Serial Saturday: "Clan of Outcasts" Season 3, Part 34: "Turning Fates"

Part 34

"Turning Fates"

The dense shadows coalesced into the form of a thick and tall man dressed in black leather. He wore the darkness like a cape trailing behind him. The temple was a broad space, but there was no missing the pile of scaly flesh amid the rubble of the damaged roof. The wings draped limp and useless, while a massive stone rested upon her right foreclaw, crushing it.

He reached for her mind, but found it closed off, absent, or somehow detached.
He stood on the wreckage of a balcony just above the injured dragon. He could see her skin flinching, but she gave no other indication that she yet lived. Clearly the dragon had suffered too many injuries in her fall.

Trevon sighed. “Oh well,” he murmured thickly. “If I cannot use you, then I don’t see any use for you.”
He stretched out a hand, reaching toward her with tendrils of Shadow that would bind her fast while he drained her of her life’s energy. He hardly noticed the bent, withered figure rising up from against the base of the nearest sculpture.

“STOP!” Thundered the voice, and Trevon felt the ground give way under his feet. The blast of brilliant blue magic sent him skidding backwards over the rubble. He caught himself with a cushion of shadow and curled his lip.

Out of my way, old man, thought Trevon, reaching his hand out in a sweeping motion.

The man stumbled a little, but he dug the end of his staff into the ground before him, and held against the telepathic force.
“You have no quarrel here,” the wizard said softly.

Trevon curled his lip; what did he know? He reached out again for the dragon’s mind, and once more he found his efforts rebuffed by a wall of blue shielding magic.
Fine, Trevon thought to himself. If the fool won’t be moved, I’ll just move the ground he stands on!

The Crow Prince gestured with his hands, and a torrential wind blew through the gaps in the masonry, carrying small pebbles with it. They swirled around the combatants, threatening to puncture or shred at the slightest twitch.

The wizened mage held Trevon’s gaze and merely sat down on the rock beside the dragon. He waited till the wind died down, and wagged his head.
“This is not your fight, son,” he said softly. “Why do you cling so ardently to the ambitions of another? Has she told you that you will have partial rulership at her side? Perhaps she has promised you a portion of the world to do with as you please… or that she would use her eventual power to restore all that you have lost.”

This time, Trevon had the sense not to telegraph what he was about to do. He flexed his hands and fireballs appeared. He didn’t launch them at the lonely Mage, but laid the flames around the perimeter of their space, illuminating it fully. He looked around as other things came into view: Angel statues flanking the walls, their forms weathered and twisted in postures of despair and agony. Trevon scowled and lashed out with his shadows, finding purchase at last as they clung to the Mage’s robes and yanked the staff out of the old man’s hand. The blackness crept upward, but the Mage didn’t strike back.

“What is the meaning of this?” Hissed a cold voice overhead.

Borne on black wings sprouting from her shoulders, Crow Queen Mallory glided into the space, frowning at her adopted brother. “Trevon, I’ve been searching for you everywhere! Why did you just—“ 

She stopped speaking when she saw the massive shape taking up most of the room. “Oh, so this is where the dragon ended up! And…”She frowned at the new face currently entangled in shadows. “Who are you?”
The Mage gripped his staff and engaged his will in keeping the shadows back. “I am the one who has been waiting for you, child.”

“I am nobody’s child!” Mallory snarled, lashing out with magic of her own. The ground quaked beneath them, and lightning pounded the rubble all around them.

“Step aside, old man!” Mallory commanded. “You’re in my way, and I am very willing to kill you if necessary.”

The Mage stroked his stubbled chin and smiled. “I think you’ll find that I am notoriously hard to kill.” He raised the staff, speaking words of power to unleash a brilliant blue light. It slid right over the black shadows, crackling like lightning—until Mallory beckoned with her hand, and all that glowing magic congealed and joined together, in a round, flickering orb of light. She let it collect and hover over her hand, and then when she clenched her fist, it disappeared.
Mallory wagged her head. “I see you have much to learn, doddering fool,” she spat, waving toward him.

