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Contents 18 страница

“They’re unarmed, at least,” Celene said, turning slowly in a circle. They were surrounded.

“No.” Briala’s voice was shaky, but she was herself again. “Look at their hands, their teeth.” The bones had stretched and warped, hands curving into savage claws and mouths gleaming with jagged fangs.

“Felassan!” Michel called, readying his sword and bringing up his shield. “Can you call forth your magic?”

Felassan hopped up onto one of the sarcophagi and raised his staff, not as a magical implement but as a simple weapon. “Certainly,” he said. “Of course, doing so will weaken the Veil even further and let more of these things into the room.”

“Then stay out of the way.” The corpses, finally on their feet, shambled forward, claws ready. Though they had no throats left, an eerie predatory hiss rattled from their fanged mouths. Michel took stock of his enemies and allies and moved. “Briala, with him on high ground. Rain fire on the back ranks. Majesty, my flank.”

Without waiting to see if they listened, Michel raised his shield and moved in.

A warrior could gain honor by killing bandits, defeating another warrior in a formal duel, or even hunting down some great beast. All of those enemies were alive, and a fight against them meant matching will and strength against something else that possessed a desire to live.

A fight against corpses and darkspawn, though, was butchery. There was no honor, no glory, only the grim pride in knowing that the world had one less monster in it.

Michel smashed back a corpse with his shield, brought down his sword and crushed the skull of another, and slammed his shoulder into a third that was trying to close. He stepped, raised his shield to knock away dagger-sharp claws, and shattered another corpse’s shoulder with a second overhand strike.

They never learned, even as he struck down a third, then a fourth. It was simple, in the same way that running in full armor from sunrise to sundown was simple. If he had the discipline and strength to keep them from overwhelming him, he would grind them all to dust. If he faltered, due to fatigue or fear, he would die.

Block, step, smash, step. His breath was tight in his chest. All around him, the corpses hissed and snarled. Claws curled around the edge of his shield. As his blade grew heavy, it was tempting to let the dead pull on the shield, use their pull to guide his next step.

Michel had watched a fellow trainee give in to that temptation, trying a flashy move to cover his fatigue. The corpses had torn his throat out moments later.

He wrenched his shield free from their grasp, smashed the bodies back and crushed another skull with the same Maker-cursed overhand blow. Block, step, smash, step.

At the edge of his vision, he saw Celene slashing the horde with her daggers. Iron or steel would have done little to bone, but Celene’s silverite blades sheared through the corpses’ claws, trailing flames that scorched the dull yellow to black. She had taken down few of them, but she kept them from flanking Michel, which was enough.

In the back ranks, skulls shattered like clay target vases as Briala fired shot after shot from her bow. Like Michel’s simple work, it was more a practice exercise than an art form.

Block, step, smash, step. Michel slipped on a flopping arm bone, recovered, and swung his blade in a great sweep that knocked the closest corpses back before they could swarm him. Sloppy, too sloppy. His old masters would have had his hide for that. Tired and lazy, loose steps leading to missteps. The longsword, a noble blade of shining silverite, felt like a great stone hammer, and a voice at the back of his mind began to whisper, as it always had during the longest drills.

Just put more into each swing, and rest for a second when the blade digs in.

Drop the shield and switch to a two-handed grip. It will be so much easier with both arms.

Or even better than that, just run. Run before you make the mistake that gets you killed. Before you slip up and show them that you’re just a fake, just a boy from the slums.

“I am,” he growled through gritted teeth, “Ser Michel de Chevin.”

Block, step, smash, step.

“I am Ser Michel de Chevin.” Another skull shattered. A trio of corpses raked claws along his armor, and he crushed their hands to dust with a swipe of his shield, slammed them back, and set himself in the proper stance, though his legs burned and his back screamed.

“I am Ser Michel de Chevin!” An arrow buzzed past his face and punched through a corpse’s skull, and he blocked, stepped, and smashed another, then stepped to his next target only to find the great burial chamber before him strewn with scattered limbs and smashed bones.

He took in a great gasping breath and, despite himself, let out a laugh as he leaned against a sarcophagus. He had no idea how many corpses had risen and fallen, but the dark voice at the back of his mind was wrong. His old masters would have been proud.

