From the Ashes (16 page)

             
Distracted, for a moment, by one such altercation, a searing line of fire across his forearm as one of Memphias’ daggers managed to find its target. The skin crackled and steamed as the dark sorceries contested with his enhanced healing, but a conscious thought caused the wound to heal, even as the Master Assassin leapt in for another attack with a snarl.

             
This wouldn’t do. He was being penned in, overwhelmed.

             
An instant of concentration, and a sphere of air exploded outwards from him, hurling all his aggressors away for a moment and giving him an instant’s respite. He leapt upwards on legs of titanic might, soaring through the air in a graceful flip to land on the dais, the stone flags beneath him smashing into a crater twenty feet wide.

             
His foes turned to face him, readying themselves to attack and Stone snarled in frustration. He could feel the unlimited power at his beck and call, there, pressing like water against a dam, calling for use. But he couldn’t. Reality still throbbed with the echoes of his entrance.

             
He was living in a world of cardboard, he thought. Tread lightly. Maintain balance. There will be a time and a place to unleash his potential.

             
For now, find other ways to win.

             
A brief thought crossed his mind, of almost forgotten friends, even as the enemy leapt the balustrade and flew towards him, daggers poised for the kill. He smiled, the torches about the room flaring into life at his command, the Khrdas and their dark leader falling to the floor in shock at the fresh light. It took but a moment for them to regain their composure, but when they looked up the giant was gone.

             
Memphias snarled, even as the Khrdas whimpered and whined in their cloaks of smoke beneath the onslaught of the light.

             
“The King’s Tower… move!”

***

The air in the tunnel was strange; first it was warm, growing warmer as they moved underground; but now the air was growing colder, fresher, as they made their way down towards the docks carved into the cliffs beneath Pen-Merethia. The freshness was welcome, the salty coolness of the air seeming to wash away the taint of the bloodshed they were leaving behind.

              Though Alann had an inkling there was yet more to come.

             
“You know who that was, don’t you…?” came the voice of Narlen in the gloom.

             
Elerik replied, his voice quiet.

“We were all there, in the arena, Plainsmen.”

              Alann nodded in the dark. He knew who it was. But at the same time, he had seemed different to the man he’d once seen. There was no cruelty or malice in the angel that had flashed into existence before them. There was only power. Forgiveness. And hope.

             
“Who was it…?” came another voice, Naresh, as they continued through the Warren. “I wasn’t there in the Arena. I was lugging food through these very tunnels.”

             
Narlen laughed at the irony.

             
“That great being of light back there, my friend,” he explained, “was none other than your King himself.”

             
Naresh gave a gasp.

             
“That was Invictus…?”

             
A chorus of nods, though pointless in the dark, before Alann spoke out.

             
“’Was’ being the operative word. Whatever that man was, he’s no longer Invictus, of that I’m sure. I felt nothing but strength and goodness flowing out from him. That’s not the tyrant of legend.”

             
Grunts of agreement, for each man had been rocked by the visitation.

             
And to tell the truth, Alann, who talked so much of the change within Stone, felt changed within himself now. How, he didn’t yet know. But he felt
different
following his encounter. The man’s words; no-one should have known that. No-one. Yet he did. He’d heard tales, of course, that shamans could rip the memories from a man’s mind. But such things were painful, traumatic. He’d felt none of that. Only an overwhelming sense of peace and relief.

             
If what the giant had said was true then Alann no longer needed to hunger for revenge. If there truly was a world beyond this and his wife, his son, were safe and happy, then what would it matter finding and avenging them upon the flesh of his nemesis?

             
His blinding hunger no longer leading him astray, he could finally embrace the role that life had been so insistent on thrusting upon him and he so reluctant to take. He could be the leader of men his people had always seen him as. He’d always shied away from the role as best he could; not from humility, but from fear of failure, fear that his thirst for vengeance would cause him to lead his people into danger.

             
A fear he’d thought realised when Kurnos had wrought havoc on his men in the forest of the North. But now… the Foresters; Iain at their head, here with the shaman army. His family; happy, at peace in the afterlife, no longer calling at him for revenge.

             
He felt lighter, more focussed, like a man once out of shape, but now trim and healthy once more. He grasped the axe in his hand; plain, unadorned, workmanlike – so like him – and felt a buzz, a tingling within that he could have sworn he felt echoing  in the wood and steel of his weapon.

             
“Nearly there…”

             
He focused into the gloom at Naresh’s words, spying the light growing brighter at the end. Yes, they were nearly there. The tunnel would soon open out into the great cove wherein sat the docks of Merethia. The air, which he had expected to grow even fresher and salty with brine, took on a tingling, greasy feel. His stomach turned at the recognition.

             
Sorcery.

             
They were expected.

***

Resistance about the right flank of the Pen that swung round to the causeway was relatively light and Hofsted grunted. Things were never this easy. Usually a calm such as this was merely to lull them into a false sense of security.

