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Covalent City
THE BATTALION MARCHED in neat lines through the tremendous, amber-colored gates of Covalent City. Barakiel occupied the front line, a testament to how strong a warrior he had become since the Council allowed him to fight from exile.
His sense of purpose sharpened as he approached the Turning, a cavernous passageway through thick bands of silver and amethyst light that flowed and swirled, ever changing into darkness and back again. He savored its beauty, as well as the energy that surged through him. His power increased with each battle.
The rearguard had barely passed through the wall of light when a horde of demons appeared. It charged, and a phalanx of beasts headed straight for Barakiel. After he dispatched the first one, he understood their plan. Behind them came a group of fifteen or so Corrupted, their black armor shedding waves of energy, their ashen faces but a grim reminder of their former beauty.
“The Corrupted!” Barakiel shouted. A squad peeled off to come to his aid as he bolted to the left, seeking to put some distance between himself and the gang of dark warriors. Three were hard upon his heels.
“Why this pointless fight, Barakiel?” called the leader. “Join us. You would be unstoppable.”
Barakiel wheeled to face her, taking the opportunity to gauge their positions. “You stink of imbalance,” he said.
The three Corrupted hissed and cackled. “Balance,” the leader spat. “Nothing but rules. We are free, filled with the power that gave rise to time. You must taste it, wayward son. Destruction is your birthright.”
“I am Covalent. Balance is my birthright.” Barakiel’s every sense was focused on his adversaries. He listened to their breath and measured the force that infused their limbs. “You are shadows. Incomplete. We will hunt you down and kill you.”
The leader shrugged and lifted her hand, signaling for the attack. Barakiel threw himself at her knees as she came head-on. When she fell forward, he thrust his dagger through the seam in her armor. Shoving upward with a twist and a hook motion, he opened her gut, releasing a torrent of coal-black blood. He drew her dying body down to shield himself from the first blows of the other two.
For the most part, it worked. One foe managed to slice open Barakiel’s calf near the knee. Despite the deep wound, he leaped to his feet to ward off the attack from the left with his dagger. He slipped over the block of the Corrupted to his right and stabbed him in the neck with the tip of his sword. The wounded fighter clutched his neck as blood squeezed through his fingers. He staggered off.
The other Corrupted were engaged by Barakiel’s fellow warriors, who outnumbered them two to one, but demons were closing in. Barakiel had to dispatch these foes quickly or the horde would overwhelm them. He whirled to face one dark warrior, who circled slowly around him, trying to maneuver so that his wounded comrade was behind Barakiel.
The Corrupted did not get the chance. Barakiel charged and their swords met with a mighty clang. The dark warrior tried to run the bottom of his sword along Barakiel’s blade, pushing down in an attempt to weaken his grip. Barakiel pushed back for an instant then pulled away, dipping his sword, using his adversary’s momentum against him, leaving him slightly off-balance. It was enough. Barakiel rammed his foot into the side of his attacker’s knee, bringing him to the ground, then thrust his sword through his throat. The Corrupted died with a shudder and a few wet choking noises just as the last dark warrior attacked, the one who had already been injured.
Barakiel took the blow in his upper left arm. His hot blood flowed, but he could not let it slow him down. The Corrupted attacked again, but by this time his neck wound had weakened him. Barakiel parried the blow and brought his sword up quickly over his head to the left, his right armed crossed in front of his face. He beheaded the dark warrior with a quick downward stroke and turned to face the bellowing demons.
“Here!” his commander called. He ran into the fray.
After the battle, the warriors gathered on the Great Plaza, a broad expanse of bronze-colored stone spreading out from the colossal doors of the Hall of the Ancients. The doors stood in the center of the wide base of the Council Keep, which rose in a muscular tower of cream-colored marble shot through with veins of gold and ochre. Two stacks of residences sat on either side of the tower, diminishing in size until the topmost seemed to fuse with the thick walls that curved in wide arcs from the base of the Keep. The right-hand arc of the wall straightened to anchor the city gates and confront the approach to the city with a mammoth boundary of granite, pale and flecked with mica. The wall then marched into the hills to encircle the homes of the citizens, and to meet the left-hand arc at a distance too far to be seen.
