Will McDermott - The Moons of Mirrodin

Chairs, tables, and gelfruit lay in ruins on the floor, cut to pieces by the levelers’ blades. Pots and pans, mangled into unrecognizable shapes, were scattered amidst the shards of her mother’s bone plates. In the dim light coming from outside, Glissa could see a dark shape just below the entrance to her parents’ spire room. Dark splatters on the floor and wall near the body told Glissa all she needed to know.

Glissa whipped the sword up in front of her and screamed.

Almost as one, the levelers turned from their search and advanced on her. More of the gleaming creatures emerged from each spire. From the pincers of one of the beasts hung the gelfruit-laced tresses of Lyese’s hair. Glissa’s temples pounded, and her ears rang as the blood raced through her body. Tears welled up in her eyes and her hands shook. All her fears and nightmares had finally come true. The levelers had come for her, but she hadn’t been home, and her family had paid for that.

A battle raged inside Glissa as the levelers advanced upon her. The screams of the little girl could not be quelled, but the adult knew that emotion could be harnessed. She transformed the little girl’s fear and sorrow into a rage that quelled the tears and stilled her shaking hands.

As the first leveler came near, the elf ran and leaped over the gleaming blades, landing on the creature’s silver back. She plunged the sword down through the side of the red dome above its mouth, then wrenched the hilt down to rip the blade out and shatter the dome completely. Inside, she could see faceted gems on metallic stalks that turned and seemed to look up at her. She swiped at them with her blade.

The sword sliced through both eye stalks, and the twin gems tumbled down inside the beast. The creature hesitated a moment, then turned as if to follow Glissa. The elf was still standing on top of the leveler, though, and as it turned, it met the twirling blades of another leveler. Metal scraped against metal as the blades cut through each other. One of the blinded leveler’s blades dug firmly into the body of the other creature, severing its pincers and front leg.

“Die!” screamed Glissa as the blind and mindless leveler chewed its comrade.

The elf jumped off her mount and landed on the next one’s back. She intended to blind it as well, spurring the huge metal beasts to tear each other apart as they had her parents and sister. Instead, as she landed, the creature twisted its body and reached for her with its pincers. Glissa lost her footing and fell backward. Her foot slid down past the beast’s head, close to the twirling blades. She pulled her feet up and rolled backward onto the floor, landing hard amidst the rubble of the kitchen, her back against the rear wall.

The levelers turned-all except the blinded one, which had made its way back into a spire room. Glissa pushed on the floor with her hands and legs, inching her way up the wall, but there was nowhere left to go. The levelers advanced on her, one behind the other. Glissa thought about jumping over the front creature’s rotating blades and trying to run across the backs of the killers and escape. The warrior inside her couldn’t bear to retreat in the face of her family’s executioners.

“This is it,” she said. Her family was gone. Her life was over. All she had left was this moment. “You’ll pay dearly for my family’s deaths before I die!” she growled.

Glissa held her sword up in front of her. The tip wavered a little. She readied for the attack, then stared at the tip of the sword. It glowed faintly. Soft green tendrils of energy played up and down the length of the blade. It was the same energy she had seen in her flare, and it was building. Now the entire blade was bright green, and the energy was climbing her arm. With a blinding flash, a tendril of energy lashed out from the tip of the sword at the nearest leveler, engulfing it in green fire. Glissa could feel the heat from the intense flame, but the fire died quickly, leaving nothing but slag where the beast had stood.

The other levelers still advanced, their blades sweeping from side to side as they inched closer. They seemed totally unaware that she had just turned one of their number into a puddle of molten metal. Like hunters who had caught scent of their prey, they would never turn away before the hunt was concluded.

The elf tried to fling another tendril of energy from the tip of the still-glowing sword, but the energy would not obey her command. The glow began to fade as she waved the sword back and forth in front of her.

“No,” she cried.

The green energy was gone. She tried to summon it again as the levelers inched closer, but it was no use. Whatever force had brought the energy from her twice this day was not under her control. She glared at her blade and tried to will the energy to reappear.

She was aware of something strange happening in front of her. Glissa watched in amazement as the levelers stopped, then turned in unison and headed for the door.

She couldn’t believe her luck. What had happened? Why were they retreating? Were they afraid of the sword or the green energy? She didn’t think so. They had continued to press the attack even after she had blinded one leveler with her blade and destroyed a second with that strange energy. Was something controlling them? And, if so, what or who was it?

All of these questions flashed through her mind, but Glissa decided she didn’t need answers. She needed vengeance. With their backs turned, the levelers were vulnerable. The elf hacked at the retreating beasts with her sword, cutting off legs, pincers, claws, anything she could reach.

She pursued them all the way to the door, but none ever turned to meet her attacks. The carcasses of several levelers lay in pieces around her, but most of the silver creatures escaped down the tree. Breathing hard, sweat streaming down her face and mixing with the tears, Glissa thought about climbing down after them. The thought of her mother and sister stopped her at the doorway. One at least might have survived. She had only seen one body. She had to go back and check.

She turned back to the main room and heard movement. The blinded leveler bore down on her. She had no time to run or jump. The metal beast slammed into her, sending Glissa sprawling onto its back. Her ankle caught in the leveler’s broken blades. She tried to pull her foot free, but the blade dug into her tendon. She screamed in pain as the blades cut through her metal skin.

The beast lunged over the lip outside the door and headed down the tree. Glissa grabbed onto the back of the leveler as she began to slide down toward the broken blades. There was nothing to do now but hold on until the creature reached the ground, when she could kill it and extract her foot.

The leveler reached the forest floor. The pain in Glissa’s leg made her wince, but she got onto one knee, brought her sword up over her head, and struck down through the back of the creature. It didn’t seem to notice. Glissa struck again with as much power as she could muster.

A movement in the Tangle beside her caught Glissa’s attention. Perhaps Kane had come to help. Maybe Chunth had left his seclusion to watch the destined one die. From the corner of her eye she saw someone … or something … she’d never seen before. It was about the size of a troll but stood erect, covered in dark robes. The gelfruit light glinted off the stranger’s head in a way that suggested it was neither metal nor flesh. She could have sworn she saw four arms.

It was gone. Glissa stared into the Tangle, looking for the figure, but saw nothing but trees, now whipping by at an incredible speed as the leveler ran. She looked down at the beast and watched as its feet swung back and forth so fast they turned into a blur. Glissa reached down to pull the sword out, intending to strike the beast again.