Renegade Wizards

CHAPTER 16

The journey was two days long, the sunlit hours spent riding up the foothills of the Vingaards and the short nights spent studying the spells lost and catching a couple hours sleep.

Luckily, it wasn’t hard for Ladonna or Par-Salian to find the renegades’ route. They found a few hidden arcane runes planted on obvious landmarks, such as an alabaster column broken by age, the last corner of some ancient building, or a mountain hemlock tree growing askew. They were also rewarded with some visible signs of passage, such as horse droppings, a spent campfire, or flattened grass. Upon reaching the steeper slopes of the Vingaards, the trail became more a matter of deduction. The carts limited the mobility of the renegades, meaning some paths were likely taken.

Again, the arcane runes marked specific branches until finally one winding route of pebbles and dirt up the slope remained. By that point, the mountain chill frosted their breath.

On the second night, in the early morning, Par-Salian roused Ladonna. She groaned lightly, the rocks and hard-packed dirt a poor mattress. Par-Salian gently touched her lips with his finger and pointed to the slope above them. They were well short of the mountain’s cliffs, but somewhere beyond a patch of green grass and the tree line farther up she could hear the faint echo of voices. It sounded like the high-pitched laughter of children. The tree line lay an hour away, the echoes of laughter floating in and out like the ghost of sound.

Ladonna nodded and prepared for the next leg of the journey. At least it didn’t appear as though they were too late.

The air crackled with anticipation, and the children sensed the excitement of their elders. Snowbeard and his entourage of helpers prepared a hearty meal that morning. Everyone ate porridge and finished the bread in danger of molding. That gave the adults the strength to ready themselves for the monumental task ahead. And the meal gave the children a much-needed boost to their spirits. They spent their morning running about and playing or watching Berthal, Tythonnia, Mariyah, and a handful of others construct a giant ritual circle.

None of the children could understand why the adults were going to deprive them the pleasure of watching the sorcerers cast the spell. The adults said it would be too dangerous, and many planned on steering clear of the ritual in case anything went wrong. That was Berthal’s order on the matter.

Tythonnia felt giddy, her stomach filled with butterflies; there was no place for food, though Mariyah finally shoved a piece of rye bread in her face and told her, “Berthal’s orders: eat something.”

She accepted the bread and wolfed it down. Perhaps she was hungrier than she realized. Mariyah smiled at Tythonnia and unfurled a piece of cloth, revealing a small loaf of bread. The two women worked side by side and pinched at the bread laid out between them, sometimes exchanging glances and chuckling.

Any reservations that Tythonnia had in coming there were gone. It felt good to be needed, to be critical to a process, to be appreciated.

Tythonnia felt she was doing something to help the world. She was happy preparing the ritual that would change all their tomorrows. She could hardly wait. They were less than an hour away.

“What’re they doing?” the man asked. He was a brutish fellow with a grizzled face, thick forehead, and a sheared head. Faded tattoos covered his arms, each a mark of the conflicts where he’d served. His chainmail shirt jangled lightly.

“A ritual circle,” Hort said addressing his concern to Dumas more than in answer to the mercenary’s question. He rose slightly to get a better look over the rock at the sorcerers transcribing the circle, but he could no more distinguish the specific runes and marks than he could the renegades involved.

“Ritual?” the mercenary said nervously.

Without regard, Dumas nodded him back, down the rocks where twenty of his men waited with the horses. “Go back to your men and prepare to attack.”

“But that circle-” he said.

“That’s our concern, Migress,” Dumas said. “You just worry about cutting down anyone who gets in your way.”

Migress nodded, uncertain but more afraid of Dumas than of any danger lurking down below. A sorcerer was bad enough, but Dumas could wield both magic and a sword, both with frightening proficiency. That made her doubly dangerous in anyone’s book. He headed back to his men.

“Do we have enough men?” Hort asked.

“Maybe,” Dumas said. “We’ll attack them during the ritual, when they’re distracted.”

“Dangerous,” Hort said. “We don’t know what ritual that is. Could threaten us all.”

“If that’s the case, then letting them complete it would be even worse,” Dumas said. “They seem almost ready. We should be ready as well.” She paused, searching the ranks of the renegades. “You’re sure only one of the three wizards is down there?” she asked.

“Certain,” Hort said. “Maybe they’re hiding. Or due along shortly.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Dumas replied. She nodded toward the small ant of a figure below them. “That’s Tythonnia,” she said. “She’s the one who delivered the killing stroke on Thoma. It’s only right that she die first.”

The Journeyman watched quietly. He knew vaguely what came next and had moved away from the excitement. He’d watched matters unfold and avoided Tythonnia lest she recognize him. He was invisible, thanks to a bit of magic and he was both unseen and far from everything, far enough to survive what happened next … he hoped.

The renegades were ready, everything in its place. Mothers and fathers escorted their children and the animals away from the ritual circle. They stayed no closer than five hundred feet away, under the supervision of Snowbeard, who wielded a double-edged axe of polished brilliance, and Lorall with his longbow.

Berthal offered last-minute instructions to the sorcerers remaining behind to help, thirty all told. Some could barely cast a handful of minor, inoffensive spells, while others such as Tythonnia and Berthal had passed (or were capable of taking) the Test of High Sorcery. A select few versed well enough in Wyldling magic to use it with any proficiency also waited in the wings.

Five would conduct the ritual; another ten, led by Shasee, would then enter the gate and secure the keep on the other side. The remaining fifteen sorcerers would remain between the camp and the ritual to protect the camp if necessary.

Kinsley, Mariyah, and Tythonnia stood at the four cardinal points of the ritual, Tythonnia and Mariyah across from each other on the north-south axis, and Kinsley and a sorcerer named Hundor along the east-west axis. Hundor was a quiet man, a product of the White Robes who eventually found himself at odds with his own order. The Journeyman suspected a growing thirst for power drove Hundor, not that it would soon matter.

They were about to begin. Berthal stepped into the center of the circle and raised his arms for the ritual’s opening stroke. It was everything the Journeyman had been preparing for, waiting for-the moment was upon them.

He needed to see what happened that forced the orders to rewrite history and wipe out almost all mention of the event.

