Chapter Thirty-Two

You are not alone in this fight. Many will stand beside you, and every one of them will be valuable. Only through their support can you succeed.

Paris,

France

March 8th, 1844

The sun was settling into the horizon beyond the smoking buildings as Jean-Luc Pouillard watched the Seine turn an ominous blood-red. He waited, along with ten thousand soldiers and a handful of wizards, for their doom to arrive down city streets. He heard a shout, and his body tensed. His heartbeat quickened, and across the river, a young man wearing the livery of a messenger broke through the line of buildings. Several of them had been sent a half-mile into the city to warn Paris's defenders when the enemy had broken past Elsa and begun to approach. Jean-Luc didn't know whether this man's arrival meant that Elsa was dead, or merely that there were too many of them for her to overcome, but either way, they had only moments.

"They are coming!" The man cried across the stretch of water, his voice small and frantic from this distance. He stumbled, suddenly, and then collapsed to one knee, and then several bullets took him at once, each of them eliciting a small puff of red in the air.

Jean-Luc swallowed hard, and then shouted, "Arms up!"

There was a rattling in the air as thousands of rifles were raised at once. Jean-Luc lowered his cheek to the stock and sighted along the reticule on the barrel, feeling his stomach lurch as a roaring, charging mass of men in dark uniforms burst through the line of buildings, pouring from every street and alley in numbers that made it very clear how painfully outnumbered he and his men were.

"Steady!" He shouted, fighting to stir his own bravery along with that of his men's. Even so, he heard several clatters along the line as some of his soldiers dropped their weapons and ran, screaming. "Steady!"

They hit the waterline, and Everdark's forces plunged directly into the river, charging through until their knees were submerged, and then their waists, and then their chests, and then they were totally submerged in the water, wave after wave of them disappearing into the choppy surf.

Jean-Luc felt his heart hammering harder than he could ever remember it beating. I might die before any of these men are able to lay a hand on me, he thought. There was the crisp sound of gunfire along the line, and bullets snapped in the water. Here and there, there a blossom of red appeared, and a body floated to the surface, but most of the shots didn't find their way home.

"Hold!" Jean-Luc yelled, realizing that his arms were trembling, and he fought to get them under control. He couldn't hit the side of a house right now.

There was a horrible waiting, a span of seconds in which the only sound was the thrashing of water, and the only sight was the legions of men, or whatever the servants of Everdark were, charging into the far side of the river. Then, all at once, the water exploded outwards at their shore, and the first wave leapt onto the shoreline.

Jean-Luc didn't need to call for fire. All at once, they began to shoot, and a fell haze of blood met the air. They ripped through the first line of their enemy, the bodies forming patchwork quilt over the ground, trampled underfoot by the next wave. They fired again, and Jean-Luc forced himself to keep his eyes open, nausea rising in his throat as bodies were torn and shattered before him. But not all the advancing soldiers fell, and some hit the line of Paris's defenders, laying about with axes and other cruel weapons. The sound of his men's screaming was added to the cacophony.

Jean-Luc shot, and he shot, again and again until his rifle was spent, and then he weiled it like a spear, ramming the bayonet into the chest of one of the horrid creatures. All around him, men on both sides were cut and torn and slain, and the ground became slick with blood. Jean-Luc couldn't think, and he acted on a combination of instinct and fear, slashing and stabbing and falling back, foot by foot, as he was increasingly surrounded by enemies.

A man to Jean-Luc's left was cut down, and he let out a horrid death cry. Then the last of Jean-Luc's allies, to his right, had his head shorn from his shoulders by a stone axe. And he was alone, surrounded by three of his enemies, even as hundreds more charged onto the island behind him. Jean-Luc could hear the screams of the innocents. They'd managed to get much of Paris's population onto the tiny island, but of course they weren't able to fit them all. The refugees that had been in camps around the city had been sent into the countryside, along with women and children from the outer wards.

