Black Magic (27 page)

Koray nodded. "You are beginning to feel the Goddess. Welcome to being herded about like a witless sheep—" Pain spiked behind his eyes again, but he stubbornly finished with a mutter, "Witless sheep, that's all we are."

"I will gladly be a sheep if it means I am not a demon," Brekk said. "Well, if the Goddess is saying I have cause to fear for Emel then I am going after them. Though I would love to be able to fly, that would draw attention. Shall we ride?"

"Yes," Koray said and pushed back a sudden, sharp longing for Sorin. He did not need Sorin to fight his battles and he would do well to remember that.

They followed Emel and the soldiers as closely as possible, but did not dare draw too close. Koray kept a sharp eye out for anything in the surrounding fields where high grass could easily hide threats until too late.

The only thing he could not watch was his back. Koray felt the presence of demons, but before he could react the demons were upon them. He screamed as he was grabbed hard from behind, claws digging into his skin even through layers of fabric. He was hauled into to the sky at a dizzying rate, the wind and snow stinging his eyes and making it impossible to see.

He struggled anyway, drawing breath for a fresh scream, pulling upon every scrap of his spiritual energy in the hopes it would be able to do something—and screamed in stark-white terror when the demon let him go.

Then it grabbed his arm, left him dangling, and Koray began to cry. The demons claws bit into his wrist, but there was nothing he could do to escape the pain. He could feel warm blood trickling down his arm beneath his sleeves. "L-l—" He thought better of the demand and instead shouted, "What do you want with me, demon?"

It only growled and offered a smile that made Koray shudder. Off in the distance, directly in the path they currently flew, he could see a black-looking castle. The demon feigned dropping him again, but Koray no longer had the breath to scream. He was just too terrified.

Then he heard a more familiar snarl, right before a dark shadow slammed into the white demon. It let him go and rounded on Brekk, who raked his claws across its face and threw it aside. He dove, catching Koray up before heading rapidly toward the ground.

Koray cried out as Brekk abruptly dropped him, but it was cut off when he landed in a massive pile of snow and sank down into it. Then Brekk was gone again, growls filling the air. Koray struggled to his feet and clumsily dragged himself out of the snow bank.

A slaughter greeted him. He didn't know why the demon had snatched him, but while Koray had been in the air, a great many other demons had attacked the group of Navath and Vindeia soldiers. Most of the Navathian soldiers looked to have fallen as well as some of the knights and paladins.

Forcing his hands to steady, Koray drew his sword and plunged into the fray, though he spent most of his time just distracting the demons long enough to give the paladins and alchemists a fighting chance.

But the demons never seemed to stop coming.

A snarling roar filled the air and Brekk crashed down on top of a demon that was beating Emel. He sank his claws into the demon's throat. Blood gushed out, the demon thrashing wildly as it tried to buck or tear Brekk off. Brekk snarled again and his entire body seemed to shimmer—and the demon dropped dead to the ground. Letting him go, Brekk stood over the body, panting heavily, claws dripping blood, and his eyes shining dark violet.

Koray shivered as an unmistakable feeling washed over him. "You broke its spirit. How—how in the name of the Goddess did you do that?"

"I don't know," Brekk said and then the still that had fallen shattered and the fighting began anew. But whatever Brekk had done, it had woken all new powers in him.

Koray fell back as he became more hindrance than help, settling for getting the wounded out of harm's way, though he was impeded as he flinched and cowered every time the rush of wings passed too close.

When at last the fighting ceased, Koray felt sick to see how few remained standing. He helped Lisay with the last of the wounded and then stood up to do his part.

"That is the worst attack we have so far endured," the Navathian captain said, wiping blood from his face. His face twisted with grief and anger as he looked over his fallen men. An alchemist approached him, and when she lightly touched his chest, the captain hugged her tightly, burying his face in her hair.

Koray left them to attend the wounded and dead, pulling out his incense and the bowl to hold it. Lighting it, he set the bowl in a clear space in the middle of all the carnage and drew his hands together in prayer, eyes falling shut.

