The 13th God (The Cycle of Galand Book 8), page 49
"Yes. Though it should be obvious that it serves my interest as well."
The resurrected man nodded to himself. His expression grew thoughtful before snapping back to guarded. "There's a hole in your story, brother. A big one. When you killed me, you didn't have any idea that you'd be able to bring me back some day. I doubt it ever even entered your mind that you'd want to try."
"You are correct."
"And you just said you only recently found this doorway to the gods' land. So when you stole away the power that should have been mine, it can't possibly have been with the intention that you'd ever give that back to me, either."
"Your years in the beyond have done nothing to dull your mind. I acted purely in my own interests. However, there were several periods since that day when I have been imprisoned. For decades at a time. During those times my body was trapped but my mind remained active. Imprisoned within myself, I could do nothing but think. In time I concluded that some flaw in my past actions had cast a stain against all my future ones. Thus I could never attain what I desired until this stain was wiped clean.
"With this thought, my task became clear. However, you are right that even then, I didn't know if either of the things I needed to do could be done. I spent years in pursuit of both paths, exploring forbidden knowledge and speaking to dark beings. I learned how to bring back the dead first. Many years ago. I wished to restore you then but you would still be mortal with only a mortal's years to your life before it would be snuffed out once more. I could only return you after I had learned how to let you transcend the flesh and take on the light that I stole from you."
Wate was staring down at the ground. "You're saying you did all this in the name of repentance. That doesn't sound like you, brother. Not one bit. I don't know why I should believe you."
"It is the end of the world, Wate," said the lich. "And of all the things I could do with the last days of this world, I came back here."
His twin brother tucked his chin, teeth bared. He couldn't seem to raise his eyes. "You expect me to just forgive you."
"Forgive me? That is not what I am asking. I doubt that such a thing is possible. But it is more than possible for the two of us to leave this dying land together, and become undying ourselves."
Wate took a long, deep breath. Then unleashed an even longer scream.
When he was done, he turned back to the lich. "I hate you. And that makes me hate it all the more that despite everything, I still want to walk through the doorway and find out what's on the other side."
The lich nodded. He said nothing but it looked as though he wanted to smile.
Dante and the two others had come within sight of the brothers just a minute earlier. He could have attacked the White Lich at any time since then, but their conversation had compelled him to duck down at the edge of the treeline and wait for it to finish.
"What are they saying?" Blays murmured. "Shouldn't we, ah, go and take care of business?"
"I want to listen just another minute," Dante said. "But be ready for my word."
"There is nothing more for us here," the lich said from across the field of broken rock. "If you are ready, it is time to move on from this world."
"Just one more thing," Wate said.
"Speak it."
"Which way are the swamps?" He pointed southward. "That way?"
"Just so. What of it?"
"I want one last look at our homeland before we leave it behind."
Wate gazed to the south. Dark as it was, and as far away as the swamps were, he couldn't have seen much. A dim expanse of flatness, little more. Even where there was open water, uncovered by trees, there was no starlight or moonlight to twinkle on it. He might as well have been staring into an empty closet.
Even so, he watched it for a full minute, saying nothing. His back was to the lich and so there wasn't enough light on his face to read his expression.
"All right," he said at last. He turned back to his brother. "I'm ready."
The lich nodded again. His blood had dried during the conversation, and he got out his knife and drew it across his left wrist.
"Just what are you about to do?" Wate said.
"Create us our doorway." The lich smiled, if very slightly. "Let us hope that I indeed have the skill to do so."
"Don't you tell me you've never done this before."
The lich didn't answer. He filled one hand with shadows, the other with light. With them he drew a doorway across the sky.
"All right," Dante said. "I'd say it's time—"
Red sparks whoomped up around both of the lich's hands. He stopped what he was doing, staring at them in confusion. Even with no additional ether or nether to feed them, they expanded into larger clouds of light that drifted away from the lich's hands. They snapped together into little red lances and launched themselves at the lich.
"Bade!" Wate yelled. He summoned the nether to him—for he had been a sorcerer too, and the speed and smoothness with which he called on the shadows and shaped them proved that he was a skilled one.
He sent them streaking to intercept the crimson missiles headed for his brother. Yet even as they rushed forward, gouts of red sparks peeled away from them, snapped together into lances of their own, and zipped back toward Wate.
Wate's assaults plowed into those heading for the lich, bashing most of them apart. The few that survived pierced into the lich. They were strong enough to draw some thin streams of blood, and pushed the lich a step back, but he didn't look seriously wounded.
Wate turned and ran, reaching for more nether. He only managed to throw a handful of bolts at the red lances heading for him. Most of them made it through, striking Wate from behind.
He fell to the turf and lay still.
29
The White Lich stood motionless. As the last of the red light faded, he lurched forward, sliding to the ground beside his fallen brother. He brought nether to his hands and sent it into Wate, ignoring the red bolts that coalesced and slammed into his body in result. He sent a second round of shadows into his brother, then a wave of ether.
Head lowered, he rose to one knee. Then lifted his head and screamed. His voice rang like a sheet of shaken copper.
