“Never understood how that happened,” said Gorm. “We fought the undead all the way into Az’Anon’s lair, and ye were barely strong enough to take on a few skeletons on your own, and half as bold as ye were strong. I saved your hide more times than ye made yourself useful. And then ye suddenly killed the Spider King on your own? No, I don’t think so. I think whatever gave Az’Anon his power offered ye the same deal, and ye took it.”
The accusation drained the blood from Johan’s face and twisted it into a resentful sneer. “I found the strength within myself!” he cried.
“Drake spit!” Gorm snarled back. “Where are ye hidin’ whatever it is? We’ll not rest until we find it!”
It took Gorm a split second to realize that he’d inadvertently delivered an ultimatum, and by the time he did, Johan was already upon him. “Then die!” hissed the paladin, his blade a burning arc in the air.
The sudden force of the attack caught Gorm off guard. He barely got his shield up in time to deflect the blow, and it knocked him off-balance enough that he had to awkwardly parry another. Yet awkward, last-second defenses weren’t enough to withstand an onslaught from the Champion of Tandos. The paladin’s sword was blessed by the god of war, and Gorm felt a hot searing in his forearm as the end of Johan’s blade slipped past his defenses and cut through his mail. A sudden cloud of green smoke erupted around them, giving Gorm just enough time to scramble away, and Gaist clashed with the king.
Johan was a streak of gold with a manic grin, a toothy comet blurring between the three heroes. Golden crescents flashed in the gloom as he struck at them, his hungry blade seeking their hearts and heads. Yet there was no finesse behind the king’s force. The paladin’s lurching strikes and lightning motions blurred the boundary between the supernatural and the unnatural. It almost looked as though his body was dragged through each charge rather than lunging, and his strikes came in staccato, jerking steps that roiled Gorm’s stomach.
Gaist parried, Gorm blocked, and Heraldin dodged and swerved like a pig at the fair to avoid the paladin’s unnerving onslaught. They feigned attacks on him as well, darting forward whenever his back was turned, never letting on that they didn’t want to strike. Not until Jynn and Laruna returned. The heroes needed to be cautious, to take the fight slow.
And they might have been able to, had the paladin kept his mouth shut.
“You’ve done it now,” snarled Johan, darting to take a swipe at Heraldin. Gaist caught his blade, and then the bard and weaponsmaster flitted away amid a cloud of vermillion smoke. The paladin growled and then ripped through the air back to Gorm. “You should have left well enough alone.”
Gorm caught the paladin’s blade with his axe. “It wasn’t well enough,” he growled.
“And what was wrong with it?” demanded the king, taking a swipe at Gorm. “I could have left you alone after the liche attacked. You had fame. You had wealth. You were comfortable. Why weren’t you satisfied?”
“Comfortable?” Gorm growled, trying to hold the paladin’s blows and the crimson mist behind his eyes at bay. “Ye killed so many! Ye built your fame and treasure on the blood of innocents! Burn your bloody fame and wealth! I’m here for justice.”
“Oh, right. The Goblin!” The flames from Johan’s blade cast his diabolical grin in a hellish light. “I almost forgot you think this is about your little greenskin friends. Do you think they’ll be better off after your little rebellion? I’m going to find every one of them that ever spoke to you and revoke their NPC papers. I’ll outlaw every stinking Orc and Goblin in this city, and see them all declared foes. Everyone you ever cared about is as good as dead and looted. They just don’t know it yet! Ha haaa!”
In his mind’s eye, Gorm could see the bodies in the street, hear the screams of the dying, feel the agony of so much loss over his own broken oath. It constricted and twisted his insides until the air was wrung from his lungs and hot tears squeezed from his eyes. He tried to reply, but could only manage a short bark, like he was choking on his own voice.
“Are you scared? Are you ready to run away?” Johan sneered, taking the Dwarf’s reaction for fear. “You won’t get away this time!” he cried, lunging forward to strike at the opening in Gorm’s defenses.