Tythonnia smiled as Berthal took his place at the center of the circle with his staff in one hand and the book in the other. He smiled back, his eyes practically glittering with anticipation. It was the kind of day the future would never forget. Shortly, the fortunes of spellcasters everywhere would change; nobody would be deprived of choice ever again. Nobody would be forced through the tortures of the test for the right to learn magic.

Berthal opened the book and stared deeply into its pages, as though each word were a keyhole. Tythonnia chanced a last glance at Shasee and the men and women waiting outside the circle. Then she looked at those forming the circle. Already Kinsley and Hundor had their eyes closed; Mariyah smiled at her. Both women closed their eyes as they focused to channel the magic through to Berthal.

He began speaking, his words reverberating deeply as though it were the song sung by ancient trees.

The language of the mystic unfurled through him, each word like a fat droplet of rain, pregnant with power. The magic flowed out of her like warm blood, comfortable and soothing.

Berthal suddenly caught his breath, and Tythonnia’s eyes flew open. More people gasped, the sorcerers outside the circle taking a step back. The book no longer rested in Berthal’s hands, but levitated before him. The pages flipped open, past lines of black and red scrawl. Some pages stopped turning long enough for a specific word to flash and vanish from the text.

Tythonnia cursed; it was a hidden spell, layered within the first.

“S-stop-aku colang keawetan,” Berthal cried, his own mouth revolting against him as it shifted between his words and the hidden spell. “St-stop-me, aku mencelik mati.”

Tythonnia struggled to act, to move, but the trap gripped her too and bled the magic from her. She felt one spell evaporate from her thoughts then another.

“Break the circle!” Shasee shouted. “Break the circle!”

“What’s happening?” Migress asked, watching as the sorcerers in the circle struggled against themselves, it seemed. The mercenaries lay near a small thatch of pine trees, hidden in the shadows of their boughs. Migress’s men fidgeted with bow or sword, nervous with such open displays of magic. Before them was the circle of sorcerers and beyond that the second group of fifteen watching the camp.

“Something’s wrong,” Hort said.

“It doesn’t matter,” Dumas said. “Attack!”

“This isn’t right!” Hort said.

“It’s our only chance!” Dumas replied. She stared at Migress and Hort, but when they seemed too scared to move, she snarled a small curse. “Fine, but if you won’t attack-”

Before Hort could stop her, she pointed her blade at the group of sorcerers standing immediately outside the ritual circle.

“Halilintar,” she cried. Electricity traveled along one chain of her book and up her sword arm. A bolt of lightning crackled outward from the sword tip, the edge of its fan catching three renegades in the back as it spread. They screamed in pain and fell to the ground in spasms. The remaining renegades seemed caught off guard, putting out the ignited robes on their three injured companions, and slowly turning to face their attackers. Two were reaching into their pouches and preparing spells, however.

“-then defend yourselves!” Dumas concluded, an absolutely wicked leer carved into her face, a woman possessed by the madness that would stay dormant no longer.

In that moment, Hort realized how insane Dumas had actually grown.

At that moment, the kaleidoscopic flash and thunder of spells erupted.

At that moment, the sky above the ritual circle tore open like an iris.

At that moment, a legion of bone-chilling wails filled the air.

A peal of thunder and cries most dreadful rolled around the tongues of the mountains. Ladonna and Par-Salian had just entered the narrow line of trees when they heard the world itself becoming undone.

“It’s happening!” Ladonna shouted, running past the trees.

Ahead of them was a group of sorcerers, some running to help those trapped in the ritual circle and some retreating to the camp. Berthal had carved the circle into the earth, its borders set with rocks and the ground stained with runes. The markings and small trench seemed to glisten with a crimson sheen, as though filling with blood. In the circle, Berthal and Tythonnia, among others, stared helplessly at the red gash in the sky. Wails and howls erupted from its depths.

Beyond the circle, a group of sorcerers fired spells of fire and darts of light at another thatch of trees. Armed men emerged from the small grove and charged the sorcerers with swords and arrows. Dumas led the charge, her blade deflecting the darts of light aimed at her. Two sorcerers fell dead as arrows plunged into their necks and chests.

To Tythonnia’s far left was the encampment, the men, women, and children there frozen between fear and curiosity.

“Par-Salian, over there.” Ladonna pointed to the camp. “Help them escape; they’re too close! I’ll save Tythonnia!”

Par-Salian didn’t argue. He ran straight for the camp, waving his arms to get everyone to run. Nobody moved. They were all too dumbfounded to uproot themselves.

Ladonna ran toward the ritual circle, praying she could reach it in time. As if in terrible response, the first of the blight shades dropped to the ground.

They had been alien to Ansalon … until that moment.

The heavens were uncorked, the evil unleashed. Tythonnia watched in frozen horror as the first creature fell through the iris above them and landed nimbly on the ground. It appeared humanoid, with a tattered hood for a head, and a black cloak covering its otherwise naked body. Shadows wreathed its emaciated limbs and sometimes, when they parted, the creature’s skin vanished as well to reveal an oily bundle of exposed muscles. Tentacles of shadow rose from its body. A terrible and bitter chill emanated from the aperture above Tythonnia, an aperture into a world where a ruined keep stood on mud-cracked earth and the orange skies smelled of sulfur.

What frightened Tythonnia even more than the gleaming embers for eyes that glowed inside the creature’s cowl, or the hint of a puckered orifice for a mouth, was the dozens-or perhaps hundreds-more creatures that ran-no galloped- for the gate. And try as she might to move, to run, to seal the doorway, the ritual circle held her tight and continued to drain her magic. Another spell formed and dissipated.

One of the sorcerers outside the circle saw the creature and cried a warning. Those who could turned to look, but they all had bigger problems. Dumas was almost upon them, the men accompanying her not two seconds behind.

The creature remained low to the ground on arms and legs bent at unnatural angles. It seemed more wolf than human as it turned about and examined its surroundings. Then ignoring her and the four others in the ritual’s confines, it bounded out of the circle and barreled into the first sorcerer it saw, a woman.

