Into the Abyss полностью

Rupert didn’t need to be told what the knight saw in order to know he’d been revealed as a demon. Damn, he thought. No sense in staying here. Even as the knight’s eyes turned from surprise to grim determination, Rupert was changing. His clothes bulging and ripping as he gained mass. Rupert didn’t waste time to complete the change, he scrambled up and backwards to the rear of the tent. Intending to tear his way out of the tent. His wings began to beat, trying to free themselves from his clothes. As of yet they were still not fully formed for him to fly.

Almost faster than his eyes could travel, which was incredibly fast, given his incredibly quick demonic reflexes, Rupert watched the knight’s sword fly free of its sheath. So fast that it was only a blur as the knight lunged forward, faster than any man in that much armor should ever be. Rupert lunged out of the way. Rupert hadn’t even had time to complete his transformation. It was useless, even though he couldn’t see it, Rupert felt the sword.

Rupert felt the sword strike his still mainly human neck with a single mighty blow. Golden light seemed to flash from the blade. Strangely enough, Rupert felt almost no pain, only shock as his world began to tilt at a strange angle. As if in some weird dream, he saw his half-demon half-human body folding in the middle, falling to the ground, as if to sit, headless. A jarring sensation came next and the world tilted crazily again as his head bounced off the cot. The last thing he saw was the priest Verigas cowering away as all within the tent were showered with blood from Rupert’s decapitated body. Then all went black.

Jehenna finished her inspection of Bromagni’s work. She was currently taking her turn at supervising the work of the students. Lenamare had gone off to deal with other matters. She shook her head; these students had to be monitored continuously lest they make a mistake. How nice it would be to have somewhat more competent help. One did with what one had, though. She walked over to the table in the corner to inspect her calculations.

She was pouring over them for the third time when the workroom door opened and in walked Lenamare and Hortwell. Jehenna blinked in surprise. “I thought you were with Zilquar?” She inquired of the newly arrived mage.

“I was, but it looks like a contingency plan has to go into effect now.” Hortwell answered her.

“It seems,” Lenamare informed her, “that Exador’s army has completely disappeared.” Jehenna simply raised an eyebrow.

“No trace. No tracks of leaving, no magical paraphernalia to indicate magical departure.” Hortwell told her. “Thus I teleported directly to Freehold so we could implement Lenamare’s contingency plan.”

“Contingency plan?” Jehenna inquired.

“I will give you one guess as to where that madman’s army went.” Lenamare told her. She simply pointed to the floor, Lenamare nodded. “Precisely, thus we need our army here as well.”

“That will take a few days to arrange, even with flying carpets.” Jehenna noted.

Lenamare simply shook his head. “Not at all. You see, Master Hortwell here,” he put a hand on the man’s shoulder, “has been making good use of his time. He constructed a wall where Zilquar’s army is camped.”

“A wall?” Jehenna was at a loss on this one.

“A wall with a gate.” Hortwell told her.

Comprehension dawned in Jehenna’s eyes. “A Runic Gateway?”

“Precisely!” Lenamare beamed. “Once again, good planning and foresight pays off in having a highly qualified Rune Wizard standing by in the right location.” He nodded to Hortwell. “Now all we need to do is find a suitable door in the palace somewhere, and soon we can bring Zilquar’s entire army into Freehold. All in one night!” Hortwell was nodding. “Will you need some assistance? A student or two?”

“One should do.” Hortwell looked over the students currently available. “Jenn, if you don’t mind?” Hortwell asked Jenn.

“Good choice, she’s not particularly useful here.” Jehenna stated. Jenn just glared at her, and was ignored.

“Master Hortwell?” Jenn asked as she stood up. “Do I understand that you’re going to open a Runic Gateway between here and the school to transport everyone through?”

“That’s what we just said girl,” Lenamare snapped impatiently.

“Well, I was just wondering why we didn’t do that in the first place? Why did we have to all split up and go over land? Couldn’t we have just done this?”

Lenamare snorted. “Once again, you show the fault of not considering all the facts. During the siege, we would have had to take the wards over to completely physical in order to open the gateway. Further, it would have taken quite some time to file everyone through the gate. Time Exador wouldn’t have allowed us.”

“But as it is, you had to take the wards to completely magical. Isn’t that the same?”