Chapter 26 Legacy of the Stone Blade #3
After fighting for so long, they were in the same place they were before.
His people had held Kaldonea back, but they shouldn’t have.
When he planned this battle with the other chiefs, they knew they wouldn’t be able to hold this valley.
It was a starting point—use the flaming logs to scatter Kaldonea’s forces and attack while they were trying to regroup.
It would work for a time, but Kaldonea’s superior forces should have knocked them back into the trees where he had archers set up.
His plan was to use to the trees to separate Kaldonea’s forces, knock them into smaller groups.
Kaldonea’s swords and magicians would be hampered in the trees, easily picked off by Clansmen used to fighting in smaller spaces.
But that didn’t happen. They were still going toe to toe with Kaldonea’s forces. What was Krait thinking? Why hadn’t he pushed forward? What did he know that Ridan didn’t?
Even the magicians were waning, keeping back and striking at the edges where the fighting was thinnest. Why would they—
It hit Ridan all at once.
Where the fuck was Krait?
He was here. Ridan’s scouts had seen him. Why wasn’t the King of Kaldonea—a talented magic user and warrior in his own right—not fighting in the thick of it?
Because this wasn’t the real fight.
He thought he’d tricked Kaldonea’s forces into following him here, forcing them into a battle on the Clansmen’s terms. But Krait had been one step ahead. This battle was just a distraction. Krait was going after the scale!
Ridan swore, twisting around to look for Schok. The magic user was flagging, his flames smaller, skin burning.
“Schok!” he screamed, voice hollow with exhaustion.
Smoke curled from every orifice in Schok’s face as he turned his attention toward Ridan.
“I need a path!” he pointed across the fighting toward Kaldonea’s side. Through those trees was the head of the path towards the Shrieking Cliffs.
Schok snorted, the smoke curling thicker before he turned. Arms trembling, he squeezed his fingers into a point. Flames burst across his skin before narrowing to a point, shooting through the ranks like a burning battering ram.
Ridan took off, following the flames as fast as his legs could run. In his peripheral, he watched Schok drop to his knees, shoulders slumped as steam rose from his skin. Corric sprinted towards him, standing over his brother with his blades raised.
He didn’t have time to think about his packmates, or Brune. He could only focus on running. Was he too late? He should have seen this!
Across the field, an archer sighted him. He was about to let his arrow go when half his head was caved in with a punch from Sevrin. The alpha raised his fist to Ridan, smiling with two missing teeth.
Flipping his blade so it was pointing behind him, he dropped his head to run forward. Dodging wild swings of swords and exploding earth, he nearly lost his balance several times before he finally hit the tree line.
Leaping over roots and rocks, Ridan couldn’t hear anything but the roaring of blood in his ears. Ridan wasn’t sure he was still running, vision narrowing as his lungs cried out for more air. He didn’t stop. He couldn’t.
Not for the first time that day, he wished he could have had Peppercorn with him. She would have traversed the distance quickly. But the rocky ground and trees made the horses useless in this fight.
Careening around twists and turns, he caught sight of the unobtrusive trail. It was nearly hidden, half covered by a leaning tree and some shrubbery. But Ridan knew it well. He’d grown up playing at the base of the trail his whole life.
Hand on the tree, he swung around it and pushed himself up the narrow incline.
Legs aching, and sweat streaming down his face, he climbed.
His mouth was dry, and his throat felt as brittle as thin ice over a pond, shattered with its shards slicing into his pallet with every ragged breath he forced his agonized lungs to draw in.
Ridan ignored the stitch in his side as he burst from the trees, entering the meadow that led up to the final climb to the cliffs.
If he looked to the right, he could see the whole plain, the Stone Blade’s home, in ruins somewhere below.
It was a view he normally enjoyed, stopping to appreciate his home and smell the small white flowers that littered the trail.
Today he didn’t look, but he knew it was there. It was what drove him forward. He held onto that view, pictured it in the forefront of his mind as a reminder of why he was running.
Corric and Jonen finally holding hands, faces red as they looked down at their feet.
Derry completely oblivious as he accidentally set his hair on fire.
Sehleh sitting by the opening of their tent, face turned to the sunset as she knitted a new scarf.
Tia begging Osmond and Niklas for just one more story before bed.
Henroen losing a drinking contest to his mate, only to drunkenly beg her to court all over again.
