The end times, p.20
The End Times, page 20
Malekith laughed as he saw her pitiful attempts to reclaim the winds of magic from him. He snatched the whirling energy from her grasp, tearing it from her control as though plucking candied fruits from a child. He thought to obliterate her with magic for the affront of her resistance, but had not accounted for the speed of Seraphon’s attack.
Two of the black dragon’s claws punched into the princess like lances as Seraphon swept over the crest of the hill, lifting her from the ground. Flexing massive digits, the dragon pulled the maiden apart, separating her spine as innards spilled free. With a thunderous crack of wings flapping, downdraft knocking Yvressians to the ground, the dragon powered skywards again, flicking the two halves of the princess’s corpse deftly into her mouth.
Malekith was about to order her to strike again, his eye drawn to a prince trying to rally a regiment of spearmen against a breakthrough by Kouran’s Black Guard, when a chorus of horn blasts split the air. Ascending, Malekith looked to the east and saw the glitter of a new army arriving, marching beneath the colours of Lothern and Chrace. At their head, astride a pure-white steed greater than any normal horse, sat a figure in blazing gold armour, his sword lifted to the skies burning with amber flame.
‘The so-called Dragon of Cothique,’ shouted the Witch King. ‘Welcome, Prince Tyrion, to your final battle.’
He was about to steer Seraphon towards the advancing column of Tyrion’s host when he felt a shimmer on the winds of magic. It felt as though someone rode behind him on the saddle-throne and he heard the calm voice of Teclis.
‘The Widowmaker, Malekith. Protect the shrine at all costs. I will meet you there.’
The mage’s spirit was gone again in an instant, and Malekith considered ignoring his meddling advice. He would spit Tyrion on the point of Urithain and the battle would be over in moments, the Shrine of Khaine safe again. All of elvendom would know that their king had returned.
He was about to bring around Seraphon for the fateful attack when another thought struck him, as though from somewhere else. It was a moment of foreboding that sent a prickle of apprehension through his fire-ravaged body.
If he faced Tyrion he would die.
The thought suddenly seemed as solid as the world, as certain as the sun rising every dawn. Only the knowledge that he was meant to be king was as sure to Malekith for that heartbeat.
It was enough to give him pause for thought. Almost immediately Malekith suspected it was some trick of Teclis, an enchantment left in the Witch King’s thoughts when the mage had contacted him. His anger started to rise again, but not so swiftly that it outpaced reason. Malekith’s pride had often been his bane. He had seen this weakness in himself when he had been forced to flee Finuval Plain through the Realm of Chaos. His disembodied, timeless wandering had forced him to realise that often the greatest architect of his failure was his own arrogance. He had vowed never again to let ire be his guide, nor pride to steer his strategy.
This was the moment that such an oath had to be upheld. Morathi believed that Tyrion was Aenarion reborn. Regardless of the truth or not of such a claim, the prince was a naturally gifted warrior who had honed his skills in countless battles, and hardened the edge of his anger against the latest daemon incursion. Aenarion had triumphed with the Widowmaker and Tyrion had succeeded without, foregoing drawing the deadly blade of Khaine until Morathi’s intervention.
There was no need for Malekith to confront his foe just yet. A whole army stood between Tyrion and his goal and if that proved insufficient, if the Dragon of Cothique was able to best thousands of warriors and a dozen Naggarothi captains and princes, Malekith would be on hand to finish the task. At the very end, if no other opportunity presented itself, he would draw the Widowmaker and kill Aenarion’s heir, ending the curse by another means.
By such justification was Malekith able to quell the rage he felt at the insult shown him by Tyrion’s opposition. When Tyrion was dead, when Malekith showed his eviscerated corpse to the pitiful weaklings that continued to oppose his claim to the Phoenix Throne, then Malekith would be satisfied and his pride sated.
He turned Seraphon and headed towards the Shrine of Khaine. A company of elves still guarded the megalith-circled temple, spears and bows at the ready. Armies could not match Seraphon and the Witch King together; a few hundred militia would be little more than a diversion.