Dante had been running toward them right up until the moment the red sparks had started going wild. That appeared to be all done with for the moment, though, and he'd just gathered his wits enough to ready himself to charge the lich again when the lich sprung to his feet and charged at them.
"You have killed him!" the lich roared. "I will tear your organs from your body and cast them before the sun!"
"We had nothing to do with that!" Dante yelled back. "That was Nolost! He's killing everyone!"
The lich called to the ether and threw it at them, heedless of the red sparks that immediately flew away from it and struck back at him. Blays expanded the Spear of Stars before Dante could yell at him to do so. The three of them had stopped running and Blays set himself and aimed the head of the spear at the incoming attack. The many missiles swerved toward him and spiraled into the purestone, which pulsed as it absorbed their power.
"What drives you to such evil and petty deeds?" said the lich. "He was no threat to you! None! Is your hatred for me so vile, that you would murder the innocent simply to wound me?"
He'd thrown another volley during this. Blays was busy scooping it up with the spear, but Dante realized they'd made a miscalculation. Two, in fact. First, the red sparks, whatever they were, hadn't been tied to a specific piece of the land. Rather they'd been following him and Gladdic and Blays. And second, they weren't equally disadvantageous to both sides. He and Gladdic couldn't employ their powers at all. Not without getting ripped apart by red bolts.
The lich, however, was made of something far sturdier than flesh. He could suffer who knew how many of the strange bolts. And all it would take for him to win would be for a few of his own to get past Blays.
"We had no idea about your brother," Dante said. "We're here to kill you. I need to take on your aspect. That's the only way to drive Nolost from our world!"
The lich launched his largest attack yet. Large enough that Blays decided to swing the spear forward and unleash a blast of captured ether. Dante went rigid as he waited for a hail of red darts to swarm them. Yet none appeared. Either the reaction only happened the first time a power was summoned, or the spear was immune to it.
The two waves of ether pounded into each other. The lich shielded his face with his forearm as the backlash of red bolts assaulted him. He was bleeding some, but none of the wounds looked too bad yet.
"You lie, little sorcerer." The White Lich's voice dripped with venom. "Do you expect me to believe the entity only chose to attack us at the exact moment you arrived?"
"Do you see me using any sorcery?" Dante yelled back. "It would kill me, too!"
"Is that so? Then let us put your words to the test."
Until then, the lich had been keeping his distance, as was usual in such battles—quite understandable, given that they'd already killed him once. He now strode forward, forming another ethereal attack.
"Keep back from him!" Dante hissed to the others. "If he gets his hands on us, he'll blow us apart and the spear won't be able to do anything to stop it!"
Ether glared toward them. Blays dropped back several steps, keeping himself in front of Dante and Gladdic, who could do little more than watch. Dante wasn't even sure he could draw his Odo Sein sword without its nether turning back on him.
Blays swiped the spear through the shower of deadly lights, drawing them into his weapon. The lich was still coming straight toward them and Blays flicked the spear, shooting his ether back at him. The lich couldn't do anything to deflect it without incurring even more damage to himself than the ether would, and so just let it slam into him.
It did no more than break his skin, though, drawing some blood but doing nothing to slow him. His long strides closed on them even as they hastened their retreat. Broken rock clacked and shifted under Dante's feet; they'd left the patch of grass and entered the sprawling field of spoil.
"Even if we turn and run he'll still catch us in the end," Blays said. "Might as well just make our stand."
The lich neared. Even in his emaciated state he towered over all of them and a terrible strength radiated from him like the bluish glow of his own skin. Dante drew his Odo Sein blade three inches from its sheath but red light flickered among the purple nether and he pushed it back in.
Even in his rage, the lich had come to realize that any attack he made at them from a distance was more likely to hurt him twice over than to do any damage to them. He carried the ether in his hands, but unleashed none of it.
Feeling like a coward, Dante clenched his teeth and distanced himself from Blays. Blays stepped forward onto the dirt where his footing would be more steady.
The lich stopped across from him. "Whatever foul power you used to kill him, it has betrayed you. And now I will put you to death under this angry sky."
He lunged at Blays, hands shining with eye-watering light. Blays jabbed him in the gut with the spear and scrambled to the side. The lich moved to throw himself at Dante instead, as if it had all been a feint, but Blays managed to thrust the spear between his feet, tripping him. Dante took the opportunity to tactically reposition himself behind Blays.
"You're not going to win, you know," Blays said. "Because if you did, it would mean the end of everything."
"Not of me." The lich's eyes glittered. "I am tempted to leave you behind and be damned to ages of torture. But I think you will flee this place before the end. You may be able to escape the eternity of misery you deserve, but I will make sure that you still face death."
He came at Blays again, discharging the ether from one hand. Blays jumped back, twirling the spear through the ether, just managing to draw all of it into the purestone before it could slip past his guard. He edged toward the lich, waiting for something. When the lich shot forth the ether from his other hand, Blays snapped the spear forward, releasing his own ether, and drove forward as the two flocks of light collided.