Then, from behind them came a voice.

“You are indeed Ser Michel de Chevin,” said Grand Duke Gaspard, “and I have been looking forward to avenging the death of my bard.”

* * *

Celene’s world went from hot to cold in an instant as she turned to look at the grand duke.

Gaspard had come in through the same eluvian they had used. It was still active behind them, and Celene had no idea whether it was because of her ruby, or if Gaspard had somehow made his own bargain with the demon.

He stood at the edge of the room, flanked by Lord Remache and a young woman robed in gray satin, holding a staff that glowed soft white. Behind them, soldiers were still stepping through the eluvian.

They were outnumbered, and badly. Michel, though he held himself proud and tall, had to be exhausted.

Still, it had to be now. If the rest of Gaspard’s men got through the door, they would have no chance.

She opened her mouth to order the attack, and a tiny motion at the edge of her vision caught her eye. It was Briala, shaking her head ever so slightly.

“Grand Duke Gaspard,” Celene said smoothly, “you continue to impress me. Though you could have arrived a few moments earlier and offered assistance.”

“With the dead?” Gaspard grinned. “I’d have been honor-bound to assist you had you asked. Good thing for me I arrived late.”

Celene stepped back, a simple, prudent move that put a stone sarcophagus between her and Gaspard and also put Briala more clearly in her line of vision. Briala had an arrow nocked in her bow, raised but not drawn. As Celene glanced over, Briala tapped her bow with her little finger. Anyone not trained in the bardic arts would have simply thought it the nervous gesture of a sloppy fighter.

From one bard to another, Briala’s gesture meant, “Encourage them to approach.”

Celene had no idea what Briala intended, but the gesture carried with it the implicit suggestion of a plan, which was more than Celene had at the moment. “Will you not be reasonable, Gaspard? How many lives have you thrown away in this play for power? How many more will die because you refused to play the Game?”

“Your game,” Gaspard said, “not mine. As for how many more…” He shrugged, grinning. “Enough. But fewer of mine.”

He was too assured. She needed him off balance. “And if I accepted your marriage proposal?”

Gaspard’s smile faded. “I offered in good faith, Celene. This, now, is another of your little games. I will not match you in a battle of words. I never could.” As more soldiers crowded in behind him, he stepped forward.

Celene glanced at Briala, who signaled “not yet.”

“If you think so little of your skill with words,” she said, “then you may not find the throne of Orlais quite as comfortable as you think. You have all of you overreached. Brutish warriors who think you can keep the empire safe by swinging your swords hard enough.” She glanced over at the man beside Gaspard. “Duke Remache, who fancies himself the next grand duke despite never becoming a chevalier. And … young Lady Lienne de Montsimmard,” she said, making a guess from the girl’s familiar features, “who believes Gaspard will protect an apostate even after he has the Circle to serve him. The future high nobility of the empire…” Celene smiled coldly. “Cowering at the door while their empress and her champion fight the dead.”

“Yes, Celene, it’s called tactics,” Gaspard said with a sigh. Celene noted that Remache took the barb angrily, while Lienne shrugged without concern. “It’s this novel concept the chevaliers taught me while you were pandering to the Chantry and trading innuendos with the courtiers. And did that work, by the way? Have you kept the templars and the mages from dragging our glorious empire into war?”

“You made that rather a moot point when you dragged our glorious empire into war.” Celene shook her head, and with the motion saw Briala gesture ever so slightly with one foot. She was pointing at her dagger, still lodged in the floor plate that controlled the chamber’s ancient traps. And with that, Celene understood. “And when we lose more land to Ferelden or Nevarra,” she added, “you will doubtless claim that it was not your fault, raging at your defeat in battles you should never have had to fight.”

Gaspard glared. “But I believe I’ll win this one, Celene,” he said, and stepped forward again as more soldiers came through the mirror into the room. “Archers, ready. If your former empress wishes to swear her loyalty to me, she lives.” One last figure stepped through the mirror. To Celene’s surprise, it was the young elven healer from the Dalish camp. “The mirror?”

“It closed behind us,” the elf said, and gave Celene a chilly look. “But if you get the gem she carries, I can activate any eluvian we need.”

