R. Salvatore - Luthien's Gamble

He saw the hem of the wizard’s brownish-yellow robes, a sickly color for a sickly man.

Luthien forced himself to his knees, threw his back against the wall, and squirmed his way up to a standing position. Before he ever fully straightened, before he ever truly looked Paragor in the eye, he heard the crackle of energy.

Blue lines of power arced between Paragor’s fingers, and when he thrust his hands toward Luthien, those lines extended, engulfing the man in a jolting, crackling shroud.

Luthien jerked spasmodically. He felt his hair standing on end, and his jaw chattered and convulsed so violently that he bit his tongue repeatedly, filling his mouth with blood. He tried to look at his adversary, tried to will himself toward the wizard, but his muscles would not react to his call. The spasms continued; Luthien slammed the back of his head against the wall so violently that he had to struggle to remain conscious.

He hardly registered the movement as Praehotec finally turned and advanced, a clawed hand reaching for his head.

With a roar of victory, the beast grabbed for its prey, meaning to squash Luthien’s skull. But the energy encircling the young Bedwyr sparked on contact and blew the demon’s hand aside. Praehotec looked at Paragor, serpentine face twisted with rage.

“You cannot kill this one!” the duke insisted. “He is mine. Go to his lover instead and take her as you will!”

Luthien heard. Above all the crackling and the pain, the sound of his own bones and ligaments popping as he jerked about, he heard. Paragor had sent Praehotec to Katerin. He had given the demon permission to kill Katerin . . . or worse.

“No,” Luthien growled, forcing the word from his mouth. He straightened, using the wall for support, and somehow, through sheer willpower, he managed to steady himself enough to look the evil duke in the eye.

Both Paragor and Praehotec stared at the young Bedwyr with a fair amount of respect, and so it was Luthien, gazing over the duke’s shoulder, who noticed the blue-robed wizard at the open doorway to the duke’s bedchamber.

Brind’Amour’s hands moved in circles as he uttered a chant. He took a deep, deep breath and brought his hands back behind his ears, then threw them forward, at the same time blowing with all his might.

Luthien got the strange image of the wizard as a boy, blowing out the candles upon his birthday cake.

There came an explosion of light, and a great and sudden burst of wind that flattened Luthien against the wall at the same time as it blew out the arcing energy emanating from Paragor’s hands, freeing the trapped young Bedwyr.

Paragor stumbled, then turned about, glaring at this new adversary, recognizing him as the old man he had seen in the divining basin. Now, with the display of power from the man, Paragor pieced things together.

“You,” he snarled accusingly, and Brind’Amour knew that the wizard-duke, who knew the stories of the ancient brotherhood and had no doubt been warned of Brind’Amour by Greensparrow, at last saw him for who he really was. With a primal scream, Paragor lifted his hands, and they glowed that sickly brownish-yellow color. The wizard-duke charged, his hands going for the old man’s throat.

By the time Luthien gained enough of his senses to look up, he was lying on the floor, a sheet of golden light suspended in the air above him. He saw the giant, shadowy form of Praehotec through that veil, saw the demon’s huge foot rise up above him.

Luthien closed his eyes, tried to grab his sword, but could not reach it in time, and screamed out, thinking he was about to be crushed.

But then it was Praehotec who was screaming, terrible, awful wails of agony, for as the demon’s foot entered the sheet of golden light, it was consumed, torn and ripped away.

Brind’Amour’s hands, glowing a fierce blue to match his own robes, came up to meet the duke’s charge. He caught Paragor’s hands in his own and could feel the disease emanating from them, a withering, rotting touch. Brind’Amour countered the only way he knew how, by reciting chants of healing, chants of ice that would paralyze Paragor’s invisible flies of sickness.

Paragor twisted and growled, pressing on with all his might. And Brind’Amour matched him, twisted and turned in accord with each of the duke’s movements. Then Paragor yanked one hand away suddenly, breaking the hold, and slapped at Brind’Amour’s face.

The old wizard intercepted with a blocking arm, accepting the slap, and his forearm, where his unprotected skin was touched by the evil duke, wrinkled and withered, pulling apart into an open sore. Brind’Amour responded by slamming his own palm into Paragor’s nose, and where the blue touched Paragor’s skin, it left an icy, crystalline whiteness, the duke’s nose and one cheek freezing solid.

Gulping for breath, the evil duke grabbed Brind’Amour’s hand with his own and the struggle continued. Paragor tried to pull Brind’Amour to the side, but to the duke’s surprise, the old wizard accepted the tug, even threw his own weight behind it, sending both of them tumbling down the hall, away from Luthien and Praehotec.

Luthien gawked at the spectacle, as Praehotec, unable to stop the momentum, sank more and more of its foot, then its ankle, into the light.

No, Luthien realized then, not light. Not a sheet of singular light, as he had first thought, but a swirling mass of tiny lights, like little sharp-edged diamonds, spinning about so fast as to appear to be a single field of light.

How they ate at the demon flesh, cutting and gobbling it into nothingness!

Everything turned red then, suddenly, as Praehotec loosed another of its powerful eye bolts, and an instant later, Luthien felt the demon’s blood and gore washing over him. He twisted and squirmed and looked up to find Brind’Amour’s protective barrier gone, along with half of Praehotec’s leg. The demon’s acidic lifeblood gushed forth, splattering the wall and floor and Luthien.

He took up his sword and rolled out from under the wounded demon, came up to his knees just as Oliver, rapier held before him, came gliding past with Estabrooke, the Dark Knight’s great sword glowing a fierce and flaming white.

Luthien tried to rise and join them, but found that he hadn’t the strength, and then Katerin was beside him, bracing his shoulders, hugging him close. She kissed him on the cheek—and he saw that she had taken a cudgel from one of the dead guards.

“I must go,” she whispered, and she scrambled up and ran off, not toward Oliver, Estabrooke, and the demon, but the other way.

Luthien looked back to see Brind’Amour and Paragor rolling and thrashing, alternately crying out. The sight brought the young Bedwyr further out of his stupor; he could control his muscles once more, but how they ached! Still, Luthien knew that he could not sit there, knew that the fight was not yet won.

“Ick!” Oliver said, skidding to a stop before he hit the puddle of demon gore.

Praehotec, leaning against the wall, didn’t seem to notice the halfling. It looked right over Oliver’s head to the shining sword and the armored man, this cavalier, this noble warrior, a relic of a past and more holy age. The demon recognized what this man was, the most hated of all humankind.

“Paladin,” Praehotec snarled, drool falling freely to the floor. Out came the great leathery wings as the beast huffed itself up to its most impressive stance, straight and as tall as the corridor would allow, despite its half-devoured leg.

Oliver was impressed by the fiend’s display, but Estabrooke, crying to God and singing joyfully, charged right in and brought his sword down in a great sweeping strike. The halfling watched his courage, knew the demon’s word, and understood what this man they had met on the fields of Eradoch truly was. “ Douzeper ,” the halfling muttered.