Spellscribed: Ascension (23 page)

Jalyin regarded him without expression, then took a drawn out breath as if she were trying to explain something to a child.

“Look. Your people don’t understand this, but where the Sha’hdi
come from, we are but public servants. We keep our people in line. Everyone knows that if they get too powerful, or get out of control with their power, anyone can petition the Poisonblades, or any other sisterhood of assassins to remove them. We do not work just for the politicians, nor the military, nor the tenders, nor the general populace. As servants, we perform a ‘service’, and that is to be both warning and weapon to those who make too many enemies.”

“That can’t possibly work. Anyone unscrupulous could hire an assassin to eliminate anyone who could be a threat to them, or their competition.” Endrance protested.

Jalyin raised an eyebrow. “That’s not how it works. As a public servant, we have the clearance from the Diarchy to fully investigate any requests before they are accepted. We are not without rules, checks and balances. Assassins who become known for taking numerous jobs without investigating may end up being the target of a public servant themselves.”

“So, you investigated this ‘job’ you had to target me?” Endrance asked.

Jalyin turned away and resumed her course, turning down one of the side passages. “Yes and no.” she replied.

“Which is it?”

“I did investigate the request, but the rules for only taking appropriate jobs only applies to the Sha’hdi or Suo’hdi.”

“So humans-”

“We have a strict law set down from the founding of our order. It is the foundation that allows us to operate on a public capacity. You can never take a job targeting a ruler, or the immediate family of a ruler. This is universal, applying to any species. Other than that, we can use our discretion.”

“So I was fair game?”

“You were a challenge.” Jalyin stopped before a passageway from the bridge and glanced over her shoulder. “I was to be paid very well to set up challenges along your journey. They had to be lethal, but not so overwhelming that you didn’t stand a chance of surviving. Then, if you survived long enough to get established in Balator, I could make three attempts at your life.”

“Which you did.
Once in the library, once during the eclipse, and once during the battle against Kalenden.” Endrance recalled. “What I didn’t understand is why you poisoned the daggers you hit Joven, Anna and Selene with, but you didn’t poison the one that you had clipped my head with.”

Jalyin turned to look at him straight on. “What do you mean? I poisoned every blade I threw that night.” Her delicate eyebrows furrowed as she looked more intently at him. “I thought you had a spell that was shielding you from poison.”

“If I had a spell like that, I would have used it on Anna.” Endrance quipped. “No, I never even thought about it until now. Joven said you had poisoned knives when we fought in the longhouse, but Joven’s really tough and had shaken it off before we even got out of the city.”

Jalyin sighed. “And it was such high quality venom too. That bodyguard of yours is a beast.”

Endrance shrugged. “He’s Joven.”

“Well, somehow you’ve managed to avoid it.” Jalyin responded. “Perhaps I did a poor job poisoning that knife.”

“Do you usually do a poor job at that?”

“No.”

“Ah.”

“Can we move on now?”

Endrance sighed. “Yes. Let’s go.”

The side passage was narrow, but with clean hand-cut stone walls and floor. Endrance had plenty of room to walk, but Jalyin had to stoop slightly as she walked. Every dozen yards, an empty torch sconce was fitted to the wall, the black iron banding bolted into the walls as part of the architecture. They passed seven sconces before the passage opened to a chamber.

The new room was only ten feet deep, but twenty wide. The ceiling opened up another few feet, so Jalyin stood up straight.

The room was empty except for a rectangular stone table in the center, with several stone blocks set in the floor around it to make simple seats. The center of the table had a depression that seemed proportional to the table’s dimensions. It was blackened with soot and scorches from fire.

“This was a rest and meal chamber for the workmen carving out the tomb.” Jalyin explained. “They would cook meals at the table and sleep over there.” She gestured at the floor to the side of the table. “This place should be good enough for you to work.”

“Work?”
Endrance asked, still looking over the room. There appeared to be no other ways into or out of the chamber than the one passage.

Jalyin walked around the table and picked up a black leather pack that had been hiding out of direct sight of the door. She set it on the stone table; and even though it looked full, Endrance didn’t hear any sound from the action.

