There’s a shout from the doorway, and I can feel a terrible energy flowing in the air. Saelyn, the Undying, stands behind the Abomination I’d seen through the window. Her entire body glowsred as she stands with knees bent and hands raised upward. Even in the darkness I can see the ground below her blacken and then turn gray.
The rocks seem to wither in that red glow. Rhaskar had told me that the Undying could rend the soul from the body, but stones don’t have souls… Do they? The sparse grass that had been blowing in the night wind crumbles as it turns gray. The deadly light expands forward, never bothering the Abomination standing beside Saelyn.
And Isola smiles. I glance at Rurik, who snarls. I haven’t spent nearly as much time around the Undying as he has, so I don’t really understand what’s happening. “Stay out of the light,” he whispers. “We have to draw the Abomination away from Isola, but she can handle Saelyn on her own.”
Trusting my teammate to know what’s best, I follow him to flank the Abomination. Jorren is still holding his hands against the tower, his blue mist still filling the doorway. It’s the only reason they haven’t overwhelmed us. If the two Chained and Burning One had joined the demon, Serica’s Abomination, and Saelyn, we’d have no chance.
“We need to draw it away from Saelyn and Isola. Then I’ll burn it down with lightning.”
I nod to him, and instead of waiting for him to attack, I draw a steel arrow from my quiver and quickly fire it at the creature. The axes move just as quickly as any Godforged creature, easily blocking the arrow as if it were a fly rather than a deadly attack. Inotice something very important. It doesn’t move at all in reaction to the shot. Good.
Rurik glances at me as I nock a lightning arrow. The thing that I learned more than anything from all my training with Azric against Abominations is that they only do what they’re taught, and this one was trained to block arrows rather than dodge them. Abominations are immune to flames according to Azric, so I know that only my limited number of lightning arrows will be effective.
Rurik may not be able to use his Godforged powers because they’re too strong. They can arc too far and catch Isola in their blast, just like the Mark of the Spear would. But I’ve seen how much less powerful the flame arrows are compared to the Mark of the Phoenix. These arrows won’t arc as far.
Aiming low and to the right, I let it loose. Just as it did before, the axes shift to block the arrows, but when the arrowhead connects with the steel, lightning explodes around it. It arcs toward the creature, but it also arcs toward Saelyn. The creature doesn’t make a sound, taking most of the electricity through its massive body, and it collapses in a tangle of an unnatural number of limbs.
It shakes just like a person would, as every stitched-together muscle tenses at the same time.
Instead of hitting Saelyn, the lightning arcs around her, striking the ground just outside the glowing sphere of red. She turns, though, surprised at what happened to the Abomination, and Isola takes advantage of Saelyn’s distraction immediately. She rushes to her enemy.
The red glow doesn’t have quite the same effect on Isola as it had on the grass and stones. Her skin looks just a little paler. The aura doesn’t seem to draw her life away like Rhaskar had explained to me. Maybe the Undying have some immunity against their own powers? I hate that I understand so little about the Godforged’s powers, and so much of what I was taught was only partial information.
But when Isola presses her hand against Saelyn’s chest, the enemy Undying’s red glow disappears almost instantly, her body becoming noticeably grayer. Isola has to retreat, though, as Saelyn draws a dagger and swings it at my teammate.
This all happens in the span of a few breaths. Rurik is already running toward the Abomination, his sword drawn with electricity sparking from the blade. The Abomination stirs as if it’s waking up, but Rurik’s already there. He drives the blade into the center of its face, and rotten fluids explode out of it, drenching him in them.
He holds the blade there, and the creature’s entire body convulses as electricity burns through it. The scent of scorched flesh mixes with the nauseating fluid that covers Rurik to make a truly vile atmosphere.
Isola and Saelyn square off against each other again, Isola covered in that red glow while Saelyn doesn’t have the same aura around her, and I nock another steel arrow to my bow. “I can’t keep this up!” Jorren yells.