Tythonnia watched in horror, helpless, as the creature swiped at anyone near it and tore terrible gashes into two sorcerers. The poor woman it attacked directly writhed in pain as the shadows surrounding its body seemed to drill into her flesh. She cried out, her skin graying and cracking, her body succumbing to a living putrefaction.

Then suddenly, the creature leaped onto another sorcerer and started a new attack. It hadn’t killed the first woman, but neither was she in any condition to defend herself.

More creatures dropped through the threshold, and the men with Dumas hesitated then stopped in their tracks.

Ladonna was about to cast a spell to smite the blight shade when it lunged and attacked a renegade outside the circle. She realized those in the circle were being bypassed. They fueled the gate; they would die last.

That suited Ladonna just fine. She had returned to save only Tythonnia, everyone else be damned. Par-Salian saving the children was merely a ruse to get him out of the way, protect him against his more noble nature. Anyone near the gate right then had little chance of survival.

Ladonna was close to the circle when five more blight shades dropped to the ground. They glanced around, searching for prey, and immediately bounded off in different directions. Two attacked the nearest sorcerers. Another passed by the closest wizards and headed straight for the men with Dumas. The last one headed right for her. She quickly prepared a spell and prayed Dumas would stop to fight the creatures.

Dumas, however, ignored the blight shades, and instead cut down the first sorcerer in her path.

What is she thinking? Ladonna wondered, but the only words that emerged from her lips were, “Sihir anak!” Four daggers of light blossomed and shot for the blight shade.

Look at the depths of their evil, Dumas thought as she reached the first sorcerer. See how they consort with those … things.

Her blade danced of its own accord to deflect another barrage of arcane darts. The sorcerer, a young man of farmer stock, backpedaled, trying desperately to prepare another spell.

This is all their doing, she thought. The three renegades summoned these monsters! Dumas’s blade seemed possessed, though the huntress knew it was the magical tome that honed her skills and protected her. Her blade found the sorcerer’s throat, cutting through it and the spell that he stuttered to unleash. She went for the next renegade.

See how the creature obeys-

Kills them? Why is it killing them? Something is wrong. A searing pain filled Dumas’s thoughts, like a hot needle sewing a filament of fire directly into her brain. She struggled to deal with the agony; her eyes shut; she fell to her knees and dropped her sword as her hands went to her temples. She felt as though she had just suffered a fatal wound. Was she dying?

Dumas opened her eyes despite the searing pain that followed. To her horror, she was still on her feet. She still held her sword and she still fought, running a sorcerer through with her blade. She was a puppet, guided by the instinct of the book.

Belize …

No! she thought. He had nothing to do with this. He wasn’t at the meeting with Astathan, Yasmine, and Reginald-Belize was alone. He did not demand the murder of three wizards for his own personal gain-in the courtyard where he opened my book.

The pain redoubled upon itself, and Dumas felt as though she might vomit from the agony. She couldn’t think clearly. She struggled to regain control of herself, but every time she forced her eyes open, she was killing someone else. She laughed hysterically.

Are there an infinite number of these creatures? Why are they killing their masters … unless? She wanted the pain to go away. She wanted to think clearly again and have purpose, direction.

Then say it, something said inside her head.

The three renegades summoned them, Dumas thought. And then turned on their allies. They are evil. Nothing is too degenerate for them.

Good girl.

The pain evaporated, and Dumas almost tripped over herself in regaining control. It was like a surreal race, she trying to catch up to her own body when her body suddenly stopped and she slammed into it. But she was focused again … and just in time.

A sorcerer with ebony skin and a look that could slaughter children was about to unleash a spell against her. He didn’t incant any words; he didn’t fumble for reagents or make his fingers dance. The arcane simply coalesced around his body, wild magic made manifest. Unlike the others, he looked reasonably competent. He would make for good practice before she got to Tythonnia.

Shasee wasn’t sure what he feared more, the monsters or the sword-wielding woman who seemed positively possessed as she cut through their ranks. Her expression seemed fluid, insane even. It shifted from a berserker’s fury to frightened and maniacal to resigned and then back to battle-frenzied. Despite being divorced from her actions, her body moved with unnatural grace. Even her own men seemed scared by her battle frenzy and fought at a distance. Distance was good. Distance was a magician’s friend.

To Shasee’s left a woman cried “Kendala!” The air shimmered and two arrows broke against her invisible wall. To his right, a man grunted and spun his two hands around each other. Wyldling tornadoes of fire suddenly spiraled up from the ground and swept through three creatures that were savaging a fallen sorcerer. The creatures screamed and bounded away, looking for easier prey. A dozen attacked, and more dropped through the rent in the sky.

The demented woman had hesitated. Her cloak shifted. Shasee finally saw the metal tome strapped to her chest. He knew then who she was, all the more reason to stop her, the blood-enemy of sorcerers and Vagros alike.

Dumas seemed lost for a moment, unable to focus. That is when Shasee saw his opportunity. He focused on the Wyldling, on the strings of chaotic magic all around them, the ones strummed to frenetic vibration with all the ambient magic and wild passions there that day, and he pulled the strings together. The demented woman turned and focused on him, a smile stretching her already-possessed face into an almost transcendent leer. She advanced, twirling the blade without feeling the weight of it.

“Die!” Shasee cried. He pulled at a thread of Wyldling magic and hurled it at her. The thread lengthened into an arrow, shot straight and true as though from a bow.

Dumas’s blade tried to intercept the attack, but she was too slow. The arrow sunk into her shoulder; the shaft bubbled and the leather around the wound disintegrated. Dumas screamed in pain and yanked the arrow free. The acid coating the arrow sizzled against her glove, but she pulled it off before the acid ate through it.

Shasee had her attention now.

Par-Salian raced for the camp, past the startled group of sorcerers. His legs burned with exhaustion, his heart shrinking at the growing howls of the unearthly. Before anyone could stop him, however, the sorcerers left behind to protect the camp shouted and pointed. Par-Salian glanced back and regretted doing so. Two of the undead monsters that Ladonna had called blight shades were racing for the six sorcerers who had stood their ground. Behind them, another pack of nine ran straight for the camp.

