Delver Magic: Book 05 - Chain of Bargains (51 page)

"I've already offered you a
bargain. I would have let you live. You seemed determine to fight me. Why the
change?"

"I am still determined to
fight you," Holli admitted. "I have no desire to let you
escape."

Sensing a trick, a feeble attempt
to waste time, the demon prepared to cast another spell that would have
obliterated the elf in an instant. Before it could complete the casting,
however, Holli forced the fiend to a halt.

"The bargain has to do with
victory," she called out. "If you simply destroy me, what have you
gained? Nothing. No bargain has been made."

"I get to escape," the
demon countered.

"Do you? Or is it only
temporary. Enin will still hunt you down. How long can you evade him now that
he knows of your existence? How vengeful will he be if he knows you killed his
apprentice?"

The demon scowled.

"What is it you offer?"

"Why waste your energy trying
to destroy me..."

"Because I can," the
demon interrupted.

"Whether you can or not is
not the issue. You have to admit it will take time and energy."

"You are already wasting
time. Is that what you hope to do now with this false offer?"

Holli actually stepped closer to
the demon.

"If you hear me out completely,
rather than interrupting, you will see that I am offering to put time on your
side instead of pitting it against you. It is Enin you fear, or perhaps the
delver, you said so yourself. I am willing to make an offer that will protect
you against them."

The demon glared at the elf guard
for but a moment.

"Make your offer and make it
clear."

"I think we both agree that
when Enin finishes with your brother, he will return here to deal with you. If
we are both here and alive when he returns, I pledge my service to you as long
as you remain alive or in this realm. When you die or exit this existence, I
forfeit my life as well."

The demon's scowl eased as it
considered the full measure of the bargain. It followed the complexity of the
deal to its conclusion and almost smiled.

"I must add to it," the
demon hissed. "You must vow not to attempt to leave this place until the
wizard arrives."

"I willingly agree. It is my
intention to destroy you or send you back to where you belong. I will not try
to flee."

Realizing that time was, in fact,
on its side, the demon paused to consider the details. It spoke of them as if
trying to clarify the meaning, but it had already placed the context of the
bargain in a form that it could manipulate.

"You will try to kill me, but
I can't kill you," the draevol pointed out. "Ultimately, that is what
you suggest. I'm not sure I like that arrangement."

It was a lie. The demon saw the
true advantage but hoped to string out the agreement to its benefit.

Holli responded with the logic of
the bargain.

"We both know that you do not
fear me. You fear Enin. It is protection against him I offer, and my life must
remain intact for the bargain to hold any sway over him. If I fail to kill you
or fail to force you back to the dark realm before he returns, what can he do?
If he kills you, then based on our bargain, he kills me as well. If you survive
my assault, I am only to remain alive as long as I can be in your service in
this land. He can not even force you back to your realm without sacrificing me.
Why would you want to kill me when keeping me alive is at the heart of the
agreement? All you have to do is survive the battle with me and you have the
ultimate bargaining chip against Enin."

"What of the delver?"

"He will be busy."

"But what if he returns. His
speed and his sword make him almost as dangerous as the wizard, perhaps even
more so."

"I will direct him to stay
out of the fight."

"He may not listen. No, the
battle must remain between you and I. If you gain any external assistance, you
forfeit and I have your vow."

Holli pointed to the roots and
branches that filled the cellar.

"I cannot make that pledge. I
already have the assistance of the trees."

"I'm not talking about
that," the demon hissed. "I'm talking about the delver... and the
other wizard who casts white magic. If they return and assist you, the bargain
falls in my favor."

"Agreed."

"Then try to destroy me, elf,
and hope your wizard master is much less efficient with his power than I expect
him to be. Time is running short for you indeed."

The bargain had been sealed and
both believed they won much. The draevol wished to stay alive, and it was Enin who
it feared. With Holli's life tied to its existence in Uton, the wizard's hands
would be bound. The demon would not have to flee or worry about covering its
escape. It could even use the elf's powers to its advantage once she was forced
into its service. It would have the valleys and grow strong from making it
whither and die. All it had to do was keep the meager elf at bay. An easy prospect.

As for Holli, she placed the demon
on the defensive. She removed all of its offensive advantages. She would not
have to worry about survival and could place all of her efforts on attacking
the draevol. With but one simple bargain, she created a battlefield where the
odds were in her favor.

It was risky. Enin could return at
any time. She knew that was what the draevol was counting on. Holli, however,
remained linked to the wizard in many ways. She knew where he was and what he
faced. He allowed for that link when he agreed to let Holli become both his
guard and his apprentice. If she kept a small part focused upon him, she would
know when he was ready to return, and she would use that advantage to ensure
the demon could not win, for without its knowledge, she already saw one path to
guaranteed victory.

She had to be
alive
when Enin returned for the draevol to win. If she failed in
defeating the draevol, all she would need to do is end her own life. Not a
prospect she relished, but she was an elf guard and vowed to offer her life to
protect her camp. Under Enin, that camp was now the entire land
of Uton.

While she was willing to die for
her duty, she did not wish for that end. She remained determined to find a way
to defeat the demon, and she would attack with all her talents and all her
ferocity.

Without wasting time, she knew she
had to find and exploit some weakness. She would not only be careful, but she
would be deliberate. Her first assaults were not meant to obliterate the
monster or to exhaust her strength and magic. She would jab first, prod and
watch.

With an elf's speed, she pulled an
arrow from her quiver and fired it at the center of the draevol. She watched it
slice through the air and wondered what it would do upon impact.

The demon sneered but made no
attempt to dodge or to block. It cast no spell to shield itself or to alter the
path of the projectile. It allowed the arrow to fly straight and true with
hardly a care toward its target.