At first, the prayers would not come. Try as he might, he could not find his usual calm. Fear still made his heart pound as those awful moments of climbing and falling and falling again played over and over in his mind. It clogged his throat, clogged his thoughts, and more tears spilled from his closed eyes.

Longing for warmth, for reassurance, for the odd comfort of awkward words and steady arms, twisted through him. It was so sharp, so clear, that Koray was half-convinced that if he opened his eyes Sorin would be there.

He opened them and sagged when he saw nothing, but corpses and red-caked snow. Stupid.

The jarring realization that Sorin's warmth was well and truly gone and that his own actions had led to it cut away the fear. No fear, even of demons and falling from the clouds, was greater than the pain of knowing that he had lost the only thing that had ever really mattered to him.

Closing his eyes again, Koray summoned the appropriate prayers and began to chant, pouring out his energy, calling to the ghosts, reassuring them that all was well and they could move on. One by one, the ghosts departed, until Koray finally sank to his knees from utter exhaustion. He shivered with a bone-deep cold no fire would ease and tried not to think about what would.

Footsteps drew his attention and he looked up as boots stopped in front of him. Emel held out a hand and Koray immediately took it—but froze in surprise when Emel pulled him into an embrace that was, Koray realized, so much like those he was forever sharing with the other paladins. Brothers in arms. Tentatively, Koray returned it, absorbing some of Emel's warmth in the process.

"Come on," Emel said as he drew back. "Rosta—the Navath captain who has been escorting us—says there is a good place to make camp a short ways from here, a building of sufficient durability that the demons will not be able to surprise us like that again. Are you all right?"

"I'll be fine," Koray said. "You've helped already."

Emel nodded. "Sorin told me before about the hot/cold thing whenever you touched, and I have heard some of Neikirk's theories on the matter. I admit it's all a bit overwhelming to me—and everything is moving so quickly—but I felt it when I helped you up. I feel replenished slightly, too. But I don't think I compare to sharing with the High Paladin." He winked, then moved away to begin helping those who needed it mount up.

It was still closer to a full mark before they were able to leave and the clouds were so heavy in the sky that it seemed night was already approaching. By the time they finally stopped, the snow had begun to fall so heavily that visibility was a matter of luck.

They poured into what proved to be an old guard tower, or at least so it seemed to Koray. It definitely was comprised largely of barracks. Emel and Brekk barred the door, and Rosta and the alchemist, who had not left his side since the battle, carried firewood out of a storeroom and got a fire lit.

Koray huddled against a bit of wall on a bedroll, bundling up in his cloak, grateful that it was of a good enough quality not to have been rendered useless by the weather. If it was the only thing he got to keep from his time at the castle … well, he would just keep it and care for it and make it last.

He closed his eyes, but could not settle enough to sleep. When he heard the unmistakable sound of Brekk's claws on stone he opened his eyes and looked up as Brekk settled down beside him. "You seem to be coming into your powers," he commented. "You looked like the necromancer version of a paladin, which I suppose is what you are."

"I'm still not certain what I did," Brekk said. "Only that I could feel him strangely. It almost reminded me of stealing energy, but instead of absorbing it I just … broke it and threw it out."

Koray nodded. "There's a particular kind of ghost that does not show up often, but can be extremely brutal when it does. We call them malcontents, so full of rage or hate when they died that the ghost retains enough of it to do real, physical harm to the world. Those spirits are not purified by prayers. They must be, as you say, broken and thrown out. I have not encountered one since I was young, not long after my training was considered complete. It was not what put the white in my hair, but it added a strip of gray." He tilted his head. "If you were not smooth-shaven, I would wager you too would have gray in your hair now. Breaking a spirit is exhausting, draining work. I think it is only because you are a warlock and not a necromancer that you endure it better than I."

"Why does your hair change?"

"It's just a physical side-effect of using too much energy, dipping into life energies when spiritual energies are depleted," Koray said with a shrug. "No different than working too hard and straining a muscle. Priests and paladins suffer their own version of side-effects, I'm sure, though I've never bothered to ask what they are exactly."

Brekk nodded—then abruptly winced and reached up to rub his shoulder.

"What's wrong?"

