The Crimson Vault Part 39

A giant, probably from Helgard, judging by its skin, roared and flailed around among the smoke, while a six-winged dragon fluttered ominously overhead. The fighting Damascan soldiers*at least, the ones he could make out at this distance*seemed to be fighting smaller creatures, or occasionally what looked like their own shadows come to life.

Grandmaster Avernus led the way, a pair of ravens circling her head like vultures. Alin followed.

As he stepped through the Gate, a nearby tree suddenly cracked in half. The sound was like a lightning strike next to his ear, and he jumped back, summoning a globe of golden light on reflex.

The top half of the tree fell over deceptively slowly*fortunately, it was just far enough away that it didn't threaten anyone in his party*and tore off, cras.h.i.+ng to the ground.

Something dropped from the center of the tree: it looked like whatever had struck the tree in the first place.

Was thataa man?

He hit the ground in a crouch before drawing himself up to his full height. His body was wrapped entirely in the shadows of chains, and he held in one hand a long sword with a core of gold.

His sword looked almost like Simon's.

The figure turned to look in Alin's direction, and even from that distance, Alin could see his black eyes.

"Move!" Grandmaster Avernus called. "Eliadel! Move, now!"

The rest of the Travelers were hurrying after the Grandmaster, trotting away from the black-eyed swordsman, so Alin followed them.

After only a few feet, he glanced back.

The man with black eyes was right behind him.

Alin let out a shout and hurled the blast of golden light. It splashed across a half-healed wound in the man's chest, doing exactly as much good as if Alin had splashed his attacker with a gla.s.s of water.

"Where is the king?" the man said, speaking not to Alin but to the Travelers behind him.

"He's here," Grandmaster Avernus said, in an almost pleading voice. "We're certain he's here."

That was when Alin realized who*or rather, what*this man was. This was the Valinhall Incarnation.

It was all Alin could do to stop himself from taking a step back.

"Where?" the Incarnation asked. He didn't sound angry or particularly threatening, but somehow Alin wondered just how far he was from killing them all.

Beneath Alin's feet, the rock twisted and formed into polished wooden flooring. The wood planks radiated out from the Incarnation, turning the natural world around him into some kind of house.

"Well, I*" the Grandmaster began.

She was cut off by a black blur and the sound of a thunderclap.

One second the Incarnation was facing the Enosh Travelers and asking questions, and the next he was ten feet away, locked in furious combat against an attacker who looked like a blob of liquid shadow.

Alin couldn't even see their blades; the wind from their conflict threatened to blow him off his feet, and he could hardly hear through the noise.

They struck each other with such speed and power that they would clash just in front of him one second, ten paces away the next, and behind him an instant later. They seemed to be everywhere, smas.h.i.+ng at each other with enough force to crack rock.

During one of the instants when they slowed down long enough to be visible to the human eye, Alin thought he saw the attacker wearing a black-and-silver mask as well as the cloak.

A young, black-cloaked man with a long sword. Even underneath the maska "Simon?" Alin muttered, but he couldn't even hear himself.

Gilad's hand seized his shoulder and pulled him away from the fight. All the Enosh Travelers were running now, lest they be caught up in the battle. Alin ran after them, casting frequent glances behind him.

Are we working with thatathing? he wondered.

He trusted the Grandmasters*well, some of them*but he was becoming less and less sure that he wanted to ally himself with any of these Incarnations.

If that had been Simon, then he was fighting the Incarnation. That might even put him on the same side as Damasca.

Alin couldn't help but wonder if Simon had the right idea.

Leah arrived at the scene of the battle wearing her crown, and with her Lirial Source all but tapped out. The noise of war was nearly deafening, and the scene was madness: Travelers called powers against soldiers, who fought against chain-wielding shadows, who tried their best to strangle summoned beasts, who killed other Travelers. And practically everything was on fire.

It looked like it would take days for her to sort out, maybe longer with her nearly empty Source.

So it was fortunate that she had brought some help.

Leah signaled Indirial, who bellowed his orders at a voice that cut even over the relentless thunder of the battlefield.

"Tartarus, forward!" Indirial called, and men and women in the armored uniforms of Tartarus stepped forward. Their outfits were marked in places with red and gold, to helpfully distinguish them from the enemy for the benefit of those without extensive battlefield experience.

Each of them held a silver key, and at another command from Indirial, they all summoned something.

Some called armor, others weapons, others relentless forces of implacable steel. Still others summoned automatons that crashed across the battlefield crus.h.i.+ng anything that didn't explicitly wear a Damascan uniform.

An Endross lightning wyrm crawled sinuously through the air over her head, letting out a roar that could be heard even over the percussive thunder of combat. It shot a ma.s.sive blast of lightning down at the ground, dangerously close to where she was standing.

Fortunately, Indirial was there.

He simply raised one hand, catching the bolt on a ghostly green gauntlet that he all of a sudden seemed to be wearing. The lightning shattered into a million sparks, damaging nothing but Leah's vision.

"Do something about that," Leah ordered, practically screaming to be heard over the noise.

Indirial grinned. "Don't worry!" he called back. "I know a specialist."

He put two fingers to his lips and whistled. Seconds later, a man in a brown cloak materialized seemingly out of nowhere.

At first, she thought the cloak was spattered with mud. Then she reminded herself where she was.

The man in brown*presumably Denner Weeks, the Valinhall Traveler she had met earlier*said something. Indirial just smiled and pointed up.

Denner looked at the lightning wyrm, wheeling overhead for another pa.s.s, and his shoulders slumped. He let out a heavy sigh.

Leah took the opportunity to look around the battlefield. Most of the Enosh Travelers were already dead or fled, with most of the summoned creatures seemingly under control. But every few seconds, another peal of what sounded like thunder crashed through the air.

