The Veiled Prophet

XIX

Uldyssian shook his head, wanting the truth to be nothing more than a bad dream. Yet the Inquisitors continued to ride toward the edyrem, and the power of the angel filled them to overflowing. These would not be simple fighters easy to defeat, as would have been the case with the Kehjani. Uldyssian was not sure how powerful the individual Inquisitors would be, but he and his people were certain to face a terrible foe.

He reached out to the others, preparing them for the imminent battle. Even when warned that these would not be mere mortal men that they faced, his edyrem remained stalwart. Their courage both stirred and concerned Uldyssian, who knew that many would die.

And still Inarius did not deign to enter the conflict.

“Where is he?” the son of Diomedes demanded of Rathma.

“Everywhere. Be not impatient to face Inarius,” the Ancient replied. “You will do that soon enough.”

The edyrem formed a great circle. They had no choice. Uldyssian would have liked to have created a vast line with reserves in the rear but was hampered by Serenthia’s discovery. Surely the demons intended to attack him from behind once his people were occupied by those before them. It was the strategy he would have used and that Rathma agreed made sense. That forced him to rely on the circle.

Most of the edyrem were to focus on the Inquisitors, but enough kept sentinel on every other direction so that warning could go out and some of those facing the front could immediately shift their attention wherever needed. Despite the complexity already inherent in the situation because of such planning, Uldyssian had also kept the edyrem constantly on the move…until now.

Serenthia readied her spear. “They’re almost upon us!” She seemed more eager than most to throw herself into the fight. “Give the word, Uldyssian!”

But he held back, trying to decipher what else the Prophet might have in mind. Unfortunately, nothing was apparent, and the massive charge was closing fast.

He saw no other choice. He let the edyrem strike.

A wave of blackened earth shot up, rising well above the oncoming riders. Guided by Uldyssian, the edyrem sent it crashing down on the first ranks.

Men and horses screamed as tons of stone and dirt buried them. Only a few managed to escape the crashing wall, one of them the female priest leading the charge. Her mount was not so fortunate, though, all but its forelegs crushed under the magical onslaught.

However, those behind did not even pause but drove their animals over the carnage. There clearly existed no desire for them but for the edyrem’s blood.

And worse, from the vast burial site Uldyssian’s followers had just created, several robed forms burrowed to the surface. Death should have claimed those the spell had struck, but the power Inarius funneled through his minions had saved many. Bereft of their horses, they grabbed whatever weapons they could locate and simply ran behind their mounted brethren, shrieking for the enemy’s death.

Only a few paces now separated the two sides. Uldyssian had time for only one more attack, which he set into motion. Despite the rain, the edyrem readily created a veritable storm of their own, fireballs that bombarded the Inquisitors with the ferocity of lightning.

This time, the attack had more effect. Several riders were blasted from their mounts. Many became fireballs in their own right, transforming into blazing corpses that dropped among their unsuspecting comrades. There was no doubting the fates of those struck; little enough remained of them that could even be identified as human.

But although the first wave of the edyrem’s attack proved quite effective, subsequent ones garnered little success. Suddenly, the Inquisitors were better able to shield themselves. Fireballs dissipated harmlessly against their breastplates. The Cathedral’s minions were no longer even slowed.

And moments later, the first of them collided with Uldyssian’s band.

He had already prepared his followers for combat, but the edyrem were at first hard pressed. The lack of outright success against the Inquisitors had dampened their confidence enough to allow the warriors to push in the right side of the circle. It might have collapsed entirely if not for Serenthia and Jonas guiding the others in immediately rebuilding the ranks.

The curved swords and spiked maces of the Inquisitors clashed with the edyrem’s varied assortment of salvaged weapons and farm implements, yet the struggle was anything but ordinary.

Both sides fueled their fight with the gifts they had. The Prophet’s warriors—often acting in inhuman unison—drove hard into their foes. Inquisitors and edyrem alike struck with weapons that flashed with raw energy when meeting each other. But the latter had other tools at their disposal as well. More than one robed warrior would suddenly rise into the air and go flying across the field of combat. Others fell as hovering edyrem tossed more potent missiles than previously used among the Inquisitors’ ranks. The sky as much as the ground became the site of what Uldyssian already thought of as the Battle of the Golden Path.

The place where the edyrem might be making their last stand.