“No! Gorm!” cried Heraldin, but it was too late. In a professional hero’s world, one can’t hope to survive if they make many sloppy mistakes.
And Johan had just reached his limit.
Gorm’s hand caught the paladin’s vambrace and held it fast. The king tried to wrench his arm back, but blanched when he looked at the Dwarf’s face.
The berserker bared his teeth at the king, or perhaps grinned at him. He gave another rattling cough, choking on the laughter bubbling up from his core. White-hot rage seared away any of Gorm’s lingering fear, leaving a burning purpose glowing at the center of his core. The pure joy of it washed over him in an irresistible wave, and he began to cackle as the crimson mists closed around him and painted the world red.
“I can’t see anything,” murmured Jynn, glancing over a memo from Aya of Blades to the Order of the Moon. “Nothing relevant, anyway.”
“We don’t have long,” Laruna called back over her shoulder.
“More spiders?” asked Jynn.
“Well yes, but—” The pyromancer paused briefly to immolate an advancing spider. “But listen!”
Jynn tilted an ear. The palace was filled with the sounds of heroes at work; clanging steel, dying screams, and the gentle ringing of sacks of gold being hefted over meaty shoulders. Yet above the distant din, he could also hear a familiar voice lifted in manic soliloquy interspersed with triumphant, two-note bouts of laughter. “Ha haaaa!”
“They’re fighting Johan already,” said the omnimancer.
“Someone is,” Laruna agreed. “We need to hurry.”
“Right.” Jynn flipped through the file and tried not to think of the tantalizing secrets and forbidden knowledge dancing past his fingertips. “I’ve seen a few allusions to a letter that circulated between Win Cinder, Aya of Blades, and my father in the final days of the Leviathan Project.”
“And you’re sure it names whatever allied with Az’Anon?”
“No. Nothing I’ve read discusses the letter’s contents in any detail.” Jynn pursed his lips as he reached the end of yet another folder. He was almost through the file of canonical evidence. “But it’s the best lead I have. Assuming I can find it.”
“And fast.” Laruna fried another spider creeping from the shadows to a smoldering crisp.
Jynn paused at a letter bearing a few official seals. It wasn’t the letter; this one was addressed to a young King Handor, from High Priest Ayathan Ith’Issan. Jynn didn’t recognize the name, but the seals and sigils stamped all over the document in crimson and gold wax indicated that he was a very senior member of the inquisitorial arm of the Temple of Tandos, and Az’Anon’s name caught his eye. The letter began with the proper formalities addressing a king, followed by overwrought assurances that the king’s request for secrecy and discretion would be treated with the same obedience as scripture. But the passage that followed was more significant.
After careful inquiries and prayerful consideration, the Temple of Tandos has found that the allegations made by Win Cinder in the unfortunate letter you referred to me are undoubtedly false. The mages employed by your father may have believed their blasphemous allegations, but their reasoning is as flawed as the results of their so-called Leviathan Project.
Ask yourself this, Your Majesty: if our scriptures are all wrong and Az’Anon really consorted with such a being as his fellow necromancer alleged, could any hero ever have overcome the Spider King as Johan the Mighty did? We do not doubt our young champion’s power, but the answer is so obvious, the alternative so ridiculous, that we are certain you will reach the same conclusion as our holy inquiry.
We have burned our copy of the heretical mages’ writings and thank the holy warrior that your father saw fit to send the Heroes’ Guild after those dark and foul sorcerers. I understand that the laws of Mankind forbid your archivist from following our example, but I nonetheless implore you to direct him to treat Win Cinder’s missive as he would a sheet of disreputable propaganda or a scrap of trash. It is of no value to anyone.
“That’s it,” muttered Jynn. The Temple of Tandos’ denial of Win Cinder’s message held no weight for him, but their recommendation was an excellent clue as to the letter’s location. He pushed past the reams of paper to expose the very back of the drawer where, as per the custom of every Agekeeper and kingdom archivist in this hemisphere, a thick, red file sat behind the other folders. It held a sheaf of loose sheets and scribbled notes; some incoherent, some discredited, and some just not relevant enough to warrant a place in the official narrative, but all too valuable for any faithful keeper of records to throw away. Between a page of illegible shorthand and a sheet of fine vellum covered by a large tea stain, Jynn found a slim black envelope.
