The Farthest Gate (The White Rose Book 1) (36 page)

Two leathery flyers were earthbound, either dead or dying, and had wolves tearing out and swallowing tasty morsels.  The third hell-beast seemed to have vanished all-together.

For some reason, Azrael was not showing himself, but a chill in the air let me know he had come very close.

I searched for the rest of our forces, wanting to know how we had fared.  The owls perched high on the arena walls.  Faang was human once more next to D’elia.  Their faces were solemn as they stood over the body of Kodiak.  He had found the death he dreamed of, fighting beneath my banner.  Diminished by the loss, I shouldered guilt over his sacrifice.

My teary gaze went to the body of the Black-Heart Knight.  He did not stir with returning life.  This was not surprising since his helmeted head had been ripped off and cast aside.  In addition, the warrior’s chest plate was caved in and very flat—as though some massive, furry beast had stomped him into the ground, hammering his ribs to powder, bursting his internal organs.  I was sure that Kodiak or Faang had done this, possibly both.  If reconstitution was possible, it would take the black knight far longer than usual.

To my great surprise, Ty’hrall was on his feet again.  Blood stained his beautiful white coat, but he wore no bandage and gave no evidence of a wound.  I could have saved myself a great deal of grief had I earlier recalled that unicorns are potent creatures of the highest magic, famed for their healing virtue.  I should not have been astonished that he could survive anything that failed to kill him instantly.

We were in full triumph, but it had cost us.  More than a few elves wore bandages.  Several were dead, draped with their own bright cloaks.  I prayed their souls would find their way back to the forests of Avalon.  A few wolves had blood matting their fur.  One was dead.  The surviving pack-mates howled their grief.  The rest of us were miraculously unscathed by the tides of fate.

I felt guilt for having been spared, but thrust it away for later.

The battlefield lull started murmurs of discontent through the spectators.  The show was now in peril, so I knew the Gamesman would soon have to put in an appearance—he would not let an opportunity for vainglory pass unclaimed.  I swore to myself that the next time I had a sword point anywhere near him, I would run him through—repeatedly.  Delay could serve no purpose.  Once I breached the Farthest Gate, reaching Death’s Courts, I could use Silver Wolf’s true name to summon him from the abyss.  The concession D’elia had asked me for had not served her son.  Only the Gamesman’s death could do that, for nothing less would drag Death himself into this tiresome game.

The abrupt hush of the crowds warned me of trouble.  I studied the masses and saw every eye fixed on the moldy sky.  My eyes swung upward, widening as I discovered an immense shape writhing in the winds.  A dragon hung there, black as soot, a scaled monstrosity larger than the battlefield around me.  It possessed a familiar smirk I hated.  The Gamesman!  It was him, I was certain.  This might even be his true form, revealed at last.

How was I supposed to kill such a monstrosity?

I became aware that
Gray and Amberyn stood beside me.  Tearing my gaze from the creature above, I met the elf’s stare.

“Have you any suggestions?” My voice was a small and distant thing coming through the silver mask I still wore.

Amberyn turned to his archers.  “Send up a volley to announce our defiance!”  He faced me again.  “With any luck, the beast will come down where we can do real damage.”

“Yes,”
Gray said, “we will bleed all over its pointy claws and fangs and thus have our revenge.  Does anyone have some wine?  I am becoming far too sober for this occasion.”

Several clusters of arrows flew straight to their marks as if assisted by magic.

The scaled serpent screamed indignation as he shed the attack like rain.

“Celeste.”  D’elia joined me, her dark eyes intense.  “Did he tell you about my son?”

I had no easy words to convey what I had learned, so I gave the truth to her without dissembling, “In a fit of spite, he cast your son’s spirit into the abyss.  But I can still—”

Her scream of pain and outrage cut across the assurance of hope I tried to offer.  Her hands emerged from her feathered cloak, holding the two white feathers I had last seen on the altar of the Great Hall.  They glowed with a soft light, imbued with a shimmering power that now surfaced.  The light-play washed down D’elia’s arms and engulfed her body.