The Keep rose far beyond the walls, so high that when viewed from the center of the plaza, the blade of its highest reaches appeared to fix the firmament, the point around which all else revolved. Beyond it, the institutions of Covalent City ringed the plaza, their stone facades by turn imposing and inviting.
As the battalion healers attended to his wounds, Barakiel admired the scene. He spent so little time in Covalent City he tried to make the most of it.
Before long, Commander Remiel interrupted his reverie to congratulate him on a battle well-fought. He basked in her praise. He had served in her battalion ever since the Council had given him leave to fight from exile.
Remiel was a formidable Warrior of the Rising, with eyes that shined like black diamonds and sinews that rippled with power under rich mahogany skin. Barakiel suspected he’d been assigned to her battalion because, before Lucifer’s rebellion, their mothers had been thick as thieves. Of course, such things were better left unmentioned. By this time, he considered her a friend.
“You know, Barakiel,” she said. “The way you dispatched those three Corrupted is the talk of the plaza, not to mention the way you charged into the hottest fight and killed two more. The quickeners have already begun their poems about your sword. They call it a deadly streak of blue fire.”
“They flatter me. I should thank the warriors for their help.”
When the healers released him from triage, Barakiel went with Remiel so she could conduct the roll call. The warriors cheered at the sight of him. He raised his sword and they roared again. As they broke formation, Remiel pulled him aside.
“I think the warriors will be drinking to you and your fearsome sword all night,” she said. “You should join us at our feast.”
“I cannot, commander. You know that.”
“Your agreement with the Council is unreasonable,” she said with an exasperated huff. “No attack will be forthcoming after the Corrupted lost such numbers.”
“The Council does not want me to get in the habit of enjoying myself here, I think. The members are afraid I will cease listening to them.”
“Perhaps you should.”
Barakiel inspected her for a moment. He couldn’t tell if she was joking. “I would, but the Council can easily take my duty away from me.”
“A ridiculous state of affairs. The warriors want to know you. They want to drink and laugh with you.”
“Please tell them I want to drink and laugh with them, too, but I cannot. I must return to my exile.”
“I am sorry.”
“So am I,” Barakiel said, although he tried to hide the extent of the feeling.
“What a waste,” Remiel said. “You should be commanding your own battalion by now.”
“Ha!” Barakiel flung his head back in a mirthful outburst. “Half the Council would drop dead with fear, tortured by visions of me marching my warriors by Lucifer’s side.”
Remiel set her mouth in a stern line. “I am glad you find it so amusing.”
“My way of holding onto sanity, commander.”
She offered a hint of a smile then, and the two said their goodbyes, grasping each other’s shoulders as warriors did when they parted company.
As Barakiel walked to the Healers Guild Hall to complete his healing, he grumbled at himself. He should have shown Remiel what it meant to him, to know she thought him worthy of command, even if it would never happen. It had been hard enough, those many phases ago, to gain the Council’s permission to fight from exile.
Ireland, Earthly Year 1465, Phase 14238
The humped limestone splintered with each blow of Barakiel’s fist. Cracks raced through the layers until the rock fell to rubble. The warrior expelled a ragged scream. Too easy. He had destroyed the outcropping in less than ten minutes and still his murderous agitation would not leave him. He stared down at the surf that crashed at the base of the cliff.
If I jumped, perhaps I would become as senseless as the rocks that broke my body. The Council should have killed me. It is cruel, to deprive me of purpose. It is dangerous.
Barakiel did not want to leave Ireland. He loved this wild, green place, but he feared for the brothers who had welcomed him. The monks of Corcomroe Abbey led quiet lives in harmony with nature. Barakiel had tried to do the same, but he felt Destruction growing within him.
I admired these brothers once. Now I envy them their purpose. Now I dream of wringing their necks.