Horses shrieked as silver bolts peppered the Inquisitor ranks. However, despite mounting losses, the robed riders continued their relentless assault, battering away with their glittering maces against the mighty, invisible shields of the edyrem. Although those shields mostly held well, the sheer fanaticism of the Inquisitors’ attacks was daunting even to the most hardened.

It became, at least for the time being, a frustrating stalemate. However, Uldyssian knew that a stalemate only meant eventual victory for Inarius. The longer the edyrem struggled uselessly, the more strength they expended. Unlike the Inquisitors, who drew from their powerful master, the edyrem only had what was within themselves.

All the while that Uldyssian struggled with that knowledge, he nevertheless fought hard. A robed warrior who attempted to batter in his skull instead lost his weapon to the son of Diomedes, who then sent the mace barreling through the man’s chest. Breastplate, flesh, and bone did nothing even to slow the missile—which then burst out the back. Uldyssian found that he had no compassion whatsoever for those he fought; they had already killed too many innocents in their zealous adoration of the Prophet.

A massive whirlwind clearly of no natural origin suddenly cut through the edyrem, seeking to pluck them selectively from the ground. Uldyssian spotted the priests responsible for the oncoming catastrophe, but before he himself could do anything, Serenthia suddenly appeared among them. She drove her spear through one, then kicked another hard in the chest. That priest went flying far into the sea of Inquisitors still rushing forward.

Swearing more at Serenthia for risking herself than anything else, Uldyssian clapped his hands together in the direction in which the merchant’s daughter fought.

The booming sound he created plowed a path through the enemy, bowling them over as if they were nothing. He then raced toward her, his leaping gait nearly flying.

He bounded among the Inquisitors closing on her and seized two by their necks. His rage caused both men literally to explode. He then raised his left hand and summoned into it a black broadsword formed from the ash that had once been the deadly grass. With that blade, the son of Diomedes cut through one opponent after another, until at last he reached Serenthia.

She, meanwhile, finished off a third priest entirely unaware of how near she had been to being slain. Serenthia looked up at Uldyssian, her strained countenance almost as unnerving as those of the magically enhanced fanatics with whom they were struggling.

He knew why immediately. “Serry! Get back among the others!”

“I’m all right! Don’t worry about me!”

“Serry! Achilios might not be gone! Do you want to die not knowing?”

Before she could answer, a terrible thud shook the ground. Men toppled everywhere.

Another thud followed the first. Uldyssian also felt the air grow very cold.

It was also, he realized, no longer raining…or, at least, no water was dropping from the sky.

There were, however, huge fragments of ice plummeting from the clouds, some of them as large as wagons. Uldyssian looked up and saw that there was still rain, but midway down, it was all coalescing together and freezing into the mammoth blocks now threatening all.

Once again, Inarius had taken Uldyssian’s work—the cloud cover—and twisted it into a fiendish assault. That it also slew his own followers meant nothing, just as long as the rebels perished.

The monstrous ice chunks did what the Inquisitors could not, shattering the cohesiveness of the edyrem circle. Too many were not powerful enough to deal with such a fearsome threat. Men and women ran wherever they could, hoping to avoid being crushed like insects.

The Cathedral’s warriors made good use of their disorganization, heedless or uncaring of the threat the ice caused them as well. More than one of Uldyssian’s followers perished with a blazing sword through the back or a gleaming mace spilling open their skulls. That some Inquisitors were caught unable to escape Inarius’s magic did nothing to counter the horror that they reaped.

Furious, Uldyssian dismissed the black sword, grabbed Serenthia by the wrist, and returned both of them to among the edyrem. He immediately reached out to those nearest, reassuring them as best he could and demanding their help. Most listened. He hoped they were enough for what he intended.

“Focus with me, Serry!” he all but shouted in her face. With great reluctance, the raven-tressed woman nodded. Immediately, her mind and his were almost one, with the others he had reached adding to their will.

A vast shadow loomed over the pair. Uldyssian did not need to look up to know what it was and how little time he had.

Be with me, he told the others again.

The shadow darkened. Uldyssian sensed the massive block of ice just above.

Gritting his teeth, he thrust both hands skyward.

The explosion utterly shattered the gargantuan block. Yet the pieces did not come raining down but rather flew with purpose through the air. They struck other huge chunks of ice even as the latter formed, shattering those, too.

Eyes shut from strain, heart beating faster, Uldyssian imagined the dramatic scene above him. He saw with far more accuracy than his mortal eyes could where each fragment had to strike to avert more slaughter.