Instinctively, I stepped back, along with Amberyn and Gray.  Growing much larger, the spirit-caller abandoned her human form for one most unexpected.  No sleepy-eyed owl confronted me, but a thunderbird with white and brown feathers, and fierce, bold eyes that promised vengeance.  Her gaze shifted from me to the black dragon above.  Her cruel, curved beak parted in a scream of hate as D’elia’s massive wings beat the air.

I further retreated to give her space.

She lifted into the air, crackling with white fire that might have come from the belly of a storm cloud.  Unflinchingly, she tore toward the Gamesman.

I well understood—Hell hath no fury like a mother avenging her son.  Even the black dragon paused in his roiling motions, daunted by the oncoming challenger.  

The skies darkened to a muddy shade of forest green.  Clouds gathered to watch.  Lightning forked above the city in intermittent flashes.  Powerful winds swept across the arena, a mere pittance compared to those that thrust the thunderbird toward her enemy like a rising star. 

The firemares trumpeted nervously, pawing the ground as if they wanted desperately to run.  Their agitation kept my attention on the battlefield as the unicorn crossed to me.

They are afraid it will rain
, he said. 
They hate rain
.

“Will it hurt them if it does?” I stroked my friend’s neck to assure myself he had truly recovered.  My touch offered silent apology that he had been injured in my place. 

Rain is coming, and the mares have been away from the Burning World for a long time.  Besides which, their fires are dimming faster in this place than expected.  They must soon return home.

“Then thank them for me.”  I cast my concerned gaze skyward once more to where D’elia and the dragon tumbled entwined across the sky.  “Open a door so the mares can go.  We shall manage without them from here on,” I said.

Ty’hrall galloped away.

I called Amberyn over, my eyes still drinking D’elia’s image.

“The firemares must leave us,” I told him.  “Place another guard over the prisoners.”

Dragon scream merged with thunderbird shriek.  The sound went through me like a stab of fear—with creatures of such power, the first one to make a mistake must die at once. 

Many times brighter than the sun, a blinding light filled the sky.  The entire arena was absorbed into a white pall that swallowed everything whole.  I could not even see the hand I lifted to shield my eyes.  A crash of thunder shuddered the earth.  The boom rattled my teeth and deafened me, as if God’s righteous fist had struck and webbed the world with widening cracks.  I felt the sound in my very bones.  The wonder of it all was that I had not been blasted from my feet.

My sight recovered.  The arena and sky returned.  Though it may well have been the same, the World of the Dead seemed darker, more forlorn, as the light passed.

Scanning the heavens, I hunted for some sign of D’elia.  At first, I only saw the black dragon, frozen in the dark green haze.  Then my gaze riveted upon a pale whiteness that tumbled earthward.  It was the lax body of the thunderbird.  My heart raced in fear for D’elia, for even if she still lived, I didn’t see how she could survive such a fall.  I could only watch as the great winged shape dropped and slapped the sand limply.  I ran to her, my heart full of apprehension. 

Faang’s booming voice filled the arena as he screamed her name.  He reached her first though I had been nearer.  We both stopped, startled as a storm of gleaming feathers burst from D’elia.  They faded in the air like passing dreams.  The thunderbird was gone.  My friend was revealed, unmoving, eyes closed, face serene.

Faang dropped to his knees and scooped her into his arms.  His slumping head hid her face.

I saw her hand twitch and relief flushed through me.  With the last of its benevolence, the thunderbird had protected her, leaving her intact from the fall.  D’elia’s arms returned Faang’s embrace.  I smiled through fresh tears.

In the sky, the dragon remained frozen in place, defiant of the winds that should have wagged his coils.  Then, as we watched, he burst, darkening the green over us.  Glazed boulders rained to earth, half-burying themselves in the arena sand.  Many of the missile battered spectators straight through their seats.  The rattle of hail surrounded me where pellets danced.  Several stung me.  The shower slacked.  Moments passed in stunned silence, and then a drifting black ash reached the ground.

