The Raven Collection Part 53

For Denser, it was the completion of a life's dream. The casting of Dawnthief and all its multi-layered complexities had been every bit as thrilling as he'd dared hope. At one with mana, truly a part of its random life, he had struggled with temptation, overcome energies the power of which he could not have conceived, and triumphed. But more, he'd opened a gate to oblivion and deposited the broken bodies of the Wytch Lords there, souls destroyed by the hunger of Septern's spell as he'd withdrawn from its influence. And now he had nothing left to give. The residue of Dawnthief clung to his mind and encased his body, caressing him, offering him peace, promising him rest. What more could Balaia's saviour desire? Was it not what he truly craved? Denser closed his eyes and gave himself up to its glories.

Mosaic splintered and crumbled under the weight of stone crashing down from above. Shards of rock flew and ricocheted. Hirad flung himself to the ground, covering his head, only to roll over and sit up immediately. The HardShields covering them all repulsed chip and boulder alike. He looked on as a slat fully five feet long and two thick tumbled end over end through the air, impacting the shield directly above the unmoving body of Denser. It slid over the invisible surface to the mosaic with a heavy thud. Elsewhere, stones the size of fists and skulls rained down, the noise of multiple collisions drumming hard on the ears and rattling the floor underfoot. And all was washed by a dust-filled light, shining through the blasted pyramid apex.

The tumbling of rock and the cracking of tile and slab subsided. Hirad climbed wearily to his feet, frowning as he caught sight of Erienne's face. The Dordovan had tears streaming down her face, her body quivering, clearly struggling to maintain control of her spell as she stood a few paces from Denser, her eyes fixed on the Dark Mage. The fall stopped, a quiet ringing replacing the boom and thump.

'It's over,' said Hirad.

Across the battle, the mood changed. From a hundred fingers, the black fire shut off abruptly, magical shields dropped and the Shamen's faces of victory turned to uncertainty and then fear.

Blackthorne saw it happen. Knew the change in the air meant The Raven had won, and yelled his delight. His men surged, the Baron himself galloping through leaderless Wesmen lines to his fallen friend. He slid from his horse, slashed his blade across the neck of an attacker and knelt down. Gresse, blood covering his head, was still breathing. Blackthorne called a man over and the two of them carried the unconscious Baron from the battlefield, the cries of the east ringing loud in their ears.

Behind them, the Wesmen were broken. Without the Wytch Lord magic, the Shamen were helpless, and without the Shamen, the warriors had no focus. Individually ferocious they might be, but the tide had turned and Blackthorne's men were alive once more.

Blackthorne opened his mouth and roared in jubilation. Today was going to be wonderful.

'Shield down,' whispered Ilkar into the silence.

'Shield down.' Erienne's voice broke and she ran to Denser, dropping to her knees and picking up his head to cradle it, burying her face in his shoulder, rocking back and forth, crying and murmuring soft words.

'What is it?' Hirad started forwards.

Erienne's tear-stained face turned to him. 'He's dead,' she wailed. 'He's not breathing.'

'No.' Hirad slid down beside her. 'Ilkar, come on, do something.'

'There's not a spell for everything, Hirad,' said Ilkar, racing to join them. 'He has no wounds. There's nothing to heal.'

Hirad gazed up and down Denser's body. There was not a mark on him, though his lips were blue.

'Right. Lay him down, Erienne. Unknown, get over here and angle his head. Clear his throat.'

'Got it.'

Hirad focused on Denser's face. 'Don't even think about it, Denser,' he said, and started thumping the mage's chest above his heart with the base of his fists. 'Don't you dare die. Come on.'

Erienne stroked Denser's hair. 'Please, Denser,' she sobbed. 'I have your child within me. Don't leave me alone.'

Hirad paused. 'You've got what? G.o.ds in the sky.' He pushed harder. 'Did you hear that, Denser? You've got responsibility now, d.a.m.n you. Breathe! Breathe!' Hirad slapped his face to either side, hard. The Unknown ma.s.saged his neck and worked his jaw.

'Breathe!'

Denser's mouth opened, his lungs seized air, his body heaved and he sat bolt upright, knocking Hirad aside. His hands clutched his chest and his throat gulped air. Erienne burst into fresh tears. Denser turned to her but fell back, and she cushioned his head from the fall. She ruffled his hair.

