The Undead Hordes of Kan-Gul (24 page)

CHAPTER FORTY

Ran knew that voice.

He turned and saw that Jysal stood behind him, her blue dress swirling about her in the wind that had suddenly kicked up. She was surrounded by tendrils of yellow gold energy that crackled and charged the air surrounding them on the cliff. Ran wanted to ask her a million questions, but now was not the time. Jysal’s eyes blazed, and even the tattoo that decorated one half of her face seemed to pulse with life.

“How is it you’ve returned from the dead?” demanded Kan-Gul. “You could not have the power to do that. Especially one as inexperienced as you. Tell me how you accomplished it. Tell me!”

Jysal laughed, and there was a strength in it that Ran had never heard reflected in her speech before. Gone was the naive and hesitant novice that he’d known the past several days. In her place stood someone very much in possession of power—a lot of power.

“You are not in the position to demand anything, warlock.” Jysal surveyed the landscape. Her eyes lit upon Neviah’s body, and Ran saw a crinkle of sadness creep onto her face. She glanced at Ran. “How did she die?”

“Malkyr,” said Ran. “Neviah tried to surprise Kan-Gul. While her back was turned, Malkyr killed her.”

“Where is he now?”

“Dead,” said Ran. “I killed him.”

Jysal nodded. “My thanks to you. Neviah did not deserve such dishonor.”

“She did not.” Ran bowed his head. “I wish I’d been able to save her.”

“You couldn’t have saved her,” said Jysal. “We all fell victim to Malkyr’s treachery. I hope wherever he is now, he is suffering at the hands of Neviah’s spirit.”

“As do I,” said Ran.

Jysal turned her attention back to Kan-Gul. “You have tortured this land for many years. The time of your reckoning is at hand.”

Kan-Gul smiled. “Then I welcome it.” He raised his hands and blue orbs danced about him. Each one raced up and down the line of Chekhal, looking as though they energized the undead horde. The Chekhal started forward, their weapons drawn and intent on killing ran and Jysal.

“Stand by my side, Ran,” said Jysal.

Ran needed no encouragement and moved to Jysal’s left. Instantly, Jysal unleashed a wave of yellow energy that rocketed into the ranks of Chekhal. As they were hit, the dull gray skin of the undead warriors seemed to vaporize, leaving behind a line of skeletons.

Kan-Gul laughed. “It will take more than that to destroy my men.” He waved his hands, and the blue energy crackled around the skeletal warriors. Once again, they started moving forward.

Jysal didn’t hesitate and unleashed a volley of golden orbs that smashed into the skeletal Chekhal, blasting several apart. “I’ll need help, Ran.”

Ran launched himself at the closest Chekhal and cut from left to right with a brutal horizontal cut that severed the spinal cord of the skeleton. He used the momentum of the strike to bring his sword up and over his head, chopping down on another Chekhal, shattering through the collar bone and then into the rib cage and pelvis. The skeleton toppled apart and lay still on the ground.

Around him, Jysal shot more golden energy bolts at Chekhal, blasting them apart with relative ease. On the other side of the cliff, Kan-Gul kept up a steady stream of reinforcements, but as as each new Chekhal entered the fray, Jysal’s magic reduced them to shambling skeletons as well. Then they were easy pickings for Ran as he smashed, cut, and kicked his way through their ranks.

Without their lifeless flesh, the Chekhal seemed much slower, but their weapons were still just as deadly. Ran had to evade and avoid swipes with their curved swords and spiked spears. But he felt energized by Jysal’s reappearance and threw himself fully into the melee. Twice Kan-Gul shot bolts of crimson energy at him, but he managed to avoid them. If he and Jysal could manage to get through the Chekhal there would only be Kan-Gul left to deal with.

Kan-Gul sent another wave of his undead horde at them, but there were fewer of the Chekhal now. Kan-Gul might have had thousands back at his castle—unless he was lying, thought Ran—but he seemed to be running out of them atop the cliff.

“Keep the pressure on,” said Jysal quietly. Even amid all the chaos, Ran could hear her voice as if it were inside his head.

He smashed through another Chekhal skeleton that tried to impale him with a thrust from a wicked-looking barbed spear. Ran chopped down, halving the spear shaft, and then flipped his blade and cut the head of the skeleton off. Bones littered the ground all around him, and he had to watch his step or risk turning his ankle as he fought through the mire of dead.

