Sadly, more often than not the difficult thing to do is also the right thing.
AS TAMMERLAND BURNED AND THE CRIES OF HER TERRIFIED citizens rose into the night, Khristos’ lead viper looked around and smiled.
Just as the Viper Lord had planned, the surprised Minion patrols wandering the city had been no match for the thousands of Blood Vipers that came slithering up from the depths of the Sippora. Caught off guard, the winged warriors had fought well, but the vipers’ superior numbers soon ruled the night. The lead viper knew that the alarm had gone out to alert the royal palace and that the hordes of Minions camped there would soon arrive. He welcomed their coming, for the Viper Lord’s plan depended on that very thing. As the heart of the city burned, the viper in charge of the carnage slithered about, taking stock of the scene.
Hundreds of citizens and Minion warriors lay dead in the streets, their blood pooling in the gutters and their bodies lying wherever they had fallen victim to the vipers’ talons, fangs, and venom. Scores of buildings had been set afire by marauding Blood Vipers carrying torches. Winding their bodies and tails around Tammerland’s many lampposts, the seething man-serpents slithered up them to smash the glass globes and eagerly light their torches. The torches were then tossed through the windows of shops and homes and the vipers gleefully watched them burn. Anyone caught rushing from a burning building was summarily killed, and the many thatched roofs in the city provided opportune targets as the torches tossed on top of them set them ablaze straightaway. Many citizens with endowed blood were being ruthlessly gorged on while still alive, their screams ringing out into the night as the vipers-once again hungry now that they had been freed from the water-searched for fresh endowed livers on which to feed.
Despite the great destruction and bloodshed, it was not the Viper Lord’s plan to occupy the city or to kill all its inhabitants. Seeing how many weak-minded mortals could be murdered meant nothing to him, nor did the growing numbers of burning buildings. Killing Minions was advantageous, but just as the main body of warriors arrived to relieve the city, most of the Blood Vipers would slither their way back down the riverbanks to reenter the Sippora and escape unseen. This would be no cowardly retreat, but a clever tactical maneuver.
To add believability to their charade, some vipers would be ordered to stay behind and fight to the death. Their ranks would be enough to trick the Minions into believing that they needed to remain in the city and fight on, but not so great that Khristos would miss them during the next part of his plan. Viper sentries waited on many rooftops, constantly searching the southern sky. At the first sign of Minion relief troops they would wave their torches, signaling that the retreat into the Sippora should start.
As the carnage wore on, the lead viper also looked skyward. The Minions would arrive soon, he realized. Turning back to survey the battle, he smiled once more. Hopefully enough time would remain to kill the few surviving Minions and devour many livers of the endowed.
After ordering another viper to watch for their sentries’ signals, he hungrily slithered across the dewy square and used his talons to rip into a young man’s corpse.
BY THE TIME SHAILIHA AND HER FORCES ARRIVED, TAMMERLAND’Scenter was nearly destroyed, and fires were spreading outward in every direction.
From her place in the litter she gazed out aghast over a sea of flames. Dead humans and Minions lay everywhere. Vipers voraciously fed on human victims as others madly set fire to yet more buildings. Heartened by their success, the grotesque monsters writhed about each other in a sickening orgy of victory. As her litter neared the scene, the princess pulled her sword from its scabbard, gripping it so hard that her knuckles turned white.
Faegan, Abbey, and Aeolus rode with her. Flying alongside, Traax commanded the bulk of the Minions, while Duvessa led her specialized cadres of female warrior-healers. At Traax’s suggestion, only a skeleton force had been left behind to guard the palace and the Redoubt. As they neared the battle, the rising smoke choked their lungs, and terrible screaming could be heard as its chilling tenor rose into the night.
Our people are dying down there, Shailiha thought. My failure to find and kill Khristos and his forces has brought this tragedy on us. But now the fight is finally joined. Khristos’ rampage must end here and now, on this night of nights.
Shailiha signaled her troops into the fray. Their dreggans flashing, thousands of Minions swooped down to tear into the seething vipers, while Faegan and Aeolus loosed azure bolts at the monsters with everything they had. The battle was joined.
KHRISTOS WAS THE FIRST TO STEALTHILY BREAK THE SURFACEof the river. His timing was perfect and his resolve unshakable. Smiling as he looked across the water, he realized that Gracchus’ plan was proceeding perfectly.
