As swords clashed for what seemed the thousandth time on this day of death, Gylen barely even noticed.
He didn’t notice the blood that stained the grass, either. Or the blood that stained his own armor.
Nor the blood that welled up through holes in that armor, holes created by one or another edged weapon.
Or, no, it wasn’t that he didn’t notice. It just didn’t register within his brain. Which was the same thing, really.
Someone whistled behind him, sharply. Velerin, he thought. He wasn’t sure where Kain was, and Velerin was the second in command out here.
The whistle itself was a command, and Gylen moved with the rest of the line to follow it. They had, up until this point, been spread out in a solid line of battle; pikes in the center, swords towards the flanks, and the dragoons and archers behind. Now, though, the line shifted into a wedge; apparently, Velerin meant to drive into the center of the enemy like a stake through the heart. An effective tactic - they could go hedgehog once they were in the middle - but a risky one. If the wedge broke, they would likely all die.
It was a desperate tactic, but this seemed the time for desperate tactics. The numbers were against them; the forces of Baron and Damcyan now numbered just a little over a thousand, their enemies almost three times that.
Gylen took his place in the wedge without really thinking about it. He no longer had any qualms about following Velerin’s orders; the man knew what he was doing, and had proved it more than once today after Kain had disappeared. Velerin’s tactics had kept a losing battle from turning into a rout.
Pikes to the fore, swordsmen to the flanks, they drove inward, inward. Gylen had to step over the fallen bodies as they moved forward. It shook him; some of them were people he recognized. Some of them were people he had once called friend. He didn’t let any of it touch him. Emotion would mean his death.
It took about four minutes, for the push to break through into the center of the enemy formation. Another whistle signaled the shift in the line: pikes to the outside, everyone else in the middle. "Everyone else" included Gylen, so he ended up out of the battle, for now. Which didn’t bother him in the slightest. He had gotten over the revulsion of his first battle, but he took no joy in fighting either.
It was a difficult formation to break. The pikemen were mostly from Damcyan, and a life lived in the desert made them resilient. It was like trying to punch a hole in the hide of the animal from which the formation got its name; it didn’t do any good, and you usually got hurt in the process. When one man on the outer line fell, the two to each side simply moved inward and filled the gap, and fought on. The enemy couldn’t break though, and meanwhile the dragoons staged vicious hit-and-run strikes, leaping straight over the heads of the pikemen to attack, then jumping back inside just as swiftly. Gylen saw Velerin participating in several of those strikes.
It wasn’t quite an invincible formation, but once set up it was formidable. Damcyan pikes were about two feet longer than those used by soldiers of Baron, and thus they had the reach on their opponents. The enemy’s advantage of numbers was slowly being reduced, but there were casualties on their side, too. And few wizards with enough strength left to heal the wounded. Gylen saw Porom seeing to Velerin after the dragoon returned with a huge gash in his gut; her face was ashen.
Now that he was out of the fight, Gylen could take the time to examine himself. And now that he had the chance to think, he felt every injury sharply. It didn’t help that his heavily dented armor was digging into his flesh in several places, nor that his shield was mangled almost beyond repair.
The hedgehog was getting smaller, slowly but inexorably. The pikemen were as mortal as any others, and they couldn’t hold against such numbers.
Yet, for some crazy reason, a lot of the men on Gylen’s side were cheering.
"What’s happening?" he asked the man who stood next to him, an archer from Baron.
"Look!" the man shouted at him, pointing over Gylen’s shoulder at the sky.
Gylen looked. "I don’t see what you’re..." he began, then trailed off.
Reinforcements had arrived, in the form of the great dragon.
In a duel of dragons, any use of fire, ice, or indeed any form of breath weapon was not allowed. It was strength against strength; teeth, claws, and wings against teeth, claws, and wings. Ancient custom demanded it, and more than custom. There was something in the mind and magic of a dragon, that would not allow it to refuse such a challenge to battle, would not allow it to break the prohibition.
So Bahamut and Vor met on equal terms. And after half an hour of fighting, neither had gained the advantage.