"Just sore," Brekk said with a shrug and let his hand fall. "My entire body aches. I think it is from all the travelling and fighting and strange new magic. No doubt the weather helps aggravate it further. I hate the cold."

Koray snorted. "Anyone who enjoys the cold is an idiot."

He looked up as Emel laughed, dropping down to join them. "Recalling our earlier, brief discussion of hot and cold, I am fairly certain the High Paladin enjoys the cold."

Rolling his eyes, Koray accepted the steaming bowl Neikirk held out, which proved to contain some sort of thin, cobbled together soup. Koray drank it gratefully, then finally said, "I have said a thousand times he is an idiot. That only confirms it."

Emel chuckled again and passed around a skin of mulled wine that had clearly been warmed by the fire. "Are you all right?" he asked Brekk. "You look to be in pain."

"No worse than anyone, though next time I will let you fly up into the sky and wrest the necromancer from the arms of a demon, then catch him and bring him back down before diving right back into battle."

"I'll leave the flying to you."

Neikirk looked as though he wanted to say something, but simply could not muster the energy, eyes drooping only to snap open before they began to droop once more. Koray knew how he felt, as exhaustion washed over him with food and wine settled in his stomach. But there was still something more he needed to say. "Those demons were trying to carry me toward a black castle, though I cannot begin to guess their purpose."

"I'll speak with Rosta about it," Emel said. "You should all get some sleep. Brekk,
rest.
I will join you shortly, I promise."

Leaving them to argue, Koray set his bowl aside and settled down on his bedroll, pulling his cloak tightly around him and his hood down over his face. Wishing he could banish the cold eating him inside and out, but long used to its presence, he quickly fell asleep.

The sound of someone whimpering jolted him awake, and Koray fumbled in the dark with his cloak and robes before he finally managed to sit up enough. He saw a dark figure shift and sit up, then hunch over in pain.

Brekk's wings fluttered restlessly for a moment before he settled them and climbed to his feet. He stood still for a moment, nearly doubled over as he whimpered again, before he picked his way through the room and slipped outside. Koray went after him, hesitating a moment over waking Emel, but deciding to leave him in peace for the moment. He followed Brekk outside, grimacing at the cold, and after a moment of searching found Brekk huddled in the corner of what remained of a wall. "Brekk?"

He looked up, eyes blazing violet, startling Koray into stillness. Then Brekk groaned, arms wrapping around his waist, bent over so far his head was practically in the snow. "I've never been in so much pain in my life," he said. "It feels like I am coming apart."

Koray drew close and knelt beside him. He lightly touched Brekk's arm, recoiling at the way he felt nearly too hot to touch—but not in the same way as Sorin, who felt like sun-warmed stone or a bath just shy of boiling. No, Brekk felt more like he had a dangerous fever. "Brekk—"

Brekk cried out then bit down on his lip to fight the scream, blood dripping where his teeth broke skin. "Make it stop!" he begged and tried to surge to his feet, wings flapping. But he only fell again, landing face down in the snow before he curled on his side, sobbing in agony.

"I don't know what to do," Koray murmured and went to go get help—but a sharp pain made him stop, turn back. "Damn you," he said with a sigh, but obediently dropped down beside Brekk again. Brekk jerked, screamed into the snow, and Koray reached out to drag Brekk into his lap.

He was half-surprised his fingers did not burn where he touched Brekk. After a moment, Koray realized Brekk's energies were fracturing as they tried to fight whatever was going on. He poured his own energy into Brekk, twining their energies together, calming Brekk's down.

That stilled Brekk some, though he still whimpered and writhed. Koray watched, horrified, as his skin began to … warp, somehow. It split, cracked, flaked and peeled away, leaving black skin and scarlet blood in the snow. Brekk moaned, looking up at Koray with pain-glazed eyes. Koray reached out to touch his face—and jerked back when one of Brekk's horns fell away and broke into pieces in the snow.

The other fell off shortly thereafter. Brekk tried to scream, but only a thin whine escaped, however, and Brekk jerked
hard
, turning over in Koray's lap so his face was buried in Koray's robes. Koray held his shoulders firmly, doing all that he could to keep Brekk steady though he felt completely helpless.