The Haunted Lands: Book III - Unholy Page 31

  The illusions vanished. It didn’t look as if any of the magic had actually wounded the one remaining Malark, but he faltered for just an instant, time enough for Mirror’s form to fill in and become discernibly manlike again—still faceless, but at least possessed of limbs and a head—and avoid another attack by plunging into the solid ground beneath him.

  Singing a battle anthem, gripping his sword with both hands, Bareris rushed in and feinted high. Malark didn’t try to parry or dodge the false attack. He simply dipped his own weapon to threaten his adversary’s groin and, when Bareris tried to block, whirled and smashed a back kick into his chest.

  The impact would have killed a living man. Ribs snapped, and Bareris reeled backward and fell.

  As he did, he caught a glimpse of the rest of the battle. Many of the guardians were still attacking Szass Tam, the zulkirs of the council, and Nevron’s familiars. But some were turning their attention to the knot of struggling figures in the center of the mountaintop.

  A pair of plague spewers rushed to take Malark’s assailants from behind. One collapsed into a shapeless heap of carrion, as though its bones had melted. The horns now torn from its head, Nevron’s ghour lunged, tackled the other, and bore it down to the ground.

  A death tyrant floated down from on high. Still all but hidden in the midst of many such creatures, Szass Tam rattled off words in some sibilant Abyssal tongue. The undead beholder twisted its eyestalks to gaze at itself, then discharged flares of virulence into its own putrid flesh.

  Plainly, though surely finding it a formidable task even to protect themselves, the archmages were trying their best to do the job Aoth had given them. And Bareris had to get back to doing his. Clenching his teeth at the grinding pain of his shattered ribs, he clambered to his feet, resumed singing his battle anthem, and circled to attack Malark from behind.

  The spymaster whirled, parried the cut, then spun back around and swept the staff at Jet. The griffon ducked, and the staff simply brushed across the top of his skull. Still, that was enough to make him scream and send him stumbling backward. He lashed his head back and forth as though trying to clear it.

  Malark pivoted to threaten Bareris, accelerating as he moved. He was fast when he started, but lightning by the time he finished. Bareris sprang back, and the staff fell short by the length of a finger joint.

  Somehow Malark had cast an enchantment of quickness on himself without the necessity of chanting or mystic passes. Perhaps he’d carried the spell stored in a talisman, or maybe it was his rulership of this place that allowed him to invoke it so easily.

  He threw himself at his two remaining adversaries, and his blows hammered at them like raindrops in a downpour. Even though Aoth and Bareris tried to flank him, they still found it impossible to attack. It was all they could do to parry and retreat.

  Meanwhile, Bareris sang a charm to make Aoth and himself as quick as Malark had become. But he doubted he’d have time to finish, especially after the spymaster, plainly recognizing his intent, concentrated his attacks on him.

  Then a mesh like a huge piece of spiderweb shimmered into existence on top of the former monk, tangling his limbs and gluing him to the ground. Bareris suspected Szass Tam had conjured it. As Malark’s wards burned the sticky strands away, Bareris sang the last note of his own spell. His muscles jumped at the infusion of power. No doubt feeling it too, Aoth bellowed a war cry, thrust his spear at the spymaster, and they all fought on.

  Bareris wanted to believe he’d done more than postpone the inevitable. Surely it mattered that he’d canceled out Malark’s advantage. And that Mirror was rising from the earth to reenter the fight. And that Jet, the feathers on his head soaked with blood, was bounding forward to do the same.

  Surely the four of them could surround Malark and cut him down. It wasn’t as if the bastard couldn’t die. He’d done it once already, when Samas had buried him in molten lead.

  But back in the Dread Ring, Malark hadn’t been a god. In this place, he avoided nine strokes out of every ten, and the one that landed glanced harmlessly off his protections. Meanwhile, he struck back with dazzling speed and showed no signs of slowing, unlike Aoth and Jet, whose chests heaved and whose breaths rasped.

  We’re going to lose, Bareris decided. And he could think of only one mad ploy that might conceivably change that dismal outcome.

  He raised his sword over his head, opening himself up, and charged Malark. Trailing tendrils of crackling shadow, the traitor’s staff whirled to meet him, and he did nothing to parry or avoid it. It smashed into his torso, and everything disappeared.

