Axel stood in the center of a semicircle of soldiers. Everyone had their mithril swords drawn. Behind them, the portal protected their backs. Given their position, it was the best defensive position he could come up with. Maybe if he’d had more than ten minutes and his ribs didn’t scream at him every time he took a deep breath something better might have occurred to him. But this would just have to do.
Hans muttered to himself on Axel’s right. He seemed more annoyed that Otto didn’t bring him along on whatever mad search he was undertaking than he was worried about the army of ghouls even now thundering down the city’s central boulevard.
“Does he go off on his own like this often?” Axel asked, more to take his mind off the impending attack than anything.
“All the time.” Hans tightened his grip on his sword. “How am I supposed to protect him if he doesn’t take me along?”
“What are you complaining about?” Corina asked from behind them. “I’m his apprentice and he took that pale-skinned witch instead of me.”
Axel actually smiled in the face of his approaching death. “When Otto gets back, you’ll have to voice your complaints.”
Hans snorted. “I’d have better luck complaining to a tree. Lord Shenk does as he pleases and my unasked-for thoughts interest him not in the least.”
At the edge of the light, the ghouls had stopped to stare at them, red eyes gleaming. More and more gathered by the second. They were massing for a charge, probably hoping to overrun Axel’s far-too-few defenders.
“Want the archers to thin them out a bit?” Cobb asked.
“Not yet.” Axel needed to buy time. If the ghouls were content to stand and stare, he wouldn’t complain.
“The corruption’s getting heavier,” Corina said. “I think they’re waiting for the portal’s effect on the ether to lessen until they can fight without trouble.”
How come no one ever gave him good news? “And how long will that take?”
“No idea. But don’t worry, Lord Shenk will find the source and deactivate it.”
“He’s certain to succeed with Lady White’s help,” Jet added.
The two women glared at each other prompting Axel to look away. It wasn’t enough that the ghouls wanted to kill them, he had those two behind him looking like they wanted to kill each other. This was why he was glad there were no women in the army. They made things too complicated.
A deafening roar came from the gathered ghouls and as one they charged.
The instant they passed into the portal’s light they slowed. But they didn’t stop. At a steady run, their skin burning and flaking off, howling like the damned, they came on.
Axel met the first ghoul with an overhead chop that took its head and right arm off.
The creature had barely collapsed when another took its place.
He hacked and slashed, cutting down anything not in a uniform.
One of the ghouls slipped inside his guard.
Before it could chomp down on him, a blast of lightning drove it back enough for him to run it through. Corina might not be his brother, but Axel was reminded once again how nice it was to have a wizard on his side.
As quick as it began, the attack ended. The ghouls pulled back out of the light, leaving about two score of their fellows behind.
“Anyone hurt?” Axel asked.
The silence indicated his people had weathered the first attack without casualties. So far so good.
Otto followed Lady White down a hall so narrow his shoulders almost brushed the walls. In the feeble light of his spell, the walls and floor appeared made of the same black stone and tile as the passages of the main pyramid. Corruption filled the air and it took all his self-control not to throw up.
Resting his hand on the hilt of his mithril sword helped a little, but he really wanted to draw the weapon and burn the corruption away. That, unfortunately, would foul up whatever magic Lady White was using to track the source of the corruption. Not that the task could be that hard given that the hall hadn’t branched yet.
After a minute of walking as quickly as they dared, Otto asked, “Is it me or are we going down?”
“It’s not you. The angle has been getting steeper by the moment. We’re getting closer to the source of the corruption.”
She sounded happy about that. As an undead creature, this sort of environment was probably invigorating for her. He shuddered and kept his opinions to himself. Axel must have engaged the ghouls by now. They needed to hurry and shut off the flow of corruption.
“Do you have any better sense of the source?” he asked.
“It’s demonic, but I can’t tell much more. It feels different from Astaroth’s power. In fact it feels like no flavor of infernal magic I know. Granted my knowledge is limited given how much the other cults hide. Still, this is bizarre. I’m eager to find out what the Arcane Lord has done.”
