“Here!” Shamil shouted, crouching and extending his hand to the crystal. “I’ll throw it.”
Rignar shook his head, the onyx glowing in response as he flattened his hand against its surface. Once again Shamil had no difficulty in reading his unheard words. “I need to be touching it.”
“You never intended to throw it!” Shamil shouted back. “Did you?”
Rignar’s lips formed a smile as he shook his head.
“Back to the Eyrie!” Shamil shouted at Stielbek. “We’ll find another way.”
Stielbek angled his wings, but instead of steering for the mountains, he turned back to the statue. “Stop!” Shamil ordered, receiving only an angry shudder in response. “Don’t do this!” he cried out to Rignar.
The mage’s eyes were sad now, but also shining with a deep contentment, his face that of a man about to fulfil a lifelong task. He removed one hand from the onyx and reached for the chain about his neck, dragging air into his lungs to call out a few words. “The Voice lied, Shamil! She never died!” Rignar snapped the chain and threw it at Shamil. He caught it by pure reflex, finding the emerald pendant dangling in his grip. “She went to find its birthplace!” the mage shouted. “Look for the immortals!”
He stared hard into Shamil’s eyes, holding his gaze until the moment Stielbek opened his claws to let him fall free.
Rignar Banlufsson tumbled through the air at a steep angle, the crystal in his hands glowing so bright he resembled a falling star. He collided with the huge narrow column of granite that formed Sharrow-Met’s legendary scimitar barely fifty feet from the point where it met the ground. Crystal and mage disappeared in an explosion powerful enough to banish the smoke for a distance of several hundred yards. Shamil struggled to keep his seat as Stielbek bucked and reared in the turbulent air. Looking down he saw the column of vehlgard closest to the scimitar’s base had been blasted into chaotic disorder. The statue, however, remained stubbornly upright.
“It didn’t work,” he groaned in despair. He scanned the scimitar, finding none of the expectant destruction that would set the great monument toppling. Instead he saw a curiously smooth and intact surface very different from the weathered granite that had formed it only seconds before. It caught a bright gleam from the sun streaming through the partly dissolved smoke, shining bright, shining like . . . ice.
“Down!” Shamil ordered, but Stielbek was already folding his wings. A barrage of fire arrows floated up from the ranks of the vehlgard to greet them as they dove, turning to a blizzard as they neared the ground. Shamil waited until Stielbek levelled out barely fifty feet from the ground before reaching for the sword once carried by Tolveg Clearwater of Wodewehl, a man who had travelled a great distance to place it in more worthy hands, a sword named Ice Cutter in the ancient tongue of his people. A fated blade.
A fire arrow streaked within an inch of Shamil’s visor as they swept closer to the scimitar. He hardly noticed, his entire attention focused on the glassy surface, searching. He found the crack near the scimitar’s edge, just a small fissure no bigger than a hand’s breadth, but big enough for a sword blade. Leaning out, he gripped the sword’s handle with both hands, stabbing it into the crack with every ounce of strength he could summon. The skeln-blad met scant resistance as it penetrated the ice, sinking so deep it was torn from Shamil’s hands as Stielbek beat his wings and bore them higher.
Shamil twisted to watch the scimitar shrink beneath them, his heart leaping in exultant satisfaction at the sight of a web of cracks spreading over its surface. Within seconds the interlocking matrix of fissures had spread from the scimitar’s base to its hilt, snaking over it to crumble Sharrow-Met’s huge fist.
The statue let out a strange groan as the scimitar fell apart, Sharrow-Met’s arm falling to pieces soon after. The great stone queen swayed, rearing back a little and causing Shamil to ponder the horrible irony that she might topple in the wrong direction. But then something cracked deep within her, and she swayed forward, the roar of a huge stone assemblage subsiding into chaos, swallowing the great murmur of surprise and fear rising from the vehlgard army below.
Shamil saw the ice storm fade away then; the Voice-mages rendered scurrying ants at this height as they ran back towards the Maw, but they could never have run fast enough. The statue crushed them beneath its fracturing legs as it collapsed, some of the rubble it shed plummeting down to shatter the columns of vehlgard, but most of its bulk fell where Rignar predicted it would.
The newly wrought bridge of cooled lava disappeared beneath Sharrow-Met’s partly destroyed mass. The rubble settled onto the glowing channel in an ugly dark sprawl that soon began to fade, swallowed by the inexorable tide of molten rock.
Shamil watched the great army of vehlgard convulse as a fresh gout of smoke erupted from the Maw, accompanied by a vast shriek, full of rage and frustration. The vehlgard seemed to be milling in confusion, some rolling about with their hands clamped to their ears, whilst others thrashed at each other in maddened delirium. Shamil even saw a few march into the lava flow, bursting into flames as the flow claimed them but still continuing to wade into the fiery current.
The Voice’s scream persisted as Stielbek flew away, the widening distance rendering it a smaller thing, vaguely reminiscent of a spoilt but forlorn child weeping over a broken toy.
11. The Black-Wing’s Quest
He found Vintress struggling back to the Eyrie on tired and faltering wings, Lyvia clinging on as the falcon bobbed in the air. Dark stripes discoloured the verdant blue of the bird’s plumage where the Voice-mage’s lightning had touched her. Still she possessed the strength to keep flying, although Shamil wasn’t sure for how much longer. Steering Stielbek alongside, he gestured to Lyvia, pointing to the black wing’s claws in an invitation to jump. Lyvia, however, replied with a stern shake of her head and stayed with her bird.
A dark, fast-moving cloud soon appeared above them, which had Shamil reaching for his bow and quiver when he realised it was in fact a dense swarm of flensers and scythers with a few larger silhouettes that told of man-bats amongst the ugly throng. He put an arrow to the string of his bow and guided Stielbek higher to place them between the swarm and Vintress. However, the expected attack never came; the Maw beasts streamed overhead without altering course. Like the vehlgard, they appeared greatly distressed, voicing a cacophony of discordant screams and lashing out at their fellow beasts as they beat their wings towards the Maw. The swarm soon disappeared into the smoke, which now covered the far bank of the lava flow in a thick blanket of soot and ash. The Voice continued to howl its anguish, but the sound had diminished to a plaintive echo by the time Shamil and Lyvia reached the Eyrie.
The sentinels awaited them on the eastward cliff edge, Morgath enclosing Shamil in a tight embrace as soon as he climbed down from Stielbek. He was aware of cheers filling the air and many hands jostling him in appreciation as Morgath guided him through the throng, but it all seemed far away. Exhaustion had risen in him with irresistible force as soon as his boots touched the ground, only fading when he found himself face-to-face with Lyvia.
“Rignar?” she asked, water welling in her eyes when he shook his head.
“He knew,” Shamil said, pulling her close to let her sob against him, slender form heaving with a mingling of grief, guilt, and fatigue that mirrored his own. “From the moment we met him, he knew his fate . . .” He let his voice fade rather than complete the thought aloud, knowing this was not the right time. As I now know mine.