In this moment, Jean-Luc envied them, for they would know the sweetness of life for several days longer than he. His wife was somewhere behind him on this island, as well as his nine-year-old son. He knew, as the men around him began to close in, that his family was probably already dead. He cried out with rage and sorrow equal to everything that was being taken from him, and he charged the nearest of his enemies.

He ran his bayonet through the man's cheek, and into his head. He felt the blade break away from his rifle under the force of his strike, and saw its reddened end burst from the back of his foe's head. A sword took Jean-Luc to the side, and he felt a terrible pain. He clung to his rifle and stumbled away from the one who had cut him, clubbing at the last with the stock of weapon. He struck the man in the sternum, and his blow was sent wild; Jean-Luc hit the man again in the side of the head, feeling a grim satisfaction as his blow broke the bones in the man's temple. Then he was struck again with the sword, and this time, he knew there was no going on.

Jean-Luc fell to his knees, and he looked down to a mess of his own intestines, spilling from a pair of rends in his side. He looked up and stared into the hate-filled eyes of his enemy as the sword plunged towards his heart, and he felt the bite of the blade once more.

xxx

The horrible song of war faded in Odette's ears, and was replaced with an overwhelming silence. She tentatively opened her eyes, and saw that she and Eleshka were huddled on the marble floor of a beautiful temple. Carved pillars of masterful workmanship formed the walls of a majestic, open-air building surrounded by golden clouds and magnificent blue skies. A rectangular pool was in the center of the room, its waters calm and idyllic. Near to them, at one end of this grand hall, was a marble throne, currently unoccupied.

"Where are we?" Eleshka asked, voice fearful.

"The Sea of Stars," Odette replied softly, climbing to her feet and looking around with a mixture of shock and awe. She looked down at her hand, still closed around Ceristo's – Hythirion's – locket. So it still worked.

"I've never been a place like this before," Eleshka said. "This place feels… strong."

"It's the seat of an immortal," Odette said, recognizing this place from the description that Elsa had given. "Elsa's, actually. This is the Hall of Glory."

Odette's sense of wonder was broken as Eleshka began to let out nervous, panicked sobs.

"We just left them all behind! We left them all to die! They're all gonna – they're –"

Odette reached out with her mind's eye, silently touching Eleshka's wavering lifeline and imbuing it with strength. Her shaking slowed, and she started to take deeper breaths, her panic fading away.

"Hush, Eleshka," Odette said, her mind starting to gallop ahead. She was starting to formulate a plan, but it was messy, and she wondered whether it made any sense. "There is only so much any of us can do. Not everyone is a fighter."

"But the whole reason that I didn't go with my father is that I was supposed to help," Eleshka said, her voice in her fear and discomfort bleeding into petulance.

"And you still will," Odette said softly. "The Sea is home to all of the domains of the immortals. Any being that humans worship has its domain here, somewhere."

"What are you saying?" Eleshka asked, sniffling and rubbing at her nose with the back of one of her hands.

"People on Earth have started worshipping Everdark," Odette said. "According to Elsa, the ancient Protector, Ashanerat, said that Everdark in part derives its power from the belief that people put in it."

"So…"

"So somewhere in the Sea of Stars, there's got to be Everdark's domain, right?"

"Maybe," Eleshka said. "But why do we care?"

She fixed in her mind the destination that she envisioned, and once she opened her mind to the heart of darkness, she immediately knew how to get there. It was like a great, voracious hole in the center of the Sea, threatening to drag the other domains into its gaping maw. A place of great power, and rapacious evil. Could she get there? She didn't know.

"Can you feel Everdark's center of power?"

"Yes," Eleshka said. "This is an old wound in the Sea of Stars, and it has grown accustomed to it. It no longer hurts the way that it once did."

Odette figured that if they both had a good mental image of the heart of darkness, they could probably get there.

"Excellent. That's exactly where we're going," Odette said, closing her eyes and drawing upon her magic.

"What?" Eleshka said, her voice jumping with fright. She grasped at Odette's arm. "No, Odette, we'll die!"