             
The front of the column rounded a rock, the foot of the storm-lashed causeway lying a hundred yards ahead, and the Lieutenant’s suspicions were proven correct. Oh, were they proven correct…

             
The creatures snarled and shrieked at the sight of the mortals; glowing red eyes filled with hate that stared out beneath black and twisting horns. They stood upright, like men, on long, sinewy legs that ended in cloven hooves, their black-skinned arms wielding cruel weapons of bone and fire, so similar to those of Kurnos before. The Tulador Guard stopped in their tracks, eyeing the monstrous gathering before them, some shivering, others retching, at the sight of the unnatural host. Arbistrath turned to Wrynn with horrified eyes, the Shaman answering him before the question left his lips.

             
“Demon spawn,” he explained, spitting the words as though unable to bear the taste of them on his tongue. “The lowliest servants of the infernal powers we face.”

             
As if in response to his words, the demons clamoured and called, spitting and frothing in eagerness to spill the mortal blood they smelt before them, yet not venturing closer, held back as though on a leash.

             
“Why do they not charge us?” enquired Hofsted, his tone indicating that he was not entirely uncomfortable with the fact.

             
Wrynn pointed out with a mighty hand, gesturing to the rippling line of air that scored the earth before them.

             
“The creatures of hell can exist on our plain for only so long. If they were to move closer to us, such lowly demons would dissipate quickly, like so much smoke from a fire. But the Portal atop the Beacon stretches thin the walls between worlds; within the sphere of its influence, they can remain quite happily.”

             
Marlyn nodded in understanding, as he appeared at Wrynn’s side.

             
“So they can’t get out, but we can get in?”

             
“Precisely.”

             
Marlyn smiled at Hofsted who grinned in turn, hefting his cannon.

             
“Tulador Guards – present arms!”

***

No matter how fast he moved, Stone couldn’t outrun the Khrdas, for the shadows were their natural home now; the dimness of every corner, the gloom behind every door, the assassins leaping out from each one to strike at him.

Therefore he walked at a relaxed gait as he wound his way up the servants’ staircase above the kitchens.

A column of stone on the wall, the flickering torch mounted there casting a dark shadow, so Stone was ready. The Khrda leapt out, appearing from nowhere as it sprang from the darkness, trailing the roiling cloak of shadows behind it. He wasted no time being elaborate, merely catching the creature’s bladed forearm in one mighty hand, crushing metal and bone, dashing the assassin to ruin against the wall before casting it down the stairs. It would return, he knew, in moments, leaping once more from the shadows whole and restored.

Distractions, nothing more, meant to hinder his progress, stop him reaching his objective.

But nothing could.

Slowly, patiently, he continued  his ascent, climbing the winding staircase of the Seers’ Tower.

***

The docks of Merethia. A vast port, once busy, bustling with life. But now a ruin, a graveyard; mariners from the East Coast, traders, merchants, ship guards, all slain and broken, corpses littering the wooden harbour; ghost ships floating at their moorings, some having broken away in the storm that enveloped the aptly named Isle out to sea, drifting off to bump into other vessels or run aground on the harsh, unforgiving rocks of the coast.

              Yet despite the cold wind, the briny spray of the ocean, the air rippled with a haze like summer heat as the Four made their way out, blinking, into what light the grey clouds permitted through.

             
“This way,” whispered Naresh as he made to move. “This path leads round the coast to the Causeway.” He suppressed a shudder of grief as he ran, the others following; this is the way Jafari would have come, having fled from his bondage, seeking refuge in the dark warmth of the tunnels they left behind.

             
They rounded a counting house, the wooden building sprawled with corpses, when a smell assailed their nostrils; the pungent reek of sulphur, tinged with the sharp tang of smoke. A flash of fire on the decking before them and they screeched to a halt, feet sliding on the wet wood. A flaming tear in reality, cloven feet touching the deck as legs stretched out, arms coalescing into being, heads forming in a cloud of smoke.

             
Malevolent red eyes stared at them in fury as the horned creatures crawled into existence, fangs gnashing, tongues lashing, claws grasping sickles of bone and daggers of flame. Demons from the worst nightmares of childhood, come to life to take theirs.

             
The men gasped in horror, weapons held limp to their sides in shock, all save Alann who stood his ground, unyielding in the face of terror. One of the black-skinned beasts glared at him, hissing an otherworldly screech that tortured the air, before charging, a tangled mass of limbs and claws.

             
The axe in Alann’s hand sang as he whipped it up, the head seeming to aim itself with marksman accuracy as he swung it with practiced ease. The demon’s horned head flew off, eyes wide in confusion as it disappeared in the waters of the harbour. The lifeless body collapsed to the floor, disappearing in a great flare of dark orange flame and smoke as it did.

             
The Woodsman turned to his men, his axe held out to his side, the silvery head gleaming in the pale light of the sun, untarnished by blood or flame. The gathered demons hissed at the weapon, backing off, tense, as though he were holding a venomous snake rather than a simple tool.

             
“Smoke and flames, my friends, that’s all they are.”

             
The trio, emboldened by their leader’s example, hefted their weapons, determination returning to their eyes as they moved to his sides. Alann turned back to the waiting demons, readying his axe once more, eyes narrowed.

             
“Nothing but smoke and flames…”

***

The elite of the Shaman army bore down on the Causeway, fighting through the foes as they pressed forth onto the bridge. The demons came at them in waves, but the destructive firepower of the Tulador Guards had decimated them from afar, the magicks of the shamans themselves mopping up the rest. Though the spirits seemed reluctant to tackle these foes.