Demon Lord VI - Son of Chaos (13 page)

Bane raised
his arms. “Get down!”

They flung
themselves to the floor as black fire blazed over their heads,
annihilating the wraiths. Bane moved into the midst of the cowering
people, who crawled from his path. He killed the last two wraiths
with bursts of shadow, then swung away and vanished through the
wall again.

Nikira
realised that her mouth was open and closed it. “He can walk
through walls?”

“
Naturally.” Drevarin’s eyes sparkled with amusement. “As can
I.”

“
You’re a creator.”

“
He is more powerful than I.”

Nikira’s eyes
widened as Bane rose through the floor of number two mess hall.
Almost twenty crewmembers had been dining in it, and four wraiths
flew around it, chasing fleeing men and women. One had settled upon
a thrashing victim, who coughed and gurgled as it sucked out his
life. Streaks of black fire shot from Bane’s hands to consume the
wraiths, then he sank back into the floor. He reappeared in the
barracks two decks below, where soldiers fought a futile battle
with the incorporeal wraiths, strafing them with blue light.

Once more,
Bane sent shadows sweeping across the room, ignoring the guards’
shouts of alarm at his sudden appearance. Although many aimed their
weapons at him, none fired, to her relief. Bane sank into the floor
again, and Nikira turned her attention to the screen that showed
the recreation room on deck four, waiting for him to appear.
Moments later he entered through the wall and unleashed a burst of
darkness that slew the three feeding wraiths. Then he paused,
frowning at the bodies of five men. Twenty survivors hid amongst
the chairs and recreation equipment, fifteen of them clutching
useless light guns. They gaped at Bane, and two of them raised
their weapons.

Nikira slapped
the intercom. “Hold your fire!”

The men jumped
and lowered their guns, glancing up at the camera in the corner of
the room.

Drevarin
chuckled. “They cannot harm him.”

“
That, I know. I just don’t think it’s a good idea to annoy
him.”

“
True.”

Nikira scanned
the screens for more wraiths, but found none, even when she checked
all the secondary screens, which showed crews’ quarters and
kitchens. Satisfied, she touched an intercom key that opened a
ship-wide channel and addressed the entire crew. “Secops, stand
down. The attack appears to be over. Report any sighting
immediately. Dispatch medical teams to number two dining room, the
recreation room on deck four, the guards’ barracks on deck eight,
and the hold. Second ops shift, report to the bridge on the
double.”

Bane wandered
out of the recreation room, using the door this time, the dazed men
and women staring after him.

“
I must go to the bridge,” Nikira said.

Drevarin
inclined his head, gesturing to the door.

When Nikira
arrived on the bridge, a rescue crew was zipping the two bodies
into plastic bags. The pilot sat white-faced at his console,
staring into the middle distance with blank eyes.

“
Report,” she ordered.

He turned to
her. “The ship is stopped, Commander. I thought it best until the
danger was past. We’re also short two ops.”

“
Another crew is coming.” She activated the intercom to the
observation room. “Montar, have you still got that... thing on the
scanners?”

“
Yes, Commander, it’s stopped ahead.”

“
Good.”

Nikira sank
down on a chair, her legs shaking. The pilot had resumed his blank
stare, and would probably need to see the doctor before he was fit
for duty again.

“
What stopped the attack, Commander?” the surviving navigation
officer asked.

She turned to
him. “Drevarin’s shield, I think.”

“
Thank goodness for him.”

“
He wasn’t the one who killed them. If not for the tar’merin,
we’d all be dead.” Nikira wondered where she had heard those words
before, then recalled that Ethra had said almost exactly the same
thing.

“
But if not for Drevarin’s shield, they’d have kept
coming.”

“
I think the tar’merin could have shielded us just as well, if
I’d asked him to.”

The officer
looked down at his control panel and muttered, “If not for him,
we’d be safe at base now.”

“
If we hadn’t captured him...” She clasped her aching head. “We
only have ourselves to blame for this.”