  Jhesrhi dashed toward So-Kehur, never mind if it looked odd for a decrepit, hobbling hag like Lallara to sprint. At this point, stopping the steel scorpion was more important than maintaining her masquerade.

  She pushed between two spearmen and obtained a clear view of all of So-Kehur, not just the part that loomed above the heads of ordinary people. At the moment, the scorpion-thing was no longer ripping into the formation, but only because he’d paused to deal with a foe who’d emerged from it to attack him. One of his tentacles was dragging Khouryn out from underneath him.

  The dwarf still had his urgrosh in his hands, but he wasn’t moving, and Jhesrhi couldn’t tell if he was alive. If so, he wouldn’t be for much longer. Not unless someone diverted So-Kehur’s attention.

  Drawing on her own strength and the power that other mages were lending her to aid her impersonation, she spoke to the earth, and stones thrust up out of the dirt. Then she married her mind to the wind and made it an extension of her will, like an extra pair of hands.

  The wind screamed, snatched up the rocks, and hurled them at So-Kehur’s various eyes. Any natural creature reflexively protected its sight, and she prayed the autharch possessed the same instincts.

  One missile cracked the opalescent left eye in the mask that passed for the scorpion-thing’s human face. Another snapped a writhing antenna with an optic gleaming at the end.

  Still clutching and dragging Khouryn, but for the moment no longer concerned with him, So-Kehur turned to face his new attacker.

  Bareris hadn’t slept since becoming undead, but violence could smash the awareness out of him, and he supposed that must be what had happened. Sprawled on his back, his torso ablaze with pain, he groggily tried to lift his head. Then, trading attacks, Aoth and Malark passed through his field of vision, the sellsword captain retreating and the immortal pushing him back.

  The sight of them sparked Bareris’s memory. He, Aoth, Mirror, and Jet had assailed Malark and found themselves outmatched. So, depending on his unnatural hardiness and recuperative powers to help him weather the assault, he’d allowed the former monk to land a solid blow with the staff, charged with destructive power though it was.

  Remembering, he froze. His desperate gamble would fail if Malark realized he’d survived.

  Although it was possible it had already failed no matter what. He’d expected injury, pain, but not agony like this. What if he could no longer move, or at least, not fast enough to make his plan succeed?

  He thrust doubt out of his mind. Malark was the last obstacle on the path to Szass Tam, and after waiting a hundred years for vengeance, he’d clear the way no matter what. He just had to lie perfectly still, watch the fight through slitted eyes, and wait for Malark to set a foot in the right place.

  Finally, the immortal did. Bareris snatched with both hands, grabbed Malark’s ankle, and squeezed with all his might.

  The bones didn’t crack. Malark’s mystical defenses prevented it. But Bareris had him anchored.

  Its tip shrouded in writhing shadow, the staff of murky crystal stabbed down repeatedly. Still maintaining his grip, Bareris wrenched himself back and forth in an effort to keep the blows from landing squarely.

  They did anyway, each jolt of torment so intense that for that moment, it was as though nothing else existed. But he managed to hold on nonetheless, and then the assault stopped. Aoth, Mirror, and Jet had rushed to surround Mala
rk, and he lifted his staff to defend against them.

  The spymaster could no longer retreat, only duck, sway from side to side, and parry. It should have made a difference, but his weapon flicked from guard to guard with impossible speed and precision, blocking one attack after another.

  A death tyrant floated toward the struggle, and, sensing the threat, Jet whirled, leaped, lashed his wings, and threw himself at the creature. Malark’s staff swept through Mirror’s shadowy form, and the phantom flickered as though tottering on the edge of nonexistence. The staff then leaped to deflect Aoth’s stabbing spear, the parry nearly knocking the shaft out of the warmage’s hands.

  Bareris didn’t think he could squeeze any harder, but he tried anyway. Drawing on his hate and rage, he crooned a malediction.

  Malark’s ankle cracked, and his body jerked. The staff stopped spinning and leaping from point to point.

