Blood Rites 5, page 26
Even so, his voice barely carried over the storm’s fury.
As the day waned, the temperature plummeted further, a bitter cold that seeped into their bones. Lazarus called for a stop to the day’s march. As the army huddled together for warmth, their campfires struggling against the wind's icy breath, Lazarus regretted leaving their horses at Red Redoubt. He’d known the animals wouldn’t make it through the mountain passes in winter, but at least they might have used their warmth to keep the soldiers alive.
A darkness so profound it seemed to leach the very hope from their hearts settled over the camp, and Lazarus pumped more and more of his power into Rowan and Aria as they fought to keep the soldiers from succumbing to the cold.
The beginnings of despair were beginning to rankle the edges of Lazarus’s mind when suddenly the winds died, the swirling snow settled onto the ground, and the night sky opened up before them like a swath of black velvet poked through with tiny holes of diamond light.
As one, the soldiers shot to their feet, their eyes darting around as if they expected some trick to befall them. Rowan stumbled through the snow toward Lazarus, her face exhausted and bewildered at the same time. “The weather workers,” she gasped. “I can’t sense them anymore.”
Gideon followed the red-haired woman, looking even more confused than she did. “I don’t understand,” he said. “I’ve sensed their presence from the moment we set foot in Nightwatch Forest, and now they’re… gone.”
A giggle came from behind Lazarus’s shoulder, and he spun just in time to see Gisele shimmer into being standing atop a snowbank. “Of course, they are,” she said. “They couldn’t hide from me.”
“Gisele,” Lazarus began, shaking his head. “You found them?”
Gisele drew one of her daggers in front of her neck and winked slyly. “Before they even knew I was there. Took me a while, until I figured out I could track them better in the other realm. Their magic makes ripples in Nocturna’s world, you know. All dark magic does. Out in the trees, the magic bounces around and gets very confusing. But there’s no hiding from death, or from one who can visit the realm of the dead!”
“You killed them?” Lazarus laughed. “So easily?”
Gisele pouted. “Well, I wouldn’t call it easy per se. Not just anyone could have done it.”
Lazarus picked the doll-like woman up and twirled her in his arms. “No, only you could make such a thing seem easy. I’m sorry I ever underestimated you, Gisele.”
She was blushing when he set her down in the snow, her deep blue eyes sparkling with pride. “I’ll forgive you,” she said. “I guess. But I’ll never tire of reminding you of the error of your ways, either.”
Rowan grasped the tiny woman in her arms and hugged her too. “Thank you, Gisele. I was afraid we wouldn’t be able to make it up the pass if we couldn’t find a way to deal with them. You’ve saved us all.”
Gisele beamed again, then glanced over Rowan’s shoulder at the camp of staring soldiers. “I did, didn’t I?” she said with a wide smile. “I don’t suppose I’ve earned some of Aria’s hot chocolate…?”
Lazarus laughed again, and made sure Gisele got her hot chocolate.
As they settled in for the night, he with his women bundled close to him, Lazarus drifted off to sleep with a smile on his face.
That night, however, his dreams were anything but pleasant. He continued to relive Valka’s betrayal, the gut-wrenching horror of discovering that she’d used the bloodshed at Red Redoubt to feed her own corruption, and the mounting fear that together, Valka and Sanguiana would prove too strong for their forces. And in between these horrors, the most awful vision of all, was a face from his past, one he would have sworn he’d forgotten.
His wife, Queen Lilith the White, with her fae-like visage and ethereal beauty and grace… twisted in a snarl of rage. She was angry at him, she felt he’d betrayed her, she would do anything to wrench his power from him…
When she spoke, it sent a shiver of dread down Lazarus’s spine and he felt ill, even in his dream. “I’m going to kill you, husband,” she hissed. “As I should have killed you the first time.”
When Lazarus woke, his lungs burning with cold air as he gasped for breath, he felt sweat freezing on his brow. The light of dawn was just breaking over the mountains, and he realized it was time to move.