Bahamut was indisputably the stronger; as King of the dragons, he had to be. The balance was redressed, though, by his injuries eighteen years previous: his left eye missing, his tail only partially grown back. A dragon’s tail was always spined, and it was one less weapon he had available to use.
Both of them bled heavily, now. The wounds on each were too numerous to count; the only two that stood out were a huge claw-slash on Bahamut’s belly, and Vor’s now-broken left wing.
For what seemed the hundredth time, Bahamut struck out with his own wing. But he was tired; what had at the beginning of the battle hurled Vor against the wall with impossible force now only bruised him. When Vor struck back, Bahamut cupped air with his wings and leaped out of range. He was too tired for true flight, but he could do that much.
In the background, battle still raged, but the sound of it was weakening. And the forces of Baron, Damcyan, and Eblan were losing.
I must end this, Bahamut thought. Now.
A redoubled assault left Vor with another long, bloody gash across his chest; its counterassault left Bahamut with a disabled foreclaw. Another weapon gone, but he was far from finished. He couldn’t let himself lose; if he did, Rydia would die. A rule of nature. The thought was maddening, and he struck out randomly with his remaining claw.
It pierced Vor’s eye. The left one. The dragon screamed in pain.
It was a bit disorienting, for a moment. Like looking into a mirror, for Bahamut himself had lived eighteen years missing one of his own eyes. The moment didn’t last long though, before he followed up, and this time, for the first time, struck true. His teeth took Vor by the throat.
Vor was a dragon, and as such, didn’t die quickly. He had to know, from the instant his blood sprayed out over the stone of the courtyard, that his fate was sealed; but still, he fought like a being possessed. It wasn’t enough, though; Bahamut held him off. Barely. It took a full three minutes for the blood loss to render Vor unconscious.
"That," Bahamut said. "was for your betrayal of me. And this is for the betrayal of your people."
When King Bahamut of the Dragons turned away, ashes were all that stained the stone.
Vashin swayed, and his blade faltered. It was like a dagger in the heart. He and Vor were no longer bonded; long and painful magic had seen to that. But it wasn’t quite a complete severance, and when Vor died, Vashin felt it in every bone of his body.
And in his moment of inattention, Corvin reached in through his guard with that jet-black sword, and disemboweled him. Literally.
Pain ripped through Vashin’s body like a river of fire. He could only watch as his insides became his outsides.
"Got you...damn fucking bastard..." Corvin gasped. A quarter hour of dueling, the sort of thing he had trained for all his life. A quarter hour where neither could gain the advantage, Corvin’s missing hand and lack of a shield offset by sheer determination.
Vashin struck at him again, but there was no strength behind the blow. Corvin parried, and the force of impact tore the blade from Vashin’s hand.
The dark Caller, young as he was, looked positively ancient in that moment. As if his age had suddenly doubled.
"Well," he managed somehow. "Seems...seems you’ve beaten me. Fitting, I suppose."
"What?" Corvin asked, confused. He lowered his sword, which had been raised for the death blow.
Vashin gave a wheezing laugh. "Well, I did set your own sister against you. And for longer than you’d think, too. She was mine when she first came back from the forest.
That shook Corvin to his very boot soles. He hadn’t even suspected.
Iron was in his voice. "You’re going to die, you know. Even if I leave you here, you’ll die."
"Oh, of course. I don’t mind, not really. I deserve it."
"What?"
"I said, I deserve it. What’s wrong with you? You of all people ought to know that I deserve death."
Corvin looked at him warily. It wasn’t what he had expected.
"I didn’t think you would agree with my assessment," he said.
"Bah," Vashin said. "I knew the moment I saw what happened, out in the shipyard, that I deserved death." He sat down on the stone floor. "All the bodies, all the blood...I wish I hadn’t begun this, do you know that? But once I started, I had to carry it through."
"Why tell me this?" Corvin asked in a raw voice.