A distant shriek that could have been laughter or a scream rang out. “We need to hurry,” Laruna repeated.
Jynn licked his lips as he lifted the envelope. His hands trembled as he opened it and unfolded the thin parchment within. His hands were shaking violently by the time he reached the end of the note.
The pyromancer glanced back at the archmage. “Jynn?”
The archmage sucked in a breath and braced himself. Then he read the last passage again, wherein Win Cinder provided evidence to confirm the worst fears of Az’Anon’s compatriots in the Leviathan Project. Jynn’s stomach roiled and his knees were turning to jelly as he read the old noctomancer’s dreadful conclusion.
“What is it?” The concern was plain on Laruna’s face as she looked at the wizard.
The blood thundered in Jynn’s ears. His mouth was dry and his palms were damp. “We have to stop them,” he gasped. “We have to stop them now.”
Chapter 31
“You’re welcome to try.” Heraldin threw up his hands in exasperation. “There’s no talking to him when he gets like this.”
Gaist nodded as he stared into the maelstrom of steel and laughter that blew around Johan the Mighty, threatening to knock the king from his feet. Gorm moved too fast for even the weaponsmaster’s eyes to follow, a red and silver blur amid the dust; the best way to follow the berserker was to watch the sparks that erupted from the paladin’s enchanted armor with every axe blow. Johan screamed something, though the other heroes couldn’t hear it above the king’s laughter and the ringing of axe on plate mail.
“We’re supposed to be stalling!” Heraldin shouted above the din, but he knew it was pointless. If Gorm noticed the bard’s warning, it didn’t alter his furious course at all.
Gaist tried stepping into the berserker’s path, raising a palm to halt the Dwarf’s fury. The weaponsmaster’s cloak kicked up in a sudden rush a split second before another shower of sparks erupted from Johan’s vambrace; Heraldin couldn’t see if Gorm had dodged around the doppelganger or if Gaist had just miscalculated his trajectory. Gaist shifted his footing again, and again his cloak snapped back in the Dwarf’s wake. The weaponsmaster tried a third time, and then another, and soon he was leaping about as though part of some complicated dance with the berserker, but he could not intercept his friend.
Heraldin turned his focus to the paladin currently experiencing exactly the opposite problem. No matter where Johan dodged, no matter how fleet his steps, Gorm was already there when he arrived. Violet and aquamarine flashes—the bright flashes of dying spells—marked wherever the Dwarf’s cruel axe hacked against the paladin’s golden armor. The ensorcelled charms and wards were all that kept the paladin on his feet. Leaking motes of magic danced around the ruptured ley lines in the plate, making it clear that the enchantments couldn’t hold out for long.
Johan swayed to and fro, a gilt tree buffeted by an uncouth storm. The tattered remnants of his crimson cloak dangled from his back, and scraps of it pooled around him like the blood of a dying beast. The king opened his mouth to shout another challenge when a vicious blow ripped his entire left pauldron from him in a spray of sparks and ozone. He staggered back and swung his sword in the general direction of the attack, but Gorm was already gone. A heartbeat later, another strike brought colorful sparks erupting from Johan’s back, knocking him toward the yawning pit at the room’s center.
It was obvious that the king was losing ground. What was less obvious initially, but was becoming more and more undeniable, was that he was losing strength as well. Every slash of the axe, every missed parry, every swipe of the flaming sword through empty air; it all seemed to sap a bit of Johan’s might. His movement had been as fast as an adder earlier; now he stumbled about sluggishly, and seemed to struggle to lift his sword. Heraldin surmised that the paladin’s mind must have been addled as well; instead of watching for incoming blows, Johan was staring into nothing and shouting nonsense.
