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Excerpt: Legions of Strife
Vitae
Scurith rushed into the faerie glade, entering along the cobbled path through blood-soaked mud. He bowed his grey and tan furred canid form in a hasty bow. “Master, more Sidhe are coming. For your plan to succeed, we must depart before witnesses arrive.”
I turned to the faithful thrall who’d sold me out at my request. “Quite right.”
Rage and adrenaline eased slowly.
My trap had succeeded perfectly. It was in the Sidhe’s nature to betray one another. They expected it. After Aquaylae’s betrayal, I knew there was little chance of reclaiming my Champion blades from within Creation. The two elven knights pinned to their knees before me had died too many times, failed too many times to risk one-on-one combat in the mortal realms.
So, I played to their expectations. I’d fabricated a drama with myself as the fool, but it was I left laughing in the end.
My hands massage the grips of the Seelie and Unseelie Champion blades. Both swords responded to my touch, wriggling to fit the hands of my newest and most superior body yet.
“I very much wish to slay you. Nevertheless, I am willing to be merciful on one condition. As we are low on time, I should give you five seconds to oath your cooperation. Swear service unto me in releasing Mare from this blade and you shall not share the fate of Mariena and Vusolaryn.”
“Master, we must hurry. They will not cooperate. Slay them and let us be away.”
“Will either of you submit to reason?” I asked.
Dolumii spat in my face.
A growl escaped the trollman holding him.
Gherrian closed his eyes. “I am disinclined.”
Scurith whined, ears pressed flat to his head. “Master, if too many arrive, we will not be able to slay them before they are able to report what you’ve done here.”
Irritation flashed through me my fingers tightened around the swords. “Fine. We’ll take Dolumii and Gherrian with us.”
“Begging your pardon, Master, but I thought the plan was to slay all witnesses,” Scurith said.
I let my cruel intentions play out along my raspberry painted lips. “I’d like to play with them before...well, let’s not spoil the surprise.”
The coyll bowed, gesturing to my enforcers. The hulking, black-washed mortal corpses my thrall had animated with troll DNA collected the glade’s many bodies—living and dead—while the winged, reanimated children’s corpses flew over watch.
As they did so, I transmogrified into pure life plasma. Stepping carefully through the battlefield, being mindful to control my essence lest it burn or stain the ground, I drew all of the spilled blood into my body. As I absorbed the powerful essence, I kept it separate from my own. Even so, A nova of magic exploded up my legs the moment I drew in Mariena’s spilled blood.
My lips curled.
I’d spoken true. This newest body infused via rebirth with the essence of two powerful knights felt nigh unstoppable in a way none of my previous rebirth experiments had been. Being reborn with the essence of two Nephilim, first children of the fallen themselves, would make me the greatest shield in history—the Hand of God in Creation.
And with this kind of power, I will wrest Mare from the Champion blade.
I drew in Vusolaryn as I had his rival and stepped through the Arch opened to my palace, leaving behind an immaculate glade and a mystery served up to confound the Sidhe.
Just desserts on a silver platter.
Ignis
Ignis struggled to draw essence around his soul, focusing on dwarfism instead of his customary form. The valve in the stone basin’s bottom restricted the flow, but he knew how it worked. He knew essence waited in the reservoir beneath.
Like a flame struggling to catch on an oil lamp’s dry wick, his body flickered and faded only to grow to life in the end. His smile blossomed the moment lips formed to hold it.
Quayla beat me.
His center of gravity settled, and he knew by the feel his new body was female. Mahogany locks hung nearly enough to curtain proud bronze breasts. In his new compact body, his dark-walled cage left plenty of room to move. He shifted muscular hips to get a feel for his new flesh.
An angry face bent left and right trying to see Ignis appeared beyond the heat-stained square window. “What the hell happened? Why isn’t Quayla here?”
Ignis’s body flashed to pure flame without a thought, riding the surge of fury through a full body transmog. He raised himself to float where he could meet his enemy’s eyes. “I know full well you are watching us, so you know exactly what happened Dunham. She beat me fair and square, so you can take your questions and shove them up your ass with a hot poker.”
A massive weight pressed down on Ignis. Had he still been in a human body, bones would’ve splintered, but compressing flame only created stars. The pressure eased. Dunham’s face disappeared. He returned ahead of a sudden wash of agony. Every atom of Ignis felt as it were being torn in half.