“I’ll have it for you in a minute. Celene?” He smiled, and when she said nothing, Gaspard said, without breaking eye contact, “Men, if she and her people are foolish enough to fight, kill them where they stand.” Then he glanced over at Briala. “At least you’d be buried with your people.”

“Do you remember what you told me as I sat in the prisoner’s wagon, Gaspard?” Briala asked, stepping down slowly from the sarcophagus.

Gaspard raised an eyebrow. “That you were easier on the eyes than I was?”

As Briala landed, she kicked her dagger free.

“No. You told me I was dangerous.”

As she dove behind a sarcophagus, arrows hissing past her, Briala fired a single shot of her own.

It was a lazy, wobbling shot from a half-drawn bow that would never punch through armor or lodge in bone.

It was, however, enough to trigger the small pressure plate on the floor near Gaspard.

A roar of flame shattered the air in an explosion of light and sound. The impact slammed Celene to the ground, her ears ringing, and flame arced over the spot where she had stood. As she dazedly tried to breathe, she realized that the explosion had not knocked her down. Michel had, shielding her with his own body. He rolled free, coming back to his feet smoothly, but Celene saw that his armor smoked.

The ground where Gaspard and his men had stood was scorched black, and most of the soldiers were charred husks on the floor, new corpses joining the old. Gaspard himself, his armor scorched and smoking like Michel’s, was back on his feet, face grim. Remache was on his knees a few yards away, coughing, and Lienne was still and unmoving on the ground, while the elven healer, sheathed in a glow of crackling magical energy, looked down at her curiously.

Behind them, the eluvian they had all come through was lined with a spider web of cracks, and its surface was dull gray and lifeless.

“For the empress!” Michel shouted, and lunged at Gaspard. Gaspard brought up his shield. The two chevaliers met in a ringing clash of steel, and Michel pressed forward, sending Gaspard stumbling back, frantically blocking Michel’s furious assault.

It seemed that the time for talking had passed, and for her own part, Celene was ready to kill someone.

One of Gaspard’s men struggled to his feet, and without hesitation, Celene darted forward, kicked him behind the knee, and slit his throat. Another warrior, badly burned but still conscious, got his sword out, but then an arrow sprouted from his throat, and he collapsed wordlessly.

“As Ser Michel said, for the empress.” Back on her feet, Briala nocked another arrow, and Celene spared her a small smile.

Then she turned to Remache, who was getting back to his feet. “Ah, Duke Remache.” Celene lunged in, sidestepped his clumsy slash, and lashed out with a slice that opened his cheekbone. “You should truly have reconsidered your career as a playwright.”

“Michel.” The cold hatred made Celene look, and she saw that it was the elven healer, raising her staff as she spoke.

Around her, energy played, light twisting, and with a sickening twist in her gut, Celene saw tendrils of light coil around the nearby bodies of the dead. Energy hissed from the corpses, and the elven healer glowed as though lit from within.

“Briala, the elf!” Celene dove back from Remache and lunged for the healer, but Remache sidestepped to place himself between them. Snarling under the blood that poured from his cheek, he swung at Celene wildly, and his reach, if not his skill, forced her to give ground.

Gaspard shoved Michel back, shield to shield, and lashed out with a high slash. Michel turned it away with stunning speed and stepped in with a low kick that caught Gaspard in the leg and sent him stumbling. Michel followed with a high overhand strike, and Gaspard caught it with his shield, only to cry out as Michel’s shield slammed into his own and staggered him.

“Michel,” the elven healer said, her voice echoing through the chamber, and this time even Michel heard it. “You should have killed me.”

She raised her hands as though cupping the air between them, and then she hardened her hands into claws.

The air around Michel hummed, and then a smoky field of energy shimmered around Celene’s champion. It coalesced around him, and Michel shouted, slashing at it uselessly. Then he grunted, struggling against the strength of the magic, and Celene heard the slow keening whine of his armor buckling.

Remache seemed stupefied, staring in sick fascination at the glowing magic that was crushing Michel. Celene darted past him. “Briala!” she shouted, and lunged at the elven healer, who still shimmered with glowing energy pulled from the corpses around the room.