Even if he cast his body on the rocks below, he would not die, and he refused to die at the hands of a demon. He stared at the storm-laden clouds as a harsh wind drove them south, hiding then revealing the sun.
You will not claim me, father. I do not want to hurt anyone. I will meet the Stream.
The Stream was the boundary of the Creative Realm. The Covalent believed this realm was their place of origin, but they understood little about it beyond a sense of constant motion and furious power. To enter—to meet the Stream—was to be absorbed by its fearsome energy, never to return. Those who did were usually far older or weaker than Barakiel, but anyone would think his choice a valid one given his aimlessness and isolation.
“What in the name of Balance are you doing all the way out here?” Pellus raised his voice to be heard over the wind as he crested the top of the hill. “I was looking all over for you. You were supposed to meet me in our usual spot.”
Barakiel snapped his head to stare at the adept. Pellus stopped a few feet away, concern etched on his face.
“The agitation. No better?”
“It is worse.”
“I suspected as much. You grow more powerful each phase.”
“Power?” Barakiel laughed bitterly. “More like impotent rage.”
“Remember what your mother taught you. Like all warriors, you have a compulsion toward violence, an innate need to take up your sword. And you are a Warrior of the Rising. The blood of the Guardians pounds through your veins. Your subconscious is on fire with their memories. You are a born weapon.”
“A useless weapon!” Barakiel shouted, looking about wildly before fixing his burning blue eyes on the sea. “A weapon that will turn upon the innocent. You must take me to the Creative Realm, Pellus. I will meet the Stream.”
“What?” Pellus said. “You are mad. I would rather meet the Stream myself than allow a warrior like you to waste himself.” He grasped Barakiel’s arm. “Look at me! I know you are struggling with your power in a way that I cannot understand, but give me a chance to help you. The Stream is for ancient Covalent who are weary of life. For weak Covalent who are a burden to the citizens. Not for you.”
“I am like him, Pellus.” Horror swept Barakiel, a chill along his skin. “I am just like my father.”
“You are not.” Pellus strode toward the edge of the cliff. When he turned back his eyes were bright with anger. “You have been deprived of Balance. If you were home, you would wield your sword in service to the Realm. Selflessness, honor and duty would channel your energy.”
The cawing of a distant flock of birds came over the sea, carried by the wind. Barakiel watched them fly. He wished he could lose himself among them.
“When I was small my mother taught me about The Rising,” he said, his eyes never leaving the birds. “She told me how the Guardians used their collective power to bond Creation and Destruction, to raise up the Turning. How they gave their lives. She told me that without their sacrifice, the elemental forces would have crushed us. I know their blood runs in my veins, Pellus. They are the highest of heroes. I feel ashamed when I think of them.”
“Do not feel ashamed. Your exile is not your fault.”
“It makes no difference whose fault it is. How long before I lose control and turn to violence for amusement? I am Lucifer in waiting.”
Pellus searched Barakiel’s face, his emotions seemingly shoved back wherever he kept them. “Your father was a great leader before he was consumed by Destruction,” he said. “You could be as well.”
Barakiel picked up a piece of shattered limestone and flung it out to sea. It traveled so far he couldn’t see where it fell to the water.
“My mother could always make him laugh,” he said. “His laughter would shake the walls of our chambers.”
“We all grieve for Lucifer,” Pellus said. “He was laid low by his own arrogance and impatience. Before the war, he argued that the Covalent should seek to conquer other worlds, or build new ones. Some members of the Council agreed with him. Some agreed that we should subjugate the Earthly Realm.”
Warriors of the Rising suffered from a terrible malaise at the time, Pellus explained. The demons that streamed nonstop from the Destructive Realm were not challenging opponents, but more sprang from the soil each turn. The warriors grew bored with the pedestrian task of killing them. They fought each other, sometimes to the death. Many met the Stream or became addicted to haze or dire essence. Lucifer saw exploration and conquest as a way to renew the warriors’ purpose.
