The Wielder: Sworn Vengeance (The Wielder Series) (38 page)

“You may wish to use the sword now,” he says “I think all the humans with projectile weapons are gone.’

I drop the gun and pull Yayne from the sheath.  When I do I immediately get the impulse – “ENEMY TO THE RIGHT!”

I feel the sword power up and I swing blindly.  The big-ass spider is cut in half and I am partially coated in its entrails.  Good thing it’s a summonling though, as it immediately starts to evaporate and I don’t have to worry about wearing spider guts all day.

I turn to Arix, who is as ready to cast
the magic as I’ve ever seen him.  He looks at me and says, “Go get that Garrigin’s head. I am prepared to defend you.”

~

The wave of force flings Karen, Shey, Sil, Pffif and two of Maldgorath’s summonlings backwards against the wall.  Vets, remembering their last encounter fell flat to the ground and the majority of the wave passes over her.  After the wave passes, she realizes all too suddenly that the seconds they are wasting in disarray are being used by their foe.

In the mere seconds Vets
was down, four new foes have fully materialized.  One attacks Ahtsag from behind and finds ruin at the tip of the poison stinger hidden in his tail. two went for the downed heroes with the last – a spider scurrying from the fight.  Vets fired quickly from the ground, not as much to kill as to wound and slow. That tactic works, as the beast barreling for Karen falls over tripping the one next to it.

Th
is chaos gives Vets time to pop up and finish one of them.  But in that time another foe ripples into existence and the tell-tale signs of another was coming.

Vets surveyed her surroundings and s
ees that Karen is stunned, Shey lays in a crumpled ball and Sil was struggling to find her feet. “Succubus! We are losing ground!” she yells to Sil, who snapped around hearing that call.

“Healer!” Vets cries
, “The Pixie!”

Christophe hear
s and moves from Greg raising his hand toward Sheyliene who begins to stir.

Shots ring
out and Vets knows that Sil is back in the battle.  Reflexively, Vets ducks and rolls then looks over to see Sil – now wide eyed.  She turns her head to follow Sil’s field of vision and understands.

They are joined by a 12 foot tall cave horror beast.

~

Sheyliene stirs
to consciousness and sees the scene in front of her.  Their adversary is bringing forth his minions at a rate of almost one summoning a second.  She bolts up and trains her bow at the foe approaching Silithes.

That foe f
alls, but due to gunfire from Vets.

She looks over at Christophe and points at Karen.

In that moment, Sheyliene realizes her error.  Her wings fluttering she takes to air and retrains her sights on Maldgorath and signs of his silver dragon.  A shimmer occurs near him and she trains her bow on it.

Then a larger shimmer blocks her view and something very
huge and crablike appears.

She whips around to see the dragon form over
their adversary's shoulder.  Znuul has hold on Maldgorath with one arm and is landing blows with the other, driving him backward.  She dodges a whipping claw from the large intruder and lets loose an arrow at the dragon.

It strikes the dragon, but i
t's not a kill. She reaches back for another arrow and watches as is opens its jaws and spits silver fire in Znuul’s face.  She sees Znuul fall over helplessly to the floor clutching his face.

Then she fires th
e arrow that ends the dragon properly.

“I think I messed up
,” she thinks to herself.

~

Ears ringing and vision still blurring Karen picks herself up and instinctively readies her wand.  She sees that they are joined by a large almost crustacean like creature that is harrying Vets and Silithes.

Her eyes, now focusing better
, look over towards the large form of Znuul, who is apparently pummeling Maldgorath.  That makes her feel better.  That is until she sees a small dragon appear.  It’s maw opens and it spews a sparkling silver fire at Znuul.

He falls.  Instantly and badly.

“No!” she cries and summons the largest column of lightning she can with a cry of “Tintreach!”   The bolt crashes into Maldgorath forcing him back several steps, but not down.  She takes in his wicked smile after he recovers from the strike.

“Well done witch!” Maldgorath shouts at her.  “But I think my dragon did a little better!”

With that he grabs Znuul by one of his horns and turns him towards Karen, showing that half of his face is missing along with most of the musculature of his right shoulder.