  Already glowing, the head of Aoth’s spear flared like a lightningbolt, while Mirror’s blade changed from a splinter of darkness to a light as bright as the sun. The two warriors hurled themselves at Malark, and their weapons punched all the way through the immortal’s torso, the spear with an audible thud and a splash of blood, the sword silently and cleanly.

  The staff fell from Malark’s hands to clink against the stony ground. For a moment, he looked astonished. Then he smiled, laughed, and more blood drooled from his mouth. “Thank you,” he breathed. “I wish you could see it too. It’s everything I …” His knees buckled, and he fell.

  The jagged crown floated up off his head, and the staff too rose into the air. Bareris realized Szass Tam must be drawing them to him. They were likely the instruments that had given Malark control of this artificial world and had made him nearly invincible, and were apt to prove more powerful still in the possession of the archmage who’d actually created them.

  Bareris sucked in a breath and bellowed with all his remaining strength. The rod and diadem shattered like the crystalline things they were.

  A hurtling stone tore another eyestalk away. Jhesrhi wondered if she actually could blind So-Kehur.

  Then a sort of chill stabbed into her head, and none of her wards, potent defenses against sorcery though they were, did anything to prevent it. The cold numbed her, dulled her, and the determination to fight faded into a dazed and hopeless acquiescence. She told herself she had to resist, but the thought was just babble that failed to engage her will.

  The coldness in her mind commanded her to release her hold on the wind, so she did. The rocks fell and thumped on the ground. It ordered her to walk forward, and she did that too.

  So-Kehur spread his pincers. At her back, soldiers shouted for her to turn around and run. She had a vague sense that it would be nice if she could.

  As Malark dropped, Aoth jerked his spear out of the corpse and, panting, pivoted to look for other threats. One of Bareris’s thunderous shouts spun him back around, just in time to see the noise smash the spymaster’s levitating staff and crown into glittering powder.

  At that point, the death tyrants and plague spewers simply faded away. Evidently the talismans had maintained the endless supply of the filthy things.

  Their sudden disappearance made the mountaintop seem strangely quiet and empty, although a handful of Nevron’s demons—limping, mangled, and gory—remained. The zulkirs of the council now spread out along the edge of the drop. And Szass Tam hovered high over everybody else.

  The lich looked down at the minute shards and dust that were all that remained of his tools. “I put a lot of work into those,” he said. “But perhaps it doesn’t matter anymore. Particularly if we’re all willing to be sensible.”

  “Meaning what?” Lallara rasped. Aoth realized that despite the distances involved, no one needed to shout to make himself heard. No doubt some petty magic helped the voices carry.

  “The Unmaking will never happen now,” Szass Tam said. Aoth risked a glance skyward and saw that, in fact, the churning vileness was gone. “We’re all tired, in some cases wounded, our magic largely exhausted. And perhaps we’ve had our fill of revenge, killing the man who, at one time or another, betrayed each and every one of us. So I propose we go our separate ways. I promise you and your legions safe passage out of Thay.”

  Bareris took hold of the sword he’d dropped when Malark had struck him, and clambered to his feet. He stood partly bent at the waist as though still in pain. But his voice was steady as he said, “Never in this world or any other.”

  “I’m inclined to concur,” said Lauzoril, still at the center of his cloud of little darting knives. “You wouldn’t suggest such a thing if you didn’t recognize that we have you at a profound disadvantage.”

  “Don’t be so sure,” the necromancer replied. “In particular, don’t be certain that it’s all of you against the one of me.” He shifted his gaze to Aoth.

  Aoth took a breath. “Actually, it is.”

  “Even though your sellsword band and the friends who help you lead it are on the brink of destruction? I’d gladly order So-Kehur to break off the attack.”

  Aoth couldn’t fathom how Szass Tam even knew about the battle by the Lapendrar, let alone that the invaders were in trouble, but his instincts told him the lich had spoken the truth. Still, he answered, “I trust the Brotherhood to pull through somehow. I mean to stick by the friends who need me here.”

  “You won’t be doing them a favor. Have you forgotten they’re undead, and I’m the world’s preeminent necromancer? If obliged to fight, the first thing I’ll do is turn them into my puppets and force them to kill you.”