Where was that coming from?

Behind her, one of her Travelers let out a curse and pushed her to the ground, pressing down on her with his entire weight.

From underneath him, she peered out to see an Endross Traveler slaughtering his way through Damascan soldiers and Travelers alike. He held a sword in each hand, with a thunderstorm spinning over his head, occasionally spitting lightning.

She couldn't help but stare for a second. She had been taught that the second an Endross Gate got out of a Traveler's grip, it would run out of control and explode. How was he doing that?

Of course, it didn't matter now.

She shoved the well-meaning Traveler off of her*resolving to learn his name later; he had, at least, acted in an attempt to save her life*and strode toward the rampaging Traveler.

When he saw her in her red-and-gold dress, wearing a ruby circlet on her head, he smiled and turned toward her. His eyes blazed with bloodl.u.s.t, and he pointed one sword at her in such a way that she knew a bolt of lightning would follow.

She didn't give him a chance. Summoning the last of her Source, she encased the man in solid crystal.

He froze there, trapped in white crystal, an insane snarl on his face and his sword pointed at her. Above him, his thunderstorm-Gate exploded into harmless sparks and light.

"Who was that?" Leah asked, though she doubted anyone heard her.

The sound of rolling, cras.h.i.+ng thunder had, for the moment, stopped. Had that just been the sound from this Traveler's Gate? Probably not, since it had sounded more distant than that, but she couldn't be sure.

She turned to ask someone, when she heard a stentorian roar.

"Ragnarus!" A man shouted, with all the fury of a volcano. She turned toward the sound, instinctively reaching for her empty Source.

From far back in the camp*all the way down the rows of tents, maybe two hundred paces away, but getting closer very quickly*the Valinhall Incarnation was running toward her.

He was only a blur, a barest hint of shape, but the flickering gold-and-silver of his sword and the hatred in his voice, even the speed at which he was moving, meant he couldn't be anyone else.

Leah almost panicked when she realized that she was out of power in Lirial, but she mastered herself and focused her mind on the ruby in her crown.

The crown was always her fallback card, her last, desperate trump, but she wasn't at all sure whether it would work on an Incarnation.

The Tartarus Travelers around her formed up into a defensive ring, but Leah wasn't at all sure that the Incarnation wouldn't just carve his way through them on his way to her.

Valin was almost upon them when Indirial appeared out of nowhere, his chipped sword held in both hands. He caught the Incarnation's first blow on his sword, preventing him from killing the front rank of Travelers.

But the sheer force of the blow carried Indirial backwards almost to Leah's feet, as if one hit from the Incarnation carried the force of a club-wielding giant.

The air around her erupted into steel as every Tartarus Traveler unloaded everything he or she had prepared. Showers of needles, spinning blades, flesh-hungry beasts of razor-sharp metal, even tornadoes of chipped gla.s.s tore into the world at the same point, shredding the Incarnation to ribbons.

At least, that's what should have happened.

The Incarnation strode through the attacks covered in what looked like paper cuts. With his blade he skewered a Tartarus Traveler through the heart; with his other hand he crushed the skull of a steel creature that looked like an armored bear. It whimpered as it died.

And the Incarnation walked on, his terrible eyes focused on Leah.

She stood her ground, rousing the power of her crown to wakefulness, and spoke the words that would bind him to her will.

She got as far as opening her mouth when another black-cloaked figure stood in front of her, back to her, sword to the Incarnation.

Simon? she thought. What is Simon doing here? He's going to get himself killed.

Then both he and the Incarnation blurred forward, and they clashed in a battle she could barely see. She could feel it, though, like wind pressed against her face.

Two nearby men burst into sprays of blood from blows that Leah never saw.

Indirial rose to his feet and pushed her backwards, hands gripping her upper arms, practically carrying her away from the battle.

The noise was deafening. Now, at least, she knew where that sound had been coming from.

"Is that Simon?" Leah asked, as soon as she could make herself heard.

"I'm afraid it is," Indirial responded.

"Help him!" she ordered, wrenching herself free of his grip.

"I would if I could," he said. He glanced back at the fight.

Suddenly, one of the blurred forms was launched into the distance by a blow that sounded like the earth being struck by a meteor.

Simon stood looking up, a mask on his face, cloak settling around him.

He traced the falling Incarnation's arc for a moment, and then streaked off to meet him.

You've got about two minutes left of this, Caela said, before you die, go insane, or merge with the Incarnation, or whatever it is that happens when two Valinhall Incarnations exist at the same time. Personally, I think you'll turn into a sofa.

Simon could feel chains wrapping his shoulders, squeezing his ribs, even sliding around his neck in a sensation that reminded him of being attacked by the Nye. Caela a.s.sured him that if the chains wrapped fully around his neck, then he would reach Incarnation.

The problem was that this wasn't working.

He couldn't stop long enough to open a Gate. Whenever he tried, the Incarnation would either rush him or start attacking someone else.

The only other alternative is killing him, Caela said. Someone else is then open to replace him, but it's better than nothing.

Simon swept Azura toward the Incarnation, only to be turned aside by Mithra. They clashed in a flurry of blows that left the rock of the plateau gouged and shattered, and then Simon managed to disengage.

He left a single slash across Valin's forearm. It dripped blood for a moment*the drops hung oddly in the weird, frozen world of the Nye essence*and then the edges of the wound quickly began drawing together.

How do you recommend we do that? Simon asked. He heals too fast.

That's a great question, Caela said. It's too bad you don't have a cursed sword that leaves deadly wounds. One that you know Valinhall has a hard time healing.

I would have expected that level of sarcasm from Otoku, not you.

Tick-tock, Caela responded.