Chapter Forty-eight

Lightning blazed across the battleground, and Thea brought wraiths and howlers to their knees. In his peripheral vision, Wilder watched her. She was power incarnate, a tempest personified, a Warsword of the highest calibre, and gods, he loved her.

When all this was over, he would tell her. He would tell her a thousand times over and then a thousand times more. He'd ask her to be his wife, traditions be damned.

But there was no time for that now. He thrust his blade into another howler, fighting the fatigue that had long ago latched onto his bones. They had been fighting for hours. Were it not for the billowing darkness in the sky, he might have wondered if dawn had come and gone.

He faltered. The darkness was amassing at the cliffs beyond the fortress, rising into the sky, seeming to flourish from a point near Thezmarr's border…

‘Tal!' Wilder shouted, fighting his way towards his former mentor. ‘Tal!'

Talemir looked around madly before he clapped eyes on Wilder motioning to the gathering shadows on the horizon.

‘Can you and Dratos scout it?' Wilder called out, ramming the pommel of his sword into a howler's nose before slicing his second blade across its gut, rotten intestines spilling out.

With a whistle, Talemir signalled to Dratos across the battlefield.

‘Feel free to take out as many wraiths as possible on the way,' Wilder added, as the two shadow-touched warriors spread their wings and launched themselves skyward.

Not wasting another moment, Wilder forged a path through the fighting to the entrance of the fortress. Monsters were still spilling from within, and he meant to put a stop to it. He left a trail of corpses in his wake as he headed to the Great Hall, before stopping in his tracks.

It was a husk.

At the head of the hall stood the Three Furies – imposing stone carvings of the three mighty weapons brandished by the original Warswords. Anchored to the ground, the sculptures reached up to the ceiling, where the hilts pierced through the rafters and into the night sky. Only now, they were wrapped in slithering shadows. And where crackling fires had once blazed in the hearths of the hall and tables had seated great warriors, there was a raging whirlpool of darkness. With shadows rippling from the thick stone pavers, a portal yawned wide, monsters pouring forth from its depths.

What had Kipp called the hall? The heart of their operation?

‘Fuck,' Wilder muttered.

‘Hawthorne!'

He whirled around to see the strategist in question at the doorway.

‘Get out of here,' Kipp panted. ‘I've got it covered!'

Wilder was already moving towards him. ‘What do you mean?'

‘Wren gave me something – we're going to blow up the chambers below.'

‘Esyllt said —'

‘Our dear weapons master had a change of heart,' Kipp replied.

Wilder nodded. ‘Bring it down. Like you said. Bring the whole thing down,' he rasped, shaking his head in disbelief at the sight. The darkness was already desecrating the stone swords and everything they stood for.

‘Exactly!' Kipp said. ‘As soon as you get the fuck out of the way.'

Wilder gripped the strategist's shoulder. ‘Don't die again.'

‘Trying not to,' Kipp muttered, practically shoving him from the hall.

Wilder left Kipp to his explosions, and sprinted back to the courtyard – only to skid to a stop in shock.

A vortex of dark magic had opened up in the heart of the fray, sucking in monsters, men and women alike, their screams silenced as they disappeared into the gaping black hole.

It was an even larger portal than the one Wilder had just seen. Audra and her army were battling the wraiths that poured from the abyss, but nothing prepared Wilder for what he saw next. A rheguld reaper – the largest he had ever seen, its sinewy flesh covered in miniature wraiths that crawled across him like spiders.

A wave of nausea hit Wilder at the sight, but he forced himself forward, swords raised, ready to slash and carve until he could no more —

But the reaper lashed out with talons and shadow, raining smaller wraiths down on the field below, a sickening wave of darkness and violence taking hold.

Panic seized Wilder's chest in a cruel fist as he was overcome, swarmed by dozens and dozens of wraiths, their talons scraping over his armour, cutting into his exposed flesh. He barely felt it. Not as the rheguld reaper stalked towards Thea, who was similarly overcome, fighting back an onslaught of wraiths and reapers, blood dripping down her face.

‘Thea!' Wilder shouted, but he was too far away, too overwhelmed —

A deep warrior cry filled the air. Wilder's gaze snapped up to see Torj leap from the surrounding wall, his war hammer raised over his head.

Wilder's heart shot into his throat.

There was no way a strike from that hammer could kill the reaper, only momentarily divert its attention from Thea… But Torj was airborne, hurtling towards the monster, and the portal of darkness behind it.

‘Torj, no!' someone in the distance screamed, realising at the same time as Wilder that he was buying Thea time with his life, that he would be swallowed by the black vortex.

All Wilder could do was watch as the Bear Slayer's mighty form soared through the air, his hammer poised for impact. It was as though time had stagnated in the final moments before his death —

A formidable crack cleaved through what little remained of the fortress, and a blaze of light blinded Wilder. Staggering back, the wraiths falling away from his body, he shielded his eyes, blinking through spotted vision to see a bolt of lightning collide with Torj's hammer.

It hadn't come from Thea, who was still overrun with monsters on the ground herself. It had come from the parapet.

Where Wren was holding out a trembling hand.

The iron seemed to absorb the shock, the power of her storm magic, sparks racing through the runes on the weapon as Torj soared through the air and brought his hammer down on the reaper's head.

Its horns shattered upon impact. With lightning still crackling from his hammer, Torj drove the creature down into the ground, the mass of darkness, the swirling vortex surging for them both. Shadow erupted as the Warsword hit the cobbles and tendrils of obsidian obscured everything from view, swallowing the reaper and the Bear Slayer whole.

Wilder loosed a shaky breath, his whole body tense as he took a step forward, towards the dissipating coils of night.

Shouts sounded from those on the parapets as they saw first what the vanishing shadows revealed.

Solid ground; strange, scorched patterns extending out across the cracked cobbles.

Torj Elderbrock had sealed the portal, banishing the reaper and the monsters closest to it back to the festering pit from which they'd come.

The Warsword hadn't succumbed to the pull of the darkness. He knelt on one knee in the rubble, braced over his hammer, sparks still flitting along the iron. Torj lifted his head slowly, and Wilder froze.

The golden-haired warrior was no more. He had been kissed by lightning and thunder, and scorch marks blackened the ground where he knelt. Thrumming with renewed Furies-given power, he stood. His hair, now silver, caught in the wind as he squared his shoulders. His gaze, now as dark as the shadows he'd vanquished, went to the young storm wielder on the parapet.

‘Holy shit…' Wilder muttered, words Torj himself would usually say.

He felt Thea at his side, following his stare from the Bear Slayer to Wren. ‘Incredible,' she whispered. ‘She let him wield her power.'

And then the moment was gone, swallowed up by the rest of the battle still raging on. Talemir and Dratos chose that moment to land before them. The determination blazing in their eyes was all the confirmation Wilder needed.

Facing Thea, he grasped her hands in his. ‘We have to go to the cliffs now. There, you can end it.'

Thea gave a single nod. ‘Yes,' she said simply.

‘What about Wren?' Talemir motioned to the flashes of light atop the walls.

Wilder shook his head. ‘Her magic is needed here. She needs to defend what's left of our forces.' He turned back to Thea and cupped her jaw, forcing her eyes to meet his. ‘You can do this. You were forged with blood and steel, with lightning and thunder… You were made for this war, made to end it, and you will, for all of us. When I first saw you spying on the Warsword meeting atop the cliffs, I sensed it in you even then.'

Tears lined Thea's eyes. ‘What?'

‘Greatness,' he told her.