Crusader

There was a quiet that fell over them, then Cyrus saw the shadow in the distance that jutted over the heads of the creatures, and it rose higher, at least four times the height of the beasts around it. “Not small,” he breathed.

“It’s looking … right … at us,” Terian said quietly. “I find that very, very unnerving.”

“I don’t blame you,” Aisling said.

Cyrus brought his sword up again and drove Praelior into the skull of a running scourge that came at him. He brought the blade up in the air again and let it descend in a hacking motion, the faint blue glow along the length of the blade gleaming in the early, cloudy twilight.

“Whatever you’re doing,” Aisling said tightly, “is pissing him off. That thing is looking right at us.”

“I’m killing its fellows,” Cyrus said, keeping his weapon light and attacking the beasts that continued to come at him. “This is hardly new.”

“His eyes are right on you,” Terian agreed. “I mean, anchored. It’s watching you, not us.”

“Do you think it senses he’s the General?” Nyad asked.

“Could be,” Aisling answered.

“Fine,” Cyrus said, raising his sword again into a high guard and slashing a leaping scourge into halves in front of him. “Whatever the reason, let him come-”

“It’s your sword,” Aisling said as the ground rumbled beneath them, “that’s what’s catching his attention; and it looks like you get your wish because here he-”

The rumble grew loud now, the shadow in the distance that was as large as a small house was crossing the snowy ground, chewing it up with surprising speed. Where Cyrus would have imagined the creature be ponderously slowly, it was anything but, rumpled skin becoming plain as it closed on them, the same grey of dead flesh covering its massive bones. It really is the size of a dragon with no wings. “Are you sure it’s my sword that’s catching it?”

“Pretty sure,” Aisling said, steadying herself as she parried the attack of another one of the creatures. “Every time you raised it where he could see the flash, he watched closer. Now that he’s gotten a look at it three times, he’s charging us.”

“I can’t argue with her logic,” Terian said, “her judgment in men, but not her logic. It happened exactly as she describes.”

“If that thing hits our line he’s going to trample his way through,” Curatio said as they held there, the beast traveling toward them. “You might want to-”

“Martaina,” Cyrus said warningly, “Nyad-”

Arrows were already in flight before he could finish his thoughts; the spells followed, a flame spell that shot in a small burst. It was hardly enough to compare to the long, flaming lines that had blocked scourge advances, but it was enough to light up the sky, to slow the massive creature as it barreled toward them, legs like tree trunks pounding feet the size of stumps against the ground, leaving tracks as big in diameter as Cyrus’s shoulders. He clutched Praelior close but kept it moving; even with this thing charging them down, the smaller ones keep coming, their onslaught always threatening to overpower our defense.

It grew closer now, a hundred feet away, thundering across the snowy plain like a dead rhino, its eyes different than the others. There was red in them, reminding him of the eye of a white rat he had once looked into when just a boy. There was intelligence burning in there, too, something far beyond the simple ravening hunger of the others, the mass. This one came for him, watched him, not the others. He could see the exhalations of steaming breath as it came forward, jagged teeth as long as his forearm.

“Nyad!” Cyrus called. “Stop him!” Too fast, he’s not slowing enough from the fire and arrows, and if he splits us, we’re dead, damned sure guaranteed to be overrun in seconds-

There was a flash of light, blinding, from behind Cyrus, white in its intensity, and hands yanked him to the side as the thing burst through the center of them, a grey, blurred leg missing him by inches. Cyrus staggered into Aisling, who had pulled him along, and the thing thundered past, stopping just beyond them, snorting into the air as it shook its head. The others, Cyrus realized, had dodged as well, breaking their small formation down the center. They surged back together now, quickly, and a wall of flame burst forth in front of them, in the open, crushed-down snow where the largest of the scourge had charged through, and it half-circled them in a hundred and eighty degrees of protection.

“A little wall,” Nyad said, her voice strained, “to minimize the vectors of attack. I won’t be able to hold it long.”

“He’s pinned between us and our army,” Cyrus said. “CHARGE!” he called out over the lines. “CHARGE!” There was movement on the line, and Cyrus could see them begin to fight forward, on the Galbadien side and in the middle of the Sanctuary forces. With Nyad’s flames stymieing the advance of the scourge behind them, Cyrus moved back toward the army, slicing his way toward the creature-the General, he thought of it-as it stood, shaking its head as though it were trying to get its senses back. It took faltering steps, crushing some of its own kind underfoot.

“Be wary,” Curatio said, grasping Cyrus’s arm. “That is no ordinary creature. No ordinary soul.”

“What is it?” Cyrus asked, pausing for just a second, unable to take his eyes off the beast, standing as it was almost three times his height, with such a massive torso as he had not seen on a creature since Mortus himself or Purgatory before it.

“I have only suspicions,” Curatio said icily. “Be careful. There is more to this thing than is readily apparent.”

As though it heard them, it turned, red eyes almost aglow. There was another flash of light, and Cyrus realized it was Curatio blinding the creature, which screeched at them in a high bellowing noise of pain and anger, then came at them in a head-down charge that Cyrus only missed by throwing himself aside at the last second. He skidded in the snow and returned to his feet, clearing the ground around him with a sweep of his sword and ending three more of the scourge in the process.

The General of the scourge was now before him again, halted before the wall of fire. The line was close by, now, and Cyrus watched them advance, thinning steadily decreasing numbers in the middle of the battlefield that were pincered between the front rank and Cyrus’s separated group. Less to worry about here, and maybe I can kill this thing before it gets its bearings again. He took off at a slow run, approaching quietly, sword in hand as the beast tried to blink its eyes back to normal once more, heavy, grey lids shuttering over the red pupils, irises and everything else.

As Cyrus reached it, he jumped-a hop to take him to the lower hindquarters of the thing, where he plunged his blade into the muscle of the left rear thigh. He drew a shriek of rage more than pain, and the leg moved abruptly where he had planted his feet upon landing, jarring him and his sword loose. He fell the five feet or so to the ground, hit the snow and rolled backward and to his feet again. He spun the sword in his grasp, back to facing upright, and brought it forward into a slicing attack as the creature turned into him. He narrowly dodged a butt of its head as it lashed back at him in a sideways motion.

Cyrus brought a sword slash across the side of its wrinkled, rotted face and it let out a roar that flooded his senses with the smell of dead things; a rot of bodies that made him gag and taste the return of his bread and water with stomach bile mixed in for good measure. His ears rang with the sound of it.

A leaping attack onto the giant scourge’s back caused it to arch its spine and howl. Aisling landed with her blades buried into the flesh and for a moment it bucked onto its back legs. Cyrus watched the sultry grin of the dark elf vanish as she was flung away. She landed on her feet and slithered quickly back while killing two scourge that blocked her retreat.

There were arrows sticking out of the General’s back and head. Cyrus could not see Martaina on the other side of the thing, but her handiwork was obvious when it exposed its other side to him. It came at him, ignoring all else, mouth open and teeth exposed. Cyrus met it head on, driving the sword into its face as it snapped at him. He missed the eyes but caught the snouted nose, leaving a great gash between the nostrils.

“Thick-skinned!” Terian shouted from somewhere to his right. Cyrus saw Scuddar In’shara attack with his curved blade on the end of the tail. Cyrus started to tell the desert man not to bother but was forced to dodge another snap of the jaws.

“Reminds me of a dragon,” Cyrus shouted back to Terian. “Any chance this is Ashan’agar? He’s dead and was none too happy with me when last we parted.”

“Or Kalam,” Terian replied, now visible in Cyrus’s peripheral vision, fending off the smaller scourge while