D’elia had won the struggle after all.

But since she survived, the Gamesman might have as well.  It was not prudent to believe him dead just yet.

I thought the pelting was over when a monstrous lump pulped our prisoners’ torsos, making the ground swell like the sea for a moment.  The thunderclap battered me from my feet.  I fell and rolled, finally lifting my head.  I saw that the meteor was actually the black dragon’s decapitated head, its once-fierce snarl a contortion of anguish.

There were sobs and shrieks of pain mixed with incoherent shouts coming from the spectators.  They scrambled to escape, having gained the fill of such extravagant entertainment.  I couldn’t say I blamed them.  If the Gamesman were able to show himself and salvage this grand exhibition, he would have to do so swiftly.

Lines of black fire appeared, filling the cracks in the dragon’s head, widening them.  Obsidian fanned out as the entire mass ruptured, crumbling away.  There, at its core, stood the Gamesman.  He clutched his hand-scythe, holding it above his head as if posed in victory.  He held that stance for a long moment, then dropped his weapon to the sand.  He wilted after it.

Had he expended all his strength in clinging to life?  Was he now truly vulnerable?

Our gazes locked across the distance separating us.  He seemed strangely transformed with the shadow of fear on his face for the first time.  He had good reason to be afraid, for I was on my feet in an instant, running for him with a savage scream.  I gripped my rapier tightly, determined to be his executioner.

The Gamesman regained his feet with effort, and managed to lift his sickle.  He held it toward me.  I knew he was reaching deep for some last dreg of power to strike me down, but I refused to stop or veer from my course.  I burned in a fever of fury, gripped by obsession.

A desperate last trick by the Gamesman caused the atmosphere to thicken as though I were an insect snared in resin.  Perhaps time itself flowed differently.  Movement came at an enormous expense.  Even the black ash in the air held its place, forgetting how to fall.  The closer I came to my foe, the harder it was to move, to breathe.  My heartbeat seemed to slow to a ponderous rhythm.

Still, I pressed on, straining.  I was drenched in sweat.  My muscles burned.  The sound of my scream emerged, a long tedious thing, no longer recognizable as something shaped by a human throat.

At the core of the phenomenon, the Gamesman straightened—untouched by the effect inflicted on the rest of us.  I barely moved as he strolled toward me, care-free, his assured smile back for all to see.

He lifted the sickle to strike me down.

I desperately willed my sword to intercept the blow, knowing all-the-while that I had become too slow, and now could only die.

But the Gamesman hesitated.  His eyes flicked to the side.

  His downward swing curved to strike elsewhere.  Horror flooded my mind as Azrael appeared, the sickle lodged in the black mists of his chest.

His head was thrown back.  Blazing eyes launched their glare upward.  A terrible, choked sound came from his lips.  He sagged in slow stages, shuddering in his cloak, stricken by the mystic power of the Gamesman’s weapon.  Though not destroyed, the dimming light in Azrael’s eyes let me know he suffered intolerably.

I would have begged the Gamesman to spare my lover and turn his sickle on me instead, but I could not mouth so much as a curse.

The Gamesman’s pleased laugh pealed sharply, slicing across my nerves.  His head turned my way.  The ugly sound died away and he spoke, regaining strength with each word thrown in my face.

“Had you thought I would let you win?  Do you know how many millennia I have passed, playing
this Game?”

The sickle was pulled free and lifted once more, stained gold with angel blood.  This time, I saw that I truly was the target.

I spied dazzling white over the gamesman’s shoulder.  A thrill of joy kindled hope in my heart.  There was one valiant spirit left with power to defy the Gamesman’s spell.  Ty’hrall ran toward me, his golden horn fiercely ablaze. 

It was a test of speed as to who would strike first. 

The sickle blurred toward my breast.

The Gamesman was impaled from behind.  His muscles locked up in agony, as several inches of spiral horn protruded from his chest.  Blood spattered my face.  Time was released from torturous restraint, and I found I could move again, at normal speed.