AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Uthe guessed they were standing in the lower bailey. Nearly a dozen statues were arrayed like scattered trees in a dirt and rock field. As they circled them warily, Uthe saw they were fully armored knights wearing the Templar mantle. They were posed at ready, like before a battle charge, all facing the opposite archway to the upper bailey.
Keldwyn's gaze went there and his senses sharpened. "My lord, there is something of great power through that opening. Several somethings. Would that be what you seek?"
"We shall go and see. Do you feel anything here?" Uthe was still staring at the statues.
"No." As Keldwyn laid his hand on one, his brow creased. "Though it feels like there should be. The magic and its intent may be cloaked. Is it wise to put them at our backs?"
Uthe swept his gaze over them. Though the alabaster features were non-specific, he felt as if he knew each of them. "Yes."
He questioned his gut about that, however. What purpose did it serve, having these still figures of his past standing here? To plant the false, childish hope that they'd come to life and his aid?
"You yourself said the Shattered World seems to act like a capricious, cruel child," Keldwyn reminded him.
The stone archway appeared to be moving, but it was the vines upon it. The barbed tendrils pushed out of the cracks and crevices, creeping over the rock. As they moved toward the opening, the signature Keldwyn was detecting became powerful enough for Uthe to feel it. Identifying it was no trouble. It was one with which he was very familiar, though it had been a while since he'd come in direct contact with it outside his mind.
Uthe clasped the seal on his neck, thumb sweeping over the raised imprint of the two knights. The metal was humming, the sorceress's magic responding to what it had been created to destroy.
They passed under the archway with eyes trained on those animated vines. Once clear of the threshold, the dry rasp of their movement against rock stopped.
Keeping a peripheral watch on the sinister vegetation, they took in what lay before them. The vast courtyard had once been cobbled, though grass now grew up between the stones and piles of rock fallen from the surrounding walls littered them. The smell was of dry death, the life long ago sucked away and leaving only a skeleton. But pulsing, raw power sat on top of it, conjuring heat like a bonfire.
Sitting at the opposite end of the upper bailey was an altar, a T-shaped structure of wood planted over a narrow rectangular table. The table was a union of rotten timbers, and leafless, thick wooden vines tangled over the T, nearly obscuring its shape. Though these were signs of decay and neglect, Uthe could see and feel the magic pulsing from the altar. Red flame danced in the cracks between the timbers and flickered in the spaces of the woven vines. Sparks arced off the altar. Though there were no charred spots around it, a burning smell permeated the air.
On the altar was the head, mounted on a flat bottomed spike. An old cup and a rusted spear sat next to it, like they'd left there by a warrior who'd sat down for an ale. Yet while the red flame surrounded and permeated the altar in continuous flow, the cup, spear and T were anchored, connected with silver-blue lines of energy that formed a spherical net around the head. That net was visible evidence of Shahnaz's binding that had kept the demon locked inside the head. The Grail, the Spear of Longinus and the True Cross had seen wear these many years, but that wear was an illusion. Their power remained just as true.
Uthe had inflicted decapitations, so he knew what a head looked like deprived of blood circulation, left to decompose in the sun and at the mercy of those whose business it was to clean up the dead, like the vultures outside. This head had never looked like that. But it didn't look alive either.
The thick brown hair was wild as a thicket. Dark, deep set eyes punched holes in a face weathered and taut. The eyes stared, empty and yet not. The flat bottomed spike kept the head upright, the mouth open and slack. The whole thing looked unnatural, eaten up by evil, and Uthe's first reaction to it, then and now, was to seek a way to destroy it. Fortunately, they'd come with one.
Uthe executed a deep bow, dropping to one knee. "I know you reject my devotion, John the Baptist, Madman, Prophet of the Wilderness, for you were ever a humble man, but I honor your courage and sacrifice these many years. If it is God's will, we will soon release you to the heavens you so richly deserve."
The eyes flickered. It was as if there were two or three interior lids, and they alternated between a serpent's gaze, feverish-looking brown eyes or wholly white orbs. In Keldwyn's mind, Uthe saw him realize why Uthe had been so discomfited by the Fae Lord's illusion of snake eyes.
"There is no God's will. There never was." The sibilant voice crawled like spiders into the ears, up the spine, across the palms of the hands, making them itch. "You will release him to dust, to nothingness. That is all. And I will be released, period."
