Phoenix Ascendant - eARC (29 page)

Chapter 44

The power of Myrionar flowed into him, and Virigar smiled.
This has
truly
been a fine, fine day
.
Even if my ultimate goals have been rather put back.

As he had intimated to Bolthawk, the problem with immortality and power was
boredom
. To encounter a surprise, something
new
, this was worth a great price, and the complete and utter reversal of his plan into something that
birthed
the very enemy he had reduced to nothingness? There was surprise indeed.

Kyri-Myrionar struggled weakly, both physically and in her will. The flow hesitated, but did not stop; his smile broadened.
She will fight, yes. As long as she retains consciousness, she will fight. And that, too—her anger, her fear, her hopelessness—these things also feed me.
That was, of course, the other of the primary reasons he did
not
simply kill his enemies outright. Not only did that remove the chance for his adversary to either surprise or amuse him, it also reduced the variety in the meal.

And the dying struggles of a god? That was a
banquet
, one to be savored slowly and carefully, as a human might linger over a magnificently prepared meal with a carefully chosen wine, not something to be bolted down in three bites so one could, metaphorically, run out the door to the next appointment. He had done this many times—with gods, and things greater—and the few times he had been forced to end it quickly were some of his greatest regrets, in a life that had very few regrets indeed.

There was a sudden shift in the flow of power, and he braced himself—but wait! That was not an attempt to fight him again, but the flow had been released, a
FLOOD
of energy fountaining into him, a reversal so unexpected that for an instant—the barest moment—he had to pause, to adjust—and he felt some of that power flow
away
from Myrionar, not towards him, not an attack, just a flow of power—

And the flow was cut off as sharply as though a guillotine had dropped across it. In the same instant, an armored knee drove straight up between his legs.

A knee armored in pure silver.

The agony and power of the impact buckled him over, and a fist—glittering with pure silver—drove upward, sending him flying.

What…?

And as he rose, he saw Kyri Vantage, Myrionar, also rising, clad in pure silver, raising a silver-gleaming sword. He reached out with his Hunger—and found it
rebuffed.
Then he looked over her shoulder and saw the fallen Balanced Sword…and a large section of that blade now bare, no longer gleaming, just steel support where silver blade should have been.

Not
created
silver! Not silver I can erase by disassembling the magic that tries to counterfeit the true metal! She has
exchanged
the metal in her armor for pure silver, silver through which courses her power, out of reach, out of reach!

From behind the silver beak of the silver helm of the Silver Phoenix, amid the golden fire of her power, Kyri Vantage’s voice spoke, with the echoing power of Myrionar making the air quiver:

“JUSTICE MUST BE DONE.”

With a joyous snarl he leapt to the attack, catching the deadly blade’s stroke with his own claws, feeling actual
pain
still radiating from the first rude strike and second followup, and still he laughed. “Then let us
see
your
justice
, Myrionar! For this, surely, is your final surprise for me.”

But as they came together, there
was
another surprise for him, after all.

The entire
world
shuddered. A dimness that had been barely visible, yet had weighed upon the senses beneath perception, flickered, faded,
lifted
, and all of Evanwyl—all of
Zarathan
—seemed to blink, to breathe.

“The Black City is banished,” Myrionar said in a voice of vindication and certainty. “The Five who were chosen have completed their task; Kerlamion is vanquished, and the Great Seal is broken.”

For the first time in literal ages, Virigar felt his mind go momentarily blank with shock.
The Black City banished? The Great Seal…BROKEN?
His stunned incomprehension was so great that he missed a parry, and the great silver sword of Myrionar ripped in cold agony across his chest.

And in the distance…or near as a heartbeat…he heard a single ringing chime, the jingling of a staff in the hand of his oldest, most beloved enemy.
Khoros.

Now, truly, all there
was
left was to finish off this young god. There was nothing here on Zarathan to hold him, no reason to stay. With the Great Seal broken, the power held in abeyance for half a million years would be unleashed, thundering across light-years and through the spaces between reality to return to the world that had not known its touch since the Fall—and he had to be there before that happened!

He spun, ducked, feeling his wound healing, denying the power of silver with the dark power that was his own, evaded a strike, another, caught the blade between splayed crystal claws. Yet…yet he did not sense the rage, the thirst for vengeance. There was only…

…only a calm, calm determination. A certainty placid and implacable as a glacier, and through the silver helm he saw eyes.

Eyes the color of stormclouds and steel, cold and grim with barely a trace of doubt or fear or hesitation, and a chill went through his soul.

Were these
exactly
the eyes?

He could not be quite certain, and then he was sure.
No. Not quite. But close, oh, so very, very close
. But Kyri’s blade was yanked from his grasp, came about again, and again he barely parried the stroke.