Somewhere deep inside, Odette appreciated the irony of this situation. She had once been as meek and timid as Eleshka, perhaps even more so. But the trials of their existence for the last two years had expunged weakness from her, and now she gave the thought of such danger little thought. This was, she knew intrinsically, what she was meant to do. The Mender was created to repair broken bonds, and what could be more broken than a tear in the essence of the Sea of Stars itself?

Odette glanced at Eleshka, and her resolve softened momentarily. Though Odette had a strong suspicion that Eleshka would be very useful to her if she were also present at the heart of darkness, admittedly she couldn't exactly see how right here. Eleshka was a child, wrapped up largely by accident in a fight that had grown far beyond her. She couldn't take Eleshka to Arborea and her father, because it lay in the far reaches of the Sea of Stars, beyond the distance that she could reach with an ordinary portal. But… perhaps it was safe here?

"You don't have to come with me, Eleshka. If you like, you can stay here. I can't promise you that it will be entirely safe here, but it's certainly less dangerous than what will come ahead."

Eleshka's eyes were fraught with conflict. Odette watched her carefully, unsure if she should say anything to try to sway the girl one way or another. Seconds crawled by in which the only sound came from a gentle whistling of the wind as it filtered through the columns of the Hall.

"I want to go with you," Eleshka eventually said, sounding nearly surprised. "I'm seeing this through to the end."

Odette nodded and smiled softly. "Let's hope that end is farther away than it seems."

She took Eleshka's hand once more and closed her eyes, opening herself to the magic energies that bound the planes together. She saw her own lifeline, which she shared with Elsa, and it was still strong and vibrant. This filled her with confidence, as it meant that Elsa was still alive and well in Paris. Next to hers was Eleshka's lifeline, also glowing bright white. Odette grasped them both in her mind's eye, and she focused on their destination. The heart of darkness was spatially distant, but in the realm of soul and spirit that their lifelines existed in, it was only a thought away. She bent them towards it, and felt her body lurch as it fell into the arcane space.

In a heartbeat, they were gone.

xxx

Hans peered out of the alleyway towards the field of rubble where the Arc de Triomphe had once stood. A yawning portal had taken its place, a rippling purple energy field through which their enemy had poured. The circular clearing around it was far from empty, however. It seemed that their enemies had were using this place as mobile command, and in the space of an hour or so since they had invaded the city, two large tents had been constructed on opposite sides of the area. Perhaps a thousand men lingered here, crossing between the tents or staking a watch on the portal.

Hans ducked back into the alley to be free of their gaze and nodded to Kariena.

"Yeah, there's about as many as you expected. Perhaps a thousand."

"Well, we knew this wasn't going to be easy," Kariena said. "But that's why we have a brilliant plan, right?"

Hans raised an eyebrow.

"We have a plan?" Thomas asked hopefully.

Hans looked at him.

"I was hoping that maybe Hans had thought of something on the way over," Kariena said.

"We aren't really the 'planning' type, Kariena," Hans said.

"We need a distraction," the meek witch said. Her name was Stella.

Hans frowned. If only Elsa were here. She was excellent at creating distractions.

"We don't need all of their attention," Thomas said. "Just the ones in our path. Just enough that there's a straight line to the portal."

He stood up from his crouch.

"Right…" Kariena said, frowning. "But we also shouldn't do something that recklessly endangers any of us."

"No," Thomas said, a noble decision shining in his eyes. "You and Hans are many times stronger than I will ever be. Each of you has the power to end this. It will be an honor to serve my empire in this moment."

Then Thomas charged through the alleyway and into the open.

"Thomas, no!" Hans shouted, sprinting after him, but Thomas was already ten yards into the line of the enemy, blazing with arcane energy as he sent radiant spears of light flying at the hostile soldiers.

