The Cost of Betrayal

22

H arruq stood at the entranceway, his eyes locked on the butchered remains of the boy. Tears ran down his face, even as anger overwhelmed his sorrow.

“This was not my doing,” Qurrah said. “Listen to me brother, it is all a ruse, a ploy…”

“Don’t lie to me!” Harruq shouted. “You think I’m stupid? It’s all for your magic, your sick, damned magic.”

“Not so long ago you helped me, or have you forgotten?”

“Those days are gone. I will not let you guilt me forever. I’ve moved on. You haven’t.”

As they talked, Harruq slowly approached, his hands clutching the hilts of his blades. His fingers twitched, seeming eager to draw. Qurrah watched, remembering all the times those swords had taken lives with brutal efficiency. Killing was what he was. He remembered this. His brother did not.

“You have not moved on,” Qurrah said, the grip on his whip tightening. “You have merely forgotten. Delusional fool. Killing is what defines you. It is your greatest ability. Now you threaten me for doing what you are the better at?”

“I’m going to stop it,” Harruq said, drawing Condemnation and Salvation. “Now. Swear it. Swear you‘ll never kill again, and maybe we can make this out alright.”

Qurrah chuckled as his world shattered. Rage clouded his mind, coupled with a sweeping sadness covering his rage like snow on a volcano.

“I cannot promise this,” he said. “Because I will forever hold my promise, and a killer is what I am. We are murderers, Harruq.”

“Not anymore.”

“Forever,” Qurrah shouted, ignoring the rupture in his throat.

“I said not anymore!” Their faces were inches apart, their wills locked in a desperate struggle.

“I will kill again,” Qurrah yelled. “I will kill children, women, elders, elves, Tarlak, Brug, I’ll kill any I wish, whenever I wish. Aurelia, Aullienna, their lives are nothing to me, nothing to you, have you grown too blind to see it?”

Harruq smashed Qurrah’s face with the back of his fist. There was no thought involved. No decision. He just struck. Qurrah reeled back, clutching his face. His complicated tangle of emotions cleared into one heated moment of fury.

“You would strike your brother,” he said. “For all we have done, all we have survived, you would betray me?”

“You’ll not lay a finger on them,” Harruq said, shaking. “Their lives over yours. That’s how it must be.”

“So be it,” Qurrah said. A black tendril shot from his hand, streaking for an exposed part of Harruq’s armor. Condemnation smacked it aside as he charged, his bloodrage taking hold. Bones ripped out of the dead child’s body and pelted his hands and face. He felt a burn on his ankle and knew it was the whip. He halted, tensed his legs, and then leapt backward.

Qurrah released the handle, knowing he could not match his brother’s strength. The fire died when the handle left his touch. Harruq kicked it off, the sting of it driving his anger. He rushed again, his arms up to protect his face.

“See only darkness,” Qurrah said, a curse leaving his hands. “May you be as blind as your heart has become.”

All light vanished from Harruq’s eyes. It was as if he were in a dark cave far from the grace of the sun. He kept his charge, hoping his orientation had not changed. When he heard spellcasting to his left, he ducked. Wet objects splattered onto the wall beside him.

Knowing he had little time, Harruq leapt toward the sound of his brother’s voice, still deep in casting. He felt his shoulder connect, followed by a faint gasp. His momentum continued forward, and when he heard the sickening sound of bone smacking against wood, his heart stopped.

“Qurrah,” he said, taking a step back.

Then the hemorrhage spell hit his arm. His right bicep tensed, tighter and tighter, until muscle broke. Blood exploded out, pouring down his arm, his leg, and across his brother’s robes and face. His mind white with pain, he lashed out with his other arm.

The sound was faint, but he knew it for what it was. In his pain, he had forgotten he still held his swords, and that single lash had cut deep into flesh.

“Qurrah?” he asked again, dropping both his blades. “Get rid of this damn dark and let me see you!”

The sound of gurgling blood was his answer. The image filling his head mortified him. He had slit his brother’s throat, his scarred, torn throat.

“Please, Delysia can help you,” he said. He staggered forward, his good arm searching. He felt a hand wrap about his wrist.