  Bareris straightened up somewhat and smiled wolfishly. “Try.”

  “Yes,” said Mirror, “do. I may perish in this place. A warrior runs that risk in any battle. But I have faith it won’t be as your slave.”

  Szass Tam kept his eyes on Aoth. “Rancor is clouding their judgment,” the necromancer said. “Don’t let it cloud yours. Remember that your employers plan to kill you.”

  Aoth paused to give the zulkirs a chance to respond to the charge. None did, at least not in the moment he allowed them. It was sufficient time for an honest denial, just not enough to compose a convincing lie.

  “I’ll deal with that when the time comes,” said Aoth. “You tried to murder the whole world. You have to answer for it.”

  Szass Tam sighed. “Do I? Well, if you all feel—”

  Aoth abruptly saw that the undead wizard was making mystic gestures with his left hand. “Watch out!” he shouted.

  Szass Tam flung out his arm, and a mass of shadow exploded into being, with vague demented faces appearing and dissolving in the murk. Growing longer and taller as it traveled, it hurtled at his foes.

  Those who’d charged Malark were closest to the effect, and it was rushing at them so fast that even as Aoth leveled his spear, he felt a sick certainty that it would hit before he could cast a spell. But Mirror drew another burst of radiance from his sword, Lallara spat a word of forbiddance, and the wave shattered into nothingness as though it had smashed itself against an invisible mass of rock.

  Meanwhile, Lauzoril hurled a dagger at a target too distant and high above the ground for even an expert knife thrower to hit. Except that the blade flew like an arrow, not a dagger, and turned to crimson light an instant before piercing the lich’s body. “Fall,” Lauzoril said. And Szass Tam plummeted to earth.

  Gaedynn often remarked that if the gods had meant for him to go within reach of his enemies’ swords and axes—or in this case, tentacles, claws, and stinger—they wouldn’t have made him the finest archer in the East. But his arrows weren’t hurting So-Kehur, the scorpion-thing was dragging Khouryn around on the ground, and now Jhesrhi, still disguised as Lallara, was advancing entranced toward her adversary’s pincers.

  Gaedynn sent Eider diving toward So-Kehur, meanwhile switching out his bow for a falchion. The griffon slammed down on the autharch’s head, above the human mask, and, wings extended for balance, managed to cling to the smooth, rounded ste
el. Up close, the scorpion-thing smelled of the gore of the men he’d slaughtered.

  “Rip!” Gaedynn shouted. What he actually wanted was for Eider to break away So-Kehur’s remaining eyestalks. She wouldn’t have understood such a specific command, but she was in the right place for her raking talons to snag them. He leaned to the right and smashed at one himself.

  Mainly, though, he watched for So-Kehur’s counterattack. The arms supporting the pincers didn’t look flexible enough to reach him, but after an instant, the gigantic stinger whipped up and over.

  “Go!” Gaedynn touched his heels to Eider’s flanks. The griffon leaped clear and lashed her wings. Behind her, metal clanged.

  Gaedynn climbed, turned his mount, and grinned to see what they’d accomplished. Most of the remaining eyestalks were gone. There was even a gap between two of the curved plates comprising So-Kehur’s head. Either Eider’s talons had caught in a crack and pulled them apart, or the autharch’s own stinger had stabbed down and poked a hole.

  Looking puny, almost vestigial, compared to the pincers, tentacles, and stinger, So-Kehur’s manlike arms and hands swirled in a complex pattern. Gaedynn’s momentary satisfaction soured into apprehension as he realized the necromancer was about to cast a spell. He hoped it would be something Eider could dodge.

  Then So-Kehur lurched off balance, and Gaedynn saw that the tentacle that had gripped Khouryn no longer had anyone at the end of it. The dwarf had evidently come to, freed himself, scrambled back under the scorpion, and resumed chopping at the legs.

  No longer mind-bound, Jhesrhi brandished her staff and cried words of power. The wind howled and threw stones. The big opal eyes in So-Kehur’s mask shattered.

  Spearmen shouted and advanced, weapons jabbing, and So-Kehur wheeled and scuttled away. Gaedynn started to pursue, but a zombie owl as big as Eider swooped down at him, and he had to fight it instead.