They converged on him like a beacon, and Hans saw, to his amazement, a straight path, right down the middle of the ruined street, open between him and the gateway to Hell. He felt a horrible wrenching in his stomach, but he turned his path straight again and ran towards the portal. A lone enemy noticed his approach and turned to fight, and Hans cut his head off without breaking stride. Then Kariena was beside him, and Stella was behind her, and they were all at the threshold of the portal.

Hans glanced over his shoulder one last time, and he saw Thomas, blazing with light, collapse to one knee as he took a sword blow to the back of one of his legs. He continued to strike his enemies down with flash after flash of searing light, and then another sword fell, separating his head from his shoulders, and the light died. Hans closed his eyes.

"Hans! Come on!" Kariena yelled, and Hans turned to follow her into Hell.

xxx

"My name is Edouard Mercier," the silver-haired wizard said as he stepped backwards and the furies to either side of him stepped forwards to engage Elsa. "My soul was banished to Hell many years ago as the result of my daughter's tampering with death."

Rimeheart clashed with two swords of gleaming steel, and then Elsa swept a wave of ice into the furies and then pressed her advantage as they were battered backwards, slashing at them with deft, precise cuts that took great skill to parry. There was no more time for anything but her best.

"But your father defeated my daughter on the very day that she managed to bind Everdark to this world again, and on that day, Everdark traveled to Hell in the Sea of Stars."

One of the witches raised a hand and the cobblestones around her erupted and flung themselves at Elsa in the form of a million tiny shards. With a thought, Elsa stopped them in midair, and then she sent a gust of cold wind at the witch, and they hurtled back into her, slashing at her skin.

"The God of Darkness was interested in rewarding us for sacrificing our earthly bodies to help ensure its return. It offered us great power, and the only price was singular devotion."

Elsa roared as she flipped Rimeheart around and extended both of her hands to her enemies. Ice burst from the arcana around them, surging upwards to entrap their legs. The other fury's face contorted with strain as her pace slowed to a crawl. Her body began to glow with multicolored energy as she drew upon her magic, and then a radial disk of heat expanded from her, burning away the flurry. She dashed the rest of the way to Elsa and launched a violent offensive. Their blades met with a might boom, and then a flurry of exchanges began.

Dark shadows of vaguely humanoid form sprung to life around Mercier and his remaining bodyguard, and they extended withered, wretched limbs to clutch the wizards and lift them to the sky, pulling them free of Elsa's onslaught. The specters lowered them again, and the second witch joined the fight. Mercier dusted snowflakes off of his shoulder and began to speak again.

"Everdark expressed regret that my daughter had not survived the ritual of re-binding. It considered her an unfortunate loss. But I no longer cared for the child who had murdered me and my son. So Everdark found it a fitting reward to my sacrifice to imbue me with the same magics that my daughter had used to perform her dark arts. Now I am the necromancer."

The cobblestones around Elsa exploded, slashing her body with shrapnel. Undead burst free from the street, dozens of them clawing their way over each other's rotted forms to grasp and claw at her. Elsa tried to sweep her arm and send a wave of ice through the zombies, but a pair of them managed to clasp it and restrain her, and another sunk horrid, yellowed teeth into her flesh. She cried out in pain and shock, and instinctively swirling blades of ice appeared around her, shearing through the writhing forms and clearing ground in a small radius around her.

Severed arms and the head and torso of one of the zombies hit the ground inside her wards, still wriggling. Elsa realized that she'd lost hold of Rimeheart, and she held out her hand. The sword spiraled off of the ground and tore through an arc of the undead creatures before its hilt landed solidly in her hand. Elsa looked at her left arm, and saw that the bite wound wasn't as bad as it had initially felt.

She'd picked up a few other cuts and bruises throughout the fighting so far, but nothing unmanageable. She could keep fighting for quite some time. On some level, however, she knew that wasn't enough. Thousands upon thousands of their enemies had swarmed past her, and by now they would already have reached the Notre Dame. Elsa realized that she was failing in her duty, engaged with these wizards on this street near the center of the city. If there was anyone left alive on the Île de la Cité, it was her responsibility to save them.

