Illidan

13

Vandel leapt through the blazing ring, hit the ground rolling, ducked under the swinging blade. It passed him by a hair’s breadth. He rose, sprang forward over the flame pit. He was first again. He had passed through all the obstacles without taking a scratch.

Cyana was just behind him, not even breathing hard. She smiled at him, but he sensed that she was piqued that he had beaten her again. She was very competitive. Ravael was next, lithe and swift. The others filtered in one after another.

In the weeks after the ritual, there had been many losses. Mavelith and Seladan and Isteth had hurled themselves from the battlements, unable to bear what they had become. Mavelith and Seladan had grown progressively more monstrous looking as the days dragged into weeks, but Isteth still had the beauty that Vandel had noticed during the first days. It was her mind that had been twisted. He hoped she was at peace now, joined at last with her dead children.

Any hope that the ritual had winnowed out those who could not face the consequences of their choices was gone. Over half of those transformed had died in the process. Their hearts had stopped, or their minds had cracked and they had needed to be put down. More had gone mad in the aftermath, unable to bear the visions they witnessed or to live with the things resident inside them.

Vandel had no doubt that their demons had pushed them over the edge. The thing within him made its presence felt every day, and he was by no means certain that he would win this struggle in the long run. There were days when depression and self-loathing made his life unbearable. There were times when he was so filled with rage that he could barely restrain himself from running through the temple and slashing elves with his blades until the guards dragged him down.

Selenis had gone out that way, and Balambor and Turanis. They had taken a lot of others with them. All of the survivors of the ritual understood what they had felt. Vandel had come within a hair’s breadth of doing it himself. He sometimes wondered if the difference between him and the berserkers was just that he had not quite reached the brink yet. He clutched the amulet he had made for Khariel tight in his hand, a talisman of protection against the possibility, a reminder to himself of why he fought with his demon every day. Vengeance, Son. One day you will have vengeance.

Something at the back of his mind mocked him, but for today, at least he could ignore it.

Things had gotten worse since the supernatural part of the training started. Their instructors, Varedis, Alandien, and Netharel, taught them how to tap the fel powers of the demons within them, how to channel the darkest energies in creation.

In a way it was thrilling. Vandel knew now how to augment his strength and speed manyfold. He could drive the blade of his dagger into a boulder and rip it free. He had cast bolts of fel energy capable of burning through the strongest of armor. He could heal himself by draining the souls of his fallen victims.

He had battled summoned demons, learning how to kill them. At first the aspirants had fought in groups, but as the weeks passed, they had been trained how to win in single combat. Scores had died during that period, and one night a felguard had broken free and rampaged through the corridors of the ruins of Karabor until Varedis had brought him down. Vandel fingered the long scar down his right side that the demon had given him. The felguard’s axe had ripped through the inking of his tattoos, distorting them and making it hard to draw on fel energies when he tried to cast certain spells.

He had learned an enormous amount in a very brief time, but it seemed no matter how much he grasped, his instructors always wanted him to try harder, master more. They were as driven as Illidan, and he could not help but feel there was some great purpose behind this, that the day was coming when all he had learned would be put to use in the Betrayer’s service. There was an urgency about this process, and a desperation. Every day the great ritual was performed. Every day more and more candidates were fed into the hungry maw of the training process. A few of them survived to be threshed through a system that often seemed intended as much to kill the weak as to teach the strong.

Kill the weak. Kill the weak. Kill the weak, the demonic voice whispered. Images of Khariel’s half-devoured body flickered mockingly through his mind. Kill them all. All are weak.

His dreams were things of horror. One night he woke to find himself standing, clutching his blade. He wondered then if the thing within him gained a measure of control during his nightmares. Tabelius had sneaked through the cells, slitting throats, until Needle ended his nocturnal adventuring forever by putting a skewer through each empty eye socket.

There were times when Vandel felt as if he were locked in a cage with murderous beasts, and he was not the least murderous of them.

He looked around him again. Illidan had been right. He could see things now as well as ever he had seen when he possessed eyes of flesh. Better. Darkness obscured nothing. Something in his mind adjusted his perceptions. He suspected the demon aided him. It wanted him to master these powers, as if the more he mastered, the more vulnerable he became to the temptations the demon put before him.

No matter. He wanted the strength. He was glad he could see. He was glad he could hear better than any elf had a right to. He was glad he was strong as an ogre and swifter than a nightsaber. His appearance reflected the changes. He could extend claws from his fingertips, and did so in moments of danger. Massive scars marked where he had gouged himself with his dagger. The mirror showed him that a fel green glow had replaced his eyes. It intensified when he used the power.

A hand descended on his shoulder. “Exhausted, are you, old one?” Cyana asked.

Vandel shook his head. “I am just getting started.”

“I hope so,” said Ravael. “This sparring session, I am going to beat you. Do not give in too easily. When you struggle, it only makes my victory all the sweeter.”

Victory is sweet, said the voice in his head. Every day it sounded more like his own. Flesh is sweeter still.

They entered the courtyard. The high, crumbling walls of Karabor’s ruins loomed over the aspirants, massive and imprisoning. Tattooed elves crowded the open spaces between the training rings, waiting for their chance to fight. Greenish-yellow glowing runes, chiseled into the flagstones, formed the circumference of the mystic circles. The runes’ shapes suggested similarities to the tattoos inked on the aspirants’ skin.

Each ring contained two combatants fighting under the supervision of one of the trainers. Spell-wrought auras surrounded their weapons and blunted the force of their blows, turning them from fatal into something merely bruising and painful.