A handbreadth from the elven mage’s throat, Celene’s daggers glanced harmlessly off a shimming barrier of arcane energy. A moment later, Briala’s arrow shattered on the same barrier.

The elf didn’t even spare them a glance. She had eyes only for Michel, who had fallen to one knee, straining against the crushing strength of her magic.

“You killed my people!” she called, as Michel groaned. “You killed everyone I loved!”

“Oh, good, we’re showing off esoteric magical talents,” Felassan called, pulling himself upright with smoke still trailing from his cloak. “Can I go next?” His own staff thrummed with power as he spun it in a fast circle, and a wave of rippling force exploded through the room.

It washed over Celene, and the room plunged into darkness.

For one terrifying heartbeat, she thought she’d been stricken blind, but then she saw that the eluvians still shimmered around the room, save the one that was cracked. She also saw a pale glow around Michel where he knelt—the spectral light wavering and falling into wispy nothingness like a chalk drawing in the rain.

Celene realized then what Felassan had done. He had cast away all nearby magic.

The elven healer screamed, and Celene looked over to see her contorted in pain as tendrils of energy crackled around her. All of her magic, the protective barrier and whatever power she had wrung from the corpses nearby, hissed along her skin. Her staff fell to the ground, its red light dimming.

Felassan’s staff flickered, and then cast out its light once more, bathing the whole room in the same gentle glow as before. The elven healer was on the ground, shaking, and everyone else was still for a moment. Remache had his hand pressed to his bleeding face. Briala stared at Felassan in awe, and even Gaspard seemed unsure of what to do next, taking a few steps back and looking from person to person with his guard raised. Michel, still on his knees, was pale and sweating, and his armor was marred with dents where the spectral force had nearly crushed the life out of him.

To Celene’s surprise, Felassan himself looked more worried than exultant.

“An enhanced dispelling, which can provide a nasty backlash on anyone surrounding herself with too much ambient magic,” he said to the silence. “And if I could please ask all the mages present to avoid any more big flashy magic in the room with the very thin Veil, lest something decide to come through?”

With the low rumble of ancient stone, the lids of the three largest sarcophagi in the room slid open.

Ser Michel had never been in this much pain. Not during his childhood in the slums, not during the harsh training at the Academie.

Whatever Felassan had done to break the elven girl’s spell had helped him as well. Some remaining energy sent soothing warmth through his limbs, easing the biting pain of ribs he was sure had cracked under the strain. Still, his momentary advantage over Gaspard was gone. The grand duke would find Michel little challenge, he knew, even as he struggled to his feet and set himself to stop his knees from shaking.

But Gaspard didn’t attack. He was not even looking at Michel. Instead, he stared at the far end of the room, sword and shield raised in the Spear-fisher guard. It was a defensive position, used to recover from fatigue, and most chevaliers derided it as the guard to choose when you knew yourself to be outclassed. Blinking, Michel followed Gaspard’s stare and saw why.

Three of the great sarcophagi in the chamber had opened, and from them rose corpses. But unlike the simple clawed horrors Michel had slain by the score a few minutes past, these were clearly beyond anything he had trained for.

Two of the creatures were simple skeletons, but even as they stood, the air around them shimmered with magic, and then spiked armor, bulky and hideously impractical to move in, formed around them. Each held a greatsword as long as Michel was tall, and under the spiked helms, cold light flared from empty sockets. Michel had heard legends of these creatures: revenants, deadly warriors that would kill every living creature they could find.

The third figure, Michel had no name for. It rose into the air, and energy swirled around it like a great golden wind, solidifying into glittering red and gold robes. Its bony claws crackled with energy, and it held no other weapon. Around its head, the magic formed a golden skullcap, and beneath it, gray skin formed a mockery of a face, with eyes that burned like coals staring out balefully.

“An era’harel,” Felassan hissed, and Michel was surprised to hear very mortal anger and fear in the elf’s voice. “It’s, ah, a demon-mage, essentially. Only worse than that sounds.”

Michel looked back at the others. Briala and Celene were up, as was Remache. Felassan looked exhausted from whatever magic he had used. Gaspard’s mages were even worse. The elven healer was still on the ground, shaking, while the young noble was unconscious.

