Storm of the Dead - Lisa Smedman [98]
Cavatina threw herself to the side. She rolled onto her stomach, her bound hands scrabbling against the gritty soil. An instant later, her holy symbol was in her hands. Clutching it, she forced herself to her knees. She sang out an urgent note, and the blackened singing sword rose into the air behind Wendonai. Soot exploded from the blade, revealing gleaming steel. Then the sword began to sing.
Wendonai whirled to face it.
Too late. Cavatina yanked her bound hands toward her chest, urging the sword forward. Its point plunged into the demon's chest, finding his heart. The sword's peal of triumph drowned out the demon's anguished roar and the angry howl of the rising wind. Wendonai staggered, clutching the hilt that was rammed tight against his chest. A bloodied length of steel protruded from his back, quivering in its victory dance.
Before the demon could heal himself, Cavatina sang out another prayer. This time, her voice was funereal and low. The dirge she sang resonated through the blade in the balor's chest and vibrated through his blood with each pulse of his massive heart. He staggered, his cloven feet scuffing furrows in the salt-crusted earth. His wings snapped erect and fluttered stiffly, and his eyes blazed. Even as the dirge forced him to his knees, Wendonai shook his massive horned head.
"This… is not finished," he gasped. "You cannot… kill me."
Another lie. Wendonai had made one terrible, fatal mistake. Had this battle taken place anywhere else, Cavatina would have been unable to kill him. The demon's essence would have fallen back into the raw chaos of the Abyss, there to be reborn. But in the Abyss, he was as mortal as she was.
Cavatina braced herself. When Wendonai died, the resulting void would tear at the fabric of the Abyss, rupturing it in a tremendous explosion. She, too, would die.
That didn't matter. Her soul would join Eilistraee's eternal dance, and Cavatina would have her victory.
Cavatina was on her knees, still at bound at ankle and wrist with the smoldering remains of the demon's whip. But Eilistraee's symbol was in her hands. Tiny and dull though the ceremonial blade might be, it would be Wendonai's downfall.
She ended her dirge with two droning words: "Die, Wendonai."
The balor's eyes rolled back in its head. He groaned-long and low as tortured metal twisting apart. Then he began to tilt to one side. The wind howled, tearing at Cavatina's hair and driving sharp granules of salt into her bare skin. The demon's hands clawed at the air, as if he were desperately trying to prop himself upright, but to no avail.
With a crash that rattled the ground on which Cavatina knelt, Wendonai fell.
For several heartbeats, the air was utterly still.
Wendonai was dead, even though his body had not been consumed.
And Cavatina was still alive.
A miracle.
The glow that enveloped Cavatina abruptly ended. She let out a shuddering sigh. "Praise be to you, Eilistraee. In my time of need…" Realizing something, she amended her prayer of thanksgiving. "Masked Lady," she corrected. "My heartfelt thanks, for… everything."
She moistened her wind-chapped lips. They were crusted with salt, but she tasted something far sweeter.
Redemption.
She shuffled on her knees to where the demon lay. Using the length of blade that protruded from his back, she sliced apart the tight binding of leather around her wrists. Then she sat, raised her bound legs, and sawed the bindings off her ankles. She nicked herself in several places but didn't care. It was all part of the dance.
Leaping to her feet, she gave in to it. Whirling, clapping, spinning in place. A victory dance. Not just for herself, but for the Masked Lady. Embracing all that they both had become.
Only in the middle of it did she suddenly remember Halisstra. She whirled in place, but the salt-encrusted plain was as bare as it had always been. Empty and flat, stretching as far as the eye could see.
"Where is she?" Cavatina wondered aloud.
She'd asked herself the same question, nearly two years ago, after slaying Selvetarm.