Once upon a dreadful time

Reckoning

Orbane strutted among those trapped at the linn, and he stopped before Auberon and smirked. “Well, Pere, tried to stop me again, did you? You fool. Neither you nor your allies nor anyone else can prevent me from taking the throne you so haughtily denied to me, your very own son, your rightful heir.

But I will not simply be the new Fey Lord to merely rule Under the Hill, for when I am done I will command not only all of Faery but the whole of the mortal world as well.” Standing motionless beside Auberon, Roel raged and tried with all of his will and heart and spirit and grit to raise his sword and cut down this arrogant being, but the prince could not twitch even the slightest of muscles. Although he could not move, still he could hear, and there came to his ears the faint sound of looms weaving, and of a sudden he realized that this very instant had been foretold, for had not Urd said-?

“ ’Pon the precipice will ye be held, As surely as can be,

Yet can ye but touch the deadly arcane, The least shall set ye free.”

Roel’s mind raced. Surely this is the precipice of that conundrum as well as the moment of time. Yet did she not also say, “If you do not solve this rede, Roel, then all as we now know it to be will come to a horrible end”? And here we are held on the linn where Time begins. But what did she mean, “touch the deadly arcane”?

Orbane widely gestured toward the cascade and the silvery flow beyond, and then back to his pustulant cloud. “See, Papa, what I bring? The corruption, the contagion, the Sickness, and with it I will pollute the River of Time. Then will it overflow its banks to run this way and that without reason, and orderly Time, heretofore so tightly confined in Faery, will be free to flow helter-skelter without bound and foster nought but Chaos itself. And as you know, Pere, I am not only the Master of the Winds, but the Master of Chaos as well.”

Roel now paid no heed to Orbane’s crowing, but frantically sought a solution to Urd’s rede. Clearly this is the place and the time, but what is it I am to do? Oh, Mithras, help me understand.

Orbane stepped to the precipice of the linn, and he cried out,

“Now is my time come, for henceforth the whole of the two worlds will be mine to rule.”

Roel tried to calm his mind, and even as he did so, the solution came unto him, yet he could not move any part of himself, much less his hand, and so he despaired.

Orbane turned toward the Sickness, and he gestured for it to come, yet it moved not. Again Orbane gestured, and his face grimaced and sweat beaded on his forehead with the effort, for he not only had to move the cloud, but he also had to control the black roiling skies, while at the same time holding motionless the allies and Raseri and Rondalo and the other Firsts and Valeray’s kith and the colts of Asphodel, as well as his very own throng. And it was at this moment he realized that had he not included his horde in the spell, he would have more than enough power to move the contagion. Yet he could not release the throng without releasing the others. And Luc and Roel and Blaise and Laurent and all the other knights at the linn had weapons in hand. And even though Orbane commanded the pustulation to come, the bilious cloud neither moved forward nor backward nor sideways.

“Acolyte, I need more of your power.”

“My lord, without Crapaud, I have no more to give.” Hissing in ire, Orbane slightly relaxed his hold as well as his link to Hradian to focus a bit more of his own power into fetching the Sickness, and oh so slowly the corruption began to drift toward the linn.

Roel, yet straining to control his hand found he could now move a single digit, though barely. Will it be enough?

Forward flowed the cloud even as downward inched the index finger on Roel’s right hand.

Orbane’s face twisted with the effort of trying to hasten the pollution unto the linn.

Down crept Roel’s finger, over the cross guard of his sword. .

“Ha!” said Orbane, relaxing, for now the pustulation drifted under its own power.

. . and that was the moment Roel managed to touch the deadly arcane-the silver-flashed rune-marked blade of Coeur d’Acier, a steel sword in the heart of Faery in the hand of a spellbound man. And Roel felt the blade grow warm, yet he despaired, for he still could not move, and it seemed all were yet frozen in place. But then he heard wee Scruff peep. The sparrow speaks! Perhaps he has been set free, yet how can he possibly be of any-

Scruff struggled out from Camille’s shoulder pocket, and he flew into Hradian’s face, chirping angrily and clawing and pecking, and she fell back in startlement-

— and the rune-weakened link between wizard and witch was completely broken-

— Raseri roared-

— darkness swept over Alain-

— Liaze and Valeray and Borel drew long-knives-

— Celeste pulled her nocked arrow to the full-

— Saissa scooped up Duran-

— and Camille shoved Orbane in the back, the wizard to plummet screaming down the cascade and plunge into the River of Time.

And Roel staggered, as if a grip of powers warring through him had suddenly been released, and Coeur d’Aciere instantly cooled to his touch.

Hradian frantically reached for the clay amulet at her throat, the last of the Seals of Orbane, but Scruff stabbed at her eyes, and the Bear stepped forth from the darkness and, with a terrible roar and a swipe of a paw, eviscerated the witch. A look of astonishment crossed her face, and then she fell dead. Yet tiny Scruff kept pecking away and did not stop until he had pierced her eyes.

And down in the current of the River of Time, Orbane screamed and began to rapidly age, his hair falling out, his eyes becoming dim, as the ravages of Time came upon him.

The throng was freed, yet so were the allies, and Jotun began to stomp. Raseri took to the air, his fire devastating, and Big Jack with Lady Bronze dealt death. Borel and Michelle and the Wolves entered the fray with fangs and sword and arrows.

And Roel and Luc and Blaise and Laurent and the other knights mounted horses and charged in with lance and sword, while lightning split the black skies above, and the heavens roared with rage.

And in Time’s flow Orbane shrieked, “Mother, help me!” And the air on one bank shimmered as of a silver mirror, and stepping through the glisten came Gloriana.

Orbane reached out his arms toward her. “Aid me, Mother.” Yet Gloriana wrung her hands and cried out in torment, for she could do nothing, her own unbreakable geas preventing her from doing ought. And she stood on the shore and wept, as upon the linn did Auberon weep.

And seemingly from nowhere and striding across the vale toward the river and Orbane came the huge man they called the Reaper, and he held in his hands his scythe. “My lord, I will come when the time is right,” he had told Luc, and now the Reaper was here. On he strode, toward the bank opposite from Gloriana, and he paused not at the edge of the flow but walked out upon it instead.

In that moment, Orbane began chanting, and slowly the aging of his face and form began to reverse.

But the Reaper cast his hood over his own head, and with every pace he took, he changed: his coarse-spun cloak turning dark and darker and finally to black. The flesh on his hands became withered, and then his fingers and the forearms showing from his sleeves turned skeletal, and his face, what could be seen of it, became skull-like.

Along the shore, Gloriana raged at the Reaper, yet just as Death held no power over her, she was equally ineffective in dealing with mortality.

But Orbane now saw the Reaper coming, and he began canting a faster chant, yet with one sweep of his scythe, the Reaper took off Orbane’s head. . and something dark and wispy was caught on the blade, and it struggled as if to get free yet could not, and the grim being and his scythe and mayhap a black soul then vanished altogether. And in the stream Orbane’s head and body rapidly decayed and fell into dust and were swept away in the currents of Time.