“You have some effective equipment.” Endrance noted. “I’ve never seen objects so effective at hiding your presence.

Jalyin flicked open the straps of her pack and only tilted her head in response. “In my homeland, there is a forest. Inside, the sun has never reached the forest floor for thousands of years. The darkness inside is deeper than the darkest night, and the animals inside have adapted to thrive.”

Endrance had not been expecting her to be so forthright. She continued when he didn’t ask any questions.

“One of the predators there, we call a Dancer in Darkness. They are nearly impossible to detect and are vicious hunters, like that blood tiger you killed. If you can catch and kill one, its hide has several benefits, but it must be treated in order to survive being exposed to the suns.”

“Dancer in Darkness?” Endrance asked.

“Your people call them Umbral Stalkers, I think.” Jalyin admitted. “But I doubt many of you have ever encountered one and lived.”

“Probably.” Endrance admitted. “So what work am I supposed to do here?”

“I need you to examine the curse Valeria put on me before it spreads any farther. If I can’t treat it soon, I’ll be dead and of no use to you.” Jalyin stated.

“And if I refuse? You’re in no position to force me to do it.” Endrance replied.

Jalyin paused in rummaging through her pack. “If you refuse, I will die. You will eventually escape from here, but knowing nothing more about what she has planned for you.”

Endrance clenched his hands into fists as he struggled to think clearly. She had valuable information that could save him in the long run, should he encounter Valeria. But already, he was overburdened with information. She was dead, but wasn’t. Litches were very dangerous to begin with, but he couldn’t comprehend the magnitude of power that an Archmage-turned-litch would have at her disposal.

In fact, it seemed a bit too impossible. Endrance turned from Jalyin and lightly bumped his forehead against the stone wall of the chamber. Jalyin watched him with a puzzled expression on her face.

“What are you doing?” she asked.

“You said you managed to escape her?” Endrance asked
, his eyes narrowing as he turned back to her. “How?”

“What do you mean?” Jalyin
asked, her hands flat on the table. “I evaded her spells, but she managed to clip me with one. I was able to injure her enough to distract her and escape. However, I was not able to prevent her from getting a sample of my blood and she used it to curse me as I fled.”

“That’s what I’ve been having a problem with, Jalyin.” Endrance replied. “If she is who I think she is, there is no way that you, even as experienced as you are, could have escaped. Not when she was planning on eliminating you when you returned anyway. A wizard is an unstoppable force when given time to prepare, and she had years to be prepared for that moment.”

Jalyin’s eyes narrowed at him, but she didn’t move. “What are you trying to say?” she asked.

Endrance touched a hand to his dagger as he spoke. “Either you’re still working for her, and this is all a façade. Or she let you escape knowing exactly where you would go.”

For the first time ever, Endrance saw Jalyin’s face pale.

The resistance was light as they battled down the ramps to the bowl’s ground level. As they fought, Selene would survey the bowl as it was spread out before them from their height advantage, trying to spot some sign of her love or some clue of his location. Joven and Bridget were too focused on the fighting and didn’t search like she did.

Selene flicked her wrist as she twirled and the dagger end of her chain blade whirled in a tight arc around her. The deceptively strong, thin chain sang as it shifted. She released the grip of her other hand at the right instant and several feet of bound up chain expended their tension, shooting the dagger head forward two yards to catch a wolfman in the open mouth, the point of the blade erupting out of the back of its head. She yanked the chain as she took another twirling step forward, and the blade slid free, gobbets of clotted blood clinging to the dagger as she guided it into the head of a wolfman about to disembowel one of the breaching warriors that fought with them.

Above, the men were securing the area in front of the gates and positioning men along the edges of the cliff. They were firing arrows down into the invading forces as the breaching team moved forward. Behind the group of thirty warriors including Joven, Bridget, and Selene, were ranks of sword and shield bearing warriors. If the breaching team started to get overwhelmed, the shield men would assist their withdrawal behind their ranks and keep the wolfmen at bay while they regrouped and reinforced.