“I didn’t mean to,” Harruq said. “I didn’t…”

Dizziness flooded his head. His entire left arm went numb. The pain followed. Agonizing, shrieking, stealing pain. His life poured out his flesh, stolen into Qurrah’s grasp. Harruq collapsed, colors of violet and red swarming across the darkness that was his vision.

“You cut me,” he heard his brother gasp. “You dared cut me.”

“Please,” Harruq said. “Please, don’t go.”

“You fear me leaving you,” said the hissing voice just above his head. “But you have left me long ago.”

“Qurrah!”

The raspy breathing trailed down the alley and faded away. Harruq struggled to stand, but one arm was numb and weak and the other torn and bleeding. He managed a sitting position. Next, he slid his legs underneath, grimaced, and rose to his feet.

“Qurrah!” he shouted again. “Where are you!” No answer. “Aurelia!”

He staggered out of the alleyway. He brushed the shoulder of his numb arm against the wall to keep his orientation. His ankle smashed against a crate, sending him sprawling.

“Aurelia! Tarlak!”

“Who has done this to you?” asked a sudden whisper, startling the half-orc.

“Haern?” he asked.

“Who, Harruq?” the whisper asked again.

“I can’t see,” the half-orc said. “Help me, I can’t see.”

“I have already sent for Delysia. Now tell me who.”

“It was Qurrah,” Harruq said.

“I knew it,” he whispered. “Stay here until you are healed, Harruq. I will find him.”

“No!” Harruq screamed. “Don’t hurt him!”

“Look what he has done to you,” Haern said. The half-orc felt strong hands grab his shoulders and prop him against a wall. “You are blind and bleeding, and he has left you.”

“I hit him first,” he gasped. “Please. I hit him first.”

The assassin’s mind had been set, and he thought no argument would stop him. Still, those words kept him by the half-orc’s side. The pain in his voice was too great. He waited for Delysia and the others to arrive.

“Harruq!” a female voice called out. A soft hand stroked the side of his face. “Are you alright?”

“Never been better,” he said. “Haern’s beat me a lot worse before.” He tried to smile, but the tears flowing from his blind eyes revealed the lie. “I’m so sorry, Aurry. I’m so sorry.”

Q urrah traveled through shadows all the way to the tower, knowing his time was short. They had to know he would come for Tessanna. He slipped through the doors and rushed up the stairs, all the while clutching his throat. He needed to stop and rest, but he had no time.

Guilt still panged him for stealing life essence from his brother, but he had no choice. He was dying.

“Tessanna,” he said, opening the door to their room. Not surprisingly, he found it empty. Further up the stairs he went. He did not knock at the top. He simply barged in.

“Tessanna,” he said, startling her from sleep. She was curled tight upon the grass directly below Aullienna’s bed. “Come. We must go.”

“What happened,” she asked, fully awake even though her slumber had been deep. “You have blood on you.”

“I have no time to explain,” he said. “The others will be coming, and they will kill me.”

“They couldn’t,” she gasped. “Why? What have you done?”

“Nothing!”

He saw her cringe at his outburst, and his guilt calmed his temper.

“They feel me guilty for things I haven’t done,” he said. “I fought my brother. His wounds are not severe, but that won’t matter. We must hurry. Come.”

“But Aullienna…”

Tessanna glanced up to where the little girl slept. Qurrah turned his back to her.

“Go, or stay. Your choice.”

He went down the stairs. The girl glanced back and forth, hating him. It was not her choice. There was no choice.

She followed him down.

T he two were deep within the trees when a blue portal ripped open at the tower door. Haern led the way, followed by Aurelia. The assassin scanned every room, his eyes missing nothing. The elf went straight to the top floor. Her relief at finding her daughter sound asleep was indescribable. They placed Harruq on a few pillows beside the fireplace. Without a word, Delysia began her craft.

“He never enters this tower again,” Tarlak declared, his eyes hard. “Never. And neither does the girl. Is that clear?”

“Don’t hurt him,” Harruq moaned from the floor. “Please, don’t hurt him.”