Only one sorcerer had managed to unleash a spell, but Par-Salian hissed a curse. Damn the caster for his inexperience; it was the wrong spell. A pattern of colors filled the air, meant to dazzle and enchant the attackers, but the undead were not easily beguiled. They broke easily through the rainbow hues and immediately leaped atop the sorcerer. He screamed as they putrefied him alive, his skin rotting and sloughing off.

Par-Salian stopped. The only way to save the camp was to stop the creatures from attacking. He had to stand and fight. He had to give the sorcerers a chance to survive.

The remaining sorcerers were stabbing and bludgeoning the two blight shades with their staves. Only one had the wherewithal to unleash a spell; she was a young girl with milky skin and almond eyes. She motioned and the tip of her stave glowed suddenly with wild arcane magic. She drove it down into the undead creature, impaling it and pinning it to the ground, struggling to keep it rooted while her compatriots finished it off. They didn’t see the half dozen blight shades bounding toward them.

Par-Salian pulled a ball of bat guano and sulfur from his pouch. His arms moved in broad strokes, like a monk practicing a kata, and the ball of guano ignited.

“Api hortasa,” he cried, unleashing the ball of flame before it could immolate him. The ball expanded, spit, and roared as it flew above the sorcerers. The fireball struck the earth right before reaching the undead and splashed outward. Four of the creatures were caught in the whoosh of flames. They screeched and writhed in agony, but the two that remained untouched sidestepped the burning ground and continued straight for them.

The sorcerers seemed confused. They knew Par-Salian, knew him as a spy. And yet he was helping them.

“Prepare yourselves!” Par-Salian shouted, drawing their attention back to the deadly enemy. He was going to need all the help he could get if they hoped to survive.

The attacks were scattered, uncoordinated, like a swarming of insects. More blight shades poured through the iris in the heavens, and while individually they proved no match for most sorcerers there, their strength was in their numbers.

Ladonna continued toward the ritual circle, spells curling off her fingers as she smote the undead. She was a dozen feet away, watching Tythonnia, Berthal, and the others struggle against the rooting effect of the curse. Three more creatures loped toward her, but she was ready with killing spells.

The first spell to roll off her tongue spent the fold of red cloth in her other hand and evaporated from her mind. The blister of swollen grass rose from the ground before a carpet of biting insects erupted from the earth. They swarmed up the arms and feet of the blight shades, biting and dying as the undead aura of decay overtook them. One of the creatures stumbled into the mass of writhing insects and thrashed about as they instantly covered its body.

The other two creatures dashed away from the patch of insects, trying to escape the devouring death.

Ladonna never felt calmer. Her test had involved necromancy unchecked and waves of undead assailing her. She survived that. She was ready for what challenged her now. Ladonna motioned the insects to clear a path for her. They did, overtaking another blight shade that seemed to melt into their mass. She reached the ritual circle.

Dumas and Shasee were engaged in battle, sword against undamaged staff, feints leading into attacks, blows blocked, and parries opening the opponent up to fast-cast spells. Shasee struck Dumas with an open palm that sent a jolt through her body. Dumas responded by speaking an arcane word and twisting the blade so a flash of light nearly blinded them all. Ladonna was impressed with Shasee’s skill. The Wyldling sorcerer was more competent than she gave him credit for.

The blight shades, meanwhile, were busy attacking Dumas’s men. The mercenaries fought a retreating battle, so Ladonna didn’t bother with them.

The ritual circle itself was corrupted, the sanctity of it despoiled. Ladonna crossed the circle, bringing the insects along with her. Blight shades landed all around her, but the swarm always attacked those closest, sending the creatures into thrashing spasms.

The circle was too large and powerful a spell to disrupt entirely, but like all chains, all she needed to find was a weak link. She grabbed Tythonnia’s arm and for a moment, studied the panicked look in her friend’s face.

“Sihir evak,” Ladonna said, gesturing as though to paint the air itself. The disruption spell unfurled in her thoughts, and she focused on shattering just one link in the curse’s complex chain. She felt it snap, and suddenly, the blood-red glow from the sigils and the rune lines burned away.

She’d broken the circle, and Tythonnia collapsed into Ladonna’s arms. The others slumped to the ground, except for Berthal, who steadied himself on his staff.

The iris, however, remained above them. The creatures that were dropping through seemed confused for a moment. Then they hissed in anger. Everyone inside the circle was suddenly fair game.

Three blight shades tackled Kinsley as he lay on the ground. They tore into him with a fierce vengeance, rotting him alive as he screamed and fought until his tendons could no longer hold him together. Another two lunged for a man in the circle Ladonna knew vaguely, Hundor she believed; he flicked his head at the undead, sending them both flying.

Berthal swept his staff around, his eyes white with Wyldling energy. An orb of fire appeared between the two dragon heads and spit out in a gush of flame as he swept the staff in a wide arc. He caught three creatures in the blaze, obliterating them.

Ladonna looked around in wonderment as she helped Tythonnia to her feet. It was utter pandemonium. The fight was everywhere, the number of creatures increasing steadily despite the many they had killed while the number of humans grew fewer by the minute. The blight shades were simply overwhelming them.

In the distance, more screams could be heard. Ladonna didn’t need to see the camp to know the creatures were there already.

More blight shades dropped through the hole, some attacking, some running toward the camp or the men with Dumas, some simply trying to escape their prison. How anyone would survive that day, Ladonna didn’t know.

Shasee struggled in the battle. Dumas alone was a skilled opponent, worthy of his full attention, but the constant threat of the creatures added to his peril. He saw one of the sorcerers by his side fall to one of the dread beings and couldn’t save him. The other closest sorcerer, a woman by the name of Calyasy, was struggling to protect him while he fought Dumas. Calyasy had no spells left, however, and she fought with her staff.

Suddenly, Calyasy screamed, and Shasee barely caught a glimpse of her as the undead dragged her to the ground.

It was the distraction Dumas needed; Shasee realized his mistake as soon she deflected his staff and reached in to grab him.

“Halilintar sentu!” she said with a smile.

Lightning shot through the claw of her hand straight into Shasee’s chest. His teeth clamped down, and he fell to the ground, unable to move as his muscles clenched into spasms.

