Paul Kemp - The Godborn

“They can’t get out alive,” Riven said. “Neither escapes.”

“Understood,” Magadon said. He pulled from the deep pool of mental energy that filled his core, shaped it into a field of latent force, and transferred it once more to the tip of the poker he held. A halo of red energy formed around the point.

The devils leaped at them, the tree-trunks of their legs propelling them forward like shot quarrels. Magadon hurled the energized poker at one of them, while Riven bounded forward with preternatural speed, meeting the larger malebranche’s charge with a charge of his own.

The fireplace poker flew true and slammed into the smaller fiend in midleap. The latent force with which Magadon had charged the tip allowed the makeshift weapon to strike with exaggerated force. The impact knocked the fiend out of the air and into a table. It bellowed with pain and rage, the poker sunk a hand span into its hide.

Meanwhile, Riven faced the other devil, his blades a whirlwind of steel, his movements trailing shadows. He sidestepped the devil’s charge and a stab from its trident, leaped over another stab, slashed and spun and cut. The devil retreated under Riven’s onslaught, bumping into tables, stumbling into chairs, its trident too slow to parry the speed of Riven’s assault. Two clay lamps hit the ground and shattered, spilling their oil.

Riven, his speed and skill that of a god, carved flesh from the devil in gory ribbons. The creature roared, ichor spraying from its wounds, and stabbed at Riven with its trident again and again, hitting only empty air. Its trident scraped the floor, and the flames between the tines ignited the oil.

The devil Magadon had knocked prone jerked the poker from its flesh and intentionally toppled another table into the flames. The lamp atop it broke, spilling its oil. Tables caught fire, a chair, another chair, the floor. Smoke clotted the air.

Magadon cursed and sprinted across the common room. The fiend leaped to its feet and gave chase. Magadon jumped over the bar, sending two tankards and a plate clattering to the floor, and landed in a heap on the other side. He scrambled to his feet and looked back to see the fiend coiling for a leap.

Drawing from his reserve of mental energy, Magadon formed it into a spike of force that bound the devil’s leg to the floor. The fiend leaped anyway, and the floor planks that now adhered to its clawed feet tore loose, the dislodged nails and wood screeching like the damned. Thrown off balance, the fiend fell forward into a table, splintering it under its weight.

Behind it, more smoke and flames. Riven and devil dueling in the flames. The room would soon be an inferno.

Magadon grabbed for his bow and quiver and had both in hand by the time the devil had regained its feet. Magadon nocked, charged his arrow with mental energy, drew, and fired into its face. The missile sunk into the devil’s throat and it screamed, staggered back, clutching at its neck. As it did, it made a wild throw with its flaming trident, and the huge weapon struck Magadon squarely in the chest.

Although the tines did not penetrate the field of force that sheathed him, the sheer power of the blow drove him backward against the wall, cracked ribs, and drove the air from his lungs. Dislodged by the impact, tankards rained from their pegs. The hogshead fell to the floor, broke open, and covered the floor in beer.

Gasping for air, coughing on the growing cloud of smoke, Magadon staggered back to the bar and reached for another arrow from his quiver. The devil he’d shot spun frenetically around the burning common room, toppling tables and chairs, screaming, its breathing an audible squeal through the hole Magadon had put in its throat.

Behind the wounded devil, Riven continued his dissection of the larger devil. Riven’s blades were a blur, slashing, stabbing, cutting. The devil roared and spun, lashed out with claws, trident, even a kick, but nothing landed. Riven was too fast, too precise. The fiend bled dark ichor from dozens of wounds. Its flesh hung in scraps from its body. A final crosscut from Riven’s saber severed its head.

As Magadon nocked another arrow, the surviving devil finally pulled the arrow from its throat, screaming in agony. It fixed its eyes on Magadon, its huge chest rising and falling. It spit a mouthful of black ichor and rushed him.

Magadon sighted and powered his arrow with enough mental energy to fell a horse. The tip glowed an angry, hot red. He picked a spot between the devil’s eyes and prepared to draw.

Before he could loose his shot, Riven stepped through the shadows, covering the length of the room in a single stride. He appeared in front of the devil, his sabers sheathed. He held a thin loop of reified shadow in his hands.

He dodged a surprised slash from the fiend’s claws, spun, and looped the line of shadow around the fiend’s neck. Before the devil could respond, Riven leaped atop the fiend’s back, wrapped his legs around the devil’s mid-section, and pulled the line taut.

The devil reared back, eyes wide, choking, gasping for breath, shooting a mist of blood from the hole Magadon had put in its throat. It spun, reached back to claw at Riven, staggered around the room, bumping into tables, chairs, walking through the flames. Throughout, Riven rode its back in calm, deadly silence, the shadow garrote choking out its life.

Magadon relaxed, set his bow on the bar, and his body lit up with pain, the suddenness of it like a lightning strike. The tip of a black sword exploded out from his abdomen and showered the bar in blood. He gasped, screamed, looked down uncomprehendingly at the dark wedge of steel protruding from his guts. His mouth was filling with blood. He gagged on it. His vision blurred.

“Shit!” He heard Riven shout. “Mags!”

“I’m all right,” he tried to say, but he wasn’t, and no words emerged, just a gurgle of blood. He put a hand on the gore-slicked bar to stay upright as his knees started to buckle. His clothing was already soaked in blood, his thoughts overwhelmed by pain.

A chuckle from behind.

He turned his head-it seemed to take forever-and saw a male devil standing behind him, holding the dark blade on which Magadon’s dying body hung. It wasn’t another malebranche. It looked almost human, save for its violet skin and the two thin horns that jutted from its head. Shadows and leather armor wrapped its lithe body. Magadon recognized it as a breed of stealthy fiend used by other devils as quiet killers and assassins. It must have entered the tavern with the malebranche, invisible or clad in darkness. Magadon had missed it. And it had killed him.

“Riven,” Magadon tried to say, but it just came out an inarticulate gurgle of blood. He tried to focus but his eyes wouldn’t hold onto anything but the devil’s face, the red eyes, the fanged mouth.

The fiend gave a smile as it twisted the blade in Magadon’s guts, then jerked it free, scraping ribs, widening the wound. A gush of warmth poured from the slit. Magadon screamed and the pain displaced numbness.

Desperately he grabbed at the pain, focused on it, lived in its center for a moment, a moment during which he ignored the blood and shit seeping from the hole in him. He grabbed at the devil with arms gone weak. He lurched, staggered, and would have fallen had he not gotten hold of the fiend by the forearm.

The devil tried to shake him loose but Magadon held on. The devil pulled back his blade for another stab but before he could Magadon made a spike of his will and drove it into the fiend’s mind.

The devil sensed its danger immediately. It resisted the mental intrusion, tried to shake Magadon’s grip loose, but its desperation fed Magadon’s physical and mental grip. His fingernails sank into the fiend’s skin and his mind put a psychic hook in the devil’s consciousness.