The Fifth Sorceress, page 27
‘True peace of mind comes only when my heart and actions are aligned with true principles and values,’ Wigg said, waiting for Tristan’s identical reply. In the space between lines, the Great Hall was as silent as a tomb.
‘True peace of mind comes only when my heart and actions are aligned with true principles and values,’ Tristan repeated.
‘I shall forsake not, to the loss of all material things, my honor and integrity,’ Wigg said.
‘I shall forsake not, to the loss of all material things, my honor and integrity.’
‘I shall protect the Paragon above all else …I shall protect the Paragon above all else …I shall protect the Paragon above all else . . .’
Just as the executioner’s ax falls, just as the horse trips and the rider knows he is going down, just as the archer’s fingers loose the arrow – whenever the portent of disaster arrives and the entire world begins to spin in a terrifying kind of slow motion, the words that one hears at that precise moment can go on almost forever in one’s head, a sickening, unforgettable prelude to disaster.
Tristan did not know it, but his world was about to be changed forever.
He would remember later that the first signs of trouble had been the sounds of breaking glass, but as he looked about the great room, he could find no disturbance. And then the multicolored shards began to rain down upon the crowd, slicing into faces and scalps as they fell. Some of the women began to scream, and Tristan saw Wigg turn around toward the crowd as if in a dream.
It was then that the prince lifted his eyes to the shattered domed ceiling of stained glass, and his mouth dropped open.
What he was seeing was unimaginable.
He watched the first one drop – no, fly – to the floor of the Great Hall, its dark, leathery wings snapping shut as it drew a great, curved sword from its scabbard and looked about the room with hate brimming in its eyes.
The creature stood motionless for a moment and then, jumping up onto the dais in one great leap, swung its sword with a speed Tristan had never seen before, cutting Frederick’s head from his shoulders in one swipe. Frederick’s severed head rolled across the dais and fell off the end, landing on the marble floor of the hall as his body crumpled into death. Shailiha screamed, the blood from her husband’s wounds splattered down over her maternity gown. Already the thing had jumped to the floor of the Great Hall and begun wildly butchering the populace at random.
Tristan shoved Wigg aside, his hand automatically reaching for one of his knives, the blade spinning through the air even before he realized he had thrown it. The knife drove deeply into the back of the thing’s head right below the shiny, winged helmet just as the creature was about to try to cut down one of the Guard. The creature fell forward, dead.
Tristan’s first response was to run to his sister. He held her tightly in his arms as she shuddered and screamed in terror. By the time he turned back to the Great Hall the sight that greeted his eyes turned his insides to ice water.
Hundreds of the awful things were descending into the room and attacking at will. Several leapt up on the dais and ran toward the wizards. Tristan threw another dirk just as one of the monsters was about to swing at Slike with his awful, curved sword, and the knife plunged headlong into the thing’s left eye. It screamed in pain and fell off the dais. But there were just too many of them – they seemed to outnumber the Royal Guard by at least ten to one. For every one of the winged attackers that went down, five or six of the Guard died with it and even more of the monsters were still pouring in through the gaping rent in the ceiling.
Tristan suddenly felt hands upon him from the rear. He turned quickly to kill another of the awful creatures, but found himself facing Wigg. The old one shouted at the top of his lungs into Tristan’s face, his aquamarine eyes almost insane with the need to try to make the prince understand.
‘Tristan! You and Shailiha must stay near me here at the altar! For the sake of everything you value and love, you both must stay by my side!’
Tristan tore his gaze away from the wizard long enough to see several of the winged barbarians starting to hack savagely into the row of the wizards of the Directorate, cutting them to pieces. First he saw Killius go down, his head severed from his body; then Egloff – the timid, likable scholar of the Tome – stood to resist the monster that had him by the robes, the point of its sword up against his throat. But before the prince could free himself from Wigg’s powerful grip, the invader moved the handle of the sword somehow, and suddenly the point of the blade shot up and through the wizard’s head and exited violently through the top of his skull, spraying bone and brain matter across the wall.
