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49. Basil - Brothers
🕑 Added 2024-10-30 02:14:44 +0000 UTC
Chapter 49
Brothers
Riding on the back of Gale’s Mythic Griffin as it shot through the sky was like nothing I had experienced before. Even sitting behind my brother, the wind tore at my face and clothing, like it wished to fling me from the saddle. The constant buffeting was gut-wrenchingly terrifying but also invigorating, my Air Source practically singing in response through my veins.
And that said nothing of the view. High up as we were, we were neighbors to the clouds, the soft blue of the sky our companion instead of the dense foliage we had been traipsing through for the past week. Without such obstructions, I could see the world stretched out before me, even more fully than my time spent atop Pirtash Peak, and the canvas of the land was absolutely breathtaking. To the south of Treledyne was the glistening sea, to the west, the mountains where Darlish rested like a jewel, to the northeast, squinting, I swore the green I saw was the edge of A’dinn’uon, the home of the elves.
And to the north of Treledyne, just outside its walls, sat the sprawling mass of the host that had come to kill us all. At this distance, the green of the orcs looked like an extension of the forest where my campionions hid, while the undead resembled a dark stain on the land, and the varied colors of the demons seemed to never be still, shifting, writhing. The collection of invaders was much larger than the city, and seeing with stark clarity the truth of that fact instantly extinguished any joy I was feeling. To think there were even more before all the killing we have done.
Halifax let out a cry as he banked sharply to the left, my stomach lurching.
“Yes, Hal, I hear you,” Gale calmly replied, patting the griffon on his feathered neck.
I let out a burp; my body had been doing that of late, as if it couldn’t decide whether the air I was breathing should stay out or in. “Do you really understand him?”
“Hal certainly understands me, and as far as I can tell, he’s taken it upon himself to teach me griffon. Most talkative bird I ever met,” Gale added with a wry grin over his shoulder. Halifax let out a growl that sounded much more feline than avian, to which my brother only laughed in reply. “That’s the one he says the most. You’d think something this smart would also have a sense of humor. Don’t worry, Hal, you’ll learn.”
Gale was in good cheer now, but when I had first requested to join him on this scouting run, he had been anything but. Atrea’s Precision Aura had been what convinced him, and I had to admit, seeing her flying alongside us, blue-tinged eyes vigilant, made me feel more at ease as well. I watched her wings beat once, twice, tracing the edge of the feathered limb to her silver armor, which had a new pattern to it. I had given her my Scalemail Relic, the two Armors melding together creating something stronger.
For my part, I wore my usual Soulforged Helm, which helped shield my face some from the wind but also forced more of it into my eyes, causing them to water constantly.
Gale wore his Vest that blurred his form, making him rather dizzying to look at, along with a sword strapped to both hips and his thrown weapon across his back in easy reach.
The real reason I was with him wasn’t to see any grand view but because I had realized that Esmi and Hull weren’t the only people on this mission who I wanted to protect. To help accomplish that, I had offered to have more of my Flyers summoned, but Gale had declined, saying he wished to keep our party small so that it was harder for the enemy to spot.
“Do you believe we’ll last long enough?” I asked. It wasn’t a pleasant question, but these were far from pleasant times.
Gale was quiet, banking the griffon east by shifting his knees, toward the direction our returning army should be coming in. Try as I might, I could see no signs of movement in the distance. And yet, if previous reports were to be believed, they should arrive in just three more days. Under different circumstances, three days would have been no time at all, here and gone with only passing notice. The way we were living now though… each day involved some sort of raid or another, and while we hadn’t lost anyone else since Ky’reen, there had been many close calls prevented only because of the Healing powers of the elves.
Gale shifted again and the griffon responded, swinging us back around. “There can be no doubt that we’ve hamstrung the orcs’ siege capabilities,” he said, “and made it to where they cannot focus solely on Treledyne, all of which weakens the enemy force.”