While thousands of his vipers waited unseen in the murky depths, Khristos surveyed the area. Just as Gracchus had told him, the palace lay near the river bend. Between the river and the palace lay a great field, its dewy expanse providing the huge area needed to contain the great Minion war camp. Untold lines of shadowy war tents seemed to stretch forever into the distance, their openings flapping gently in the nighttime breeze. Just as Khristos had hoped, it seemed that every available warrior save for a few sentries had been called out to quell the mayhem raging in the heart of the city. Quietly turning around in the water, he confirmed the orange-red glow in the sky.
Looking back, he saw the royal palace standing west of the campsite, its many lit torches shining down onto its barbicaned parapets. The moat surrounding the castle looked deep and tranquil, and the drawbridge had been raised and locked into place between its twin gate towers. To an untrained observer the magnificent structure would surely appear unassailable, but on this night that perception would be wrong. Even so, the largely unprotected palace and the many treasures it housed were not Khristos’ first goals. Looking to the south, the Viper Lord smiled again as he spied the first of Gracchus’ targets.
The two magnificent Black Ships that Tristan had left behind sparkled in the moonlight as they rested in their massive wooden cradles. Khristos’ heart leapt as he realized that only a handful of Minion sentries guarded them. Without the great ships, theJin’Saiou ’s ability to hunt him down would be greatly curtailed, and she could no longer sail across the Sea of Whispers. These ships would therefore be Khristos’ targets.
Following Gracchus’ orders, he would set fire to one and steal the other, filling it with his vipers and then using it to his further purposes. Having fought and sailed alongside Failee during the Sorceresses’ War, he could empower Black Ships as well as any mystic alive. But even he could fly only one ship at a time, so the other must be made useless to theJin’Saiou here and now. These things must be done quickly, before Shailiha and her Vigors mystics realized that the battle in the square was a diversion and hurried back to the palace. The time was right, the setting was all Khristos could have hoped for, and Gracchus’ plan was ready to be executed.
Submerging again, Khristos waved his thousands of vipers forward. They would quietly climb the riverbanks, then slither silently on their bellies through the tall grass to flank both sides of the Minion camp and rush in to dispatch the remaining sentries. Soon after, the warriors guarding the ships some distance away would follow their brothers into the Afterlife. If both attacks succeeded quickly and quietly, those in the castle would perceive no threat until one Black Ship was in the air and the other was in flames.
As the magenta moonlight gently licked the waves of the Sippora, Khristos and his vipers started to surface, their huge numbers slithering up the dark riverbank like a menacing tide.
SWINGING HER SWORD IN A PERFECT ARC, SHAILIHA SLICEDits blade through the throat of another attacking viper. The thing stood frozen in time for a moment before falling to the cobblestones, dead where it lay.
Daring to lower her sword for a few precious moments, the princess found that her arms were leaden and that her lungs clawed to capture each new breath. Her mind wanted to keep fighting, but more and more her body refused to obey. She and her forces were exhausted, and to her dismay, seemingly endless hordes of vipers still poured around street corners and down dark alleyways to come and challenge them. The princess’s face and body were peppered with blood and offal, and she knew that her muscles would soon give out. Even so, like her comrades, she had no choice but to fight on. Faegan and Aeolus were somewhere on the far side of the square, still loosing azure bolts, their fingertips long since blackened and singed. The acolyte and consular cadres who had followed in separate litters were doing the same all across the macabre urban battlefield.
Shailiha took a quick look around to see that the Minion corpses seemed at least equal in number to those of the vipers that had been blown apart by azure bolts or cut down by Minion swords or returning wheels. As more Minions landed in the streets, terrified citizens ran madly in every direction as they tried to escape the raging vipers.
Shailiha desperately hungered for a battle report, but Traax had not yet brought one to her, forcing her to wonder if her valiant commander was dead. She knew that to effectively lead this fight, she must understand what was going on around her. But in all this madness, finding Traax seemed impossible. Shailiha had lost track of Abbey long ago, and she had yet to see Khristos. Not finding the Viper Lord worried her, but aimlessly searching through the raging battle would surely get her killed. Knowing that she must learn how her troops were faring, she realized that there was only one way to do it. She would take to the air again and view the battle from above.
