Thankfully Min didn’t lock the vault before she took up her guard post here or that might’ve been a bit more of a problem for us if it had come to blows after all. She simply has to turn the wheel and it starts to swing open almost of its own accord, although I imagine her immense orcish strength helps some. We hang back all the same, weapons in hand, ready for anything.

After Min pulled her axe from Roe’s body, Krakka did what he could for the fallen hob, speaking low, whispered rites and a blessing to Serena to help his spirit on the way to wherever he hoped to go. He struck me as a follower of Thorin, if he gave allegiance to any god at all, and the way he met his end surely means the Stormlord’s already sent his Valkyries to whisk Roe’s spirit away to feast with his fallen friends in Valhalla.

Shay is … shaky, if I’m honest. Her mother’s not holding up much better after that, but it’s written clearer on the half-orc’s face. This death’s hit her harder than any that have come before, and for many more reasons than the obvious. Tarrow and Garnon too, from what I can tell, although it’s clearer with the boy, the dragonhalf wizard certainly still keeping a tight rein on his emotions. I’d worry about them all more if I could, but right now there’s no time for grief. There’s still work to be done.

The sounds from above are petering out now, and I’m not sure if that’s a good sign or not. We can only hope that Driver 8’s done what he clearly intended, quelling what resistance was left, and now he’ll be standing in front of the doorway above, making sure no-one else comes down here looking to stop us. Hopefully Yeslee’s having similar success at the keep’s gate, although after that ogre came smashing through I have to wonder …

Once the door finishes its long, heavy outward swing and the vault’s open to us, none of us move for several moments. A silence falls over the group as we look at each other, old friends and tentative new ones, a conflicting wave of emotions playing through us all, but more than anything we’re hesitant. We don’t know what to expect going in there.

Even over the smell of blood that clings to everything, not only from Roe’s body but hanging on all of us who haven’t had opportunity to clean up yet, there’s something else. Something deep down, an undercurrent to everything else. Something awfully familiar, now I reach for it, but it still takes me a moment to recognise it.

Ozone. A crackling charge in the atmosphere, potent and palpable. The whole place smells like magic. Something’s going on down here. Not that we can see anything yet – like the entrance to the keep, this vault was built to defend in case that massive door was ever breached, so beyond there’s a tight passage that cuts at a sharp angle directly to the right, gloomy without any direct torchlight to show the way.

Finally Kesla breaks the silence, letting out a deep sigh and stepping forward, but she stops when Min quickly raises her axe one-handed in front of her, no threat, simply cutting her off. She remains focused on the gloomy portal open before us for a few moments, then clears her throat, squares her shoulders and steps through, and before Kesla can follow Shay shoulders past and steps after her mother.

“Stay sharp.” Kesla says after a moment, flexing and tightening her grips as she finally goes through herself. It takes me a moment to realise she directed that to all of us, not just me specifically, but I’d take it to heart all the same if I wasn’t already wound so tight. That smell’s got me right on edge, I can’t help it. Something here doesn’t sit right.

Looking back at the others, I see they’re as uncomfortable as me, but I suspect for a variety of different reasons. I hang back for now, letting others forge ahead, Krakka and Garnon, then Tarrow. Finally it’s just me here with Art and Wenrich.

“Are you all right?” my old friend asks me, clear concern in his eyes as he watches me.

“You smell that, right? You feel it? That charge, in the air.”

“I do. It’s coming from inside. Be careful.”

“Of course.” I look to Art, who meets my eyes and doesn’t look away. He gives me a smile, although it’s a little tighter than I’d like, and I return the best one I can, which doesn’t feel any more convincing. Even so, it’s enough reassurance for me to step through.

Nothing happens to us in the passage, even as it takes a sharp turn to the left and winds around until we’re deep in the cold stone of the mountain itself. The gloom gives way ahead as light filters down from above, warm but fitful from torches or braziers or whatever, no way to tell yet since all we can see is a very steep stone staircase leading up. Again, easy to defend, I would imagine. We’ve been stretched out coming through but as we all arrive at the stairs we’re bunching up, clearly not wanting to ascend again until we’re all together again.

Kesla’s looking up, and while I can’t see her face her posture tells me enough, her tension clear. As the three of us reach them Min nods and starts climbing, using one hand to steady herself on the steep ascent, axe low at her side, and Shay’s already waiting to follow her.

There’s quite the resemblance between the two of them, once you get a look at them together, despite the increasingly clear elven contribution to Shay’s bloodline. Min is an intense and domineering presence, dark and potent as a ferocious storm rolling in over a wide plain, but there’s the same deep control that I instantly recognised in her daughter, sharp and tempered as the finest dwarven steel. Like Shay she wears her jet black hair tightly woven back in cornrows, kept out of reach from angry hands seeking a grip in a fight, no doubt, and there’s a fierce beauty to her, somewhat at odds with her heavily-muscled bulk and hard, feral features. It almost seems to compliment her, and I think I can see what Shay’s father must have, once upon a time.

When she’s halfway up she pauses, as if waiting for something to happen. Nothing does, and I can almost feel Shay deflating a little, she was clearly so wound up as if expecting her mother to be attacked the moment she emerged. She pauses on th first step and looks back down at the rest of us, lingering on Kesla for a moment before beginning her own ascent.

Kesla starts up after, and Krakka’s already jostling to get into position behind her but Garnon moves ahead of him with stern politeness. For a moment our cleric bristles, I can see it in the fluffing of the feathers around his neck, but he doesn’t protest, instead setting his jaw and allowing the dragonhalf to go. No-one else tries to get in his way, though.

“You ready for this?” Art’s at my shoulder now, rolling his neck on his shoulders a little as he limbers up again. I can somewhat commiserate with him, I’ve been fighting hard to get here myself and I’m starting to feel it, the fatigue and stiffness and pain. It’s getting to all of us, I think, but some more than others. You’d certainly never know looking at Kesla.

“I hope so.” It’s all I can really think to say, but I still regret it the moment the words are out, they feel so clumsy and insufficient. He must catch my wince because he leans in and gives me a little nudge with his shoulder, his smile warmer now.

Taking a deep breath, I take my place in the line and start climbing up after Tarrow, and the moment I start I see why everyone’s been having trouble here, it’s almost more like a ladder than a staircase. When I reach the top I start to reach up to just pull myself out bracing against the floor I’m emerging through, but I find a large hand reaching down for me, and I’ve already taken it before I realise it’s Min herself helping me out. That grip is immense, I’m amazed she doesn’t crush my hand before I’m settled up top.