Dumas smiled down at him and walked away. Her blade shot out on its own, cutting three quick slices into an undead creature about to attack her. She ignored the ones advancing on him, however.

Shasee struggled to move, to defend himself, but two creatures were upon him already. They grabbed his arm and his leg and pulled. He felt the decay overtake his limbs, like a torch being passed over a field of his nerves. He struggled to fight back, but it was too late. A terrible cold overtook him, not enough to numb him from the pain, but enough to sap his strength. That was when he felt his joints pop and the fabric of his skin rip.

Hort stood his ground between the trees and the ritual circle. He wanted to advance, to help Dumas, but the mad gleam in her eye was foreign to the woman he knew. A feral countenance had slipped over her, and it recognized nothing else beyond what lay in her pin-point focus. He wasn’t sure she wouldn’t strike at him if he approached too suddenly. And she’d just left her foe to a terrible death at the hands of the creatures. It was an act wholly without mercy or humanity. This new Dumas, whoever she was, frightened him more deeply than anyone ever had. Loyalty kept him from retreating, but fear stopped him from advancing.

Instead, he fought the closest creatures with his axe, its viscera-clotted edge deftly slicing through them. Those that thought distance was safer, however, met with his spells. He cast nothing terribly fancy, just the type of arcane magic that bent the advantage in his direction. There was no time to use the crossbow strapped to his back, not at that range.

Hort unleashed filaments of web from his fingertips, catching four creatures in the strands suspended between two rocks.

“Archers, shoot!” he cried, backing away from the monsters.

When no arrows whistled in response, he turned and saw Migress and the surviving mercenaries fighting a retreat back to the tree line.

“You’re on your own, madman,” Migress shouted.

An undead creature deftly avoided the sword stroke of one of the men next to him and latched its puckered mouth onto his throat. The mercenary fell but Migress came to his man’s rescue.

A sharp pain cut into Hort’s shoulder then, and he cursed himself for being distracted. One of the creatures was on his back and clawing at him. Pain blistered his skin, the first whisper of death. Hort swung backward, overhead, with his axe. His blade sliced cleanly into the undead. It screeched in his ear and tried to drop away. Hort pivoted and slammed his axe and the undead into the ground, driving the blade deeper into it.

The creature stopped writhing, and Hort’s back tingled as life slowly returned to it. At least the putrefaction wasn’t permanent, Hort thought, but he faced an ugly proposition. He couldn’t stand alone here. He was making himself a target, and there was safety in numbers. He wanted to retreat, but he didn’t want to abandon Dumas. She meant too much to him. Despite everything, she remained his friend. He owed it to her to save her.

Hort advanced toward the ritual circle, slaughtering any of the creatures foolish enough to approach him. But then, they were all fools that day, he thought.

Berthal yelled in rage, a frustrated cry of anger so foreign to his nature that Tythonnia glanced at him fearfully. Shasee had died, in the most inhuman way possible, and the huntress Dumas was heading straight for her and Ladonna.

Mariyah rose to her feet with Hundor’s help; he continued knocking creatures about with a glance or a head toss. He appeared weakened, however, each effort costing him. Tythonnia felt exhausted, her spells gone, her energy drained through the vortex of the gate. Ladonna helped her up, to her own peril. She didn’t see the creature at her back.

“Api kartus,” Tythonnia said, barely thinking. The thumbs of her outstretched hands touched, and a jet of flame engulfed the creature advancing on them. She didn’t even realize she had any magic left. Ladonna spun around in surprise then nodded in appreciation.

“We have to leave now!” Ladonna said. She began pulling Tythonnia out of the circle.

“Not without the others,” Tythonnia said, tugging herself free from Ladonna’s grip.

“I don’t care about the others,” Ladonna replied. She was about to say something else, but a terrific explosion almost knocked them off their feet.

Berthal and Dumas were fighting.

Staff rang against sword, neither of them giving an inch. Spell slammed into counterspell, obliterating one another in showers of sparks and fire. As Berthal and Dumas struggled, each one a master of their craft, Hundor and Mariyah kept the creatures at bay and away from their leader. Tythonnia broke from Ladonna’s grip and joined her friends. They couldn’t help Berthal fight; they had their hands full with the blight shades.

Berthal twirled his staff around, striking out with the hardened bottom, but Dumas parried the blow. She couldn’t match force with force, but she was skilled enough to deflect his best efforts.

Each collision of wood and steel produced a flicker of sparks as each arcane weapon tried to defeat the other. Dumas deflected another staff thrust and spun away, her hand on her metal tome, her mouth moving. Her sword arm shot out, unleashing a clash of bright hues that threatened to overtake Berthal. Instead he slammed his staff into the ground, sending out a wild distortion wave that broke the back of the incoming spell.

Before Dumas could unleash another spell, however, Berthal rushed forward to close the gap. He barely deflected two rapid strokes, but a third one nicked him on the arm. He backed away, but as Dumas tried to press the advantage, Berthal leveled the staff at her. A fire sphere appeared between the two dragon heads and shot out like an arrow. Dumas raised her arm to shield her face. The ball of fire struck her and exploded. Streams of flame curved around her body. She caught some of its heat, her clothing combusted along her arm, but otherwise was unhurt.

And so they continued sparring, trading cut for cut, injury for injury.

Tythonnia struggled to remember and cast her remaining spells, but Mariyah seemed harder hit. She fumbled her incantations and dropped reagents through leaden fingers. Hundor fared best as he motioned across the gap between them and the gate that disgorged more undead; a wall of flames broke free of the ground, sending sheets of fire upward. Tythonnia suspected their relative skills in magic dictated who had gotten hit the hardest and who survived the curse the best. As it was, she was scraping bottom, her spells nearly depleted or useless. Hundor still had learned magic and Wyldling ways to spare.

Thankfully, Ladonna was with them, adding her spells to the mix. If she’d hoped for a quick escape with Tythonnia, that was no longer an option. The creatures were attacking steadily-uncoordinated but steady. Ladonna, however, was ready for the worst. Her spells punished the creatures for their advance, destroying any that skirted around the wall of flames. From her fingers flew a ray of sickly green light that overtook two creatures. They collapsed to the ground and struggled to rise.