Tristan turned, his own eyes now bordering on insanity, and looked pleadingly at Wigg. The old one still stood where he was, screaming, beseeching the prince and his sister to come and stand near him once again at the altar. The wizards, Tristan raged silently. Why aren’t they using their powers to defend us? And then the answer came to him as clearly as if Wigg had just spoken it. The Paragon. The stone is in the water, and their powers have been taken away.
Without thinking, Tristan started to reach into the chalice and remove the stone, assuming that if he did, the remaining wizards’ powers would return and help them. But as soon as he reached for it he felt Wigg’s stronger hands pulling him away, screaming something at him about how he must leave the stone where it was, and bring his sister to stand with him near the altar. Tristan looked into the old one’s eyes with a mixture of frustration and horror. Is he mad? Can’t he see we’re being butchered? Why isn’t he at least trying to help us?
Violently tearing himself away from Wigg for the second time, he turned to see the sickening fates of three more of the wizards. Slike was already dead, lying in a pool of his own blood at the foot of his throne. A horrible-looking type of silver wheel with teeth all along its edge was embedded in the side of his skull. Tretiak, the second most powerful of the Directorate, lay in a gaunt posture of death, half of his robed body off the edge of the dais, a dagger deep in his chest. Maaddar was a few feet from his throne, bravely trying to stand before the royal family as several more of the hideous killers began to move quickly toward them. Tristan’s arm again took to his knives, three fast times in a row, and several of the monstrous things died in their tracks. But before the prince could do anything else, a shiny, silver disk careened through the air, narrowly missing his head. It slammed into the side of Maaddar’s neck, cutting the carotid artery, and blood began to pump violently from the wound. Tristan watched in shock as the wheel kept on impossibly flying as if it had never struck the poor wizard, unbelievably arcing around to return to one of the attackers standing on the hall floor. The winged butcher in the shiny silver helmet plucked the bloody wheel out of the air as if it were second nature and turned to look directly at the prince.
And then the monster laughed at him.
Something in Tristan snapped. A combination of hate, determination, and fear flooded through him, and he screamed in rage at the grotesque thing that stood laughing before him.
The creature drew his sword and, with his free hand, beckoned Tristan to come to him.
Tristan went for his knives, not sure how many he had left, but knowing in his heart that he would keep throwing until they were either gone or he was dead. His arm moved like lightning as, one after the other, the silver dirks flew through the air toward the killer.
But the winged monster was too fast, and Tristan watched in abject horror as the winged, musclebound freak easily used his curved sword to deflect each of the knives as they came at him.
Again he laughed at the prince, and Tristan flew toward the edge of the dais in a rage.
Everything else had been blotted from his mind, even his family’s safety and the presence of Wigg still standing at the altar, as he jumped from the dais and picked up a discarded Royal Guard broadsword, its handle covered in the blood of its owner. All he could see before him was the thing that had killed his friends, and even if he died trying, he would taste yet more blood this day.
Screaming insanely, he charged with his bloody sword held high and slashed with all of his strength at the taller, heavier monstrosity. But his opponent easily parried his blow, sending the prince flying. Tristan again attacked, this time swiping at both feet to cut the invader’s legs from beneath him. But with surprising agility the thing jumped into the air, escaping Tristan’s swing completely, and laughed yet again.
The prince backed off, watching the winged monster as the two of them circled each other in a centuries-old dance of death. Suddenly the sickening image of Frederick’s head rolling off the dais and the dirk he had thrown at his brother-in-law’s attacker tore through his mind. Even if I die at this moment, at least I avenged Frederick.
With every last ounce of his strength, Tristan lunged, sword slashing. But the creature simply stepped to the side and scooped him up in a chokehold from behind, and then applied a torturous elbow lock to the prince’s sword arm.
He whispered directly into the prince’s ear, with a voice that was both terrifying and taunting at the same time.