We’re in another large, vaulted chamber like the one above, but this one seems a good deal more cluttered, a line of stacked boxes arranged in a curved semicircle in front of us. That said, as I catch glimpses of open space through gaps between the stacks it occurs to me that this is actually more like a screen, and as I look around I realise this whole oversized chamber is circular. The floor under our feet is flagstones again, but unlike the rest of the fortress these are much smoother, a rich white marble with spider silk-fine black veins cutting through it. Once I take in the walls I realise they’ve been finished in the same beautiful but sombre stone, which seems so ostentatious after the hard, martial simplicity we’ve encountered throughout the rest of Heldereth. It’s almost as if this place was built in a different time, for a very different purpose.

It's also deathly quiet in here, the only sounds in the whole space now are our own as we emerge from the hole in the floor or shift around waiting for the rest. As he emerges behind me even Art, usually softly silent as a falling feather without even trying to be, seems surprisingly loud to me now.

“A little help, please?” I’m shaken from my revelations and turn back to find Wenrich is having particular difficulty climbing through, so I stoop low and grab his proffered hand and pretty much just lift him the rest of the way. He gives me a look which is half appreciation, half reproach, but still thanks me for it.

“Don’t mention it.” I barely whisper it back, but even this carries far too well in here. Gods, I hate this place already.

After a moment I realise that’s all of us, and I look at the others again. That reluctance is still there, but then this place is creepy, and aside from that smell there’s something in the air, something oppressive, like a weight of terrible anticipation. I open my mouth even though I have no idea what I’m about to say and Kesla waves me down. Then she points to Art, Krakka, Garnon and Tarrow, signalling for them to move around to the right, going quietly. Then she signals to Shay, Min and I to follow her to the left. This leaves Wenrich, who she tells to wait here in cover. If Yeslee was with us too she’d likely keep her back with him to provide cover, but circumstances have somewhat tied our hands there.

Just as he starts to join the others, I grab Art’s arm and pull him back. I want to tell him to be careful but now that we’re trying to be quiet about it I stop myself, and as he looks up at me, expectant and it’s a little infuriating, I just let a hard sigh go and pull him into a tight hug. He stiffens for a moment before reciprocating, and when we part he looks terribly sheepish. Once I look down at myself I realise what he’s getting at – he’s a far gorier than I am, and now he’s smeared all kinds of bloody mess all over me. Shit.

I give him a little shove, only half reproachful given that I can’t keep the smile from my lips, and he grins back at me as he mouths: “Be careful.”

“You too, idiot.” is my own silent response as I turn away from him. I find Shay watching me as I join our group, and her look is complex, I really have no idea what she’s thinking now. Finally she frowns and turns away, and I’m left feeling deeply confused.

As I step to the edge of the screening line of crates, I feel a hand grip my empty one and look down to find Wenrich at my side again. I stoop down to bring my face close to his, a little struck by just how nervous he looks now.

“Watch yourself out there.” His whisper is so low I really have to strain to hear it. “This is worse than anything you’ve faced before, I’m sure of it. I don’t want to have to tell your father this was the end of you.”

Instead of trying to reply as quietly as I can, I simply cock my brow with a non-plussed look.

“And yes, I would be deeply hurt and terribly grieved too if anything were to happen to you. So please be careful.”

This time I just draw him into a hug and he returns it with warmth and affection. I don’t pull away until I feel a tap on my shoulder, and when I break away from him I look up to find Kesla watching me. It might be expectant, I really can’t tell with that helmet. Patting Wenrich on the shoulder one last time, I straighten up, taking a deep breath and hefting my staff.

Kesla just nods and runs out into the open, which is enough to break what little silence we’ve managed to maintain up until now because her sabatons are loud on the marble. She curves around the line of the wall as she goes, circling the centre of the room, then Min follows with Shay close behind, and I fall into step behind.

As I come out of cover, Wenrich taking up his position just inside the shadow of the screen as I go, I’m finally able to get a proper look at the room itself. It’s even bigger than I expected, a great wide open space stretching out before me, significantly larger than the chamber we just fought our way through, and the ceiling’s much higher, enough marble to boggle the mind at what it must have cost to build this place. The light is coming from several oil-burning lamps set high in the walls around us, and half a dozen tall cast iron braziers set around the floor, all blazing brightly. There are three large vaults set deep into the walls at equal distances around the circle of the chamber, even more impressive than the huge door we passed through before, and each looks more impenetrable too. The cargo’s in one of them still, I’m sure, because I can’t see it out here.

What I can see is Ashsong stood in the very centre of the chamber, another figure maybe six feet away from him, a strong contrast to all the white marble around us he’s dressed so dark. No, not he. Going off the description this is definitely the one Shay calls the Creep, so it’s definitely not a man.

Even so, they’ve done a good enough job approximating one. The face could be called beautiful, except that it’s a little eerie to look at, something just a little off about that impossibly pale skin, like cream but when I try to look at it it’s like it’s moving subtly. Like something’s crawling underneath maybe? Oh gods … I don’t like the look of this one at all. Least of all the way they’re just standing there, a careless slouch to their stance with arms folded across their chest. Like they couldn’t care less about anything.

“Ashsong!” Kesla doesn’t need to shout very loudly, her voice carries so well in here, but she puts force into it all the same. “Stop this now and return the cargo to us! Come quietly and you might even get outta here in one piece!”

Ashsong turns to her now, as if he’s been ignoring us all until now, with a look of tired contempt. He sneers, shaking his hands out, and I notice something dripping from them, realising they’re completely the wrong colour. They’re so red. “Would that perhaps be intended as humour? You have no hope, you must surely realise that.” He waves one of those red hands vaguely in a dismissive gesture. “Begone, please. I have no time for this.”

Looking around, I finally notice they’re not actually the only other people in this chamber with us, although it quickly becomes clear they are the only other ones still alive. There are seven bodies strewn in a very loose, rough circle around the pair in the centre, and now I’m looking they’re too small. No, not small. Young. Gods, they’re just children.

Now I’m really looking, I can see there’s … things drawn on the floor, something’s been painted there, now painfully clearly scrawled out in blood. It’s a seal of some kind, a summoning circle from the look of it, although I don’t recognise any of the mechanics or sigils intended to make it work. This is completely alien to me, well-read as I am.

“Oh my … gods … you monster.” Min’s taking it all in with wider eyes than I’ve ever seen in an orc’s face before, and while she looked horrified seeing Roe dead by her own hand this is much worse for her. “What have you done? How could you … where did you …”

For a moment Ashsong just frowns at her as though he hasn’t a clue what she’s talking about. Then he looks at his hands, as if seeing the blood for the first time, then at the scattered bodies lying about the circle. When he looks up at her again he’s actually rolling his eyes for a moment. “Oh dear, really? My apologies, I really should have made my requirements clearer before we began this endeavour. If you feel so raw about it, I can easily compensate you further for the loss.”

