“I can’t help you get around out there without getting caught,” Phen said. “You’re invisible, I’m not.”
Hyden sucked in a deep breath and let go of the boy. Standing on his own, he had to reach down deep to muster the strength to stay upright, while doing his best to block out the pain. “Where’s Mikahl?” he asked through gritted teeth.
Phen peeked out the door and Spike shot between his legs into the grassy garden area. The lyna found a thick shrub and hid beneath it. From there, Phen watched through his familiar ’ s eyes. The sun would be setting soon, and the bailey was already bathed in shadow. The garden was bustling with people, though. The red-robed priests were lighting torches and candles, and making preparations. Queen Shaella was standing amongst four white clad men-no, they were statues. The statues from outside her bedchamber, Phen realized. She was speaking to them with closed eyes and making subtle hand gestures. She was in the middle of some sort of spell, he guessed.
Beyond her in the gazebo, he could see one of the red-robed priests lifting the Silver Skull from its podium. He recognized part of Rosa’s dress on the floor nearby.
“In their temple,” said Phen. “I can see Princess Rosa lying there. Surely they’re together.”
Hyden peeked around the edge of the door and used Phen’s shoulder to hold himself steady. “Where will the seal open?” he asked. His vision was blurry at best. He could barely make out the structure on the lawn.
“Can you see where they burned the symbols in the grass?” Phen asked.
The marks were nearer to the door, and Hyden could see the shape. He recognized the ancient symbol that was burned inside the circle. He had eradicated a more permanent version of it in the Dragon’s Spire, so that Mikahl could kill Pael. “Here,” he grunted, pulling Loak’s ring from his finger. “Put it on. Go see if you can help Mikahl and the Princess.”
Phen took the ring and watched as Hyden leaned heavily on the wall. He looked like he had sweated all the liquid from his body, as if his eyes were sinking away. Outside, the priests were beginning to chant. Phen gave Hyden a quick hug then wiped the tears from his eyes. He wanted to speak, to say goodbye or something, anything, but no words would come.
Hyden forced a smile. “Put it on, Phen,” he said weakly. “Be sure and destroy the skull after.”
“After what?” Phen asked, as he faded from sight.
“You’ll know when it’s time.” A tremor shook Hyden. “When she… she comes for you, tell her what hap… happened to me. Now go. Ta… take care of Talon.”
Hyden didn’t wait for Phen to respond. He shoved Phen’s invisible body gently out the door and quietly latched it closed behind him.
Phen had no idea what ‘she’ Hyden was talking about. Hyden was obviously feeling the effects of the poison and not thinking clearly. Hyden was about to die. Phen knew he would never be able to laugh or joke with him again. Phen was so overcome with grief that he had to fight to keep from sobbing out loud. He couldn’t…
A deep whooshing sound blasted from somewhere under the seal. It was so deep and powerful that it startled Phen out of his grief. The rush of fear-driven anxiety hurried his pace across the garden. Just as they had before, the red priests had moved the skull from its place atop the podium to a small altar built at one end of the symbol they’d burned into the lawn. The skull sat so that its wicked jade eyes looked over the place where the world would soon fade away into blackness.
Phen noticed that Shaella’s statues had taken up new positions. He hadn’t seen them move. Two of them now stood guard on each side of the short set of wooden steps that led up into the makeshift temple. He had no choice but to go between them. He glanced at Shaella as he passed her. She was fidgety, yet focused. Her eyes were glued to the place where Gerard had appeared before. Just as Phen started into the gazebo the whooshing sound came again, only this time it took on a deep thumping that pulsed in time with the diminished harmony the priests were chanting. He knew he had to hurry. He could feel the static drawing in.
He didn’t want to have to tangle with the marble guardians. He had no idea how formidable they were, but he was sure that they were plenty capable of stopping a terrified boy from getting by if they had to.
Remembering that Spike was about, he called to his familiar. The lyna shot toward him across the yard like a startled rabbit. It bounded up into the gazebo without a thought. Phen watched the statues carefully, but saw nothing, not even the slightest of flinches. Through Spike’s eyes, he looked about the inside of the structure and saw that the walls were nothing more than heavy curtains. If he had to, he could get out through the seams where they overlapped. Mikahl and Rosa were lying as still as the statues that were guarding them. A shining glint on the altar caught the lyna’s eye. It was the tip of a blade. Phen hoped that it was Ironspike. Hyden had told him once that all of King Mikahl’s powers were held in the blade. If Mikahl ever lost it, or dropped it, he would be vulnerable. Hyden explained that this was why the High King trained so rigorously and regularly with it.
Phen heard Shaella gasp and glanced back toward the seal.
It was opening. He had to hurry.
He took a deep breath and charged between the statues. He didn’t look back. If he had, he would have been frozen with fear. Both marble guardians were starting in right behind him.