Seraphon stooped, picking up speed as dragon and rider dropped towards the black stones of the shrine. A dozen heartbeats from crashing into the unforgiving rock the dragon snapped open her wings, turning the plunge into an effortless glide, jaw open, claws outstretched. Malekith leaned to his right with Urithain poised while the winds of magic churned at his command.
Something flashed past Malekith’s left shoulder and his steed uttered a piercing cry of pain. The most majestic, powerful predator of the skies became a screeching mess of flying scales and blood, wing shredded by some missile from below. Malekith barely glimpsed a hooded, cloaked figure skulking in the shadows of the shrine – Alith Anar with moonbow in hand – before Seraphon’s descent turned into a tumbling crash, ground and sky whirling together.
Dragon and rider ploughed across the bone-strewn hillside, spraying ivory-coloured shards in their wake. Malekith clung tightly to the dragon’s chains, turning upside down over and over, his armour battering against uncaring rock every couple of heartbeats, ears ringing from the impacts on his helm. He lost his grip and fell under the rolling beast, only the armour of midnight stopping the last breath being crushed from his lungs.
They eventually came to a stop, sliding down a gore-slicked hillock some distance down the slope from the shrine. Dazed, Malekith lay with Seraphon’s bulk across his legs, staring up at the turbulent sky. He thought he heard his mother’s voice, a single clear word that called out to him, but it was on the winds of magic that the voice came to him and he knew it to be a word of command.
He heard other voices, coming closer. The defenders of the shrine encircled the fallen monster and its rider, spears levelled, bowstrings taut as the ring of warriors tightened. Stars flashed across Malekith’s vision, painfully bright.
Seraphon stirred, growling. Bone jutted awkwardly from her ragged wing and the jagged ground had torn wounds through the flesh and scales of her flank, but she heaved herself up, the broken remnants of the saddle-throne falling from her back. The asur backed away, suddenly uncertain of their oaths to protect the shrine unto death.
The dragon looked at him and Malekith saw hunger in her eyes. He saw himself reflected in the dark orbs, a twisted figure of metal and fire, and he knew he had not been a kind master. Hurting, lips rippling with the effort, the black dragon stood over Malekith, ropes of bloodied saliva drooling from her fangs.
With a bass whimper, the dragon dipped her good wing, dropping her flank so that Malekith could climb upon her bare back.
The Revenants attacked, loosing their arrows from the summit of the shrine while others charged down the slope with their spears gleaming. Seraphon swept out her good wing, blocking the storm of arrows falling through the sky, even as Malekith retrieved Urithain from amongst the broken bones. He hauled himself onto her back, spitting a curse that unleashed a hail of icy shards towards the shrine. A few heartbeats later dozens of archers fell, their bodies ripped asunder by the storm of magical splinters, skin turned to rags, flesh flensed from breaking bones.
Seraphon met the descending phalanx of spears head-on, crashing through the glistening points, jaws snapping. The Witch King leaned low to slash with his magical blade, splitting white-hafted spears and scale armour with broad sweeps. His gaze became death, shredding the minds of any that dared meet his fiery stare.
As Seraphon laboured up the hill towards the megaliths marking the perimeter of the shrine, Malekith cast his attention back to the battle. The druchii ranks had split. Elements from Ghrond were fighting against each other, while banners in the other contingents were splitting away, turning on their own kind.
Morathi.
Her single word had been a summons, calling those faithful to her to throw off the concealing veil of loyalty. The Black Guard remained steadfast at the centre of the attack, but the flanks were giving way as dreadspears turned on bolt thrower crews, bleakswords fought amongst themselves and sorceresses directed their spells against regiments of darkshards still following the Witch King.
Everything was collapsing into anarchy but there was no time to worry about the larger battle. The Witch King saw a white and gold blur carving its way through the disrupted line straight towards the Shrine of Khaine – Tyrion leading the charge. He had broken ahead of his army, leaving knights, white lions and militia to battle through in his wake. Above, Malekith spied a phoenix burning with a white fire cutting across the sky towards him. Alith Anar was already close at hand.
His enemies were growing in number and time was growing shorter.