“Sihir anak!” Tythonnia said, unleashing what she suspected was the last of her useful spells. Her illusions had proven ineffective against the undead. She dispatched four missiles of light that darted around one another as they peppered one of the monsters. It fell back, wounded but still eager for the fight. With a flick of his head, Hundor sent the wounded creature into the cascading wall of flames. It shrieked as the heat ignited it; Hundor sent it flying into two more undead, igniting their parchment-like skin as well.

Tythonnia glanced at Berthal. The fight with Dumas obviously had taxed him, but he didn’t show any sign of surrendering. Both Berthal and his opponent moved fluidly from parry to stroke to spell as though it was all one beautifully choreographed move.

Hundor had other ideas, however. With the fire wall extended around them, he turned his attention on the preoccupied Dumas. His hands flew into deft motion, his movements graceful and precise as he grabbed the spell’s reagent from the battle pouch on his wrist. The spell was just materializing on his lips when he staggered back.

The crossbow bolt had appeared out of nowhere; it pierced Hundor’s chest. He cried out in pain and gripped the wound around the shaft with one hand, as though to stop the red spot that raced outward. With the other hand, however, he motioned toward a large man.

It was the other hunter, Tythonnia realized. He was taking aim again with his crossbow.

“Kendala,” Hundor groaned. Nothing seemed to happen until the hunter unleashed another bolt. It struck something in midair and broke. The hunter appeared unhappy and quickly reached for one of his pouches. Tythonnia did the same, both of them racing to unleash their spells.

Her illusions had little chance of entrancing the undead, but they still worked against the living.

Berthal and Dumas paid no attention to the others. Berthal spun the staff above his head, shifting it from one hand to the other. As he did, sparks rained from the staff’s tip down around them both, striking and sparking off Dumas’s face and arms. She yelped in pain and, for the first time, stumbled back. Berthal pressed his advantage. He attacked like a man possessed, battering his staff against her blade as she held it up to protect herself. He forced her to her knee and seemed poised to win.

That was when the large hunter brought something out from his pouch, a piece of metal. Tythonnia couldn’t hear what he said, but to her horror he hurled it at Berthal who froze suddenly, unable to move as the spell held him. Tythonnia could see his wide-eyed panic, his arms over his head, exposing his chest and stomach to Dumas.

Tythonnia tried to redirect her illusion spell to save Berthal somehow, but in her panic, it slipped from its mooring and dissolved in her own mind. In that moment, Dumas lunged forward with her thin blade and pierced Berthal through his stomach. She smiled with bloody teeth, a hellfire grin married with the mad delight in her eyes.

The large hunter screamed, and out of the corner of her eye, Tythonnia saw fire engulf him. The hunter had Ladonna’s full attention. And Dumas had Tythonnia’s.

Berthal had collapsed to his knees, with Dumas standing over him. He cradled his stomach as though the world itself might spill out. He looked up helplessly at the hunter. She stabbed him again and again through the stomach. Tythonnia screamed her hate and, rushing forward, caught Dumas in the back with her dagger; she plunged it in deep, twisting the knife with all her strength.

The huntress threw her head back, slamming it into Tythonnia’s forehead. She staggered from the blow, her head blossoming with pain-filled light. She could barely focus. She had a vague sense of Berthal lying on the ground, of Dumas driven to one knee, of the other hunter screaming and twisting in agony as fire engulfed his entire body, of Mariyah cradling a dying Hundor, of Ladonna standing alone and unleashing spells in a frenzy trying to keep the undead at bay. There seemed to be a lot of them, circling around.

“We have to leave!” Ladonna shouted; Tythonnia had the distant impression her words was directed at her. “Dark Nuitari, it’s too late!”

Tythonnia felt the tug on her clothing and hair, that sense of an impending shift in gravity … toward the iris. The undead wailed again; they turned and screamed at the gate that pulled at them and encouraged them to come home then turned back again to stare hungrily at Tythonnia and the others.

This is it, Tythonnia thought. This is how we die.

The undead readied themselves for the final onslaught.

“You will not have me!” Ladonna screamed at them. “It is I who will have you! Rogan xur grig!”

For a moment, Tythonnia thought she was hallucinating. Ladonna stood with straightened back, her arms out by her sides as though ready to become airborne. In the sunlight and in the orange glow of the world beyond the aperture, her jewelry seemed to sparkle. Then all at once, the precious stones lifted from their settings and hovered around Ladonna. A dozen or more egg-shaped stones of the most vibrant purple surrounded her. They orbited around her on a dozen separate trajectories that brought them into intersecting paths, but never once did they collide.

The undead hesitated at the spectacle but for only a moment. Then the stones circling Ladonna flared and flashed, and from each, she unleashed hidden spells.

Tythonnia shielded her head as daggers of light-too many to count-burst outward from the stones. They filled the air with their numbers, each one zigging and zagging around the others and leaving trails of light as the arcane darts found their marks and peppered the undead. Still more daggers of light exploded from the stones until they filled the air with their singing whine. It was almost beautiful.

There were too many of them; it was impossible to halt the tide. Par-Salian and another sorcerer, a Vagros barely old enough to call himself a man, were at the edge of the camp. They were trying to save people-Par-Salian with learned spells and the young man with the erratic magic of the Wyldling.

The blight shades were everywhere, and the cries of anguish and agony wouldn’t stop. The most terrible of the screams came from the children, their high-pitched terror as the undead slaughtered indiscriminately. Par-Salian wished he could gouge out his own eyes and tear off his ears. A senseless dark would have been better than this horror.

Par-Salian summoned another sphere of flame and directed its path to protect those in the greatest danger. He maneuvered to avoid the bodies littering the ground already, but it was growing more difficult.

The Vagros continued unleashing what paltry magic he possessed and swinging his club when he had a chance. He was crying and struggling to keep the tears from blinding him, but he fought with a frenzied fervor for his friends and family. Par-Salian’s heart broke for him.

