David Dalglish - The Shadows of Grace

“On your knees!” Melorak cried. “Humility for your error! Repentance for your arrogance! It is not too late.”

A scattered few fell to their knees, but the vast majority remained standing. Melorak hardened his heart. They had chosen. Karak’s power swirled about them, and still they clung to their choice. So be it. He heard Karak’s voice in his ear, clear and unwavering.

“Judgment!” he shouted. “It is now!”

The cloud tore open, and from within lions fell, their fur made of shadow, their teeth, moonlight. They roared in unison, their claws outstretched, their red eyes glinting with fire. They descended upon half the camp, tearing through flesh and crunching bone. Those that knelt, or stood behind Melorak, went unharmed. Preston, however, cried out a desperate plea to Karak as three lions circled around him.

“I did your will!” he shouted. “It was always your will.”

“You did as you desired,” one of the lions said. “Never Karak’s.”

They pounced on his rotting form and tore it to pieces, his frantic screams the last in the basin, followed only by prayers for forgiveness and mercy.

The true Melorak looked upon the carnage and smiled.

“Only the faithful remain,” he said. “As it must be. The prophet failed to understand the great damage a faithless follower could do.”

“Praise be to Karak,” said one of the priests as the lions faded away like smoke.

“Indeed,” Melorak said. “Praise be to him.”

They spread out, cleaning up the remains of the dead and casting them upon the bonfire. The basin was theirs now, and they had work to do.

T he first night they camped with the angels, the Eschaton slept in a single, giant tent that Tarlak somehow carried inside his hat. As the rest gathered around, he called Azariah over. With a twist of his hat, the blackened pendant that had harmed Lathaar fell to the ground.

“We were hoping you could tell us what to do,” Tarlak said as Azariah analyzed the pendant from afar.

“I’d prefer an explanation of what it is,” Lathaar said. “Since it nearly killed me and all.”

Azariah clutched a similar pendant that hung from his neck.

“When Velixar still lived, he was the high priest of Karak, known by a name now long forgotten,” he said. “Back then I was high priest for Ashhur, effectively Velixar’s counterpart. When the war broke between the gods, each of us were slain in battle. Ashhur made me as I am, as we all are, in the golden eternity after his imprisonment. Velixar, however, was given a different reprieve. Karak gave life to his bones. He trapped Velixar's soul in his pendant, and bade him never to fall until his release.”

“So Velixar can never die?” Harruq asked.

“He can,” Azariah said, gesturing to the pendant. “If that is destroyed.”

“Simple enough,” Jerico said, standing and grabbing his mace.

“No!” Azariah said. “There is more to it! For many years we’ve hoped a paladin of Ashhur might find that pendant, for its proximity to Velixar is deadly to him. He loses much of his strength so close to the object his life is contained within.”

“So we use it as a weapon?” Tarlak asked.

“I can talk to him then,” Azariah said. “Learn from him. No other man in this world has seen as much as he, and his understanding of clerical magic is immense.”

“What would you want to learn from him?” Aurelia asked, shifting uncomfortably against Harruq’s side and pulling their blanket higher. “He’s a vile thing. There’s no wisdom in that corpse.”

“He has been to the places Ashhur cannot go,” Azariah insisted. “He has heard the only voice Ashhur cannot hear. If I could just have a year or two to…”

“There will be no such thing,” said Ahaesarus as he entered the tent, Judarius at his side.

“Where is the pendant?” Judarius asked. Tarlak pointed to where it lay on the ground. The angel readied his enormous mace and approached.

“This is a mistake,” said Azariah.

Judarius hefted the mace high and swung. The pendant shattered into pieces. Purple smoke flashed into the air, the potent smell of sulfur burning their eyes.

“Too many centuries he has walked the land,” Ahaesarus said. “If we see him, we end him, and this time he’ll stay dead.”

The two left the tent. Azariah remained, sadly shaking his head.

“It is a sacrifice that sometimes must be made,” he said, slipping his pendant underneath his robes. “Faith over knowledge, safety over learning. So be it.”

He bowed to them all and left, his wings rustling against the flaps of the tent.

“Well that was depressing,” Tarlak said. When the others gave him strange looks, he clarified. “Even after death, it appears we’re still stuck with politics.”

The paladins laughed, and the others rolled their eyes and did their best to sleep.

Miles away, feeling abandoned by his god, Velixar shrieked in fury and terror as he felt truly vulnerable for the first time in centuries.

H aern limped up the stairs, the hairs on his neck standing on end. His heart thudded in his chest. He needed a window. He needed to see. Ominous but familiar shapes had poisoned his dreams, and when he awoke he had heard the sound of his nightmares.

“Please, no,” he whispered. “Just no.”

He found a window and looked out. Shimmering over the night sky was the lion, its outline traced in a bloody red. Again it roared, shaking the city with its sound.

“Damn you, Karak,” Haern said. “What game do you play now?”

It had been four days since Antonil’s departure. Bernard had cast healing spell after healing spell, and through the daily rituals Haern found his strength returning. But whatever priest cast the lion image, he was too powerful for him in his current state.

He returned to his bed, but when he sat down, he paused. The shadows were wrong.

“I know you’re here,” he said. “Show yourself.”

The lone torch in the room danced, and as the shadows flickered one of them leaped off the wall, growing thin white claws. Haern rolled back, drawing his sabers. He stabbed upward as he hit the ground, his attacker atop him. They cut through the shadow, doing no visible harm. The claws scraped his face. Its body might have been intangible, but its claws were real, and as blood splattered across the floor Haern rolled.

The shadow lunged after him, claws leading, but Haern dropped to the floor. The shadow sailed over him, its claws entangled in the thick cloth of his bed. Haern spun, tossing his sheets over the shadow. Dropping one of his sabers, he grabbed the torch and yanked it free. He faced his attacker, trying not to be disoriented by the way the cloth shook and moved as if a real person were underneath. What he fought was a denizen of Karak’s Abyss, and every act was lie and deception.

The cloth dropped, and the shadow slid underneath, its claws shredding their way out. Haern beat it back with his torch, swinging and parrying it as if it were a sword. The shadow shrieked as the fire passed through its being, the unearthly sound a combination of bird and lion. It leaped back, slashed its claws against the wall, and then lunged. Haern swung, but it lashed at his torch with both claws and then bit down on the handle. Blood spurted as the teeth sank into his hand. Haern kicked, but his foot passed right through. Desperate, he spun, tore his hand free, and fell to the bed. The shadow hovered over him, its toothy grin dripping with blood.

It lurched forward, shrieking its bizarre call. The shadows shrank inward, the teeth and claws shattered, and only Deathmask remained, standing at the door with a hand outstretched and glowing purple.

“I thought they would come for you,” he said.

“Who is 'they'?” Haern asked, wrapping his bleeding hand with a torn part of his shirt.