Of Gaspard’s soldiers, there were no survivors. They had either died in the blast or, worse, been left on that Maker-damned path between mirrors for all eternity when the eluvian had cracked.

“Gaspard!” Celene said sharply. “I would say we have common cause.”

The grand duke looked back at her, then at the horrors rising from their tombs. “Agreed.” He looked over at Michel, and his lips twitched with a tiny smile. “Come, then, brother. Let us show these things how wrong they were to face Orlesian chevaliers on the field of battle.”

Gaspard had to know that Michel was barely on his feet. It could have been encouragement or insult, but either way, it was enough of a goad to set Michel’s back straight. He raised his blade into the Spear-fisher guard, tightened his grip on his shield, and gave Gaspard a solemn nod. “Agreed.”

Then he lumbered forward, grimacing through the pain as each step made his dented armor dig into his shoulders and side. Gaspard matched his gait—not a full charge, for only a fool would charge such unknown and powerful creatures, but a jog that would put the force of their armored bodies behind their first blows.

“You must slay the demon-mage!” Felassan called from behind them. “Da’len, clear a path!”

Fast as lightning, an arrow punched into the armor of the revenant on the right, even as a boulder smashed into the one on the left. Breath whistling in his lungs, Michel ran past the revenants at the mage-corpse, the one Felassan had called era’harel.

He had almost reached the thing when it raised its hands. Energy rained down from above and drove Michel to his knees. The room spun, and only years of training kept his sword from falling from nerveless fingers.

It would have been so easy to let it end. He had slain a roomful of the dead. No one could accuse him of doing less than his duty. Even the chevaliers had their limits, and the reanimated corpse of an ancient elven mage was certainly a worthy foe. Somewhere in the distance, fire roared and lightning crackled as Felassan brought his power to bear.

Then the ground lurched again beneath Michel, and with a sickening twist, he found himself standing not before the mage-corpse, but before one of the revenants. Though half a dozen arrows sprouted from its breastplate and greaves, it held its greatsword without concern.

Michel barely had time to raise his shield before the first blow slammed down, faster than any mortal man could have swung such a weapon, and the force nearly tore Michel’s shield from his arm. Even as he stumbled, the blade came back up with blinding speed, smashing through Michel’s guard and spinning him back.

Michel slammed hard into a sarcophagus, and the physical shock of the blow was enough to knock the fog from his mind. He came to his senses just in time to see the great blade coming down at him. Staggered and leaning against the stone behind him, Michel had no defense.

Gaspard’s shield caught the blow.

The grand duke himself was driven to his knees by the force of the blow—he had leaped, Michel realized belatedly, to stop what would surely have been a deathblow from landing. Even the revenant seemed caught off-guard, stumbling back momentarily.

Gaspard could die right here, Michel realized, and if he did, he would die having defended another chevalier who was too frightened and tired to fight for himself.

Ser Michel de Chevin, champion of Empress Celene of Orlais, would not allow that to be his legacy.

With a roar, Michel leaped up and chopped down on the revenant’s arm, shearing through magical armor and ancient bone just below the elbow. Instead of falling free, the arm hung in place, and Michel saw tendrils of magic snaking out from the severed limb. Snarling, Michel drove the lip of his shield into the wound, and as the revenant hissed in rage, Michel leaned in and smashed the pommel of his sword into the thing’s face.

It grunted, flailing and trying to free its arm from Michel’s shield, to bring its fearsome sword to bear, and then it raised its other arm, gauntleted fingers curled into claws.

Gaspard chopped the revenant’s other hand off at the wrist with a savage laugh. The grand duke met Michel’s eyes and gave him a tiny nod. Then both men broke free from the revenant, turned in unison, and struck at the ancient warrior from both sides.

Michel’s blow chopped into its torso. Gaspard’s blow tore into its shoulder. The unnatural creature fell back, wisps of magic leaking from it like a bloody spray, and an arrow buzzed past Michel’s ear, hissed under the revenant’s helmet, and exploded out the back of the thing’s skull.

An ancient skeleton, cracked and broken all over, fell to the ground bare and naked.

