Alara Unbroken - Doug Beyer [106]
Or if you think it’s right, continued Jazal, then do it. Kill her. Avenge me. You’ve reached your goal—-you’ve found my killer at last. My spirit will finally rest! So what are you waiting for? Enact your vengeance!
Ajani’s teeth clenched tight. His brother’s voice spoke the truth, but it jabbed him in the heart. Zaliki had made a mistake, influenced by Marisi. Jazal’s blood was on Marisi’s hands, if anyone’s. He was the one who had delivered Bolas’s dragonscale orb to the pride. He was the one who had brought it into Zaliki’s hands. And yet Ajani still wanted to close his claws around her neck.
It’s your choice, brother, Jazal said, and then fell silent.
“I knew in my heart it was wrong,” Zaliki was saying. “I knew the spell was meant for Jazal, and I even knew it was meant to hurt him.”
“Zaliki, I—I need to know. Where is Marisi now?”
“He’s dead. I killed him with my own hands.”
Just like that, Ajani’s chance at vengeance was taken away from him.
“Ajani, I’m so sorry. I should die. I should die so that Jazal can rest.” She buried her face in his chest. “I—” Her voice broke into heaving sobs. She said something over and over, something obscured by the tears. Eventually Ajani made it out. “I killed him,” she was saying.
An alloy of pity, disgust, and grief melted together in Ajani’s mind. He wanted to push her away, embrace her, and crush her all at once—all forces that fought each other, paralyzing him. After a tortured moment, he stood.
Zaliki was a harbinger, not an assassin; in his heart he knew that. Taking revenge on her would only deepen the injustice Jazal had suffered, and reward the sins of the dark forces far beyond her. Ajani’s pursuit was not over—just refocused. He would not stop until the being who truly began the chain of events, the evil ultimately responsible for Jazal’s death, was punished.
BANT
Knight-Captain Elspeth Tirel had been at the ruins of Giltspire Castle since word came that the demon army approached. She had a private contingent of knights, the responsibility granted to her in Rafiq’s prior absence. Among her legion were some of her knight companions from back in Valeron. Any minute now, when the moment came, she would have to order them into the fray, to ask them to die for the world that she had only recently adopted. Her heart was as heavy as a stone. Though she loved that world, Bant was truly theirs, not hers. Thw white stone obelisk behind her, the remains of a great citadel, was not a cherished landmark to Elspeth, but a reminder of the fragility of all she held dear —family, honor, peace.
High above her, angels smashed into screeching demons. Before her, the army of Malfegor approached, thrashing through Asha’s Army without so much as a slow in their pace. If Bant’s fighters weren’t ready for the mages of Esper, Elspeth thought, then they could never conceive of the horrors of war with demons and the undead. Her home was being overrun. She felt a stab of paralyzing terror as the morbid things approached—it was like she was back on her home world again.
Far across the battlefield, over the warring armies, Elspeth saw the demon-dragon abomination, the Grixis general Malfegor. She saw it rear back, spreading its batlike wings to blot out the sun—and saw that its eyes were locked on the white obelisk behind her. Malfegor uttered a vast noise from the bowels of its chest, and raised two of its arms high. Even from where she was, Elspeth could see that between its hands, it was conjuring a noxious tangle of black magic. Bant soldiers and Grixis undead alike began screaming in bloody agony, writhing and toppling onto the battlefield.
“Legion, attack!” Elspeth called. “Mages, fire on that demon! All cavalry, charge that demon! All infantry, destroy that demon!”
Elspeth’s troops rode into combat ahead of her, charging into the fray to face Malfegor. She took her place in the saddle of her leotau steed, and was about to follow after them, when she heard a call from behind her, from the road behind the obelisk.
“Elspeth!” shouted