RE: Monarch

There was no grotesque shifting and splitting of limbs as there had been with the other abominations, nor did cowl hold any of the strange, disquieting animal quality of the infernal’s transformation. But his eyes grew a deep red, his body sagging and shuddering.

He glanced up at the cascading paper birds lit with demon-fire, and seemed to come to the same conclusion as me. Time was the enemy.

With reckless abandon, he threw himself towards me, and our careful dance devolved into an all-out brawl. Darkness shrouded his hands. He was fast, far faster than I was prepared for—and the feint I’d expected never came. Instead, he crashed into me faster than I could swing my sword, grabbing my shoulders in a wrestlers grip. The smell of ozone grew unbearable as mana surged into the spots.

I shifted his weight and threw him, flinging him away from me, but not before the charging mana went off at my shoulder in a shrieking hiss. My sword clattered to the ground, hilt bouncing once before I scooped it back up. Everything in me was screaming to close distance, but he’d been slippery enough before the transformation. Instead, I reached up and called the air, bringing the fiery parchment down like flaming birds of prey. He dodged the first few easily, but there were too many.

One smacked into the back of his neck, setting his dark robe alight. It didn’t catch nearly as quickly as it should have—he must have treated his robes with something—and he put it out quickly with a patch of darkness.

There was another sharp hiss as he reached into the air and summoned a perfectly shaped rod made from darkness, the end pointed.

But it had cost him time he didn’t have. Exploiting the speed inscriptions, I leapt over the small fissure and landed, carved a burning gash across his thigh.

But Cowl didn’t budge, or react to the impact. Instead, the tip of his spear popped up suddenly, aiming directly for my eye. There was nowhere to go, no way to get clear.

A thin, pressurized line of water came from above, slicing across the back of Cowl’s neck, followed by a spatter of water mixed with dark blood covering the ground. I glanced up at Jorra and nodded. His face was set, grim. Even in the throes of battle, I realized what it meant. If Cowl hadn’t protected himself from the corruption, it would have been a killing blow.

Cowl whirled around, his attention split between the mouth of the cave-in, the circling paper birds, and me. And I knew at that moment that he’d already lost. Panic was starting to creep in. Despite all his preparation and power, he’d lost the mental war.

As if sensing this, Cowl charged, spear held low and aimed at my guts. I let the rage go and settled into the mindset of cold calculation instead. Slowly, I wore him down, using my air magic to keep the birds aloft, bring one after another down when he was off-balance. He kept putting out the flame, but his reactions weren’t instant: the burns were increasing, hindering his mobility.

I dodged beneath his strikes, letting my training and experience take over. Over and over, I baited him, allowing the jagged spear tip to pass inches from my face before moving, rotating. The fact that it was a pole arm actively hurt him. I’d spent too much time sparring with Maya to not recognizing the body movement, to be able to predict everything. I kept waiting for him to shift gears, to pull another trap out or a poison.

But no. He’d stopped fighting smart and was just trying to brute force his way through this, and I’d spent too long fighting opponents bigger and stronger than me to fall to someone weaker who was attempting the same thing.

Cowl finally changed tact, right before the end. He pulled his spear back and threw it at me. My body tensed as I prepared to leap out of the way, but then, I stopped.

A dozen thoughts ran through my head in a split-second. It made no sense for him to throw his spear away. Even in the altered state, I didn’t think he was stupid. What if he’d spent the entire last half of the fight building up to this moment. Luring me into a rhythm before he struck, using one last piece of unexpected magic to finish me. It wasn’t hard to get out of the way of a spear. He had to know that.

So, I didn’t move. Instead, I brought up my gauntleted left arm, palm facing up, and caught the spear. As soon as it impacted, it began to bubble, growing wider, rapidly increasing in mass and volume. I grunted as the gauntlet absorbed it faster than it could replicate, my entire left arm going numb before the shadow flared out in a dark wing out of the side of the gauntlet, sending me tumbling from the back-blast.

My skin grew clammy at the close call. How strong was the magic if Ozra’s gauntlet had to vent it?

Cowl was panting now, looking like a caged animal, angry but completely drained. He began the process of resummoning the spear.

No.

I reached out to the air, dragging it around in a circle. One by one, the fiery birds were caught in the draft, until they all rotated in a circular spiral. Then, calling upon the control that Saladius taught me, I pulled my fist down.

Cowl staggered as he was struck by dozens of flaming projectiles, one after another. His little circles of darkness danced around his body, but it was like trying to put out an inferno with a watering can. The magician began to scream and staggered backward. I advanced, stoking the flame, the coldness taking me. Cowl spun madly, trying to fight, trying to extinguish himself, before tripping into the open whole.

Still, even on fire, his ruined hand grasped the ledge as his body dangled from the fissures edge.

He stared up at me, his eyes panicked.

Slowly, I let the bloodlust go. I willed the flames to recede, dying down to dark violet embers. He struggled on the ledge as I bent down before him.

“I won’t repeat myself.” My voice sounded strangely calm. “Tell me what Thoth is after and it will go better for you.”

Cowl sneered. Again, I was taken with how young he looked.

“You’re not a fool enough to spare me.”

“No.” I shook my head. “But I don’t have to burn you on the way down.”

He paled, then laughed shakily. “Cold. She was right about you. You really are something different. Something new. But that doesn’t matter. What was it you said to me? Thoth is beyond you. Any of us.”