Phen saw that it was Ironspike on the altar. He snatched it and started over to where Mikahl lay beside the Princess. The weight of the sword caused him to drop it when its blade slid off of the altar. It hung in the satiny tablecloth that was draped over the table. Phen grabbed that and pulled a candelabra and a statue onto the floor with a clatter. The first marble guard that came in charged at Phen as if it could see him, but it got tangled in the tablecloth and fell face first. Its reaching hand fell just short of Phen’s ankle. The second one stumbled over the first, buying Phen just enough time to boot the sword against Mikahl and wrap the High King’s hand around the hilt.
Phen wasn’t sure what he hoped would happen, but he’d expected more than nothing. His heart sank. It would apparently take more than just the sword to pull Mikahl out of the spell he was under. Phen looked back, and one of the guardians was on him. He wasn’t sure what happened next, but he knew that Ironspike’s blade flickered blue for a moment. He dove over the wooden rail of the gazebo into the drapery that hung there. His weight tore the heavy cloth from its hangers and he fell the few feet to the ground on the back side of the building.
Thinking that the stone-formed guard was right on his heels, Phen rolled to his feet quickly. He ran to a place a few dozen feet behind Queen Shaella. There he began silently reciting the words to the spell he would use to destroy the skull.
It was getting darker, but the hole in the world was far blacker then any Westland night had ever been. Already the seal was opened wide, and over the physical roar of power it caused, Phen could hear something coming up from within.
Mikahl felt the rush of Ironspike’s magic. It didn’t come on like a symphonic tidal wave this time. The sound came slower, the trickle of whistled melody, an echo of a reverberation that was eventually joined by another strand of audible power, and then another. Slowly it worked its way around and through the spell that was cast on him. The thick muck he felt trapped in gave way to a more viscous resistance. Then gradually he was able to move and stretch his limbs.
The first thing he did was raise the blade up into the strange white-painted man that was charging over him. Even when he’d been spelled, he could see. Knowing that Phen had the ring that made him invisible, he assumed that it was Phen who’d moved his sword across the floor and put it in his hand. The man over him wasn’t a man at all, he found, when his blade sent a showering of stone chips across his face. The sword cleaved through a stone leg, though, leaving the heavy granite limb to crash into his body. The rest of the animated statue crumbled into gravel as it fell.
Mikahl shoved the leg away and sat up. Another of the stone men was untangling itself from an overturned table and cloth. Mikahl wasted no time. He sat up and lunged with his sword so that its tip punctured the marble man’s chest. He saw his stupidity as the man cracked apart and began to crumble over them. He had to roll and crawl over the limp form of Princess Rosa to keep the heavy chunks of stone from bashing into her delicate body. Luckily, the back of his head and shoulders took the brunt of the damage.
A few heartbeats later, Mikahl started down the wooden steps of the gazebo only to see the thing that was once Gerard Skyler standing over a black hole in the lawn. Mikahl saw the back of Shaella’s half-scorched head reflecting the flickering torch flames, just as two more of the marble guardians came closing in on him from either side. The eyes of the beast in the hole locked onto his. He felt a chill tear through him when the striking resemblance to Hyden registered in his brain. Shaella whirled on him as well, with the makings of a spell already on her lips.
It was all Mikahl could do to call Ironspike’s magical shield forth from its symphony as he spun with his blade extended to slice a complete circle around him. Both of the marble guardians shattered at the sword’s touch. Then a hot crimson blast shot forth from Shaella’s hands hitting his crackling blue shield in an explosion of prismatic light. But the concussion of raw power that Gerard sent hurling at him was far more potent. Mikahl went flinging backwards through the gazebo and right out the other side of the structure. He came to a tumbling halt on the lawn on the other side, so entangled in drapery that he had to fight just to extend his legs.
“Gerard,” a weak voice called out from behind the thing standing in the seal. It was Hyden. “What have you done to yourself?” he asked. The tears flowing from his eyes were bloody. Inside the thick plated body of the thing before him, he could plainly see his little brother, and the idea of it ripped at his heart like a jagged claw.
“Hyden?” the thing said in a voice so big and deep that it shook the walls of the castle.
“What have you become?” Hyden asked, as he fought to stay on his feet.
The recognition in Gerard’s eyes was fleeting. The voices and thoughts of too many powerful entities were swirling around his brain. The minute part of him that was still human could find no purchase to grasp hold of.
“I am the Warlord now,” Gerard boomed. He stepped forward, moving his gaze from Hyden to the depths of the black hole beside him. “I am the Master of Hell and Earth,” he called down into the Nethers. “Come, my pets, relish the freedom you have been denied.”
A huge black thing with a buzzard’s head and wide leathery wings crawled out of the darkness and leapt into flight. Behind it, a trio of hellcats shot straight up into the air. They were followed by another winged creature that might have been part insect.
“No!” Hyden yelled as he charged across the few feet that separated them.
Shaella sent a spiraling strand of yellow force streaking out at him. It wrapped around Hyden and squeezed him tightly in place. If she’d let the force go, he would have fallen into a heap. He didn’t have the strength to struggle. Instead, he said a prayer to the White Goddess to help him find the chance, and the strength, he needed to do what she had told him must be done.