‘You’re no match for me, boy,’ the low, commanding voice said. ‘I am not supposed to kill you yet, as the mistress has changed my orders slightly. But she didn’t say anything about not abusing you, and I have personal reasons for wanting to do so. Drop the weapon, or I shall see to it that your sword arm is broken slowly, and in more than one place.’
Tristan was on his toes in indescribable pain, held in a vise lock from behind, the arm around his throat so tight that he could scarcely breathe. He knew that in a moment either his arm would break or his elbow would dislocate. He turned his head slightly and summoned his remaining breath.
‘No!’ he snarled through the unrelenting pain. ‘Not before I see your guts on the palace floor!’
Instead of the sound of his arm breaking, the sickening, diseased laugh once more drifted to his ears.
‘Your supposedly endowed blood will not help you now, you worthless whelp. Besides, that’s no way for a king to talk, do you think?’ it said, mocking him.
Then, suddenly, he was spun around to face the thing and was struck in the face with such force that he almost went unconscious. He skidded to the floor a few feet away, landing in one of the many puddles of blood that had collected almost everywhere upon the marble floor. The blood of my people, he heard his mind whisper. Don’t black out. If you black out now you will never wake up again. He staggered to one knee to face the monster as best he could, but before he knew it his attacker was upon him, this time striking him in the windpipe, bending him over in exquisite pain. Both his hands immediately went to his throat as he desperately tried to refill his lungs with air. He was choking to death, and he knew it.
The faceless beast in the shiny winged helmet reached down and took a handful of the prince’s dark hair, wrenching Tristan’s head violently up and back. Air rushed into Tristan’s lungs.
‘Don’t worry, Prince Galland,’ the thing said menacingly, virtually spitting the words out into Tristan’s face. ‘I won’t allow you to choke to death. That would be far too easy. No, you will not die just now, but before this night is over you will beg me for death, and I will oblige you.’
With unbelievable strength the attacker lifted Tristan by his throat with one arm, dragged him back to the dais on his toes, and literally threw him upon it as if he were a rag doll. Tristan landed hard on one side of his face, colliding into the uneven row of wizards’ chairs as he fought to regain his breath and take stock of his surroundings.
Coughing and gasping, he managed to get up on all fours and look up to where his family had been standing before he had jumped down onto the floor of the hall.
They were alive. Thank the Afterlife, they’re still alive.
King Nicholas was holding Morganna in his arms and speaking softly to her, apparently trying to give her hope. Wigg was standing next to them, a look of total loss upon his face such as Tristan had never before seen on any human being in his life.
And then he saw his sister.
Shailiha sat at her parents’ feet in her now blood-soaked gown, pathetically holding the headless corpse of her husband, crying and talking to the dead body as if it could talk back. She’s lost her mind, he thought.
Upon seeing Tristan back on the dais Nicholas quickly reached out to him, but one of the invaders backhanded him across the face almost immediately. The king fell backward, crashing down into his throne. Morganna, crying, reached down to help him up.
As his vision cleared and his senses slowly returned, Tristan could see that the royal family was no longer being attacked. Instead, a ring of the winged soldiers had formed around them, holding them in place and watching their every move. Suddenly, strong hands gripped him from behind, wrenched him to his feet, and roughly threw him back to the floor, inside the circle with his family.
Hearing screaming again, he turned his head to look out over the Great Hall.
The scene before his eyes made him start to vomit, and he put his head to the floor, forced just to let it happen.
Even with his head down, he could tell that the battle inside the hall itself was over, but he could hear fierce fighting going on through the open windows. Apparently there were more of the awful things outside the palace, and they were attacking the Royal Guard. Still on all fours, he looked down to the floor of the dais in shame. If the members of the Guard outside of the palace did no better than their comrades in this room, then all was lost. Indeed, even as he thought the words, it seemed that the sounds from around the windows were lessening already.