My brother was looking ahead of us where the war was happening in truth, all along Treledyne’s northern wall. Though the people and structures were tiny, I could see that the orcs had the barest few siege engines compared to their allies. From this height, making out specific defenders was impossible, but I knew Edaine would be there, along with all the noble families including our parents – Twelve protect them – and most importantly the king. Surely the reason why our walls had yet to be breached by such an overwhelming number of foes was because he was holding them at bay.
“Will that be enough?” Gale continued, “only the Twins can –”
Our momentum forward came to a sudden, lurching halt, knocking me forcibly into my brother’s back as he cut off. Halifax screeched in rage, but that sound was in no way as worrisome as the voice I heard.
“Found you,” it said, not once, but over and over like an echo in a cave, drifting away.
My eyes behind my mask widened as I looked down to see a demon holding onto Halifax’s back leg. The creature was man-shaped, purple of skin and had twin horns sprouting from its bald head. It stood on the shoulders of another similar looking demon below it, and that one did the same to a demon below it, and so on, on and on, in an impossible, swaying ladder that looked to stretch all the way to the ground.
Halifax twisted, rending the demon that was holding it in half. But the demon only smiled, and I watched in horror as an arm sprouted from its head, using one of the long horns to pull itself up. In less than a heartbeat, the arm was joined by a new set of horns, pushing out of the purple skin, along with another head, arm, and body, birthing an entirely new demon, identical to the first, which latched onto Halifax. Gale slashed at it, cutting through the black leathers it wore, but it wasn’t until his second slash of Flurry struck that it died. Two more demons birthed from his one, clamoring up the griffon’s back, digging into the beast's furred flank with their taloned nails.
Atrea shot across, skewering one with her blade and knocking it into the air where it tumbled downward without a single cry of distress. The one still on Halifax’s back was now two, and I readied a Protection Spell, hoping to use it when as many attacked at once. If I could just give Atrea, who was arcing back around, enough time to dislodge the rest…
A sharp cry of fury and pain snapped my head around, and I saw that the demon ladder had regrown its top, catching hold of Halifax’s front. The griffon was slicing through the demons with his great claws but with each that fell more appeared, scrambling over the griffon’s front end, tipping us forward as the mount beat its wings frantically, trying to keep us airborne.
At this rate, we’d be overrun in moments.
“Gale –”
My brother twisted in his seat and grabbed me by the shirtfront. Then, he wrenched me sideways, my feet slipping out of the stirrups. “Use one of your Bodyguards!” he shouted, right before letting go.
I dropped like a stone, plummeting straight down at terrifying speed. Worse, my free fall put me directly beside the stacked demons who eyed me hungrily, grabbing at me as I shot past – one spawned a new demon from its forearm to leap at me, which barely missed.
Then Atrea was at my side, her wings tucked against her body like a diving hawk.
“Take my hand!” she cried, and I reached out. Our fingers missed, making my already strained heart flutter, but then we grasped onto one another, and I held fast. Opening one wing partially, Atrea angled our fall away from the demons, and when that distance was great enough, she spread her wings wide. I was too heavy for her to carry and instantly fell below her, dragging her down, but her wings seemed to slow our descent some.
Even so, the ground was fast approaching. Atrea had wisely put us over the forest instead of the battlefield, but that meant I might hit multiple tree limbs before the ground. Would I even survive this? Would Gale? I glanced up, following the line of swaying demon bodies to find a clump of them so dense I couldn’t even see my brother
“Basil!” Atrea said. “Will your Helmet save you?”
She sounded worried, and a look down showed why: I was only a handful of seconds away from impacting the top of the forest canopy. My Helm would protect me from attacks, but I wasn’t sure if careening into the earth would count as that, so, like my brother suggested, I summoned one of my Master Shieldbearers.
I grabbed onto the Soul’s red cloak as soon as it formed. “I am sorry to do this to you!” I shouted, only imagining what it might think to be summoned in such a circumstance, “but I need you to protect me!”