Ran glanced at Kan-Gul and saw sweat flowing down the sorcerer’s face. It was the first time he’d seen Kan-Gul look concerned. The sorcerer kept throwing more spells into the air, but each one seemed to have no effect. He sent a barrage of brilliant red bolts at Jysal, but she was surrounded by a yellow aura that simply deflected the bolts and sent them careening back at Kan-Gul.

“The girl! Kill the girl!” Kan-Gul directed a trio of Chekhal to avoid Ran and turn their attention to Jysal.

Ran leapt in front of them, slashing side to side and driving the edge of his sword through bone and evil magic. Again and again he cut, swerved, cut, and evaded. Every fiber of his being felt like it was on fire, sizzling with an untapped energy that filled him with power despite his exhaustion. Ran had never felt this way during combat before and wondered if it was coming from Jysal or from somewhere even deeper within himself.

At the moment, it didn’t matter. As more and more Chekhal fell to his strikes and fewer and fewer rushed into battle, Kan-Gul started slowly backing away. He still fired more and more deadly magic, but it had no effect. Even the bolts he shot at Ran were off-target and dissolved before they could harm him.

The ground around them was a seething mess of blood, slime, bones, mud, and trampled grass. Ran felt his footing slip several times and had to go with it to adapt to the environment rather than fight against it and risk a lucky strike from the Chekhal.

And then the Chekhal stopped coming.

Jysal looked around the top of the cliff. She seemed entirely nonplussed and not the least bit tired. Ran squatted down amid the bones of the countless Chekhal skeletons he’d slain and let his lungs heave as they flushed oxygen into himself. His muscles burned, and sweat glistened everywhere on his skin. It was if lightning had struck him and the energy had coursed through him like a liquid fire.

“Kan-Gul has left us, apparently,” said Jysal.

Ran looked across the way. She was right. He was gone. Ran stood. “Where is he?”

Jysal closed her eyes for a moment. “Running back down the trail toward the shore. His magic is depleted. He has nothing left to give.”

“Then now is a good time for him to die,” said Ran. He rushed across the cliff and down the winding game trail. The wind still blew, swirling as if a fresh storm were coming to rest along the coastline. The air smelled cleaner, though, as if the impending rain would wipe the stench of Kan-Gul’s magic from this inhospitable land.

Ran rounded another corner and then leapt into the air to avoid a root. As he came down, something slammed into his chest, knocking him to the ground. All of the air in his lungs rushed out of him.

He threw himself to the side as he caught sight of the staff careening toward his head. The tip of the staff smashed into the dirt, spraying up dirt and gravel that flew into Ran’s face. He jumped up and brought his sword up, but it was instantly swiped away by a strike to the back of his hands.

Kan-Gul stood before him, no longer dressed in the gowns he’d worn earlier but instead a simple pair of leggings and a threadbare half shirt of linen. Despite his obvious advanced age, Ran could see that Kan-Gul’s wiry frame nevertheless possessed strength. Thin cords of muscle ran along his arms, twisting around his bones.

“You won’t find me the easy opponent she thought I would be,” said Kan-Gul. But the calm confident demeanor that had been a constant of his personality was no longer in place. And the beads of sweat told Ran that his opponent was much less a threat than he had been only minutes before.

Kan-Gul flipped the six-foot staff around and around, making a circular pattern in the air that reminded Ran of some of the techniques he’d been taught from one of the shadow-warrior schools. He glanced around, but his sword was somewhere off the side of the trail amid the tall, dry grasses. He wouldn’t be able to find it. Not now, at least.

Kan-Gul launched a series of downward and upward strikes that swept in from all sorts of angles. Ran moved counter to them, fitting his body into the spaces they created, trying to draw down the distance so he could get inside the weapon’s effective range. Twice he misjudged the distance and nearly got his head caved in for the trouble.

But even as he got hit, Ran kept moving. He knew it was tougher for Kan-Gul to hit a moving target than a stationary one. And as he moved inside the range of yet another attack, Ran threw an elbow into Kan-Gul’s sternum, hoping to break the bones there and pierce the evil warlock’s heart.

Kan-Gul grunted and drew back. Ran followed and grabbed the staff, breaking it out of Kan-Gul’s grasp. Kan-Gul kicked him as he did so, and Ran lost control of it, dropping it. He watched it fall over the side of the trail.