The arrow plunged into the demon
at the center of its massive glowing chest. It did not splinter or burn into
ash. It passed harmlessly through the demon and crashed into the bricks of the
wall behind the monster.

It was not a complete surprise to
the elf. Demons were not made of flesh and blood. They were spawned from the
entrails of beast demons. They were entities of filth and disease, glowing
hatred that took the shape of a colossus to instill fear. A pure demon had no
heart, no vital organs. Physical attack would be useless against such a
creature.

She would not, however, ignore her
own physical abilities. She was determined to use her training as an elf guard
to defeat the fiend. She no longer had to focus on defense, but she would
utilize her speed and agility to confuse the monster, keep it off balance. She
only had to find the proper weapon.

Racing about the roots and
branches, she moved in a haphazard, confused pattern, as if trying to avoid
rain drops during a light shower. She was not concerned about dodging an
assault, but she hoped to keep her motives as puzzling as possible. With a
quick twist and then a turn, she cut around to the back of the monster. She
watched it carefully to see how the fiend reacted.

The demon did not move, made no
attempt to turn. It seemed content to remain motionless. Wasting energy to face
the elf was beneath it, like chasing an ant across the forest floor.

Holli wondered if the draevol
suffered from over-confidence. Perhaps it thought it had nothing to fear from
the elf, and she wondered if maybe that was true. If she couldn't attack it
physically, it would come down to a battle of magic. That was a fight the
creature couldn't lose, not to her. Disease, rot and decay overshadowed the
emerald energy of nature, and Holli's magical prowess could not stand up to the
overpowering forces available to the demon.

Not willing to give up, she
returned her focus to the physical aspects of the battle. For a moment, she
wished she still had Ryson's sword. She believed the enchantment might offer a
way to destroy the demon, but the delver had reclaimed his weapon. She would
have to rely on what was within her reach. Unfortunately, the weapons available
to her couldn't harm the draevol.

With that thought, the spark of an
idea formed within her mind. If she couldn't successfully engage the fiend in
its current state, then she needed to change that condition.

The demon continued to ignore her,
giving Holli time and opportunity to consider the dilemma, and she began to
form a tactic of utilizing both magic and physical attack. It was clear to her
that the draevol demonstrated properties of light. It glowed bright white and
its form lacked true substance. Holli's skill over nature gave her enhanced
command over both water and light, for it was within the power of nature to
turn light into energy that would invigorate plants and trees. She wondered if
she could reshape her inherent powers of the emerald magic to focus on the
light and slightly alter the properties of the draevol.

Enin had taught her that utilizing
magic was about finding the right state of mind, about building upon an
abstract concept and using the magical energy to stimulate thought into action
and imagination into reality. Control and depth of energy were important, but
Enin advised her that it was creativity and open-mindedness that molded magic
into its greatest power. She had to avoid casting doubt upon her skills and
placing limitations on the energy within her.

Building upon her idea of light
and nature, she let the concept flow through her perception of reality and
placed it upon the state of the demon. She focused on turning light into
something more, something of substance, and a new spell crystallized in her
mind.

She quickly slipped the bow over
her shoulder and threw her hands together. A green octagon formed about her fingers.
She whispered words that brought clarity to her fledgling idea and then she
cast the energy at the creature.

The emerald magic expanded as it
flew through the air. It turned into a great sheet of yellowish green as it
rose above the fiend's head. It collapsed down upon the monster and covered it
in full. It fused to the monsters body, turning its bright white form into a
lime green shadow.

The spell caused the creature no
pain and the fiend remained indifferent to the activity around it. It showed no
care or concern to the elf's actions, as if Holli was nothing more than some
small, irritating child trying to call for attention.

Holli took hold of her bow and
removed another arrow from her quill. Once more, she fired at the center of the
creature, but this time she aimed for its back and she also expected different
results. She was not disappointed.

The arrow plunged into the center
of the demon and held fast as if it embedded into flesh. The creature howled in
unexpected pain just as Holli smiled with satisfaction.

The draevol finally turned about,
the arrow still sticking in its back.

"What have you done,
elf?"

"Found a way to hurt
you."

"Hurt me? No, you have
annoyed me, nothing more. You think this magical shell that partially
solidifies my substance is a true threat?"

"That shriek of pain was no
mere annoyance," Holli noted.

She fired another arrow in a blur
of motion that almost rivaled a delver, and a second arrow sank into the demon,
this time into its chest. While the creature screamed again in both pain and
fury, Holli ran across the cellar floor, steadied herself against a thick root
and fired a third and fourth arrow. Both found their mark at the creature's
side just below its arm.

The creature screamed again, but
it also raged with anger. Its pale form blazed and the demon fire within it
burned across its entire body. The flames devoured the emerald energy that
surrounded it and the green tint of its body died away. The arrows that had
once stuck in its form disintegrated into dust.

Holli ceased firing arrows as she
knew her spell had been eliminated, but she took hope in the fact she had
indeed found a way to hurt the demon. She had to build on that hope, discover
something the demon could not fight.

The draevol turned to face Holli,
acknowledging that it would no longer leave its back to the elf.

"I will give you a small
amount of credit in becoming more of a pest than I imagined, but that is all
you have done. That, and convinced me that I will be able to use you for far
greater purposes once I have your service bound to me. You were a great fool to
make that bargain and many will suffer because of it."

That would not happen, whether she
could defeat the demon or not, but with the demon fully prepared to defend
itself, Holli began to wonder if her death was the only way to ensure the
creature's defeat. She placed that path in the back of her mind as a last
resort, and continued to search for weaknesses.