“I ordered you to feel pain when you even thought such comments,” Dunham snarled.
He did at that.
“Why aren’t you suffering for your insolence? Tell me the truth.”
Despite not having lungs, Ignis’s breath left him as Dunham’s fingers throttled Ignis’s stolen heart.
“I am.”
The simple phrase was the literal truth, so no more agony worsened Ignis’s ordeal.
“If you don’t want to die—”
“Screw off, Dunham. You can’t afford to kill any more of us. Besides, I obeyed you to the letter.”
Dunham darkened.
Ignis’s pain intensified.
The Anseelie Queen appeared over Dunham’s shoulder. Her delicate fingers drew him away.
“Where the hell have you been?” Dunham demanded.
For the barest fraction of a split second, fury tightened her eyes. Her face relaxed into a smile. “Little angel’s room.”
Ignis’s pain waned as Dunham’s attention shifted away. “You’re suppose—”
The anger returned to transform her face into something terrifying—angel to demon in a blink. “I am not actually your assistant, Dunham, quite the opposite in fact. I have a war to wage, one my general isn’t tending properly. Since your attention isn’t on what’s important, that leaves me to take care of business, doesn’t it?”
Dunham glanced over his shoulder at Ignis, his face that of a teen called out for rebelliousness. He raised the burning ruby of Ignis’s former heart into view and squeezed.
Pain lanced through the fire phoenix again. He dropped to the floor of his cage, curled into a tight agonized ball.
You wait, Dunham. Just wait.
Dunham
Dunham turned his back on Vivian marching to the control console. Her fingers slapped down on the shoulder like a vice.
“What you think you’re doing?” She asked. “I’m talking to you.”
“I’m sending the Terra to take care of Quayla.”
“No, you are not.”
Dunham darkened, gesturing for the nearby Windows. “I know where she is. I know she’s beat to hell. I’m sending the Terra to finish her off, didn’t you say we needed her?”
“Vitae has slain Mariena and Vusolaryn. Local Seelie and Unseelie will be in chaos. Now is the time to slay as many of them as we can.”
Red rage ignited along Dunham’s skin. “No! I want Quayla!”
Vivian’s hand slammed into his face turning rage molten. Magical energy rushed through him until eldritch magic coalesced into green power throbbed between his fingers.
She hit him again. “Don’t challenge me, boy. Even with Summus’s essence you are no match for me.”
Dunham glowered at her. It had been at least a century since he’d last tried proving himself her equal. None of those attempts had ended well. Still, he had tried without the power of divine phoenix on those occasions.
Divine phoenixes replaced archangels like Michael. Shouldn’t Summus’s power more than match a Fallen angel’s strength?
Except Vivian wasn’t just any fallen angel. She had reigned as one of the Dark Trinity. She’d been a Principality of Hell, one of Lucifer’s three chosen captains—the Lady of Water. She had eons of experience fighting and surviving creatures far more powerful than Dunham.
He eased the magic back into his core.
“Good.” Vivian smiled. “Now dispatch Terra to Sugarloaf Mills mall. Have her clean up the Sidhe at Medieval Times.”
Dunham matched her smile. “Of course, mother.”
Vivian’s eyes narrowed. Warning filled her voice. “Dunham this is too important. Whatever your thinking, don’t do it.”
“All I’m thinking about is sending the Terra to eliminate your enemies. That is what you want, isn’t it?”
“If you’re speaking specifically of my enemy Sidhe at the Sugarloaf Mills mall, yes.”
“Whom else would I be speaking of?”
Her expression hardened. “No one else if you know what’s good for you.”
Dunham folded his hands behind his back. “Have you had any luck obtaining a new source of life, air or water essence?”
She remained suspicious but allowed the change of topic. “I may have a way to gain us another water phoenix. As for life, Vitae is playing right into my hands.”
“If you can get us another water phoenix to help keep Summus contained, what are you waiting for?”
Vivian watched him for several moments in tense silence. She arrived at some conclusion without her eyes giving away its contents. “Some things must follow other things. There is no other way.”
She marched across the room, descending the spiral stair toward her apartments. Dunham gave her fifteen minutes to change her mind or return. When she remained absent, he flicked the intercom open. “Terra, I have a mission for you. You will go to your home, slay Quayla, and proceed to the Sugarloaf Mills mall to exterminate a Sidhe enclave.”