"No, you won't," Another voice came from the head, this one rough like tree bark. "I would prefer God consign me to dust than endure another moment of your foul company, demon."
"It comes out of its shell to speak, thinking that somehow it is about to be saved." A harsh laugh. "I will destroy all your illusions and dreams. That will be my parting gift to you, Madman."
"I never asked to be saved. Only for your banishment. And I come out of my shell to feel your intent more clearly. Vampire, call for aid with the Fae Queen's power. It is time. He summons your enemies in force--"
A garbled scream, and the head vibrated with energy, as if two minds were doing battle within it. "Now," the voice barked.
The transition was abrupt, but Uthe didn't question the Baptist's command. He yanked Rhoswen's amulet from the pouch at his waist even as Keldwyn turned toward him, the same order on his lips. Nexus trilled a challenge.
Pulling the amulet around his neck, Uthe clasped the shard of ice in his hand and chanted the words Keldwyn had taught him. Keldwyn's mind-voice echoed in his head so they spoke the words together, in both languages. "Should all about to be lost, may those true of heart and of like mind come to aid my purpose, be it of the highest intent."
A rumbling began beneath their feet. Keldwyn yanked Uthe away from the archway, Nexus circling behind them. The stone crumbled, punctuated by a billowing wall of dust and flailing vines. Nexus skidded to a halt with a clatter of hooves and let out a piercing call Uthe remembered all too well. The horse's battle call had his heart thudding up into his throat.
Damn horse wants to give the call to charge, Sir Leonard had grumbled good-naturedly.
The ground was vibrating. Uthe could hear distant yells. Something was coming up the rocky slopes around the castle. But those cries weren't close enough to be what was coming through the archway, climbing over the crumbled rock and materializing out of the billowing cloud of dust.
Uthe took a more secure hold on the sword, and Keldwyn unsheathed both long daggers at his belt, both of them prepared to face whatever came out of that churning dust. The Fae was fully in his mind, knowing this was the right time to move in sync with one another.
"Blessed Virgin..."
The first thing he saw was a black tunic with a bold red cross emblazone
d across the front, and then the man inhabiting it came into focus. Manfred, his sergeant. Though he was as fierce a fighter as any knight, he'd come into the Order after the Rule had been written, and it required those wanting to take the white mantle to be knights before joining the Order. Jacques, Uthe's squire, was just behind him. He wore a studded jerkin and leggings, his dark hair just as messy and uncombed as it ever was. Uthe had doused him in a trough once to remind him to keep himself clean in the eyes of the Lord. Despite his stench, the boy had the courage of Nexus and a heart as innocent as a virgin's.
"Kel..."
"I see it, Varick. I see all of them. It is real."
Uthe's throat was too thick to say anything else. A wall of white mantles formed behind his sergeant and squire. Leonard, Carlos, Olivier, Jean-Claude, Barabbas... When the dust settled there was a line of thirteen of them, his closest brethren at the time of Hattin. They'd all died there, but today they'd come back from the dead to fight this fight with him. Not for the kings of Jerusalem, France or Constantinople. Not for the Pope. Today they fought for the cause of the Lord, not the men who claimed to act in His Name. And they were not Uthe's only reinforcements.
The residual power of the amulet was swirling around and through him. As it spiraled through his blood, he heard another message. The voice was indefinable, not Rhoswen nor any of the known voices in his head, but as soon as it spoke, Uthe knew its truth came straight from the magic itself.
"Their hearts must be like yours...warriors, reconciled to who and what they are, no fear of death, only of the triumph of evil and what that would mean to those they love. They fight for love. The only reason a fight must be fought."
Out of a narrow opening of what remained of the curtain wall, Daegan Rei stepped. He was not dressed in a Templar's garb, but in his usual dark clothing, the better to access the katana he had scabbarded on his back. He probably carried a dozen other weapons Uthe couldn't see. He gave Uthe a short nod, then adjusted to allow Gideon and Jacob room to step out with him.
Gideon was dressed as a traditional knight, in brown belted tunic over mail, armed with sword, axe and mace. A smile touched Uthe's lips. He'd always recognized the knight in Gideon, whether or not he'd actually been one in a past life, like his brother had been. Jacob stood at an alert resting state in the white tunic of the Crusader, marked with a red cross on the chest. His hair was longer, just past his shoulders, and he looked like every veteran Crusader Uthe had seen, limned with sand and sunburn. His blue eyes met Uthe's and he gave a short nod, much as Daegan had done.
