Obsidian Ridge (33 page)

Jallal rather admired that quality. It was too bad Quinn had to die.

Crossing the throne room, Jallal pounced on the four beasts standing guard outside Xeries’s private chamber. His exotic blade bit through their flesh and bone with no more effort than a knife through water. It cleaved their obsidian claws from their limbs, took their heads from their shoulders, stole their souls with little more than a thought.

He stood in front of the private chamber, the corpses of the black beasts at his feet. He had tracked Quinn to this very room. Had seen Xeries disarm him and place him in custody behind that door. All he had to do now, to claim his prize, was to open it and walk through.

His skin tingled with anticipation. His mind raced with the tantalizing excitement that was to be his revenge. Gripping his blade tightly in one hand, Jallal Tasca released the lever, and the heavy stone door swung wide.

Charging inside, he skidded to a stop in front of a smashed coffin.

His shout rattled the skin of the desiccated corpses, all but one neatly arranged in coffins on the wall.

The room was empty. Quinn was gone.

Grabbing the lip of the first coffin with his powerful hands, Jallal began climbing up the wall to the hole near the ceiling.

He would find Quinn, and when he did, he would make the man suffer. Oh yes. The Claw would beg him for death, and Jallal would oblige.

+++++

The Matron was appalled.

Arriving at Klarsamryn, she expected to find the king dead and her assassins in control. Instead, she found them fighting by his side. Did she have to do everything herself?

The beasts from the Obsidian Ridge had also picked this moment to attack the palace. But that was no concern of hers. There would be time enough to deal with them once she

controlled the throne. She would negotiate with this Xeries fellow. Every man had his price, and she was certain they could come to some sort of an arrangement that would make everyone happy.

Right now, however, she was not even close to happy.

“The goddess Waukeen is not at all pleased!” she screamed, her voice piercing the air.

The battle raged in front of her. Her assassins engaged the black beasts, none paying attention to her orders or displeasure.

Pointing her finger at the closest of her minions, she cast a spell.

“Kill the king,” she commanded.

The assassin turned away from the beast he was fighting and headed deeper into the fray to do her bidding.

“Kill the king,” she commanded again and again, continuing to direct the energies of her prayer.

More and more of her men followed her command, until finally she had turned the tide far enough in her favor that she no longer needed her magic to compel her assassins.

“Kill the king!” she shouted at the top of her lungs, her words bellowing over the field of battle.

The assassins responded to her orders, now aware of the Matron and her desires.

As they had once been swayed by the courageous words of their king, they were now swayed by the fear of retribution from their mistress.

“If he cannot be controlled, then he must be eliminated,” said the Matron. “Korox, I will have your head on a stake before this day is out.”

+

Quinn and Mariko climbed out of the chamber into a lava tube right behind the wall. Once they were all free, Evelyne started down the corridor.

“This is the way we came in,” said Evelyne. “I figure it’ll be the way out as well.”

Mariko followed, but Quinn did not.

“You two go on,” he said. “I must finish my mission.”

“Your mission?” asked Evelyne. “We got your girl. What more do you want?”

“I told the king I’d take down the citadel, and I think I know how to do it.”

“The huge rubies you told me about?” asked Mariko through the mimmio.

“That’s right,” replied Quinn. “I’m going to destroy them and this place with it.”

“We’ll go with you,” said Maliko.

Quinn took her by the arms and gave her a long, slow kiss. “Your father will need your help. Go to him. I’ll be right behind you.”

“But…”

Quinn cut her off with another long kiss. “No time to argue. Your father is in danger, and he may think that I’ve betrayed him. Find him. Protect him. Then we can be together—when this is all over.”

“Listen to your man, honey,” said Evelyne. “We’ll get to getting, and he’ll do whatever it is that a man’s got to do. Leave the romance part for later.”

There was a screeching sound behind them, coming from the chamber they had just left.

“Hurry now,” said Quinn. “No sense in getting caught again.”

Mariko nodded. Then, giving him one last kiss good-bye, she and Evelyne slipped down the hall.