Michel drew himself up, knowing that the battle-fury that was currently keeping him on his feet could desert him at any moment. The other revenant stood over the fallen form of Duke Remache, but it was falling as well, frosted with ice that made even its spectral armor hiss and squeal as it cracked. An arrow lodged in its breastplate, and then a ball of fire roared through the chamber, and when the smoke cleared, the armor and the blade were gone, and only a charred skeleton fell to the ground, crumbling into dust as it landed.

The mage-corpse floated forward, its hands raised with energy crackling between them.

Michel rushed at it, blade swinging wildly in an attempt to disrupt whatever spell the creature was preparing, but before he reached it, Celene stepped out from the shadows behind a sarcophagus and plunged her daggers into the thing’s back.

It flinched, dropping whatever horrific spell it had been prepared to unleash, and that was all the time Michel needed.

His blow came in fast and clean, slashing through the creature’s neck. Grand Duke Gaspard came down almost at the same time, his blow chopping from shoulder to crotch.

The foul demon possessing the corpse fled, defeated, and another ancient skeleton fell to the ground.

Celene, Gaspard, and Michel stood over the thing that had nearly slain them. It looked pitiful now, a bare skeleton clad in faded rags that had once been robes. Though it was hard to say, with so many bones cruelly shattered, the skeleton looked small. In life, Michel wondered if the elven mage would have even come up to his shoulder.

He offered a small prayer to the Maker. Whatever heathen gods this mage had worshipped in life, he had deserved better than for his bones to be possessed by demons.

Then he looked at Celene. She was looking at the skeleton as well, but with the calculated attention that meant she was thinking hard. She shifted her grip on her daggers, and her gaze stayed on the skeleton, not on Gaspard, even when the grand duke let out a chuckle that would normally have drawn her attention.

She didn’t want to alert him.

Michel saw her think it. Saw the tiny shift of her weight that would let her blade slide so easily across Gaspard’s throat, ending a war and putting her back on the throne with no cost except a broken truce.

No one would ever know, except for Michel. He would not even need to attack, just stand idly and say nothing while Celene took Gaspard by surprise. Michel might disapprove, but Celene was hardly a chevalier, restricted by the same code of honor to which Michel and Gaspard held themselves.

But Michel was a chevalier.

“Gaspard,” Michel said as he stepped back, lowering his blade. “Is our truce concluded, or would you speak further?”

He pretended not to see the flash of frustration in Celene’s eyes.

* * *

Briala watched from atop the sarcophagus, next to Felassan, as Celene, Michel, and Gaspard stood over the bodies of the demon-mage and the revenants. Her bow was raised, an arrow ready in her free hand, ready for whatever came next.

As it turned out, what came next was talking.

Briala lowered her bow, grimacing at the stupidity of humans. “Maker’s blood. She should have killed him then and there.”

Felassan gave a tiny shrug. “Humans.”

Briala looked at the humans as they spoke. Gaspard stood stiff and formal, as though his battlefield honor could somehow erase the betrayal of attempting to usurp the throne in the first place. Celene had shifted her stance, a tiny step that made her look just a little smaller and more submissive. Before she became empress, she had used that stance to get the boys to do foolish things for her. Michel was practically dead on his feet, legs locked, holding himself up by force of will.

“It wouldn’t be a certainty,” she said. She had used most of her arrows in the battle before, and she hadn’t had the chance to retrieve any from the battlefield.

“True.” Felassan hopped down, and Briala followed. “This was but the first danger. There will certainly be more. Say what you will about the humans, they’re smart enough to burn their dead.”

Briala nodded. “So rather than kill each other here and then die at the hands of whatever else guards the eluvians, we ally with Gaspard, get to the central chamber, and then decide matters there?”

“It makes sense.”

“Yes.” Briala looked at the humans again. Celene had lived too long behind her mask. Her tiny smile gave away that she was getting what she wanted. “But that isn’t why they’re doing it.”

“Probably not.” Felassan looked over at Gaspard’s allies. “Tell me what you saw of Mihris.”

Briala blinked at the change of subject, then looked over at the First of Clan Virnehn. She had recovered from Felassan’s magical attack, though she was still on her knees a dozen yards away, near the unconscious human mage. Her staff lay on the ground beside her. “Her staff glowed white before, but it’s red now.” She squinted. “And it is the same staff. Is that common?”

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