Maldgorath  pitches Znuul to the side
casually and laughs, which infuriates Karen. “No!” she cries as she begins casting in a frenzy – fire, lightning, ice.  Maldgorath is pummeled back by the fury.   But Karen’s fury can only last so long.

She
finds herself spent, magically.

And despite the horrendous damage, Maldgorath rises – wounds
once again healing at a rate beyond any reason.

“
Red Witch! I think you will make a very nice addition to the collection,” he says loudly over the sounds of battle.

~

Pffiferil comes to, shaking off the impact of Maldgorath's wave.  The first thing he notices is the 12 foot tall cave horror trying to jamb its pointy legs into Vets and clamp its claw on Sil.

Shaking himself he checks his vest and pulls
out shells for double Barrel Betty.   Loading the weapon he says.  “Times to earn our keep.”  With that he lunges forward faster than you would think with those two small legs of his.

With a baseball-like slide he goes under the cave terror, then pop
s up when directly under it.  He shoves Betty into a leg joint and lets rip. The creature responds with a resonating bellow. Not waiting a moment, he pulls a grenade from his vest and shoves his arm inside the hole betty made.  Then he runs like hell in the other direction – cackling in laughter.

The grenade explodes and this large foe only has one set of legs now
. It totters to the side.

~

As shooting at the horror does little due to its tough outer shell, Sil flaps her wings to elevate herself and stay out of reach. Shooting at other targets makes the most sense to her. 

She s
ees Pffif make his move, the beast roar and Pffif dart out.

The explosion that follow
s cripples the beast.  But it also makes it attack more frantically. A cave horror is not a thinking creature to start with. Vets is the thing on the ground presenting the most obvious threat.  All it’s thrashing fury becomes directed to Vets.

Sil collapses her wings and hits the ground fast.  She remembers her training with Karen, clears her mind and works through the casting for the fire explosion.  She pitches the spell at the abdomen of the creature and watches as the conflagration sets.

The creature lets out a shriek.

“Cook in your own shell,
bastard,” Sil thinks.

The creature
obliges.

~

The feeling of being dragged up, shocks Znuul back to consciousness.  The pain is the first thing that grasped him.  He tries to smile but half of his face is missing. Pain is good.  Pain is sensory input.  Pain means alive.

He feels himself cast to the side.  He tries to bring healing to the one eye that is still there.  A quick survey of himself leaves him growling.  He has lost most of the use of his right side upper body.
  He could heal, but not in time, not in this kind of battle.

He curses the dragon and its damn silver fire.

He begins to stand noting that Maldgorath is well under attack from Karen.

It won’t be enough. He thinks to himself.  The next thought he has is
, “where is that damn Arthur?”

He hears Maldgorath say something to Karen to the extent of “your next.”  Reflexively he lunges at Maldgorath, who blocks the blow and lays h
im low with a blow right in his blind spot.

“Seriously
, Ahtsag? It’s all but over. I’m going to reap your little red witch and from the looks of things you too.  You can’t imagine the fun you two are going to have harming one another.”

Rage. Pure blinding rage.  That’s all Znuul fe
els and he goes with that. He explodes from the ground slamming Maldgorath into the wall, bending the metal supports. Out of the corner of his good eye, he sees a figure with a glowing white sword run into the area.  That being cuts down two combatants and turns Znuul’s way.

Znuul feels Maldgorath’s hand sink deep into his
right shoulder where there is no flesh. The other hand reaches over and grabs Znuul’s remaining horn.  With a twist, Znuul is now the one whose back is against the wall. A clubbing blow pushes Znuul’s head through the metal sheathing of the building.

“Fool, where is your
famed strength now?” Maldgorath gloats at him.  As a response Znuul pulls his head back out and trains his good eye on Maldgorath followed by an attempt at a smile. 

Unable to really say anything as his mouth and tongue were burned away, he grabs Maldgorath with his good arm, pulling him close.  Then seeing what he want
s, he winks to Arthur who just skidded to a stop about 12 feet behind them.

Znuul raises his leg and kicks Maldgorath like nobody’s business.

~

Spider guts or no, I have to move. I bolt through the door and see a giant burning crab/scorpion thing and Znuul pushing Maldgorath against the wall.  I rush in.