'I thought you'd died, you b.a.s.t.a.r.d. I thought you'd died,' she said, a tear falling on to his cheek.

Denser smiled and shook his head. 'I tried my best, though,' he said. 'My chest hurts.'

'Well, we had to do something,' said Hirad.

'It feels like you shook hands with my heart.'

'No, no. Just persuaded it to beat.'

'Thank you.'

Hirad shrugged. 'You're Raven. I can't let you die when you've just destroyed the Wytch Lords. No glory in that.' He followed Denser's gaze up through the dust-clouded air into Balaia's mainly blue sky. A rolling grey-flecked brown patch hung there.

'Oh dear,' said Denser. 'I'm not sure that was supposed to happen.'

Hirad looked a little longer at the new rip before settling his gaze on Denser.

'We'll live with it,' he said. He stood up and brushed dust off his tunic and leggings. The rip ate at the sky. 'How're you feeling?'

'Tired. And sore.'

'Well, this is a place of rest,' said Ilkar, not able to take his eyes from the rip for too long.

'It'll do for now.' Denser closed his eyes. 'Wake me in a few days.'

'Could you give us a little s.p.a.ce?' asked Erienne, her hand again idly stroking Denser's hair.

'Of course,' replied The Unknown. 'Gentlemen . . .' He sheathed his sword, slung it across his back and made a shovelling motion with his hands.

'What's up, Ilkar?' asked Hirad, coming to the elf's shoulder.

'That,' said Ilkar, pointing at the rip. 'I wonder where it leads. Somewhere harmless, I hope.' He clacked his tongue and sighed. 'What have we done, eh?'

Hirad put an arm round his shoulder and squeezed him.

'We won. Come on, you'll be able to see it better from outside,' he said. He turned Ilkar from the rip to face The Unknown, Will and Thraun. 'We won.'

'At least we can collect on the contract,' said Ilkar.

'I thought you wouldn't touch Xetesk's filthy money,' said Denser from his p.r.o.ne position.

Ilkar laughed. 'It doesn't do to be too proud where money's concerned,' he replied.

'Spoken like a true mercenary,' said Hirad. Erienne cleared her throat noisily. 'Sorry, Erienne.' He indicated the way to the sunlight.

'Raven,' he said quietly, crooking his finger. 'Raven with me.'

No book is constructed in complete isolation and the path to this one contains many milestones, some way back in my youth. Here goes.

To my parents, who never once complained at the incessant tap of the typewriter throughout my school days and, well, for just being you. To Stuart Widd, an English teacher who encouraged imagination and expression. To Paul H, Carl B, Hazel G, Chris G, Robert N, and Ray C who unwittingly gave birth to The Raven many years ago, did any of us but know it at the time. To readers like Tara Falk and Dave Mutton who criticised and improved me at every turn. But most to Peter Robinson, John 'George' Cross and Simon Spanton (more Ravenites) for cajoling, bullying, ideas and encouragement all the way. It's a cliche, I know, but without you, this wouldn't just be only half the book, it wouldn't be a book at all.

I thank you all for your love, help and support.

Noonshade.

For my parents, Keith and Thea Barclay.

Always there, always wonderful.

Cast List.

Prologue.

The intensity of vibration grew in his head. Within the dark of the Choul, deep beneath the jungles of Teras, those of the Brood-at-rest shifted in sudden nervousness, most of them unaware of what they were feeling.

Like an itch he couldn't rub, the humming picked at his mind and worried him deep in the core of his being. He opened a huge blue eye, pupil widening to admit the dim light from the entrance high above, picking out the hollowed damp rock, the lianas creeping down and the lichen which covered every surface. It showed him the fluttering of a wing, the shaking of a neck and the shifting of clawed feet as the Brood moved to premature wakefulness. He felt the quickening of pulses, the rumble of lungs drawing in air and the creaking of jaws stretched wide.

A great shiver coursed his body and Sha-Kaan's heart leapt. The vibration, a siren for disaster, clamoured in his skull. He came to his feet, great wings unfurling for flight, a cry forming in his mouth. He called to the Brood and led them from the Choul, charging towards the light, drawn to the great boiling in the sky where a new battle was just beginning.

Chapter 1.