It was an echo of I thought I’d held for quite some time. But I didn’t need to hear it from him. Casually, I shifted my foot, positioning it over his hand. His eyes widened.

“What? You’re not going to ask me my name? If I have any family? Give me the toll for the crossing?” His cackle tinged with despair.

It was a momentary surprise as realized what he was referencing. An image of Tusk flashed through my mind. Thoth had been watching me outside Kholis. It wasn’t hard to fathom that Cowl had as well. Gods, that felt like a lifetime ago. In many ways, it had been.

“Last chance.” I let my foot rest on his fingers.

“Fine,” Cowl said, his voice tight. “She intends to open the gate to the prime leyline, releasing everything tainted inside.”

My gut clenched. I’d suspected, but there was nothing like definitive confirmation. I removed my foot and placed a hand to my forehead, a spell of dizziness settling over me.

“There might be a way to come out on top.” Cowl’s voice was quieter, more in control. “Lift me up, and we can talk.”

“You can talk from there.”

“I wasn’t born yesterday.” Cowl growled. “I know what happens here if I give up my leverage.”

I considered it. My goal up to this point had been information. For once, I didn’t have much of a plan. Chasing blindly after Thoth wasn’t much different from riding a dire wolf. Eventually, it would come back to bite me, and I couldn’t afford to play fast and loose until I was confident the reset point had moved.

Then, I shook my head. “No. Tell me first. That’s the only option you have.”

“You’ll kill me,” Cowl said.

“Maybe. You’ve been watching me long enough to know that my word is my bond, but I suppose there’s no guarantee. If you want to live, it’s just a chance you’ll have to take.”

He considered that, his face conflicted. Then he seemed to settle on a decision. “Very well. The gate itself isn’t hard to open when you have the key. The tricky part is the trial.”

“What kind of trial?”

“I don’t know. She wouldn’t tell me, but it seemed like she had experience with it. One of the few times I’ve seen her look that uncomfortable. Like she somehow knew exactly what to expect.”

“And your solution?” I prompted.

The last fragments of hesitation finally left him. “The gate itself. From what I understand, it’s nearly impossible to open from the inside. The only way it’s kept the monsters within at bay. She’ll have posted guards, mercenaries, probably. If you can deal with them…”

“We may be able to lock her inside,” I realized. It wasn’t a permanent solution. I seriously doubted that any prison could hold Thoth, no matter well defended or magical, but it could potentially buy time to assemble Ozra and whatever Sanctum elders we could scrounge up. The question was if it would be enough.

I closed my eyes. “Thank you.”

“Now help me up.”

“Is Saladius alive?” I asked. My chest felt cold, hollow.

“Who?” Cowl replied.

“The infernal you fought in the desert chamber.”

Cowl said nothing.

Slowly, I reached down towards him, saw his spirits lift. There was no anger in me, no coldness, as I reached down past his arm, down to his satchel, removing it from his belt as he dangled.

“Wait—what are you doing?” Cowl said, grasping at me as I stood back up, his face wilting. “What happened to your word?”

“You killed a friend of mine. A lot of my friends. Repeatedly.” As I spoke, his eyes glazed over. “And if I let you go, who’s to stop you from coming after me again to fulfill your missive? That’s something we have in common, I think. We do whatever is needed. And anything that gets in our way is just another obstacle to be overcome.”

“You fucking hypocrite.”

“Probably.” I said. And then I planted my foot on his head and shoved. The scream that tore from his throat lingered long after he fell, and the flames flared to life, consuming his flesh, a fading violet beacon that disappeared into the waiting void. If the fall didn’t kill him, the fire would. Either way, I wasn’t taking any chances.

I staggered back from the edge, spent, and took a moment to survey the battlefield. It was covered with small craters from the mana detonation, small flames still burning and smoke from the demon-fire obscuring my vision.

Maya finished her descent down the rope. Her face was tinged with exhaustion and worry, and for a moment, I thought she might embrace me. Then she stopped. Bell raced past her and jumped on me. I grunted under the weight, laughing as she peppered me with questions on the particulars of the battle.

“I don’t know how you managed it!” Bell exclaimed.

“With some excellent help,” I smiled.

Jorra nodded. “Still, it wasn’t nothing. Even with the assist, you took on a full magician in a direct confrontation and won.”

Maya went to work tending my wounds, and a feeling of relief went through me as my ribs and side mended.

“I’m sorry.” I looked at them. The words were hard to say. It felt like even speaking them was lending legitimacy to the staged argument.

There wasn’t an immediate response. Instead, the conversation halted for a moment, and the resumed, as if I hadn’t spoken at all.

“It worked.” Bell shrugged.

“It’s hard to argue with the results,” Jorra agreed.

Maya didn’t speak, just continued to mend my wounds.

I tossed Jorra the satchel to sort through, warning him to take care to discard anything alchemical that wasn’t raw ingredients. Bell busied herself inspecting the nearby craters.

Maya was so close I could feel the heat from her breath.

“I hurt you,” I said.

“We discussed it beforehand. Decided not to talk about the particulars, so the reaction was real.” Maya’s indifference was almost believable.

“Doesn’t change what I said.”

There was a long pause.

“No, it does not.” Maya’s voice was quiet.

“Are we going to be okay?” I asked her.

“I think so. That does not stop me from wishing we could have talked about some of these things in a more productive manner.”

The silence was heavy between us. Finally, I asked the question that had lingered in the back of my mind for entirely too long.

“What does Ni’lend mean?”

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