Then, a woman stumbles out of the doorway. Her dark brown skin is covered in hardened calluses that seem to be made of stone,the color of tree bark. Her eyes glow red as she escapes the mist Jorren’s been using to control the most dangerous of our enemies.
Her black hair is in tangles. Her clothes are ragged, as if she hasn’t cared for them in years. Her lips are as gray as ash. A Burning One. She was once a normal human woman whom Erelith took to the Realm of Flames. Every day, she was flayed from head to toe before her wounds were healed. Eventually, that skin grew back as hard as stone. Flames were forced into her body until they became as much a part of her as the water she drank or the air she breathed.
When she raises her hand, Rurik yells, “Take cover!” Instead, I let my arrow fly, and it hits true, piercing Saelyn’s chest. Isola moves to her side immediately. Saelyn tries to reach for Isola’s face. Isola’s hands manipulate the enemy Undying’s arms to always keep them out of reach of her skin while still managing momentary touches against Saelyn’s body. Each time Isola connects with her enemy, the color drains even further in the location.
When she touches Saelyn’s shoulder, her arm hangs loosely at her side, useless. When she brushes against her hip, Saelyn nearly falls, her leg no longer supporting her. There isn’t time for Isola to do anything else, though, as the Burning One’s hands become wreathed in flames. She knows she needs to get some space between herself and the much stronger enemy.
Then Jorren appears from behind the woman where he’d been standing at the wall of the tower. He wraps his hands around her temples, and the Burning One’s wail is enough to make me fall to the ground. The next thing I know, there’s an explosion of flames as she smashes her palms against her own face.
Jorren’s already scrambled backward. The Burning One continues to slam flame-covered hands against her face, and Isola rushes toward her. Slipping under one of her enemy’s uncontrolled swings, Isola presses her hand against the deadly Godforged’s back. Isola glows bright red, and the Godforged in tattered clothing slowly stops moving. Her arms go limp. She falls to her knees.
Then she goes completely gray. Starting with the tips of her hair and her fingers. Her skin had been a deep reddish-brown, but as Isola pulls her soul from her, her skin loses all its vibrancy. Instead of changing colors, it becomes lighter and lighter as if someone were drawing the paint from a wall.
And when the Burning One finally falls to the ground, there isn’t a touch of color on her. Not in her skin, hair, eyes, or even her clothing. She looks as though she was carved from a block of ash, and when she hits the ground, she shatters. There’s no blood, no gore. Just pieces of a woman who’d gone through terrible torture and found the end of this life at the hands of an Undying.
I don’t have time to think any more about Isola’s powers because the first of the two Chained steps out of the door. Jorren’s got his hand pressed against the tower and is using it to help support himself. He’s exhausted. Isola looks nearly spent as well. Rurik takes one step toward Saelyn, and in a single motion, decapitates her.
Then he turns toward the Chained, who’s wielding a greatsword in one hand and a shield larger than I am in the other. His rust-colored armor covers him from head to toe in thick steel. Just like all armor, there are weak spots. Under the armpits, betweenthe helmet and breastplate, at the elbows and knees, and along the inner thighs. But those weak spots are hard to get to, and none of them are killing blows. Plus, I’d still have to break through the chain mail that covers those sections.
The Chained, more than any other Godforged, are the ones I didn’t want to fight. Maybe if I were a good enough archer to shoot through its eye-slit, I would have a chance, but I’m not that good. I know their armor will protect them from flames, but I don’t know about lightning.
I nock an arrow with yellow flights to my bow and let it loose. Immediately upon impact with the Chained’s shield, electricity arcs around it, but it doesn’t seem to affect it.
“Electricity doesn’t work unless you can drive it into their flesh,” Rurik says without turning to look at me. “That’s a hard-won bit of experience. You’re faster than them, so fight him from behind. I’ll hold his attention, and whatever happens, don’t let him get a grip on you.”
“I’m not dead yet,” Isola says as she catches her breath. “It’s not like it’ll be the first time I’ll fight a Chained.”
