Bruce Cordell - Key of Stars

Japheth realized the void was probably thick with monsters, streaming quietly through the dark. Or perhaps, like Dayereth said, the armada’s mere presence called them from nothing. Either way, at this rate, they’d soon be overwhelmed.

“Griffon!” Japheth yelled to their steed. “Take us down-follow the lane through the void cleared by Xxiphu’s passage!”

The chariot dipped as the flying steed responded to Japheth’s directive, and dived. Dozens of gallons of cold water surged forward. The torrent knocked another archer to his doom, and pushed Raidon and the beast to the front railing. The creature started to go over, but three tentacles and one muscled arm latched on.

The monk drew Angul. With a bellow of triumph, the sword bloomed with avenging fire. With a single slice, the ice monster’s multi-limb grip was severed. It went writhing down.

Raidon watched the creature fall, Angul drawn and ready. Fire from his symbol and sword arced back and forth, producing an illumination far more brilliant than any of the knights’ lances.

Two archers remained in the chariot, but only one with a bow.

Dayereth lay nearly submerged under the water still in the chariot, weakly clawing at the ice covering his face.

Japheth bent and examined the situation. The ice smelled foul; it wasn’t formed of pure water. The warlock shoved his old jade rod into its holster and pulled out the one given him by the Lady of the Moon. He muttered a simple curse of breaking, and directed the energy through the rod. Verdant strength momentarily greened Japheth’s flesh even as the ice shattered.

The eladrin gasped and sputtered. Japheth helped him to his feet. The wizard was pale, and his hair was in disarray. The warlock resisted asking him what he thought about avoiding fights. By Dayereth’s expression, Japheth already knew the answer.

Instead, he examined the implement of Silvanus. Merely handling the item produced a comforting warmth. It calmed him. “This rod your mother gave me; it’s powerful,” he said to Raidon.

“The armada is beset,” replied the monk.

Japheth looked out and saw flickers of golden light swirling through the darkness, each one a knight on a griffon, or perhaps a chariot. The formations that had formed up so smartly upon their departure from Forever’s Edge were mostly broken. Lone knights swerved and dodged through the abyss, pulsing the night with bursts of brighter illumination from their lances. Sometimes those pulses caught abominations and blasted them into so much drifting dust. Most times the attacks missed and were swallowed by the immensity of space.

Every few heartbeats, one of the golden gleams went out all together. Most of the knights were so far away, he couldn’t determine for what reason they were being doused. But he could guess.

“The armada needs to form up in the lane Xxiphu made!” Japheth reiterated. He grabbed the wizard, who was staring out at the flickering lights with dismay. “Dayereth, can you contact the knights?”

“I … I should … I mean, yes. I can,” the wizard said. “Sorry, I just didn’t expect-”

“Get hold of yourself, wizard,” said Raidon. “Contact the knights and have them follow us.”

The wizard closed his eyes and raised a fist to his mouth. A ring on his finger winked with yellowish highlights. The wizard waved his other hand over the ring, and its glow increased tenfold. “I can only do this once,” he announced, then said in a stronger voice, “Knights of the Watch, listen! This is Dayereth of Moon Spire. We are being torn asunder! But we have a chance to salvage our mission: follow the path of the aboleth city that preceded us. Its passage broke a course through the aberrations that flood the void. Quickly now!”

The ring’s glow failed.

Their own chariot leveled out as the griffon reached the altitude it sought.

All round them, emberlike objects swirled, leaking red light. So close, Japheth was able to make out their shapes.

The closest one looked like nothing so much as a set of disembodied intestines with slack human mouths dotting its exterior. Part of the thing was torn away and missing, and it was that ripped flesh that glowed fire red, like violence given malevolent memory.

Japheth’s throat constricted. That … carcass, that cast-off thing was an instrument of the same pact to which he’d sworn himself.

He wondered, not for the first time, if one day he would end up looking something like that aberrant shell. His earlier musings were academic. With evidence so close at hand that he could smell its unnatural odor …

Bitter fluid rose in Japheth’s throat. He coughed and forced his eyes forward, away from the drifting mass that flashed past the chariot.

He raised the Rod of Silvanus. The Lady of the Moon’s words, when she had presented her gift, rang in his ears. The object remained warm to the touch, and its simple, elegant designs drew his eye into a calmer space.

No. He would not end up like one of these aberrant bulks. The lady’s gift would be his anchor. He let out a breath.

Everyone else’s attention was fixed on the remnants of the armada. The survivors finally managed to form up in a line behind them. Its size was half what it’d been when they departed Forever’s Edge.

Their intuition had been correct. No more blights winged out of the void to draw knights screaming into the darkness.

One of the hoarfrost griffons appeared beside their chariot, and set its pace equal with their draft steed. The warlock saw no sign of the other white griffon, or for that matter, the vanguard of knights who had so boldly taken the lead into the gulf of emptiness.

“It could have been worse,” said Raidon as he sheathed his sword.

“How are you doing?” Japheth asked the monk. “Getting a better handle on your sword?” Usually the half-elf struggled to return Angul to its scabbard.

“This is the fight I was meant for,” said Raidon. “Angul feels it too. The blade knows it’ll be drawn again, and soon. When that happens, it will be to destroy the passage into this world of all things aberrant. Angul is content to wait, and dream of future glory.”

The monk actually smiled. Japheth returned it.

Silence descended on the chariot as they advanced down the lane of shattered aberrations, toward a destination likely to take all their lives.

There was a real possibility he would die fighting the aberrations. But for some reason, he wasn’t afraid. Instead, he felt light, and almost giddy.

Maybe this was what sacrifice for a larger cause felt like. All his passions were usually for selfish aims-for himself, or more recently, for Anusha.

Was this what she felt, when she had set them all on their current course? If so, he finally understood some inkling of what impelled her. He understood, just perhaps, why she’d insisted that he and she separate.

For him at least, as long as Anusha was around, his concern for her would trump every other consideration. Maybe it was the same for her?

Some measure of the anger he’d gathered against Anusha dissipated then. She’d pushed him away, yes. Maybe even partly because she knew he and she would have a rocky future, at best. But perhaps also so she could allow what was most noble inside her to shine forth.

That noble impulse was one of the things he loved about her. That, and her soft skin, her sweet breath, and the texture of her dark hair beneath his hand …

The only problem was, he suspected Anusha no longer sailed safely on the Sea of Fallen Stars. If evil had befallen her despite all his efforts to preserve her safety … He inhaled sharply.

If she had come to permanent harm, all these thoughts would crumple into so much dross. His heart would cease beating, he was sure; he’d die. He couldn’t bear thinking that it could be true.