Ordinarily Otto would have been right there with her, but right now all he cared about was how to shut it down. Time was not on their side. If he had to cut the magic apart, he’d do it without a second thought.
The slope continued to deepen until they reached an actual set of stairs.
“It’s not far now,” Lady White said. “Unless I miss my guess, we’re no longer under the pyramid but rather somewhere between them. Though it pains me, this is a good time to draw that sword of yours.”
Otto didn’t need to be told twice. He pulled the blade and immediately some of the oppressive weight vanished.
She set out again and he followed, careful of his footing, trying his best to watch for traps that would no doubt be invisible to the naked eye anyway. Otto hadn’t been this tense in a long time. Something told him that whatever they found, it wouldn’t be pleasant.
They reached the bottom of the stairs without issue and found themselves at the entrance to a high, domed cavern. In the center of the chamber, a magic circle crackled with black lightning. In the center of the circle, a creature out of nightmare writhed and thrashed, trying to break free and getting zapped for its trouble.
The demon, for it could be nothing else, resembled a blot of darkness with random mouths and eyes forming and getting absorbed so fast he barely had time to register them. Despite its mouths appearing and vanishing at a rapid clip, it still managed to issue a mind-numbing moan that Otto feared would make his ears bleed. He’d take the pounding of the hammers in Garen any day.
Black energy rose off the creature and was drawn left and right through the walls and out of sight. Otto didn’t bother trying to trace it. He had a pretty good idea where it was going.
Lady White stared at the creature with a rapt expression.
“What is it?” he asked.
She gave a little shake as whatever spell she was under broke. “It’s an Amalgam of Souls. I’ve only heard about them. I suppose it’s only natural that an Arcane Lord would have been the person to actually create one.”
“Okay, what is it and how do we kill it?”
“Basically, Amet Sur caught the souls of the dying before they transformed into energy and were absorbed into heaven or hell. One by one he squashed them together and bound them to the mortal realm. I assume that’s what the circle does. The black lightning is torturing them to generate corruption which is what’s messing with the portal. The smaller pyramids likely serve as control and focusing units. It must have taken decades at least to accomplish all this.”
“Sounds about right for an Arcane Lord. How do we stop it?”
When she didn’t answer right away Otto’s throat tightened. Time was not on their side here.
At last she said, “We need to set it free. That will end the flow of corruption.”
“Great, how do we do that?”
“There’s a catch.”
He scrubbed a hand across his face. Wasn’t there always? “Such as?”
“Once it’s free, it will almost certainly try and kill us. I can’t begin to guess how to control such a thing. So you’re going to have to carve it apart one soul at a time. I can protect you from its aura of corruption, but not for long.”
That didn’t sound good to Otto, especially given that they had no idea how many souls Amet Sur had used to create the creature. On the other hand, the longer they waited the better the odds that Axel and the others were torn apart. He refused to allow that. Not to mention that, most amazing of all, at least to him, he’d actually come to like his brother for the first time maybe ever.
“How do I free it?”
“That part at least is simple. Take your mithril blade and make a cut across the circle. Once the binding is broken, so is the spell.”
Otto drew his sword and took a step toward the circle.
Lady White caught him by the shoulder. “If you get too close, the corruption will reduce you to nothing in an instant. You need to create an ethereal construct to hold the sword.”
Otto grimaced. The corruption would burn away pure ether as quickly as flesh, assuming he could even gather enough to build a construct. As he stared at his sword the answer came to him. He’d use the mithril to purify the ether before he built the tentacle. As long as he kept the flow passing through his sword, it should work.
But there was only way to find out for sure.
Drawing ether from around the blade, he pulled it into the metal then back out, creating a slowly expanding sphere of useable energy. The process took far longer than he would have preferred, but at last he had enough to do what he needed.
The tentacle formed at his command and he released the sword. Like a drill through wood, the mithril blade bored its way through the corruption.
