Chapter Ten: Call of the Sovereign


The start of the match began with the flutter of a purple sash, dropped by an official whose hand shook when he glanced at Talisman. It drifted toward the ground like a loop of Jester's frilly handwriting, and even before it touched the earth, the waiting fighters engaged. Talisman, to no one's surprise, went straight for Fjord. Which, in Beau's opinion, was unfair. During her admittedly fitful snatches of sleep, her dreams had been full of Talisman's delicate cranial bones cackling and snapping under her fists. But, heck, if she really had to, she could put a pin in that. After all, it wasn't like Talisman was alone in his bastardry. There were two more for the taking.

She ended up facing off with the orcish barbarian, seven and a half feet of muscle and bone, and a face not even a mother could love. He towered, wrinkled lips pulled over his teeth, while one red-lidded eye rolled lividly and a string of drool dripped down his jaw. When he moved, he looked like an animal, and the weapon he wielded, with its knob of bone, was a sword in name only. Really, it was more of a club. Only the end, horn-tipped like an antler, had the piercing power of a more traditional weapon. That he weaved through the air, drawing ever decreasing circles like he was honing in on her vital parts.

Ha, Beau thought over the wild palpitations of her heart. She was going to eat this guy for breakfast. "We gonna dance, big guy?"

With a roar, he charged.

His fighting style was vicious, reckless, and blunt. He wielded his faux-sword with terrific speed, and more than once, Beau felt the wind of it tugging at her bangs or scraping across her belly, promising disembowelment if she moved just a little less sprightly. It was her training that saved her. Brute strength wasn't the Cobalt Soul way, but finesse was, and Beau brought all of it out to play. She dodged and rolled, dashed and flipped. She could tell it was disorienting Sisk, but he was dogged, absolutely intent. Even when she got in a flurry of blows, low over his kidneys, he merely grunted, turning on dime to catch her in the ribs.

That sent her tumbling, and by the time she was upright again, her whole midsection was throbbing. "Really wish I had some nice platted armor right now," she muttered. "Preferably with nasty ice powers. Yeah, ice powers would be nice."

She looked Sisk in the eye, saw that he was still fighting off the pain of her own attack, and seized the opportunity to throw out a different kind of punch. "So, Sisk. Tell me, why did you go after my friend that night? Talisman, I get. The guy's a lunatic. But what possible reason could you have to cut off somebody's hands and leave them for dead?"

Hesitation percolated through the cloudy rage in Sisk's eyes. "Wizard made master angry."

Master, huh? Well, that explained a few things. "Oh, yeah? And what role did you play? You hold him down, Sisk?"

Sick's expression twisted in Beau read as discomfort. "I hold," he said. "I break. Small bones and big bones." He made an unidentifiable sound, like a great dog who'd had someone step on his tail.

The description cut through Beau. She had a vivid imagination and was more than equipped to visualize what had happened to Caleb, yet somehow, hearing this halting, monosyllabic account was worse. "You broke his bones," she repeated.

"Knife not right knife. Not cut enough."

Beau thought she might be sick. Instead, she clung to her anger. "Right, and you went along with it. Did he fight? Did he curse you?"

Sisk's huge shoulders sagged. "He cry," the orc said.

Beau's stomach lurched. She told herself it was stupid to feel any kind of pity for this monster. Still, she knew exploitation when she saw it, and while it didn't exactly surprise her given what they knew of Talisman, that didn't make it any less scummy. "Sisk," she said. "You know, you don't have listen to Talisman."

Sisk shook his head. Violence was entering his eyes again, driving away the brief moment of clarity. "No," he grunted. "Master said."

"Caleb was defenseless," Beau snapped. "He didn't deserve to be hurt like that. No one does. Talisman was wrong."

"NO!" Sisk thundered, and any semblance of sanity was lost. The beast-like disposition returned, and he threw himself back into the fray.

As the fight carried on, Beau maintained rigorous control of her respiration and heartrate, yet even so, she knew the strain was beginning to tell. It was time to take this brute down. "Hey, Sisk," she snapped. "You going to keep swinging that hedge clipper around or are we actually going to fight?"