Dragging her wounded wing like a ship that had lost a mast, Seraphon carried her lord up to the summit of the shrine-hill, leaving gouged and poisoned corpses in drifts behind her. At the moment they breached the crest, Malekith laid eyes upon the black rock of the altar.
Where the Godslayer had first appeared to him as a sceptre, a symbol that he could destroy the world with all of elvenkind as his weapon, now there rested a spear with a head of crimson lightning and a shaft of bone. It wailed to Malekith, begging him to take up his rightful gift from the God of Murder. Khaine had chosen him just as He had chosen Aenarion, and millennia of suffering had resulted from Malekith’s denial of his birthright.
A last defender wearing the plume of a captain heaved himself clear of the dismembered remains of his warriors and stood before the Witch King and his monstrous steed, breaking Malekith’s trance-like fascination. The other elf held his sword levelled at Seraphon’s chest and there was blood trickling from a wound across his cheek, but the resolute defiance in his eyes stopped Malekith.
‘I’m impressed,’ said the Witch King. ‘Your company died well. So will you.’
‘I am Caradon, last of the Revenants of Khaine,’ spat the elf, blood flying from broken lips. ‘I curse thee, Malekith. I curse th–’
Urithain took off his head as Seraphon shouldered past a standing stone and Malekith leaned low on her back. The Witch King looked again at the altar and the spear that beckoned to him with subtle words of praise and promise.
A noise, barely audible amongst the cacophony of war and the patter of raining blood. A flutter, the faintest rustling of cloth. The sound of droplets pattering on metal.
Malekith acted without thought, Urithain spearing out as he turned towards the sound. The black-clad assassin twisted in mid-air as he leapt from the monolith, the Witch King’s magical blade flashing just past his scalp. It was enough, the killing blow directed towards Malekith’s neck missing its mark, though the blackened dagger tore through his iron-skinned shoulder, the enchanted blade splitting the armour of midnight as though it were a common mail coat.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
KHAINE’S PROMISE
Malekith roared, lashing out with raw dark magic as the assassin tried to land on Seraphon’s back. The instinctive spell smashed into the Khainite, hurling him into the piled bones at the shrine’s edge. As the would-be killer rolled through the charnel debris, Malekith recognised his face. It was Shadowblade, most infamous of his calling since Urian Poisonblade, once Malekith’s deadliest weapon and most effective defence against traitors. It seemed that Shadowblade’s mistress, Hellebron, had decided to defy the Witch King, though to what ends he could not guess.
‘Why is everyone trying to kill me?’ bellowed Malekith, exasperated at another delay and distraction. ‘Don’t you know that I’m trying to save the world?’
The assassin staggered to his feet and with a flick of the wrist Malekith hurled another bolt of dark magic, smashing Shadowblade against a standing stone. As the Khainite stood up again, he shook his head and looked around as though waking up, an expression of confusion on his face. Startled by this reaction, Malekith held his next bolt for a moment. A moment too long.
The clatter of hooves and a flash of gold heralded the arrival of a foe even more dangerous than the stunned assassin. Malekith cast a glance towards Prince Tyrion as his steed forged up the slope of the shrine. He cast his spell even as he wheeled Seraphon to face the fresh danger, but Shadowblade was gone, the sorcerous blast turning a standing stone into a cloud of black splinters.
The Dragon of Cothique was a magnificent sight, clad in burnished plate and scale, his winged helm plumed with white feathers. He rode Malhandir, a steed as renowned as the prince, larger and swifter than any stallion of Ellyrion, as white as the snows of the Annulii.
In Tyrion’s grasp flashed the Sunfang, Lacelothrai, a sword as long as Malekith’s arm inscribed with runes that burned with the light and heat of the sun. The prince’s armour was of pure ithilmar, forged on the Anvil of Vaul for Aenarion himself, reclaimed from the Blighted Isle after the first Phoenix King’s disappearance.
Malekith gasped, for the vision that thundered up to the shrine was the image of his father, even the burning wrath that lit the Dragon of Cothique’s eyes.
Their eyes locked and in that moment the separation of centuries disappeared, the bloodline that locked the destiny of both elves united again. No words passed their lips as they raised their swords, but nonetheless their thoughts spoke to each other.