And when at last it seemed Inarius could not keep pace with his efforts, Uldyssian took the thousands and thousands of sharp pieces and threw them down upon the bulk of the Inquisitor legions. He threw them with as much force as he could, defying the power that the Prophet fed his servants to save them from this peril.

The needlelike shards dove toward the ground with a swiftness that left in their wakes a high, hissing sound. The Inquisitors gazed up to see their deaths coming. They used their power to try to prevent the oncoming missiles from reaching them…used that power and still failed utterly to stop even one.

The shards drove through metal, flesh, and bone without pause. Eyes and mouths were punctured with ease. In mere seconds, men became nothing more than quivering pincushions, so many were the icy missiles that dropped upon them.

The screams rose to a crescendo, then quickly died down. So swift was the slaughter that for the space of a single heartbeat, more than half of the Inquisitors still stood. Their bodies were drenched with blood, and their ruined countenances were slack, but they stood.

Then, as one, the might of the Cathedral crumpled like rag dolls to the unforgiving ground. The bodies lay sprawled at all angles.

Of the many Inarius had sent, only those mixed among the edyrem yet survived. Their numbers, though, dropped quickly as Uldyssian’s people vented their fury for the deaths of their own on the Cathedral’s survivors.

Momentarily sickened by events, Uldyssian fought to stop the executions. He succeeded, but only after far too many more were slain. The rest of the Inquisitors were slowly rounded up, although what to do with them was a question for which he had no answer.

As he stumbled among the dead, his eyes watching for whatever next the Prophet would send at them, the son of Diomedes ran across a figure he had not seen since early on. It was the gray-haired priestess who had been leading the riders. Unlike the rest, she had no discernible mark on her, yet she was definitely dead. Her open eyes stared up at him almost accusingly.

“Master Uldyssian?”

His inspection of the body was interrupted by wiry Jonas. The bald former brigand moved toward him with tentative steps.

There were red, liquid lines across the right side of his face, but otherwise he was unharmed.

“Jonas! Did you see what happened to this one?”

The edyrem glanced at the priestess. “Nay. Was she of some import?”

Giving it some thought, Uldyssian shook his head. “Not anymore.”

The other man peered sharply at him. “Master Uldyssian! You look all done in! Let me give you a hand…”

The son of Diomedes was tempted, but he could show no weakness now. Whatever reprieve that they had been given was certain to be a short one. He waved off the hand. “It’s not necessary…”

“As you wish, Master Uldyssian,” the Parthan returned abruptly. With an equally curt bow, Jonas quickly retreated. “I will go see to the others.”

Even as he rushed off, Uldyssian became aware of someone coming from the opposite direction. He turned to find Mendeln. “Well?”

Uldyssian’s brother knew exactly what he asked. “There are many dead. Many. If I had to guess, I would say nearly a quarter of our number since this first began.”

“Nearly a quarter…” So many lives lost. It was made worse by the fact that although the Cathedral had suffered far, far greater, those lives meant nothing to the true enemy. Inarius considered his dead servants less than nothing.

The thought stirred Uldyssian’s rage anew.

Mendeln quickly took hold of his shoulder. “Uldyssian, do not let this happen to you again! Each time you permit your base emotions to rise to the forefront, you risk losing mastery of your powers. Think about it! Would that not play into Inarius’s hands?”

His brother had a point, but Uldyssian kept seeing all those who had perished here. Even the woman at his feet, who had obviously served as one of the Prophet’s chief acolytes, was a victim of the angel’s madness.

“Uldyssian…listen to me…”

But he no longer paid any mind to Mendeln, for at that moment, Uldyssian spotted something on the corpse that made every muscle tense. He quickly bent down and examined the face. With trepidation, Uldyssian turned the priestess’s head to the side in order to get a better look.

“Mendeln, look at this.”

His black-robed sibling bent near, and a gasp escaped Mendeln. “By the dragon!”

There were two dark lesions near the ear, lesions whose origins were unmistakable.

“Malic!” Mendeln whispered. “He was among us!”

“You didn’t notice him?”

The younger brother shook his head. “I must be near, and even then it would take a moment. Malic…”

“Inarius never runs out of tricks.” Uldyssian surveyed the body, seeking again the cause of death. He needed badly to find a cause. A single wound. A cracked gap at the back of the skull. Anything.

But there was no mark.