Quinn watched them go, thinking that he had spent a lot of time lately doing exactly that. When she disappeared into the darkness, he turned and went the other way down the lava tube.

+++++

In the middle of the swirling melee, where men fought and died, where the future of a kingdom lay at stake, a friendship turned the tides.

“Get up, Korox.”

The Warrior King, Korox Morkann of Erlkazar, sat on his knees-in the center of the battlefield. His sword lay on the ground before him. His face rested in his hands. He recognized the voice. Lord Purdun, the Baron of Ahlarkhem, old friend and brother-in-law to the king, stood before him, defending Korox against the onslaught of fighters.

“I have nothing left,” he said, shaking his head. “I have doomed my kingdom to save my daughter, and now I have lost everything.”

“This is not the man I know.” Another would-be assassin went sprawling to the ground, split across the belly by Lord Purdun’s sword. “What would your father think if he saw you now? Where would we be if he had given up when his wife, your mother, was killed?”

“He did not lose everything,” said the king. “He had me, and his daughter—your wife.”

“And you still have me, and your sister, and a kingdom that needs your leadership if it is going to survive.”

Purdun spun to catch another assassin just under the chin, taking his jaw from his face with a single blow and sending the man reeling—no longer able to scream.

Korox took a deep breath and looked into the eyes of his old friend. “We fought hard to get here,” he said, remembering the battles they had won when they both had called themselves Crusaders.

“And we must fight hard to stay here,” said the Baron of Ahlarkhem, pausing long enough to cleave the golden-haired symbol of Waukeen from the chest of an incoming assassin and add him to the pile of dead at his feet. “The tides have turned against us, and only you can turn them back.”

Korox looked out at the battlefield. He did not know exactly how long he had been wallowing in self pity. However long it was, it had been too long, and things had changed.

Xeries’s army had them surrounded. The assassins of Waukeen had turned back against him and his men, and most surprisingly—the Matron had arrived. She spurred her forces onward, her veil flowing in the afternoon breeze, casting spells into the battle at her whim.

She had come here to see him removed from the throne. She had come to see him killed at the hands of her assassins.

Korox picked up his sword and hefted it toward Lord Purdun in a salute.

“You are right, my friend—my brother. I have a duty to uphold, and I owe you a debt of gratitude.”

Purdun bowed his head. “I am your humble servant.”

“Then you will fight by my side, one more time?”

The Baron of Ahlarkhem smiled. “One more time would be an honor. Let us hope it is not the last.”

With that, the two men charged back into the fray, pushing their way past the Magistrates, Watchers, mages,

and elite guards to cut into those who would threaten their home, their kingdom, and the nation they fought so hard to free from the rule of Tethyr.

+++++

The Matron had been successful in turning her assassins back to the task of killing King Korox, but it had been a poor tactical decision. Xeries’s army of beasts did not take the time to distinguish between those fighting the king and those fighting with the king. The obsidian beasts mauled and ripped and macerated everything in their path.

The Matron’s desire to take the throne had trapped her minions between two foes, and now they paid the price. The assassins had been compelled to turn their attention away from the invaders to attack the king and his troops. For their efforts, they were simply chewed to pieces from behind. The beasts came at them with their mouths agape, killing a man in one bite, a half-ore in two.

Praying to the goddess Waukeen as fast as she could, the Matron tried to aid her followers. Where one took a wound, another was healed. Where one was outnumbered, he suddenly found himself with the strength of four men. But no matter how fast she countered the beasts of Xeries, she was still not fast enough.

Realizing her error, the Matron called her men back. “To me, my assassins!” she ordered. “We let the beasts fight the king and his troops, then we move in for the kill.”

Casting one final spell, the Matron inscribed a magical circle on the ground—a protective ward that would make it more difficult for the black creatures to reach her and those near her.

“Give them a reason to eat the other soldiers first,” she said, smiling at the cunning of her plan. “The path of least resistance leads directly to Korox and his men.”