“Loss? Loss?!” Min takes a step forward but Shay hooks her knife arm around her mother’s at the last and barely holds her back before she can continue. “Are you really telling me this is merely a transaction to you? That you’ve murdered our children just so you can …” She spreads both arms wide, although it’s a little difficult with Shay still holding onto her. “What even is this? What the fuck are you even doing here?”

“But I thought I already explained this to you. I contacted my people before, they’re coming to collect their prize. I simply have to bring them here.” He spreads his own hands wide to indicate his work.

I doubt Min has any magical education, but she’s smart enough to catch on all the same, and while she’s still full of rage it becomes coloured with more than a little healthy unease given the implication. This is very bad magic indeed, I don’t need any direct knowledge of what I’m looking at to work that out. The circle being drawn in blood is enough all on its own …

“It’s true. You really are a lunatic.”

Ashsong starts laughing, and it’s a remarkable sound, almost musical, but then he’s an elf, and it wouldn’t be anything else but a thing of beauty. And yet, as with everything else about him, there’s something a little off about it. “Oh my, that’s priceless. No, my dear Mistress Min. I fear I may be the only truly sane person in this room. But thankfully not on this side of the world, at least. Unfortunately I have no time left to educate any of you. I really must insist that you all leave now, before something terrible happens to you.”

“Nah, fuck that.” Kesla gives her axes a little flourish and I swear I hear a buzzing hiss, almost like a sizzling sound, as they arc through the air. “Kill him.”

The three of them start charging pretty much all at the same time, and on the other side of the room I see Art, Tarrow and Krakka break from their own spots along the wall with similar urgency, and I have to fight my own urge to follow. Instead I take a few diagonal steps to the right, hoping to get in round the side, and it looks like Garnon’s had a similar thought.

Then Ashsong just slaps his hands together and those strange bracers of his seem to flair with that strange light while he turns sidelong to us all before spreading his arms wide. I don’t really think about what I’m doing in the moment, I simply react, but somehow my timing’s good enough to save me as an almost invisible wave of force blasts out from him, radiating out in both directions at once. The others don’t see it coming, it’s nothing more than a formless ripple in the air, but it hits them hard all the same, and everyone charging in is knocked down and tossed back several feet.

It feels like a fierce wind as it tears through me, whipping at my cloak and my hair, but I keep my feet, and Garnon seems to have fared as well. Ashsong’s already noticed, a curious cock to his head as he turns my way, but I don’t give him time to react. While I countered the effect I was already charging something underneath it, and I draw it up fast now, focusing everything into my staff and bringing it up to hurl it at the immediate threat.

My lightning bolt lances right for Ashsong, who doesn’t even try to defend against it, and just before it hits I think I might have him beaten already … then it smashes into an invisible barrier two feet short and I watch the arcing bolt crackle and dance over his shield dome before bouncing off and splitting marble in the wall on the far side of the room. As the surge dissipates I find my head swimming a little and stumble before I can regain my footing, biting my lip a little harder than intended to claw my focus back. Damn it.

Across the chamber, Garnon’s standing by, a frown forming after he sees that. I doubt he’s particularly surprised, but he’s likely still rethinking his options.

“Ow.” Close by, Kesla’s starting to pick herself up, and for the first time since we were reunited I see her fatigue starting to show as she struggles to find her feet again. I doubt the armour’s helping, it’s troubling Min too as she claws her way up, or more likely she’s simply rattled from the hit. Shay’s still on her back, blinking as she casts about, looking dazed.

“Are you all right?” I start towards Kesla as she pants, still down on one knee, stooping to pick her glowing axes back up.

“I’m fine, focus on the fight.” She claws her weapons up with a loud scraping sound as the hot blades cut deep grooves in the marble without any effort at all, and she grits her teeth, forcing herself to stand again. She stumbles for a few steps finding her balance, hissing with frustration. “Don’t worry about us, just keep your eyes open.”

Right, she’s right. I turn back to find Ashsong still watching me, brow cocked like his head now, and he seems to be evaluating me. Oh dear, that can’t be a good thing.

“So you are Darion Foxtail’s offspring, I take it? I’d be pleased to make your acquaintance under different circumstances. You certainly are as impressive as your father, especially after surviving that fall and the river after. My sincerest congratulations on your great success.” He sighs. “Shame I must now put a stop to it.”

Okay, what does that –

He doesn’t work a sigil, doesn’t even say a word, nothing at all, he simply throws a force blast right at me with no preparation at all, and it’s all I can do to throw up my own shield in time for the bright blue bolt to smash apart over it. Shit … he doesn’t even seem to be fazed after that, how the hell did he even do that? When I tried that before it messed me up badly, but he’s just taking it in his stride.

In his distraction, though, he’s become entirely focused on me, and I see Garnon preparing something of his own, rubbing his hands together with his staff in the crook of his arm before he snatches it up. He throws his own lightning bolt at Ashsong’s exposed back with no warning at all and it strikes home, and for a moment everything else in the chamber goes away as all the light in the room suddenly seems to focus on that impact. The bolt snaps and sparks and crackles as it burns through the warlock it’s focused on, almost eclipsing him with its savage, blinding power, and Garnon pours it on for as long as he can, only pulling back when his own strength starts to give. When he finally releases he stumbles back, weaving on his feet, a little out of it now. Damn … he might’ve put a little too much into that hit.

For a few moments all I can see in the centre of the chamber is a great column of smoke pouring towards the ceiling, and there’s something like a small cracked impact crater there in the floor now. Then the haze starts to clear and I see the results … fuck me. Ashsong has a little stretch, completely unharmed, and as they come into sight I can see crackling lines of static bouncing across the glowing metal of his bracers, as if they absorbed the hit all on their own. But there’s something under his skin now, a glow, writhing and livid now, while his eyes seem to blaze with power. It slowly dissipates, until he’s simply Ashsong again, but it’s sobering enough to see all the same.

“Bugger me …” At my side, a still slightly unsteady Kesla simply gapes at this display. “Gael, what … how did he …”

No matter how hard I think there’s nothing I can come up with to explain that. I’m suddenly terrified.

Ashsong turns to the Creep then, who’s stood by all this time with amused detachment, in fact I doubt he’s even moved during this whole exchange. “My friend, if you would?”

For a moment that … thing just looks at their companion, then they sigh, actually sigh, and unfold their arms, shrugging a little now. “Ah well, why not?” I can barely hear that voice, it’s almost not even a whisper, but it seems to carry all the same, and it grates on me badly just hearing it. Then they take a step to the right and just … vanish.

The next moment – no, not even that, it’s barely even a blink, really – they’re suddenly right next to Garnon, who doesn’t even have time to realise the threat before the Creep draws the sword at their side and sweeps it upwards across them in one single motion. It’s frightening how similar it is to Kesla’s own move, but it’s so much more devastating. Garnon’s chest just … opens in a great red gout and they stagger back, unable to even make a sound as they topple.