Among a clutch of wagons, Par-Salian spied Snowbeard struggling to protect a young boy of eight. One arm dangled by Snowbeard’s side, bloody and useless, while the other still hefted an axe. He was swinging it freely to keep two blight shades at bay, but his last swing unbalanced him, and Snowbeard tripped over Lorall’s body. The undead creatures mauled him while the boy looked on and screamed.

One of the monsters noticed the boy then, its head snapping up in attention.

“Save him!” the Vagros sorcerer shouted. He batted at the head of a blight shade nearing him, but the creature, after stumbling, sprang back to its feet, angrier than ever.

Par-Salian nodded and ran for the boy, only barely recognizing him as one of his history students. He directed a sphere of flame ahead of himself with a flick of his hand, catching the undead from behind. Its gauzy cloak and hood caught fire, and it threw itself against the earth, thrashing, trying to extinguish the flame. Its high-pitched shrieks filled the air, and its compatriot leaped away from Snowbeard’s decayed corpse to avoid the same fate.

The boy was still screaming when Par-Salian reached him. The child clung to his leg, sobbing Par-Salian’s name into his thigh. Par-Salian wanted to pick him up and console him, but he needed both hands free. Another two blight shades loped toward them. They were surrounded; only Par-Salian’s blazing sphere kept the monsters at bay.

A sudden flash of light caught their attention. Even the undead glanced back at the incredible spectacle unfolding at the ritual circle.

Par-Salian could barely see his friends through the black bodies of the undead, but the air over their heads glowed as dozens of hornetlike lights spit out in all directions. He watched in amazement as missiles angled off. The air seemed filled with a never-ending cascade.

Ladonna’s Death Blossom, Par-Salian realized. She’d been preparing for the attack for days, slowly storing one single spell again and again in the magical stones hidden in her jewelry. It would be her final desperate act if the monsters were about to overwhelm her, he knew. It meant that conjuring a horse to escape with Tythonnia was impossible now. It meant that reaching her to teleport away was equally unlikely. It was the end. She was in mortal peril, and he could do nothing to save her.

He could barely save himself and the boy with him.

Just then, Par-Salian felt the pull of some critical force … toward the gate. The boy cried out in panic, as his feet seemed to lift into the air. The blight shades howled in panic and clawed at the ground to anchor themselves.

Farther away, creatures, a few corpses, and renegades who had escaped were already aloft and flying through the air, back toward the gate. Just before they reached Par-Salian, however, they stopped in from their flight, fell and landed hard.

The pull is greater at the periphery, Par-Salian realized. It was a collapsing bubble that was about to sweep over them and push them back toward the iris and into it.

Par-Salian abandoned the flame sphere and lifted the boy in his arms.

“Run!” he screamed. He wasn’t sure anyone was left to hear him, but he ran, the undead be damned, for the gate.

And at his back, he felt the growing pressure of the collapsing bubble.

Once caught, nothing could escape it.

The deadly darts blasted the undead, peppering them with shots and leaving behind ruined bodies. Tythonnia knew the missiles wouldn’t touch her, yet found it impossible to budge. It was time for her to act, to do something.

Berthal was on the ground, struggling to rise and bleeding heavily. Hundor lay deathly still, though Mariyah gripped him like a drowning woman looking for purchase on the ocean. Everything seemed surreal, the moment too insane to grasp completely. As Tythonnia watched in shock, she saw the limp bodies of the destroyed creatures begin to roll away, toward the patch of ground beneath the iris. More monsters landed on the ground, intent on coming through. But some of the others were being tugged upward.

Then Dumas rose slowly to her feet. She didn’t seem to notice the angry gnats of light buzzing around her. A furious mixture of hate and pain swelled her face. Berthal was forgotten in her eyes, but Ladonna was there to slake her blade’s thirst.

In that moment, Tythonnia never hated another human being as much as she did the huntress. Dumas was not yet broken. Tythonnia wanted to shatter her. She wanted to hear the woman scream in agony, to match the unholy wails in her own thoughts.

Tythonnia envisioned her tattoo, her gift from Amma Batros, and imagined the full circle of black ink drain away. She felt the power of the tattoo slip through her skin and into her veins and arteries. The power infused her, made her skin ache. She shivered.

Dumas advanced on Ladonna, stumble-stepping with her blade in her hand. Ladonna did not see her. Tythonnia did, and moved to counter her once and for all.

Tythonnia was spent of her learned spells, but the Wyldling was still hers to command. She fell into familiar motions. Her fingers flew together. They flew apart. Her mind became a mirror. And in that mirror where Sutler had once stood was Dumas. She was blurry and distant somehow, but the tome on her chest was visible and distinct in each detail. Also in the reflection, standing behind Dumas, was the very thing to end her.

“Khalayan ut matithat,” Tythonnia said through clenched teeth. The magic sent static coursing through her hair.

Dumas hesitated as a shadowy, nebulous vision appeared to block her path. It was indistinct and hard to decipher. She shook her head and swung weakly at it. The illusion shimmered and wavered-it was as though she had hit a wall. The metal tome was resisting the spell, but the magic in her would not be denied. She pushed harder and drained the ink of the tattoo completely, forever perhaps. The Wyldling flooded into her blood and back out again through her mind. Around her, flames of witch fire flickered and sparkled.

The huntress let out a small yelp at the same time Ladonna’s flight of darts finally ended. Bodies were slowly floating upward, through the portal. The pull had strengthened.

Dumas shook her head against the illusion, fighting it with every last ounce of willpower. Tythonnia forced every ounce of hers into the spell, but in the mirror where Dumas stood, there was the tome, protecting her. It prevented her from coming into view clearly.

Then the image wavered.

“No!” Dumas grunted. She shook her head. Whatever she saw was beginning to shake her confidence. Her hand grabbed at the cover, her fingers scrambling at its edges. “No!” she said.

In the mirror, Dumas was struggling to pull the metal tome off.

She’s fighting with the book! Tythonnia realized.

“I killed Thoma!” Dumas cried. “I did it! Bastard! He made me do it! It was Be-” she stammered, trying to force the word out, but something was stopping her. “B-Be-!”

