Robert Crane - Crusader

The head came around again but Cyrus was ready. Instead of dodging, he threw himself at it, blade first. He buried the sword in the side of the head, and Drettanden halted his forward momentum quickly, screeching, jerking away rather than following through with a headbutt that would have sent Cyrus flying. Strike at your fear, and it will recoil. He worked the sword free, prompting Drettanden to retreat three steps to swing about to face him. Grasp at it and it will dissolve in the sunlight. Confront it, make it your own … and make it fear you.

He let out a cry of rage and emotion, jumping into the air and striking down with the blade again. A streak of black blood welled up on the face of the dead god, and he backed up again toward the still-standing wall of fire, toward the foes that waited beyond, a chorus of wailing voices and gnashing teeth. Cyrus pressed the attack and Drettanden moved into the fire and recoiled, screaming in a voice that was almost human but very definitely not. With three quick strikes, Cyrus carved into the face of the beast, and when it tried to bat at him, he slipped low and waited for the paw to land. You are faster than your fears. You need not outrun them when you can outfight them, conquer them, make them yours … He threw everything into the thrust, all his strength, the full twist of his hips and back, and he landed the blow at the ankle joint of Drettanden’s front leg. Praelior buried itself into the grey flesh all the way to the bone. Cyrus forced it in, harder now, gritting his teeth and pushing with all his strength as the creature lifted its foot.

With a surge forward, Cyrus felt the flesh and bone give first, and the foot came free, as did his sword. He stumbled forward then dodged to his left as Drettanden fell, squealing all the way down. The scourge-god landed heavily on his face, now missing a foot to stand on. Cyrus whirled about, saw the creature lying splayed out, and he spun his sword around. “You wanted to make me fear you. You thought you could drive me before you, keep running me.” Cyrus clenched his hand over the grip of the sword as he reversed it. “You think this is your sword, but it’s not. I won it through a price paid you can’t imagine, through sacrifice you probably can’t even conceive of anymore. This is Praelior, the Champion’s Sword. And I’m going to give it back to you-right now.”

Cyrus leapt, his arc taking him high above the creature. He landed heavily on the back of its neck as it struggled to stand. Without warning he plunged the blade down into the top of Drettanden’s skull, and he couldn’t even feel the resistance as he shoved it into the head of what once had been the God of Courage. There was a sound almost like a sizzle as the blade cut through the flesh, broke through bone, and then a sickening lurch as the creature’s balance shifted. As its legs collapsed, Cyrus withdrew the sword and vaulted off, coming to a landing and hitting with his shoulder, sliding into a forward roll that carried him back to his feet, armor clinking against the stone surface of the bridge.

He came up and Alaric was waiting, standing there peacefully calm, watching. Odellan was there, ghastly pale but alive, Longwell next to him, holding his side and using his lance to keep him upright. Scuddar watched as well, and Terian; the others stood back a ways, and Cyrus could see a druid straining, red glow around his hands.

“You may cease the fire now,” Alaric said to the druid, who dropped mercifully to the ground at that. Martaina caught the man in her arms and began to drag him backward. “You seem to have come up against your fears and won.”

“Aye,” Cyrus said. “I suppose I did, at that.”

“You couldn’t have done that at Enrant Monge?” Terian asked, shaking his head and rolling his eyes. “Might have made it easier on the rest of us.”

“Sorry,” Cyrus said, spinning about as the line of fire began to disappear from the bridge. “I don’t think it quite works that way.”

“Figures,” the dark knight said. “You’re so screwed up it took you a year to get the idea ironed out in your head that you’re the greatest warrior walking the land of Arkaria.” Cyrus looked at him in surprise, and the dark knight shook his head. “Or so I’ve heard others say.”

“They come,” Longwell said. “That big one might be dead, but there’s a whole host behind him that isn’t letting up.”

Cyrus looked back at them, and the smell of death washed over him. It was familiar and horrible-but no longer fearsome. He saw the black eyes and the emptiness within them, but instead of fear, he felt a curiosity, a pity- They didn’t ask to become this. To end them is a mercy. A cool reserve found him, a confidence, a glacial sense of inevitability. We will strike down many today. Kill many. They were loosed now, the fire no longer holding them back. They rushed forward in a mad dash, coming at Cyrus, at the others. He hefted Praelior in his hand, felt the weight of the blade, heard the scamper of the claws on the stone, and could taste the desire to break them as fast as they could come at him. Come on, then. Send all that you have, and I’ll fight them. To the death-mine or theirs. And I’d wager theirs comes long before mine.

I’m not afraid of you.

Vara

Day 223 of the Siege of Sanctuary

They came in a flood now, from all directions, from holes in the wall that were beyond number. The Sanctuary defenders were forced up against the front steps in retreat, and there was fighting everywhere within the walls. There is only room in this space for a few thousand, but a few thousand we have and more. A few thousand of ours trying to beat them back, a few thousand of theirs trying to come forward, and we’ll be left with a few thousand dead on each side by the time this is through-a better bargain for them with their more than a hundred thousand in number than us with our less than four.

The striking of swords, the guttural cries of men and women at war: these were the things that dominated the space around her. Clash of weapon against weapon, of blade on blade and against armor, shield and gauntlet. It was frenzied chaos, wall to wall, a shoving match and a swordfight all in one, and the smell of the dead filled her nose until she could taste it, death and despair in equal measure, and no matter how many times she plunged her sword into a dark elf, it did not cease.

Fortin was at the gap, the closest one, where the gate had once stood, and he was holding out, armored bodies flung through the air every few seconds. She saw spells arcing toward him but the rock giant appeared unmoved by them, and another armored dark elf hit the wrecked wall, cracking and screaming as he fell back to the earth.

A fire burst held the next gap, surging, almost a living flame, reminding her of the bit of magic she’d seen used against the trolls at the last assault on the foyer. We’re losing. Too many of them, too few of us, and all the time in the world helps us little. She felt a nick against her arm as a dagger bit into it and she gasped but did not halt her swing. She killed the wielder of the blade and was prepared to deal death to the next dark elf in line when a face popped into her view.

“This is not going well,” Aisling said to her, wrenching a dagger across the throat of an unsuspecting dark elf who stood between her and Vara.

“Ah, so your talent for understatement is what Cyrus finds attractive about you,” Vara muttered, striking down another dark elf with even more fury than she thought she had in her.

“Actually, it’s my talent for-” The dark elf was forced to parry a strike by a troll, rolling between his legs and coming up behind him to strike him in the kidneys with two blades. “Well,” she called back to Vara as the troll toppled over, clutching his back. “You know.”