“NO!!!” I hear Shay scream close by, but I can’t tear my eyes from our dragonhalf friend as he just collapses in a heap on the far side of the chamber, far from the reach of any of us. Unceremoniously ended for daring to raise his hand against the great Erjeon Ashsong.

I don’t know why, but in that moment I look back to the corner we just came around, and right there, almost as though I expected to find him, Wenrich’s stood by, watching this all unfold with similar shock writ large across his face. Then our eyes meet, his hardening a little, and somehow it gives me some resolve of my own.

“Son of a bitch …” I hear Shay growl, and I to find her struggling to her feet, swaying badly and dropping to one knee on her first attempt, but her mother’s got her own balance back now and she looks angrier than I’ve ever seen an orc capable of getting before. And Kesla’s back to her old self now, too, growling low as she tenses.

“ASHSONG!!! YOU’RE A DEAD MAN!!!” Min tightens in on herself, ready to spring into a charge, and if she were a bull she’d be pawing the floor now.

When the Creep appears this time I catch something of a blur in the air a sliver of a second before he arrives, but he’s not moving at impossible speed, it’s more like some kind of strange new form of teleportation I’ve never seen before. Min barely gets a chance to react as he rakes his sword at her, and when she brings it up in front of her to deflect the blow it catches the full force of his stroke but the weapon doesn’t stop it. Instead the axe shatters, the blade instantly turning into dozens of little shards of shrapnel that fly in all directions, and Min stumbles back as she bears the brunt of the hit.

Fuck … somehow I manage to get my shield up in time and those lethal little slivers of metal seem to smash apart across it before they hit me, but the Creep’s rounding on me now, likely clocking me as the biggest threat here after my attack. For the first time I get a good look at him, and what I see unsettles me even further. Shay described his eyes and I can see exactly what she meant, they’re awful, but more than that, now I can see his skin I realise it's not that there’s something underneath it, there seems to be something on it that makes his look so strange. His cheeks, his chin, his forehead … every inch of skin that’s visible seems to be covered in tiny scars, perfectly white and pearlescent, all arranged in strange, intricate patterns that almost seems to be moving when it catches the light.

It's their sword that gives me real pause, though. I’ve never seen a weapon like it, I might have thought it was made of some kind of strange black stone from a distance, but now that I see it up close it seems more like the metal simply absorbs light, as though it’s made of solid shadow. The lines are jagged and cruel, there’s no kindness at all to this weapon, it’s the cruellest weapon I’ve ever laid eyes on.

The shield holds up to the first strike as he swings at me, but I feel it all the same, the reverberations ringing through hurting my ears. Perhaps it’s the pain that weakens me on the second stroke, but the shield buckles this time, and I stumble a little as I’m forced to let go, and now I’m open. As he draws back for a third hit I bring my staff up to counter it even though I know it couldn’t possibly resist that weapon, so I do the only thing I can think of – I pour every ounce of power I can muster into the staff as I raise it.

As the sword meets my staff there’s a great flash, bright enough to blind me for a few moments, and a terrible thunderous crack. I barely manage to keep my feet as I’m forced back several feet, my boots skidding across the flagstones underfoot. Even when my vision finally starts to come back all I can really see is dancing lights flitting about in darkness, but then the room swims back into view and I look down at my hands to see … two short, splintered pieces of wood, all that remains of my staff, the rest having just disintegrated. But somehow it saved my life, I’m otherwise unmarked.

“Gael!” With the subtle breeze of a closing portal, Wenrich’s at my side, clearly deciding the plan’s gone to hell and not prepared to hang back anymore. “Are you all right?”

“My … my staff.” I gawk at the remnants in my hands, still smoking a little from their smashed ends. “He broke my bloody staff!”

“He damn near broke you!” Wenrich tries to admonish me with his tone, but it’s mostly just concern in his voice. “You’re lucky you weren’t killed.”

Looking back, I see Kesla jumped in to intercept our opponent, and as she swings those blazing axes at him, for the first time I see his demeanour change, the smug look that’s been carved on their otherwise perfect face starting to slip. As one of the axe-blades whistles close enough to decapitate him if he hadn’t just ducked out of range of the stroke with unnerving swiftness, he almost seems afraid of the white hot metal. No, not hot. Bright.

“Shit … Wenrich, I need you to get Krakka.”

“What? Why do you …” He looks at the Creep as he dodges back again and again from Kesla’s swings, then finally starts parrying hard to try and ward her off, and this time the blades don’t shatter like I expected them to, and that simply confirms my suspicion. “Wait … I see it.”

“Go. Do it now.”

Smiling, Wenrich takes a deep breath, mutters his incantation and ports away. I look down at the smashed pieces of staff one last time, and drop them at my feet. Then I reach into the holster under my cloak and draw out my wand.

The Creep’s clearly grown tired of the onslaught, whipping a hard roundhouse kick that glides under Kesla’s weapons and pounds her down hard enough that she slides ten feet when she hits the floor. He starts forward, starting to look a little upset, but Min cuts him off, and while her face is bleeding badly from her broken axe, it’s clear her armour fended off the brunt of the damage. She’s drawn her broadsword now, a typical orcish blade, long, heavy and jagged, designed for tearing and cleaving its targets. And yet, she doesn’t wield it like that.

No, Min the Reckless truly is something special now I see her in action. There’s something of her daughter in the way she moves, a speed and agile grace that seems almost impossible for her heavy muscular bulk, and each stroke of her sword is swift and surgical as she starts to drive the Creep back. She fights like Kesla, I suddenly realise, and when I really start watching it becomes clear that she might well be as good as my friend herself. It’s a sobering realisation, and a small part of me wonders how that match might have gone, down in the tunnel, if they really had come to blows. Could that have been the end of Kesla Shoon?

Then I look past the fight and see Ashsong crouched down now, seeming to pore over various accoutrements I now notice have been set out around him. As I watch he plunges his hands into a large bowl and they come out dripping, the blood on them refreshed, and as he stands up again he’s painting lines and symbols across his face and breastplate with his fingers. Completing the ritual. Shit! No time left for games, then. I run to Kesla, who’s forcing herself up again, and Shay, who’s finally gotten herself in order too, follows me.

“Okay …” Kesla growls, clearly sore from the hit that I suspect might have hurt her even more than she’s letting on. I wonder if she might have some broken ribs now, even if without the armour it might have been a whole lot worse. “Now what?”

A dark portal opens for just a blink and Krakka appears with his arm around Wenrich’s shoulders. He sways badly as they find their feet, and I realise this might actually be the first time he’s been ported, but he fights the nausea off and as I watch, approaches Min and the Creep with caution. As he moves he raises Bloodmoon high and shouts: “Mother Luna!” and the hammer’s head erupts into blinding white light.

