Incarnation: Wandering Stars Volume One (4 page)

Why do we keep doing this?  How long are we supposed to watch each other die?
  Is there even victory on the other side of this war?

One after another, faces
sprang
into Sariel’s mind. 
Iryllur
. 
Anduar
. 
Vidir
.  Soldiers.  Friends.  He closed his eyes, but the memories only became more vivid.  Ages of loss concentrated into one moment.  When he opened his eyes, tears rolled down his cheeks.

Amthardel
was leaning more heavily on him
now
. 
Gently
,
Sariel
pulled his arm out from underneath his friend’s and leaned away to look into the
face of the soldier who had been with him through countless battles. 
The angel’s
eyes were closed and the pale light that shone beneath his skin only
moments
ago had now faded.

In the distance, a faint howl sounded.  It echoed through the valley, a chilling reminder of the enemy’s relentless aggression.

Sariel remained seated on the shore, holding the last
member of his team.  Despite the
peaceful rhythm of dancing leaves
and soothing
melodies of trickling
water
,
th
i
s sacred valley
failed to ease his constricted throat.  He
could still see the confused faces of his soldiers.  Their innocent questions reverberated in his ears.

And what did I tell them?  That everything would be fine.  That this mission was just like all the rest.

These were a
ll the same words that Sariel had heard from his own superiors.  He regurgitated them just
as
a loyal soldier
ought
. 
And in the end, they turned out to be lies.  As he
gently
lowered Amthardel’s body to
the grass,
he noticed
the cuts and scrapes on his own forearms
.

Why
was I
spared?

Why were his injuries so miniscule by comparison?
  Why was he the only survivor when he was the one who led them to their deaths
?

Another howl
echoed
through the valley.

Reaching down, Sariel pried a
vaepkir
f
rom the now sti
ff fingers of his friend.  Amthardel h
ad clutched it tight until the very end, a testament to his unwavering determination to fight. 
Lifting the weapon from the pool of blood beside his
soldier
,
Sariel held it
tight
and felt the weight of it in his hand.  He
examined
the three sharpened talons that
diverged from the primary blade to cover his
knuckles
. 
Even in the near formlessness of the
Borderland
, the weapon still appeared graceful. 
On the other end, a
t the very tip of the
deadly
instrument of war, the dark stains of demon blood marred
its
otherwise gleaming surface.

Another howl sounded.  It was only a few hundred feet away and now
accompanied by
snorting and heavy breathing.

Sariel stood up and walked a few paces away from the water, facing the direction of
the
forest
where the howling had come from.
 
He realized now that his silent promise to Amthardel only moments ago might also have been a lie.

Don’t let
them win.  Don’t let the
demons win.  But I can’t control the outcome. 
I promised
all of
them that it
would be
just like every other mission. 
And
I
couldn’t control that either!

What he would normally push aside for a more convenient time, he allowed himself to feel.  It had been a pointless battle; an utter failure and a staggering waste of resources.  He and his soldiers had no business being pulled into that operation. 
N
ow
, he was the only one left of a highly-trained and specialized group of soldiers. 
M
ore than that, they had been his last remaining friends—the only ones he had trusted, and the only ones who had trusted him. 
And now
, he was alone.

Sariel’s hand began to shake.  Only then did he notice the bulging knuckles and strained tendons of the fingers that had unconsciously tightened around the hilt of the weapon—a blade
that had ended the tortured lives of innumerable demons
.

Shadows moved
between the trees, keeping just out of sight.  They were waiting for something.

Sariel remained still. 
His body, rigorously trained by ages of conflict, reacted with a simple determination.  There would be no more running. 
Amthardel
had died in a place of peace and beauty; not in the wasteland of the demons.  That objective had been met.  And now,
while his thoughts were consumed, his winged, warrior form readied itself for its last stand.  This would be the end.

Suddenly, the whole forest darkened.  Demons poured from between the
dense
trees and came into the open in one coordinated movement, blocking the radiance of the
woods
with their emptiness.  Their bodies were collections of nothingness, reflecting no light.  Instead, as the negative mass of each demon moved in front of an object, the light around it distorted and bent inward.

Small shapes crawled over the ground on four legs.  Their talons dug into the soil as their elongated snouts inhaled loudly, taking in the scent of their prey.  In the trees above, larger
,
flying creatures settled on the branches, extending their angular wings to either side.  In between the darker sections of structural bone, the thin membrane
s
that made up their wings absorbed less light, giving a pale appearance.

