“Leave them,” said Mazael. “They trusted in the San-keth to protect them...and the serpent priests failed. Perhaps they'll rethink their faith in Sepharivaim.”
###
Two hours later Mazael rode to the east, his face grim.
Corvad and Molly. His children, both of them. And together they threatened to destroy the Grim Marches, to slay the peasants and knights and nobles under his protection. But not if Mazael stopped them.
Not if Mazael slew them.
His own children.
His scowl deepened, his hand tightening around Lion's hilt.
He already had the blood of his half-brother and half-sister on his hands, Amalric and Morebeth Galbraith.
No doubt he could live with the blood of his children on his hands, as well.
Chapter 20 – Master of Shadows
The moaning wind never ceased.
Lucan made his slow way along the road, one hand braced against the rock wall of the mountain. The path here was little more than a twisting ribbon of stone, clinging to the mountain's jagged side. The slope wasn't quite a cliff, but steep enough that a fall would kill him.
He laughed a little at the thought.
One needed a physical body in order to die. And what would happen if he was killed here? Would his spirit disintegrate into nothingness? Would the Demonsouled corruption devour him? Or would he be trapped here forever, the reapers and killing him over and over again?
That thought did not make him laugh. Perhaps the Old Demon had lied to him, and his physical body was already dead. Perhaps he was trapped here.
“No,” growled Lucan. He would escape from this place. He would return to his body. Then he would take vengeance upon Malavost, upon his father, upon his brother, upon anyone who had ever caused him pain.
He gazed up at the mountain, at the ruined black city overhead. It was much closer now, and he had a clear view of the gaping holes torn into its black walls. What was the black city? Everything else here was either a manifestation of the Demonsouled corruption or something spawned from the depths of Lucan's own mind. So what did the black city represent? The Demonsouled power of the bloodstaff? Lucan's inner mind? Or something else entirely?
He would find out, soon enough.
Assuming the reapers and the hooded shadows did not kill him first.
Lucan glanced backward, at the foothills and the dead forest and the roiling black sea. He had seen no one else since leaving the burned castle in the foothills, and the long road let him see anyone attempting to ascend the mountain. Not that it mattered – Lucan suspected the reapers would not rely on anything as mundane as walking.
The road widened as it followed the curve of the mountain. Lucan lifted his hand, drawing on power for a spell. The wider road meant that more than one reaper could attack him at once, if they wanted a fight. He kept walking, hand raised, and the road widened into a broad ledge.
Then he saw the ruins ahead.
“Not again,” he muttered.
A courtyard jutted from the side of the mountain, built of the same black stone as the ruined castle and the city atop the peak. Broken statues littered the courtyard, images of men in armor and women in flowing gowns. It looked a great deal like the Court of Swords at his father's castle of Swordgrim.
“What is it this time?” shouted Lucan, stepping into the courtyard, his boots clicking against the black flagstones. “Shall you appear in the form of my mother, and castigate me for my failures? Or will you take Tymaen's shape, and blame all my pain upon my mistakes? Or perhaps you'll take the shape of Marstan, and mock my weakness?” His voice rose to a shout, echoing off the side of the mountain. “Or maybe you'll take my shape as a child, and I can reflect sadly upon my lost innocence and youth.” The rage bubbled in him, threatening to spin out of control. He had made mistakes, yes, but he had done what was necessary. He had already suffered so much, lost so much. Why must he suffer this, too? “Well? Stop hiding! Out with it already!”
The echoes died away.
“Have you grown so suspicious, Lucan?”
He turned, scowling.
Tymaen stood by the stone railing, clad in a gown of rich green with gold trim on the sleeves and hem. Her hair rippled in the wind, and her sad blue eyes watched him.
“Or perhaps,” she said, “your own guilt makes you suspicious, for you know that retribution is close at hand.”
“I am suspicious,” said Lucan, “because I am trapped in the spirit realm, and pursued by chattering wraiths that weary my ears with absurdities.”
Tymaen shook her head. “I remember when you were happy. When you were...”
“Shut up,” said Lucan. “You're not Tymaen. You're either one of the reapers, or one of those the shadows. Another servant of the Demonsouled corruption.” He flexed his hand, drawing more magical power. “Return to your master, and tell him to stop sending tattered wraiths to pursue me. I will escape from this place, and if he hinders me, I will destroy him.”
