52. Protect the Ones You Love
Chapter 52
Protect the Ones You Love
18 th Day of the Blood Moon
Ilnaen – Winter, Year 3081 After Doom
Arden stood between Calen and the Chosen, his Soulblade ignited in his fist. The others had said they’d seen rune-marked Uraks the night the Blood Moon had risen, seen them become hosts for the Chosen. The thing was a monster, a head and shoulders above even him in his Sentinel armour.
“Go.” Arden didn’t dare take his eyes from the Chosen, but he felt the sand shifting beneath his feet as Calen rose.
“I’m not leaving you.” Calen stepped up beside Arden, a purple níthral bursting to life in his hand. When had that happened? “We do this together.”
“I’ll be right behind you, little brother. But I will not let you die here.”
“Haem—”
“Go!” Arden roared, his gaze still fixed on the Chosen, who now marched across the sand. He looked to the satchels of eggs Calen had dropped in the sand. “Get those eggs out of here, Calen. Valerys is injured. You need to leave while you still can.”
Blood streaked from Calen’s lip, his jaws clenched. The mention of Valerys’s name softened his stare. For a moment it looked as though he was going to argue, but he nodded. “Thank you.”
“Always,” Arden whispered as Calen sprinted up the sand towards the rooftop, scrambling to throw the satchels over his shoulders as he did.
The Urak Chosen moved forwards, a snarl on his scarred lip as he stared after Calen.
“Ah, ah,” Arden said, shaking his head. “You can have him. But you’ll have to go through me first.”
The creature snarled, then spat a mixture of saliva and blood into the sand. Liquid metal flowed from the collar of its armour, and its helm reformed as it charged, crimson Soulblade levelled.
The first strike came at Arden’s head. He blocked it in a burst of light, tightening his grip on the hilt of his Soulblade. Three more times the creature tried with blunt force to take Arden’s head from his shoulders. Grace and poise it had none, but the thing hit like a rampaging bull.
Arden glanced over his shoulder to see that Calen had vanished over the parapet of the building’s roof behind him.
Don’t look back. Arden reached out to Kallinvar through the Sigil, letting the Grandmaster know he was ready.
“Come, demon,” he said, circling the silver beast. “Let us see whose god stands taller.”
Arden charged. He swung his Soulblade at the creature’s thigh, then its shoulder, then ribs. Quick and hard. The Chosen blocked all three but shifted backwards with each, feet sinking into the sand.
It swung its crimson blade in a wide arc meant to cleave Arden at the waist. Arden dropped to one knee, spinning, switching his blade into his left hand. He was half a second from slicing through the Chosen’s shin when a pulse of the Taint erupted from the creature and sent him crashing into the wall of the building behind him.
A striking pain ignited in his lower back, punching the air from his lungs. He recovered just in time to throw himself to his right as the Chosen’s crimson blade slammed into the stone where his neck had been.
Arden hit the sand and rolled. He sprang to his feet and drove his Soulblade at the creature’s back only for something heavy to fall on him from above. He staggered backwards and collapsed into the sand, an Urak kneeling over him, howling as it swung its blade above its head.
Arden released his Soulblade, pressed his fist against the creature’s side, and summoned the ancient weapon once again. Green light burst from his hand and ripped through the creature’s torso. Blood poured out around the light-wrought blade, and Arden shoved the lifeless creature to the side, rising. Six more Bloodspawn now stood in the sand-filled street, the Chosen warrior at the centre.
He didn’t like those odds. Arden sent another pulse through the Sigil to Kallinvar, more urgent this time.
“My god, warrior of Achyron, seeks to cross into this world, seeks to fight for the things he loves. What does your god do? Cowers while you die. Where is he? I do not see him.” The Chosen’s voice sent a shiver down Arden’s spine, two voices overlapped, both harsh and preternatural. “You fight well. A worthy soul for my blade.”
“And you talk too much.” Without giving the Bloodspawn time to react, Arden rushed towards the one closest to him. He sidestepped the thrust of the creature’s spear, hacked through its arm, then split its face from the bottom of its jaw up through its skull. The body stood for half a moment before slumping into the sand as Arden leapt over it.
He made for the roof. Fighting the creatures in the street would have been easier, but he would die either way. He needed to put distance between him and them. He needed to give Kallinvar time.
Lyrin’s voice rang out as Arden reached the top of the sand slope and crested the roof’s parapet. “Down!”