Now it was the Mage’s turn to buckle under the telekinetic pressure. He collapsed against Erlis’s side with a cry.
Mallory’s gaze shifted to the towering man at her side. “Well done finding the Gate,” she gestured to a recessed portion of the cliff in front of them. “If only you hadn’t let the Key get away!”

Trevon wordlessly raised his hands.
The Mage gave a wheezing, coughing giggle.

Mallory sneered at him. “What’s so funny?”

He wagged his head, speaking softly between gasps. “The ineffability of prophecy,” he said, gazing around at the solemn Angel statues poised to watch the scene unfolding.
Mallory and Trevon shared a glance. “What’s that supposed to mean?” she asked.

The Mage said nothing, only lifted his eyes to at the stone Angels extending their arms overhead.
Queen Mallory rolled her eyes. “I don’t have time for your nonsense, you relic!” She held her hand toward him, snatching at the air.

The Mage’s body froze, levitating off the ground a few inches.
A host of new arrivals closed in on their position.

“Korsan!” someone cried, and Mallory felt the hairs on the back of her neck rise as the air crackled with electricity. She dropped the choking Mage and turned to face these new threats.

A second Mage lobbed flurries of purple Darklight toward the pair. Mallory ducked an attack of hailstones as she engaged a heavily-armed commander with more of her telekinetic tricks, twisting the redheaded soldier's weapons and pinching the plates of her armor. A fiery shape screamed toward her, and Mallory didn't have time to defend herself--but at the last moment, a wall of black shadow engulfed her, and Trevon materialized at her side.

Mallory frowned at him. "I thought I told you to get out of here," she said. "Never mind, I'll go after the Key; you stay here and finish them off!"

Trevon looked down at her, a strange hesitation flickering across his normally blank expression. Mallory almost asked him why he hesitated, but just then his telepathic voice posed a question in her mind that she'd never heard him utter before: Why?

Mallory took off into the air, searching for a more advantageous position as the Gifted defenders swarmed around the fallen dragon, shifting the rubble off her battered body and forming a protective shield around it.

"Don't question me!" She snarled at Trevon. "Just get rid of them!" She signaled her airborne forces, and a whole host of black birds converged in the grey sky overhead. "Fight for me!" Mallory commanded, and the crows became soldiers ready to throw themselves at the attackers.

Damaris tossed fireballs at the oncoming soldiers with one hand, while he flourished a whipping tail of flame with his longstaff. As he sent a row of soldiers screaming an beating out the flames in the feathers around their collars, he heard voice whisper "Damaris..."

He turned around, but the only people behind him were Azelie, Nyella, and Jaran, fending off the invaders still in crow form from the damaged dragon.
He directed his thoughts to the Queen. Azelie, did you call me?
Her reply was direct and short. I'm a little busy right now, Damaris. Try not to disrupt my focus!

Damaris... There it was again! This time, he recognized the voice and made his way through the skirmishing stories to reach the source. Erlis, I'm here, he thought in return. What do you need?
She directed him toward her right foreclaw, the one that had been crushed by the rock.

"Damaris!" Rysin roared behind him. "Get out of the way! Master Korsan and I are laying down an impenetrable protection spell, and nothing or no one will be able to get in or out!"

Damaris glimpsed something glinting among the twisted claws. "Just give me a minute!"
"Go now, Damaris!" Korsan roared, as the swirling blue and purple magic combined into a wall around Erlis.

Damaris slipped his pickpocket hands in between the claws and gripped the shining thing in a hurry, tucking it into his tunic as he dashed over the growing barrier. In the time it took to regain his balance, the barrier sealed with a sonic explosion. Damaris looked at the thing in his hand: a large pendant hanging on a gold chain. The Key! A shiver ran down his spine as he realized that this thing he held was the same artifact that had rendered Zayra invisible for several days. More than that, this pendant apparently unlocked the fabled Gate somewhere in the cliffside, offering the mortal world direct access to Justicia, the domain of Juros.

Damaris lifted his head, at once honing his pickpocket skills to weave his way between murderous soldiers and warring Gifted to a quiet edge of the vicinity. Lucky for them all, he knew exactly who to give this Key to, and keep it from falling into Mallory's clutches.