The effect on the Creep is instantaneous, as a ripple seems to pass through them and they stumble backwards, their free arm instantly raising to shield their face from that flaring light. As Min continues to press them back they fall back, faltering badly on the defensive now, and as I watch their face seems to distort, becoming something far more feral, strange and twisted and alien now, something I couldn’t possibly describe. Then they vanish again and it seems to stutter - when they reappear it’s only a few feet away, but they don’t seem to realise they’re still so close to Min, who rushes to attack again.

“Keep that thing occupied!” I say to Kesla now, already focusing a fresh charge into my wand. “I need to stop Ashsong now.”

Kesla grunts as she shoves her helmet off over the back of her head, grimacing a little but also clearly relieved, and I realise that in her current state that thing must have been pretty smothering for her. She turns to look past me now as Ashsong starts working a sigil in the air in front of him with his bloody hands, and she nods. “You watch your arse, Gael Foxtail.”

“Same to you, Kesla Shoon.” I give her shoulder a little squeeze but with the pauldron it’s somewhat lost on her. Even so, she still gives me a little smile before she focuses on the Creep.

“What about me?” Shay still looks a little unsteady on her feet, that first hit must have hurt her more in her lighter leather armour, but she’s got enough focus at least. She’s retrieved her sword and knife, which hang at her sides but are still held with purpose.

“Back me up, but watch yourself. You saw what he can do, you take another hit like that you’re out of the fight again.”

“No shit.” she growls, and the death glare she aims at Ashsong is a frightening thing. Her first two steps are still a little shaky, but as I start to lead her in wide a route around the fight she grows steadier. Wenrich’s toddling along in our rear, clearly unwilling to abandon me, and I’m not about to turn down the implied offer of help.

I keep charging the wand as we approach Ashsong again, and for now he seems to be concentrating on his spell, more sigils hanging in the air and growing brighter by the moment as he completes each and moves on to the next. I can feel a hum in the floor now, a low, constant vibrating note, and when I look down I can see the subtlest glow in the blood scrawled across the marble. It sets my skin to crawling and a chill in my bones, like something terribly, horribly wrong is about to happen.

“You really don’t learn, do you?”

He almost brings me up short when he speaks. I’m not expecting it when he seems so engrossed in what he’s doing, but he’s speaking to us all the same. After a moment I pause after all and shoot Wenrich a quick look, waving him around to my side, close to the screen of supplies, then start to circle the other way, while Shay starts to split the difference between us. “Actually, I do. Very quickly, actually. I tend to pick things up without much trouble at all, actually. It was remarked upon as being one of my greatest strengths at the Academy.”

“Not here, though. You’re proving wilfully dense her and now, young Master Foxtail.” He finally looks at me, and it’s as if his eyes are ablaze now, the green in his irises like sickly pale emerald rings of flame. “It still hasn’t sunk in that you’re getting yourself killed.”

“We all have to die of something.” I chance a sidelong glance at Shay, find she’s stopped moving, now bouncing on the balls of her feet, ready to charge with her blades cocked. “The trick, I’ve learned, is to find something to die for.”

The expression he returns might’ve been intended as a sarcastic smile, but it looks like a sneer to me. He finishes drawing another sigil and lets it float into place, and I don’t give him a chance to start another one, instead whipping my wand up and unleashing the bolt with a whisper. He throws up his shield at the last and it bursts in a wash of bright blue energy over the surface of the dome, but the sigils stay where they are, burning bright, while the glow in the lines under our feet is growing too. Unaffected by his distraction.

But Shay was already moving the moment I threw the blast, and she’s shaken off any lingering effects from the hit now, lending speed to her charge. As the energy dissipates and he drops his shield she’s already leaping, whipping her sword down in a ferocious lunge aimed at his face, and it seems she may have caught him in time. Until he moves with a speed that seems almost impossible.

Shay’s thrust whistles past his cheek to meet open air, and as she comes down there’s no way she can stop her own momentum. Ashsong’s already ducking aside and as he turns he whips out an empty-handed strike with his left arm that catches her hard across the back, and I see the bracer flare brightly as he hits her. It’s like she’s been backhanded by a troll, the hit smashing her into the floor, and she rolls away, limp and boneless as a ragdoll.

“Shay!” I don’t recognise the voice right away, but then another body whips up on Ashsong from behind and a longsword swings at him, and once again he moves with that uncanny swiftness that turns him into a blur. Tarrow’s swing goes wide and he tumbles gracelessly over Ashsong’s back, sprawling clumsily across the floor to land at my feet.

Now Ashsong’s moving again, reacting to another attack, and as I watch him whip about in almost random motions he batters away one, two, three small pieces of sharp metal before a fourth pings off the pauldron on his left shoulder. One of the missiles clatters close by and I recognise one of Art’s lethal little darts. Ashsong jumps back suddenly, barely dodging a lunge for the throat from my friend’s slender sword, which he’s already whipping back around to power a hard thrust up into the elf’s exposed armpit on the other side. He has no hope of trying to stab him through that plate armour, so he’s trying to goad him into making a mistake instead to exploit one of the weak spots.

Except that Ashsong’s too quick, even for Art’s mercurial reflexes, and as the sword shoots upwards he whips his arm around and brings the other up behind, hooking the blade aside with one wrist while he brings the other down hard. Both bracers flash in the moment and Art’s sword snaps, leaving him less than a foot of blade in his hand. He gapes at it in dismay and that’s distraction enough, my own shout of warning too late to stop Ashsong swinging another backhander and slamming him aside.

Elves are uncanny creatures, I know this well enough, but even so I’ve never seen one move with the kind of speed Ashsong’s suddenly proven able to muster. Together with those bracers it’s clear he’s got some strange, unprecedented new powers at his disposal. As Tarrow jumps up from the floor again and rushes him I swear I see him rolling his eyes as he musters a force blast on the spot, no need to even voice an incantation as he does it, and swats him back down again.

Wenrich throws a force-bolt of his own at Ashsong’s exposed back and it’s like he doesn’t even need to see it coming, his shield seems to come up almost on its own to block it before he can turn to this new threat. I’m close now, though, when I saw Art go down I couldn’t help myself, I just started rushing him, and I throw my own bolt at his side even though I fully expect him to block this too.

Instead it smashes into him with full force, and for a moment the blazing blue light dances all over him, but it still barely knocks him two feet. He wavers for a moment, unsteady on his feet but keeping them all the same, and as he turns to me again he’s already regaining his composure. And now, suddenly, he looks almost angry. Perhaps I’ve finally cracked that hard, arrogant shell of composure. Yeah … that might have been a less than stellar idea.