If her words trickled through Sisk's consciousness, all they appeared to do was outrage him. He came at her like a charging manticore, spittle flying from his mouth. She took the opening his rage provided, slipping under his guard and coming up under his chin with the palm of her hand. She felt it sink into his throat, but just as she felt a spike of triumph, an iron hold clamped down under her armpit. He lifted her without apparent effort, like lifting a rickety wooden bench in a tavern. He shook her, and her teeth slammed together, her stomach flipping over. Nausea rose high as her eyeballs, and she gagged even as her hands scrambled for any kind of grip.

Her heel got in a lucky blow, but his only response was to snap her harder, and this time she felt her shoulder give. She couldn't help but howl as the bones dislocated. White sunk her vision, and for a moment, there was only agony, paralysis, fear...

'Focus,' hummed Xenoth's voice, and she swallowed down bile. By effort alone, she controlled the pain. It slipped down the scale from debilitating to manageable, and she opened her eyes to the orc's slavering face. "Hey," she said to him, perhaps a little dreamily. Which, lightheadedness could do that to a person, you know? "I hate to say this, but I'm a bit done in. Not that I'm not having fun or anything. It's just, like, my insides feel a little pulverized. So, if you don't mind..."

The kick was perfect. She had to practically bend in half to get the right angle, but, hell, Beau liked a challenge. This time she felt the bones of his nose give, knew the shards would be traveling upward, into delicate tissue. Not enough to enter the brain. Nope. She intended to follow the rules. So she held back, using only enough force to keep the guy down until a healer could perform a Greater Restoration on his face.

Had Sisk been any other race, he probably would have collapsed outright, but that orcish vitality – man, it was a thing. Instead, he backpedaled. There was a final moment of crushing pressure on Beau's arm, and then she was airborne. Sisk slammed into the clay, splayed on his back. Beau landed not much farther away, more or less on her feet. Panting, she remarked, "Perfect three point landing. Urk." Then, slowly, she stood, holding her arching shoulder as she hobbled over to make sure her foe wouldn't be getting up anytime soon.


On another part of the field, a different kind of battle was taking place.

Far from sinking into Sisk's primitive rage, Yasha had taken the time to make a careful evaluation of her opponent, and what she saw prompted her to take the greatest caution. He was small, between Jester and Caleb in height, and slight of build, though the dark cloak obscured most of his body. Though he was supposedly an unarmed fighter, he didn't move like one. His steps were mincing and silent, and he kept his hands tucked out of sight. Even his clothing was wrong. Kicking and punching would be restricted. And he watched her with eyes like a martin – beady and fierce, but keenly aware of its size.

And cornered animals did not fight fair.

"You do not have to fight me," she said, letting the wind carry her words rather than increase their volume.

The human flinched, his jaw tightening, but he did not respond.

She raised her sword as he darted forward, but even as her footing shifted, his body moved like an eel, and he was no longer in front of her. There was a flash of metal beneath her arm, and then pain burned across her side, deep and penetrating. She looked down. Blood already soaked her woolen tunic, and she could feel the cut.

Her opponent was watching, wary and whetted. His eyes never left her, even as she hunched slightly from her wound. Yasha searched for a weapon, but she saw none. His hands, though still mostly lost in the folds of his garment, were empty. A hidden blade, then. She'd seen them in use before, clever devices that folded into the sleeves or were enchanted to take the form of a ring or a bangle. That he was so willing to use such a thing without even the pretense of abiding by the rules meant that he knew this confrontation went far beyond the tournament itself. They were fighting for their lives, and this man meant to live.

And possibly to kill.

"Okay," she murmured, straightening slowly. Death did not frighten her. It had been close to her all her life, every long winter a lesson, every frozen stream or barren womb or wolf cry in the night a ringing reminder. She had lived by her sword and by her strength always, and she did not mind doing it now, especially not when righteous anger simmered so close to the surface, ready to be called on. Ignoring the pain of her wound, she raised her weapon.

The rogue – for that was what he was – moved.

He was a shadow; here and gone, insubstantial, a wraith. She barely tracked his shape, even now that she knew how he moved. This time he did not get close enough to cut her. Her sword created a huge swath of deadly space, and though he nimbly avoided it, it forced him out of range. He cursed, low and thready. They moved around one another, him outside, her in. Seeking an opening.