‘I see why they call you the Defender reborn, nephew.’
‘And I know why they call you the Betrayer.’
‘Give up! To draw the Sword of Khaine is to doom our people. My mother has bewitched you.’
‘What do you care of our doom, architect of the Sundering? I will end your treacherous existence!’
‘Do you not think I would have drawn the Widowmaker an age ago if I thought it would bring me victory? None that wield it can hope to survive its influence. Not even my father, and certainly not some spoiled prince of Cothique!’
‘You shall see how strong flows the blood of Aenarion in my veins. And when I open them, how weakly in yours.’
Malhandir cleared the last of the slope with an almighty leap and Tyrion stretched out his sword arm, faster than any stroke Malekith had ever witnessed. The two warriors passed each other and Malekith wondered where the blow had struck, but he felt no fresh pain. The answer came when Seraphon arched back her head and let out a plaintive whine. Dark, thick blood bubbled from a glowing cut across her throat. Seraphon swept out her uninjured wing, barbs flexing, but Malhandir darted aside so that the blow caught only the crest of Tyrion’s helm and tore it off, golden locks spilling free.
‘Not nearly good enough.’ Malekith swept down Urithain as Seraphon scrambled after the steed and prince, keeping her body low to bring the Witch King’s crackling sword into range.
‘You are correct.’ Tyrion turned in the saddle and Lacelothrai was a golden shimmer meeting Malekith’s sword with a flash of sparks and fire. ‘You are not good enough, nor fast enough.’
The burning tip of the Sunfang looped around Malekith’s guard and scored a deep wound across his breastplate, releasing a fountain of fire and blood, almost knocking him from the back of Seraphon. Sensing her master’s injury, the black dragon heaved herself away while Malekith gritted his teeth against the pain of shattered ribs and cut flesh. The dagger still in his shoulder vexed his bones and muscles, making every movement an agony.
‘You are fine with a blade,’ admitted Malekith, drawing on the winds of magic. ‘But without your brother, you cannot hope to defeat my sorcery.’
Seraphon attacked with wide jaws, forcing Malhandir back. Tyrion stared grimly at Malekith as the Witch King pointed Urithain, black flames burning along the sword’s length. The fires became an inferno, rushing out to engulf the asur prince, but again his steed was too swift, circling around the Altar of Khaine, the magical flames splashing harmlessly from bone and rock just behind rider and mount.
‘I do not need my pathetic twin to fight fire.’
Tyrion raised the Sunfang, drawing on the enchantment placed on the blade by the loremasters of Hoeth centuries past. The blinding light of the noon sun exploded from the sword, carving into the black flames of Malekith’s rage, the two spells meeting above Khaine’s sacrificial stone. The Witch King drew in more power, blocking out the pain of his injuries, his resentment and rage further fuelled by a growing fear. Tyrion had never been so fast and determined before, and Malekith was already badly hurt and spent from a day of battle.
The thought returned that Tyrion would kill him.
The sudden dread of this thought surged through Malekith, but it did not cause him to falter, but steeled his will, the fear of failure falling on his rage like oil cast upon a fire. The black flame swept towards Tyrion even as the bolt from Lacelothrai waned, engulfing the prince.
Malhandir let out a piercing, chilling scream as the black fires fell upon his pure-white flank, while the runes of Aenarion’s armour, forged as proof against even dragonfire, shone with magical power. But the regent of the Phoenix Throne had lost his helm. The black fire caught in his hair and scorched across his handsome face.
Despite the horrific injuries, Tyrion forced Malhandir towards Malekith, into the heart of the flame, driven by the battle-lust of Khaine. There were no taunts and threats between them now, only the silence of lethal purpose. With mane and tail burning, Malhandir leapt the altar, bringing Tyrion next to Malekith again. Lacelothrai crashed into Malekith’s arm as he clumsily raised Urithain to fend off the blow, throwing him from the back of Seraphon.
His head swam as he landed heavily in a pile of shattering bones, Urithain almost jarred from his grasp. A cut ran the length of his forearm. It was a near-miracle that the limb had not been severed by Tyrion’s blow.