I don’t realise how perilously close I am until he takes one big, fast step forward and swings his arm at my face, and I barely duck under it in time. By which point he’s already countering, swinging his other fist up while the other bracer flashes and I can feel the force contained in that blow almost seeming to precede the strike itself. I pull my shield up just in time and the punch crashes hard into it and another release of bright blue arcs over it, but the shield must give a little because I actually feel a little of the force pass through me after all. I keep my footing but only just, and my shield’s already dissipating when he follows through with a kick to my sternum that puts me down hard.

When I hit the floor I’m badly winded, and while it wasn’t a powered hit it was still delivered with surprising force, and for several moments I all I can do is lie here, gripping my throbbing chest because the pain is so bad. If he wants to he can crush me like an insect right now and there’s nothing I could do to stop him.

Art doesn’t give him a chance, looking battered now and still unsteady but I think his threat towards me probably sets him moving surely as seeing him go down did for me. He doesn’t bother trying anything fancy, simply shoulder-checking him with all he has, and while it doesn’t knock Ashsong down it still unbalances him significantly while he throws Art off with enough force to send him spinning. He turns back to me again and I feel terribly exposed as I try to will some movement back into my limbs, then the air around us just explodes.

Yeah, I didn’t want to try a lightning bolt with all my friends so close to him, there was no safe way to hit Ashsong without risking frying one of them too, but clearly Wenrich feels the risk of not trying is too great right now. His own is … well it’s simply terrifying, to be honest. He always said he’s no great wizard, that he never really had the true knack and only ever mastered enough magic to serve him as circumstances require while he’s working. He’s always used wits and words more than any spells, but seeing him let loose now I wonder if he’s just been particularly modest all these years. This is like the Wrath of Thorin …

It hits Ashsong with full force and he just vanishes in a great globe of crackling white that keeps growing larger as my friend pours more of his power and strength and sheer will into it. Watching this, I finally realise it’s not that his own power’s simply so much greater than mine, he’s just not holding anything back this time, he’s summoned up every ounce of magic he has in him for this one attack. As I watch all the lines drawn on the marble around us seem to flare at once, and I have this horrible feeling that Wenrich might have accidentally finished Ashsong’s spell for him after all and we’re about to be engulfed by unimaginable horrors from the Night Lands. Then the completed sigils flare white and fritz out as one, and there’s a great splintering crack as in the same moment the floor erupts, every inch that’s been slathered with blood shattering in an instant.

I’m barely able to muster enough strength to roll aside in time to keep from being punctured by splintering rock as a line ruptures right under me, and I still feel a cut open on my cheek and ear as I move. The adrenaline’s impetus enough to force my feet back under me again, and I round on the scene just as the bolt finally chokes out. I look to Wenrich and he’s already dropping to his knees, limp and pale with hand shaking and face slick with sweat, and I realise he’s spent now. He hasn’t drained himself quite so badly as I did escaping the avalanche since he’s still conscious, but he’s come close. I know full well he won’t be able to summon anything else for this battle.

Movement in the corner of my eye catches my attention and I see Ashsong’s still in one piece, still alive, able to move despite the fact that the smoke is absolutely pouring off him. He’s seared and blackened but he doesn’t seem to have been burned anywhere near as much as I would’ve liked. I couldn’t possibly imagine anyone being able to resist that much power, but he just shakes it off, and as he regains his feet he glares about, examining the scene. Realisation dawns as he takes in the ruin of his summoning circle, and what seemed like anger before is eclipsed as his once perfect face contorts into something incredibly ugly. Pure, unrestrained rage.

“Boy!” He raises his hands towards Wenrich as he starts to step forward. “I should have ended you the moment I saw you yesterday! You’ve meddled with forces you could never comprehend if you lived for a billion years!”

Seeing his lips working in a low incantation as he reaches out, I start forward and almost fall flat on my face as my legs try to give out under me. Ashsong finishes casting and pulls both hands back into his chest in tight fists, almost as if he’s dragging the very air towards him, and the sound of splintering wood fills the air. I turn just in time to see the whole curving wall of stacked crates collapse at once, and it’s all toppling far too fast for it to simply be falling on its own. And Wenrich’s all but immobile right under it.

“NO!!!” I try to rush for him again and this time my knees really do give out, and as I collapse I see Art rush forward, darting directly for the downed halfling. He’s not even close when the massive clutter of falling wood and grain and fruit and vegetables and gods know what else rains down on both of them and everything smashes with a roar loud enough to hurt my ears. The waft of billowing dust that’s set loose under the crash is too weak to do anything to me, but I feel like I’ve been struck down all the same, sure in my very bones I’ve just seen two of my friends die.

The pain gives me focus as surely as the grief and anger, and this time when I force myself to my feet my balance is sure. I’m slow realising I’ve lost my wand somewhere in that whole mess, but I’m not unarmed yet, drawing my sword and rounding on Ashsong. “BASTARD!!!” I scream it at the top of my lungs as I charge.

This close I’m already on him while he’s still turning to face me, and all he can do is duck aside as I make my first swing. I’m not really thinking about what I’m doing, certainly the idea that I’m trying to cut down a man in full plate armour with my sword is barely there at the back of my mind, but I’m absolutely furious right now. As he rolls out of my way I regain my footing and go after him again, but this time his hand’s already gone to his side and as I try to hack into his head with a bit more focus he’s drawing his sword. My own strikes it dead on and the jarring’s so hard I almost lose my grip right there, barely keeping hold of my sword as I stumble back. He doesn’t attack, instead springing back into a patient defence as he raises the sword beside his head, gripping it two-handed now.

“Foolish. Very foolish. You have no chance, child. I will end you here and now.”

Gritting my teeth against the painful buzzing in my hand, I give the sword a flourish to shake out the kinks and just growl back at him, throwing a force-bolt in his face at the same time.

To his credit, he doesn’t go down when it hits, but it still makes him stumble back as the blue energy crackles across him, and I charge again while he’s distracted, attacking with more focus now. Kesla was very particular when we were training, if I find myself up against an opponent in heavy armour I have no chance of getting through that, no matter how sharp my blade is. You aim where the armour’s weak, where there’s gaps. Under the arm, between the legs, at the neck. So I swing for the most open target, hoping I might be able to cut that smug head from his shoulders before he can recover enough to stop me.

Instead he simply spins on the spot as I come in and swats the sword aside mid-swing, and I don’t even see his counter as he whips his own slash up under my arm. I twist at the last moment and it’s just a glancing blow, but it catches my side all the same, and it feels like a line of fire opening under my ribs as I stumble away. Looking down I can see the leather plate’s sheared through as clean as cloth, and while the cut’s shallow I’m bleeding a lot. I put my left hand to the wound and fight against the flare of pain as I force myself to press down hard, hoping to stem the flood as I back away from my opponent. I look at that sword with more cautious eyes.