It came as he stumbled. Just the tiniest uneven step, and she lunged. There was enough time to see the whites of his eyes, to turn the edge of her blade, but as she made her final approach, she saw her error. His fingers twisted something, and there was the tiniest pop. Yasha flung herself back too late. The vial was already shattered, sinking wetly into the stinging cuts it had made on her hand. Fumes, deceptively sweet and sinuous, filled her nostrils, and she felt the spell take hold, weight piling on her limbs until she could barely move. She felt herself beginning to sink...

Yasha closed her eyes, concentrating even as her thoughts became syrupy and slow. From within, she heard a voice speaking in a quiet Zemnian accent: "It is a battle of wills, magic. If you focus your mind and funnel it properly, any spell can be broken." This he'd said to her over a campfire during a midnight watch. They'd shared many such conversations, letting them meander naturally, without demands. It was easy to speak with Caleb, and now this piece of advice came back, seeping even through the influence of the potion's effect.

"Will," she said, and exercised all of her own on the unseen chains binding her limbs together.

They needed her.

Her friends needed her.

Caleb needed her.

The chains snapped. Heaving, she stumbled, in full control of her limbs once more. She flexed her hands, feeling them respond at the normal speed. Coal-darkened eyes speared the rogue, who looked dumbfounded. "You shouldn't have been able to do that," he stammered. "I paid plenty to make sure –"

"You would be surprised what you can do when people are depending on you," Yasha said, and his mouth snapped shut under the weight of her gaze. Yasha breathed out. She felt empowered, emboldened. Readiness filled her completely, rushed through her nerves like a roll of thunder in a coming storm. She looked at the unfortunate human, netted into this battle by some unknown pressure, and weighed him down under an impassive gaze. "I think I would like to rage."

Terror entered him, and he backed up a hasty step. Not that any amount of steps would keep him away from her once the tide of her anger was fixed on him. She decided to give him a final chance. Her eyes rotated slowly to where Fjord and Talisman were locked in combat of their own. In this setting, the sorcerer wore no mask to hide himself. He wielded his magic and his words with equal venom, and when he sensed her gaze, he snapped at Bekkit, "Do you need a graven invitation, you fool?"

To the hesitating rogue, Yasha asked, "Is this a man you plan to die for?"

Bekkit was clearly at war with duel fears. Then there was movement under his cloak, a cloud of smoke, and he disappeared.


Talisman saw Bekkit run. "Traitorous worm!"

Fjord watched the rogue disengage. He hadn't heard what Yasha said to him, but he had heard Talisman, who had made no secret of his disdain for his human comrade. It didn't surprise him that, given the choice between a contemptuous master and a fully-enraged barbarian, he had chosen flight. "Thin loyalties will do that."

A dark head jerked around. "Do not mock me."

Truth had a sting, Fjord knew. "I think you're the one whose words have done the most damage."

He was expecting the attack, but still the heat of it crackled so close he felt his skin burn. Hissing, Fjord reached into his belt pouch. With an effort, he managed to get off a Witch Bolt, but Talisman brushed off the energy as though it were flecks of water. He demanded, "Can you do no more than tickle me?"

"Dammit, Caleb. How do you do this?" Fjord muttered, banking to avoid an attack aimed directly at him. He was able to duck and roll, using a pile of stones as cover, but he was off his game, reaching blindly for a weapon he wasn't wielding. There was an itch beneath his skin, and it was calling, whispering, cajoling, but he shoved it down, exerted the self-control he valued so greatly. He stepped out from cover, calling on another bolt and almost lost his head when a bolt of electric energy cratered into the earth so close to him that the concussion lifted him off his feet. "Ah!"

He needed to slow things down. But what usually came so naturally was now difficult. He knew what he needed, had practiced time and again, but still Fjord fumbled over the slippery glob of flesh, nearly losing it through his fingers.

"Shit!"

Seeing him struggle, Talisman scoffed at him. "What is this pitiful display? I know acolytes who can do better." His own powers seemed fully under his control. Fjord could see the power simmering beneath the surface, in the veins and skin of his grey-green body. 'And you,' he thought, 'barely able to hold onto a newt's eye.' But even as he said it, the component was in between his fingers and he whispered the words aloud that usually came from his spirit.