Both men were now unarmed.

Kan-Gul ripped off his linen shirt. Sweat flowed from his pores and pooled in the crevices of his muscles. He wiped a hand along his mouth and regarded Ran. “Are you as gifted with your hands as you are with your weapons?”

Ran smiled. “It’s the first thing we learn.”

Kan-Gul rushed him, launching a massive arcing kick aimed at Ran’s head. Ran dropped under it and waited for the limb to pass overhead before coming up with a series of punches into Kan-Gul’s lower back. The sorcerer leapt away, surprisingly agile for someone as old as he was.

He circled Ran now, much more wary than he had been initially. “Impressive.”

Ran said nothing, but kept his hands up, alert for the next attack.

Kan-Gul feinted with a punch and immediately went low, trying to tackle Ran around the waist. Ran stumbled back, taken by the head butt to his stomach, and then found himself falling onto his back. Kan-Gul snaked up his body, driving elbows and knees into all of Ran’s crevices. Shots of pain riddled Ran as Kan-Gul used his body weight to keep in control.

Ran felt Kan-Gul’s hands encircle his neck, squeezing and choking. Kan-Gul’s face swam into view. Ran could smell his rancid breath. Drops of sweat spilled from Kan-Gul’s face onto Ran’s. And then the evil warlock leaned closer, so they were only inches apart.

“Tell me, shadow warrior, are you truly living right now? This is what you wanted, isn’t it? The challenge? Well, here it is.”

His bony fingers continued to crush Ran’s trachea. Ran’s vision melted into blackness. He could get no oxygen into his lungs. He heard the slowing pulse in his ears. Felt his muscles slacking.

Heard Kan-Gul chortling with glee.

“Time to die, Ran.”

No.

Ran had tried with all of his strength to push back, but Kan-Gul had met him power for power. They were locked together, each pushing against the other, and Kan-Gul was slowly winning.

So Ran let himself go utterly slack.

The sudden release of power caused Kan-Gul to fall forward slightly. And there, in that smallest instant of possibility, Ran bucked his hips and brought his hands up behind Kan-Gul’s elbows, smacking them off. Ran continued to roll, dislodging the warlock. Kan-Gul sprawled in the grass as Ran got to his feet, coughing and unsteady as he was.

He drew in several quick breaths and steadied himself. Kan-Gul was already on his feet and rushing back in at him. The sorcerer threw kick after kick, but Ran moved easily out of the way as each flew past. Kan-Gul’s breath was audible now, and it came in stuttering spurts that betrayed his faltering strength.

Ran waited until he overcommitted on a chopping strike aimed at his neck. Then he stepped inside of the strike, drove another elbow into Kan-Gul’s chest, and then straightened his arm, using the edge of his hand to chop horizontally into Kan-Gul’s throat.

The effect was instant. Kan-Gul’s hands flew to his throat, trying to free the pressure from the collapsed trachea. His torso convulsed as he vomited, but nothing could escape because his throat was permanently damaged. As Kan-Gul sank to his knees, still trying to work his bony fingers into his mouth in a vain attempt to open his airway, Ran stepped into the grass and searched for his sword.

As his hand closed around the handle, he looked back. Kan-Gul’s eyes were already starting to roll over white.

Ran stepped out of the grass and stood before the sorcerer. Kan-Gul grunted as bile spilled from his lips. There was hatred in his eyes, but Ran never gave him the chance to utter a thing. With one sweep of his sword, the blade cut through the thin neck and severed it from the rest of his body. A small stream of blood shot from the neck as Kan-Gul’s head dropped to the grass. His body slumped to the ground.

Ran picked up his head and walked back to the top of the cliff. He bypassed Jysal and stood near the edge. Below him, the sea churned. and the white froth of colliding waves called to him.

He hesitated only a moment before lofting the head as far as he could out to sea. He watched it tumble through the air, end over end, and then splash into the ocean. For a split second, it seemed to want to float. But then a wave swept over the grisly trophy, and it slipped beneath the waves.

Kan-Gul was dead.

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

“I thought you were dead.”