The two
traumatised men left when relief crew arrived, and the new pilot
set the ship in motion, whereupon Montar reported that the dark
creature was moving ahead again. Nikira slumped in her chair, dazed
by the horror of the attack, and how close they had come to
disaster. When her exhaustion became acute several hours later, she
left the bridge and went to her cabin to try to get some rest.

***

Nikira glanced
around as the lift doors opened, then jumped up when Bane entered,
followed by Drevarin. The bridge crew eyed the dark god, who
approached Nikira and stopped in front of her. She gazed up at him,
dreading that he would insist she perform her humiliating
prostration in front of her crew. His gaze roamed the bridge and
came to rest upon the main screen, which showed a dull grey and
brown landscape rushing at them beneath a dark, yellow-tinged
sky.

“
Is the ship invisible?”

“
No, Lord. At this speed -”

“
Make it so.”

Nikira turned
to the pilot. “Slow to one quarter.”

“
Yes, Commander.” The woman tapped her keyboard, and the hum of
the engines softened.

Nikira
addressed the officer beside her. “Enter stealth mode.”

He ran his
hands over the control panels in front of him, and the engines’ hum
changed to a deep throbbing. Bane gazed at the screen, where the
landscape now drifted towards them at a leisurely pace. Nikira
wondered what was going to happen, but did not dare to ask. An
alarm beeped, making her start. Her comscreen lighted, and Montar’s
worried visage filled it.

“
Commander, there’s a dra’voren dead ahead. The scanners just
picked him up.”

“
Stop the ship.”

“
No,” Bane murmured. “Go closer.”

Nikira nodded
to the pilot, and the ship continued to drift forwards. An op
silenced the alarm, and a moment later, Montar cried, “There are
seven of them! No, wait... six fiends, it looks like, and another
of those creatures.”

“
A demon hound,” Bane supplied.

“
There’s something else too... a sphere of some sort. It’s...
it’s made from white power.”

Nikira glanced
at Bane. “Is that Kayos?”

Bane nodded,
gazing at the screen, but they were too far away for the entities
on the scanners to be visible yet. Time dragged past with
unbelievable sluggishness, the tension on the bridge growing
thicker with each passing minute. Nikira was tempted to zoom the
camera in so they could see the beings ahead, but decided that it
might alarm Bane. He probably needed to know how far away they
really were, not the false impression of a zoom lens.

“
How can you tell the difference between gods and demons with
these scanners of yours?” Bane’s soft voice made her jump, for she
had been too engrossed in the screen’s image to notice him move
closer to her, and his proximity made her shiver.

“
Fiends are grey, dra’voren are black, because fiends are far
less powerful.”
Like you,
she wanted to add, but did not dare. Realising
that she had omitted his title yet again, she added,
“Lord.”

The Demon Lord
studied the landscape on the screen, then his eyes became intent as
distant figures appeared, and Nikira stared at them in horror. Six
massive fire demons stood like burning sentinels a short distance
from a shadow hound, which sat facing a tall, crimson-clad man. The
figures were too small to make out any details, and she held her
breath as the ship drifted closer. A few minutes later, a
shimmering silver sphere became visible next to the dra’voren, who
waved something that shone like a star over it.

Bane pointed
at the screen. “Stop the ship next to that rock.”

A large grey
boulder rose above its counterparts a short distance from the
dra’voren, too close for comfort. She cast him a worried
glance.

“
That’s very close, Lord.”

“
It needs to be.”

“
Yes, Lord.” Nikira nodded to the pilot, who steered the ship
towards the boulder.

Bane swung
away. “I must prepare.”

Drevarin
followed him into the lift, and Nikira chewed her lip. As soon as
the two men left the bridge, the pilot swung to face her.

“
Commander, that’s far too close. It’s not safe.”

“
You heard what he said.”

“
He doesn’t care if we get killed.”

Nikira frowned
at her. “You don’t know that.”

“
We don’t even know what he’s going to do.”

“
I’m going to find out. Do as he said.”