Just as she was about to summon some warriors to her side, Shailiha saw another viper coming. She instinctively backed up and lifted her sword high with both hands, readying herself for its attack. Then the deadly viper unexpectedly stopped short and glared directly into her eyes. With its talons outstretched and its strong tail coiled up beneath its humanlike upper body, the thing ominously levered high into the air, then looked down on her and let go a menacing hiss.
Standing her ground, Shailiha knew what the monster would likely do next, for she had seen it happen dozens of times this terrible night. Rearing back, the viper would suddenly launch at her, its talons and incisors flashing as it came. Holding her ground, theJin’Saiou summoned her courage and defiantly glared back.
But rather than charging, the Blood Viper opened its mouth wider, hissing again and exposing its forked tongue. Only too late did Shailiha sense the danger and swivel to one side. As the viper spat its venom, the shock of seeing the acidic poison fly through the air was so great that the danger seemed to come at her in slow motion. Even so, she could not move fast enough.
The green substance flew through the air and hit the left side of her face. Smoke immediately rose from her burning skin, and the pain ripping through her eye was unimaginable. Screaming wildly, she covered her stricken face with one hand while trying to hold onto her precious sword with the other. But the pain was too much and she fell to the bloody square, her sword slipping from her grasp to rattle down onto the bloody cobblestones. Sensing his chance, the viper moved in for the kill.
Slithering forward, the thing reared up alongside Shailiha’s prostrate body to hiss viciously and look down on its greatest victory. The liver of theJin’Saiou would grant it inordinate power.
Bending closer, the thing curiously tilted its awful head back and forth as it luxuriated in the sight of its terrible handiwork. Despite the many dangers surrounding the viper, it knew that this woman of supremely endowed blood was the conquest of a lifetime, and he was determined to savor her. First he would kill her slowly by strangulation; only then would he rip her open and take her liver. Smiling, the thing spread wide its talons and reached down for Shailiha’s exposed neck.
He never saw the silver blur that killed him. Coming directly from behind, the Minion’s returning wheel sliced straight through the thing’s neck, severing its head from its body without stopping. Soaring on nearly unfettered, the wheel careened through the air in a perfect circle back toward its master.
Reaching up, Traax expertly caught the bloody wheel in the leaded glove covering his left hand, then quickly returned it to its resting place at one hip. Running with all his might, he abandoned any thought of his own safety and tore across the chaotic square to kneel beside the stricken princess. When he turned her over and looked at her face, the air rushed from his lungs.
Shailiha was near death, the left side of her face ravaged by the viper’s venom. Smoldering and hissing, the terrible venom was still doing its awful work and burning deep craters in her skin. Traax hurriedly removed a kerchief from beneath his armor, but when he tried to wipe away the venom, the cloth also started to hiss and steam, forcing him to stop.
Reaching down, he touched the side of her neck. He found a heartbeat, but its rhythm was weak and slow. Just then theJin’Saiou started to regain consciousness, and her burned eyelids fluttered open. Screaming and writhing in exquisite pain, her one good eye beseechingly looked up at Traax. As she did, the Minion commander tried his best to hide his shock.
Shailiha’s left eye had been nearly destroyed.
The eyeball was pitted and glassy, and vitreous fluid ran from it, crazily tracing down her severely pockmarked cheek. Traax could easily tell that the eye was blinded, and he sadly guessed that it would never again see the light of day. As her good eye moved frantically about, her damaged one did not copy its movements, telling Traax that the muscles of the affected eye had also been damaged by the viper’s venom.
Screaming again, Shailiha madly reached out to grasp Traax’s shoulders. There was only one thing to do, he realized. Quickly overpowering her with his strong arms, he wrestled her back down atop the bloody cobblestones.
“Forgive me…” he said quietly.
Reaching out, he used two fingers of one hand to find the carotid artery on the right side of her neck, and he pressed hard. Eight seconds later the princess was again unconscious. Picking her up in his arms, Traax unfolded his strong wings and took to the air.
“IS SHE DEAD?” AEOLUS ASKED.
Faegan did his best to wipe the tears from his face, but even more came to take their places. “Yes,” he answered simply, his voice little more than a tremulous whisper. Taking his eyes from the shrouded body lying before him, he sadly looked around.