That glancing stroke should’ve done nothing but score a groove in the armour, at worst it might’ve just about cut through but not actually wounded me. Instead it cut clean through my leather armour, but not my sword ... I wonder how it would fare against full plate. Certainly it’s enchanted, as Wenrich suspected. I’m in a more dangerous spot that I thought I was.

Muttering under my breath, I bite my lip hard enough to make it bleed, taking my hand from the wound long enough to trace a sigil before putting my hand back over the cut. The pain’s as strong as the first time, but now I feel heat in the wound too, a tingling, itchy warmth that’s not actually that pleasant. I need to do this in stages, I remind myself, otherwise I could wind up welding my armour right to my flesh as I mend everything at once.

Seeing this, Ashsong’s frown grows a little bit, and he bares his teeth. He won’t let me take advantage of his momentary pause, then. Damn it, this is going to take a little while, and I need to concentrate. I back off a few more paces and he starts to follow me, tensing to spring now, and I bite down harder, cursing in my head and wishing there was some way I could speed this up.

Shay comes out of nowhere and cuts him off before he can lunge, and he has to skip back with a lot less grace now to deflect the hard slash she flicks at his face. Snarling more in challenge than anger, she presses him back, and he gives more ground under the speed and savagery of her attacks. I let out the breath I find I’ve been holding and finally feel that the skin under my hand’s done knitting, so I spit out the blood that’s been welling in my mouth into my hand and press it over the damaged armour, muttering a fresh incantation to repair the plate. This’ll take a little longer, mind, it’s harder to work with, and as I concentrate I can feel the needle pressing deeper into my brain, the blooming of fresh pain there. This is taking a toll I really can’t afford to pay right now, but I can’t afford to be defenceless either, however insufficient my armour’s just been proven to be.

“You okay?” Tarrow’s at my side before I realise he’s up again, but given how focused I am right now I’m not really that surprised. Looking at him now, I can see how battered he is, how worn, he’s steady enough on his feet but his face is drawn, tight, he’s clearly fighting some hurts I can’t see. Looking at him, his asking that question is almost comical, but I manage to fight down the smile that wants to come.

“After a fashion.” I look down at the cut in my armour, which seems to be sealing itself now, although it’s never going to be a hundred percent again. “I’m going to have quite the scar though, I should think.” I shrug. “I suppose it puts me in good company, really.”

“I thought only clerics could heal wounds like that.”

“I didn’t healing it, I just mended it. Just knitted the flesh back together. If this had been worse I would only have been able to plug the wound, the damage would still have needed addressing. I certainly can’t save anyone from a major injury like Krakka can.”

“Shay can’t stop him, can she?”

“Not on her own, and not with the weapons she has. Best she can do is keep him occupied. She needs help.”

“Gotcha.” He spins his sword and starts to skip away, then stops, turning back. “Can you do anything?”

“Maybe. But I need you to give me a minute or two.”

Tarrow nods, his face taking on a new grim determination which isn’t entirely convincing given how tight his face remains. I think one of the hits Ashsong gave him really hurt him, but he still rushes off and jumps at the elf while he’s concentrating on fighting back against Shay.

Even both of them together won’t be able to stop him right now, even if they are both clearly very skilled. As I half-watch them, I can clearly see that, while they’re pressing him back and forth between them, he’s easily deflecting their attacks and offering a few barely-avoided responses of his own, his natural elven talents serving him well. He’s too good for them, so that even if he only has one sword against two determined opponents, one with a pair of blades, he’s not in any real trouble yet. That uncanny speed of his definitely helps, too.

Rummaging through my components, I find what I’m looking for at last, and after I pull the tiny little bottle of special oil out I sheathe my sword so I have a hand free to retrieve my whetstone too. Thumbing the stopper free, I trickle a few drops onto the stone and then replace the bottle in the satchel, then draw again as I mutter a fresh incantation, already feeling the stone grow warm in my hand as the oil begins to bubble and glow. Finishing the incantation, I raise the stone to my lips and breathe one long, slow lungful onto it, and the stone grows almost unbearably hot in my hand, becoming almost red as it flares.

Now I raise the sword lengthwise the way I do when I’m inspecting it, draw the stone across either edge and then tap the blade three times along its length, then flip it over and repeat the process on the other side. I do this three times, and each time the blade begins to glow as well, not a brilliant blaze like Kesla’s moon-blessed weapons but a far more subtle light, while the sword’s now thrumming in my hand.

Okay … stuffing the whetstone in the nearest available pouch, I give the sword a couple of practice swings and it almost seems to whine tunefully as it cuts through the air. Yes, this should serve, but I have to be quick, I have minutes at most with this, and the niggle in my head’s turning into a stab of hot pain, warning that I’m really pushing my luck now.

As I rush in again, Ashsong drives Tarrow back with a fierce flurry of blows, then as Shay attempts to press her advantage on his blindside he somehow manages to duck under her thrust, and as he turns he clips her across the side of her face with a vicious spin kick. She goes down hard, flailing a little while her blades skitter away, and I suspect the hit was hard enough to daze her a little, while there’s no way Tarrow can take him alone. Ashsong’s already rounding on the boy again, and he swats aside Tarrow’s attempted killing blow with ease, preparing to follow through with a vicious hack while he’s unbalanced.

I don’t give him the chance, bringing the sword hard down on his left arm before I’m quite in position, and perhaps it’s the urgency of the moment that fouls my attack enough that I don’t simply cut it right off on the spot. The sword cuts deep though, separating the steel of his pauldron as easily as his own blade did my leather, and he pulls away from me in an instant, pure instinct causing him to retreat from the pain as his blood splashes the marble. He dances back, eyes wide, and I follow him, determined not to give him a chance to rally.

He turns my first two attacks with frustrating ease but I keep coming, feinting right and then coming in on the left, and somehow I manage to trick him enough in the moment, or perhaps he’s simply rattled enough to fall for it. Whatever it is, he responds to my fake attack, leaving his side exposed, and I take advantage by powering through a slash with all the strength I can muster. It cleaves through his cuirass like it’s not even there and his side opens up underneath in a great gout of blood.

“Blood for blood, you son of a BITCH!!!” I practically scream it in his face as he stumbles back, genuinely shocked now as his hand goes to the gushing wound in his side, the blood gushing between his fingers and pouring down his leg. It splashes the floor, leaving little puddles as he staggers away, and what little composure he might have had left is gone now. As for me, I just can’t believe that worked.

