Tim Lebbon - Dusk

She could hear the battle now, a whisper of cries and chaos seeping past the roar of air about her ears. She could make out the lay of the land too… and what she saw amazed her. She had dreamed so much over the centuries, her ancient memories turning into something that resembled myth in her mind, but she had never truly believed that she would ever see magic in action again. Here, now, directly below her diving hawk, machines were entering into battle. The shimmering blue light of magic cast its sheen across some of their weird constructs, and yet others fought in darkness, their magic contained within. The whole area inside the bowl-shaped valley was a slightly different color from its surroundings: lighter, more animated, more alive.

Lenora glanced across at Angel just as the Mage screeched her delight.

Here was their target. Here was magic. And it was mere seconds from their grasp.

TREY HAD FOUGHTfledge blights, vampire bats and cave snakes. Several years ago his cave had battled a plague of the snakes, vicious serpents whose normally pleasing song had been turned shrill and threatening by some weird disease. They had made away with three babies before the men had time to band together and hunt them into the tunnels. Normally creatures such as these would easily elude capture, easing into holes and cracks that could never be penetrated by the fledge miners, however supple evolution had made them. But these creatures had not only grown mad with their illness, but large as well. It gave them a hunger that could not be allayed, and their incessant eating-each other, cave creatures, the babies they had caught-made them large and ungainly. The hunt had been short and brutal. The fat snakes had come apart under the onslaught of the miners’ disc-swords, spilling things onto the cave floor that did not bear closer examination.

That had been a killing, not a fight. The snakes had not fought back. And they had not screamed in ear-shattering rage as they came at him.

The Red Monk had been severely lacerated by its encounters with some of the reanimated machines. Its right arm was all but severed, hanging on by threads of gristle and shredded robe. Blood spewed from wounds in its chest and stomach, and Trey knew that this thing should be dead. Its wounds were fatal, surely, and yet it charged like a fledge blight in full ferocity, its voice louder, its rage more obvious, its blooded sword raised high in its left hand. Trey was too stunned to act.

Kosar’s sword saved his life. The thief stepped between them and lashed out, stumbled as the Monk fell at his feet, stepped in quickly, stabbed down and jumped back again. It screeched and writhed and Trey, instantly shamed by his inaction, swung his disc-sword. It caught the Monk beneath the chin and whipped up its head, burying itself in the jawbone and holding fast.

The Monk opened its mouth, but the scream was choked with blood. It turned to look at Trey. The movement forced the jammed disc-sword handle down toward the ground, and though the pain must have been immense the Monk cast its rage-red gaze upon him, marking him in case it had a future.

“Back!” Kosar hissed. He lunged in and stabbed at the floored Monk again, his sword finding and parting flesh.

Trey squatted, twisted and wrenched at the disc-sword handle until the blade screeched free. The Monk howled and thrashed on the ground, its sword lashing out, and Kosar cursed and staggered back, bleeding hand splayed out before him like a wounded spider.

“Kosar?” Trey said.

“I’m all right. Just watch it!”

Trey lunged with his disc-sword again and again, but the Monk’s mad thrashing seemed to throw off every parry and thrust. The thing stood and advanced, coming straight for Trey. Its lower jaw was hanging by a few red threads, teeth glistening with blood, and the hissing sound must have been its best attempts at a scream. The miner stood his ground and worked his disc-sword, sending the blade at its tip spinning, catching the last of the daylight on its bloodied rim. The Monk aimed a clumsy strike with its sword, which Trey deflected and countered. Another wound opened through its torn robes. He struck again, aiming high for the Monk’s throat and face, but the disc-sword glanced from its bony forehead and took only skin.

Trey looked around, making sure that Hope, Alishia and Rafe were safe, then turned back to see the Monk’s sword swinging at his face.

Kosar screamed and deflected the blow, stepping once again between Trey and the demon. He kicked the Monk and sent it sprawling.

Trey stepped forward to slice at the fallen enemy, but Kosar held him back. “No,” the thief panted. “No need.”

The Monk went to stand but the ground beneath it lifted, an area three steps on edge rising straight up and then folding inward as the wakened machine found its purpose. The Monk was enveloped by green-veined rock, and this strange new machine crushed in and down like a flower in reverse. The Monk’s death was quick and horrific. It took only a few seconds for the machine to retreat belowground once again, leaving little more than a disturbed patch of sod to mark its place.

“Took its time,” Trey gasped.

“I suppose they think we should be doing some of the work,” Kosar said. He smiled at Trey, then winced and looked at his wounded hand. Blood glistened blackly in the dusky light, though Trey could not tell how bad the wound was. He did not want to ask.

“What’s that?” Hope suddenly screamed. “What’s that?” The fear in the old witch’s voice was shocking. Even above the continuing sounds of battle, and the screams of new waves of Monks forging into the valley, her voice held power. Trey had never heard anyone sounding so terrified. His first reaction was to look at Hope, and she was pointing straight up at where the death moon was even now manifesting from the gloom.

Trey saw the shapes high in the sky. They were still within the sun’s influence, but it did little to illuminate them. They were shadows against the dark blue background. And they were growing. Trey looked around at the dozens of battling machines-newly enfleshed arms spinning Monks through the air, great metal fists pounding them into the ground, spinning blades rending them in two, a hundred more of the bloody demons dodging between the magical constructs and coming closer, closer-and he wondered why he felt the true threat coming from elsewhere.

“Hawks?” Kosar said.

“Not this low,” Hope said. “Not this low! They live and die high up out of sight. The pressure’s too much for them down here. They’re not of the land. Unless…”

“Unless what?” Trey demanded.

The witch did not take her eyes from the shapes growing larger above them. “Unless something’s steering them.”

“The Mages,” a voice said. Trey looked down at Rafe where he lay at Hope’s feet. “The Mages are here.” He slowly hauled his hands from the ground, scraping moist earth from between his fingers, and sat up to face his companions. His face was pale and drawn, as if the arrival of dusk had brought defeat upon him.

Trey hated the expression on the boy’s face. It matched the fear he had heard in Hope’s voice. “What do we do?” Trey asked.

Rafe did not reply. Does he know? Trey wondered. Can this farm boy really get us out of here? And he began to wonder.

FIRST THERE WASnothing but pain and shredding, nothing touching the senses but an agony much deeper, searing her wounded soul and burning the exposed endings of her psychic nerves with a cruel conflagration. There was no consciousness of outside, beyond, only of the dark here and now.

I am in pain. I am under siege. And I am not whole.

The thoughts seemed alien, and she tried to pull away from them like an animal from fire. But they were not of a single point, they were the point, and they could not be escaped. Her mind quietened and she could accept that, because to think was to hurt. She had no wish to think these things. They made her feel less than she should have been, and although she had no memory of exactly what that was, she knew that she was much reduced.