Mark Chadbourn - Destroyer of Worlds

Sitting cross-legged next to the soupy water, he examined the Wayfinder's blue flame. 'Oh, the wonder of it all — a genie in the lamp, and a Brother of Dragons to boot. Can you hear me, little man?' He roughly rattled the lantern in front of his face. 'Sadly, I am a mortal like any other, and prone to the melancholies of all men. And yes, the desire for a touch of revenge for being so badly treated. And I have been, oh, how I have been! During that terrible Age of Misrule I was manipulated… possibly brutally coerced… into helping those misshapen monsters, the Fomorii.

'And did the Brothers and Sisters of Dragons forgive and forget? Did they respond to my plight, and offer a friendly hand in answer to my humble admission of my wrongs and my plaintive desire for redemption? No. They punished me, and brutalised me, and eventually took my sad, sad life. And these are Champions of Existence! How ironic. It is through their cruel machinations that events have conspired to keep me trapped in this hideous place.' He paused slyly. 'Or should I say your machinations? It is unfortunate that you will have to pay the price for their sins.'

Callow did an excited jig before calming himself. 'Now how should I do it? Fling the lantern into one of these sucking pools and watch it disappear for ever? Then you would understand the kind of purgatory I have experienced for so long. Or should I smash it and watch the flame flicker and die?' He considered this for a moment, and smiled triumphantly. 'I think that would set my world alight.'

Drawing one of the many razor blades he had secreted about his person, he attempted to carve his name into the lantern, but he could make no mark on the shiny surface and the razor blunted within seconds. He tossed it angrily into the water where something snapped and spat.

'I was just a humble knight of the road when I met that overinflated Pecksniff Jack Churchill,' he muttered to himself. 'No harm to man nor beast. Lover of the byways, lover of people, a helping hand to all I met on my way. And look what he did to me.'

Callow laid the Wayfinder on the ground, took a running jump and slammed both booted feet upon it. A peal of thunder was accompanied by a fizz of blue sparks. He repeated the assault three times before examining it again. The lantern was dented and the glass on one side was cracked.

'Once more,' he muttered. 'This may well look like a lantern, but I know its true shape is different from what I see. Yet here in the Grim Lands it is as vulnerable as anything from the places where the living roam. Yes, I think once more will do. I'll say goodbye to you now, oh genie. Enjoy the great hereafter.'

Laying the lantern down once again, he paced out a long run-up and then, with a grim smile, hurled himself at the Wayfinder. At the point when Callow hung above the lantern, a column of Blue Fire engulfed him and hurled him back to the edge of the swamp water. Callow let out a high-pitched, shocked scream.

It was only when he picked himself up that he realised the flames were cold, and had done little more than propel him away.

'So it's a fight you want,' he said, drawing up his sleeves. 'We'll see how long you can keep that up in this place.'

The blue flash lit up the swamplands even through the mist, followed closely by the echo of Callow's scream across the black water.

Caitlin broke off her examination of the myriad paths through the swamp and removed the axe from its harness on her back. Etain, Tannis, Owein and Branwen were already climbing into their saddles as Mallory growled, 'With any luck, something's eaten him.'

'That flash — it was Blue Fire,' Caitlin said coldly.

Mallory didn't respond.

Another blue flash filtered through the mists, but this time it was accompanied by a shout of gleeful anger.

Callow was so engrossed in his vigorous attempts to destroy the lantern that he didn't hear their approach until the last. With a girlish shriek, he booted the lantern towards the deep water and ran.

Diving at full run, Mallory's fingertips skimmed the Wayfinder before it splashed into the depths, spinning it upwards where it threatened to escape him again. Scrabbling wildly, he eventually snagged it and hugged it to his chest.

'Sorry, Hal,' he whispered. 'I won't let you out of my grasp again.'

With powerful strides, Caitlin caught up with Callow in seconds, brutally kicking his legs out from under him. His frightened pleas quickly turned into sly attempts to explain his actions, but when he saw the dark fury in Caitlin's eyes his voice faded away.

'I bleed, you don't,' she said, 'so how do I get my revenge against a dead thing?' She pressed the blade of her axe against his face. 'I could chop you into tiny chunks, but would there be any conscious thought left in them to suffer?'

'Being in this place is suffering enough, m-m-m-ma'am,' Callow stuttered.

'But it doesn't make me feel any better. Where's the justice in that? Where's the lesson learned?'

'Please,' Callow called out to Mallory, 'have a heart! I made a mistake, that's all. You are Brothers and Sisters of Dragons. You celebrate all that is good about life.'

Distractedly, Mallory polished the lantern. 'True. But unluckily for you we're not Church's group. They've got compassion in spades. Existence brought us together with specific qualities in mind. They're the good guys. We're the hard bastards.' He gave Callow a brutal smile. 'All except Hal, and I'm betting he's not feeling very sympathetic towards you right now.'

Callow let out a small whimper. Caitlin dragged him to Etain and retrieved a rope from her saddle. His searing cries echoed across the entire swamp as Caitlin bound his wrists tightly behind his back, looped the rope around his ankles, then threw the other end over the branch of one of the spindly trees overhanging the swamp. With a jerk, she whipped Callow's feet out from under him and suspended him an inch above the water, where snapping shapes swam hungrily just beneath the surface.

He cried and pleaded until his throat was raw, and when he finally stopped, Caitlin said, 'I think the best thing would be to leave you here where you can't do any more harm. With a few friends for company.'

Another jerk of the rope plunged Callow's head into the water up to the bridge of his nose. The water boiled around him as the razor-worms plunged into his eyes and ears, burrowing and eating for what could be eternity.

Half an hour later they could still hear his terrible screams as they made their way out of the swamp and onto a barren plain, once again following the lantern's blue flame.

In the hard, silvery gleam of dawn, Decebalus came round deep in the mire of the battlefield. The storm had ended, and a strained quiet lay across the great plain, punctuated by the occasional cry. All around were scattered dismembered corpses of both allies and enemy. It took a second or two for Decebalus's thoughts to flicker into some semblance of cohesion, and then another few seconds to realise he was alive and intact. His first thought was how Seth had been prepared to devastate his own side to achieve a minor advantage.

The remnants of the once-enormous Enemy force trailed across the battlefield towards the city in small pockets, pausing occasionally to slay a survivor. They skirted much of the area where the gods had fought. Decebalus guessed that if he lived, most of the gods would have survived too. Seth would want to achieve his aims before they returned to the fray.

Drawing his strength back into his shaky limbs, Decebalus was gripped by a flash of memory. Keeping low, he desperately searched amongst the fallen, overturning bodies to peer into blood- and mud-stained faces. Finally he located Aula buried under a heap of dismembered Lament-Brood. She was deathly pale, her eyes closed, her blond hair matted with gore. Decebalus muttered a brief prayer before taking her wrist and locating a thready pulse. Relief flooded through him; the Pendragon Spirit would work its magic; she would survive. Bowing his head to her chest, he closed his eyes and remembered Dacia, so far away in time and space. He wished he could have shown Aula the beauty of the forests on a summer's twilight, the great river at dawn with the sun glinting off the water and the smell of a new day rising. Gently, he kissed the back of her hand. So many things unsaid, so many emotions buried deep in his heart that in his rough ways he had never been able to express. But she knew, he was sure.