Vashin shrugged. "I dunno. Maybe so you’ll know when you kill me that you’re killing someone who regrets what he’d done. Maybe so when it’s over, you’ll hurt. You took one of my oldest friends from me, this day. Vor is dead. And Hapheera...is yours." There was pain in that last bit. "I lost her friendship long before this, but you took her from me. I want you to hurt, for that."
"What are you trying to do?" Corvin said. "Talk me out of killing you? Make me doubt that you deserve it? I have no doubts. You are mine now. I’ll kill you and be glad I rid this world of the foul blot on it that is your face."
Vashin, who had been grinning slightly even in his pain, now frowned. "Very well, Corvin," he said coldly. "Kill me then. But even as you do so, I have my revenge. For me, for her, for everything."
As Corvin began his final swing, time seemed to slow. No, it didn’t seem to; it did, for him at least. Magic crackled in the air around him, Vashin’s magic. And as his blade made its slow path towards Vashin’s head, where it would crash through his skull and spray his brains across the wall, the wizard and Caller thrust his hand above his head and spoke three words, words of magic. Normal magic, not Caller’s, and Corvin couldn’t recognize it.
Purple lightning streamed from that hand, spread out along the ceiling, and vanished down the corridor. Half a second passed, before it struck its target. And Corvin knew, somehow, what it did, how it worked. He still didn’t recognize it, he simply knew.
It was a binding. A mix of Caller’s magic and Vashin’s magic of the mind, it was a binding between humans. And it struck Caitlin, and he felt it strike her, as if it had struck himself.
Corvin desperately reversed the action of his muscles, struggling to bring the blackened blade to a halt. But it wouldn’t obey him. He strained, but the sword of shadows continued on its course, exploding through Vashin’s temple and cleaving his head in half.
Time lurched back into its normal course. Too late, much too late, Corvin slung the blade away. It clattered to the floor by the wall. He collapsed to the floor, and he wept.
Minutes passed. Hours. His sobs weakened, and stopped. And still he stayed there. He couldn’t bring himself to go back and see the results of what he’d done.
Footsteps approached from down the hall. Who’s? He couldn’t tell.
"Corvin?" A man’s voice. Cecil’s voice. He sounded haggard. And remorseful.
"What?" Corvin replied, struggling to keep his voice calm.
Cecil walked up beside him, and looked down at the disemboweled and destroyed corpse. "So it ends, then," he said bleakly. "Kain?"
"I’m here," the dragoon spoke from back in the doorway. Corvin looked up, and back at the two of them, and also at Edge, who stood behind Kain, face bleak.
Corvin looked at his father, tears and a question in his eyes. Edge shook his head. It was answer enough.
He refused to acknowledge the pain. Not the pain of his body, nor the pain in his soul. "Is the battle still going? Are we winning? We should get out there and fight, come on...."
"Corvin," Cecil began.
"We have to go, we can’t leave everyone figh-"
"Corvin," Cecil cut him off. Corvin fell silent. "The battle is over. We won."
"It’s over?" Corvin asked, not understanding.
"It’s over."
He looked down at Vashin’s corpse. "I want to go home," he said.
"Time enough for that later," Cecil said, not unkindly. Corvin could see the old Paladin set himself, and knew what he was about to say. "Corvin...your sister is dead."
A binding, he thought. "I know," was all he said.
"Come on. We have to go. Leave this...."
"Yeah..." Corvin said.
Cecil turned around, to the other two. "Where are the others?" he asked. "I saw some of them outside...Velerin, Gylen, Rosa, Rydia, Bahamut. And Cid and the Elder. And I think I saw Porom out there too. Where’s Edward? And Palom?"
Kain looked down at the floor. "They’re both dead," he said hoarsely.
From the look on Cecil’s face, Corvin thought he would break down and weep, right there. Much as he himself wanted to. Edward, the one with the sad eyes, who never looked quite right with a sword at his side. And Palom, the mischievous one, always ready with a joke, or a piercing comment. Brilliant, too. The most powerful Black wizard in centuries. And both of them were dead. Along with his sister....
But Cecil only nodded, somberly. "So it ends," he said again. And he led them out, into the daylight. The sun’s warmth on Corvin’s face burned like cold fire.