Uldyssian looked around, but the nearest edyrem were far away. “We can’t have this now, Mendeln! I can’t concentrate on both him and Inarius—”

“Malic is my mistake,” Mendeln hissed, his eyes narrowed in self-loathing. “My curse to bear. I was reckless, and because of that, I let a fiend as terrible as any demon back into the world.” He straightened. “I will deal with him. You must focus on Inarius only.”

They both knew that there was far more of an impending threat than just the renegade angel, but Inarius was indeed the imminent problem. Nothing else would matter if they failed to defeat him.

Still, Uldyssian could not help considering their new problem—and a possible answer finally came to him. “He was here. He was the only one nearby.”

“Who?”

“Jonas.” Now that he thought more about it, Uldyssian recalled also what he felt had been the Parthan’s odd behavior. “Yes…it’s Jonas, damn it!”

That was all Mendeln evidently needed. He held the ivory dagger ready. It glowed with a deathly light. “I will find him. He will not escape this time.”

Neither suggested telling the others of the monster in their midst. That would be the final panic as edyrem turned on one another believing Malic was about to take over their bodies. The high priest was invisible to Uldyssian’s senses, and that no doubt had to do with Inarius. That meant that none of the others—save perhaps Mendeln—could sense Malic, either.

Worse, who was to say the specter even looked like Jonas anymore?

He could not think about it. Uldyssian had to trust Mendeln. Mendeln would not let him down.

Rathma suddenly stood next to him. It said something for Uldyssian’s current mood that he found no surprise in the Ancient’s abrupt arrival. Such things were becoming much too commonplace for the former farmer.

“I have a thought,” Rathma declared.

“Those are never good. What is it?”

The Ancient cocked his head, then granted Uldyssian his point. “This one has the hopes of being something better…at least, I think so.”

“Does it have the same chance of success that your visit to your father had?” the mortal asked with open sarcasm in his tone.

“More than that.” Rathma pursed his lips. “But possibly not much more.”

Uldyssian was more concerned with what Inarius was currently plotting. He glanced to the north but only saw the Cathedral of Light. Something was brewing, though. Inarius would not remain idle…

“We can’t do anything to help you this time.”

The cowled figure wrapped his cloak tight about him. His inhumanly handsome face held no emotion. “I expect none. But this must be attempted.”

There was obviously no talking Rathma out of whatever it was that he thought he needed to do, but Uldyssian wanted at least to know what the Ancient thought so important that he would leave the edyrem at such a juncture. “Just tell me what you think you can accomplish. Where are you going this time?”

His face as still as death, Inarius’s son casually replied, “I’m going for what help I might be able to find. I’m calling a family gathering…”

Mendeln rushed among the edyrem, no doubt looking to them like death itself come to gather more victims. For all their might, even the most skilled of his brother’s followers looked away as he passed. Only one of his handful of “students” acknowledged him, but he immediately indicated to her that he was on a task demanding the utmost privacy.

Of necessity, Uldyssian’s brother paused now and then to ask some unsettled edyrem if they had seen the Parthan. Most had not, but finally two directed him toward where they had last noticed him. Not at all confident that he would still find the false Jonas there, Mendeln nonetheless vigorously pursued his only lead.

He continued to hold the dagger in front of him, but thus far, it had given no sign that he was near the ghoulish shade. Mendeln eyed everyone he passed, seeking whether one of them might be Malic’s latest host.

Inarius’s attacks and the edyrem’s defenses had left much of the area churned up. The massive chunks of ice had raised entire hills when they had come crashing down, and although they were now rapidly melting, they, too, created more barriers, more places around which to hide.

But as Mendeln neared one particularly jagged hill, his sharp eyes caught sight of something pale peeking out from the unstable rubble. At the same time, he sensed the wrongness that was Malic in the nearby vicinity.

A spell ready on his lips, Uldyssian’s brother approached whatever it was the upturned stone and dirt all but covered. With caution, he used his free hand to brush some of the rubble away.

A scarred, bone-white elbow revealed itself. It was a body, just as he had assumed, but it did not wear the garments of Jonas. That it was very likely Parthan—for there was none of the light-skinned Kehjani among the edyrem—was all Mendeln could tell of it. He dismissed the corpse quickly, still aware that Malic had to be close by.