“If only he had waited,” Pellus continued. “If only he had let his allies on the Council work with the others. Some compromise could have been reached. Instead, Lucifer moved to win the Travelers Guild to his cause. The Council tried to arrest him, as if anyone could succeed in taking such a warrior into custody. Your father resorted to war. He thought nothing could stop him.”
Barakiel had heard all this from his mother. He didn’t know why Pellus was rehashing it now. It made him feel worse.
“If my mother had not spent all her effort protecting me, she could have gone to him,” he said. “She could have convinced him to lay down his arms before Destruction poisoned him beyond reason. If I had never been born, the Realm would be at peace.”
“Do not be ridiculous. You are not that important.” The adept’s harsh words were belied by the compassion in his eyes. “Your ego is feeding your despair.”
“I know the answer to my despair. Take me to meet the Stream.”
“I will not,” Pellus said. “I will help you. I knew it would come to this. I have spoken with the Council. I have asked whether you could return home to take up your duty. They flatly refused, but I will press them.”
The warrior stood there with his mouth hanging open, not knowing if he should let himself hope.
“I have been thinking,” Pellus continued. “With Ravellen’s help, I may be able to persuade them to let you fight from exile. If your father can sense your presence, Covalent City will be safe so long as you return here to the Earthly Realm after battle. And your continued exile will allow the Council to control you.”
The adept explained his proposal. Unless he was in battle, Barakiel would remain home for only a fraction of a turn, a Covalent measure of time slightly longer than an earthly day. He would join his fellow warriors just before they marched through the city gates into the Turning, where the battle with Lucifer’s forces constantly raged.
Pellus would propose that Barakiel fight a few times each phase, a period equivalent to about six earthly weeks.
“My only worry is that your father will concentrate the Corrupted against you. You will be in greater peril than any other warrior.”
“Who cares?!” Barakiel strode across the layered rock. He wanted to howl with excitement. “Let that be a selling point! The Council can use it to their advantage.”
“You want to make yourself bait.”
“Better to be bait than useless.”
“All right.” Pellus gave him an admiring look. “I will ask. We have a good chance, I believe. The war has not been going well. The Council needs your sword.”
Barakiel spun around and slapped Pellus on the back. “Oh, thank you, my most excellent friend!”
“You are welcome. You should return to the abbey. Meet me at our usual spot at dawn three days from now. I need to secure an audience. The Council needs to see for themselves what you have become.” Pellus nodded to the warrior, then bounded down the hill to the kinetic rift.
For Barakiel, the world was transformed. The mighty ocean that seemed to mock him with its crashing now called to him, offering its energy. He took a lungful of pure Irish air and charged across the rocky hills of the Burren so fast that he was little more than a blur, not even caring if he were to encounter some random monk. If he were to stop, he would seem to have walked out of the air.
The dawn bathed the layered gray hills of the Burren in pink light as Barakiel waited for his traveler. When Pellus appeared he wore a grin, so Barakiel knew the Council had granted them an audience. Pellus reported that Abraxos and his allies had fought hard against the proposal, arguing it would be foolish to give Lucifer’s son an avenue to power by allowing him to fight beside his fellow warriors. The adept had countered, making his case about Barakiel’s strategic value. With Ravellen’s support, Pellus had prevailed.
The two Covalent slipped into the rift, emerging onto the Great Plaza a few pulses later in a flash of ultraviolet light. As the energy of the Covalent Realm flowed into Barakiel, he threw his head and arms back, breathing deeply.
I thought I felt strong in the Realm in my youth. Little did I know.
When Barakiel stopped luxuriating, he noticed Pellus staring at him.
Little did you know either, my friend.
With a glance toward a few citizens who were also staring, Pellus walked off toward the Keep, gesturing for Barakiel to follow. In the anteroom of the Council Chamber, the warrior tried to focus as the attendant swung the doors wide. The power was intoxicating.
