The Black Ankh
Duel of Fates, Cont'd
by Laura Campbell, aka Shadow of Light Dragon

Kra'lysie fell back to walk just behind me as we reached the edge of the Deep Forest. The allied humans, gargoyles, goblins, trolls, tril'khai, drakelings and dragons of Britannia, Atarka, Tarna and Scaeduen had gathered on the clear stretch of ground between the trees and the Shrine of Justice. I was intensely conscious of heads turning in our direction as we strode from the cover of the forest and between the massed forces. I was even more aware, uncomfortably so, of the Crown of Lord British glittering in the noon sun.

I heard whispers of my name as the dragon-woman and I strode towards the Shrine of Justice, where the 'command group' were waiting. There was hope in most of the voices. Pride. Determination. I could almost hear the thoughts behind the simple vocalisation of my title. It was the same as when I'd brought the Britannians through the heat-blasted desert on Atarka…

But how many deaths will there be this time? Virtues… help us. Help me. Please.

"Thou art troubled," a familiar voice murmured at my left shoulder. Richard had flickered into vague form and drifted near-invisibly in my wake.

"Aren't you?" I relied quietly.

The ghost smiled. "Thou canst not take care of everyone, Elora. Focus on thy tasks and let others look to their own strength for this fight. Trust that they will do what they're here to do."

I nodded slowly. "I will. What will you do?"

"There is nothing much I can do… I will likely see thee on the Isle of the Avatar."

One way or another, my mind added as he faded from sight. I tried to banish the thought of my king, my friend, rising from death with incandescence in his eyes and malice in his smile. The possibility, however, was real. If it happened… would I have the strength to end him?

Would I have the strength to end Britannia?

"You don't have to worry about that, Avatar," Kra'lysie said, her voice pitched low.

"Listening in again?" I asked mildly. After a moment, when she didn't answer, I added, "You would… kill him?"

"Not just him."

I continued to look straight ahead as we walked on, my strides unchecked. Finally, quietly, I replied, "Thank you."


The assault began.

The first group, the goblins from Tarna under the lead of their regent, used the Virtue Stone Mellorin had Marked for the caves beneath the Isle of the Avatar. We had no idea what kind of resistance there would be down there now that there were no prisoners to guard, but Mellorin was sure that almost six hundred goblins would be more than enough to overpower any patrols.

With the rest waiting, I transported myself, invisible, to the Shrine of Humility.

The first thing I saw, as the new scenery wavered into view, was soldiers. No… daemons. All of them daemons. At least twenty. And all of them reacted with exclamations and curses as the scrying shield I'd just ripped through fell to pieces around them. A couple attempted spells designed to restore the shield, others to reveal what had torn it down. All failed, but my attention wasn't immediately on their magical endeavours.

There was a glowing… portal. It hung in the air above the shrine's pedestal like a great cloud of steam, distorting and blurring everything behind it.

They were trying to re-open the old daemon gate that had existed back in the Age of Enlightenment.

"Were I you, Avatar," Kra'lysie distant voice came to my mind, "I would either make myself scarce or fireproof."

I had only a couple of seconds with which to consider that choice before the air above the Shrine of Humility was full of dragons. Mellorin, who'd transported them here, had the presence of mind to vanish almost as quickly as she'd arrived. I almost followed her, before remembering that the Crown would only offer our draconic allies its protection so long as I remained with them.

Flames roared all around me, punctuated by reptilian shrieks and daemonic cries. The advantage was clearly on the side of the dragons, for most of the daemons kept trying to use magic. The quicker ones shed their human guises and took flight, seeking to either engage or flee. None got very far.

"That was all?" Kra'lysie demanded, alighting on a cliff. Her eyes were bright with victory. "If that's the worst we must face, Avatar, I'm surprised we didn't try a frontal attack sooner!"

"You did great," I said, dropping my invisibility. "Keep an eye on things here and we'll start bringing people in."


It didn't take too long. As soon as a force was brought into the Shrine of Humility, they surged from the canyon to engage the Atarkan troops camped to the west. A group of mages remained with the daemon gate, seeking a way to reseal it.

With the battle joined, those we'd organised to fly with the dragons to the Shrine of the Codex gathered and mounted. Lord Draxinusom elected to fly himself, and while I'd expected to travel with Kra'lysie, I found the molan Cale approaching me. At that, Kra'lysie only sniffed and promised she wouldn't be offended. Mellorin was carried by Tailrace, who casually informed her he'd have no trouble eating her if she pulled anything.