The tactic worked very effectively and, thus far, they had only suffered the loss of two warriors during their fight. One had been torn apart by three wolfmen who got under his greatsword, and the other died when a charging wolfman carried him over the side of the ramp, dropping him over sixty feet to the next ramp below.

Selene’s fighting style required others to give her wide berth, so she remained in the front lines the whole time. After the second man fell to his death, she took up the front near the cliff side. At least she could stay away from the edge and still engage enemies.  In a worst case scenario, if she was high enough from the ramp below she could grow wings to catch her fall. Not that she’d want to, but it was an option.

At first she had been embarrassed, fighting through the monstrous invaders wearing nothing but pretty clothes and a cloak, but as she started to realize how easy it was, she started to feel more confident in herself. The demon’s blood in her veins started burning and she realized by the time they were nearly to ground level, that she was starting to enjoy herself.

Once they had cleared the landing and immediate surroundings of wolfmen, Selene had to calm herself down. She was actually aroused and excited by the fighting, and part of her wanted nothing more than to find the nearest handsome warrior, tear his armor off and-

Selene shook her head, reining in her other side. She still had problems with
those
impulses, which she struggled with every day since her demonic half had awakened. She looked up and noticed several of the soldiers staring at her. She blinked at them and turned to Joven as he approached.

“What?” she asked.

Joven raised an eyebrow. “You’re smoking.”

Selene looked down at herself. Steam, thin amounts of it, were leaking from her pores and trailing up into the sky before vanishing. The smell of fresh rain wafted along with the steam.

“Am I?” she stated, smiling. “Oh well.”

“You’re not about to…” Joven gestured awkwardly with his hands. “Fwoosh, are you?”

“Fwoosh?” Selene replied.

“You know, burst into flames? I’ve seen it happen before.” Joven explained.

Selene laughed and shook her head, tossing her curly hair. “No! I’m fine. I just… got a little hot, that’s all.”

“Does that usually happen?” Joven asked.

“No idea.” Selene said uncomfortably. “I would guess only when I’m really… excited.”

Joven looked at her skeptically for several seconds before turning. “Okay. I’m going to just pretend its normal.”

They managed to clear the area for several hundred feet around the bottom of the ramps. Shortly, dozens of fully prepared warriors poured into the first bowl, spreading out into squads of eight men. Well-armed regulars of Balator’s military, these men had fought plenty of skirmishes against wolfmen in the past. They were able to enter the first few houses and eliminate the feral wolfmen with brutal efficiency.

It had only been a few hours since the attack began, but they had already begun to push the wolfmen back. They had numbers, but because of the actions of a mage they hoped was Endrance, a huge bulk of the forces the wolfmen had inside the bowl had been decimated, leaving the trickle of wolfmen who were swarming into the area in the wake of their missing assault group.

Selene looked up at the orb of ice and shook her head. The thing hung suspended in the air, turning slowly like a glass bead on an invisible string. Occasionally an arc of electricity would dance across the surface, illuminating the hundreds of black wolfish silhouettes within. She shuddered and turned her attention back to the next onrushing wolfman. The rest of the barbarians had been quite effectively ignoring it, instead taking pleasure in the fight they had before them. She should too.

Bridget slid into her view, swinging with her newly crafted blade. The hardened edge cut clean through the forearm of the wolfman who had been swinging at her and impacted its head just beside the muzzle. Her weapon wrenched free as she whirled to take down another wolfman with an equally efficient and powerful strike. Selene arced the chain dagger past Bridget, striking a wolfman as it came up behind her. Her fellow Draugnoa winked, panting, before turning with glee to end another wolfman’s existence.

Selene fell into a steady rhythm of battle, the sounds of the warriors around her grunting with exertion, cries of pain from the living, and the sound of her chain singing became as music to her. She danced to the tune, getting fully into the motion, her body swaying with the sounds as she whirled and worked the chain blade with a precision she had not ever allowed herself to get into before.