At the lift,
she tapped the button and waited for it to return, her mind
seething with questions. When it arrived, she descended to the
fifth floor, hoping the two men were in their usual place. She
trotted into the dining room and stopped in surprise and confusion.
Bane sat on his couch, his head bowed, a faint blue nimbus
shimmering between him and the pale cloud. Mirra sat beside him,
holding his hand, her expression anguished. Drevarin stood close
by, talking, while Ethra, Sarrin and the rest of Bane’s little
group sat on the floor. Sarrin glanced around and smiled, then
raised a finger to her lips. Nikira crept closer and knelt beside
her.

“
What’s going on?” she whispered.

Sarrin looked
sad. “Bane is... concerned. He fears what lies in store for him. He
is afraid he will fail.”

“
What’s he going to do?”

“
Free Kayos.”

“
But how? That dra’voren will stop him.”

Sarrin nodded.
“He will try.”

Ethra turned
to them, her eyes bright with tears. “Tell him not to go, Sarrin,
he’ll listen to you. He could be killed!”

Nikira thought
that was highly likely, and glanced over at the two men. Drevarin
had seated himself beside Bane and placed an arm around his
shoulders, blue fire sparkling between them. She strained to hear
what he was saying, but failed. Turning her attention to Sarrin and
Ethra, she listened to the old woman comfort the girl instead. This
was madness. The scanners had shown that Bane was less powerful
than a fiend; there was no way he had any hope of defeating the
dra’voren. She recalled the angel’s assertion that he was extremely
powerful, and Drevarin’s contention that the Demon Lord outranked
even him, but it made no sense.

The scanners
did not lie, and he had used the dark power when he had summoned
the shadow hound. An intense sadness invaded her at the prospect of
his demise, and she wondered if Drevarin was trying to dissuade him
from his mad intention to free the embattled Grey God. Drevarin had
left his domain to save Bane because he was unique and valuable, so
surely he would not allow him to commit suicide now? Yet Drevarin
had told her that Bane could defeat a dra’voren, and that was why
he was so valued. That was also the reason they had come to this
place, seeking the Grey God and his foe, but she failed to
understand how he could possibly defeat a dra’voren.

She gathered
her courage and stood up. “Lord.”

Bane raised
his head, his eyes impaling her, and Drevarin glanced at her with a
frown.

“
We could set the trap for this dra’voren. Then all you would
have to do is lure him into it, and we’ll shred him.”

He looked
pensive. “Perhaps that would be a good idea.”

Drevarin
shrugged. “You cannot take too many precautions, I suppose.”

“
Precautions?” Nikira raised her brows. “Surely it’s the only
way to defeat that dra’voren?”

Bane smiled,
looking down at his hands. “It would be safer, but not ideal. Where
would this trap be?”

“
It’s always a hundred and fifty yards directly in front of the
ship. That’s where the translocation generators are
aimed.”

“
I will bear it in mind.” He sighed. “I do not understand why
Kayos chose this place. It is far too dark.”

“
It was probably a lot lighter when he came here,” Drevarin
said. “This battle has been raging for weeks now, and his foe has
brought in dark power.”

Bane nodded.
“Of course. If I am wounded, you will not be able to heal me unless
I cast out my power first, so do not try. If I have not cast it
out, do not come near me without your shields... or without my wife
beside you.” He cast Mirra warm glance, and she managed a stiff
smile. “She alone is safe from me when the darkness fills me.”

“
Very well.”

The Demon Lord
rose and wandered away, his hands clasped behind his back. Mirra
followed, and Nikira watched him with a puzzled frown, then glanced
at Drevarin, who smiled at her confusion.

“
He is preparing himself.”

“
Surely he doesn’t mean to try to fight that
dra’voren?”

“
No, I think he intends to destroy him.”

Nikira’s mouth
fell open. “You’re kidding! That’s nuts.”

He tilted his
head. “Why is it nuts?”

“
Because he’s... We’ve seen him on the scanners, twice, and
he’s not even as powerful as a fiend. I don’t know why you say he’s
more powerful than you; it’s just not true.”