Sariel’s eyes narrowed at seeing the demonic counterpart to the
Iryllur
ym
—the soldiers of the
M
a
r
o
tru
who had descended upon his team from above
.  But eventually, his gaze landed on the largest and darkest creatures
; the ones who destroyed the angelic army from beneath.  The
Nedaret
moved now across the grassy surface with barbed tentacles, hard as stone,
raking
the fertile soil for traction.

The entire formation slowed to a stop
.  Though Sariel had eliminated
hundreds
of them on the battlefield this day, the enemy’s reluctance to attack was not due to fear.  Instead, they relished the fact that they had th
e lone angel surrounded.

With his back to the water, Sariel looked out upon
one after another of his
enemies. 
There was no escape. 
The odds were impossible.  He star
ed
at his own death
and couldn’t help the defiant grin that overtook his face.

The winged demons took to the air.

The small ones scrambled forward along the ground.

The massive ones lurched into motion.

Sariel crouched forward with his
v
aepkir
ready to strike.  But something inside him hesitated.

Your function is not to think, but to act
!
he remembered, as the words of his superior came to memory.  The words spoken just before the battle.

Yes, my Rada!

In that single, obedient response, Sariel had
committed
his soldiers to their deaths.

This is what they’d want.  For me to
act.  For me to
fight!

The smaller, faster demons had now come
within
striking distance.  Two sprang from the ground with their claws ready to rip
his stomach open.

His lightning-quick reflex cut through both shadows in
one swift movement
and the demons vanished into a brilliant flash.

Think!
  What would they
not
want you to do?

Spinning to face three more demons, his reflexes took over now.  His muscled limbs propelled him through a dance of death, hacking and slashing his way through the infestation of darkness.

Go where it is forbidden.  Where the demons cannot follow.  Regroup.

Sariel
sprang from the ground as his wings thrust him upward into the nearest shadow.

The blade of
the
demon came down on him.  Its
serrated
edge glanced off his vaepkir, leaving behind crimson sparks that perished into swirls of smoke.

Sariel
plowed through
th
e absence of light and brought the protruding tip of his own blade across the demon’s neck.  Pale green and purple flashed as the enemy slipped by, spiraling downward to its death.

The
T
emporal
R
ealm
!

In a small pocket of safety before the next winged demon, Sariel
cast his weapon away and
willed his body to
shift
.  Though he wore the winged form of an
Iryllur
, he was not bound by their limitations.  He was one of the
Myndarym
—the race of angels who could
shift
their existence to any point along the
spectrum
of creation.

What
had
once
appeared as
a cloud of winged shadows and snarling fangs suddenly became a dizzying array of swirling ashes
—a
mixture of pale and dark
, colorless blotches that quickly gave way to empty air.  The sky, once deep orange, drained of color before it took on shades of blue.  In the distance, the brilliance of the trees dimmed and the green hues seemed to become encased in more distinct forms.

As Sariel moved through the la
yers of the creation
spectrum
,
he could almost feel the confusion among the ranks of the
Marotru
.  A
Shaper
masquerading as a
soldier
was rare enough, but e
ven his own kind would have been shocked.  The
T
emporal
R
ealm had long ago become forbidden to those who used to
shape
it.  Though it was a violation of the laws of his realm, he kept pushing himself until he felt the firm lift of air beneath his feathered wings.

*   *   *   *

Sheyir
sat on a low, flat rock, dangling her feet in the still water of the pond.  It felt cool between her toes and gave her a momentary distraction from her frustration.  It shouldn’t have come as a surprise when her father
announced the
forthcoming betrothal to her uncle,
but it did anyway.  She had many uncles
,
but
it seemed as though she would have to marry the most repulsive one.  Unfortunately, her father didn’t have much say in the matter; such things were dictated by the customs of her people.  Nevertheless,
she wasn’t comforted by this
.  It only made her angry to think about the fact that there wasn’t another option.  Someday
this would all seem more bearable, someday when she had given up hope for something different.

But now was not that time.  Now, she wasn’t able to bear it.  And the feel of the water wasn’t able to dispel her feelings.  In fact, the whole valley felt different today. 
The trees around her looked strange and dull, like the life had been drained out of them.  Had something happened,
or
was
it just her own situation that had changed
?
  Since she was a child, she’d been coming to this place to be alone and to sing.  But she didn’t feel much like singing now.

As she glanced around at her surroundings,
something on the edge of her vision caught her attention.
  She
yir
turned and
looked up, noticing something
strange about
the trees just a few yards away.  She squinted, but the
perplexing vision only intensified.  One section of the forest seemed to bulge outward as if she were looking at it through a dew drop.  The subtle green and brown hues of the vegetation slowly separated into bands of more intense color. 
She watched, fascinated
by
the
beautiful, but unexplained event.