Enough of this. I have no more time to waste. A magnificent day, still, yet now I must end it in haste.

He flipped backward, concentrated, brought all the power he had stolen to bear, and increased his speed beyond any limit. The world froze about him, the debris of their clashes suspended in air as though frozen in ice, the breaths of Kyri’s friends and allies halted, the very
sound
crawling so slowly that he could
sense
the sluggish, sluggish rippling of the atmosphere, such that he could have counted to a thousand and it would barely have moved a hair’s breadth. Like a bolt of lightning he strode through the unmoving world and brought his claws down to cleave Myrionar from head to toe.

Silver rocketed across his perceptions, smashed into his face, a bludgeon of flaming cold agony. He rolled, dodged a gold-blazing blade, swung, was
parried
, even at this impossible speed, and then another strike.
Fast! Faster than
I
! That’s impossible!

And the golden Phoenix fire was changing. The fire
itself
was shimmering, blazing to a cool liquid white, sparkling, silver flame that drew its strength from the foundations of the earth, from the source of silver itself, a past lost in time and memory even for him. She struck him again, and
again
, and he impacted the ground with a force that sent a wave rippling out, and he
tried
to regain his bearings, yet she was
there
, in front of him, even before he could
blink
, and her eyes blazed gray and silver as the power that tore into him, shredded his essence like his own Hunger had rent so many other souls asunder!

Impossible,
his thoughts repeated.
What is she?

But…he knew that light. He had seen it
before
.

And then the memory broke through, from the place it had been hidden by his own will when first he began this game, and for the first time in ages
beyond
ages he felt a touch of fear.

Virigar turned and
fled
, and the silver-blazing avatar of Justice was close on his heels.
No, no chance to match this, not now, it would take long,
far
too long, to unbind that which lies within, to retake that which I have hidden! By the time that could be accomplished, I would be dead, torn apart by that which I have created!

He knew what was happening, and why, and fear warred with laughter at the absolute
perfection
of this, the final surprise. His only hope was his knowledge that it was a
unique
event. If she could be interrupted, even for a few moments…
I must escape. I can
NOT
allow her to complete this apotheosis!

He ran, focusing all his power now into speed, and slowly,
slowly
he drew ahead, feeling the silver fire still burning in his wounds, knowing that he was defeated in truth.

There! Evanwyl, the town before me!

He spun then, whipped savage claws around, sent a surge of his Hunger
screaming
at her, separated that part of himself in the veriest
instant
before it struck, and then streaked away, shedding his power, his shape, everything, as he dove into the one shelter he knew could protect him.

Chapter 45

The black-consuming Hunger clawed at Her, and She met it with silver and calm, certain will.

Even as Her blade struck, She realized that it was
not
Her enemy; a part of him, a piece thrown aside as a distraction, as a lizard might shed its tail to divert the hawk, an octopus relinquish a tentacle that it might regrow later. She understood this, but even that did not upset Her tranquil certainty, absolute conviction, pure Justice. She
was
Justice now, only vaguely aware She had ever
had
another name, silver burning through Her like shimmering cool water with the power of the sun dancing along it at dawn, and She no longer thought of vengeance or fear or anger, no longer worried about friends or enemies, only of the
one
Enemy, the Enemy that had been behind all other enemies.

She cleared Her vision, dispersed the foul darkness of the distraction, and sped forward through air as solid as stone to Her feet, seeking that final confrontation with the King of Wolves.

But here was a village, a small city. A part of Her knew it was Evanwyl, the center of a faith dedicated to one small aspect of Justice.

And Her enemy was gone—hidden, She could be absolutely certain, within this village. For that was Virigar’s most potent talent, his ability to hide, to be unseen by any. He was here—as one of the townsfolk, as a dog, perhaps even a stone.

But he would
not
escape. Justice
demanded
his destruction, a destruction earned eons before She could even truly recall or understand, and She answered that call, raised Her Sword, called the silver flame of Justice and Retribution to kindle above Her, a silver sphere the size of a mountain. It would eradicate all beneath it, and even the Lightslayer could never escape.

No.

It was the tiniest of voices, an echo of a hint of a memory lost within the vastness of what She was becoming, had very nearly become.

Mercy before Justice. Justice before Vengeance.

Yet the deaths and destruction that the Wolf had caused towered up in Her knowledge, some the result of others who had stayed their hand, been unwilling to strike against the King of Wolves because he held others hostage, and so let him flee, let him destroy again, and
that
blood was then on
their
hands, not on his alone. She firmed Her resolve and began to call upon the Silver Fire to descend.

No. Justice can never be done by expedience.
The voice was Hers, yet it was not. It was a quieter voice, a
human
voice, but it strengthened.

