The Book of Deacon: Book 02 - The Great Convergence (57 page)

A sudden surge of mystic power drew the
attentions of the trio. Each had become finely attuned to such
things. Without another word, both Myranda and Deacon rushed off
toward Epidime. Ether began to follow, but didn't manage more than
a few steps before she nearly collapsed. Her limit had been
reached. For now all that she could do was wait. Slowly she turned
and trudged toward the side street just ahead. Lain was waiting
there. His sword was held low but ready, Ivy resting on the ground
at his feet. Every muscle in his body was tensed, ready to sprint
the very moment that the glassy, shining wall ahead was
destroyed.

Myranda rushed into the courtyard ahead.
Three nearmen blocked her path as Epidime stood before a mangled
pile of defeated dragoyles. He raised his halberd and summoned
forth the unholy glow that always accompanied his spells. The mass
of ruined creatures before him began to shift and turn, waves of
black twisting and crawling over its surface. The pieces rose from
the ground, piling upon themselves. Deacon raised his crystal and
set his mind to halting whatever it was that Epidime had planned.
Myranda waved her staff and a swath of white energy cut across the
nearmen. They shuddered and stumbled before collapsing in a flash
of light and burst of dust, leaving only a mound of empty
armor.

As Myranda turned herself to Epidime, it was
clear that precious little had been done to impede the work of
their foe. The last pieces of a fiendish puzzle were slipping
together. The pieces of the destroyed dragoyles were cobbled
loosely into a towering, mismatched titan. The heads had been
joined side by side, strung together like beads on a necklace, jaws
separated and hanging in a similar strand beneath them, affixed at
either end. The limbs were attached end to end, fore and hind legs
shuffled with little concern for their proper place, claws affixed
one on top of the other until each leg ended in a tapered spike.
The shattered pieces of torso were assembled into a mosaic just
barely cohesive enough to accommodate the limbs, and the remainder
of spare parts curled into a massive, lashing tail.

"I've never felt a will so strong. The magic,
the texture of it . . . It is different. Fundamentally so. There is
only one way to end this," Deacon warned.

He did not need to say any more, Myranda knew
what had to be done. As Epidime climbed to his perch atop the
hideous beast, the pair that faced him burst into action. So too
did their foe. The spindly creature skittered across the ground
like an insect, the jagged spikes that served as legs slicing into
the hard stone and earth like it was clay. It moved ponderously, in
long slow strides, but the span of the legs and the lashing tail
made it seem as though it was everywhere at once. Deacon and
Myranda split up, hoping to divide the attention of the
creature.

Deacon stuck close to the buildings. He
constantly tried to assault Epidime with spells of every type, but
the diabolical wizard shrugged them off or worse, caused them to
fade to nothing before they reached him. The beast he rode, if such
a thing could rightly be called a beast, turned away from him,
aiming its head at Myranda and its tail at Deacon. The
disproportionately long appendage struck as though it had a mind of
its own, one moment swinging in long slashes, the next gouging like
a scorpion. It was faster than he was. Faster by far. Each strike
was just barely turned away by a hastily erected shield spell, but
the blows cracked it and warped it, as though something about the
physical blow affected his magic as well. And the attacks were
growing stronger. Deacon knew that if he hoped to gain an edge, he
would have to slow it down. Immobilize it. But how?

Myranda had far greater concerns. The heads,
belching out their combined breath, sent great gales of the vile
black stuff at her. Deft bursts of wind kept her safe, but the
courtyard was quickly filling with the black mist. It pooled in
sizzling puddles in the cracks in the street, and every moment
there was less and less fresh air to whisk the danger away. The air
around her became saturated. She could feel the sting on her skin.
The ground was too dangerous. She had to get above it. With all of
her strength she leapt into the air, mixing in as much levitation
as she could manage. The leap turned into a slow drift toward the
rooftops. The cracked and broken heads lunged, trying to snap her
out of the air, but she tumbled backward. The creature tried to
lunge again, but it stopped and pulled back suddenly.