He strode into the Chamber. The members did not seem as they had so long ago. He had been frightened when he faced them last and tried to cover his fear with impertinence. Now, he felt no fear. Pellus said they needed to see what he had become, so he concentrated on the strength he could feel running through his veins and the energy that coursed through his limbs.
This power is what I have become.
The huge table shimmered before Barakiel like a moonlit lake. The Council members gaped at him, some clearly apprehensive. He was, after all, the progeny of Lucifer and Yahoel, two of the most powerful Warriors of the Rising the Realm had ever known.
The Council invited him to make his case, then voted. He would be permitted to fight from exile. Barakiel tamped down the urge to throw the attendants into the air like confetti. He realized the fight had happened well before he set foot in the chamber. Gratitude flooded his heart. For Ravellen. For Pellus. The adept’s wisdom and skill lent his opinion great weight.
On behalf of the Council, Ravellen described the terms. Barakiel was not to fight on a regular basis as the other warriors did, although he would be attached to a battalion. Instead, he would appear randomly, so that his appearance could not be predicted in case they ever needed to use him strategically. He would remain in Covalent City for only a fraction of a turn before and after a battle so that Lucifer would have no time to react to his presence.
“Thank you, Madam President, and members of the Council,” Barakiel said, bowing low. “You have my deepest gratitude. I will fight well.”
“I have no doubt, warrior,” Ravellen said.
They rose to recite the Covalent Pledge. Barakiel remembered.
We are Covalent.
We stand between Creation and Destruction.
To bond them, to bind them.
Our blood we pledge to this.
To Balance, preserver of life.
Covalent City, Phase 14238, Earthly Year 1465
Gratitude danced in Barakiel’s mind as he marched at the rear of a formation of Covalent warriors, a thousand strong. He held his new sword at the ready. Forged by a master artisan, it was the finest blade Barakiel had ever encountered. He hefted it now, relishing the way the grip fit his hand, admiring the sword’s dull blue gleam and its perfect symmetry and balance.
As they approached the Turning, his body throbbed and flashed with power. The lesser warriors on either side of him stole fascinated glances, but they were suspicious. They were not friendly.
Barakiel had been assigned to serve under Commander Remiel, whose warriors seemed to hang on her every word. He counted this as a good sign. She’d explained that their battalion would be one of three that held the Turning at any given time to prevent Lucifer’s forces from storming the city gates, a typical tour of duty. Then she’d sent him to the rear of the formation where his lack of experience would do the least damage. He didn’t blame her. Any good commander would have done the same with an untested warrior. But he grinned as he marched.
After this turn, my place will never be in the back of the formation again.
The battalion advanced into the wall of silver and amethyst light at the edge of the Turning. Barakiel had passed through it on his ill-fated journey to save his mother, but he was still staggered by its shimmering beauty, and by the power that welled up within him from the contact. Warriors had been fighting in the Turning since the Guardians created it by fusing their minds to bond the elemental forces, an event known as The Rising. Unfortunately, the bonded Destructive Force had given birth to the demons. With Lucifer’s mind now directing the beasts, keeping them at bay was hardly a simple proposition.
A short march later and the demon swarm was upon them, all snarls and spit and swinging axes. Barakiel drew his sword from his back sheath and launched himself at the largest beast he saw, his blue steel moving so quickly it seemed like nothing but a luminous streak had taken the demon’s head. Barakiel turned to the next brute, and the next, pivoting from side to side, sweeping with his blade while he kept its edges perfectly parallel to the ground. He was far too fast and strong for the demons to mount a defense.
When he noticed a fellow warrior surrounded by a slobbering crowd, he leaped into its center with a yell. He thrust his sword so forcefully into the torso of the nearest demon that it traveled through and wounded the arm of the one behind it. Barakiel crouched and pushed up his blade. Half the demon’s body fell away. He burst over the carcass, brought his sword up to his full height and then down in a sweeping arc. He took the second demon’s head clean off and whirled to face the others. They fled. The warrior to whose aid he had come regarded him with amazement.
“Who in the name of Balance are you?” he asked.
“I am new.”