Every foot cost Otto energy as he replaced what the corruption burned away. Sweat poured down his face and his whole body trembled.
With two feet to go his knees started to wobble.
Come on!
With a final effort he slashed across the circle, breaking the binding spell. At once the black lightning vanished. The oppressive air filling the room only grew deeper as the Amalgam of Souls rose toward the ceiling.
Somehow Otto didn’t fall, but his whole body ached. Lady White was at his side in an instant. She put her arm around him, offering support.
“That was impressive,” she said.
“Thanks.”
“Pity the hard part is yet to come.”
He swallowed a sigh. Somehow he knew she was going to say that.
Axel hacked down another ghoul. The beasts had made a third charge and this one was the strongest so far. It felt like they grew more powerful by the second while Axel’s sword felt heavier with every swing. No matter how many they killed, it seemed like more showed up to replace them. Whatever magic summoned the creatures must have called every ghoul in the desert.
Not a terribly encouraging thought.
He had no doubt that the mithril weapons were the only thing keeping them in this fight. He risked a glance left and right. He had two wounded men behind the line, but so far, no fatalities. Heaven had to be watching over them. Nothing else could explain that kind of luck.
A snarling ghoul leapt at him, jaws snapping and saliva flying.
Axel bashed it in the head with his pommel and chopped its head off.
Sweat stung his eyes and he swiped his sleeve across them. On his right, Hans was hard pressed by a pair of ghouls.
Axel hacked one of their arms off and the distraction gave Hans the space he needed to run the second one through.
The rest of the ghouls pulled back a dozen yards to let their numbers replenish for another charge. Axel didn’t believe for a moment that they’d give up, no matter how many the scouts killed. They seemed to give no thought to what passed for their lives.
“We can’t keep this up much longer.” Hans panted for air. “When do we risk the portal?”
“We don’t,” Corina said from behind them. “The corruption’s getting worse by the moment. Anyone using it will be dead instantly. Trust in my master. He’ll come through.”
Axel had great confidence in his brother, it was the timeline he worried about. Otto couldn’t know how hard pressed they were. It would be cold comfort to have the portal cleansed only for them all to be dead.
“Here they come,” Cobb said, cutting the debate short.
Axel took a two-handed grip on his sword and hacked down the first ghoul to move into range. At this point he could hardly swing the weapon with one hand. Any sort of skill had given way to brute force and determination. Against a human opponent, they’d have been killed long ago. But the undead seemed to have no understanding of tactics beyond charge in and try to overwhelm them with ferocity.
In their defense, it might actually work this time.
One of the scouts went down on a ghoul’s claws.
Axel rushed over and cut the creature’s head off.
Too late.
His scout’s throat had been ripped open.
Fury drove Axel to new efforts.
He hacked and slashed, cutting down anything that got close.
The ghouls started to pull back. They hissed and raised their hands.
Had he finally frightened them? That seemed unlikely at this point. A moment later one of them started to smoke. It howled and burst into flame.
Axel looked back at Corina, expecting magic.
She grinned. “He did it! The flow of corruption has stopped. The portal is repairing itself and the pure ether is burning them.”
She’d barely finished speaking when two more burst into flames. Like a signal, all the ghouls turned and fled out of sight. In seconds they were alone again.
Axel fell to his knees, his sword falling from numb fingers. They’d survived. Most of them anyway.
“Cobb. Take the wounded through the portal and to a healer.” He turned to Corina. “It’s safe now, right?”
“I’d give it five more minutes just to be sure, but it’s pretty close,” she said.
“You heard the lady. The rest of us will wait for my brother.”
While Cobb organized the injured, Hans plopped to the ground beside Axel. “That was too close. I’m sorry about your man.”
“Thanks. Honestly, it’s a wonder we only lost one. How are your men?”
“Tired, but intact. I’ll take that. When we get back, I’ll buy you drink at the Thirsty Sprite. Heaven knows we’ve earned one.”
“I’d say we’ve earned several.” Axel held out his hand and Hans shook it.