Epidime turned to see what held him. One of
the creature's legs was embedded in the ground. The ground beneath
the other hind leg seemed to slosh aside, losing its substance and
parting like a liquid. The dark wizard realized what was next and
commanded his creation to draw it's leg free, but Deacon acted more
swiftly, seizing the altered ground back again into not a mixture
of stone and soil as it had been, but solid rock. The legs were
held fast. As Epidime leveled his Halberd to deal with this
newcomer directly, an arrow hissing though the air and gashing his
already badly injured arm reminded him of his primary target.

The battle was going on too long. He needed
to eliminate one of these heroes
now
. Epidime ordered his
beast forward. The head strained and snapped at Myranda, who was
readying another arrow. Great plumes of miasma erupted forth, only
to be blown in curling clouds back at Epidime. The horrid stuff
burned relentlessly at him, but he paid it no mind. Myranda was far
too important a target for him to fail now. With a horrifying snap,
the monstrosity's hind legs gave way, tearing free and allowing
beast and rider to crash forward into the building Myranda stood
atop. The weak walls buckled, the ancient roof splintered. Myranda
rushed to the edge and dove to the next roof, losing her arrow. She
landed on the sloped shingles, falling and struggling to grip the
icy roof. Finally she found a foothold and climbed to her feet,
turning to the house that was crumbling beneath the unbalanced
creature as it fought to gain footing on now incomplete legs. A
flash of motion distracted Myranda. Through the broken roof, she
saw a terrified woman scrambling to escape her failing house.
Myranda's eyes swept over the town. The black acid was eroding
walls, streets, roofs. The poor people of this town were having
their homes destroyed. Their lives were in danger.

With bow in one hand and staff in the other,
she closed her eyes and opened her mind, drawing hard at the clouds
above as she had in her exam in Entwell. With knowledge and purpose
guiding the action, not to mention a considerable increase in
power, the clouds above darkened and multiplied in seconds. A
moment later there was a crack of lighting and a roar of thunder as
a torrent came pouring down from above. Her eyes opened to reveal a
terrible storm summoned up in a matter of moments. Water diluted
and washed away the wretched black acid.

"You've come far, Myranda. Quite far,"
Epidime allowed, taking note of this new display of skill.

Myranda ignored the words of her foe and
leapt from the roof, rolling to the ground. She could not let him
destroy any more of this city. The battle would have to be fought
in the open, and finished soon. Deacon wrapped his mind around the
lashing tail, crushing his will around it like a vice and, with all
of the effort he could muster, manipulating it. He had honed his
manipulation skill to a fine edge. He could raise great stones,
trees, anvils, but this was by far his greatest challenge. He
managed to hold the lashing limb fast, but a will fought against
his. He held his crystal out, straining to keep it still but slowly
losing the tug of war. With a last desperate twist, he managed to
snare the tail around one of the grotesquely struggling legs still
held fast to the ground and anchor it there. Epidime swung his
halberd without looking, a blast of black energy slicing through
the air toward Deacon. He managed to dodge, and apparently blind to
the danger of it, scrambled between the beast's remaining legs,
under its head, and back to Myranda's side.

Lightning danced in the sky above him. Deacon
called to Myranda.

"We won't hit him with a single strike he can
see," he affirmed.

"Fine then. Let us strike at him with a
thousand that he can see," she decided.

The words were cryptic, but they rang clear
in Deacon's mind. Myranda drew back an arrow and fired it skyward.
It arced upward, nearly disappearing from sight. Deacon then thrust
his crystal high, a filament of brilliant light tracing upward
until it met the arrow at the peak of its flight. Instantly a
section of the sky turned darker than even the storm clouds. The
patch of black spread like a swarm of insects, separating into
hundreds, thousands of tiny specks. Arrows.

The two heroes scrambled for the far end of
the courtyard as the first of the rain of arrows struck. They moved
in a wave, prickling the earth in an ever advancing line toward
Epidime. His halberd raised defensively for a moment, but then let
it drop. He turned a scornful eye to his foes who now stood just
ahead of where the first arrows had fallen. A handful of the
plummeting shafts struck the head of the beast . . . with no
effect. A constant stream fell upon him, vanishing just as they
struck.

"Illusions. You would think to deceive me
with illusions?" Epidime scoffed, genuinely angered by the
simplicity of the ruse.

