AsTheWormTurns[Continued from It Takes Two To Trump] With the last Hound disposed of, Malachi had bought them a momentary reprieve. And sniper fire from high above kept the lumbering shapes in the distance at bay, striking down walking corpses and monstrosities of all shapes and horrible design. Pelageya and Fiona's defensive runes slowed most of them to a crawl - allowing the soldiers more time to dispatch them. But as the world twisted inside out, they couldn't contain the ceaseless influx of Nyx's creations. Gillian saw it first - the wide, long dimple in the ground rushing toward the hill - as if something massive was displacing the earth beneath it. Like an arrow, it streaked towards them, carving out a tunnel through the earth. They had mere seconds before the train-sized reptilian creature burst through the side of the bunker, nearly flattening Martin and the others. Its segmented body - as sleek like a centipede- began to fill their shelter. Massive jaws hinged open to reveal vertical razor-sharp plates erupting from tumorous cartilage. Barely visible in the poor light, Gillian could see twin glands near the back of its throat - hissing with poisonous steam. Both she and Malachi realized with dawning horror that it had dug a pathway for its fellow monstrosities. If it freed itself from the ground, not only would they'd be likely crushed by its sheer bulk... but they'd also be overrun by whatever was behind it in the tunnel. <This concludes the social portion of our program,> Malachi thought with grim humor. He immediately moved between Gillian and the monster. "Finish what you need to do," he said, sounding far more calm than he felt. "I can't rejoin them, dammit," she snapped, her anger at the situation bleeding through. With a feral growl, [Malachi] leapt at the monster, thrusting his long spear at its eyes and trying to dash past when the beast flinched. Seizing a segment of the colossal creature's head, he swung himself up, trying to mount up atop it. Although its 'eyes' were invisible, Malachi's instincts must have been on the mark - the creature turning its head defensively to avoid the spear thrust. Deftly dodging its metallic maw and rows of cutting segments, he scrambled onto its slick back. It bucked and swung, forcing him to hold on rather than press his attack. Seeing Malachi's heroic madness, Gillian swallowed down the killing spell rising to her lips. Instead, she filtered the deadly magicks into another form and technique - reigning over the forces of wind and air. Her Power reached into the creature's rudimentary lungs, drawing out the air in a violent burst. The creature arched its back in agony, the rarefaction shredding its lung tissue. Bloody foam and meat spilled out of its mouth in a stinking loud. This also drew out the poisonous cloud forming in its mouth, which she ensnared. A part of her repelled at the destruction she forced upon another living thing, but that part was distant. Gillian smiled. The beast was well on its way to death, but remained stubbornly dangerous - thrashing its serrated body back and forth like a saw-blade. And Gillian had a swirling, churning cloud of acidic poison under her control. She searched over the ridge for a suitable target for her poison cloud. As rifts in time and space tore open around them, Gillian was offered a plethora of targets. Fortunately, Pelageya's runic protections kept the rifts at a distance, so the verminous mass of flesh and steel assembling around the hill had plenty of ground to cover to reach them. She sensed an intrusion of the Logrus very near. Someone was gating in. Cynwyd. Malachi clung to the monster's back with one hand and the steel-shod toe of one boot, grasping his ash-hafted spear in the other, bounced around like a rag doll with a determined, tenacious grip. He knew nothing of GIllians' sorcery, thought only of driving his spear through the creature's brain before it could harm her or disrupt whatever was happening on this hill. Ignorant of the details, the big man nonetheless knew that the fate of Amber and all its shadows had become concentrated in that little scrap of nameless geography. With a painful effort, he watched for his moment. It came in short order, the beast arching its arrow-shaped head forward, parting the segments of chitin and metal, exposing the rotting meat beneath. His spear thrust down, penetrating through the greasy sinew, and severing the creature's spine nerves. Disconnected from its rudimentary brain, the remainder of body shut off and collapsed forward... ...Nearly flattening Cole, who suddenly crash-landed into the trench - riding some kind of soft-winged glider. The creature's maw flexed and spit and then grew still. Upon the lone hill, the ragtag group who'd begun as strangers and become brother and sisters at arms witnessed the ruination of Amber. Even as the blood of their enemies pooled around their feet, the Nyx high above them began to tear apart the last strands of Reality, forcing its way into their world. Rifts of all shapes and sizes opened, letting free the spawn of her flesh, the atrocities of her blood. Screams and cries of the dead and dying filtered up to greet them like terrible music. Having realized its truest threat, She Who Dwelled In Darkness, directed every last ounce of her Will toward the lone hill... her Children annihilating everything in their path, ignorant of their own deaths and suffering. Only her Will remained to them. Even the giant wyrm Malachi had felled shuddered and trembled as dozens of beasts gnawed their way through its flesh - so much more supple and tender than hard earth. Rhea and Temnal stood like ghosts, fighting