Tymaen smirked. She had never worn an expression like that in life, her mouth twisted with cruelty, her blue eyes filled with hateful glee. “Tell him yourself.”
Lucan spun.
His father stood in the center of the courtyard. Even his late forties, Lord Richard Mandragon was strong and vigorous. Lord Richard wore armor made from crimson chain and the overlapping red scales of a slain dragon. At the age of eighteen, Richard Mandragon had ventured into the dragon-haunted peaks of the Great Mountains and slain a dragon with his own hands, earning the name Dragonslayer. At eighteen, Lucan's elder brother Toraine had done the same, killing a black dragon, and men called him the Black Dragon.
When Lucan had been eighteen, Marstan had tried to possess him.
The Dragon's Shadow, men called Lucan. The skulking wizard, lurking in the shadows of his noble father and fearless brother.
“How terribly clever,” said Lucan. “A hooded shadow wearing my father's form. Have you come to lecture me about my failings? How I have disappointed you? How I am unworthy of bearing the name of Mandragon?”
Richard said nothing, his black eyes focused on Lucan.
Lucan sneered and stepped forward. “I am what I am because of you, father. You let Marstan teach me, even knowing what he was. And you used my arts and spells to fortify your power. Yes, Richard Mandragon is a generous and wise lord...but cross him and he'll send Toraine to rape your daughters and Lucan to work dark magic on your lands.”
Still Richard said nothing.
“Get out of my way,” said Lucan. “You're not my father. You're only another shadow.”
He cast a spell, his will hammering in a psychokinetic blast.
Richard made a twisting motion with his right hand, his eyes blazing with crimson fire. For an instant the air around him distorted, like the air rippling over the hot ground in the summer sun. Lucan’s psychokinetic attack collapsed, leaving Richard unharmed.
A warding spell.
“Ah,” said Lucan, flexing his fingers. “Another hooded shadow, I assume? I destroyed the first of your kind I encountered, and I shall destroy both of you.”
“You are a fool, Lucan Mandragon,” said Richard. It was his father's voice, the voice Lucan had endured all his life. Yet now it had a strange resonance, as if something darker and stronger snarled beneath the deep tones of Lord Richard's voice.
“Perhaps,” said Lucan, “but I know what you are. A hooded shadow, a servant of the Demonsouled corruption I brought into myself.”
“Do you not know who I am?” said Richard. The bloody fire in his eyes blazed brighter.
Lucan frowned. The fire in Richard Mandragon's eyes was the same color as the light that had flickered in the sigils of his bloodstaff. The bloodstaff that Lucan had forged in Mazael's Demonsouled blood...
“You,” said Lucan, “you're...”
“I am you,” said Richard.
“No,” said Lucan. “You're the Demonsouled power I pulled into myself, the corruption that...”
“No,” said Richard. “I am you, Lucan Mandragon. I am the Demonsouled power that fused with a portion of your spirit, creating this place.” He gestured with a red-armored hand at the mountain, the black city, and the dead forest spread out below. “You see me as your father, do you not? You always feared that you would become as cold and as ruthless as him. But now you fear what the Demonsouled power will make of you. You struggle against it, against me, even as it devours your soul piece by piece.”
“I will defeat you,” said Lucan.
Richard shook his head. “I am you. How can you defeat yourself? You fear me...but you should not. You have always desired power, and I have great power. I am what you are destined to become, what you were meant to be. Join with me. Let the sundered halves of our soul rejoin. And when we become one once more, no will have the power to stop us. Everyone who ever made us suffer will pay a thousand times over. And then, we will have the strength to cleanse the world of dark magic forever, to hunt down and slay every last necromancer. We shall make the San-keth extinct.” His voice hardened. “We will hunt down and kill every last Demonsouled. For they are the ultimate authors of our suffering. The Old Demon himself trained Marstan’s teachers. And the power in Mazael's blood did this to us, splitting us asunder.”
“Yes,” whispered Lucan. He did want that, very much. The power to end all dark magic. The power to make his enemies suffer, to make them beg for mercy...
No! That way lay madness.
