“Go now,” she whispered. “I will give you the time you require.” She strode forward before she finished her words.
Ancel fought desperately against Mensa. The man moved more like oily smoke than a human. He spun, dodged, and parried at the perfect moments, either avoiding or deflecting his every blow. Leaping up and down the temple’s wide marble stairs, they sought any advantage. A serene smile graced Mensa’s lips.
The city burned, its heat scorching Ancel’s back. Corpses littered the ground, most of them the remnants of Eldanhill’s folk. From time to time, the dead shuddered and then stood before charging off to fight the living. With each resurrection, Mensa’s grin widened.
Close by, Mirza and Kachien fought Jillian. Charra’s roars echoed over the other sounds of battle. Ancel could not tell how they fared. All his focus needed to be on Mensa. The slices and cuts on his arms and abdomen and his swollen eye from a kick taught him the folly of any lapse in concentration.
Not once did Mensa speak, but his movements were a far cry from the disheveled servant he had played. Whenever Ancel landed a blow, blackness coiled around the wound, healing it in seconds. At those times, the man actually cackled in glee.
Ancel delved into every attack he could muster. His Stances and Styles changed more swiftly than at any other time when he sparred against Ryne. Their intricacies came to him, as deep inside the Eye, he fed his emotions to his sword work. Their battle became a dance to the music of ringing steel.
His love for his people mixed with his hate for Mensa, adding to his speed, yet providing him with moves so stealthy he was sure Mensa never saw them coming. This, he combined with the frenzy the winds brought, attacking in every direction, while infusing it with the energy of fire. The sword responded, its blade black and red at the same time, sweeping and licking in half a dozen slices, feints, and arcs.
Mensa dodged or parried them all.
Ancel whipped forward, carried on threads of air, trying to predict Mensa’s next attack or defense. When Mensa’s sword swept in, Ancel infused the determination and strength of the earth into his parrying blow. The blades crashed together. A wave of earth rumbled under their feet. Standing on air, neither of them felt its effects.
Stance after Stance, Ancel unleashed. His Waterweave, flowing in swirls and rushes to match a waterfall, met Mensa’s Shadowstalk, the man disappearing to reappear at Ancel’s flank. Voidwalk, which relied on the air he stood upon, glided Ancel away from the killing blow, momentum thrusting him across the cobbles.
As exhilarating as the battle had become, Ancel knew it could not last. At least not for him. His legs and chest burned. The weight of his sword bore down on his arms. His breaths were becoming labored.
Mensa chose that moment for all out attack. He flitted in, his earlier speed nothing more than a slow glide. Ancel snatched for the Etchings on his forearm as he brought his hand up, making a solid shield of pure Forms. Mensa’s sword stopped just before it connected.
Ancel never saw the foot that slammed into his chest. Blown back, he crashed into a pillar. Dust rained down.
“You’re almost as good as your master,” Mensa sauntered toward him, “and much better than your father, but you cannot hope to defeat me. You haven’t the power.” He threw his hands up.
Shade shot through the air from the temple and from other points within the city. The essence roared into Mensa. His body expanded, legs and arms growing thicker, more muscular.
Auras spilled about the man. Ancel strained his eyes to take them in. Had he just seen reflections of Mensa within the auras? He peered closely as Mensa stood absorbing more essences. There, he saw them now, multiple images of the man and tentacles. Deep in his Matersense, he also saw where Mensa’s power originated.
One of the pillars hummed. Ancel frowned at its familiarity.
Distracted, he didn’t see Mensa move. The flat of the Skadwaz’s blade took him in the ribs. Ancel felt something crunch. He cried out in pain.
“Your mother thought she could best me also.” The sword in Mensa’s fist glowed black, dark fire spilling from its Etchings. “As did many who were linked with netherlings. Yet, us humans have a propensity for growth that most, if not all other races, lack.”
Mensa drew in more Mater. His body swelled rapidly. It did not only grow in height but in girth, until he towered at least twenty feet into the sky. Dark mists congealed all around him. He laughed, the sound pealing like a great bell.
A burst of Mater resonated from the far north.
“Ah, my master is the process of killing yours it seems.”
A voice whispered in Ancel’s head. Ryne’s voice. “I gave you my light. Now, I give you the world’s light. Kill this fucking idiot, destroy the Chainin he is using, and at the same time you will have helped me and the others.”
Light and heat essences to rival the sun coruscated in the clouds above, igniting them like a flaming sunset. They glowed so brightly Ancel threw his hand up to shield his eyes.
Pure, unadulterated Prima.
Mensa cried out.
Without thought, Ancel reached into the power spilling from Mensa. He allowed it to flow over him, accepted it into himself. He fought his way through its clinging filth to its origin.
The Chainin was within the pillar he felt vibrating.
The voices from Denestia’s essences gibbered and raged. Ancel fed them to the Prima within his Etchings. His body burned.
Light to balance shade. Light to show honor. Honor to show mercy.
The temple’s roof exploded. The Chainin shattered. Prima Mateirum shot into the sky. From both himself and from whatever source Ryne used far to the north.
Flames whiter than bleached bones, whiter than pure snow, whiter than the spots that danced before his eyes, burst from the temple.
Etien strode from the conflagration, his size to match Mensa. He pointed his glowing sword. “Vile creature, a melding of netherling and man such as yourself is an abomination.”
The words also came from Ancel. After all, he and Etien were one and the same. They were the Battlegaurd.
When he swiped his sword, Etien repeated the stroke. Mensa brought up his blade to block. Ancel’s weapons sheared through the Skadwaz’s like a knife through paper. A rain of black blood fell.
Through the power pouring from the Sanctums of Shelter, Ancel sought those of his people who still lived within Randane. Those who a mending could save, and one he prayed for a chance to find help. Drawing on Etien’s knowledge, he Materialized the survivors to where he sensed Irmina’s pull at the Iluminus.
The rest of Randane, he burned.
Chapter 53
Connected to the Sanctums, Ryne could tell when Ancel departed Randane. Mater surged from the Iluminus where a netherling battled a human with at least as much power as an Exalted. For now, the human was holding his own behind a Forging that drew on the essences imbued into the Iluminus itself. However, they could not maintain it for a long. If the madness didn’t take them first, they would deplete their sela essences and die.
With the Prima released by Ancel, he’d called up reserves to shut away Kahkon and the Great Divide from any immediate access. He made out the Skadwaz raging on the other side of the barrier he’d erected. Depleted of some of his power when Ancel destroyed the Chainin, thus breaking the link to the shade he had been tapping into, Kahkon could do nothing more. Any attacks would have to be more direct, through systematic destruction of each Bastion. A feat still beyond the shade.
It had been through sheer desperation that Ryne had given the Sanctums light to Ancel, but there was no other way for him to keep Kahkon at bay. Not with the way the Skadwaz had wrenched shade from him. He knew within himself if he’d attempted to summon his other sentient, he would have failed.