Damaris dashed out to the high point at the middle of the city, climbed up the highest point he could reach, and used the flame on the end of his longstaff to send up a signal.
Kaidan!
What is it, Damaris?
I need you to send word to Markus. Tell him to scan the battlefield and find Sir Roger.
Why are you looking for Sir Roger?

Damaris smiled and began working his way back down to the ground, ready to depart in any direction at a moment's notice. I have something to give him.
I'll see what I can do, answered the former Historian.

Minutes later, Damaris saw Hadrian swooping low over the edge of the city, and curving back toward the battlefield, where fresh soldiers replaced their fallen comrades by the dozen. Damaris used his flame to signal her, and Hadrian answered with a jet of her own, pointing east of his position. Damaris took off in that direction, surrounding himself with a ring of flame to shield himself as he barreled over the scorched grass and the blood-soaked mud. A detachment of White Castle Knights had surrounded a group of crow soldiers. Surely Sir Roger must be among them!

Damaris felt his sense of balance shift mid-stride. When he righted himself, he wasn't on the battlefield anymore. A wide tunnel yawned in front of him--but he was still going too fast to stop. He caught his foot on a protruding root and tumbled headlong into the darkness.
"Sorry about the stumble," said a voice from the darkness.

Damaris brushed the soil from his hair and his clothes, and quickly checked his hand to make sure that the Key was still there.

Polaris fairly glowed in the absence of natural light.

"Thanks for nothing!" Damaris grumbled, folding his arms and slumping against a root system hanging overhead.
Polaris shrugged and pointed to his hand. "What do you have there?"
Damaris held up the gleaming pendant, causing Polaris to recoil.
"How did you get that?"

The young Phoenix shrugged and told Polaris all about what went down in Gybralltyr. "Erlis is protected now, and the others are fighting back the soldiers. I don't know where Trevon went to, but Mallory herself is fighting there as well." He fiddled with the gold chain between his fingers. "Erlis told me Zayra had handed the pendant off to her while she flew over the battlefield, and she wanted me to take it before no one would have access to her."

"Why in the world would you be carrying that thing so openly through hostile territory?" the Shadow demanded.

"I wasn't carrying it openly," Damaris protested. "And, if you must know, I was taking it to Sir Roger--I mean, Juros. He should be the one to have it. Mallory wouldn't dare try to take it from him. Now, bring me back to where he is!"

Polaris shook his head. "That Key is vulnerable out on the battlefield, no matter who is carrying it. You've gotten it out of Gybralltyr, and that is good. I want to ensure that it never goes anywhere near that city again. Come follow me. This passage leads to The Roque. It would be the safest place for the Key right now."
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

In the wide field between the city and the isolated Roque, there seemed to be no end to the carnage. Every soldier the Gifted struck down could be raised by Mallory as a bird, and restored to a whole human again by sheer force of her will. As they dropped from exhaustion, she brought more birds into the area, and transformed those, ready to devote themselves to the cause she instilled within them. She kept them intent on one goal: Kill the Gifted. Loot the bodies. Retrieve the Key. Kill. Loot. Retrieve. It kept things simple that way, she didn't have to worry about strategy or defenses. She could set them in motion and concentrate on other things.

Such as where the blazes Trevon had gone. And why he had suddenly questioned her, out of the blue.
"Dammit, Trevon," she muttered as she stalked through the battlefield, heedless of the constant surge of soldiers and crows happening all around her. "Where are you?"

In her agitation, she bypassed several pockets of fallen soldiers, and unlike their compatriots, these remained dead and injured where they fell. A thick swirling mass of crows circled and screamed overhead, waiting their turn to land and follow the standing directive of Kill. Loot. Retrieve... But no such change occurred, and ever so slowly, things started to shift in favor of the Gifted forces and their allies.

In the ruined city, the Gifted fighters ensured that all those who were fighting against them had been subdued, and Erlis was secure to begin the healing process, whereupon she needed only to find the rune sequence Korsan had implanted in her mind, and she would be free to rejoin her friends.
Risyn sent out a spell that confused the sense of direction in the nearest soldiers, causing them to run the opposite way they intended, and stop in their tracks when their every effort resulted in even more disorientation.
Jaran drew the enchanted knife and called out, "Polaris!"