It would be a glorious victory. Lord Senedai of the Heystron Tribes stood on a raised platform watching the smoke billowing over Julatsa as building after building was put to flame. The acrid smell of the smoke was beautiful in his nostrils and through the fog it created, he could see the white and black fire his Shamen wielded through linkage with the Wytch Lords, tearing what was left of the city's heart to shreds. And there was nothing the Julatsans could do to stop them.

Ripping from their fingers and gnawing at the stone and woodwork of the once proud College city, the white fire issued from the fingertips of a hundred Shamen, demolishing building, fence and barricade. And where men and women ran in terror, the black fire picked the flesh from their bones and gouged the eyes from their skulls while they fell screaming to die in agony.

Senedai felt no sympathy. He leapt from the platform and yelled his Lieutenants to him. All that held up his progress to the College itself were the mages who still shielded great swathes of the city borders and the enemy soldiers who protected the mages from the swords of his warriors. It was time to put a stop to this irritating resistance.

As he ran towards the battle, issuing orders and watching the standards and banners sway as tribes ran to do his bidding, a wall of flame erupted ahead, the spell detonation rippling through the ground as the targets, all Shamen, were engulfed and died without a sound of their own.

'Press! Press!' he yelled. But this close the noise, muted to a roar only a hundred yards away, was as deafening as it was distinct. He could hear individual sword clashes, the cries of panic, fear and pain. He could hear bellowed orders, desperate and confident, and he could hear the thud of metal on leather, the tumbling of stone and the cracking of timber.

Beside him, his warrior guard ran a crescent of protection while he kept himself just out of bow range as did all but his most foolhardy of Shamen. The line of Julatsans was thin to the point of collapse and Senedai knew that once pierced, there would be a route straight through to the walls of the College itself.

Horns blew and his warriors surged again. Behind the enemy lines, mages were torn to shreds by the black fire, even as they spoke their spells of protection. He could taste the anguish of his foe and his Wesmen axes rose and fell, showering blood into the smoke-muddied sky.

'I want those mages to the right destroyed!' he shouted at a lieutenant. 'See it is signalled immediately.' The ground heaved with Julatsan magic, cold air blasted through the warmth of the day and the sky rained drops of fire, his tribesmen paying dearly for every pace they took.

A detachment of Shamen broke and ran right, arrows peppering the ground where they moved. One fell, a shaft buried deep in his thigh. He was left to writhe. Senedai watched them go, felt a thrill when their hands and mouths moved, summoning the fire from deep within the black souls of the Wytch Lords to project its hideous power on helpless victims.

But as he watched, he felt a change. The fire pulsing from outstretched fingers guttered, strengthened briefly, flickered and died. A ripple spread across the tribes. From every part of the battle ground, shouts were raised and Shamen stared at their hands and each other, incomprehension and fear on bleak faces.

From the enemy, a cheer, gaining in intensity, swept along the defensive line. Immediately, the barrage of spells increased and the defenders pushed into the confusion that gripped his warriors. They fell back.

'My Lord?' ventured a Captain. Senedai turned to the man, whose face held anxiety not fit for a Wesmen warrior, and found a rage boiling inside him. His gaze swept back across his failing attack, taking in the magic that blasted his men and the swords of the exhausted defence that fell with renewed energy and determination. He pushed the Captain aside and ran forwards, heedless of the risk.

'By all the Spirits, are we not warriors?' he bellowed into the roar of battle. 'Horns, sound the attack! All fronts. Magic be d.a.m.ned, we fight with steel. Attack, you b.a.s.t.a.r.ds, attack!' He crashed into the battle, his axe ploughing through the shoulder of a defending Julatsan. The man collapsed and Senedai trod on the corpse, ripping the axe clear to bat it side-on into the face of the next enemy. Around him, the tribesmen responded, picking up songs of battle as they surged again.

Horns sounded new orders, wavering standards straightened in the hands of their bearers and moved forward again. The Wesmen poured back into the battle for Julatsa, ignoring the spells that handed out death and maiming injury indiscriminately, and seeing the defenders begin to wilt at the ferocity of the onslaught.

Lord Senedai dared a look either way along the lines and smiled. Many warriors would die without the Wytch Lords' fire but the day, he determined, would still belong to the Wesmen. Noting the positions of the knots of offensive casting mages, he slapped aside a clumsy thrust and forged back into the fray.

