Sam Bowring - Prophecy's Ruin

He sent a tendril of darkness creeping towards her like a floating serpent. It eased forward steadily, worming its way through her glimmering defence. Sweat beaded on her forehead as she struggled to halt its advance. The serpentine shadow hovered before her, then darted in to touch her stomach. There was a flash of blue energy and she went flying, her muscles contracting to squeeze her bones, her lips pulled back in a silent scream. She hit the ground in a twisted, shaking heap, gasping for air through constricted lungs.

Come on, girl, Fazel thought. Get up.

She flooded her body with light, which he knew would hurt her, but would also nullify any shadow energy it touched. He raised his hand for a spell that would pop the organs from her body, but it crackled into the ground where she had been but a moment before. She had managed a dodge spell, and reappeared a few paces from where she’d been, her defences shooting up again.

Good girl, thought Fazel, smiling grimly as he sent a new wave of power crashing against her. Just win, girl. Win.

Crouching beside Tyrellan on a gnarled branch at the clearing’s edge, Rhobi watched the battle raging. He’d never seen conflict between such strong mages and was fascinated. Elessa and Fazel staggered around each other, emanating light and shadow as their hands spewed forth power.

‘How long do you think we’ll have to wait?’ he asked.

Tyrellan did not take his eyes from the fight. ‘Fool,’ he muttered, not with venom, but as if it were simple fact. ‘Do you suppose the day is already won?’

Rhobi glared at him.

Tyrellan turned to meet his eyes. ‘Mages have their uses,’ he said. ‘Does that void us of ours? You,’ he said, jabbing a black claw at Rhobi, ‘skirt the perimeter of the clearing. Stay out of sight. Get to the hut.’

‘While you sit safely in the trees?’ Rhobi asked, scowling.

‘I’ll draw out the mage’s guard, which means attacking her with steel. If you think you can launch a physical attack on one of her magical prowess and survive, be my guest. I’ll fetch some marshmallows to toast over your charred remains.’

Tyrellan seized Rhobi by the throat, pinning him against the tree trunk. Rhobi’s eyes bulged as his legs kicked the air. Tyrellan pulled up close, speaking softly in his ear. ‘I normally don’t brook recalcitrance with such good grace.’ He glanced back to the battle while Rhobi scratched at his grip, fighting for breath. ‘But you’re about to prove yourself useful whether you like it or not.’

He released Rhobi, who scrabbled for purchase on the slippery branch as he gasped.

‘Forgive me, First Slave,’ Rhobi croaked.

He prayed that Tyrellan would survive this night and leave the pleasure of sliding a knife between his ribs to Rhobi alone. Never had he been so affronted. Tyrellan had gone too far! He massaged his neck, wondering if he would bruise. Perhaps Tyrellan had earned himself a painful death. He could drug the bastard, tie him up, then eke out a slow revenge …

‘What would you have me do, First Slave?’

‘Get to the hut,’ repeated Tyrellan. ‘Wait until I draw out the Varenkai blade, then get inside. Deal with the woodsman, nab the child. Do not harm it. Get it away from this clearing, then head south as quickly as you can. Get out of the forest tonight. We’ll catch up once there’s no one alive to follow. Understood?’

‘Yes, First Slave,’ growled Rhobi.

He slipped off the branch into the darkness below, landing without breaking a twig. As he headed for the perimeter, he tried to exorcise the blissful image of Tyrellan begging for his life and concentrate on the job at hand.

Tyrellan smoothed a hand over his hairless scalp and thought about changing his vantage. Higher or lower, that was the question. Wherever it was, he needed to be able to get away from it fast once he had acted. Did he, even with his superb night vision and finely tuned reflexes, trust a drop from a tall treetop through these windy, rainy, branch-infested surrounds? And if he didn’t place the drop right, with a tree between himself and the mage, he would be falling exposed in the air, an easy target.

He fingered one of the daggers hanging from his belt. He would try for a killing strike, of course, but at this distance, through the wind and rain, he was doubtful. Even if he landed one, it was unlikely to deliver the instant death necessary to avoid a backlash.

He would just have to be very careful.

Before Fazel rose a translucent conjuration of a sunwing – a legendary warrior of Arkus. It was a golden-skinned humanoid, with oversized oval eyes and large, languidly beating butterfly wings. Through its insubstantial form Fazel could see Elessa, her brow deeply furrowed in concentration, her lips moving with incantation. The sunwing flipped a shining arrow from its quiver and notched it to a bow. It drew the arrow back, sighting Fazel.

The spell was a powerful one and Fazel was impressed. He dared to hope. He was gravely disappointed when he saw how easy it would be to counterspell. The girl was expending too much power to properly attend to her defences.

Fazel waved a skeletal hand and from the shadows beneath the sunwing erupted a darker visage. Cavernous black jaws exploded upwards, molten mud falling from a fish-like head with burning red eyes. Fazel’s counter-creature clamped shut over the sunwing, leaving only one wing exposed, which continued to flap uselessly. As the sunwing was dragged downwards, both enchantments faded, leaving no sign in the earth of their passage.

Elessa staggered backwards, tears of frustration streaming down her cheeks. It had taken all she had to force the sunwing through the mage’s defence, yet he’d squashed it like a bug. Now she felt the merciless push of his power once again.

‘Damn you!’ she screamed, her dress flapping in the wind. ‘Back to the grave!’

She pushed with all the strength she could muster and for a moment the shadows about her receded.

Dakur, she sent to the blade, while she could, he’s too powerful. Escape with the child.

I am your guard!

Escape with the child, curse you!

I will not!

‘No!’ she shrieked as another serpent head uncoiled before her face. It reared forward and she knew it was a death strike.

Lightning cracked the sky, and briefly the clearing was brightly illuminated. In that split second, the advantage was hers. She drew hard on the light, channelling a burst of power towards Fazel, destroying the snake head and piercing his defences with blazing yellow beams. He howled as skin, cloth, flesh and bone sizzled and smoked. The air suddenly stank.

She waved her hand and a glowing sword appeared, solidifying in her grip. She drew close enough to strike and aimed a downward swing at his head – but he’d seen her coming and threw up his hands. The blade deflected, sliding down the length of his arm instead, shearing off a sheet of bone.

Fazel swung his other arm, hitting Elessa in the mouth with a bony smack.

Almost, girl, came his voice in her head. Almost.

Perched so high in the swaying tree that the trunk was no more than a handspan wide, Tyrellan watched for an opportunity. With one arm hooked around the trunk, the other twirling a dagger between his fingers, he seemed an extension of the tree itself. A shadowed branch and a single deadly dancing leaf.

Rhobi should have reached the hut by now, was probably waiting in the trees that bordered it. Far beneath, Elessa and Fazel forced each other back and forth across the clearing. By the Dark Gods, Tyrellan thought, she must be talented to have survived him this long.