Vandel watched a pair of fighters circle and strike until one knocked the other down. “I claim victory!” the winner shouted, while the loser lolled on the ground in defeat.

Varedis nodded and raised his hand, and the combat was over. The circle emptied. The trainer gestured for Ravael and Vandel to begin.

Ravael stepped into the circle, a scythe in each hand. Protective auras shimmered around their blades. Varedis put the spell on Vandel’s runic dagger and the other blade he had taken from the temple armory. Vandel stepped into the circle.

Ravael made an obscene gesture with his right-hand weapon. “Today you will learn the meaning of defeat.”

He sprang, blazingly fast, uncannily precise in his movements. The ritual had granted Ravael even more strength and speed than it had given Vandel. It had gifted him with huge claws and twisted, circular horns. Now, in the arena, as he drew upon his demonic powers, those attributes seemed even more pronounced. The scythe impacted on Vandel’s biceps with numbing force.

“If this were a real fight, you would have lost your arm,” Ravael taunted.

Anger surged deep within Vandel. That had not been fair. He dismissed the thought. In combat, no demon would give him a fair chance. “In a real fight, I would come and tear your heart out.”

He meant the words to sound mocking, but they came out utterly serious, and he knew, even as they left his lips, that he meant them. Ravael unleashed a flurry of blows, but this time Vandel was ready. Dagger clattered against scythe. The sound of metal on metal rang around the courtyard. Every blow Ravael launched, Vandel parried.

At the end of the storm of attacks, he reached out and struck Ravael just above the heart with his dagger. If he had been a fraction quicker, he would have struck the equivalent of a killing blow, but as it was, he would merely have wounded his foe.

“A scratch,” said Ravael.

A spark of berserk rage ignited within Vandel’s chest. He would not be mocked. Not by one as weak and pitiful as this. Something in Ravael sensed his mood and responded. The air between them crackled with tension. Vandel threw himself forward, aiming at Ravael’s head. Ravael raised both scythes, caught his blade, and twisted, but as he did so Vandel’s second blade connected with his stomach.

“And now you would be dead,” Vandel said, and something within him wished his foe was. “I win again.”

He was about to turn away when he heard Ravael growling. A low, bestial sound emerged from deep within the other elf’s chest. Spittle dripped from the corner of his mouth. His eye sockets were pools of blood in which witch fires danced. Balls of ruddy light flickered around the tips of his horns.

“I am not defeated,” said Ravael. His voice was thick and guttural and full of hate.

Power clotted in the air around him. A sheen of shadow passed across his body, turning his skin first gray and then blacker than night. Great wings of shadow lifted from Ravael’s back. Vandel felt the air displaced by their movement. He could smell brimstone and the aura of demon, stronger in his nostrils than at any time save when he had fought with real denizens of the Nether realms.

Ravael sprang forward, bringing his blades down. Both blows impacted painfully on Vandel’s arms. This time there was no doubt he would be either crippled or dead if the fight had been a real one. It was not enough for his opponent. Ravael rained down blow after agonizing blow. Vandel brought his own blades up and managed to parry the first scythe. The second one caught him above the temple. Pain lanced his brow. The metallic tang of blood filled his nostrils.

Shadow had engulfed the scythes in Ravael’s hands, drowning out the protective spells. His power overcame the wards upon the blades. The scythes were deadly now, and Ravael was intent upon using them.

No one made any move to intervene. Spectators licked their lips. Varedis made a careless gesture, indicating that the fight should continue. He looked more interested than worried by this latest development. The scythes flicked out. More blood flowed. Ravael smiled. White fangs became visible within his shadowy outline. “This time I will win.”

No one was going to intervene as long as Ravael did not leave the circle. Vandel could step outside it himself and put an end to things by admitting defeat. He was tempted to do so, but something in him responded to the smell of his own blood and the feeling of pain. Rage reddened his vision, and with it came power. He raised his hands and wove a thunderbolt of fel energy. It surged out from his pointing finger and smashed into Ravael. The ravenous green energy tore at the shadowy integument, shredding it to blackened tatters.

He fed more strength into the spell. Ravael screamed as his flesh roasted. Vandel knew that he should stop, but part of him did not want to, and it was not just the demonic part. He wanted Ravael to experience the same pain that he had. He poured more and more of his strength into the bolt. His heart sounded loud as a drumbeat. Breath emerged in ragged gasps. He changed the focus of the spell once he knew Ravael was dead, drawing shadowy globules of the defeated elf’s corrupted soul into his own, channeling the stolen power and using it to heal his wounds.

Vandel knew he should feel guilty, but he did not. He felt exaltation. His only regret was that he had to restrain himself from feasting. The smell of burned demon flesh was still in the air, and it made his mouth water.

He looked around at the faces clustered at the edge of the circle. He was tempted to unleash his power on them, to strike and slay and kill, to slake the thirst for destruction that this combat had aroused. But that would be fatal, and he was not quite ready to die yet. He fought the urge down. The thunder of his heartbeat became softer in his ears. His breathing became more regular. He waited to see what his instructor would do.

Varedis just shook his head, as if he had seen things like this before and they did not trouble him.

He tried to kill you, said the voice in his head. And if you had not drawn on my power, he would have succeeded. You owe me your life.

It was true, Vandel realized. He had slain one of the other recruits, and no one appeared to be doing anything about it. He stepped outside the circle. “I claim victory,” he said.

“You are victorious,” Varedis replied.