“He has a fever,” Delysia said, glancing back to the wizard. “I think his left arm is rotting.”

“Do what you can,” Tarlak told her. “We’ll take him to Calan if we must.”

Brug mumbled constant streams of curses while healing light poured out of Delysia and into Harruq. Aurelia stroked her husband’s head, taking in every moan he made and every flinch of skin. They were signs of life, and she needed their reassurance.

Haern slid next to the wizard, his sabers drawn underneath his cloaks.

“Should I hunt for them?” he whispered. Tarlak watched the healing, knowing the decision he gave would hold grave consequences either way. In the end, he sided with his gut. The two were trouble.

“Do what must be done,” the wizard whispered back. “May Harruq forgive us when he wakes.”

Haern bowed, his eyes aflame.

“Ashhur be with you,” he whispered.

“Ashhur be with us all,” said Tarlak.

T hey ran until Qurrah’s body could take no more. His lungs gasped for air and his chest racked with cough after cough. Blood covered his throat, lips, teeth and tongue. Tessanna held him as they walked. The forest was quiet, its calm in strong contrast to their emotions.

“Don’t push yourself so hard,” Tessanna said. “Please, stop for a moment.”

When she pulled against his arm he had not the strength to fight. Mouth agape and spitting blood, he wished he was dead. The girl knelt down before him, tossed back her hair, and started to whisper. Her face was calm, and the half-orc knew he shouldn’t be surprised. A maelstrom lived inside Tessanna’s mind, so why would she worry now?

A faint blue light surrounded the girl’s hand, grew in strength, and then dipped into his chest. Energy filled his body. The ache in his muscles faded, and the fog that had grown about his mind lifted. She smiled up at him, batting her eyelashes.

“Did I do good?” she asked.

“Very good,” he said. He wrapped his arms about her shoulders and pulled her up to him. They embraced, long and silent in the cool, dark air.

“We can’t return there anymore, can we?” she asked, the voice of a child.

“No. Not for a long time.”

“I’ll never see any of them,” she said. “None.”

“I will find a way,” Qurrah said, knowing what troubled her. “I promise.”

“Just like you promised to cure me?”

The comment stung even though she had meant no insult.

“Yes,” he said. “The same.”

She sighed. The crook of his shoulder became the perfect place to rest her neck, and a sound came from her throat almost like a purr.

“Qurrah?”

“Yes, Tessanna?”

“Someone is coming to kill us.”

He shoved her away and then ducked as a flailing mass of cloaks sailed past. He felt a sting on his arm, but the wound was shallow. He lashed out with his whip, desperate as he staggered off balance. The flaming tip wrapped about Haern’s wrist. Before the half-orc could pull it taut, the man was gone, the whip curled about air.

“Behind,” he heard Tessanna say. He spun, his heart halting. The man was right on top of him, his sabers leading. Knowing death was but a breath away, he still attempted to cast a spell. If he would die, he would die with a spell of necromancy on his lips.

But the blades did not come, and the next breath he drew was not his last. A howl of wind slammed Haern away. His legs smacked against a tree, spinning him so that he cracked head first against another. For a moment, he struggled to stand.

Qurrah used that moment well. The words of a curse left his tongue, draining away some of the strength in Haern’s muscles. Black clouds grew from the earth, enveloping his body and pouring into his lungs. The assassin gagged, the air poisonous and vile.

“What harm have I done to you?” Qurrah asked him, drawing ready his whip. “Was it my brother that sent you here?” He lashed out, browning a spot on Haern’s back and ruining the fabric. He lashed the same spot, this time burning all the way through to singe flesh. “Or have you always hated me, and now you have your excuse?”

“I need no excuse,” Haern said, staggering to his feet. “And I need no hatred. You know what you have done.”

With that, he clutched his wrist and enacted the magic of one of his rings. White light swarmed over his body, banishing the clouds and scattering darkness for hundreds of feet. Qurrah cried out, the sight burning his eyes. The jewel on the ring shattered, the last of its power flooding Haern with healing magic. When the darkness returned, Qurrah’s eyes took a moment to readjust. A moment was all Haern needed. He charged for Tessanna.