After much hard fighting, the battle had finally been won. The last of the Blood Vipers had been corralled, and incensed Minions were eagerly beheading them on Faegan’s orders. Khristos had not been among the dead, nor had anyone reported seeing him. That realization continued to deeply worry Faegan despite his overwhelming grief.
He and Aeolus had loosed azure bolts at the enemy until they had nearly collapsed with exhaustion, killing hundreds of vipers in the process. The acolytes and consuls who had also rushed here from the Redoubt had killed many more. Four loyal acolytes and seven worthy consuls lay dead, not to mention the still uncounted Minions who had also perished. Each surviving mystic had suffered venom burns and talon wounds, some of them serious.
Much of the stricken neighborhood remained aflame, but the Minions were battling the fires. Faegan watched as throngs of citizens wandered aimlessly through the bloody streets in search of loved ones. The sounds of crying children, neighing horses, wildly barking dogs, and groaning citizens and Minions still filled the air. Duvessa and her warrior-healers were doing everything they could to stem the suffering, but they too were exhausted and could only do so much. The gutters ran red with blood, bodies and body parts littered the shiny cobblestones, and hungry flies were already gathering atop the corpses. As the news of the singularly important death spread, all the surviving mystics and hundreds of spent Minion warriors had congregated to mourn the shrouded corpse lying in the street.
Faegan wearily moved his chair closer. Her courageous death will long be remembered, he realized, and her life’s story would resonate in everyone’s consciousness for longer still. How can we possibly tell Tristan and Wigg about our failure to protect her? he wondered. Will either of them ever trust us again? Still unable to believe, with a trembling hand he reached down and pulled back the makeshift shroud.
Abbey had died quickly, they told him. She was last seen fighting three vipers at once, and she had succumbed to their attacks before Minion warriors could reach her. She bled out quickly from the viper talons that had slashed at her throat, then she had fallen to the ground, where her innards were ravaged by the terrible beasts. Finally some frantically struggling warriors reached her and ensured that the vipers responsible for her death had suffered horribly before being killed.
Faegan looked down at her face with bleary eyes. The herbmistress and partial adept had been instrumental in defeating Wulfgar and Serena, and in ensuring that the Vigors had not perished from the earth. Many of the people gathered here owed their lives to her several times over. She had been a handsome woman, with long dark hair lightly streaked with gray, a strong jaw, and a shapely figure. The only partial adept on the Conclave, her specialized use of the craft would be sorely missed. Faegan had enhanced her time enchantments so that her body would not immediately fall to dust, even though she had been more than three centuries old. Raising his head, Faegan looked out across the carnage-ridden neighborhood.
Wigg will be inconsolable, he thought. Because I am his oldest friend, the grim burden of telling him should fall to me. But how does one do such a thing?
Just then Faegan saw a Minion warrior approaching in the night sky. As the warrior neared, the wizard saw that he carried someone, the victim’s arms and legs dangling lifelessly earthward. On finally recognizing the warrior and his charge, Faegan’s blood ran cold.
Traax landed before the crowd and quickly handed the princess over to Aeolus.
“You must help her!” he shouted urgently.
As Aeolus and Faegan stared in horror at Shailiha, the blood drained from their faces. “What happened to her?” Faegan demanded.
“She was struck by viper venom!” Traax answered. “It continues to burn her even now! But I fear that her eye took the worst of it!”
“Hand her to me!” Faegan shouted.
As Aeolus quickly laid the princess in Faegan’s lap, Faegan looked at the burns and pockmarks on her face. Calling the craft straightaway, he induced a spell over the venom to try to stop it from doing further damage. He also called another spell to help control her pain and to keep her unconscious. Then he carefully lifted the damaged lid of her left eye. He closed his own eyes and bowed his head in sorrow.
“How bad is it?” Aeolus demanded.
“Very bad, I fear,” Faegan answered. “We might be able to help her, but to do so we must hurry back to the palace. There is no time to lose!”
Seeing Abbey’s corpse for the first time, Traax took a sharp breath. “Is she-?”
“Yes,” Faegan answered. “We can no longer help her. Shailiha is now our greatest worry. Summon a litter at once! Half of our forces will remain here and continue to quell the fires and help the wounded as best they can. The rest of our warriors will accompany us home. Duvessa and her group will remain here as well. Go and give the orders! We must leave now!”