“I am Lucan Mandragon,” spat Lucan, “not you. I am not the puppet of the Demonsouled, or the Old Demon, or the San-keth, or anyone else! And you are only a posturing shadow, a phantasm of the spirit world.”
“Do not be a fool.”
A new voice. Lucan saw his older brother Toraine, tall and slim in his armor of black dragon scales, walk to join Lord Richard and Tymaen.
“You could never defeat me,” said Toraine. “You were always too weak. Well, now is your chance to become the strongest. Are you too cowardly to seize it?”
“Oh, he has potential, certainly.” This time Marstan, an old man in black robes, strode across the courtyard. “But he was too weak to seize it.” He smirked. “Lucan is nothing more than raw material for those strong enough to use him.”
Lucan swallowed. Tymaen, Toraine, and Marstan were almost certainly hooded shadows. Lucan could take one of the hooded shadows in a straight fight, but three would almost certainly overpower him. And he did not know what kind of power the Lord Richard apparition wielded. If Richard drew on the full power the bloodstaff had possessed, then Lucan would find himself quickly defeated.
Richard held out an armored hand. “Join me. Let us become one, as we were meant to be.”
“No,” said Lucan. “I am my own man. Not a puppet. If I accept you, if I accept the Demonsouled power, I'll become the sort of twisted creature that Ultorin became. And I will not. I did not fight against dark magic only to let it devour me.”
Richard shook his head. “The end is not in doubt. We shall become one, and you shall become greater. The only question is whether you come of your own will...or I force you to do so. Take him.”
Tymaen, Toraine, and Marstan lifted their hands, casting spells, and Lucan felt the crawling tingle of magical force.
He struck first.
Lucan's will lashed out, flinging a blast of psychokinetic power. But instead of one massive blow, he split his will, sending the force in a dozen different directions. The blast struck the chunks of broken statues scattered around the courtyard, sent them flying into the air.
Into Lucan's enemies.
Broken statues fell into Marstan, Tymaen, and Toraine, disrupting their spells and sending them crashing to the ground. Lucan cast another spell, unleashing a volley of sizzling blue sparks at Richard Mandragon. The air around Richard shimmered, and then flashed as his defensive wards collapsed. Lucan began casting again, hoping to land a killing blow on Richard.
Richard moved faster.
Blood-colored fire burned around his fingers, and he flung a bolt of crimson flame. Lucan cast a ward around himself, just in time. His ward screamed and shuddered under the strain of the blast, and he staggered back several steps. The attack had been hideously strong, and Lucan's strength had barely sufficed to turn it aside.
Tymaen, Marstan, and Toraine scrambled to their feet, and as they did, their human shape melted away, flowing back into the form of hooded shadows. Richard began casting another spell, more crimson flame dancing in his palms.
Lucan launched another blast of psychokinetic force, seizing more chunks of broken statues and flinging them at Richard and the hooded shadows. But the shadows cast wards of their own, deflecting the rain of debris. Richard gestured, and crimson flame devoured the rubble flying for his head, reducing it to dust.
“You're too weak, Lucan,” said Richard.
“Now you truly sound like my father,” growled Lucan.
“Join with me,” said Richard. “Let us become one. For we are one, already – you are merely delaying the inevitable. You struggle against what you might become, the power that is rightly yours.”
“You're damned right I struggle against what I might become,” said Lucan. “I will not become a man like Marstan or Malavost. Or a monster like Ultorin.”
“You already are a man like Marstan and Malavost,” said Richard, the hooded shadows waiting at his side. “They wielded dark magic to achieve their ends. You have done the same. What is the difference between you?”
Lucan opened his mouth to speak an answer...and found that he did not have one.
Richard used his hesitation to strike, flinging another blast of bloody flame, and Lucan barely deflected it. The hooded shadows began casting spells, their magic picking up broken pieces of statuary and hurling them at Lucan. He cast fresh wards about himself, trying to deflect both the blasts of fire and the rocky missiles. His defenses held, the wards sparking and flickering beneath the strain.
But he had no power left to attack, and his wards were collapsing...
A chunk of stone clipped Lucan on the shoulder. Another slammed into his thigh, and he staggered back several steps. A third struck his hip, and he collapsed to his knees, blood falling from his wounds.