30. Rourk
Chapter thirty
Rourk
A guttural cry bursts from me as Galene falls.
Blood seeps from her stomach and stains her clothes. Horror and rage fuel me. I charge at Thanek with a sword in one hand and a spear in another. I can’t think about losing Galene. I channel the anger and lash out, striking with my sword and swinging the spear.
Thanek blocks or avoids my attacks, and the ones that land on him do no damage at all. But that thrumming sensation is no longer jarring me. I realize, as I duck under his sword, that something has changed. Galene has done something to him.
Thanek strikes out and the sword gets knocked from my hand, so I spin the spear in a flourish and bring it down into his boot. The spear tip pierces the boot and causes Thanek to jerk and reel back.
Relief floods me as I side step a swing of his sword while he staggers away. He has been weakened. His attacks have slowed slightly, as well. Galene harming herself has removed some of his power .
That’s it. Thanek’s bloodline. It needs to go. Removing his family will weaken him and allow us to defeat him. That’s what Aldus had implied, and what Galene was trying to tell me in her last moments.
But Thanek is enraged and I know he’s still too powerful of a foe. He slams his sword down, and I jump away in time to feel the rush of air and the shockwave behind me as the blade strikes the roof.
I spare a glance at Galene’s fallen body and my blood runs cold. Did she just move? I can’t be certain. I need to stay focused on my enemy. Tears sting my eyes as I fight.
It’s then that I see someone is watching us from a nearby roof. Across the street, on a lower building, is Aldus. Nearby flames on the street highlight him in a blood-red light. He’s been watching us this whole time. Waiting for Thanek to consume Galene’s power. The man is a monster. The sight of him churns my stomach and floods me with dark anger. I can tell he’s proud of himself for getting the better of me with his earth manipulation magic. He thinks he’s better than everyone.
I duck and roll under Thanek’s next sword strike, and as I come up, I run to the edge of the roof. I let my spear fly with a heavy grunt. Aldus has a second to register the trajectory before the spear pierces his chest and pins him to the roof.
Weaken the bloodline. Weaken the enemy. So be it.
Thanek growls with anger as he comes to me. I snatch up a sword and then roll to collect a second sword as a wave of black magic passes by me. He is weakened. I can feel it. His magic and presence no longer jar me.
“Insolent wretch!” he yells as he swings at me .
I meet him in a flourish of strikes. He is furious and relentless, and my left arm has begun to numb and weaken. Twisting away from his sword swings, I lash out and manage to slice through his shoulder armor. A pauldron drops to the roof with a heavy thud. Despite my bruises, the blood seeping from several places, and the numbness in my arm, I fight on, fueled with renewed energy. I can no longer feel myself. I just know I have to do everything I can to send this demon back to hell.
While I duck and sidestep two sword strikes, I unleash a quick succession of attacks with both swords to slice through Thanek’s thighs and shins. That will slow him down even more. One of my swords gets stuck in his leg and I lose my grip on it.
A wave of black energy crashes down on me, but I twist to the side and drop to the ground, letting it crack through the roof. I come across a spear on the ground. Now’s my moment. I throw the sword at Thanek’s face, causing him to deflect it with his broadsword. As he does so, I spring up with the spear. He moves faster than I expected and a torrent of burning black light erupts like a rupture of water from the roof. It knocks me into the air and breaks the spear in two. Crippling pain grips me as I’m thrown upward amid the gushing black flames, my bones trembling and muscles burning.
I fall back toward Thanek with the two pieces of spear on either side of me. Before the tumultuous agony overwhelms me and I pass out, I snatch the spear tip from the air and slam it down into the flesh of his neck. A beam of black energy shoots out from the puncture and throws me off him. I hit the roof hard and look up to see Thanek staggering back, his steps faltering. He drops his enormous broadsword and falls to his knees, the spear tip still in his neck.
Thanek reaches a weak hand up to the spear tip, but he is too wounded to grasp it. His helmet is cracked and, as I push myself to my feet, the helmet begins to snap and break apart. It falls in three heavy chunks and thuds onto the roof. A bone-white face is revealed with matted hair the color of straw. He is just a man, who looks no older than me. His face is hardened with pain, gasping for breath with blood sputtering from his mouth. Other than his height, he could be any man I walk by in the streets. Hardly what I expected the Dark King of Old to look like.
Waves of nausea crash through me as his power disperses. He’s down. His power is leaving him. But it’s not over yet. Life is still in him.
I push myself to my feet and pick up Thanek’s broadsword with great effort, managing to get it up and resting on my shoulder. The dark, thrumming energy from it rattles me, but I ignore it as I stand over him. On his knees, he reaches my height. There is a dull melancholy on his smooth face, as if he is waiting for me to strike the final blow. Accepting it. Thankful for it. His lips move as if he’s trying to tell me something, but no sound comes out.
Thanek sways in place for a moment, before I bring the broadsword down with a heavy grunt to slice into his torso. The blade slices through his shoulder and almost cleaves off his arm.
A torrent of black energy detonates from him, throwing me off my feet. The power dissolves into the air and vanishes in the night sky. The Dark King becomes a corpse once again.
I lay on my back, gasping for breath and fighting through the pain searing through me. Now the fight is over, my injuries are hitting me at once. But I have enough left in me to push myself up, and I stumble over to Galene’s body.