past her and out at the ocean.

“What’s your name?”

“My name?” Scab’s eyes shifted back to hers, regaining focus.

“Yes, your name. You must have one. Don’t you?” Nyset shielded her eyes from the sun glinting from Scab’s bottle with one hand, the other planted on her hip.

“Of course, Edsel’s my name, wanderer of the sands,” he said with a nervy chuckle.

“Edsel,” she scoffed. “I won’t give you my name because you already know it. Did you ever doubt that I would find you?”

Scab’s throat worked with a swallow. “No, not I, Mistress.” Scab gave a broad smile, showing his teeth black with rot. “And yet, here we are. I am defenseless and you wield the fire of the Dragon.” He spread his arms in a gesture of innocence. “What will you do with me?”

“I only hold the Dragon now because it reminds me of where I’ve been, not because I intend to end you. Though, maybe I should. An Arch Wizard stands for peace, but we are no strangers to war if it must come to that.”

“Hah! Indeed, you are a fearsome woman. Walter was a lucky man, had to count his blessings for winning your affections, I always told him. That his child?” he pointed at her belly.

“Our child,” she corrected with a nod. Nyset cocked her head. “Did you? Before or after you abandoned him to Alena?” It felt like it had been years since she’d last seen Walter. It felt like that life was a dream, a different world. Now she had awoken and life marched on.

Scab took a long swig from his bottle, emptying its contents down his throat. “We all make mistakes, Mistress. I live out my days here, knowing full well there are few years left in this old body. The few people I’ve met here don’t like me for some reason.”

“That is surprising.” Nyset frowned. A soft breeze sent her robes curling over her sticky arms and back, and she felt sand tickling at her ankles. The baby shifted and sent butterflies over her skin.

“What will you do with me, Mistress?” Scab said, his voice almost pleading.

“I suppose I should bring you back to the Tower for a trial.”

“A trial?” Scab sucked his teeth.

“But I’m going to let you go.” Nyset nodded as if approving of her decision.

“You-you are?” Scab winced as if struck. “Or maybe you don’t want to kill me looking you in the eye, is that it? But no, that isn’t you.” Scab scratched at his mangy beard.

“I am, and you’re right, everyone makes mistakes. So long as you stay out of trouble, I’ll leave you in peace.”

“The band has long been disbanded, no worries there, Mistress. And your assassins? Will I taste their blades in my sleep perhaps?”

“No, my assassins will leave you in peace too. Though I can’t let you walk away unharmed. I cannot say whether or not you will survive your wounds.”

He belched. “You can’t? What wounds? I’m not wounded…” Scab’s amber bottle slipped from his fingers, hitting the sand with a clunk, realization dawning. “But why?”

“Because you owe me a debt and debts must be paid. A mercenary should know that better than any other.” A disc of fire burst to light and whooshed past Scab. Blood sprang from his arm, severed at the elbow. The other half flopped to the ground, ringed fingers glistening with gems and blood. Blood on the sand shone for a second before being swallowed.

“You fucking bitch!” Scab fell to his knees, clutching his spurting arm. His rheumy eyes accosted her. “Without my help… you and your friends, Walter, and all would’ve died!” he yelled between pained gasps. “Without my help, there still’d be Death Spawn everywhere! Without—” He cut off as yellow vomit spilled from his mouth, heaving and choking on his pain.

Nyset jutted her chin and her eyes widened with the Dragon’s fury. “History will forever remember you as the betrayer of Walter the Shadow slayer. It will be immortalized in every tome. You will always be remembered as a scoundrel until the end of days.”

She raised a glowing hand. A spear of white fire tore from her palm, hissed through Scab’s eye and out the back of his skull. Scab let out a surprised squawk. His legs jerked and kicked up sand, his jaundiced hand pressing over his scorched eye. He hit the ground with a thud and blood oozed from the back of his skull. Air rattled from his lips.

“As I said, I’m not sure if you will recover from your wounds.”

Scab’s remaining eye violently twitched.

With that, she turned around, started off down the shoreline.

Scab lay there dying and even might’ve once croaked for her help, but no help would come. Nyset walked away and felt like a great weight had been lifted from her back. Some said revenge only left you hollow. Forgiveness, even for ones enemies, was a Tower virtue she had to embody, but not today. If Walter had fallen before he’d killed Asebor and the Shadow god…” She shivered. That was a world she didn’t want to imagine. A world that might have been if Scab’s gambit succeeded.

She had this world now. The sky was a glittering dome. A few gulls lazily squawked at each other and coasted on the salt-tanged air. Small waves formed and re-formed in ripples and shimmers.

It was a beautiful time to be alive.

* * *

To be continued in Ascending Shadows - Book 6 of The Age of Dawn.

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Acknowledgments

First of all, I would like to thank you, reader. Without you I wouldn’t be writing. I truly appreciate every one of you. I would like to also thank my editor, Lynette Patterson, and my book cover illustrator and map creator, Promit. Thank you for all of your help.

About the Author

Everet Martins writes stories of the fantastic. His first foray into the published realm is Stormcaller - Book #1 of The Age of Dawn Series. It has the type of visceral action and fun he had always dreamed fantasy could be.

Living in New Hampshire, Everet finds inspiration for his books within his exciting life. He has always loved getting lost in role-playing games and novels. In his youth, he was notorious for being found with his face lost behind the cover of a book. Fascinated by the written word and always wanting to try putting pen to page, he started writing short stories, and eventually a novel.

As a young boy he was exposed to the rigors of martial arts and continued to practice them throughout his adult life, dabbling in various styles. The love for physical fitness morphed into other bodily challenges such as strength training and long distance running.

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This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters , places and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental.

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