Jysal smiled. “I very nearly was. I’m still not entirely sure what happened. After that initial use of magic, my body shut down. It was as if I’d tapped into something so overwhelming that my body couldn’t deal with it so it closed down. For the longest time, it felt like I was floating in darkness. I couldn’t hear anything, see anything. Maybe it was like being suspended in time or something.”

“What brought you back?”

Jysal frowned. “I don’t know. Maybe if I was more experienced at using magic, I could answer that question. But something nudged me to wake up, and as soon as that happened, all of this amazing energy flowed into me. I felt more alive than I’d ever felt before.”

“And apparently able to wield magic,” said Ran with a smirk. “That certainly came in handy.”

“I was always able to wield magic,” said Jysal. “But I was held back by fear of the unknown. The consequences of using it scared me. It didn’t help that Neviah filled my head with all of these crazy images and thoughts of what might happen.”

“She was only trying to protect you,” said Ran. “You can’t blame her.”

“If I’d used magic earlier, she might still be alive.”

“Or she might not,” said Ran. “You can’t blame yourself for her death. Neviah never stopped trying to help us. The attempt she made on Kan-Gul’s life shocked even me.”

“She was a credit to the school of protectors she came from.” She walked over to where the bodies of Kancho and his daughter, Yuki, lay. “Such a waste of life. I feel awful he is dead.”

“He died in battle. He wouldn’t have wanted it any other way. If he was unable to live, then death by this method brings him the most honor.”

“And her? What does she gain by her death?”

Ran squatted beside Yuki and pulled Kancho’s sword out of her. Then he arranged their bodies side by side and laid Kancho’s sword between them. “She gains honor. Perhaps enough to offset the dishonor Kancho brought upon them by coming to rescue her in the first place.”

“I don’t understand,” said Jysal. “She gave up.”

“No,” said Ran. “She refused to submit. There’s a difference. Yuki was no warrior, but she was Murai. This was the only path open to her that would have enabled her to retain her honor and restore her family’s name. Despite her youth, she understood this. And she displayed incredible courage by doing so.”

“I still think it’s a waste,” said Jysal.

“It is a waste,” said Ran. “But that is how the Murai think. I don’t fault her for doing what she did. If I had been in her place, I might have done the same thing.” He stood and gathered some sticks nearby. “We’ll need to gather wood for a funeral pyre. I won’t leave their bodies here for scavengers to pick through. Neviah, too.”

Jysal nodded and started helping him gather wood. “It will be strange to not have her around any longer.”

It took them an hour to scour the surrounding area for enough wood for such a large fire. They dragged several big pieces of driftwood back up from the beach, but eventually gathered enough. Ran started a small fire and then held it out to the wood. The blaze quickly spread and raced along the bodies of their three comrades. In seconds, the air filled with dense black smoke. Ran and Jysal stood there a moment longer, each lost in their own thoughts. Then Ran bowed quickly and walked off down the path with Jysal.

“What will you do now? You don’t need schooling anymore, judging by what I saw happen here.”

Jysal touched his arm. “I need to reach the temple now more than ever before. True, I wielded enough magic to help us here, but it’s still untempered. I need guidance that only experienced magic wielders can give me. To go out into the world now would simply be foolish. I’m more a danger than an asset. It’s vital I reach the temple.”

“I’ll take you,” said Ran. “I have no idea where it is, but I’ll accompany you for as long as it takes.”

“I know the way,” said Jysal. “And it shouldn’t take you off the path you’re on, either.”

“My path?” Ran cocked an eyebrow. “How would you know where I’m headed?”

“You’re a shadow warrior. It’s your job to gather information. And Kan-Gul’s death doesn’t change the fact that there’s a huge army massing to the north. If they cross the mountains and come down here, then we are all in danger. Unless I’m badly mistaken, you’ll be heading north to see what you can find out about the invaders.” She turned to look at him. “And making clandestine contact with a member of your clan to send a warning to your people.”

Ran grinned. “I can neither confirm nor deny that.”

Jysal smiled. “But you can accompany me, right? After all, the roads of this land are no place for a single traveler to wander.”

“Even one as dangerous as you are.”

“Dangerous? Me?”

“And beautiful,” said Ran. “Especially beautiful.”

Jysal tucked her arm in Ran’s. “Fortunately, I have a guardian at my side.”

“Me? I’m just another warrior for hire.”

“Of course you are,” laughed Jysal. “Of course you are.”

THE END