The heavily armored Rare, craned its neck up to see me, and then managed to get its shields underneath itself, resting both knees upon them. “It will be as you say!”
Fwip, fwip, fwip was the sound of the leaves as they rustled past my ear, followed by the ping and thud of branches of various sizes colliding with my Bodyguard’s shields. I caught sight of a huge limb ahead of us and in a panic cast the Protection I’d previously had at the ready. A large shield appeared, ricocheting us off of it at an unfortunate angle the rest of the way to the ground. Right before impact, the Shieldbearer grabbed onto me, spinning us in the air so it was his back that struck the earth before I did. Card shards exploded around me like confetti, and I rolled through them, across the bumpy earth and right into a bush, which I fetched up against awkwardly, sharp branches poking me through my clothes.
My head spun, and my legs were shaky as I tottered upright – I even had a few leaves to spit out of my mouth – but all in all, miraculously, I was unharmed at the cost of only two cards. I looked to the spot of impact, silently thanking the Bodyguard who had saved me.
A rustling from above yanked my eyes up.
“Thank the Twins,” I said in relief. It was only Atrea drifting down through a section of the trees that were sparser than the rest. “Go scout for me, please,” I asked before she landed. “Both for my brother and to see where we might be.”
She nodded, one snap of her wings enough to propel her back up through the canopy opening she had used.
With her gone, I looked around, but the collage of plantlife did nothing to help me. Unlike Qi’shen or the other elves, I had learned in my first hour in this wood that I had no talent for forestcraft, one section looking identical to the next to me, just like that demon who had attacked us.
My hands tightened on my cards. I needed to be prepared for him should we meet again. How though? I had looked directly at him and seen no card, which meant he was a Summoner – one with an incredibly powerful Soul Ability, like that Spell Drinker demon the others had faced. However, therein lied the trouble. What removal cards I had were designed for eliminating Souls, not Summoners and definitely not hordes of them. Equality, Penitence, and Execution would all be useless, and the same for Defensive Kata considering the numbers the demon had attacked us in. My Souls were no better: Assassins were meant for taking out single targets, the Werespiders Web didn’t work on Summoners, and dying Summoners wouldn’t trigger my Carrion Condors Ability. What I would give for Hull’s new Wildfire Spell!
I began pacing as I thought, summoning a second Bodyguard and Healing myself for 2 to recover the Bodyguard and Protection I had used. Those were among the only types of cards I had that would work for me, along with perhaps some of my Life Enhancement Spells. Be better prepared, Griff had told me, so I went ahead and cast Fluid Grace on myself.
I usually preferred putting Dodge on my Bodyguard, but with how many demons there were, it wouldn’t make a difference. On me though, perhaps it would provide a momentary surprise. The Feral Strengths I held back for similar reasons: 1 or 2 extra health or attack at the right moment might swing things our way.
‘Our’ assuming my brother had survived. The last glance I had gotten of him had been far from promising, and Atrea had yet to return. I had been so caught up in my calculations, I hadn’t yet considered what it might mean if he was dead. A cold numbness spread throughout me at that thought. It was much deeper than my previous concern for Hull because the possibility of it seemed so much more real.
He could be gone, well and truly gone if where his body had fallen was never recovered, or worse yet, if the demon got his Soul Card. I had already almost lost him once to Hull’s mother and Gale’s foolish behavior, but this time he had just been trying to scout the enemy’s position, to do his job. I had forced him to bring me along so I could protect him, and instead, he had tried to save me.
I realized I was shaking and looking down I saw I was holding the newest of my cards, one that actually could harm a Summoner.
It would be ineffective against a horde, but if I could find the original, I might actually be able to avenge Gale.
There was a rustle again, snapping my head up and over. Once again Atrea drifted downward, and I searched her face for some sign as to the type of news she brought with her. My inspection was unnecessary though because in her wake came my brother, hanging from the claws of his favorite Hunting Hawk, his weight no doubt reduced.
