David Dalglish - Blood Of Gods

Are you with me? Bardiya prayed as it seemed the very ground shook beneath his feet while he ran. Because I need you now. Let me show them. Let every last vile thing sense your presence, and let them be afraid!

The sword weighed nothing in his hands. He’d thought it evil, thought it a curse he never hoped to endure. But before him was true evil, hate with claws and teeth, created solely to murder and kill. And with his sword, he would end them. Clutching the weapon tightly, he let out a bellow, all the pain in his body gone. Into the ranks of the beasts he slammed, and he swung his sword with all his might-but not at any animal. An overpowering instinct guided his hands as he drove the weapon with a massive overhead swing straight into the ground.

The earth rumbled and broke.

The shock wave rolled over the battlefield, knocking aside man and beast alike. The creatures yipped and howled, twisting back to their feet as Bardiya ripped the sword from the ground and held it high above him. The blade shimmered with light, and the things snarled defensively, shielding their eyes with their misshapen mockeries of human hands.

“Say his name!” Bardiya cried. “Say the name of your god!”

“Karak,” hundreds of them whimpered and growled, the word seemingly pulled unwillingly from their throats.

Again he slammed his sword into the broken earth. The ground roiled, and air blasted in all directions with the force of the mightiest storm. The beast-men let out cries of fear and confusion as behind them the people of Ker backed away, the soil firm beneath their feet.

“Say his name!” Bardiya roared, the challenge so loud it hurt his own ears. He could hardly believe himself capable of such volume. “Say the name of he who gives you strength!”

“Karak,” they answered, quieter. Even fewer were willing to meet his gaze, yet none dared turn away. Their attention was his. Simple beings, he knew. They were driven by fear, only fear. Fear of Karak, the god who made them. It filled their hearts and minds. But fear was weak, lacking loyalty or faith. Fear he could conquer. Fear he could break.

“Karak’s strength?” Bardiya asked. “Show it to me, you unclean things. Show me his strength!”

They did not move, only tensed their muscles. Despite the blood dripping from his body, despite the exhaustion he felt tickling in the back of his mind, Bardiya grinned.

“Fine,” he said. “Then let me show you mine.”

He rushed them, sword pulled back to swing. The sword’s light flared brilliantly, and the creatures howled. When Bardiya swung in a wide arc, it was as if there was no end to his weapon’s length. Ten times his height it slashed out, cutting the beasts down, severing their bodies with shining white. Pulling the blade back, this time he flipped it around and drove the blade downward, and as it pierced the rocky ground, a wave of chromatic brightness rolled in all directions. The beasts it touched let out cries as their hair burned away, and their skin turned black and rotten. The sound was deafening, and with it came the stampede. All of them, thousands, from the greatest to the smallest, fled north. Bardiya stood there, watching them, chest heaving as he breathed in and out, the glow on his sword slowly fading away.

When the last of them were gone, Bardiya collapsed to his knees, and he had to clutch the hilt of his sword to remain upright. The steel of the pommel was cold against his warm cheek, and he closed his eyes and held it to him as if it were a long lost friend.

“Thank you,” he whispered.

Slowly Bardiya rose to his feet and turned to face his countrymen. Where once there had been four hundred, now there was barely half that number. All of them were bloodied and injured, a few near death themselves. Of those he had known best, only Allay Loros remained standing. They stared at him with wide eyes, a mixture of fear and awe that Bardiya would never forget.

“Ki-Nan?” Bardiya called. He turned and staggered through the corpses until he found his friend. Ki-Nan’s left side was mangled, and a gash in his neck was soaked with blood. His lips moved, but Bardiya couldn’t hear the words. The giant lowered himself to his knees and leaned closer to Ki-Nan’s mouth.

“I knew it,” the dying man said in barely a whisper. “I knew. . you could.”

Bardiya didn’t hesitate. He placed his hands on Ki-Nan’s chest and allowed the healing energy to flow through him. This time, he felt no pain as Ki-Nan’s wounds mended. When it was finished, the man rolled over and coughed.

“Stand,” he told his old friend. “You have a woman and family to find, remember?”

Bardiya helped Ki-Nan to his feet, and together they made their way to their maimed brethren. The giant flexed his arm as he went. The wracking pain of the injury he’d sustained from the bear-man’s jaws was now a dull throb, but he knew the pain would return in time. Still, there was more he had to do before he looked to himself.

Bardiya turned to his friend as he walked. “What is the name of the woman you love?”

“Catherine,” said Ki-Nan.

“After I heal our brothers, leave this place and do not return. I wish never to see your face unless this Catherine is at your side.”

“But what of Karak?” asked Ki-Nan. “If you think I’m going to abandon you while the rest of our people-”

“Enough,” Bardiya said. “Let me work.”

For the next two hours, as the sun reached its highest point and began to descend, Bardiya spent his energy healing the remaining one hundred and eighty-two of his people. By the time it was over, he was exhausted, and his arm pulsed despite the bandage he’d tied about it. He slumped down on his rump, feeling much smaller than the giant he was, and gazed at the sea of corpses, both beast and man, that surrounded him. He then looked back at those he had just healed, who hovered a few feet away. They were torn, overwhelmed by grief yet given hope by his display of strength. But Bardiya knew their purpose was done. After today, they would follow him to the ends of Dezrel. Yet, after today, he would never ask them to.

“Go home,” he told them.

Once more that day, all eyes turned to him.

“What?” asked Allay Loros, tearing his sorrowful gaze from his brother’s corpse.

“I said go home. There is nothing left for you here but death, and that is never what I wanted for you all.”

“But what of Karak?” asked Midoro, a middle-aged man whose white sideburns nearly glowed against his black flesh.

“Karak is a god,” Bardiya said. “There is nothing you can do to him.”

“But I thought we-”

“It matters not what we thought,” said the giant gravely. “Your lives are all that matter. So take off that borrowed armor, toss it to the ground, and go back to Ang. Be with your wives; play with your children; bring joy and laughter into the world once more. You have witnessed enough ugliness for five lifetimes, never mind one.”

“And what will you do?”

The question came from Ki-Nan, and Bardiya could see the pain in his old friend’s face. Ki-Nan might have betrayed him by desiring to be someplace other than the land where he was raised, but in that single look Bardiya understood just how much Ki-Nan still loved him.

“I will continue on,” he said. “This is my burden. Whatever trust you have, put it in me now. Let me carry it alone.”

Ki-Nan gazed at him solemnly.

“I know I’ll never understand what we just saw,” he said, “but even that will never be enough. You will lose, brother.”

Bardiya nodded, his massive body casting an imposing shadow over his remaining mates.

“I know, my friend,” he told him. “I know.”