Unwilling to let him rally, I press my advantage, but he senses the danger well enough and he’s a wounded animal now, pain and fear making him desperate and very dangerous. As I approach he whips his sword out savagely and the blow’s so unexpected I barely manage to turn it away in time, reeling back as he rounds on me again, trying to ward me off with more wild strokes. Tarrow tries to press his own advantage on his wounded side and Ashsong swings out at him too, and he has to jump back to avoid getting cut in two by the ferocity of the half-intended blow.

I can already feel the thrum in my sword starting to wind down, I don’t have much more of this, so I don’t have time to waste playing a waiting game. I give Tarrow a look and he just catches it, his own eyes narrowing as I hope he gets my meaning, then he chances another attack and Ashsong growls through gritted teeth as he leaps into it, moving with renewed speed now. Tarrow barely beats it away, but it’s all the opening I need as I charge in on the blindside and draw a deep slash down the elf’s back, and he arches against the fresh pain as I cleave clean through again. The cut’s shallower this time but still brings a lot of blood, and I can’t help the laugh that comes seeing it.

Which has me distracted enough that when he whips a spinning roundhouse kick towards me I don’t quite catch it in time. I’m wary enough that I start to block, but the blow still knocks me aside, and I stumble badly fighting to keep my feet, while the arm I brought up to block throbs with fresh pain, my sword hand getting weak from it.

Ashsong rallies a little fresh strength despite his wounds, or perhaps adrenaline simply lends him a desperate reserve, and this time when he attacks Tarrow it’s with a savagery that forces the boy to give ground. Seeing it, I force myself up again and shake the feeling back into my arm, but I’ve given him too much of an opening now, and he takes his chance before I can jump back into the fight.

Tarrow’s a great fighter, he really is, I’ve come to understand in the short time we’ve known them that Shay taught him a lot of what he can do herself, and he’s clearly been a diligent and talented pupil. But even wounded, Ashsong’s too good for him alone, all he needs is one opening. I see him set the boy up but I’m not good enough to actually catch it until it’s too late, and even as he falls for the elf’s particularly skilled feint it genuinely looks like his response will grant him the final victory. He lunges for Ashsong’s exposed side, the armour cut free and gaping ready for him to drive his sword up under the ribcage and skewer his heart … then Ashsong twists to the other side and Tarrow’s lunge overextends past him, and the boy is wide open.

“NO!!!” I hear Shay’s scream before I see her struggling to her feet through the corner of my eye, still shaky and unbalanced from the kick but sharp enough to see the kill coming. My heart breaks for her, it hurts me as much to see my new friend killed right in front of me.

Ashsong cuts Tarrow’s head off with one clean stroke and his body runs a few more paces before it starts to crumple. Shay screams again but this time it’s just a wordless wail of anguish, and I find myself joining her, my own howl no more coherent as I just rush him again. But victory seems to have granted him fresh focus, it seems …

He turns my lunge away before I can hit home and I can’t arrest my momentum in time as he draws back into a tight crouch, even though I can see in his face that it really hurts him to do it, and he whips his sword back before thrusting forward in one unnervingly deft, fluid motion. The first I know that his sword’s impaled me through my sternum is when my momentum just stops dead, but thankfully my feet don’t kick out from under me before I’m halted, and the pain only starts once I’ve looked down to see it. There’s barely three inches of blade between me and the guard, the rest must be sticking out of my back. Fuck …

The pain is, unsurprisingly, unbelievable. Not unexpected, though, I suppose – I have more than two feet of strangely glassy steel stuck right through me. Suddenly my mouth’s full of blood, the sharp, coppery taste overwhelming and I smell it too, and I don’t even try to fight the gag reflex as I just vomit it right in his face.

Ashsong snarls in response and starts to withdraw, and I don’t really think about what I do next, suddenly it just seems like the thing to do. Somewhere I vaguely hear voices screaming my name, and the pain’s affecting some small part of me, but it’s all so surprisingly distant to me right now. All I can really focus on now is the pain, and Ashsong.

So when he tries to pull the sword out I drop my own and, with both hands free, grab hold of as much of his as I can with both. I feel an additional flare of pain in two of the fingers in my right hand and passively realise I’m now clutching the bare edge, but I manage to ignore this as I hold on as tight as I can. The sword sticks fast and a look of confusion flashes across Ashsong’s face, then his frown deepens and he takes his hand from the wound in his side to wrap around the other. He starts pulling, and I do the same, putting every remaining lick of strength I have into it.

“What … what are you … let go you stupid bitch! Give me back my sword!”

Part of me wants to spit some witty retort back at him, but I couldn’t think of one right now if I tried, so I just grin, and with all the blood I suspect it’s quite an awful sight. The bracers flare and his pull grows much stronger, but I just plant my feet and stand my ground, and I’m not sure if it’s my own grim determination or the fact that he’s probably bleeding so badly that holds us in a stalemate. Whatever it is, his sword remains stuck fast.

Even so, my head’s starting to grow light, my vision drawing inwards, more tunnelled, and I feel a numbness starting to spread through me despite the pain, but now that’s starting to fade too. My rational side is screaming at me that this is a very bad thing indeed.

Ashsong snarls at me and starts to curse my name as he doubles down on his efforts to win over me, but he’s not gaining any more ground on me, weird strength and magic bracers be damned. Then he gasps as something jabs into his side and drives him back a little, and his own grip begins to falter. Looking down I see a bade driven up into him through the rent I cut, and I turn to see Shay grimacing angrily as she drives the blade higher up, and conversely deeper in. Now it’s his turn to spit blood.

Someone rushes past on the other side now and I don’t really catch sight of them, they’re moving much too fast as they jam something up under his arm, and even before I realise who it is I recognise this attack. The knife in Art’s paw digs in once, twice, three times, blood spurting with each withdrawal but less than I would’ve expected as he begins to falter, and this is finally enough to break Ashsong’s grip. I keep my feet as he stumbles backwards, weaving like a drunkard after he pulls away from Shay’s blade, and he’s paler than ever, eyes glassy now as he casts about for some means of escape, already realising there isn’t one. He knows he’s dead, he just can’t accept it.

Then a third figure leaps into the air from Shay’s side and he starts to turn just as they come down, which is probably not the wisest move because he leaves himself open to the attack … then there’s a flash of something impossibly bright and Kesla brings Hefdred down, blazing like a long white beacon, to cleave clean through him. It severs him from shoulder to hip, and I can almost smell searing meat for a moment, then he stumbles back, still whole for now, wavering worse than ever as his knees finally buckle. He gawks through it all, attempting to form words, but nothing’s coming.

It's when his knees meet the floor that the severed half of him finally sloughs away, clattering to the floor while the remainder of his body slowly folds up on itself and slumps at Kesla’s feet. It doesn’t take long for what’s left of his blood to leak out of the two severed halves, but by then everyone’s turning to me.

Just as my own legs finally give out and I fall down.