Arden dropped to the ground, Lyrin’s Soulblade slinging past his head and removing that of a Bloodspawn who had leapt through the air after Arden.
The head hit the stone in front of Arden, red eyes wide and staring, blood seeping from its severed neck.
“Where’s Kallinvar?” Arden pulled himself to his feet, then he and Lyrin moved backwards in tandem, holding their guard as the Chosen and more Bloodspawn charged towards them.
Lyrin tilted his head towards a set of rooftops nearer the tower where green and crimson Soulblades clashed. “He’s a little tied up.” Lyrin dropped his shoulder and rammed the first Bloodspawn over the parapet, sending it soaring down, then spun to parry the swing of a blackened steel blade, splitting its wielder’s stomach open. “Where’s that brother of yours?”
“Safe.” Arden swept past Lyrin and sent three Bloodspawn to wander the void as they leapt over the parapet, his Soulblade carving through flesh and bone.
The Bloodspawn kept coming, more and more flowing over the parapet, pushing Arden and Lyrin back across the roof. The silver armour of the Chosen rose clear above them all, gleaming ruby in the moonlight. Smoke drifted from the runes set into the creature’s armour. Three more of the creatures had joined it, and now moved at its side.
“There are too many.” A touch of fear painted Lyrin’s voice. He grabbed a Bloodspawn by the back of the neck and slammed his helmeted head into the bridge of its nose, blood bursting, then drove his Soulblade into its belly before ripping the blade free and opening another beast’s throat. He glanced over the rooftops to where it looked like Kallinvar and the others were still fighting.
“I’m sorry.” Arden didn’t have to explain further. Lyrin knew why he was sorry. He’d charged off when he’d seen Valerys whirling towards a different roof. He’d separated from the others to help Calen, and in doing so, he’d left himself isolated. And now Lyrin was isolated with him.
“Not really the time for apologies,” Lyrin called back as he pulled his Soulblade from a Bloodspawn’s chest. “Later.” He opened an Urak navel to groin. “When it’s quieter.” He stomped down into a shin, bones splintering and blood flowing free. “Less blood.”
The Bloodspawn continued to flow over the parapet until Lyrin and Arden were back to back and surrounded on all sides. More than once his Sentinel armour saved him from a blow that would have killed any other man.
The four Chosen strode with slow purpose, a sense of inevitability about them.
Another Bloodspawn walked at their side, shorter but still bigger than the others – a Shaman. A glowing red gemstone topped the staff in its right hand, and a mixture of metal plates and stiff leather armoured its body, grey robes draped over its shoulders. But there was something else, something Arden had never seen before: barbed horns coiled around the Shaman’s head like some kind of bone-hewn crown.
A gust of wind swirled, and before Arden could react, a river of fire poured down over the rooftop, sweeping from right to left, illuminating the night in a blaze of light. The stone shook and parts of the roof collapsed, cracks creeping outwards, Bloodspawn shrieking and howling.
He looked up to see Valerys tear through the sky overhead, spreading his wings and turning back for a second pass. The wounds on the dragon’s chest were blackened and raw, the scales scarred around them.
“I told you to go,” Arden hissed. He blocked a swing from an Urak blade, then carved open the beast’s chest.
Amidst the flames and chaos, the Shaman raised its staff and unleashed a maelstrom of black fire laced with lightning into the air, forcing Valerys to twist and turn before swooping behind the remnants of an old tower.
The four Chosen broke into a charge, the firelight glowing incandescent on their silver plate.
“Lyrin!” Arden gestured at the charging Chosen with his Soulblade before whipping it back across his body to deflect the swipe of a Bloodspawn sword, then back again to carve into its cheeks and the bridge of its nose, and once more to sever the creature’s head. Half the creatures had been caught in the dragonfire, but the other half had only been shaken and were now regaining themselves around Arden and Lyrin.
“I see them!” Lyrin howled back.
With a pulse of the Taint, one of the Chosen leapt over a collapsed section of roof, its legs carrying it further than should have been possible.
The creature swung its níthral for Arden’s head as two Bloodspawn lunged from the left and right. Arden swept his Soulblade around, parrying two strikes while planting his right foot in the third attacker’s chest and sending it screaming through one of the newly-made holes in the roof.
The Chosen caught Arden in the helmet with a monstrous backhand that sent him reeling, then followed up with a downward swing of its Soulblade. The strike would have carved Arden open from the gut down had Lyrin not launched himself into its chest. The creature grabbed Lyrin by the back of the helmet and made to run him through with its crimson blade, but Lyrin released and reignited his own Soulblade in quick succession, the green light bursting through the Chosen’s forearm and ripping it free as Lyrin fell away.
