Forums » Fan Fiction

In the Sway of Storms - chapter 19

    • 231 posts
    February 3, 2022 9:59 AM PST

    Chapter 19

     

    I saw the Night.

    It came in the shape of a hand, in the shape of an axe, and it ended life because it wanted to, because extinguishing the flame brought it joy. Because all the varied life beneath the sun was hateful to it. And so the Night moved to smother it all.

    The wind would come, thick with the dust of frail and forgotten things. The wind would course through the streets of abandoned cities, and sough across the empty plain, carrying the voices of those who live there no more.

    And in my vision, all who remained were those few who hid in secret places until the Night was gone.

     

    — from the known pages of the Oracle of Aovyn

     

    * * * * *

     

    Isonis led his people from the Spire, stepping by the guards who still lay paralyzed. Whatever Safranin had done, the elves were the first to rise, and so they passed unhindered into the city.

    In the east a shouting arose, though no words could they understand.

    “To the cache for our remaining things,” said Isonis. “We’ll make for the weakness in the south wall, the one Aovyn likes to use. Not low enough for refugees to easily climb, but a determined elf can make it.”

    He glanced at Aovyn. “Call your wolf. Tell her we are coming out, and we shall never return to this place.”

    Aovyn nodded. “This I am glad to hear, although…” He looked around at the crowds through which they moved. People glanced east, wondering what the shouting was about.

    “There is nothing we can do for them,” said Isonis. “And even if there were, I would not risk one of you to do it.”

    Aovyn nodded. Crowdancer tapped a light rhythm, urging their feet to greater speed.

     

    * * * * *

     

    Rhydian stood before the general’s pavilion and smoked some sort of plant he had found in the east. The effect was mildly calming, which was helpful when he was meant to pass a command from a demigod to a general.

    He had seen armies before. Usually troops stood in close ranks, perfectly aligned in rows and columns like good little soldiers.

    The Revenant were nothing like them. This army seethed and churned, sometimes fighting one another without a thought. Rhydian was surrounded by a din of growls and hurled insults in a language he could not understand.

    Probably for the best, he thought.

    Somehow the senseless fury in their brains comprehended that they should not meddle with one of Ossari’s chosen humans, so he felt relatively safe from them. Now and then he did glance nervously toward one of the wickerwends drifting through the army. One of them stared at him now, its wisp eyes holding his gaze for a long moment before the cloud of fog turned and drifted away.

    He hated those things, but whatever magic had been used in their creation, they understood any language spoken or thought by sentient creatures. He shuddered then, wondering if they heard in his mind the hate and revulsion he felt toward them.

    He served the same lord as these things, but he didn’t have to like it. One day when all of this was done, those who had served the Lord of Rage well would be rewarded. He believed this, even if now and then he wondered what such a reward might be when most of humanity would be utterly destroyed. After all, what good is power if no one can see you wield it? When no one jumps at your command?

    True, there were other species who served Ossari, but it wouldn’t be quite as satisfying to order them around—if he could even bring himself to spend time with other species when the war was over. He had had quite enough of the sounds and smells of non-humans.

    Perhaps a mountaintop castle of his own—surely there must be some to spare—with servants who never bothered him unless he called. Perhaps even magic power. It was difficult to imagine, but the general claimed her own power was a gift from their lord.

    He stood straighter as he saw the general approach through a gap in the chaos of the Revenant forces. Any who did not scuttle out of her way fast enough were gifted a bolt of fire encourage them.

    Rhydian smiled and bowed slightly. “General Safranin Alizar, it is indeed a pleasure.”

    “Of course,” she said. “I assume you had no trouble?”

    He shrugged. “They didn’t have many scouts. Easily picked off in the tall grasses. When the army came over the hills, they must have thought we were more refugees from the east.”

    “Good work.” She smirked. “I heard the horns, so the watchposts know better now.”

    “They do indeed, general.”

    “I met some elves in Sarnishar.”

    “Did you kill them?”

    “Why would I do that? Then they would miss the devastation of watching their forests burn—or hearing about it when they emerge from wherever they go to ground.”

    “They do love their ash, the elves.”

    “We shall make sure they have plenty of ash for what faces remain among them.”

    When she moved to pass him and enter her pavilion, he said, “I bear a message from our Lord, general.”

    She frowned. “What is this?”

    “He awaits you in his pavilion.”

    She sent him a dangerous look. “You should have told me right away. Idiot.”

    She turned and hurried off across the army—still arriving from the east—toward Ossari’s headquarters.

    Rhydian kept a tally of every insult she gave him. Perhaps Ossari would one day allow him to claim payment.

    He raised the rolled paper to his lips and took another draw of calming leaf smoke.

    * * * * *

     

    Like a crimson flower, the great tent opened on the midday field. The flickering darkness within beckoned, and Safranin felt a quickening of her pulse as she stepped into the lair of her Lord.