Kyu sitting with Neir between her legs, idly working leather while her mate nursed Merle.
Brune’s smile.
All of it was Ridan’s—his to treasure, and his to protect. And he would. With the strength in his arm and the blood in his veins. Nothing would get past him.
Stumbling up the ridge on numb legs, he blinked, and suddenly they were in front of him.
Krait’s bulk was easy to see. His red hair, darker than Schok’s, was impossible to miss. He was standing at the mouth of the tunnel, his arms crossed as he watched a skinny, crook backed man and two soldiers chip away at the rock.
He’d never seen Cyrill before, but his identity was obvious.
Not only because he held no weapon, but because of the void hovering by his soldier.
An undulating cloud so dark, Ridan couldn’t stand to look at it for long.
It seemed to cling to Cyrill’s thin shoulder like it was attached, whirling around his head and pulsating, flashes of light rippling from the center every few moments. Almost like it was…
Feeding off him.
Cyrill’s eyes were dark, face sallow as he instructed the soldiers to keep chiseling away at the wall. Ridan’s heart ached to see the mountain so desecrated.
“Krait!” Ridan roared, his voice ragged.
The entire group startled, turning to face Ridan. What little breath he had was nearly stolen when Krait’s familiar eyes turned to him. Corric’s eyes. But this man wasn’t his packmate.
The soldiers peeled away, drawing their swords to come at Ridan. They were clearly better trained than the soldiers below him. Their weapons were fine, decorated with thin filigree that matched their leather armor.
The narrow path forced the soldiers to attack one at a time.
As the first approached, Ridan dropped to a knee, swiping up a handful of gravel and dirt.
He flung it at the unsuspecting soldier’s eyes, swinging underhand with his sword to cut a deep wound just under the man’s breastplate.
Gurgling, the soldier fell to his knees.
Flipping his sword, he met the second over the body of the first. It was a quick fight. These soldiers might be Krait’s elite, but they had nothing on a pissed off Stone Blade. Two blocks and Ridan was slipping under their defense, dropping the second body behind him.
Chest heaving, he met Krait’s eye as he lifted his blade. Blood dripped off the blade, plinking into the dirt at his feet as he pointed it at him.
“I’m going to water this mountain with your blood,” he promised.
Krait turned to face him, drawing his massive two-handed sword. He was bigger than Ridan. Despite his size, his eyes were small below his slicked back hair, beady as they sized him up.
His voice was rough, grating like a rockslide. “Your death will be meaningless, omega.”
Ridan bared his teeth, focused on every twitch of the big alpha's body. Behind him, Cyrill kept working. Hands frantically clawing at the rock.
Krait’s first blow came overhead. He did nothing to hide the move, broadcasting it the entire time, hoping his superior size and strength would break through Ridan’s defense. He caught the blade on his, twisting so it slid across the fuller and sliced into the ground with a thud.
Light on his feet, Ridan struck at Krait’s back, surprised when the man’s blade met him.
He was fast for someone of his size, shoving Ridan back so hard he landed on his ass.
Rolling, he only gained his feet in time to be pushed back again and again.
Krait’s sword came so close he could feel the wind buffeting off the blade.
Before he could get his bearings, Krait was back. They traded blows, their swords clanging with the scrape of metal. Ridan's arms vibrated with the blows. His arms shook each time Krait pressed down on him, the big man’s face inching closer with every swing.
As they fought, Cyrill crowed with victory. His fingers raw from digging through the rocks, he reached into the hole he’d excavated, pulling something free. The void behind him grew in size, crawling down the magician’s arm toward what he held in his hand.
Ridan groaned as Krait’s blade skated across his, knocking into his guard. He held it back, pushing off his back foot when Krait let go with one hand and sent a punishing right hook into Ridan’s jaw.
Stars exploded behind his eyes as he dropped to a knee. Tasting blood, he tried to keep his defense up, but it fell, blade swinging past him to dig into the meat of his shoulder. Ridan screamed as pain lanced down his arm. It felt like someone had dropped his right side into a fire.
With his eyes watering, he threw himself to the ground, shoulder jarring where it hit the ground.
Blinded by pain, he tried to ignore the fresh waves that throbbed with every beat of his heart.
His entire right arm was slick with blood as he picked up his sword again, jerkily getting to his feet.