But he knew it was the scene in the hall itself that would be the most horrifying. He slowly stood and raised his face to look at it – to look at what they had done to his countrymen.
Men, women, and children had been slaughtered with no quarter. They lay everywhere in giant, spreading, dark red pools of their own blood. Severed arms and legs were scattered crazily at random, as were the heads of many. He could see some of the strange silver wheels still protruding grotesquely from a number of them.
The methodical, winged killers were walking quietly among the wounded, kicking them and poking them harshly with their daggers. If any of the supposed dead moved or cried out, they were killed on the spot with the strange, curved swords.
But many of the visitors were still alive and unhurt, crying and screaming as the monsters walked in their midst, finishing off the wounded. Tristan estimated that about half of the civilians had been killed, along with every single member of the Royal Guard. The many shiny breastplates carrying the broadsword and lion were covered in blood.
They died well, he thought.
The citizens who remained alive had been forced to their knees, and now that the killing of the wounded was beginning to subside, some of the creatures had begun striking and abusing the survivors in order to make them quiet.
Finally, after at least an hour, the Great Hall once again became still, the many surviving citizens who had had the bad fortune to attend the ceremony still quietly on their knees in a small sea of Eutracian blood.
Instinctively, he thought to look for Evelyn and her parents, but finding any one person or persons in the bloody throng seemed impossible. After a few minutes of looking in the general area in which he had last seen them, he finally spotted Evelyn’s blond hair.
She was lying in a pool of blood on the floor, her throat cut, her eyes frozen open and staring outward as if she were still gazing at him, even in death. Her parents lay nearby. Her father had been butchered with a sword, and her mother’s head was all but off her shoulders and hanging down over her back, one of the horrible silver wheels embedded in the side of her neck.
Tristan looked away, back to the winged monstrosity that he had fought with – and lost.
Tristan’s attacker seemed to be in charge, he noticed. The creature walked throughout the hall with the others, giving orders and occasionally killing one of the wounded himself. Then, as Tristan watched, the monster jumped on the dais with ease and pushed its way through the circle to stand before Tristan, Wigg, and the rest of the royal family.
Slowly reaching up, it removed the winged helmet and looked directly into Tristan’s eyes.
It was a face the prince knew he would never forget: unkempt, shoulder-length black-and-gray hair; dark goatee; long, white scar; and impossibly dark, piercing eyes. The creatures seemed to be human, despite their wings and their overall advantage in size. The one who stood looking down into the prince’s eyes with contempt was easily seven feet tall.
I will kill this creature one day, Tristan swore silently. In the name of everything that I am, and all that I hold dear, I will kill him.
The monster’s gaze pulled back to take in the rest of the family and the wizard, and finally he spoke. ‘Sit down,’ he ordered, pointing to the row of bloody wizards’ chairs that sadly were now empty. ‘First the wizard, then the prince, the king, the queen, and the princess, in that order,’ he said simply.
Looking around briefly at each other, they did as they were told. Tristan found himself seated between Wigg on his left, and his father on his right.
‘My name is Kluge,’ the creature said, ‘and I am the commander of the Minions of Day and Night, the troops who have smashed your overrated Royal Guard. From now on your nation, and everything in it, belongs to someone else.’ The one called Kluge turned and walked a couple of paces to Nicholas’s throne, which had been tipped over on its side in the melee. Putting one of his boots atop the nearest of the throne legs, he pushed down on it with his foot and disrespectfully righted the throne in one sudden, single movement. He confidently dropped himself down into it at an angle, his back against one of the arms and one of his long legs up and over the other.
He turned to address the troops that were still encircling the family. ‘You may remove your helmets,’ he said to them, ‘and rejoin your comrades on the floor of the hall. They may remove their helmets, as well. Please have patience. You will be able to begin taking your pleasures soon enough. Have someone send for Traax. And someone bring me something to eat.’ He smiled wickedly into the prince’s face. ‘All of this killing has made me hungry.’