Phen had the last word of his casting on the tip of his tongue, but held it in his mouth. He could see what Hyden intended to do now. He whirled and looked back to see King Mikahl kicking and crawling out of the tangle he was in. Relief flowed over him. He hadn’t been sure if the vicious blow had killed the High King or not. His attention was pulled back to the scene before him as the buzz of a few dozen sheep-sized insects came skittering out of the hole like swarming ants. Fear swam through his veins as two of them started toward him. They looked like giant roaches, or water beetles, with sharp pincers extending from the sides of their clacking beak-like mouths.
Phen could cast a spell against them, but he would lose the one he needed to destroy the Silver Skull. As one of them darted forward to attack, indecision froze him. Out of nowhere, Spike leapt onto the creature’s swiveling head and started clawing and tearing at its red glowing eyes. As the thing behind it started forward, another lyna came leaping out of the shadows, then another, and another. Before long, the two demon bugs were in a frenzied battle with a half dozen of the small quilled felines.
“Hyden Hawk,” Mikahl yelled from just behind Phen.
“Let him be,” Phen warned. “Kill the Dragon Queen. Hyden knows what he’s about.”
Phen couldn’t believe that he’d just ordered the High King like he was a kitchen maid. Then again, he couldn’t believe he was standing before a gateway to the Nethers, surrounded by all sorts of terrible creatures. He had forgotten completely that he was invisible. It seemed that all of the demon-kind could see him plainly, and things weren’t looking good.
Mikahl slashed his way through the battling insects, swinging Ironspike around to force them back. The lyna of took full advantage of their fear of the sword’s power and soon had the bugs fleeing over the walls of the bailey garden or up onto the balcony of Shaella’s bedchamber.
Gerard roared and sent a sizzling purple blast at Mikahl as he came up behind Shaella. Mikahl sent a white hot raging streak to meet the demon magic. The two channels of power collided in a blinding explosion and hung there. Mikahl’s magic wasn’t as strong as the Lord of the Hells’, and the surging purple ray moved back toward him swiftly. Using all his will and rage Mikahl fought against it, but it was no use. Already the tip of his sword was turning from its bright white radiance to a dull amber. The Abbadon was draining the power out of it. Mikahl fell to his knees, trying to avoid the tainted magic. He glanced at Hyden, who was still trapped in Shaella’s eldritch rope. He didn’t know what to do. Nearly the whole length of Ironspike’s blade was coated with viscous amber goo. A deathly icy feeling was creeping into the hilt now, and he could feel it reaching into his hand, and up his arm.
Suddenly, Talon’s ear shattering shriek split the night. It was so loud and fierce that even Gerard looked up into the sky.
Like a streaking shadow, the hawkling swooped. Raking claws shot across Shaella’s face. She had no choice but to let go of the hold she had on Hyden as she clutched, screaming, at her ruined eyes.
Hyden felt the magical force let go of him and gave a roar of his own. He stumbled, then charged, leaping onto the thing that had once been his brother. His presence caused the creature to give up its attack on Mikahl. Hyden took a step up. Using Gerard’s thigh, he leapt onto his neck. Reaching around his brother, he rammed his hand into one of Gerard’s eye sockets with all he had left in him. As he did, Mikahl charged up behind Shaella with three running paces, and with a massive swing of Ironspike’s blade, sent her head tumbling through the air.
Gerard saw the blow with one eye. He saw the blood fountain up out of the stump of Shaella’s neck and pour down her cleavage. He saw her body crumple to its knees and then pitch forward. He even saw the shocked expression on her face as her head hit the lawn. What he didn’t see was the blast from Mikahl’s sword that hit him full in the chest and sent him staggering over backwards into the hole that he’d come out of.
“Jump away, Hyden!” Mikahl screamed to his friend. The beast was falling back into its hell and Mikahl didn’t understand why Hyden was still holding on.
Phen understood, and he cast his spell, calling out the name of the man whose skull the wizard Zorellin had once dipped in molten silver. The three priests screamed in fear and pain as the form of the Silver Skull suddenly began to shrivel and melt away.
Mikahl watched in terror as his friend clung viciously to the back of the raging demon god. For an instant, it looked like the powerful beast was going to catch air with its wings. A clawed hand found the edge of the hole and held on, and again it looked like the thing might pull itself back out of the seal, but first one lyna, then another came streaking across the lawn. The prickly-furred cats attacked Gerard’s gripping claw until it let go.
“No, Spike!” Phen screamed as his familiar went over the edge with Hyden. Just as they fell away, the great whooshing sound of the seal faded, and the hole in the earth cinched closed.
A screaming red-robed priest came charging at Phen, but one of the big hell-born things that escaped the Nethers snatched him up before he got halfway across the bailey. Apparently, King Mikahl, Phen, and Talon all had the same thought at the same time, because all three of them went racing toward the shambled gazebo where Princess Rosa was starting to wake from the spell she’d been under.