    Only sparse candles gave a shifting light to the sanctum within, but it was enough to trace with her eyes the path of blood-stained rug that led toward the throne upon which the god reclined. The shape of him was traced lightly in the candlelight, but she could not see his expression.

    When she reached him, she fell to her knees upon the rug. “My Lord,” she whispered, and her voice trembled. Her fingers lay upon the old wool and dried blood of the rug.

    It was but a moment before she felt the caress of his fingers in her hair. “Safranin,” rumbled her god, “what news from the city?”

    She dared lift her eyes to behold his face, so drowned in shadow yet familiar. He was smaller today, nearly the size of a tall and muscular man. Sometimes he grew with his rage, and then he could be enormous. She could not see his shadowed eyes—but it was seldom that he allowed her to see those eyes, endless red and deep as the darkness between stars.

    “They refuse to bow down before you, my Lord,” Safranin said.

    “Of course,” he said, his voice as deep as the deepest stone secrets of the world. “Mortals so often think themselves lofty when they have nought but the power of mortal hands. They are as insects who challenge a giant.”

    “I also met elves, my Lord. Three elves far from Faerthale. I invited them to my final audience with the king to see what they would say, and they did as one would expect.”

    “Did you kill them?”

    “No, my Lord. I prophesied to them of your coming to their lands, so that they might live in fear.”

    A rumbling laugh. “Good. They should fear.”

    His hand drifted down around her cheek until he ran his thumb along her lip. She kissed his flesh, and it tasted of copper blood and rage.

    “Your brief lives are not worthy of the sensations of mortal flesh.”

    “I am not worthy of you, my Lord, but I am yours nonetheless.”

    “Of course you are. But now I wish to burn a city to the ground. I long for it, to hear their screams and drink of the fear, the final pleading for my mercy.” He laughed again. “But of mercy there shall be none.”

    And now the rage entered his voice again, and his hand grew larger in hers.

    “What do you command, my Lord?”

    “Use the sound ring that I gave you. Command the army to overrun the city of Sarnishar and rip asunder all that lives. Leave only the spire as a reminder of my victory, but remove its inhabitants.”

    Safranin placed her head against the rug once more. “As you command, my Lord. And the elves?”

    “If they are found inside the walls, they die.”

     

    * * * * *

     

    Isonis stood frozen on the rooftop for a long moment, staring at an army pouring over the eastern wall of Sarnishar. Then he was down the stairs along the outside of the building, down to where his companions waited.

    “Run,” he said, and they ran.

    But passage through the city was difficult, for the people were rising up in fear. Some ran from the east shouting about the enemy in the city slaughtering without reason. Some who heard turned and fled toward the western gate, knocking down any who stood in their way. Many ran in other directions, shouting about their families.

    So the elves pushed through a panicked throng that raced in every direction. Isonis had sword and bow, and a backpack with a few supplies. He was nearly knocked off his feet several times trying to move through an intersection. In the din he could hear nothing of his own people, but he knew they were on either side.

    Crowdancer’s drumming gave them a tireless swiftness that helped, as long as they could avoid stray limbs in their paths, or the larger Sarnfolk pushing through the multitude. She had never been able to explain to him how the sound of her magic could focus tightly on only those whom she intended to hear. But he and Aovyn heard, and their feet danced among the many limbs of the crowd, picking their way south through the city.

    Until a group of Sarnish soldiers in heavy chain pushed their way through at a run, and Isonis hit the ground. He leapt from the ground quickly for fear that the maddened mob would crush him as they passed. But when he stood and looked around, he could see nothing of his companions. He thought he heard a faint drumming, but he could have imagined it in the thunder of countless boots in the dirt.

    He rushed up a stairwell to the flat roof of the nearest building—mercifully free of frenzied locals—and looked around, shouting. But he saw neither of them, and he doubted that his voice was even reaching the street in this din. He wiped dirt and perspiration from his face and stood for a moment, catching his breath.

    They know where to go, he thought. We shall meet at the south wall. We must.

    He hit the street running and darted through the crowd. The mob began to thin as he passed into a southwest neighborhood of crafting companies and warehouses. As he passed each intersection, he glanced around hoping to see his companions. He saw people leaving their places of work, wondering what the shouting was about.

    Then he saw Revenant. They rushed into groups of people, their faces grinning with hunger and anticipation, slick with drool and blood. They leapt and toppled people, pulling them down like beasts pulling down a gazelle, beginning to feed even before their prey hit the ground. One sarnish man tried to pull himself onto a roof, but three Revenant grabbed his legs and pulled him to the ground.

    Isonis did not slow. To slow was death. He knew from long experience that Revenant preferred to fight in groups, to overwhelm their enemies and eat them alive. They cut clothing away and sliced bits of flesh from limbs and torso, sometimes singing or laughing along with the screams of their victims.