We lifted off, flew east past the edge of the island's cliffs, then skimmed so low across the water I could have almost sworn I could reach down and touch it. The experience of riding Cale was quite different to Kra'lysie. I had to shake my head the longer the journey became, as I started seeing… things. No, that wasn't quite right. I started getting impressions that I was someone else. There was the faint outline of a helm obscuring my vision, and I could see the black hilt of a sword, as transparent as smoke, hovering before me.

A memory of another world's Avatar, long dead? Or an offer?

The impulse to reach out and take the hilt was strong.

Cale's muscles bunched beneath me and his burning wings tilted as we began to curve around a sheer cliff that dropped down into foaming surf. As we swept past, the sloping valley leading towards the Guardian Statues was instantly visible. So were the ranks of Atarkan soldiers massed before it. At the sight of me astride the fire-winged horse, there were distant shouts and finger pointing.

The reaction when six dragons glided into view in our wake was a bit more panicky.

Men and women broke ranks and fled as draconic roars reverberated through the valley. As the dragons sped towards the foe with fire kindling in their throats (except Kra'lysie, that is), my eyes were distracted by the hovering sword hilt once again. I noticed Cale was not hanging back, was instead folding his wings to speed over the heads of the enemy. Thinking I understood what the molan was trying to convey, I grabbed the sword hilt hanging in the air.

The Voidblade solidified in my grasp.

With dragonfire gushing down on either side of me and arrows thwipping up from below, Cale swooped lower. I flourished the Valkyrie's sword high.

Beneath us, enemy soldiers toppled like felled trees.

"There!" Kra'lysie bellowed above us. "The goblins are emerging! Give them cover!"

I cast about until I could find the cave mouth leading into the tunnels beneath the Isle of the Avatar. Sure enough, the green-skinned goblins of Tarna were pouring from the entrance. While the dragons kept the bulk of the foe at bay with their fire, the goblins cut into the rest between the burning turf and the Guardian Statues. Then, as though it'd been something they'd practised, the dragons broke off with a furious backsweep of their wings and the goblins charged forward to engage the soldiers who were still reeling from the burning, skyborne assault.

"Take us down!" I yelled, and Kra'lysie repeated my order in her louder voice. Once those of us with two legs were safely grounded (some more gratefully than others), the five Britannian dragons beat their way aloft again to rejoin the fight. While the three males remained to support the goblins, the two females struggled for altitude and veered northwards, where the rest of the army was embattled near the Shrine of Humility.

"Uh, Avatar?" Iolo began.

"What?"

The bard cleared his throat, and looked at me pointedly. Some of the others were regarding me with curious expressions. Mellorin's face was carefully blank. After a second, I realised I was still sitting astride Cale, the Voidblade clenched in one hand. With a slight grin, I slid from the molan's back and tossed the sword into the air, where it curled into smoke and dissipated.

A few eyes widened.

Kra'lysie, reverted to human form once more, muttered "Show-off," under her breath.

"That's a neat trick," Dupre managed. "How didst thou know… er… how to do that, exactly?"

"I read it in a book somewhere." Reaching over my shoulder, I drew the Blacksword. The expressions of my friends changed instantly with that small action. Some froze, some looked wary… others looked away.

For a fraction of a second, I could have sworn Mellorin smirked.

"Come on," I said, turning for the Guardian Statues and pushing myself into a run. "Richard's waiting for us."


As Arcadion had predicted, the Shrine of the Codex was guarded by human soldiers and mages. Fifty of them, not counting the daemon. The daemon itself, disguised as me, was standing near the Codex's empty pedestal, Richard's body sprawled on the crimson carpeted dais. At the sight of our arrival, the creature snatched something away from its head. The crown? I couldn't tell if it'd been about to wear it, or had just taken it off… The daemon's voice, my voice, lifted to command our deaths.

Fifty of them against fifteen of us.

But we weren't just human. There was Kra'lysie. There was Cale. There was Lord Draxinusom.

There was me.

I smiled grimly as the bulk of the enemy moved to bar the way into the shrine. Their mages began to incant…

Only five soldiers were left protecting the daemon.

Silently, I sent my words into the minds of my companions. "I'm going to Blink us past this lot. Mellorin, you and I will tackle the daemon." I wasn't leaving her to backstab any more of my friends."The rest of you, keep the Atarkans off our backs. Kill them, incapacitate them, get them to surrender, just keep them occupied."

"But—" Kra'lysie began.

"You're with me too, Kra'lysie."

Oddly, there was not a word of protest from my friends. I'd been hoping there wouldn't be, but had expected some. Then again, it was Mellorin they wanted a piece of, not some daemon

With a focussed thought, I transported the lot of us into the Shrine, halfway between the daemon and the majority of the soldiers.