Unlike when I had seen Hull safe, I resisted the urge to hug him; our family had always been rather reserved with each other.
“Are you harmed?” I asked him instead.
Gale shook his head when he alighted beside me. “Poor Hal took all the damage.”
I nodded in relief, but still used my Source to Heal him, so he could recover the Mythic Mount.
“You make poor prey. Too easy to surround.” The voice had the same echoing quality as before, and with a jerk of surprise, Gale and I discovered that the demon was indeed all around: the creature stepped out from behind trees and bushes, one after the other, as if the plants were doorways leading to waiting armies of the duplicates. In no time, we were encircled by a full ring or horn-headed creatures, more sprouting into being behind them, deepening their ranks as I watched.
Since the demon could speak, I thought it might explain why it was hunting us, but instead it charged, brandishing nails that had been strong enough to destroy a Mythic. As it ran toward us it let out a warcry that, when coming from so many throats, was near deafening. I felt like I was in the center of a concert, with drums and horns all around me.
Gale reacted to the onslaught faster than I ever could, sending his Epic Relic rebounding through their midst.
The weapon tore into the creatures, cutting through the dark leather armor they wore and into their flesh, blood flowing freely. The moment the Whirling Edge returned to his hand, Gale let it loose again, paying his Source to do so. Four times he had to do this until the wave of demons charging at us finally collapsed, leaving what had to be a hundred fallen bodies.
Laughter issued from the hundreds more who were behind those who had been reaped. “Foolish,” they said. “You merely die a few breaths later.” Rushing over the dead duplicates, the new ones seemed to have no trouble finding their footing.
“I hate it when they're right,” Gale said. His chronic fatigue had caught up to him, and he looked as pale and bereft of energy as his devoted source.
“Here!” I said, using the same tactic I had with Hull in training.
Gale wasn't ready for it, so he missed the first of the source power I sent at him, but he must have recognized the feel of Air better because that he caught hold of, using it and what source of his that was still ready to send his Whirling Edge out again, cutting down another swathe of charging demons.
“Sickening,” the horned creatures outside the growing circle of corpses said. “Letting another touch your source. Is each extra moment of this life so sweet that you must cling to it so desperately?”
“Annoying you makes it sweet enough,” I responded, to which my brother raised an approving eyebrow.
The demons narrowed their eyes, an eerie display with so many acting in unison. “Your source may not tire, but you will. I must simply wait.”
"He has us there," Gale said to me under his breath. So many of my brother's cards were like mine: Shockwave and Invisible Barrier didn’t work against Summoners, and even buffing his swords wouldn’t help against so many demons.
“If both of us die,” Gale mused, “Randel will finally have to stop making those terrible sculptures of his to carry on the family tradition. There’s a certain pleasure to knowing that at least.”
I looked at my brother in shock. “You’re giving up? But you’re Epic,” I whispered, “and you bested a mighty demon to become so.”
“A demon, Basil. I can tell when I’m outmatched. That,” Gale said, raising his voice, “is one of the army generals. What he’s doing wasting his time out here is beyond me.”
“Someone killed my Spell Drinker,” the demons’ said, barring their teeth. “Until I find its card, I will split open the heads of every Summoner I find.”
“Lucky us,” Gale said with a drawl, while I stiffened.
The reaction was a mistake, earning me the attention of all the demons. “You know something. Tell me.”
I swallowed. “I don’t think I shall.” I didn’t know anything about the mystery girl that Hull had described, but she had fought against the demons, which made her an ally of sorts. An army general??
The horned creatures considered me, and then smiled a sharp-toothed smile. “You will. You will.” How one living thing could look at another so hatefully was beyond me, but the demon did, and I believed it.
General or not, I focused on my Master Shieldbearer within arm’s reach and Atrea hovering nearby, waiting for my command. As powerful as it was, there had to be some way around the demon’s ability. Was that not the very training we had done with Edaine?