Tessanna, however, had no trouble seeing when the light faded. Her skin glowed as if she had absorbed the illumination. Fire swarmed about her body, covering her exposed flesh. Her anger gave it fuel, and all the restraint she had held within the tower burned away.

“You won’t keep me from her,” she shouted, fire leaping from her hands. Haern ducked between the streams and rolled past, slashing her legs with both blades as he did. The metal clanged as if hitting stone. Fire leapt off her body, traveling down the metal and torching the skin of his hands. Haern held in a scream of pain. The stink of his own burnt flesh filled his nose.

A bolt of shadow struck his back. Pain overloaded his senses, doubling in strength as a second bolt smashed the base of his neck.

“Do not touch her!” Qurrah shouted, his hands outstretched and bleeding darkness. “You are a coward, a fool, and deserve not the breath in your lungs.”

The third shadow bolt flew. Haern tucked his arms and twisted. It struck ground, instantly killing the grass it touched. Not wishing to try his luck with a fourth, Haern leapt into the air, kicked off a tree, and slammed into Tessanna. Over and over, he bit his blades into her flaming flesh. His skin, his clothes, his hair: it all erupted into fire and smoke. He felt like a miner hacking a rock with a broken pickaxe in the middle of a wildfire. His lungs cried out for air as the fire on his skin continued to grow. He had no choice.

“Damn you, girl,” he said, shoving his foot into her face and leaping off, a living ember in the night. A whip took his foot out from underneath when he landed, smashing his face to the ground. He didn’t mind, for it put out the fire that had blackened his cheeks and nearly scarred his eyes shut. He rolled over to see Qurrah hovering over him, a sick anger in his eyes.

“I’ll send my brother to meet you soon,” he said. “ Hemorrhage! ”

The spell was aimed for his face, and most certainly would have finished him. Haern activated the magic of the king’s ring. The spell fizzled. Haern was gone. Qurrah spun, his eyes searching, but he did not look the correct way. He did not look up. Haern fell as he had lain, on his back. The heel of his foot cracked across the top of Qurrah’s skull, sending him spinning. Knowing his time was short, Haern scrambled to one knee, used his ring to teleport further into the forest, and then fled with all his remaining strength. Fire streamed after him, torching tree and bush and grass. It was not long before everything behind him was a raging inferno, a power that mocked his own feeble blades.

He chugged a small healing potion as he ran. It did little to subdue the pain he felt as his flesh tightened, ripped, and peeled. Anger burned his gut, far worse than the fire that had burned his skin. Even with the element of surprise, he had lost.

T essanna, are you hurt?” Qurrah asked, gingerly touching the knot growing on the back of his head.

“I’m fine,” the girl said, the fire on her flesh withering away. Scratches covered her body. They were long and thin, and they were bleeding. Qurrah hurried to her, catching her in his arms. She giggled, licking her lips as blood from a slash across her eye trickled into her mouth.

“I burned him good,” she laughed. “He was fast, but I burned him, and he’ll glow forever.”

“We need to bandage these cuts,” Qurrah said.

“No. Let them bleed. I’ll be fine.” She shoved him aside. Her body appeared weak, but the will in her eyes was healthy, and terrifying, as ever. “He deserves what happened. I knew what he was thinking. He was thinking I will never see Aullienna again, and that made him happy. He deserves to burn. I want to burn him again and again and again.”

“We both need to rest,” Qurrah said, taking her arm. “Please, we still have a long walk ahead.”

“Then let’s walk.”

Arm in arm, they made their way home.

O n the third knock, the tower door opened.

“Where the bloody abyss have you…” Brug caught Haern in his arms, grunting at the weight.

“Delysia!” he called back inside. “Hope you got a bit of magic still left in you.” He turned his attention back to the assassin. “Did you dance in a funeral pyre?”

“Amusing,” Haern said with a grimace. “And you’re closer than you know.”

Brug dragged him next to Harruq, who slept soundly. Aurelia slept with him, her slender frame nestled against his.