Before the day she had fought Jalyin and Kalenden up atop the mountain, she had never used her chain dagger to kill. She had trained with it for years, the only one who had incidentally been able to learn through the many cuts she suffered from her mistakes. She could hit a target from twenty feet, or spear a melon from a sister’s hands without risking cutting them. However that had all been training and practice under controlled conditions. The Ergkinoa were not required to fight in the military despite their training, and she had never pitted her skills against another warrior before she fought Jalyin.

It had been clear that her skills were not enough to cross the gap between her and the assassin. In case she returned, Selene had been training every day she could steal away. She had been trying harder and harder challenges. She was confident she could hit a target twice as far away if her weapon had the length; or spear an apple from someone’s hand without coming close to cutting them.

Now, in the heat of battle, and able to fully unleash her skills, she found the wolfmen surprisingly easy. Their movements almost seemed in slow motion, and her eyes caught every motion they made as she fought. The chain wrapped and unwrapped in rapid succession around her body and arms. Like an intimate dancer, she worked with her blade; striking down enemies before they even had a chance to react to her coming within range.

Selene had struck down yet another wolfman when she finally realized that the sounds of the men around her had faded. Glancing back, the rest of the breaching team had fallen over a dozen yards behind her. Between them, a trail of bloody corpses was left in her wake. Countless wolfmen lay scattered around her path, both dead and some still twitching.

Selene took off at a run, moving back towards the group as they finished off the remaining wolfmen they were engaged with. As she approached, Joven looked past her and whistled appreciatively.

“Gods…” he muttered. “What have you been doing for practice? You’ve torn through as many wolfmen today as the rest of us together!”

Selene blushed. Bridget, her chest heaving as she caught her breath, laughed. “Selene was always the scariest of the Ergkinoa, Joven. She just doesn’t like to show it.”

“She would scare me if I had to fight her.” Joven admitted, scratching the back of his head. “I heard you were good, but damn.”

Selene checked over her weapon for damage. “I didn’t think I had gotten this good.”

“Could it be, you know, the other half helping?” Joven asked. He pulled a hand axe from his belt and casually hurled it off to the side, catching a lone wolfman in the head as it charged at them.

Selene shook her head. She was good, but she still had a long way to go to be as casually lethal as Joven just was. He could be sitting at home having pleasant conversation, for how much constant battling seemed to affect him. “I don’t know.
Maybe. Endrance said that my mother was a type of demon that didn’t prefer to fight, but that didn’t mean they weren’t capable.”

Bridget shook her head, hefting her weapon again. “It’s always the quiet ones, you know?” she said, smiling as she walked past Selene.
“Now, c’mon. We’ve got twenty seven stunned men behind us and gods know how many more wolfmen between us and the front gates. I want to make this a one day victory!”

Selene watched her move ahead as the remaining warriors hustled to catch up. Joven leaned down and plucked his hand axe from the dead wolfman’s head. “She seems to have adjusted well.”
He observed, wiping the clotted mess off on the wolfman’s hide before slipping it back onto his belt.

“I think a big battle like this is what she needed.” Selene replied, wrapping the chain across her palm and elbow of one arm as she prepared it for re-entering combat. “She can feel like she’s not useless, and she can get out some of those pent up feelings she’s had.”

Joven hefted the axe of his father and nodded. “Yep.” He replied. “Though the enemies are kind of pathetic, now that we know what we’re dealing with.”

Selene looked up at the scintillating orb of ice in the air above them. “I think that without Endrance, it would have been a much harder fight. We would have been up to our eyes in wolfmen every step of the way.”

“Yeah?”

“Look at what I’ve done. How many I’ve killed.”

“Yeah.”

“Now look up there, how many do you think he killed there?”

“…” Joven hesitated. “I can’t count that high.”

“Neither can
I. All of those could have been down here, with us.”

“Damn it.” Joven grumbled
good naturedly. “Even when we’re mounting a rescue operation, Endrance just has to make it easier for us.”

Selene giggled. “It wouldn’t be our Spengur if he didn’t have our people’s best interests at heart, even when he should be instead thinking of his own hide.”

The two moved forward, skirting the edge of the reservoir. The front gates were in sight, the armies of Balator were at their backs and she had managed to prove she was better than she was a month before. Things were already looking better.