"HEX."

For once, his ineptitude was his advantage; Talisman wasn't guarded enough to avoid the enchantment, screaming as the necrotic effect kicked in. It was his dexterity Fjord targeted; he'd be slower to react now, less agile. Hopefully less dangerous, though Fjord wasn't holding his breath. The added damage wouldn't have much of an impact since he couldn't actually hit anything without his falchion. Which he needed, needed, needed...

'No, I can do this my own strength,' he insisted, tamping down the urge. Waters hissed within, but not to the point he was overwhelmed – and an idea came. The edge of one tooth pressed against his lip as he smiled. He'd seen what Talisman could do; knew the magic he drew on most easily was a current, and knew even more intimately from his burns and bruises just how powerful those currents could be. So what he needed...

He stepped into full view and got off another bolt, but clumsily. Even hexed, Talisman had no trouble dodging. But it did make him angry. "You swine. Do you think you can best me with this paltry show of magic?"

"I think that little goblin girl you attacked could best you with her pinky finger," Fjord retorted. "She's certainly got you beat when it comes to looks."

Juvenile, but he had judged Talisman rightly as a man who could broker no insult. Fjord could actually see the glaze of anger go over his eyes. His fingers crackled, and then a great shocking bolt streaked toward his opponent, tearing up the terrain as it went. Ready for this assault, Fjord threw himself behind the rocky outcropping, already muttering under his breath. The mist seized him as stones exploded, pelting everyone and everything in a twenty foot radius with shards of shale and bits of dirt. Talisman leaned forward, seeking, perhaps, a charred body...

...and Fjord appeared behind him.

The arcane fire slammed into Talisman's back with all the force of Fjord's will, which was so intense it was pulsing. It felt as though every cell of his body was alive, and as the Eldritch flames burst into vivid life, they took that intensity with them, building into the strongest blast he'd yet created. It hurled his opponent to the earth, ricocheting him like a stone across a lake. Only there was no lake, just rough ground that scrapped the skin off his face and tore his robes. The fire snarled, scorching before it died. The Talisman who pushed himself onto his elbows and knees was no longer a resplendent figure in blue silk. He was tattered, oozing blood that made his hairline caked with dirt. He made such a pathetic figure that some person in the crowd barked a laugh.

Talisman's head snapped toward it.

"You INSECT," he snarled, sounding completely unhinged. Without the veneer of poshness, there was an insanity that turned his handsome face into angles and teeth. He held out his hand, and before Fjord could do anyhing about it, a streak of energy bolted directly into the crowd. There were screams. More dirt rained. Fjord's mouth hung open, and faintly he could hear an official bellowing.

"No! You can't endanger spectators. The crownsguard will –"

The official didn't get to finish his statement before another bolt went streaking in his direction. Fjord saw a mage's shield go up, which he hoped meant the man was alive, but there was so much dust, pluming from the explosions of dry earth, that he was unable to tell for certain. "Talisman!" he shouted, wanting to draw the fight back to himself and away from vulnerable onlookers. The tournament was clearly over, but that didn't mean the fight was. In fact, he felt certain it had just begun in earnest. "Talisman, where are you, you bastard?"

His answer was his feet leaving the ground, as it was suddenly not there anymore. He lost consciousness for a moment, and when he came to a second later, the situation had changed. Yasha was pulling him onto his knees. Beau was sunk into a defensive posture he knew well after months of fighting in tandem. Others had joined them: crownsguard and some of the defeated competitors, even a few audience members who apparently had some martial background. They surrounded Talisman, who was crouched in the center of them all. His voice was high. "Fools! You think you can challenge me?"

"Sir, you must not resist arrest," the crownsguard said. "Lower your guard immediately and remain still while we approach."

Talisman actually laughed. "Arrest?"

"You killed people," said the sober officer. His weapon did not tremble in his hand, though grief showed on his face. Fjord wondered how many casualties there were.

Beau spoke, "Yeah, you sicko. And this time you didn't do it in the dark. So stand the hell down already. You're defeated."