Overcoming a disadvantage started with information. What did I know? The demon was a Summoner who could make as many copies of itself as it desired, or so it seemed, each taking only a few seconds to appear. It wore leather armor, but I didn’t spot source around any of the horned heads, nor did I see any cards. In some ways that made sense, because if only one of them had such things that would clearly be the original, which would be a grave weakness. The demon had no weapons, just long, dark nails on each purple finger, so it must be strong enough inherently to do at least 1 damage since it had hurt Halifax. What else? What else?
The demons watched us, more demons gradually appeared behind them; Gale, despite having said such things to me, kept his hand by his deck, clearly ready to throw his Whirling Edge again should the creatures charge.
“I’ll summon Halifax,” my brother surprised me by saying. “You hop on and get away while I keep them busy.”
“As soon as you die, so will Halifax. I wouldn’t get far enough.” Gale cursed, but I kept staring at the demon’s body and the black leather armor he wore. No matter which one I looked at, that was all: no weapons, no jewelry, nothing else besides the straps of dyed hide.
Summoning Halifax would likely be a necessity, but the Mythic cost a total of 6 source, 2 of which were Air, which would stop him from being able to throw the Whirling Death enough times to kill the demons. If we used my source to assist with his first set of throws, that would leave a gap in our defenses, time the demons could use to reach us, tearing us to shreds before Gale could throw again.
We needed a card that could combat the demon besides Whirling Death, and I think I knew what it might be.
“Dismiss your Vestments,” I told my brother.
“What, why?”
“Trust me,” I said, looking at him emphatically and not wanting to say more when the demon might hear.
He stared at me a moment and then did so, the shimmering armor vanishing, revealing his regular traveling clothes underneath. The demons said nothing in response, continuing to watch us and grow in number. How many could be out there now? Hundreds? Thousands? If the Whirling Edge didn’t hit every summoner in range, we would have been overrun long before.
“I must admit, I’m feeling rather vulnerable now,” Gale said after a time, sounding rather peevish.
“It wouldn’t have saved you,” I answered bluntly. I was trying to keep conversation about the Relic to a minimum, because one thing I had deduced was that these copies had no gamemaster glasses or an equivalent, at least not that I could see. After all, if the Summoner’s Soul Ability allowed it to also make copies of any artifacts it had, wouldn’t all of them be armed with some sort of magical item? Of course, it was possible that the demon had an Ability like mine, but the Twins giving such a combat focused creature that type of gift seemed unlikely to me. Gale had said that he hadn’t taken any damage from the demon, which meant the enemy still didn’t know what Gale’s Relic did. If we could leverage that fact at just the right time…
“And this will?” my brother whispered, sounding doubtful.
“Perhaps,” I allowed. “Let me know when it’s back.”
We lapsed into silence, the two of us and three summoned Souls surrounded by dead demons that were only now beginning to dissolve, their decomposition one of the worst smelling things I had ever before encountered, like burnt hair trapped in an outhouse.
When the plethora of bodies were nothing more than an indigo soup on the ground, I saw Gale draw a card. “I have it,” he said out of the side of his mouth to me.
“After summoning Halifax, save enough of your Source to use it,” I told him, and as soon as I saw him nod, I hissed, “Call the griffon.”
Gale did so, the great beast forming in front of us.
No sooner had it appeared than the demons came, splashing through what remained of their previous selves. Whether they guessed my plan or simply didn’t want to give us the opportunity to use any new resources was unclear, but whatever the reason, they’d be on us if we didn’t act. Halifax had fully refreshed two of Gale’s devoted source, and seeing the oncoming demons, he used that to throw his Whirling Death the first time. I sent extra source his way, scrambling onto the griffon’s back, and pulled my Master Shieldbearer with me, sitting him in front. Gale used my source to finish off the current group of demons but more where coming on their heels, and we didn’t have enough Air left for another full round of four throws.
“Get on!” I shouted at Gale. He spun around, hesitating as he looked at his Hunting Hawk, but then, blessedly, he trusted me, and leapt through the air, light as a feather, landing in the slim space in front of the Bodyguard.