Cale reared, spread his fiery wings to their full width and screamed a wild challenge. In the moment of fearful uncertainty this generated in the Atarkans, we all ran to the attack.

"You're pathetic, you know that?" Mellorin shouted as the two of us rushed forward together, preparing to take on the five soldiers moving to protect the daemon. "You could have killed them all with a few words and spared us the trouble! You could have flattened the entire army!"

I swung the Shade Blade to block an oncoming sword. "And risk my own sanity? Next I could be turning my powers on my friends!"

Mellorin snorted and neatly ran one soldier through. She wrapped her left hand around her bandaged right wrist as she wrenched the Lifestealer free. "You're stronger than that. The real reason is because you think using that kind of power is evil. Let me ask you something, Avatar, isn't it more evil to spare your virtuous self the deaths of an enemy army so that all your allies can bleed and die to achieve the same end?"

"You don't know what it's like to be undead, so don't pretend you can understand!" Taking down one adversary, I moved to engage the second. The daemon, I noticed, was nearing panic. A sidelong glance revealed Kra'lysie stalking one side of the fray, her eyes burning.

Mellorin drew a sharp breath. "I might get that chance soon if we don't hurry!"

I followed her gaze. The daemon, in apparent desperation, had lifted the Crown of the Liche King.

Kra'lysie pounced forward with a roar, which still sounded oddly draconic even in her human form. Despite her lack of wings, she virtually flew up to the dais.

Mellorin and I, at the same time, smashed through the final two soldiers and charged up the stairs, swords flailing.

All three of us reached the creature at the same time and, after it fell, not one of us could agree who had killed it.


I crouched and pulled the Crown of the Liche King from the pitiful heap of ashes before Mellorin could try to claim it. I hadn't given much thought into how the thing could be destroyed. I supposed it would have to be done as soon as possible, if not after the battle was—

"Put it on, Avatar," Arcadion murmured.

I glanced down at the softly glowing ether gem, feeling a need to shiver. Did I trust the daemon? Did I trust him with my life..?

"You are my only chance at freedom, Master," the daemon whispered into my uncertain silence. "If I betray you, I'm stuck in this cursed blade forever. And what choice do you have, really? This… or waiting for Mellorin to cooperate."

I stood slowly. Pitching my voice as low as I could, I said, "I just don't understand how—"

"Trust me."

I clenched my jaw and quickly removed the Crown of Lord British, replacing it with the Crown of the Liche King. Insofar as I could feel heat and cold as one of the undead, the touch of the second crown against my skin burned like ice and I heard myself gasp at the contact. The sound and the sensation deafened me to whatever Kra'lysie had just said, but her outraged tone of voice couldn't be misinterpreted.

For a moment… I felt it. I felt the power of life flowing through me…

…followed by pain.

I looked down with a kind of detached interest at the length of bloodstained steel protruding from my chest. The Lifestealer.

"Very well done, Arcadion," Mellorin's voice murmured near my ear. She gestured, whispering, and Energy Fields sprang up across the width of the Shrine of the Codex, blocking the two of us from the rest of the group. Some of them, upon seeing Mellorin's betrayal, had shouted in fury or alarm and started towards us. None of them could help now. From the looks on their faces, they knew it as well as I did. I was also aware, belatedly so, of Kra'lysie lying in a crumpled heap at the foot of the dais.

"Enough power, and I'll be free." Mellorin twisted the sword a bit, pushing. Burning metal slithered through me until I felt the press of the hilt against my back. I stood as one paralysed, waiting for I knew-not-what. I could feel life-force and power flooding through me like a never-ending wave, and spilling out into the Lifestealer.

"…Avatar."

My gaze dropped to the Blacksword again, where it hung from my limp grasp.

Traitor, I wanted to say, but I didn't seem capable of uttering a word. I could feel my end nearing. I could see death approaching through the tidal wave of life, through the stagnancy of undeath, and could only watch…

"Avatar," Arcadion said again. "Strike."

Then Mellorin said what I couldn't, her voice sharp.

"What?"

"You are wearing the Crown of the Liche King," he said patiently. "I am a daemon. Strike."

I obeyed without fully comprehending, my fingers tightening and my arms making the move a single fluid motion. Reversing the Shade Blade, both hands clenched around the hilt, I thrust backwards and upwards. Mellorin's cry of pain and shock coupled with the tear of metal through chain, leather and flesh.

"Arcadion."

I heard my voice as though from a great distance, slow and distinct.

"Arcadion. Restore my powers."

-TBC-