“I’ll do what I can,” Delysia said, giving him a faint smile. Her entire face sagged, and the dark circles underneath her eyes hid much of her beauty. Still, she placed one hand on Haern’s chest, another on his face, and began praying to Ashhur.

Lathaar took her hands into his own and removed them.

“You have done enough,” he said, brushing strands of hair away from her face. “Let me do what I can.”

Tarlak wandered over, his own eyes bloodshot from exhaustion. He watched Lathaar place his hands on the assassin’s chest and face, strong blue light flaring from his fingers.

“How could they do this to him,” the wizard wondered aloud. Brug heard him and snorted.

“You sent him after them, didn’t you?” A soft nod was his answer. “If they can do this to Haern, I’m sure glad they’re dining with the worms now.”

“They’re not,” Haern gasped. “I failed, Tarlak. I failed.”

Soothing light flooded his being. As the pain faded, his body cried out stronger and stronger for sleep. He had not the strength to resist. Lathaar backed away, letting Delysia go to him.

“Sleep will help you heal faster,” the priestess whispered, kissing his cheek as the man fell into slumber. Her back creaked, and her legs wobbled unsteadily when she tried to stand.

“Easy there,” Tarlak said, taking her into his arms. “I couldn’t have said it better myself. You must rest.”

“Since when did you start acting like the big brother you are?” she asked, smiling despite her aches.

“Never. This is just a fluke. Now go to bed.”

He helped her upstairs, leaving Brug and Lathaar with the three sleepers. When he returned, they had taken a seat at the table. A frothing mug was in Brug’s hand. Tarlak sighed and sat next to him, declining the offer for a drink.

“What Haern said, you think it means what it sounds like?” Brug asked.

“Qurrah and the girl still live,” Tarlak said. “Yeah, I think so.”

Brug gulped down a third of the mug. “That’s terrifying.”

Tarlak laughed.

“I’m being serious here,” Brug insisted. “Anyone who can do that to Haern, and look at him, he’s a crispy critter, anyone who can do that is not someone I want to mess with. You sent him to kill ‘em both, didn’t you? They know that. They have to know that.”

“You fear retaliation?” the wizard asked.

“Course not. Not for myself. They won’t retaliate against us, not in a normal way. They’ll hurt us differently. A deeper way.” Another gulp of the mug. “Always said they was bad news.”

“Never disagreed with you on that,” Tarlak said, snapping his fingers so that a long glass appeared, filled with a sparkling orange drink. He took a sip, ignoring Brug’s disgusted look.

“They are necromancers,” Lathaar said. “At least, the half-orc is. The girl knows many necromantic spells, but she isn’t one in the strictest sense. If they seek to harm any of you, they have the ability. When you sleep, when you walk underneath the stars, it is then they can find you.”

“Sounds like you have experience,” Tarlak said. “Stories I haven’t heard yet?”

“Necromancers and followers of Karak are essentially the same thing,” Lathaar said. “They may believe otherwise, but any follower of Karak is a follower of a death god. And trust me, Tarlak, I’ve fought many followers of Karak.”

“We going after them, or do we wait like sitting ducks?” Brug asked.

“We wait,” the wizard decided. “We have no choice. I’ll let Antonil know we found the Veldaren Reaper. At least the killings will stop. I doubt Harruq will let me hunt down his brother. The two are sad souls, really. I hoped to show them kindness, bring them out of the pits they had sunken into, but…” He sighed. “No good deed goes unpunished, right Lathaar?”

“No good man goes untested,” Lathaar said, rising from the table. “All good deeds have their reward. Never confuse the two.”

“Night, Lathaar.”

“Night, Tarlak, Brug.”

The paladin prayed on one knee by the two wounded, his brown hair falling to hide his face as he whispered in the quiet. Finished, he climbed the stairs to sleep.

“It’s almost daylight,” Tarlak said, turning back to Brug. “Figure we should turn in.”

“Go ahead. I can go a day or two without sleep, no problem.”

“Aye, but you get grumpy. Go on to bed. This night’s been a long one.”

“Bah. If you insist.”

Tarlak waved at the fireplace. The light dimmed, although the heat from it remained strong. The two trudged up the stairs, leaving the three to sleep.