Her assassins fell back to her and the protective circle.

Some were cut down in the process, but it was no matter. The Matron only needed enough to mop up whoever managed to survive the onslaught.

A few more than twenty of her minions made it back to her side. The black beasts lunged at them, their open mouths drooling in anticipation, but they were held back, blocked by the magic powers of the goddess Waukeen.

They jumped and clawed, growled and hissed at the invisible wall, but none of them managed to make it through. Though they were stupid creatures, they eventually tired of trying to get past the Matron’s barrier. Then they turned their full attention toward the king and the rest of his men.

“This is it,” said the Matron. “Our hour of victory is at hand.” She straightened her veil, eager to see King Korox Morkann fall and the throne of Erlkazar become-open for her to plunder.

+++++

On the edge of the battlefield, Quinn stopped to look for something. There was little left here, only dead grass and barren trees, the reminders of the king’s disobedience.

The desolation made him smile.

Scanning farther along, past the edge of the square buildings and ruined shrubbery, he found what he wanted.

“That’ll do nicely.” He walked to the tall statue of a rather regal-looking woman holding a book, seemingly engrossed in its pages.

The plinth that she stood upon was nearly the full height of a man—perfect for him to perch on and watch his black beasts punish the foolish king and his followers. Grabbing hold of the stone edge, he struggled to pull himself up.

With some effort, he managed to get to his feet to stand beside the woman and look out at the battle that raged in the courtyard. As soon as he did, the stone beneath him began to vibrate, almost like the soft undulations of the Obsidian

Ridge. The feeling was rather comforting, and it made the victory he was about to witness that much more pleasant.

A wind began to blow, ruffling the dry grass and the robes of the man on the plinth. Mores of white light and tiny glowing orange orbs floated up from him, swirling around each other, once, twice, then shooting out in all different directions.

Quinn’s body began to transform. Muscular arms, straight back, and smooth skin withered and bent, becoming a hunched, pockmarked monstrosity. Buboes and pus-filled lumps appeared. His armor and cape morphed into oddly cut wizard’s robes.

The magical visage of Quinn fell away, leaving behind only a twisted and decrepit overlord.

When the transformation was complete, the wind died.

“That’s very strange,” said Xeries, his voice and appearance having returned to their true forms. “I did not release that spell.”

He looked up at the carved stone woman standing beside him. She seemed to be looking right back at him, her eyes fixed on a single spot.

A strange chill ran down his spine.

Shaking it off, he let out a timid snicker. “Don’t be foolish Xeries,” he said to himself. “It’s only a statue.”

Turning back to the battle at hand, he let out another laugh, this one louder. The arch magus sounded like wind chimes as he reveled in his soon-to-be victory.

+++++

The twin red wyverns on his chest had all but disappeared under a thick coat of blood and gore. King Korox stood beside Lord Purdun. It seemed the two men were eternally fighting for the freedom of their kingdom. Perhaps that was their fare, to fight and die for what they believed in.

Pulling his blade from another downed opponent, the

Warrior King surveyed the battlefield. His men were pinned, and the Matron had found a way to turn the black beasts’ attention away from her own assassins. The tide of this battle had shifted so many times that he was starting to lose count. He was tired, and so too were the men who fought at his behest.

That’s when he spotted Quinn.

The man he had trusted with the life of his daughter had failed him, had betrayed him. Now, it seemed, his one-time bodyguard was going to climb atop the memorial statue of the queen and mock Korox in his final moments.

Spheres of orange and white light shot up into the air over the statue. Korox rubbed his eyes, not sure if what he just saw had actually happened. He looked again. Quinn was hunched over, his body twisted and bent.

That wasn’t Quinn at all. It was Xeries.

Spinning around, Korox put his fingers to his lips and let out a short, shrill whistle. Then a second. The sound of a horse whinnying rose over the clashing melee, and the king’s own black war steed, wounded as it was, appeared at the edge of the fighting. Its heavy hooves stomped down a pair of black beasts as it galloped obediently toward its master.