against some unseen adversary. The strain of their conflict hollowing them out, pulling them deeper and deeper into Oblivion. How they continued on in spite of their obvious torment taxed the imagination. For a moment, victory appeared impossible. The Nyx could not be unseated from her throne. Her words were inescapable. Death came to every man. And was that not better than true annihilation? Would it not be easier to lie down and accept their Fate? What could they do in the face of this endless tide? And then, just when all seemed lost, a scream ripped across the battlefield. A scream inhuman and impossible in its intensity. The Blind Bull was dying. Felled by a single woman. And with its death, so died the Nyx's Anchor to this realm. A moan of desperation echoed through the Nyx's spawn. A cry of confusion and disbelief. And that sound, though hideous and ugly, contained something beautiful, joyous. Hope. Rhea and Temnal surged forward against the Nyx, empowered by this sound. If they were allowed those last few moments to complete their great work... Amber would be saved. But as the tide resumed its rush toward the lone hill, the ragtag band of witches and warriors could only wonder... would they be alive long enough to see it? Down on the battlefield, the single woman who had felled the Blind Bull was still alive, although still gravely wounded. Her eyes watched the death of the Bull, and the sky above, and the hill. Her part, however, was for the moment, done. Pelageya could and would watch the end. Gillian looked at the ghostly forms of Temnal and Rhea. Either they would prevail or they wouldn't and there was nothing she could do about it. She turned away and gazed down the ridge at the enemies of Amber and felt anger burn inside her. If death and oblivion was her fate, well by damn she was not going to go gently. She waved her arms and her poisonous cloud spread in a horizontal arc and blew down onto the field below. The swirling cloud descended at her whim, catching up enemy after enemy in its wake. In addition to the paralytic qualities of the gas, its acidic touch promised slow, ugly death to anything it touched. Skin blistered, lungs seared, eyes melted, weapons rusted. However, after three passes, the cloud began to dissipate, losing its effects. Had this been another force, they would have been given pause - but the Oblivion-mad entities simply crawled over the bodies of the fallen to press ever forward. Their goal went without saying, the consequences even more so. Though Cynwyd's Other was a willworker of the greatest degree- Cynwyd had never totally appropriated that. The weapons that he employed were more visceral, and ended very close to his fists. It's wasn't because he couldn't operate on a larger level- just that he *enjoyed* working close in. But there was no way a single blade, no matter how powerful, could stem this tide... Cynwyd's hand came up, almost unbidden. He reached into the place from whence he called Nuala, deep, at the center of his power. Unbeknownst to him, the winds whipped up around him as he stood rigid and motionless, struggling to control a primordial force within himself. The changes wrought by Solataire helped him in this regard to comprehend what was going on- even as they hindered his ability to arrest the tide that was coming forth- if he let it out uncontrolled, there was no telling if he'd be able to put the genie back in the bottle. His face began to darken even as his green eyes burned with an unholy light. His body convulsed with the power racing through it, as dark, jagged blades burst out from his form as the power in him woke to its full flood. He wanted to kill, ravage, destroy anything and everything in his path. Though he was changed, that outstretched hand was still human... Then he realized that in order to control the merging with Nuala, he'd have to embrace the power she gave him. And with a word, the power exploded from him in a titanic flash of blood-red light as he ran towards his enemy. The energy coalesced into claws that sought his enemies with malicious intent, writhing, lengthening, rending, tearing... lit by the supernatural glow of this force, Cywnyd's face was a mask of pure malevolence. Blood spattered Cynwyd's face and arms as severed body parts and viscera littered the ground around him. An inhuman howl blended with the sounds of the battlefield as internally Cynwyd struggled to direct the force of nature he'd become- to differentiate friend from foe, and force himself not to range too far afield as his world descended into one of continuous death and destruction. Greater and greater terrors rose to meet Cynwyd, all falling before him. Some portion of him remained aware of his proximity to the buttress, pulling him back whenever the bloodlust dragged him too far. With his strength and adaptability, the Nyx's army could not react fast enough to count him or overcome him. It became a cycle of death upon death, slaughter upon slaughter. But the western flank held for his tenacity and tenacity alone. Cole took a stance with his back to Rhea and Temnal, his sword held in both hands, the etching on the red blade swirling with hunger. A memory came to him from Finndo, and he drew upon it: another way to use the Pattern, to manifest its eternal nature within himself, the power to resist and endure. Something in Cole's blood responded. An image came to him: the great oaks of his homeland, second in size only to the giants of Arden, weathering storms from the sea. Cole's skin darkened, roughened, and took on the toughness and texture of oak bark. His feet broke through his shoes and gripped the ground like roots. He