"Defeated? Me?" Talisman's eyes were skittering. Blood was making a gory streak down the side of his face, and there was a starling amount of it. He took a hobbling step, and the defenders reacted, retreating even as their hands and weapons readied, but Talisman did nothing violent. Instead, his gaze was directed upward, almost as though they – or he – wasn't there. He was shaking his head. "I am Talisman Salvatore of the Red Claws of Greystone," he muttered. "I will accept no defeat."

Wariness came upon Fjord like a vice. "Talisman –"

The half-orc giggled. It was an unnerving sound. He was still looking at the sky, his eyes wet and wild as the storm itself. He muttered, "Is that what it would take? All of it, I could have all of it, and you –" His chest hitched, and he looked wrecked. "Everything, no more grasping, no more – you promise, Father?"

The bottom dropped out of Fjord's stomach. He didn't understand what was happening here, but he knew it wasn't good. Yasha, too, was stiff as a board. Her eyes were on the swirling clouds, head shaking. "No. This is wrong," she was saying. "It's not what he thinks –"

Fjord shouted into the gathering tempest. The hair on his arms was standing straight up, and he realized with a sudden primal fear that he air smiled of ozone. "TALISMAN."

But Talisman was beyond their hearing. His dark hair was drifting around his head, moved by a wind that tugged and pulled. In slow motion, he raised his arms, and as he did his body raised with them until his feet left the ground. He was levitating, but not any kind of levitation that Fjord had ever seen. Torches died, and whirlwinds and pockets of hot and cold air turned the river basin into a nightmarish scene. Head tipped back so that his throat was exposed, Talisman opened his mouth and screamed, and from the clouds directly overhead a thunderbolt struck him dead on.

There was the impression of terrible heat. Fjord shielded his eyes, and when he withdrew his arm, expecting to see nothing but a smudgy ashen crater where Talisman had once been, instead he saw a creature overtaken. No longer a person, for a person could not have survived. Yet a figure that resembled the half-orc sorcerer remained, rotating in the air, the remaining strips of his clothing fluttering around him like war banners, and his voice, echoing magically, gagging as he laughed through blood.

At the same time, the earth began to break apart. Chunks of sediment, formerly crusted into the packed earth, came up in masses. Half-submerged rocks rose and fell like debris launched from a trebuchet. Part of the embankment ran like liquid into the basin. It felt as though the earth was being literally torn apart as lightning fell and the air began to sizzle.

Fjord could see Talisman, the centerpiece of the storm. Blood was seeping from his tear ducts and nose, was red on his teeth. This was too much for him, that much was clear. Whatever it was that had claimed him in order to give him this power, he wasn't holding the reigns, not any longer. This wasn't a sorcerer's power. This was Something Else.

"He did healer things, but bad." Jester's tired words came back to him. She'd sounded sad, almost betrayed, and he had understood it was because this was a perversion of something she found sacred. "Did you know there were bad clerics like that, Fjord?"

He heard a shriek. Beau went down, clutching her leg. For a horrible moment, Fjord was sure it had been blasted completely away. There was bone and blood and the stink of cooked flesh, but though Beau panted with pain, she was alive. Yasha was looking at Fjord. He could barely hear her over the wind. "What do we do?"

The time for rules was past. Fjord summoned his falchion. However, his attack merely ricocheted off the swirling winds. It didn't even get close to reaching Talisman or whatever it was he had become. Yet something must have remained because as the Eldritch Blast dissipated into nothing, the head that had been thrown back turned, a mask of gore and tusks and eyes that were no longer yellow but blazing, luminescent gold. It sneered directly at Fjord and licked its gory lips.

It said, "Now we will see who is defeated."

Then it attacked.


The sky was screaming. That was what it seemed like to Nott. She bolted headlong through streets washed in grey and black, the only colors left as the remaining light was devoured. Jester panted behind her, struggling to keep up.

"Come on!" Nott pressed past others heading in the opposite direction, away from the river basin. From the sky, there seemed to be laughter, ancient and terrible.

Jester cried, "Oh, Nott. What is that?"

She didn't know, and she didn't care. All that mattered was Caleb. As the first, fist-sized pieces of hail began to fall, Nott picked up her pace.