The Raven stood in silence in Parve's central square. The battle was won. Dawnthief had been cast, the Wytch Lords destroyed and their city once more a place of the dead. Above them, the after-effect of Dawnthief hung in the sky, brown and modulating, an alien and malevolent stain suspended like some predatory beast above the land of Balaia. It was the dimensional rip to nowhere.

Away across the square, Darrick and the remnants of the four-College cavalry had destroyed any remaining resistance and now piled bodies onto makeshift pyres; Wytch Lord acolytes, Wesmen and Guardians in one area, their own fallen in another, and the reverence with which dead cavalrymen were handled was in stark contrast to the dragging and throwing of enemy corpses. Styliann and the Protectors were in the blasted pyramid, searching the rubble for anything that might gives clues to the ancients' brief but cataclysmic return to power.

The silence in the square was palpable. None of Darrick's men spoke as they went about their sombre task; the sky under the rip was bereft of birds and the breeze that gusted across the open s.p.a.ce seemed muted to a whisper as it coiled around Parve's buildings.

And for The Raven, victory was once again tarnished by loss.

Denser leaned heavily on Hirad, Erienne at his other side, her arm about his waist. Ilkar stood by the barbarian. Opposite them, across the grave, Will, Thraun and The Unknown Warrior. All of them gazed down at the shrouded form of Jandyr. The elf's bow lay the length of his body, his sword from chin to knees.

Sadness echoed its quiet around The Raven. At the moment of triumph, life had been taken from Jandyr. After everything he had survived, his was an unkind fate.

For Ilkar, the loss was keen. Elves were not numerous in Balaia, preferring as a rule the heat of the Southern Lands. Few now travelled to the Northern Continent excepting those called by magic and even their numbers were dwindling. They could ill-afford to lose elves like Jandyr. But the grief was felt most personally by Will and Thraun. Their long-time friend had died in the service of Balaia and The Raven. What had begun as a simple rescue had finished on the steps of the Wytch Lords' tomb at the end of a desperate chase to find and cast the only spell that could save Balaia from the ancient evil. Yet Jandyr had died not knowing the outcome of the casting of Dawnthief. Life could be cruel. Mistimed death more so.

The Unknown intoned The Raven's words of parting. 'By north, by east, by south, by west. Though you are gone, you will always be Raven and we shall always remember. Balaia will never forget the sacrifice you made. The G.o.ds will smile on your soul. Farewell in whatever faces you now and ever.'

Will nodded. 'Thank you,' he said. 'Your respect and honour are truly appreciated. Now Thraun and I need time alone with him.'

'Naturally,' said Ilkar. He moved away.

'I'll stay a little longer,' said Erienne, disentangling herself from Denser. 'After all, he came to rescue my family.' Will nodded and she knelt by the graveside, joining the thief and Thraun, the shapechanger, in their regrets and hopes.

The Unknown, Hirad and Denser caught up with Ilkar and the quartet sat in the lee of the pyramid tunnel, the rip above and behind them, its presence huge and menacing. Further out in the central square, Darrick's men continued piling bodies ready for the pyres. Great slicks of dried blood swathed the paving stones and here and there, pieces of torn clothing blew and ruffled in the warm breeze. Styliann and the Protectors remained inside the pyramid, no doubt dissecting every rune, painting and mosaic.

General Ry Darrick walked over and joined them as The Unknown finished pa.s.sing around mugs of coffee from Will's bubbling pan. There was a brief quiet.

'I almost hate to bring this up,' said Darrick. 'But great as the victory is, we number perhaps three hundred and there are a good fifty thousand Wesmen between here and our homes.'

'Funny isn't it?' said Ilkar. 'You think about all we've achieved and the result is that we've given Balaia a chance and no more. Nothing is certain.'

'So much for basking in glory,' said Hirad.

'Don't understate what we've done,' said Denser from his p.r.o.ne position, hands under his head. 'We have removed the certainty of the Wytch Lords' triumph and their dominion over Balaia. And more than that, we've destroyed them and given ourselves real hope. Bask in that.'

'I'll try,' said Hirad, the smile returning to his face.

'Remember,' said Denser. 'The Wesmen have no magic.'