James Davis - The Shield of Weeping Ghosts

A blade slid from its scabbard, and Anilya crossed her arms defensively.

"Get up, exile!" Syrolf said, shoving his boot into Bastun's ribs.

He tried to rise, squinting through the chaos of ghosts that surrounded him. Duras appeared and placed a hand on his shoulder. The contact seemed to ground him briefly in the present. His muttering stopped and he rose to one knee.

"What's wrong, Bastun? Are you hurt?" Duras said, his voice strident and clear in the silence of the violent images.

"Get him to his feet!" Thaena yelled. "We cannot stop here!"

He felt himself being lifted, though by whom he wasn't sure. Spirits struggled all around them, stabbing and slashing, reliving their ancient battle. He groaned, trying to find his balance, unsure of his footing.

"He spoke like the language of the Creel!" Syrolf proclaimed, drawing closer with his sword.

The ghosts paused in their fighting, turning as one toward the center of the wall where a black aura of magic pulsed. Thaena turned as well, then Duras. Syrolf walked past them, his eyes widening as shadows coalesced out of thin air.

Pain subsiding, Bastun released his grip on the Breath, the bond it had forged between himself and the past fading, his last sight being of the child at the center of the swirling darkness on the wall.

"They can see it… her… them…" he whispered, drawing a curious glance from Duras. "The children in the stone…"

In the thrashing shadows stood the eldest girl of the child spirits, her hair waving as before, tossed in some strange watery current. Thaena strode forward, her hands tracing the intricate motions of a spell. Duras cursed and shoved Bastun against the battlements as he rushed to stand at the ethran's side.

The wall hummed beneath his palms, vibrating with power, and he pushed himself away.

"Wait!" he cried. "Stop!"

Thaena glanced at him, fury in her eyes as the glow of magic faded from her hands. Flailing chains whipped around the girl in shadow as her head tilted, her weight slowly shifting forward.

"No," Bastun muttered in fear and stepped forward.

A familiar hand gripped his shoulder roughly, stopping him from getting any closer to the ethran. Turning, he spun his staff into the center of Syrolfs chest. The warrior stumbled backward but recovered quickly. He advanced on the vremyonni even as the shadows erupted in a chorus of pained and angry voices.

Thaena and Duras fell back from the darkness as the wall shook with a terrible impact. No one moved as the snow's surface shifted, conforming to the cracks of damage beneath. Anilya and her men were the first to begin retreating from the growing rift. Thaena followed suit as the wall began to crumble before their eyes. With a curse Syrolf fell in step behind the ethran and the fang.

Bastun froze in place, staring into the shadows as if he might communicate with them, plead with them to trust him. The remnant of some horrible memory flitted through his thoughts, a recollection not his own, but somehow imparted to him through the Breath.

Duras grabbed his arm and pulled.

"Run, Bastun! The wall won't stand much longer!"

Shrugging him off, the vremyonni held onto the battlements for balance. Snow just paces in front of him slid away and fell. Duras grabbed him again, hauling him back toward the tower.

"Come!"

Bastun hesitated only a moment before relenting. He fled the pursuing darkness. Somewhere in its midst was the little one, the innocent. Whatever influence she had over the others was gone, and he feared for her as the other ghosts succumbed to madness.

"She's not your sister," he mumbled, but he couldn't let go of the concern he had for the suffering spirit. "She's something else. Can't remember…"

Stone gave way beneath him and he slipped. He stopped as Duras's grip on his robes left him swinging over the edge. Pulled back onto solid ground, he nodded to his old friend and the pair ran for the tower door.

The tremors had slowed, but the shadows continued to flow toward them. Ducking inside, they found the tower mostly empty save for the last few members of the fang, who were descending through a trap door. Duras led the way, and Bastun kept watch on the spirits whose howls and whispers echoed as they entered the chamber, eclipsing the entrance.

Backing down the stairs, Bastun brought spells to mind, considering one after the other as he thought of a way to stop the maddened ghosts. Duras's footfalls could be heard below, joined by the shouted orders of Thaena and Anilya. Swords and axes cracked against old wood, creating an escape. Passing a small window, Bastun paused to observe the destruction of the wall.

Thaena meant to cross it, he realized. The ethran's intentions of reaching the northwest tower were as determined as the spirits' intention to stop them. Looking back to the stairs, the shadows crawled closer and grew louder in their pursuit. Thaena would never make it in time.

Steeling himself, he stopped, flexing his hand and steadying his thoughts.

"You want this?" he yelled at the shadows, pulling his cloak aside and revealing the Breath. They hissed in answer. "I give it to you! Take it!"

He gripped the handle and drew the blade from his belt, brandishing the weapon at the crowded darkness. Keening wails erupted from the mass, their chainlike tendrils drawing back into the stone. His vision once again was thrust into scenes of the past. Pain lanced through his skull. It was stronger now. The link forged by the Breath between himself and the Shield's history filled his ears with the sounds of soldiers shouting orders and boots pounding down the stairs. Ghostly warriors streamed past him like a cold wind raising gooseflesh on his arms and neck. The shadows became a blurry double image, existing in both the present and the past.

"Are they repeating the past," he whispered, "or are we?"

The Breath blurred as well, trailing behind itself as he continued down the stairs. A ghostly arm followed his own, wielding the artifacts counterpart in the haunting reenactment.

The blade itself is haunted, he thought, growing stronger the closer we get, the farther we run…

Mystified, he caught his own reflection in a sheet of ice along the wall. There, superimposed over his mask, lay the face of a stranger. An older man with a salt-and-pepper beard, wearing dark blue robes, regarded him with a look of mystified surprise.

Too shocked to examine the spirit, he turned and ran, following in the footsteps of the Shield's defenders, caught up in their battle as surely as if he were one of them. He suspected that somehow he might be one of them, the hem of his robes trailing a translucent edge as he neared a pale light below.

Tumbling into a room crowded with the images, he reached through them as if they were cobwebs. The nentyarch's soldiers appeared among them, and the battle continued. The shadowy children still approached from behind, but they would not near the Breath. The mass of shadows fell in among the ghostly fray, dispersing and joining with the persistent vision. They devoured without prejudice, enveloping defender and attacker alike, losing themselves in the ancient siege.

The strain of witnessing past and present pressed on Bastun's mind, increasing the pain behind his eyes. He moved toward the door, squinting through the spirits' flesh toward solid reality, trying to stay focused. A Nar blade slashed toward his throat, and reflexively he pulled back, returning the strike as he thrust the Breath into the phantom soldier. He gasped as the soldier attempted to parry the blow, his sword passing through the Breath with a shimmer of faint light.

Bastun stumbled toward the doorway in shock, staring as the soldier was impaled on a pike from behind. He retreated outside. The ground became uneven beneath him, and he fell against a wall of broken stone and rubble. He replaced the Breath in his belt, sighing in relief as the scenes faded and the present reasserted itself in his mind.