"Enough!" Elsa cried out, slamming Rimeheart into the earth.

A crack appeared in the street, rippling down towards where the enemy wizards stood, and then bursting forth with shards of ice. The zombies around her were torn to pieces, and the wizards ducked away from the slashing projectiles. Elsa turned and sprinted several steps before a track of ice picked up beneath her, and then she slid ten feet into the air, and then another ten, and then she was above the rooftops. She swept her gaze around, and saw the burning spires of the Notre Dame many streets away.

"You cannot run from this fight, Elsa!" Mercier called after her, but Elsa wasn't listening.

One of the furies sent a bolt of energy after her, but she was already too far to away to be hit, gaining speed with each new step. There was an uncountable number of hostile soldiers on and around that island, and there was sure to be many more wizards there, too. And if Everdark was here, she knew that at some point, she would have to face it again, too, without Hans to aid her.

Was this how you felt, Ashanerat? When you considered giving up hope? Because I don't think I'm making it out of this one alive.

xxx

Arno Belgold Montaigne stood on a window balcony at Versailles, gazing upon the road that led from the palace to Paris. The sun was blood-red as it touched the horizon, turning the fields of golden grasses a sanguine color that served as an uncomfortable reminder of the bloody days, during the height of the French Revolution, when he had to watch the gutters of his home run with the blood of nobility. He had been a poor boy, a late child in a large family, and his father and mother had told him each day of the great fortune that awaited them under the new regime.

But all he could recall were the endless streams of executions, burned into the backs of his eyelids.

Those days were a long, long time past; sometimes, Montaigne wondered how he had gotten to be so old, that memories from his own life seemed foreign and unfamiliar. His life was so far gone, so far departed, from that of the poor French boy. Today, however, was a day that reminded him of the revolution.

Silhouetted against the horizon was a legion of dark forms, marching in the street and through the fields, so numerous were they that they could not be confined to its width. They were close enough now that he could hear the advancing army's footfalls, like a slow, steady thunder. He did not want to think about the implications of such a large force approaching Versailles unmolested, because to him it seemed to imply that Elsa and Hans had been defeated in Paris.

Or if they were still fighting, Everdark had managed to field truly overwhelming forces.

"Montaigne." Anna's voice broke him from his pessimistic thoughts.

"You should be gone already, miss," Montaigne said, glancing over his shoulder at the empress.

He still felt a terrible, crushing guilt at the horrid thought that he had been an unwitting co-conspirator in her recent imprisonment, but against all odds, she managed to look as regal and powerful as she ever had, standing on the threshold of the balcony. He knew that he would take the guilt with him to his grave, but also he didn't expect to live out the night. She glanced past him, at the oncoming army. Much of the palace had already been evacuated, but there was nowhere to go. They were fleeing to the southeast, to Rambouillet, because a portal had never been established there and so theoretically, it was safe from Everdark for the time being, but many of them realized that there was no real point to running.

Why prolong a life that would only be whiled out waiting in fear?

Anna shook her head. "Either my sister and the others find a way to save us, or we die. We might not die tonight if we run, but we would inevitably face the same fate. I have no will to run."

"Not even for your child?" Montaigne said, feeling a great sadness at the thought that young Michael would be snatched so cruelly away from a world he had never even gotten to experience.

"He was sent away with the wet nurses," Anna said softly. "I can't bring myself to leave."

"Neither can I," Montaigne replied as he turned back to gaze out at the advancing army. They were closer now, close enough that he could make out the faint forest of pikes rising above the heads of the enemy.

Anna leaned against the balcony beside him, the dying light casting an orange glow on her face and evoking a molten light in her eyes.

"It was a beautiful dream," she said softly. "A world united, standing hand in hand before an unstoppable enemy and saying, 'no.' You are the unwavering force, but we are the unbreakable mountain. By the force of our virtue and the strength of our conviction, we will prevail. A unified empire."

Montaigne realized that he had begun to cry. "Yes, it was," he said. "A beautiful dream."