The shadow shape meant to kill Dumas struggled to take form. Dumas’s fingers grappled with the tome’s lock. Her body was caught in seemingly crippling paroxysms as she fought the illusion and fought herself.

A single moment of control was all she needed. Tythonnia pushed harder a final time. Dumas grabbed the latch of the metal book.

“Ufta!” she cried.

The hard, bronze cover swung open, the gold-leaf pages within flapping wildly. In Tythonnia’s mind, the tome vanished from the reflection and Dumas appeared in focus.

The illusion had her; the Wyldling currents pushed into the huntress, scouring out her skull. She began screaming as pure horror gripped her tightly. Tythonnia couldn’t stop it if she wanted to.

Ladonna was spent, as were her precious stones. They’d fallen back into their settings among her jewelry, though the color had left them. Around her, the blight shades regrouped, but the gate was dragging everything back toward it. The creatures were content to wait; everything would get pulled through, and anyone still alive would be at their terrible mercies.

In the distance, Ladonna could see the undead, the renegades, and Dumas’s soldiers all falling and tumbling back toward them. Would they be crushed and battered before going through? It didn’t matter. They couldn’t run from it. Even as she watched, her clothing rippled upward as though caught in an updraft, and the pull drove her to her knees.

The undead began clacking eagerly, like a flock of birds. Some willingly jumped up and back inside the iris; others struggled against the force. Some just watched them, waiting for the terrible moment when it all would be done. There wasn’t much time left. Dumas was dead, her expression forever locked in a state of horror, the empty pages of her book flapping in the air. She began to roll away, toward the gate.

Tythonnia was by Berthal’s side, cradling his head and struggling to keep them both rooted. Mariyah was near them, looking frightened and alone.

“Tell her to leave … before it’s too late,” he gasped. “Ladonna!”

Ladonna didn’t expect to hear her name. She scrambled to Berthal’s side and nearly overshot him when the iris pulled her along an additional foot. Tythonnia was struggling to keep them both in place, and Mariyah joined them to add her strength.

“It’s too late,” Ladonna shouted over the rush of air and the clacks of the undead. “We’re trapped.”

“No!” he said, staring at Tythonnia. Ladonna tried not to wince at the look of utter grief and confusion that filled her friend. He touched Tythonnia’s face. The pull of the other world grew stronger still. They were being dragged through the dirt slowly.

Mariyah and Tythonnia gripped Berthal harder, as though trying to anchor him through willpower alone.

“I can’t do this with them on me!” Berthal cried. He appeared ashen and so close to death that Ladonna half wondered if he wasn’t dead already. But she understood. She grabbed Tythonnia by the shoulders and tried to pull her away.

“No!” Tythonnia screamed.

“Mariyah, help me!” Ladonna cried. “Berthal’s trying to save us!”

Mariyah, though frightened, nodded and struggled to peel Tythonnia away. They were being dragged toward the iris. Finally, Ladonna and Mariyah managed to wrench Tythonnia away from Berthal. They fell together and Berthal was immediately dragged toward the gate; he left a blood smear in his wake, as he fumbled for his staff.

“Go!” he shouted. He slammed the staff into the ground. A circle, no more than five feet across, glowed brightly where his staff touched the earth then dimmed. It didn’t vanish, however.

The gate sucked Berthal farther away from them. He was almost beneath it; his body rose by inches then feet.

“No!” Tythonnia cried. She struggled against her friends, desperate to break free and save him.

Ladonna and Mariyah held her tightly, tighter still when he was suddenly sucked through. Berthal was gone and the growing roar of the gate devoured Tythonnia’s scream. Ladonna pulled them toward the circle of light left by Berthal, the iris’s gravity helping them along. Plumes of dirt and grass spiraled around the gate’s lip like water being drained through a hole. The undead fought the pull as well, though many slipped and fell up through it.

The circle was almost beneath their feet. Ladonna quickly looked around to see if there was anyone left to save, but she couldn’t see another soul through the biting dirt storm. She prayed Par-Salian had been selfish enough to save himself.

Tythonnia struggled to get away, to run for the portal and pursue Berthal into the beyond, but Ladonna and Mariyah tackled her again when she broke from their grips. They overshot the circle by inches and a few inches more as the gate dragged them toward its greedy mouth. Mariyah screamed. One of the undead gripped her foot, but she kicked the monster hard enough that it stumbled back and up, through the aperture.

Mariyah grabbed Ladonna’s legs as the gate dragged her up; even then, Ladonna could feel her grip around Tythonnia’s waist and Mariyah’s grip on her leg slipping. At the last second, Tythonnia realized what was happening and reached down to grab Mariyah’s wrist before she, too, fell away. With the last of her strength, Ladonna stretched for the circle even as the gate tried to suck her from it.

Her ribs protested the torture, but her finger grazed the lip of Berthal’s circle. The teleportation ring exploded in a burst of light, and all three women vanished.

Par-Salian wedged the boy into a rock outcropping, trying to shield his body. The pull of the gate was tremendous, with bodies slamming into the rocks and ground with enough force to crack bone. In a moment, he’d be sucked away and the boy would be crushed against the rocks by the growing force trying to drag them into hell.

The winds whipped and howled around them, and Par-Salian struggled to look over the rocks at the ritual circle. Was anyone still alive?

He spotted Ladonna, struggling on the ground with Tythonnia and Mariyah. They were seconds away from being sucked through the iris. Mariyah kicked away a blight shade. Ladonna lunged for something on the ground, and a burst of light nearly blinded him. When he could see again, they were gone.

Panic filled his stomach and lungs. Where’d she go? Was she safe?

Anywhere is better than here, he thought.

The boy cried out in pain. The weight exerted against them had flattened the boy out on the stone. He was pressed against it.

“Can’t-breathe,” he gasped.

Par-Salian felt the pressure too. If he didn’t act, they’d both be dead. But he couldn’t leave while Ladonna was still here.

Wherever you are, be safe, he prayed. The pull increased and he nearly tumbled out over the rocks. The boy could no longer cry; the air was being crushed from him.

“Beysar,” Par-Salian gasped as he touched the boy’s shoulder.

They both vanished.