As he got up with his soldiers and went about the business of breaking camp, his memory of the dream slipped away, as dreams often do. Lazarus forgot about the nightmarish visage, forgot about the threat, and was left only with an unsettling feeling that he couldn’t shake even in the beautiful, clear morning light.
28
Dark Energies
They made much faster progress up the mountain that day. It was as if their enemies never expected anyone to be able to pass the weather workers, and so had not prepared any further obstacles for them to cross.
Lazarus knew that this would not be the case for their entire journey, but he thought it would be foolish not to appreciate the lull in activity. The air was still cold and wintry, growing colder as they climbed. But the sky was clear, and no storms clouded the horizon. It should have felt peaceful, and Lazarus tried to tell himself this as they climbed. But it didn’t. No matter how pleasant a day it was, Lazarus could not shake the unease that he’d felt since he’d awoken that morning.
The mood seemed to coalesce around him, changing the environment, poisoning it like arsenic in a well. By midday, no one seemed able to appreciate the beauty of the day.
As Lazarus's army trudged through the pass, a sense of disquiet began to permeate the ranks. The howling wind—which never ceased even with the weather worker’s demise—seemed to carry whispers, and shadows flitted just beyond the edge of vision, unsettling even the most seasoned warriors among them.
Lazarus called a halt, unable to bear the feeling any longer. “Is anyone else sensing this?” he asked, glancing at Aria, Rowan, and Gisele who walked by his side whenever they could.
The women nodded, but none had an answer for what might be causing the disturbing sensation.
“It is Sanguiana’s darkness you sense,” Gideon said, pushing through the ranks of soldiers to join them at the head of the line. “It seems to pool in this place, gathering like a foul smell that sinks to the bottom of a valley. We would do well to move cautiously from here. Magic like this has a way of attracting… likeminded creatures.”
“And if the barriers between the realms have weakened,” Rowan added, “there’s no telling what kind of creatures they might be, I suppose.”
“That’s right,” the ancient druid replied, putting a hand on his young student’s shoulder. “We must be prepared for any—”
A howl interrupted Gideon’s speech as the trees that bordered the mountain pass came alive with sudden, startling movement. Low, slinking animals like massive wolves made of black, wispy shadows, lunged from the bushes, their eyes glowing with a baleful light.
“On guard, men!” Lazarus shouted, drawing his axes and leaping into the path of one of the beasts. He swung one axe down upon the neck of the creature, feeling its flesh give beneath his blade, the bones crunching like gravel beneath a boot.
The shadowy hound let out a shriek and collapsed at Lazarus’s feet. All around him, the growls of other similar creatures snarled to life like a mixture of the wailing wind and the crackling of frozen branches underfoot. It was a sound that chilled the soul.
Ten more of the hounds fell to Lazarus’s blades as he felt the heat of blood magic warming his veins. His soldiers battled next to him, undeterred by the black hounds’ malignant presence.
Gisele cackled happily as she leaped upon one creature’s back and rode it into the ground with her daggers stuck in either side of the monster’s neck.
Aria drank in the monster’s life force, shimmering with a similar black, wispy fog as their magic fought against hers and lost.
Rowan and Gideon wrapped the creatures in roots, and pulled them into the frozen earth, snapping their bones like dry twigs.
But the shadow hounds were only the beginning of their problems.
Tall, robed beings descended from the trees, like Sanguiana’s black, eyeless priests. But as they opened their arms, the creatures revealed themselves to be not men, but huge bird-like figures with hooked black beaks and cruel, taloned hands. Their cawing mockery of laughter shook the tress as they swooped toward the soldiers like specters of death.
Lazarus struck the first of the bird men in the chest with his axe, and immediately felt that these creatures were different from the hounds. Like the mantis warriors, the blackened, feathered flesh seemed to leech Lazarus’s power out through his blade, strengthening his opponent rather than hurting him.
He fought to wrench his blade free, his blood magic leaking out of his body, through his blade, and into his opponent who seemed to be drinking his very strength.
