Sword of the Gods - Bruce R. Cordell [10]
The genasi sneered. “Too bad. Because—”
“What’s going on out here, Garth?” a new voice interjected.
A man—a human, not a genasi—emerged from a curio shop opposite the Lantern. He was overweight, and his blue surcoat strained against a gold chain belt. His hair was black with a touch of silver at the ears, and ink stained his fingertips. A hand crossbow of peculiar design rode one hip.
The firesoul rounded on the shop owner and said, “None of your business, Chant. Get out of here, or you’ll get the same lesson as this dimskull!”
The man, evidently called Chant, approached until he was only a pace from the genasi. He said, “I’m not going anywhere, Garth. Especially not at the behest of morons in their cups like you. Why don’t you clear out of here before the peacemakers notice and send a detachment?”
The genasi spit from the corner of his mouth, made as if to turn away, but instead punched the shop owner across the chin. Chant’s head jerked. His eyes rolled up in his head as he collapsed.
The onlookers roared their surprise and approval.
“Burning dominions,” cursed Demascus as he retreated a step to draw his blade, fighting his atavistic urge to draw a much longer sword that didn’t exist. As he fumbled with his weapon, his toe caught a loose cobble in the street. He failed to draw, stumbled, and only managed to avoid pitching onto his face by grabbing Garth.
Garth elbowed him in the ribs. Demascus gasped and let go, backpedaling until his calves touched the wide fountain. The overweight human who’d tried to warn off Demascus’s assailants groaned from where he lay on the cobbles.
The handful of watching Lantern patrons were emboldened by the firesoul’s antics and shambled closer.
“I don’t want trouble,” Demascus said again, but only because it seemed the sort of thing to say. Part of him did want trouble …
Still, his odds of winning a fight with so many were poor. They believed he was part of some group that paraded around in red leather jackets, a group they obviously didn’t think too highly of. “I don’t know who you think I am, I just found this coat.”
Garth laughed, “Nice try, but who’d be shtuu …” He stopped, then continued, taking care to enunciate his words instead of drunkenly slur them, “Who’d be stupid enough to wear the red down here, if he wasn’t a member of the Firestorm Cabal?”
Apparently Demascus would be that stupid.
The rabble advanced. A couple picked up stones. His hand found the hilt of his sword, and the crowd howled like a beast in response.
It reminded him of …
A memory fell from nowhere, swamping his senses. He was standing on a gray field of barren rock. He was arrayed in a panoply of silver armor. Golden radiance leaked from a wide metallic band around one finger that contained a single twist. A gargantuan sword with divided red and white runes vibrated in his hands, eager to taste the flesh of the horde advancing upon him. A pale length of fabric was wrapped around the sword’s hilt—the scarf! Trinkets of some sort dangled from tight braids in his hair.
Shambling corpses, skeletons, and crawling, hopping, slithering bits of animated flesh surrounded him, advancing. He pointed the sword tip high and bellowed, “Look upon your end, foul creatures! Flee back to the shadows forever!”
The runes on his sword suddenly flashed with a fury brighter than the sun, a purifying light that washed across the advancing mass like a tsunami rolling over a coastal village.
He blinked, and found himself back in the plaza. He strove to hold onto the memory—
And lost it when a hurled tankard shattered on the curve of the catchment fountain next to his head.
Demascus’s borrowed sword was out of its scabbard in the next instant. It was a poor replacement for the rune-scribed artifact of his vision. But something of his memory remained with him. A feeling. A … knowing.
He swept the blade out in an arc as resonant syllables fell from his lips. The