Just squeezing his fingers around the hilt made his knees weak.
Flashes of his mother lying on her deathbed burned into his mind as he struggled to lift his sword. His arm ached then, too, but for a different reason. The sword had been heavy, unwieldy to an arm that wasn’t used to the responsibility.
I just wanted to be like dad.
His eyes dropped to the sword in his hand.
The point was barely hovering above the ground, unsteady in his hand.
Over Krait’s shoulder, something glinted in Cyrill’s hand.
Held in his two palms, it shone even under millennia of dust. Oblong and golden.
The void raced toward it, reaching for the giant crack down the center of the scale.
Your father was the greatest man I’ve ever known.
Blood dripped from his fingers, sticky and warm.
It soaked into the leather hilt, squelching between his fingers.
He watched as it dribbled between the molars wired to the hilt, worn with time and use.
Beside them, a new ornament had been wired to the hilt.
A plain stone, just above where his thumb sat.
He ran the digit over its smooth surface.
You will be even greater than him.
Ridan’s jaw unhinged as he screamed, using all his strength to lift his sword.
The blade was steady as he met Krait’s next blow.
His blade was faster, edge meeting edge as he threw Krait’s strike off.
He jolted as his blade ripped through skin, stuttering as it struck bone and plunged through Krait’s chest. With his entire weight behind the stab, Ridan couldn’t catch himself.
He fell with Krait, his sword piercing through the man’s body to burst out his back in a spray of blood and gore.
Hitting his sore jaw on the ground, Ridan gasped in pain as he rolled off Krait. Blindly he grabbed for his sword. It was stuck between Krait’s ribs. Leaving it, he lunged for Cyrill.
The magician had disappeared behind Sinestrus as he reared back. Ridan could just see Artrax’s broken scale between the waves of the void. He didn’t stop, couldn’t stop moving his legs. He reached for the scale.
Behind him, he heard someone scream his name.
Bloody fingers extended, he shoved through the darkness and grabbed the scale, the edges of the crack digging into his palm before a white-hot heat exploded under his hand, knocking him back.
He was caught by Sinestrus. His cold fingers grabbing Ridan, choking his life.
The void reached for his hand. Icy tendrils ripped at his fingers, trying to peel them away from the hot, golden scale.
He gripped harder, dragging it to his chest so he could clasp both hands over the scale.
Sinestrus shrieked, his voice so loud it rattled Ridan’s brain. His very bones shook with it.
Fingers slick with blood, he ignored the raging pain as Sinestrus ripped at him. Ducking his head, he curled around the scale as it pulsed under his hands. Power buzzed along its slick surface, older than time itself. It was neutral. Neither evil nor good, just existing, ripe for the taking.
Ridan focused on that as Sinestrus buffeted him with his limited power, desperately trying to get inside Ridan.
To warp his mind like he’d done with so many others.
But there was a pull, a faint pulse of hope against his chest. Head screaming, blood pouring from his nose and ears, Ridan blindly began feeling along the scale.
His fingertips brushed against the ragged edge of the crack. It needs to be fixed.
With what strength he had left, he wrenched his arm from Sinestrus’s grasp and covered the crack with both hands. He didn’t know what to do! He fumbled along the fissure, desperate for something to—
Sinestrus’s tendril pierced through his chest. There was no pain.
There was no blood. Just the inky blackness ripping through him, reaching for the scale.
Cold seeped through his chest, racing along his skin until his breath fogged up in front of him in smaller and smaller plumes until he couldn’t draw any more breath to exhale.
It was as if there was nothing. A void in his chest, growing larger as it fed from him, tearing him apart from the inside.
The tendril wrenched free only to pierce through Ridan’s left hand, yanking it back and away from the scale.
. The scale was unprotected in his right hand. He couldn’t risk Sinestrus grabbing it. He pulled the scale to him, burying it in the hole in his chest.
Closing his eyes, Ridan nearly sighed in relief when he felt the warmth of the scale. Without knowing how, he reached for the ancient magic. It lifted at the touch of his consciousness, slowly waking as he drew the last of it from where it had been resting in its golden bed.
The last sluggish beats of his heart reverberated against the scale.
Destroy yourself.
Artrax’s final golden scale, Sinestrus Voidsoul’s prison, and the last vestiges of pure magic, disintegrated in the bloody hands of a Stone Blade.