He would have asked the ghosts, but since the moment Uldyssian and the rest had entered the grasslands, all the ghosts had vanished. Even those of the recent dead had not remained in the vicinity, as was usual. It was as if they dared not stay near the confrontation. Mendeln was frustrated by the lack of such company. Now, more than ever, he could have used their eyes, their knowledge.

From the north, there suddenly came what sounded—impossibly—like a glorious chorus. Light glistened above him, a fantastic light reflected by the huge chunk of ice. That light also illuminated everything save the area shadowed by the churned ground.

Mendeln froze. He knew what the light and the chorus presaged.

Inarius had finally entered the fray.

For the moment, all thought of Malic vanished as Mendeln concerned himself with Uldyssian and the angel. He wanted to rush to his brother’s side, even though he knew that Serenthia and Rathma would already be there. He had sworn to himself that when the Prophet appeared, he, too, would face him.

But Malic could not be ignored.

The dagger flared.

Mendeln started to turn.

He could only imagine that it was because of his swift reaction that his skull was not cracked open. Even still, the rock in Malic’s fist sent shock waves through Mendeln’s head. Uldyssian’s brother collapsed against the hill.

Through blurry eyes, he beheld Jonas’s leering face. The smile was exactly as he recalled Malic’s.

“A crude method, but effective,” remarked the specter, holding forth the rock. “I dared not use a spell other than to add to the masking shield. We wanted you to notice me just enough and no more…”

We. That could only mean Inarius had planned this with the shade. “You—” Mendeln’s head ached. “This moment was to—”

“This moment was all arranged, if that is what you mean!” Throwing away the rock, the bald figure retrieved Mendeln’s dagger. “This should help.” Malic reached into a pouch on Jonas’s belt, removing from it a red stone. “Between the two, I should have no trouble taking your body this time.”

Mendeln could not fathom why Malic would want a body so badly injured, but then he realized that his head wound was not life-threatening. He was merely stunned, something that would not affect the ghost.

As for why Malic would want him at all, the answer was obvious. Mendeln ul-Diomed would stand by his brother’s side—and then with a touch steal Uldyssian’s body while simultaneously killing the older sibling.

And hardly lifting a finger, the Prophet would defeat his adversary.

Mendeln sought to focus his thoughts enough to cast a spell, but too late he realized that the high priest had struck with calculation. He had never meant to hit his victim anywhere but where he had and Mendeln had foolishly obliged him by turning as planned. Better if Uldyssian’s brother had simply stood with his back to the creature, for then perhaps Malic would have killed him.

In actuality, that was doubtful. Malic was not so careless. He wanted Uldyssian’s body, and the only way to achieve that was through Mendeln.

“You—you are being used!” the son of Diomedes managed. “Inarius—the angels—”

Malic grinned. “Will find that the fate of Sanctuary is beyond their control.”

And suddenly, Mendeln recalled what Serenthia had found, that demonic hordes waited to attack. But they were not in league with Inarius anymore. Instead, they prepared to battle over Sanctuary and its humans, especially the edyrem, with Tyrael’s host.

And the high priest intended to profit by that, assuming—perhaps wrongly—that the Burning Hells would triumph. Uldyssian’s brother considered pointing out the risk the double-dealing ghost was taking but chose not to. More important than Malic’s plot was the fact that Mendeln at last felt his head clearing. The words he had sought came back to him. He blurted out the first—

Malic held the red stone before his eyes. Immediately, Mendeln could not help but stare at it. His spell died on his lips.

“Your gaze cannot escape,” mocked the specter, leaning close. “Your mind cannot think save to hear me.”

His victim sought to protest but could not. Mendeln’s last coherent thought was that he could expect no aid from anyone else, for they were all focused upon Inarius’s coming.

Beyond the crystal, Malic raised the dagger. It was not his intention to stab Mendeln but to use the ethereal weapon’s magic against its owner.

“So very close now…” The shade’s words echoed in Mendeln’s numbed mind. “Soon—”

Without warning, the mesmerizing stone vanished from sight. Mendeln blinked. His brain and body seemed disconnected from each other, but his ears apparently worked, for they registered the sounds of struggle. Uldyssian’s brother tried to clear his vision—

And as he did, he beheld Jonas—no, Malic—battling with someone who held the high priest’s wrists from behind. The hand wielding the dagger thrust straight up as the two fought over it. Of the crystal, there was no sign.

But all that mattered to Mendeln was just who had come to his rescue, the person he would have least expected.

Achilios.