As Traax hurried off, Faegan reached down and removed the gold medallion from Shailiha’s person and placed it around his neck. After doing so, he sadly rocked the princess in his arms, just as he might cradle a child who had been taken mortally ill.
“Why did you take her medallion?” Aeolus asked quietly.
“I did it for both Tristan’s and Shailiha’s sakes,” Faegan answered. “There is no telling when Tristan might again use his medallion to contact his sister. Do you want his next glimpse of her to be like this?”
“I understand,” Aeolus answered. “But doesn’t Shailiha need to be wearing the medallion for it to work?”
Faegan shook his head. “No,” he answered. “The needed spell is contained in the two medallions, not in their wearers’ blood. That is why the Ones cautioned Tristan so strongly about not letting the medallions fall into the wrong hands.”
“And you know how to call the spell?” Aeolus asked.
Before answering, Faegan cradled the stricken princess closer. “Yes,” he answered simply. “We can only hope that Tristan does not contact us before we have had some time to try and help her.”
Just then a litter arrived, its six stout warriors landing it quickly before the hushed crowd. With Shailiha still lying in his lap, Faegan levitated his chair up and over the litter’s sides. Aeolus joined him, and before they knew it they were soaring through the air toward the royal palace.
As the litter gained speed, Faegan looked down at the stricken princess’s face, then back toward the fires that were finally starting to come under control. Keeping pace alongside, Traax and half the exhausted Minion survivors accompanied the two wizards and their fallen leader. As they hurried on, Faegan sadly closed his eyes.
You have won this day, Khristos, he thought. We killed many of your vipers, but Abbey is dead and the Jin’Saiouwill likely never be the same again. If it is the last thing I ever do, I will hunt you down and kill you, I swear it. But where were you this night, you bastard product of the Vagaries? If attacking Tammerland was so important, why weren’t you there, leading your vipers?
All at once the terrifying realization hit him, and Faegan took a sharp breath. Looking over at Traax, he barked out new orders as fast as he could.
THE MINION SENTRIES DIED QUIETLY. AFTER SLITHERINGon their bellies up the banks of the Sippora, Khristos’ vipers had quietly flanked the camp. They then closed the circle to surprise and kill the unsuspecting sentries by first blinding them with their venom and then slitting their throats. Some of the warriors had seen them coming and fought back, but the several hundred Minions were no match for the thousands of Blood Vipers that commanded the element of surprise. Confident that the palace had not been alerted, Khristos again motioned for his vipers to slither their way through the dewy grass toward his next targets.
Watching from the safety of the camp, the Viper Lord wished he was going with them. But he would hold back where he could not be seen from the palace’s parapets. Nor could he use his silver staff to help his servants kill the Minions guarding the Black Ships, for that would certainly cause uproar among those warriors guarding the palace. While he stood alone among the Minion dead, his servants expertly went about his bidding.
Fifty warriors patrolled the area surrounding the two Black Ships, and they died as quickly and as quietly as had their more numerous brothers who had guarded the war camp. When one of his lead vipers slithered back to whisper news of their success, the Viper Lord rushed to where the others waited for him. As he looked up at the great ships, he knew that he must hurry in his mission, for once it started, those Minions left behind to guard the palace would surely see what was happening and attack him.
TheCavalon and theIllendium rested peacefully in their massive wooden cradles, their hulls and masts twinkling beautifully in the night. Deciding to steal theIllendium, Khristos ordered his vipers to stealthily board her in the darkness. Silently slithering their way up the cradle spars, the thousands of monsters took possession of the great ship.
Once they had all boarded, Khristos would remain on the ground as he empowered the ship into the air. Only after he had taken theIllendium a safe distance away from the palace grounds would he set fire to its mate, then fly through the air and land on theIllendium ’s topside to spirit her away. Those vipers that had secretly left the battle in Tammerland to slink back into the Sippora had been ordered to travel submerged downriver. Only after they were well away from Tammerland would they again surface to meet and board the piratedIllendium. Satisfied that his vipers would soon be aboard his new flagship, Khristos turned his attention to theCavalon.
She was equally beautiful, and in a strange way he almost regretted having to destroy her. Knowing that he must hurry, he looked back at theIllendium to see one of his lead vipers signal that all his servants had boarded, and he smiled when he saw their huge numbers crowding the gunwales and slithering quickly up the masts. With no time to lose, he raised his arms and called the craft.