A moment later the grimace of anger vanished
as an arrow, quite real, drove itself into his shoulder. It was
true that the rain of arrows was false, but the one she had fired
was not, and it had found its mark. Epidime gazed upon them with a
look of calm, almost serenity as he pulled the arrow free. It
should have killed him just as countless other attacks should have,
but he stubbornly clung to life, a smile returning to his blood
tinged mouth.

"When will you learn that it will take so
much more than you have to defeat me?" he asked.

Suddenly he began to cough and hack, his
whole body heaving with the increasing outbursts. He closed his
eyes and steadied himself on the creature's back as he struggled to
regain control of his failing body. The sound of something hissing
toward him through the air, alas, did not go unnoticed. His mind
reached out and slowed the projectile. His free hand rose up and
snatched it from the air. He spat and opened his eyes. What he held
was the broken head of a casting staff.

"You threw your staff? Have you so quickly
reached the bottom of your bag of tricks that you resort to this
act of-" he began. He would never finish his sentence.

With the target held firmly in the hand of
her foe, Myranda turned her mind skyward and drew down the true
attack. A blinding bolt of lightning tore from the clouds above and
struck the weapon, continuing through the man who held it and the
beast he rode. Myranda maintained the state of concentration as
long as she could, prolonging the bolt for seconds. All was white
around them, in their ears continuous, deafening roar, like a clap
of thunder that would not end. Finally she could manage no more.
The lightning flickered away. She opened her eyes. The world was a
haze. Even with her eyes firmly shut the intensity of the lightning
had robbed her of her vision almost entirely. There was little left
of the beast that stood before them seconds earlier. Less still was
left of the man. Only a charred husk inseparable from the rest of
the ruined rubble, and the blackened halberd. Myranda recalled her
staff. The crystal glowed white hot, and the augmented wood
smoldered, but her spell had done its work. It had delivered its
payload to Epidime and been spared most of the damage.

"That was . . . savage . . . and brilliant,"
Deacon admired, though his comment was unheard, the ringing in
their ears easily drowning it out.

Myranda wished her staff was whole, as the
cost of the spell was high enough to leave her nearly for want of
the strength to stand. And yet, she didn't feel as though it was
over. Around them, the sudden and complete silence following the
thunderous uproar had inspired the bravest of the townsfolk to peek
their heads from their shelters. Deacon tugged at Myranda's arm,
drawing her attention and pulling up his hood. The wall was down.
Now was the time for escape.

The hero turned to run, but the sight she
caught out of the corner of her eye nearly stopped her heart. The
halberd's glow returned weakly to the damaged crystal. She turned
and saw the weapon rock free of the crumbling fingers of its former
wielder and rise high into the air. Myranda's eyes turned to the
ground as lighting cast three shadows. One was of the halberd. The
second was that of a twisted, unnatural mockery of a human gripping
the weapon. The third was that of a young child that had foolishly
ventured into the courtyard from his hiding place. Myranda called
out to the boy.

"No! Stay away!" she urged, but she could not
hear even her own voice. Surely the boy could not.

She looked to the sky, searching for the
twisted form Myranda had seen silhouetted below, but there was
none. The halberd hung alone, yet a second flash of lightning
revealed the three shadows again as the halberd swept to the
child's side. She summoned a bright light, prolonging the shadows
as she tried to rush to the child. The twisted figure existed only
in shadow, but it suddenly grasped the shadow of the boy. The child
shook as if struck. Then Myranda watched helplessly as the boy's
shadow was somehow torn free. The boy dropped to the ground, then
slowly rose as the twisted shadow replaced the stolen one. The boy
reached out and clutched the halberd. Instantly the look of
innocence and fear was replaced by the look of cool, disconnected
intellect that Epidime had worn. Indeed, he still wore it.

In a smooth, practiced motion of the halberd,
Epidime summoned the swirling black form she'd seen Demont step out
of. He guided his stolen body through just as Myranda reached it.
Before she could do anything, the void in the air snapped shut,
releasing a wave of black energy that knocked her to the ground.
Deacon was beside her in a flash, helping her to her feet. The air
was still ringing in her ears, her vision returning slowly, but
what she saw told her that she could delay no longer. People were
now flooding out. They did not know what had caused this, why their
town had been ravaged. Fear, anger and confusion filled their
heads. It was a potent mix, and it needed an outlet. If she and her
friends lingered, the townspeople could not be blamed for what they
did.