Something attacks me and I cut it in half without thinking.

The frog-faced demon
I have seen before attacks me immediately after that. I dodge frog face and cleave it’s head from its shoulders.  I could swear frog face's rolling head mouthed “not again" as it tumbled. 

Maldgorath
flips Z around and strikes him hard enough to put his head through the wall.

My momentum
carries me right behind Znuul and the Collector.  I raise my sword.

The
n I see the strangest thing. Z pulls his head out of the wall. Half of Ahtsag’s face is missing.  One eye is completely gone.  He is so messed up.  But he winks at me with the good one.

Then next thing I know Maldgorath is sliding my way. 
His back to me, just skidding.  He has no idea I’m even here. It feels like slow motion. I raise my sword and in great clarity, step in and take his head.

His summonlings immediately stop, fall
, and begin to dissolve.  Znuul falls to a knee.

I hear the cold splut of Maldgorath’s head hitting the pavement.

I take a step back and look at Maldgorath’s headless body standing, teetering - his arms outstretch
ed fingers grasping.  After a moment the body’s balance is lost and it falls to the ground unceremoniously where it twitches for a moment, black blood pumping from the ever so cleanly cut neck stump.

It’s remarkably quiet.  No more angry minions.  No more gunfire. It’s quite surreal.

I look over at Znuul.  He’s on the ground on all fours.  He lifts himself up and turns to me – I about fall over.  Half of his face is just gone, black bone exposed, his right eye socket empty.  The burns extend down the right part of his torso, more bones and organs exposed.

“Ahtsag!”  Karen’s cry breaks the silence.  I jump and turn towards the cry.  She’s running towards him as he is trying to lift himself up.  I hear her tell him to sit.  She fumbles at a pouch at her side, pulling out a red healing potion.

“Drink this,” she says putting the bottle to his mouth.  She discards the empty bottle quickly, pulls out another and pours the contents over where his flesh used to be.  She is crying.

Th
e scene is interrupted by Sil’s voice, “Hey Pixie! Time to see you dance in his black blood.”

Th
is seems to perk Znuul up a bit.  He gives a weak thumbs-up to that.

Christophe
comes over and helps tend to Znuul.  He casts a healing spell on Znuul, who promptly throws up, resulting in the concrete hissing and steaming. Guess that healing universal love doesn’t sit as well with him as others.

By this time, Sheyliene has come over.  “Eww
,” she says to Znuul’s display.  Then she looks at the large pool of Maldgorath’s black blood.  “I don’t want to have to clean that icky stuff off.”

I don’t blame her. Over to the side lays Maldgorath’s head.  I walk over to it and give it a small kick, then reach down and grab his head up by the tentacle/dreadlock like things and hold it for all to see.

“Revenge is ours! Jerry, Marge, Grey, Herrmann you are avenged!”  Then I turn his ugly head around to face me. “Teach you to fuck with Arthur MacInerny you evil son of bitch.”

To add a little cosmic emphasis I slap his ugly face.

The eyes open.

“Arrr
-herr  Nooo!” comes Znuul’s slurred voice.

I drop the head and take a few steps back.  A black cloud begins
emanating from his mouth. Yayne lights up and sends me a warning.  The cloud rushes at me and I swing the sword trying to stop it.  It envelopes my face.  I feel this greasy black cloud pushing into my eyes, my ears, my nose.  I hold my breath to deny it access.  I feel hands upon me – it must be the others.  I’m trying not to panic.

Panic will use up my oxygen.  I feel a spell upon me – a warding of sorts. 
Someone is trying to help.

My eyes are burning as this noxious cloud is trying to push through my eyelids. My nose is burning as it pushes its way in. My lungs are burning from a lack of air.

My brain is swirling.  This isn’t fair! I’ve come too far to let this sack of crap off me with some black cloud. I drop Yayne and begin trying to grab handfuls of it and pull it away.  I can’t grab it - it’s a gas.

Panic.

My lungs are exploding. I take off running hoping to blow this thing off me and crash into a wall. 

The impact
knocks the breath of me. As I inhale, I don’t feel the relief of fresh air.  I taste the greasy metallic flavor of the cloud and feel the touch of death.  My lungs are aflame.

My world goes blank.