Realm of Light - Deborah Chester [175]
He let the flames become a part of him, as the light was, as once he had absorbed the fire of the warding keys so long ago. He absorbed all that Beloth hurled against him, and felt himself grow stronger. Radiance shone from him, burning back the gloom and darkness that veiled the air. The mist upon the ground melted back from him. Light—dim and feeble at first—began to spread across the square, becoming brighter with every passing moment.
Beloth staggered back, and the flames ceased. The god no longer wore Kostimon’s features. Instead his face was a blank visage, lacking any features except his glowing eyes. And they were growing dull and dim.
“You cannot defeat me!” he roared. “I am the destroyer!”
“Then destroy yourself,” Caelan replied, and lifted his arms. He swung Exoner with all his might.
Beloth’s sword met it, but this time the black sword shattered. Beloth went down, screaming hateful curses, and Caelan plunged Exoner deep.
There was a great explosion, and the sound of stone breaking. The earth cracked open, yawning wide in a gulf that spanned the square and sent people scrambling for safety. Beloth clawed at the edge of the chasm, clutching at Caelan’s ankles as though to pull him over too. Caelan called upon everything he had left and drove the blade deeper, knocking Beloth over the edge.
As Beloth fell into the chasm, Caelan pulled Exoner free with a shout of triumph.
Not yet able to believe it, his blood still thrumming hard, Caelan glanced down at himself and saw that his skin was whole. Not even his clothes were charred. So this was victory, sweeter and more glorious than anything ever met in the arena.
He lifted the sword and started to turn around, but felt a terrible pain plunge through his chest. Buckling to his knees, he glanced down and saw a hand reaching up from the chasm. It was a woman’s hand, black with soil and ashes, and it gripped the long shaft of a spinning distaff that had been thrust through him.
She twisted her weapon, this symbol of Fate, and Caelan arched back, crying out as the agony tore the breath from him. The woman came climbing out of the ground in triumph of her own.
She was emaciated to the point of being skin and bones. Her hair was tangled in a filthy mat, and she was crusted with dirt. Her eyes held only destruction.
Twisting the long distaff, she jerked it from Caelan, and he fell there at the edge of the chasm. Exoner was still clutched in his fingers, but he could not feel the weapon. Its song had been silenced. He felt light and strength flowing from his wound like blood.
The light that had begun to shine over the city dimmed now as she raised her bloody distaff. It was as though she sucked all the life from the very air. Everything she gazed upon withered and died. The ground she stood upon burned with flames. When she turned her head to look at the screaming people who tried to flee, many of them fell dead.
Caelan stared up at her, trying to find one last measure of strength, something in reserve not yet exhausted and driven from him. He knew her, and her very name was enough to freeze his bowels.
“Mael,” he whispered, “bringer of destruction.”
She laughed at him, and her gaze stole the breath from his lungs so that he gasped helplessly at her feet.
“Mortal, playing at godhood,” she said. Her voice rasped out, hoarse and ugly. “Don’t you know the ancient legends? Have you pathetic mortals forgotten everything? In defeating Beloth, you have set me free. How will you rid the world of pestilence and plague? I have only to blow my breath across you to flail the very skin from your bones.”
As she spoke, she lifted the distaff over him, ready to plunge it through his heart. Caelan could feel his blood running beneath him, soaking into the ground. He couldn’t move, much less meet her attack. Exoner lay under his hand, the blade no longer shining, as though they were dying together. He gripped the hilt, straining to lift the sword one last time.
In the distance he heard female voices lifted in a shrill chant. “Chiara