The sacrifice of innocents is
never
Justice.

She wavered, confused. What the voice said was true. Yet She also knew that the monster below had
used
that to escape, had been responsible for deaths, for corruption, for evil utterly beyond measure on a thousand thousand worlds in a thousand thousand realities, and he was so
close
, so
vulnerable
, and voices forgotten for years out of mind called to Her to
strike!

NO.

It was a human voice, and it was
Her
voice, and She suddenly
saw
Evanwyl beneath Her, and remembered Lythos and Arbiter Kelsley and the little twins in the temple, afraid, and most of all remembered herself, crying, holding her brother’s body.
If I do that to another, there is no Justice, no matter what monster I may strike down
. And with sadness, She knew it to be true, and lowered her sword, let the Silver Fire return to her from above.

“No,” she said to herself, and with fear and wonder realized that she was finally remembering who she
was
, that she had lost herself in something that had lain beyond rage, beyond vengeance, beyond even Myrionar, and now was returning, returning from the high, implacable
otherness
that was even now fading from her understanding. The silver fire guttered down, faded, transformed back to the red-gold flame of the Phoenix, and Kyri looked down on her home, seeing the faces of all the people looking up at her in awe and welcome.

And then she remembered the others and the battle that had raged about them. With a spurt of perfectly human fear that she
embraced
after that passage at inhuman coolness, she streaked away, back, back to the devastated forest, the fallen Retreat, feeling her heart beating, her limbs trembling, chest rising and falling, and taking back her
life
that she sensed had been within a knife’s edge of vanishing utterly into something else.

Kyri-Myrionar looked down, and then breathed a sigh of relief. For there in a mostly undamaged circle, still shimmering with traces of her own red-gold flame, were Tobimar, Poplock, Aran; the Watchland, smiling up at her with vindication; and Bolthawk, collapsing with stunned relief to the ground.

All about lay destruction; the Justiciar’s Retreat was an almost unrecognizable mass of pulverized stone, buckled steel, burning trees and wood, shattered glass. Even the remains of the Balanced Sword were broken, some of the silver taken by her in that last, desperate maneuver, some of it simply stripped and crumpled by multiple impacts.

The sight weighed on her heart.
It took twenty years to build it, it was said. And in a few moments, it’s been destroyed. Corruption had come here…but these halls were not to blame.
The thought that even the Justiciar’s Retreat was gone, the great Balanced Sword thrown down, no home remaining for even the last Justiciar unless Evanwyl were willing to dedicate itself once more for decades to rebuild it? One more injustice that wrenched at her heart.

But then she saw the wonder in the eyes of her friends, and suddenly remembered that, somehow, impossibly, she
was
Myrionar, was the living god of Justice and Vengeance and, she knew now in her heart, Mercy…and a god incarnate in the world did not always have to heed its limitations.

Kyri laughed, and reached out into memory with golden Phoenix-fire. Flames leapt up throughout the clearing, flames that sparkled like gold and danced like joy, and the wreckage quivered, chimed, began to move. Kyri-Myrionar called to the remains of the Retreat, to the elements that made it, to the magic that still lingered, and reminded it of form, recalled to it strength, told it the tale of proud, high walls and strong doors and songs sung and stories recounted, of laughter and oaths sworn and victories celebrated.

With the fire of the Phoenix the Justiciar’s Retreat rose from its ashes and wreckage, windows reforming, great halls rebuilding themselves out of broken stone that became whole and solid once again, and finally the great Balanced Sword rose up, its blade pure and shining silver, balancing two great pans of gold upon a solid bearing of imperishable sapphire.

The shattered and burning forests flickered, and the burning became brighter, became auric flame as bright as the sun, a flame that did not consume but
healed
. Green grass followed golden fire. Brown, seamed trunks sprang anew from the earth and burned for a moment with gilded power that faded to emerald leaves that rustled quietly,
joyously
, in the untainted breeze.

Kyri landed before the others, and they all—from Tobimar on down—dropped to their knees before her, save only for Poplock, who bowed as low as his squat body would permit and cast his golden eyes down.

She reached down, drew Tobimar up. “Never kneel to me, Tobimar. Or you, Poplock.” She looked at the others. “Nor you, Watchland.” She gave a sudden grin. “Aran, Bolthawk—you can do it once in a while.”

Tobimar burst out laughing, and his brilliant blue eyes shone at her as they had the first day she’d realized she loved him. “You’re…still yourself. I wasn’t sure.”

She remembered those brief silver moments and shivered, then took his hands in hers. “I wasn’t, either. But now I am.”

He embraced her so hard her armor creaked, and she returned the hug fiercely. “Now I am.”