    But he and the others had fought them in small groups. This was an army.

    Five Revenant sped into an intersection ahead of him. One saw him, and screeched at the others.

    Isonis looked into the sky, where many birds had already begun to gather, waiting. Vultures. Crows. Hawks.

    Large vale hawks.

    Isonis let out a cry in the tongue of hawks and ran toward a stairwell that led to a roof. He could hear the loping of Revenant behind him.

    Once on the roof he saw two hawks soaring down. They lifted him, talons digging into leather, until he was high enough that the Revenant could not pull him down. He looked back and saw that none of them carried bows.

    He pointed beyond two more rows of buildings, and they set him down on a roof. He thanked them and then ran down another stairwell into a broad space between warehouses.

    Then he shuddered to a halt when he saw a mist curling along the front of a building. Breathing heavily from exertion, he watched the source of the mist drift into view from around a corner. A cloud of fog coalesced in the open space, and wisps like eyes appeared and stared at Isonis.

    He had two arrows in the air in a moment. They disappeared into the fog without effect, and the creature began to move toward him.

    Isonis dropped bow and backpack and drew his sword.

    “So you are a wickerwend,” he said.

    A sound from the fog like a blade gently sharpened, rising at the end.

    “I am Isonis Rowan,” he said, and raised his sword until the blade was vertical before his face, “and this is Drinker of Night’s Breath.”

    As the fog drifted closer, he changed stance and made ready. Then he leapt, both hands gripping the hilt and bringing the blade down upon the fog. Suddenly a vine or tentacle whipped out from the fog and snapped around his ankle. The vine threw him down upon the dirt, and he grunted as the air left him.

    He blinked dirt out of his eyes and looked around for his sword. As his hand darted out to grasp the hilt, his eyes caught a flash of dull green to one side, just before a waterslick vine wrapped whiplike around his wrist. It felt and smelled like something newly emerged from a bog.

    Furiously he kicked out with his left leg and pulled the hilt toward him as another vine took his right ankle. As the vines pulled him up off the ground, he grasped the hilt with his free hand and severed the vine holding his ankle.

    His legs dropped groundward, and he swung upward to hack at the vine holding his right wrist.

    The creature screamed, the sound of a baby screaming beside a grinding wheel against a blade. The fog was but two yards away now. Lifting his head from the ground again, Isonis saw that the wisplike eyes were now low in the fog, fixed upon him as they moved along the ground.

    Shreds of mist moving ahead of the fog passed over one hand—cold, cold—and he jerked his hand back, numb.

    More vines—no, tentacles—flew out of the fog, grasping, and he kicked backward off the ground.

    The cold wisps watched him as the fog moved closer. Isonis kept low, watching the tentacles reach for him, dodging when they came too close.

    How many does it have?

    He wiped perspiration from his eyes with a sleeve, and ran for a gap. There must be something within the fog controlling the tentacles.

    But as he ran, four tentacles whipped around and caught him. Another came from the fog and gripped his right wrist, tightening until he dropped his sword. He cried out as his right arm and left leg were pulled in different directions. It was trying to rip him apart.

    Then a flash of fire around him, though he felt no heat. The creature screamed again and released him. Four tentacles batted wildly against the ground, all wrapped in flame.

    Isonis grasped his sword and kicked off the ground again, landing several yards away on his feet and left hand. He glanced around and saw Aovyn casting. Then Isonis felt the wind around his feet and knew that he would move more quickly for a time.

    “Too many arms,” he muttered, running toward one side of the creature. “Too many arms.”

    Winds flew around the fog, cutting across and lifting the mist from whatever hid inside the creature. For a moment he saw a glimpse of what lurked within.

    They gather parts, Safranin had said.

    “The fog is the magic!” shouted Aovyn.

    What did he mean? No time. Singed tentacles flew once more from the fog, reaching for Isonis. He dodged left and made for the stairs running up one side of a building. Faster.

    “Too many arms,” he said again, and leapt from above, ignoring whatever it was that Aovyn was shouting at him.

    Tentacles whipped around again—but he was faster.

    Both hands gripping the hilt, Isonis brought down the blade toward the creature.

    Drinker of Night’s Breath sliced into the fog and mist and parted it completely. The wickerwend screamed again, deafening. The blade continued down, hewing into a collection of rotting body parts held together by smaller tentacles wrapped around them.

    Isonis landed badly and crawled away, braced against the grasping tentacles again.

    But nothing came. The tentacles wilted, spilling the wickerwend’s collection into a pile on the ground.

    Aovyn dragged him away from the pile of parts. Isonis turned and saw that the remnants of the fog itself were drifting away, blown by a strong wind. The glowing wisps were gone.