Suddenly, a dagger burst through the front of the bird-man’s throat and slashed to one side. The creature’s eyes dulled and its head tipped sideways, still attached to the neck but barely. Gisele’s face floated about the bird-man’s shoulders, grinning manically with blood spattered on both cheeks, before the creature’s body slumped into the snow.
Lazarus stepped on the bird’s chest and wrenched his axe free, slowly feeling his magical reserves coming back. “Thank you,” he said, panting with relief that the damage hadn’t been permanent. “These are Valka’s creatures, too. She’s imbued them with powerful blood magic. I can’t fight them.”
“But I can,” Gisele said, shimmering to his side and planting a quick kiss on his cheek. “And so can the others. Want to give me a boost? My fearful presence seems to work really well on the raven-looking ones.”
Lazarus put his hands on Gisele’s waist and kissed her again, planting the Warrior’s Resolve and Shield of Retribution buff on the gleeful murderess. “Let’s see what you can do,” he said, his lips quirking as he saw the excitement in her eyes.
“Yes, Master,” she said. “You will not be disappointed!”
Gisele shimmered away, Ghost Step carrying her into the midst of a group of the black, winged creatures. Immediately upon her arrival the monsters staggered, cowering as if from an overhead attack. Gisele grinned, withdrew her daggers, and spun like a whirling dervish, slashing everything in her path. With Lazarus’s buffs strengthening her attacks, the birdmen were diced to pieces, falling in bloody, feathered chunks into the dirty snow.
Gisele hopped to the next group, then the next, quickly decimating the ranks of Valka’s monsters while Thaddeus and his soldiers finished off the last of the ones who had been attacking the front lines, as well as the last of the hounds.
Of course, they weren’t finished yet. As the last of the birdmen fell, the darkness between the trees began to tremble once more.
“Dark creatures are drawn to this place,” Gideon warned. “But I sense a divine pressure, too. If it is Valka, though, she is weaker now than she was upon the battlefield and Red Redoubt.”
“I do not think she expected us to survive that first attack,” Lazarus said, readying himself for the next wave of monsters. “She put too much into that effort and has little strength reserved to defend Ravenhold. We must press on while she is weak so that she does not have time to gather her strength again. Unless she breaks through the barrier between our realms and comes for me herself, Valka is all but defeated.”
Gideon stared at Lazarus in alarm, his old gray eyes widening. Lazarus was being very bold, laying out a direct challenge to the goddess like that. It was all but guaranteed that Valka could hear his taunts. Of course, Lazarus knew she would. In fact, he was counting upon her listening in and falling prey to the bait. They only way he would be able to defeat her for good was to destroy her in the mortal realm while she embodied a physical form. They would never be free of Valka or Sanguiana if the goddesses remained in the divine realm.
Fortunately, neither of the corrupted deities were satisfied with their lives in the divine realm, and they would certainly cross into Selunath to see Lazarus defeated in person—if they weren’t already there. Lazarus was counting on that arrogance.
Gideon’s widened eyes crinkled at the edges as he began to see the reason for Lazarus’s bravado. He nodded almost imperceptibly, showing that he understood.
“You are a brave man to taunt a powerful goddess so,” the old druid added for dramatic effect. “You must be very certain that you can defeat her.”
Lazarus grinned. “Valka is nothing without me,” he said. “You can see what pitiful creatures she must resort to in order to harry our forces. If she were truly as powerful as she wishes us to believe, she would come up with something a little more impressive than bugs, wispy dog things, and birdmen.”
All of a sudden, the rustling in the darkness between the trees stopped. All the soldiers waited for some new monster to appear, but nothing came. Gideon and Lazarus looked at one another and shrugged.
“Are they… giving up?” Rowan stood apart from the others, knee deep in snow, with thick, black roots pulsing like snakes around her feet. She glowered into the trees as if disappointed that she wasn’t going to get to crush more enemies with her favored attack. The roots had proven particularly effective against the shadow hounds and raven men, and the druid radiated a soft green glow as if her magic had been strengthened by her victories.