The star-bound Shadow appeared at once. "Yes, your Majesty," he said with a nod of his ethereal head.
Jaran gestured to his wife huddling near his side. "Get Azelie to safety. Now that Erlis is secure, she's too vulnerable, and she cannot hear the thoughts of Queen Mallory's forces anyway."

Azelie gripped her husband's hand. "Wait! That's not strictly true!" She looked up at him. "I can hear some of them now!"

Beren joined his brother, panting heavily after the exertion of pushing large waves around. "She can what now?"

Azelie pointed to a handful of black-garbed soldiers who had stopped striking wantonly, and now looked around at the mass of confusion as if realizing their situation for the first time. "Those men! I couldn't hear anyone under Mallory's control, because her influence is so complete and overbearing... but there is something different about these ones."

Jaran considered the implications. "Her control must be slipping! Risyn, can you bind those men to remove them from combat?"

Risyn played his collection of runes through his fingers. "I might be able to," he said. "But no matter what I try, all Mallory would have to do is wave her hand, and they'd be right back under."

Azelie had stood rooted to the spot, an expression of intense concentration on her face. "Not if I keep turning their minds," she said at last. "I can keep them distracted so her influence can't take hold."

Jaran laid a tender hand on his wife's shoulder. "Can you do this from the safety of The Roque?"
Azelie nodded. "I will still be able to see the battlefield from there, and that's really all I need."

Beren sighed with relief. "Well! This is a new development--if we can just turn them, maybe we don't have to kill them to remove them from Mallory's influence!"

Jaran nodded in agreement, and when he turned to check with his wife--Azelie had wandered farther away from them, and a new unit of Crow Soldiers had just descended on the field in front of them!

"Azelie!" Jaran shouted, but the screams of the angry soldiers drowned out his voice. He saw her briefly once more, a pale silver glimpse in a sea of black leather and feathers, and she was gone.
Jaran gripped the enchanted knife harder, pulling Polaris closer to him. "Stay with her!" he begged. "Do not let any harm come to her!"

I'm all right for now, her reassuring whisper reached the minds of her friends. There is something else we should know about these soldiers that aren't as trapped in Mallory's control, Azelie continued. From what I can observe, they are Gifted, just like us.

Jaran started. "She has Gifted soldiers fighting for her? Don't they know they're fighting against Juros?"
I cannot tell if they know while they're under her spells, Azelie answered, But I do know that the ones with stronger Gifts are more apt to fight, since they are more of an asset to her. But their Gifts also mean that once her sway is broken, their psyche recovers faster.

Polaris nodded. "She's right--I can sense all those who are Gifted on the battlefield, both our allies, and our enemies."

"How does that help us?" Risyn asked. "We don't want to call out our Angel to just Gift all the soldiers--that would make them even more dangerous!"

Jaran glanced at the ghostly Knight beside him. "But we have a Shadow," he said. "What can Shadows do for the Gifted?"

Polaris tilted his head. "My ability is Jacking--I can alter the strength of the Gift." He lifted a finger as inspiration struck. "I don't want to make them even more powerful than they already are, but I can sap their strength until the Gift is completely nullified, rendering them almost impotent."
Beren snorted. "I imagine they won't be so keen to fight, then, which would make them almost useless to Mallory."

Jaran nodded to the indentured Knight. "Do that, for all our sakes. If we succeed in discouraging more and more of her forces, it may reduce the threat so that the only one she has to fight against us is herself!"

"Let's go, then!" Edri roared, bounding into her lion form with a ferocious roar. Soldiers scattered, standing stiffly in a terrified group while the Lion of The Realm prowled about.

Beren made his way over to where Anahita called down a torrential downpour over the heads of a group of soldiers, reducing visibility to almost nothing.

She looked up at his approach, and he nodded in approval. "Not bad," he said. "Now, would you like to learn how to construct a wall of solid ice?"
The water-dancer's eyes lit up. "Teach me, please!"

As the sun coasted across the sky, more and more soldiers found themselves in a state of confusion as they began to question why they were fighting, and why the battlefield was suddenly sectioned off by walls of ice twenty feet high and two feet thick.

The Gifted allies felt the strength of their hope returning. Victory was in sight, at last!

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