At once theIllendium ’s black and red dark sails tumbled free of their spars. Expertly manipulating the craft, Khristos then summoned the first of the powerful forces that would lift the great ship and send her skyward. Her hull groaning and her masts straining against the pull of the sails, she slowly left her cradle to rise into the night air. Moving his hands, he expertly guided her to a safe distance from theCavalon, then set her hovering. With theIllendium airborne, he again gathered up his power to finish off theCavalon.
Raising his silver staff, Khristos pointed it at the great ship. Because of the many enchantments used by her builders to protect her, setting her afire would not be a simple feat, but once she started burning, her ages-old timbers would become a raging inferno. Summoning all his remaining power while also causing theIllendium to hover, he loosed the first azure bolt from the tip of his staff.
AS FAEGAN AND AEOLUS NEARED THE PALACE AND SAW THEfirst of Khristos’ bolts strike theCavalon, their worst fears were confirmed. How could we have been so blind? Faegan asked himself. Cursing the heavens, he pounded his fists against the sides of the litter.
Worse, Shailiha still lay unconscious in his lap, her fragile soul barely clinging to her wounded body. If she didn’t receive treatment soon, the venom coursing through her bloodstream would surely kill her. Even so, Faegan didn’t dare hurry her into the Redoubt for fear that the palace had also been overrun.
Then they saw theIllendium hovering in the air, and even from this distance they could see that it was filled with Blood Vipers. With one Black Ship taken and the other destroyed, the Conclave’s ability to defeat Khristos would be drastically weakened-perhaps to the point that the Viper Lord could savage all of Eutracia at will. The death and destruction that he could cause with even one Black Ship at his command, while the Conclave had none with which to counter him, would be unstoppable.
As Khristos’ next bolt struck the hull of theCavalon, Faegan started to doubt his assumptions about what the Viper Lord was trying to accomplish. Trying to destroy a Black Ship with azure bolts could be done, but it would take a long time-more time than Khristos had available. And then Faegan understood fully. Khristos was trying to set theCavalon ablaze. Shouting out to the Minions, he beseeched them to fly faster and take him within range of the Viper Lord.
Seeing the Minion forces cross before the three magenta moons, Khristos cursed, then loosed another bolt against the mighty ship. The first two had been largely ineffective, but the third highly concentrated beam sent against the same spot finally sent wood shards flying from theCavalon ’s starboard side, and smoke started drifting into the air from the jagged wound that had formed. Khristos had little time before the enemy would be on him, and he knew that he must work fast if he and his vipers were to escape in theIllendium. He quickly backed away from the ship to gain a different perspective.
Khristos pointed his staff directly at theCavalon ’s mainmast. At once her furled sails were set free and went tumbling down. Knowing that the sails were far more vulnerable to fire than were the ship’s timbers, he loosed a narrow bolt from his staff to thunder straight toward the exposed mainsail. At once it burst into flames, then started setting fire to the others around it.
Laughing into the night, Khristos caused all the other sails to come rolling down and quickly set fire to them as well. Returning his attention to the smoldering hole in theCavalon ’s starboard hull, he quickly loosed bolt after bolt against it, finally setting it ablaze. But just as he was about to join theIllendium and fly her away, the litter bearing Faegan and Aeolus appeared in the night sky. Soaring toward theIllendium, the Conclave wizards seemed determined to stop her from escaping before attacking Khristos or trying to save the burningCavalon.
Knowing that he could not defeat both wizards at once, Khristos cursed aloud. He realized that if he was to escape with theIllendium, his best course would be to board her quickly and spirit her away. While theCavalon burned, Khristos quickly made for the riverbank.
As they neared theIllendium, Faegan and Aeolus understood the unfolding disaster all too well. TheCavalon was burning, and their badly outnumbered and exhausted Minions couldn’t retake theIllendium without suffering unacceptable losses. Cursing his decision to leave half the warriors behind in the center of Tammerland, Faegan looked at Aeolus.
“If we deal with theIllendium first, do you believe that we can then save theCavalon from destruction?” he shouted.
As the fires raged aboard theCavalon, Aeolus anxiously tried to decide. He desperately wanted to save the burning ship, but the threat from the viper-ladenIllendium was great. If theIllendium turned to attack the palace, the vipers aboard might well take it. Of equal worry, the ghostlike Viper Lord might escape them yet again. While Traax and the throngs of exhausted warriors hovered alongside the wizards’ litter, they desperately hoped for an order that would send them to attack the vile creatures that had commandeered theIllendium.