“There’s still something in there,” Aria said, narrowing her eyes at the trees. “I can sense the lifeforce. But its… changing.”
Lazarus suspected that Valka had been listening to his discussion with Gideon and was now changing tactics. “Keep moving,” he called out. “We might as well make some progress here while we wait for these so-called gods to figure out what they’re doing.”
He was surprised, however, when no new monsters appeared.
Lazarus let Rowan and Gideon lead the army forward, with Gisele scouting ahead with her Ghost Step, while he hung back to keep an eye on the trees where he was certain more enemies should have been emerging.
But it was like Valka had taken his criticism to heart and had perhaps decided to conserve her energy for the final attack. Rather than feeling worried, this made Lazarus smile. If his words had affected her so deeply, he was closer in his assumption than he’d expected to be. Valka was getting worried, and that was a good thing, no matter which way he looked at it. With his ability to spend his blood magic supporting the others there was little Valka could throw at their army that would pose a significant challenge.
The only thing she had left at this point was to challenge him directly. And for that, she had to leave the safety of the divine realm behind and face him on his home turf, where she was as vulnerable as he was to the perils of fighting in a mortal body.
Lazarus wasn’t lying to himself. He knew a battle against Valka in the flesh would be harder than any battle he’d ever fought, especially so if he had to fight Sanguiana at the same time.
Yet hope buoyed him, for as challenging as such a fight would be it was the only way that he could defeat the goddesses for good.
Banishing them from the mortal realm was only a temporary salve on a millennia-old wound. It would teach the divines only to be more careful with their machinations in the future.
With the goddess’s deaths, however, Lazarus would send a message to any other deities who sought to manipulate the mortal world.
This way lies death.
Their deaths could protect the kingdom of Selunath from the divine realm forever.
That boon would be worth any price.
29
A Shadow of Doubt
Lazarus had misgivings about leaving the area of Nightwatch Pass that seemed so steeped in dark magic. Rowan and Gideon led the army farther along the winding, rocky path up the mountain. Gisele promised to keep an eye open up ahead. The soldiers marched on, with breath forming clouds before their faces as they clutched their weapons, ready for the next attack. Even Gideon’s Grenvuul seemed more edgy than usual, and the giant-kin were about as unflappable a species as Lazarus had ever encountered.
Aria hung back with him, keeping her honey-brown eyes fixed on the place in the trees where the monsters had originated. She didn’t say much, often closing her eyes and feeling with her other senses for the lifeforces that were invisible to Lazarus. When the last of the soldiers had gone and the pass was completely silent, Aria sighed.
“Whatever was there is gone now,” she said, shaking her head. “I could feel it gathering, like many living things becoming one large thing. I thought for sure some enormous beast was going to come crashing out of the trees at us. But it grew and grew and then simply disappeared.”
Lazarus nodded, convinced that his prediction was right. Valka had withdrawn her forces and was waiting to attack them with all her remaining strength when they got to Castle Ravenhold. “We should join the others then,” he said, taking her small, cold hand in his. “Keep your senses awake and open, though. We don’t want anything sneaking up behind us.”
Aria squeezed his hand and pulled his arm close to her side, lifting her other arm across her body to hold onto his forearm. “Do you think Belladonna and the others are all right?” she asked, her voice meeker than when she was ordering her apprentices around or directing soldiers in battle. “Do you think they will arrive in time to help us?”
“If they couldn’t, I’m sure she would send Sylvia to tell us as much,” Lazarus said. “So, as they say, no news is good news.”
“I hope so,” she said. “There are not many people that I care enough for that I would risk my life for them. But I would rather die than see harm come to you or any of our family.”
The air was crisp and cold, but the sunlight was still bright. Lazarus thought he could feel a hint of spring in the air that he hadn’t sensed weeks ago. It renewed his hopes that soon, the horrors that had plagued their kingdom would be banished for good.