“Hup!” he cried, kicking his legs against Halifax’s flanks, and the griffon launched from the ground. Not, however, before a number of horned demons reached us, some who I hadn’t even noticed leaping down out of the trees.
“Put the Vestments on the Bodyguard!” I said, frantically fearful it would be too late, “and any damage Halifax suffers onto you!”
As always when he chose to act, my brother was fast, his hands moving almost in a blur, a card vanishing from his fingers.
A shimmer surrounded the Master Shieldbearer, his thick armor and shields now bending the light.
“Protect my brother!” I commanded it.
My body was knocked sideways by an attacking demon, but with a thought, I let my Helm shatter, taking all that damage. Another demon leapt at me, but with Fluid Grace, I twisted in the saddle, and it sailed past me. Two more struck in concert, but a Protection from hand was enough to hold them back. Atrea stopped another, taking a point of damage past her 2 Armor but gutting it.
And what we faced was barely anything at all.
Halifax took the brunt of the grounded assault, but each of those attacks was redirected by Fate’s hand toward my brother. And each that reached for him was slapped aside by my Shieldbearer, just like when I had used one to protect Hull in the Lows. Better now though was the effect of Gale’s Relic that it wore. With the Vestment, every demon who came in contact with the Bodyguard was forced to devote, slumping where it stood.
In the end, my Shieldbearer exploded in shards, taking how much damage I didn’t know, but he also left behind a pile of slumped demons all around, the exhausted bodies serving as an impediment to those still wishing to reach us.
“You will not escape me,” the prone demons hissed, but Halifax let out a great cry, drowning out their voices. This time the weight that had stripped the griffon of his Flight a moment ago was nothing more than Devoted bodies who fell away when he launched himself upward. We were ten feet into the air in an eyeblink, the Mythic breaking through the trees to reach the sky. More demons leapt for us, but Gale’s Hunting Hawk stopped one, Atrea another, and Gale’s flashing blade plus his Flurry finished off another.
Halifax shot through the upper canopy, sending leaves spraying like card shards.
“Well played, brother!” Gale said with a laugh that made my heart light. “Well played indeed!” Then he angled us east, urging the griffon to greater speed. I could only imagine we were heading back to camp, which was exactly where I wished to be. With a terror like that demon on the loose, we would need to come up with a strategy to defeat it. More cards would make the challenge easier, but even with our resources pooled, our group possessed few cards that affected summoners. Such was the direction of my thoughts when I heard Gale say, “That bastard.”
Confused, I looked down on our elven Watch Platform, which I had started to think of as yet another home away from home, only to find it crawling with purple demons, like ants on an apple rind.
Comments
iridium248
I think he can't actually use those spells against Summoner-derived clones, so his options are limited.
FiveBoxes
Demon clone tokens. His ability probably summons a bunch all at once. It's not really a rush deck, but once it gets going he would have a near unlimited amount of clones as fodder. And it doesn't seem like he buffs them... so his deck might be for protecting himself. The Spell Drinker is a weird "pet" to keep though... maybe to counter other Spell Drinkers and similar?
FiveBoxes
Gerad improving just means he becomes a better stepping stone for Hull. But yeah, any improvement on him gives me headaches. (Hull's titan soul getting downgraded was nice though, the insubordinate little shit. And Gerad can only use one Legendary at a time.) Gerad's deck isn't so great at wave clearing though. He has that Relic that repeats spells but his spells can only kill a few enemies for each cast.
Sharrif
Or even if they aren't able to kill him, hurting him enough to escape would absolutely still be an achievement or a feat imo! Huh... I wonder if Gerad might elevate from this encounter. I hope not, but it's not unreasonable... Dammit.
Sharrif
Please let them kill the general off, somehow. I wanna see Hull elevate for Protecting everyone, and gaining a deeper understanding of who and what he is, as a person.