“Perhaps!” he shouted back at Faegan. “With Shailiha incapacitated, you are in command! What are your orders?”
Faegan decided that there was but one course of action. It was drastic, and once he set the needed spell into motion there could be no going back. Clearly the vipers must be dealt with first, and in a way that would cost the fewest Minion lives. The Conclave could continue battling Khristos without the Black Ships, but not without enough warriors. His mind made up, he looked at Aeolus.
“I’m going to call the spell!” he shouted. “There seems no other choice!”
Aeolus gave Faegan a grim look, then nodded. Harsh as the crippled wizard’s decision was, Aeolus could also see no other way.
“Very well!” he shouted back. “But you must allow me and the warriors to start trying to save theCavalon! If the fires advance farther we will surely lose her!”
“I understand!” Faegan shouted back.
Looking over at Traax, Faegan barked out a series of sharp orders. Unable to believe what he just heard, Traax gave Faegan a searching look.
“You want us toretreat?” he demanded. “But the enemy hovers directly before us. They’retaunting us to attack! I beg you to let us finish this here and now!”
“No-you will follow my orders!” Faegan angrily shouted back. “There are not enough of you to win, and Khristos knows it! Take Aeolus into your arms and then order all your forces to obey him! You must do your best to save theCavalon! Leave only my litter bearers behind! You are to also order a patrol into the palace to see if it is safe! If so, the princess must be immediately taken to the Redoubt!”
Although he could not fathom Faegan’s logic, Traax had no option but to obey. “I live to serve!” he shouted. Scooping Aeolus up in his arms, the Minion commander shouted a series of orders to his troops, and they all flew toward the strickenCavalon as fast as their wings could take them.
Left hovering in the night air with only Shailiha and his litter bearers, Faegan looked across the night sky toward theIllendium. Soon after the discovery of the subtle matter and the decision that two of the Black Ships would try to sail across the Azure Sea and find Shashida, Tristan had insisted that his Conclave mystics combine their knowledge to devise a unique spell-one he hoped he would never be forced to use. Even so, he ordered that it be infused into every Black Ship and readied for immediate use should their path lead them to Rustannica and thePon Q’tar rather than to Shashida and the Ones. It was that same spell that Faegan would now be forced to call forth. It remained untested, for summoning it successfully would have produced the direst of consequences. As he hardened his heart, Faegan raised his arms.
Summoning all his power, he recalled the elegant series of calculations. Straining and shaking, he finally loosed the spell that had been laid deep into the age-old timbers of theIllendium.
The resulting explosion seemed to tear apart the heavens. Bursting from the inside out, every rib, beam, mast, spar, and other bit of wood that was theIllendium ruptured mightily in a massive azure detonation of the craft. As the shock wave and debris reached Faegan’s litter, for several awful moments the wizard was sure that the warriors bearing it would lose their grip. Yet despite the awful concussion, the warriors held fast.
When the great ship exploded, so too did every Blood Viper aboard her. Soon blood and bits of flesh rained down, and Faegan, Shailiha, their litter, and the warriors bearing it were covered with the awful stuff. Leaving behind no surviving part of theIllendium larger than a matchstick, the cacophony finally subsided as tons of debris fell to the ground. As the smoke cleared and the Minion bearers regained control of the litter, only the nighttime sky remained where the mightyIllendium had hovered moments before.
Lowering his hands, Faegan sadly looked around. The enchantment for theIllendium ’s self-destruction had worked well. Although he had killed every Blood Viper aboard her, he felt little sense of accomplishment. Shouting out a new set of orders, he told his bearers to take him and Shailiha to the palace as quickly as he could.
From his place by the river’s edge, Khristos watched the unexpected explosion with mixed emotions. He had lost many vipers this night, and he had failed to take theIllendium for his own. But the Conclave he so hated had lost much more. Many of their warriors had been slaughtered; one Black Ship was destroyed, and fires still raged aboard the other. Had he also known that the woundedJin’Saiou lay near death, he would have judged the night a near total success. Smiling, he walked down the riverbank and entered the Sippora to join the rest of his forces waiting downstream.
Moments later he was gone.