grew taller, and his arms grew longer, stronger, until he stood over the battlefield like one of Malachi and Corwin's mechanical colossi. A crown of leaves burst forth from the top of his head. He swung his blade and roared defiance at the Nyx's oncoming spawn. "YOU WANT OBLIVION?" he shouted. "COME TO ME! I WILL GIVE IT TO YOU!" And come they did. In legions. Humans and monsters alike, all twisted into crude mockeries, but no less deadly for it. His blade plunged again and again into flesh and bone, painting himself and the ground crimson with gore. And as stalwart as his namesake, Cole remained rooted to the spot, preventing any and all from approaching the twin ghosts. Between their valiant efforts, the hill did not fall. The few soldiers remaining around the hill - only human - gave their lives; inspired by this display of unwavering duty. Desperation ran through the Adversary's children like wildfire. They sensed the impending defeat, yet did not recognize it, for they'd never experienced it before. Rhea's figure solidified, though she appeared gaunt, exhausted from whatever trial took place on the other side. "It's almost time," she cried out. "Just a minute longer." The thing that had been Cole laughed. "Take your time," he said in a deep, booming voice. "I can do this all day." It probably wasn't true: though his sword and his red metal bracers had protected him from most of the attacks, he had several gashes in his bark, and thick red sap leaked from each. But he was here, and Rhea was here, and that was all he needed for now. "I brought you a present, if you like," he added, indicating the rifle at his feet. Rhea picked up the rifle, more for comfort than conflict. Her focus remained on Temnal, and her duty to him. Pain-laced tears streaked the bone dust from her face. Cynwyd--or that which Cynwyd became--held the the western flank. Cole held another. Fire came easily to Gillian earlier, so she stood on the edge of the ridge and released fire down the middle, waves of fire that consumed bone and sinew and in its intensity purged the monsters to ash. Together, they stood. Together, they felled a legion. Against the ceaseless onslaught, only they remained. Bodies stacked up, creating their own landscape - a terrain of blood and flesh and ruin. But none could overcome the sheer might of the Chosen. And, together, they accomplished the impossible. Rhea cried out in pain, and then triumph. The air in front of her split open, birthing a man from its inky void. Temnal, yet-not-Temnal; his body warped and reshaped by his sacrifices. She cradled him in his arms, holding his prone figure like a child, soothing him with her words. He lay limp and nerveless, naked as a babe newborn. His flesh was wasted as if by long starvation, with golden skin stretched on a rack of bone. Hair like a spill of cool moonlight fell over Rhea's arm. It was hard to tell if he was breathing. They didn't have long before his success became evident, the effects around them almost immediate. The numerous rifts in the air and sky sputtered into nothingness. With them, so went the unsettling distortions of color and space; the pristine skies of Amber returning above them, crystalline moonlight softening the bleak landscape. The numerous creatures simply feel apart, crumbling like cinders and ash, blowing away in the breeze. The Possessed collapsed like puppets with their strings cut; finding blessed relief. Around them, the sounds of battle slowly faded, replaced by ecstatic cheers. Amber had survived. Amber remained. The Fall had not come. As the great moon shone down upon the True City, only the thing remaining was to count its glorious dead. Down on the field, near where the Blind Bull had been felled, Pelageya looked up in wonder. Success had been achieved. Impossible, improbable, unexpected success. The costs were great and in the time to come the true costs would be registered and tallied. But, set against the possibility, the probability of total annihilation, the costs were a price bearable. She found herself wondering who had survived, who had not, and what of Amber and the world remained, was left to be rebuilt, and what there was to do. Her body continued to knit together and soon she would rise, and join her compatriots. The thing that had been Cole sat down next to Rhea and took her in his lap, holding her even as she held Temnal. "All done," he rumbled softly. "Rest now." Rhea shivered instinctively as Cole shed his Oaken Shape. Even so, she reached out for him, sinking into him - so light and gaunt. A thousand ages drained from her sparrow-frail body. Temnal's eyelids fluttered, then opened halfway, his eyes gleaming gold. He looked up into Rhea's face. "Lady," he whispered, almost to softly to be heard. "You've saved me again." "What does that mean?" Cole asked her. Rhea blushed brightly, tears renewed. "He's mistaking me for his Goddess. I saw her in his mind. And I'm nothing like her." She brushed Temnal's hair back, "Listen to my Love. Sleep now." The golden eyes closed again, gratefully, in sleep. Gillian collapsed down onto the little hillock of grass where she'd been standing and stared out at the field below her. She felt...she didn't really know what she felt. Elation? Relief? Numbness? She needed...Seabhac, to feel his arms around her. She brought his trump to mind and reached out to him. It took a moment, but the connection opened. Seabhac's sad smile greeted her. <There's my Gilly.> She felt his hand slip into hers across the ether, offering her the comfort she required. Gillian stepped through to him, disappearing from the field. [Gillian continued in in Tears Under Moonlight] |
