Chapter 15 #2
Their demonic essence responded to his will. Were part and parcel of the abyss. He focused on the Well and closed his eyes. Their wounds were bright gashes in his mind’s eye, black smoke streaming from them into his personal abyss.
And the power that brought.
Each moment had only empowered his ability, raised the rate of absorption, so that he could sense how rapidly they were weakening now, strength fleeing their limbs, movements growing ragged and jerky, their very vitality smothered.
“Mine,” he said, and raised his hand. “All that you are is mine.”
Another pulse washed out, and this time Nessa moaned and fell to one knee. Sam’s protection had truly faltered.
But the Handmaidens turned to run.
“Mine,” he intoned again, and with all the might of the Crown, he willed them to turn and face him.
His will, empowered beyond all measure, reached out and snared them.
The six—no, five, as his Shadow Elixethera cut one down—slowed, strained, then turned back to look at him over their shoulders.
He could see their essence now with the naked eye. Flooding out of their bodies, draining them like wine sacks, causing their flesh to waste away, their eyes to bulge, their skin to turn sallow. Armor listed on bony frames, hair grew straw-like, and their breaths became rapid and shallow.
Void motes drifted across them again and again, slashing them apart. Harald brought his focus to bear, and dark clouds appeared around first one then the next, void blades slashing and hewing and tearing them apart.
One fell in a geyser of flayed skin and jointed bones.
Then another.
More power flooded into his Well.
He caught a third essence and bound her to his Cosmos.
His twin Shadow Handmaidens drew back, eyes wide with glee as they watched their sisters waste away.
The air had grown a deep purple, heavy and thick like near-frozen water, and Harald felt his will made manifest as he drank the last from the remaining three Handmaidens. Fire ran through his veins, majesty burned in his soul, and he felt his presence crush them.
The Well grew only hungrier.
Another pulse washed out, the most potent yet, and the three Handmaidens crumpled.
Nessa fell over as well, but he ignored that. She would be fine. It was just nausea, and she was a big girl.
Had he ever thought wine delicious? Had he ever thought anything sweet?
This was beyond all experience. This was sinking his teeth into the very fabric of power and feasting.
Sonora Manor was a distant shadow. The grass had turned black.
The moon was a bruised disc seen through the screen of his Imperium.
Oh, wonder.
Oh, joy.
The Demon Seed was thrilling within him.
Harald strolled up to the first Handmaiden. She was on her knees, aged to look like a centenarian. She raised her face, trembling, trying to whisper something, but clasping the Scourge with both hands, he cut her head clear off her shoulders.
She toppled over, her essence flooding into him.
Over to the next.
Who was weeping tears of black blood, which ran into the seams of her once perfect cheeks.
Another blow, and she toppled, too.
The last had collapsed onto her side, laboring to breathe, unable to do more than turn her head to stare at her approaching nemesis.
The three Shadow Handmaidens watched impassively from one side.
Harald considered interrogating the last demon, but that felt beneath him. So he reversed his grip on the great blade and drove it down with all his might. It punched clear through her head, shattering the skull, and she sank into the turf.
More essence.
The abyss knows its own.
By the decree of the Fallen Angel, you are granted the next echelon of your destiny:
Abyssal Master 10
Harald shuddered with delight. Such power. And now? It was such a shame to waste it. But what could he do? March over to the cathedral and challenge the remaining Handmaidens by himself?
No.
Reluctantly, he looked at where Nessa lay gasping by Sam’s side, spew on the grass where she’d just finished retching.
No. He had to tend to his friends.
Didn’t he?
For a long, aching moment he just considered his fallen companions. But then Sam moaned, fought to rise, and managed to push herself up to one elbow. She met Harald’s gaze, and the spell was broken.
Harald allowed his Thrones to fall quiet, banished the Shadow Handmaidens, and dismissed the Scourge.
“What a pity,” came a dry, bored voice from above.
Exeros.
He hovered in his child-form, six wings still and spread out about him, face stern as he stared down at Harald. Filthy, dressed in rags, his appearance was utterly incongruous with the cold, radiant disdain that was burning off him as he watched Harald.
“Exeros.” Harald passed his hand across his lips. “You’re…?”
“Staying my hand, for now.” The angel’s voice was cold-burning iron. “But you came so close, Darrowdelve. So close to my extending my hand… alas.” His form began to collapse into a mote of light once more. “There will surely be a next time.”
Harald felt a chill course through him as he realized how close he’d come to total destruction. Then, shaking off the fear, he rushed over to where his companions lay.
“Sam. Where are you…” But it was obvious. A terrible gash in her shoulder. A bleeding hole in her side. “Here.” He tore his scale pouch free and poured Golden Dawns into her palm. “Absorb them.”
Nessa slowly sat up, her color gradually returning. “Urgh. What… was that?”
Harald poured the remainder of his scales into her cupped palms as well. They glimmered and disappeared, and she blinked, revived.
“They’re dead?” Sam looked around the grounds. Dead demons lay strewn about them. “How did we…?”
“I thought we were dead.” Nessa passed her hand over her blood-smeared brow.
“I…” Harald sat down heavily on the grass.
The chill of Exeros’ warning sat like a heavy stone in his chest. Right where the Well was still thrumming with well-fed satisfaction.
“We should have… been?” He felt the heady exultation fade away.
Felt himself return to some semblance of…
normality? What had even happened there at the end?
Sam inhaled deeply as the scales did their work, and then looked past Harald to where the wizened Handmaidens lay executed. “Harald…?” There was a mixture of wonder and horror in her voice. “What did you… how did you do that? Who was that angel child?”
Harald stared at the executed Handmaidens. He could remember cutting them down, but that felt like another person, someone lost to intoxication and glory, more like a fever-dream than a memory.
“Wow.” Nessa’s tone was bleak. “We… did we actually defeat… how many is that? Ten? Eleven Handmaidens?”
“Not us,” said Sam. “Looks like this was mostly just Harald.”
He dry-swallowed. “First things first. That floating angel child was Exeros. He… I guess he was watching me fight, wondering if he’d be given cause to step in and kill me.
” Harald took a deep breath and forced a shaky smile.
“Guess I just managed to avoid that fate this time around. And! In answer to your statement, no, it wasn’t just me.
I couldn’t have done it without you both. ”
Nessa raised a brow in skepticism.
“No, I’m serious. Starfire Bastion alone was a huge help. All that you both brought to the table.”
“But…?” prompted Nessa.
“But… yeah. My new powers. The consolidation I underwent. And… this wasn’t a normal fight.”
“Fighting a dozen Handmaidens isn’t normal?” asked Sam, tone deceptively bland.
“I mean, they felt particularly susceptible to my attacks. My abyssal powers. They’re made from the abyss. And so my—I told you that I now have a permanent opening to the abyss in my soul, right?”
Both women stared at him blankly.
“It’s not as bad as it sounds!” Harald hurried to reassure them. “It’s just a, you know, like a well or a hole I can open or close when I need, and it, well—it drains vitality and strength through people’s wounds. Empowers me with it, like my Abyssal Grasp used to. Remember my shadow tentacles?”
“The ones the dwarves said fed the demons?” asked Nessa dryly.