    He felt the water-cool magic of Aovyn healing wounds Isonis hadn’t had time to notice.

    “I killed it,” he said, letting out a long breath. “I think I did.”

    “You did,” said Aovyn.

    “Good. I would rather not look again.” Isonis looked around, then stood up on shaking legs and raised his sword again. “Get behind me.”

    Half a dozen Revenant stared, torn between the ruin of the wickerwend, and the two elves before them.

    “They’re afraid,” said Aovyn. “I think they were afraid of that, and you killed it.”

    Fear danced in their eyes, yet one stepped forward and raised an axe.

    “Can we kill all six?” asked Aovyn.

    “I am more than wiling to try. Where is Crowdancer?”

    “I haven’t seen her since we were pulled apart in the crowd.”

    Suddenly a voice rose from the direction of the spire. A powerful voice, a familiar voice. The bard sang a song in the Ginto tongue, a calling. A beckoning.

    “What is she doing?” whispered Aovyn.

    Isonis could feel her magic, as familiar to him after so many years as her face, her voice. But it was targeted toward the invaders, and he did not feel the call. He could hear the longing, the siren song that pulled at them—but he was not the instrument she played.

    Yet the Revenant heard. They turned as if beckoned by the song of a god. And then as one they began to move.

    Toward the spire.

    “No,” said Isonis, and made to run toward the spire as well.

    Aovyn held him back. “You can’t,” he said quietly.

    What is she doing?

    “Saving us.”

    Still the song called in Ginto, called the wretched ones toward the voice of home.

    “No. We have to save her—“

    Aovyn held his arm. “She wouldn’t have done this if she saw any way of getting to us. She’s trapped among them.”

    “We can fight through!”

    “Thousands of them!” shouted Aovyn. “Ossari’s army is in this city!”

    “We cannot let her—“

    “We have no choice.” Aovyn’s voice broke on the words. “She has already chosen for us.”

    Isonis pushed him against the warehouse wall. “There has to be a way. Some shaman way you haven’t told me about.”

    Aovyn wept. “I cannot take us through legions, Isonis.”

    Isonis realized that he was saying no over and over. He gripped Aovyn by the arms and stared at the ground at their feet.

    There was nothing he could do. And he did not care. He slowly turned back toward the spire.

    “If you die, then Arebon and the others—“

    To Tohr with Arebon!”

    But Isonis didn’t move. He only stared at the ground, at his feet that would move no further. Still Crowdancer’s song beckoned an army of Revenant to join her.

    Then there was a hand on his shoulder. “Come, my brother,” said Aovyn. The strength was gone from his voice. “If we do not flee now, then she has done this for nothing.”

    With an inarticulate cry, Isonis turned and began to run toward the southern wall. They passed a few more rows of crafting halls and warehouses, until at last they found the sagging stone wall they sought.

    A Revenant pulled itself over the wall and landed. Its eyes moved between the spire and the two elves in its way.

    Then a blur of fur flew from the left as Aovyn’s wolf sank teeth into the Revenant’s leg. The creature cried out and lifted a sword.

    Isonis sliced its head from its torso and caught the Revenant’s hand as its sword fell.

    Aovyn hugged his wolf, and the blue of his healing magic swept across her fur.

    The song—the bardic song that had cleared a path for them—ended. The voice stopped abruptly, and there was silence but for the growls of an army, a species, a god triumphant.

    Isonis could not breathe. He saw his arms reach for the wall, felt himself begin to climb. In his mind, thunder.

     

    * * * * *

     

    Arebon stared down the hill at the city he had sent his companions to. The so-called sanctuary city. Parts of the city were in flames, and the part of the army that wasn’t feeding upon refugees outside the walls was now sweeping through the city like flies across a corpse.

    Nearer, he saw Isonis and Aovyn and the wolf running up the hill. Several Revenant were pursuing them.

    Arebon ran to meet them, with Sairi by his side. They helped the others defeat their enemy, and then Isonis turned red eyes toward Arebon.

    Arebon began, “Where is Crowdancer? Is she—“

    Isonis hit him with his whole body and brought him down to the ground. Arebon had just enough time to realize that Isonis was punching him before the other elf was dragged away from him by Aovyn and Sairi.

    Isonis fell to his knees. “She’s gone,” he said in a ragged voice. “She’s gone.”

    Arebon laid his head back upon the grass and watched the smoke from many fires passing across the sky.

    Gone.

     

    ~ END OF PART THREE ~

     

    You can read Chapter 20 at https://seforums.pantheonmmo.com/content/forums/topic/13622/in-the-sway-of-storms-chapter-20/view/post_id/261600

     


    This post was edited by Crowsinger at March 17, 2022 9:48 AM PDT
    • 231 posts
    February 3, 2022 10:01 AM PST

    Isonis prepares to fight

     

    https://imgur.com/533WABW.png