The Chosen unleashed a feral howl, pulses of the Taint flowing from it in waves.
A roar gave a second’s warning before Valerys appeared in Arden’s periphery and dropped atop the Chosen. The dragon lifted the creature into the air, one talon wrapped around its leg, the other around its arm. He held it there for a moment before slamming it down a few feet to the left, the roof shaking once more, Bloodspawn scrambling to make way.
Valerys’s tail whipped back and knocked a clutch of Bloodspawn from the roof while arcs of blue lightning streaked from Calen’s palms at the nape of the dragon’s neck.
Valerys lifted his head, rolled his neck, then unleashed a torrent of white-hot fire down over the Bloodspawn Chosen. The creature’s legs thrashed for a moment, then went still, the Bloodspawn around it shrieking as their flesh and leather burst into flames.
A surge of power rippled through Arden’s Sigil, and the Rift opened behind him, but still he found himself staring into the raging dragonfire. And when the flames ceased, only ash remained.
“Go!” Calen roared from Valerys’s back, pointing towards the Rift. The dragon tore a Bloodspawn to pieces with a swipe of its forelimb, then unleashed another pillar of fire across the rooftop. “Haem, go!”
Through the flames, the Shaman stood tall, its gaze moving from Haem to Calen and Valerys, and behind it more Chosen leapt from the other rooves, the runes in their silver armour glowing.
Lyrin grabbed Arden by the shoulders and threw him backwards towards the Rift as more Bloodspawn closed around them. One last look over Arden’s shoulder saw Valerys lifting into the air, and then Arden fell through the Rift.
Ice washed over him and flowed through his veins, time standing still, the world becoming nothing but blackness.
He emerged from the Rift’s embrace into the Heart Chamber, dropping to his knees, his heart thumping.
Watchers swarmed around him, the candlelight sending their shadows in all directions. They were shouting. Why were they shouting?
The Watchers and priests didn’t stop at Arden, they rushed around him, their voices dull in his ears.
Slowly, he stood and turned. His mouth went dry, his throat tight.
Lyrin lay on the ground behind him, a black blade jutting from his chest, the handle of a staff sticking from his back, sheared where the Rift had sliced it.
“It’s all right, brother.” Arden pushed the others out of the way and pulled Lyrin into his arms. “I’ll get you to Heraya’s Well.” Arden rushed across the Heart Chamber, shoving aside anyone in his way. “Move! Move!”
“Didn’t see it coming,” Lyin choked, his helmet receding into his armour. He puffed out his cheeks. “Fucking hurts.”
“Stop talking.” Arden kicked open the door and charged down the hall, his steps echoing, people stopping and staring.
“Never.” Lyrin coughed.
“Lyrin, stop fucking talking.” Arden twisted as he stepped between two priests. “Get out of the way!”
Lyrin grunted. “I’m just happy I got to see a dragon.” He coughed, blood sprinkling his lips. “Fucking gods. Why does nobody tell you how much dying hurts?”
“You’re not dying. Now shut your mouth.”
“I’m pretty sure I’m dying.”
“If you don’t shut up, I’ll kill you.”
Lyrin coughed a bloody laugh, his lips curling into a weak smile. “Don’t look so sad, big guy. At least you’ll not have to put up with any more jokes.” His breathing grew heavy and laboured, his face twisting in pain. “It was an honour.”
“Just hold on.” Arden charged through the temple’s corridors and burst into the Tranquil Garden. He could see the glowing waters of Heraya’s Well ahead. “We’re here, we’re…”
Arden looked down, and there, in that moment, Lyrin was gone, his eyes empty, his head lolling.
A wave of loss pulsed from Arden’s Sigil and swept through him. Lyrin’s Sentinel armour turned to liquid and flowed back over his body, returning to the Sigil in his chest.
Arden stood in the garden with his friend’s body in his arms, the black blade protruding from a bloody tunic.
Watchers, and priests, and porters crowded around him, flooding into the garden.
Heraya’s Well was so close… They had almost made it.
“Why didn’t you shut your mouth?” Arden whispered.
“Brother Arden,” Gildrick called, grasping Arden’s arm, panic in his voice. “You must hurry, he doesn’t…”
Arden shook his head, and Gildrick’s voice faded. He clenched his jaw so tight he thought his teeth might snap, and then he pulled Lyrin’s body closer.