He struck the lich in the chest but just missed his heart. The lich grabbed hold of the shaft of the spear and twisted his body to the side, trying to wrench it from Blays' grasp, but Blays had its tether wrapped around his wrist. Still, he was yanked from his feet, sprawling on his stomach.
The lich shot another volley at him from mere feet away. Somehow Blays twisted himself about, sitting up, and jerked the spear free, pulling the purestone alongside the cluster of ether.
But two bright darts made it past. Blays lunged forward, all but ensuring the darts would strike him—but plunged the blade of the spear deep into the lich's heart at the same time.
Both of them fell to the ground. Dante yelled out, calling to the nether, meaning to heal Blays with it, but remembering just in time that was only likely to kill him instead. He froze then. He couldn't wield his talents. He couldn't even wield his sword. What else could he do?
The lich stirred, fumbling to prop himself up on his elbow. Dante jolted forward, took hold of the spear, and raised it high.
"You may kill me again," the lich said. "But you will never take on my power."
"We'll see what you have to say about that after you're dead again."
The lich laughed, the sound of it ringing in the night air. "It is not a thing that can be picked up like a toy dropped in the street. It must be taken. And my will will always overpower your own."
Figuring that it would be a more convincing rejoinder than any verbal response, Dante jammed the spear as hard as he could into the wound Blays had opened in the lich's heart. With a flash of divine lightning and a clap of heavenly thunder, the spear's blade drove all the way through the lich's chest and out his back. He gasped, grabbing at the shaft of the spear, tensing his arms to pull it from Dante's hands.
His body was racked by a heavy shudder. His hands fell from the spear and plopped to the ground. His body slumped forward, then went fuzzy. A pile of ash hissed to the ground—and something much more solid and heavy thumped down to it.
Dante stared at the lichstone for a single second, then spun toward Gladdic. "We have to find a way to heal him!"
"That should be a simple matter," Gladdic said. "Hold the purestone close while I bring the ether to him."
"You think that'll stop the sparks?"
"Even if it does not, Blays will live. Now get the spear in position before he ceases to."
Blays had already bled so much it was hard to tell where it was coming from. That was Gladdic's job to deal with, though, and Dante got beside him and held the spear parallel to Blays' unconscious body. Gladdic summoned the ether. Dante was afraid the purestone was going to suck up the ether and do nothing to stop the sparks, leaving him with two dead friends, but Gladdic tested this by placing his hand directly on Blays and sending a mere mote of ether into him. The handful of sparks it spat out wobbled, then drifted toward the purestone and vanished within it.
Gladdic leaned forward and streamed more ether into Blays. Dante kept one eye on that and the other on the profusion of glowing red dust. This, fortunately, continued to deposit itself into the spear.
Blays sat up in a rush, coughing out blood. He tried to jump to his feet but fell back down. "What happened?"
"You were hurt," Dante said.
Blays' eyes fell on the pile of ashes and the lichstone resting on top of it. "I mean what happened to the lich?"
"I killed him. With the spear."
"You used the spear?"
"It wasn't that hard. I figured out which was the sharp end, and put it through him."
"I suppose there wasn't much left to do after I stabbed him in the heart." Blays tried to get to his feet again and succeeded. With the lich gone, they stood in deep darkness. "What's the plan now?"
"I'm going to take on his power."
"You wish to try?" Gladdic said.
"Unless Blays mastered the nether while we weren't looking, I'm our only other option."
"I might try again. I have more experience."
"Yeah, at failing. I really don't want to have to chase this bastard down again. Just tell me everything you saw and did when you tried."
As Gladdic recounted his attempt at attaining lichdom, Dante got out the light of life so that it could listen as well and add any wisdom it might have to offer. But it stayed silent as Gladdic completed his tale.
"Aside from my briefest of hesitations, I still do not know what went wrong," Gladdic said. "Everything felt fine until the moment he stepped forth and displaced my mind with his own."
"Before he died, he said I'd have to overcome his will," Dante said. "Do you think that was where it went wrong?"
"When I was first linked to the stone, the presence within it came at me in a great rush, and almost stampeded over the top of me. That was the only time that I felt any such thing as a will."
"Right. Well, wish me luck."
"You're going to try right now?" Blays said. "It's only been a minute."
"Oh, should I show more respect for the dead?" Dante bent and picked up the lichstone. It felt heavier than it appeared, and colder than it should. "I didn't exactly tire myself out doing nothing while you fought the lich. I'm ready."
"Yet you are forgetting one thing," Gladdic said.
"What's that, the…" Dante smacked his hand to his forehead. "The gods damned sparks. What can we do?"
"We will have to travel back to the swamps, and hope that the effect is localized after all."
"And if it isn't?"
"Then we will travel all the way back to the portal to Yent. It will not follow us there."
"So we won't even know if this will work until days from now. I don't like that at all." Dante gave a slow sigh. "Well, at least we've got it back. Might as well see how much walking our legs have left in them." He started back toward the trees they'd emerged from.
"We could wait all that time," Blays said. "But why don't we see if there's any sparks down in the mines?"
"Why wouldn't there be?"
