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  That smoky and towering “goddess” was not long confused by his subterfuge, nor by the sudden appearance of a dark and powerful sword. She formed a chilly new face on the theoretical back of her head, then opened her entire body lengthwise to swallow V47 Pilot. The change was absolute and immediate. Light, heat and battle-noise vanished completely, leaving the cyborg surrounded by roiling vapor, mocking laughter and circuits. There was an entire bleak universe in there; one of ruin, loss and decay. His own recently fired ordnance hung near him in stasis, looking like a constellation of novae frozen in mid-eruption; their fiery glow smothered by thunderous clouds.

  Nice.

  “Thank you for getting me past your defenses, dark one,” he mocked, adding, “But what this place needs is a little more light.”

  For three-thousand subjective years, he’d done nothing but build, create and explore in the realm of the masters. It was no trouble at all to spark the birth of a star from the Mother’s infinite nebular substance, using gravity, spin and her own surging manna. The goddess shrieked as pure white light dawned inside of her… as Chaos and darkness birthed a new sun.

  Twisting wildly, she reached for that hovering sword.

  “I will destroy you!” screamed the Mother, while OVR-Lord’s circuits first took the shape of an antlered and elegant showman, then poured themselves into her clutching hand like a silvery glove.

  ‘Command: Take hold, V47 Pilot,’ sent OVR-Lord.

  Right.

  “Full power and manna to grip-strength, Vee,” ordered Pilot, reaching into that silvery, hand-shaped target. His AI responded at once.

  ‘Command received. Command processed. All power and manna to grip-strength, Pilot. Shields down. Life support failure is imminent.’

  Utter cold and brilliant new light fought for control inside of the Mother’s vaporous body. OVR-Lord, V47 Pilot and the wounded goddess battled to claim the weapon; all of them clasping its hilt as one. And elsewhere…?

  XXXXXX

  Away on a nearly extinguished planet, a single chamber floated over the wasted and barren plain. All that remained of Far Keep, that lone rocky chamber pulsed and thumped from within, rocked by another furious battle. Its lightning-like glow lit the surrounding crags, as three silver streaks crossed the last stretch of blue sky left on a darkened world. All around that shrinking bubble of life, an implacable firewall tightened its noose. Then a surge of power flared deep down below, in the shrine's dusty wine cellar.

  So much for externals and possibly-too-late-to-help. Inside of the bleak and corrupted chamber, Gildyr repeatedly dodged attack; panting, lunging, diving and scrambling. Couldn’t change shapes any longer. His lordship had seen to that. Instead, the druid summoned a globe of shining green life-force, determined to win without fighting. Rose from a skidding tumble, battered and scraped, but still whole.

  “Milord,” he said to that withered, stalking monstrosity, “This is wrong, and you know it! You have a friend; someone you care for more than anything else in this world. Helping Sheraz…”

  “Keep his name out of your filthy mouth, woodling!” raged Arvendahl. The fallen elf-lord leapt forward, slashing and stabbing with a sword that was wreathed in sullen red flame, driving Gildyr toward the open, high window.

  Not far away, that dismembered witch reached into the potion bottle with a long, pointed tongue. There was little left but a coating of moisture. Barely a drop, when gathered together, but what there was worked. All of the ocean and Bea’s massed power were held in that layer of shimmering slime. Ulnag used it to heal herself, first. Went in moments from mutilated hag to tall sorceress; white-haired and shaking with wrath. Her only question was who to kill first.

  Further back, a freed shrine goddess danced with her golden fey-lights, working to cleanse and reclaim the corrupted waystation. With tinkling music and graceful movements, she called upon the combined might of Lobum, Exarod, Amur, Gottshan and Aerie Station (now just five lights in a dead, silent void). She summoned their strength to burn away evil and death. To refill a mucky and crusted fountain. Each of her sister shrines responded with all that they had, sending hoarded-up manna and light.

  Meanwhile, Gildyr didn’t throw his green life-orb, he wafted it. Sent that emerald ball drifting across to the fallen elf lord, who could dodge and twist, but could not shake its pursuit. His long-sword did nothing at all to the glittering thing, for it wasn’t a purely physical target.

  Worse, (for him) striking the green orb only sent jabs of healing and life through his blade and into Lord Arvendahl’s host. His moldering bits caught like paper scraps in a fireplace, instantly starting to burn.

  “NO!” bellowed the furious ghoul. “You may have stolen my victim, druid, but I’ll discover the traitor’s location soon enough, torn from your last shrieking chunk!”

  Next, Ulnag rose up, calling on manna and starting to gesture and chant. Whatever harm she intended was cut off in mid-hiss, though. Her stolen orc-arm shot up all at once to seize and crush the woman’s throat, sending her reeling into a wall, blue-faced and clawing.

  The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

  Arvendahl paid no attention. He’d backed Gildyr onto the windowsill, sword upraised for a pain-slice, not a death-blow. Only… that strike missed, too. Someone shoved Gildyr out of the way, sending the druid skidding across the stone floor. A levitating shadow briefly blocked light from the staticky data wall, outside. Then Lord Erron vaulted through. He smelled rather of wine and fiercely scraped courage. Needed both very badly, for this was a place of pure terror for him, of torment and shame and imprisonment. It was all he could do to take that next step and the one after that.

  But he did it, edging his way further inside, toward the last voice he’d heard, the last face he’d seen, in his previous life. Saw the burning wreck of his enemy turn from attacking a lichen-draped wood-elf. Said,

  “We have unfinished business, Trask.”

  Except, it wasn’t only the Fallen One who looked through those sunken blue eyes.

  “What is this?” sneered a cold voice. “Some vengeful survivor? Another hero, looking to reclaim lost honor? Wait your turn, puppy. I’ll see to you, soon enough.”

  Like a serpent hypnotizing a bird… except that Erron had already faced the worst that could happen. Cursed himself to death, then been stored for long ages and brought back to life. Erron was the Last General… and he fought for much more than himself.

  His eyes went to the darkly blazing sword that the ghoul-prince held clutched in one bony hand. That wire-wrapped hilt, the guard that resembled a basket of thorns… He’d seen them before, in a very old tapestry.

  Erron took a deep breath, sheathing his own weapon. There was an ancient family legend. Just a myth, more than likely, but he had to try. Forcing his voice not to shake, Erron extended a hand and ordered,

  “Grassfire, to me!”

  Arvendahl cursed as his corpse-parts blazed and the family sword twisted itself from his grip. That faithless blade flew to Erron, who took it up with a flourish, and a very thin, humorless smile. But his enemy wasn’t disarmed for long.

  “You,” snarled Arvendahl, realizing who it was that he faced. “Very well,” said the corpse-lord, reaching through time and space with Sherazedan’s power. “So be it, exile! Take up your worthless cloak-pin. I know a sword that will cut straight through your heart and into the traitor’s, no matter where you have hidden him!”

  And with that, Arvendahl/ Orrin took hold of Destroyer, adding his might to the others’, pulling it into the Dark World’s final half-mile and few moments.

  XXXXXXXXXXX

  Valerian should have acted. Needed to, for everything was going wrong all around him. Instead, paralyzed by crushing grief, he clung tightly to Filimar’s body. Ought to have burnt it with fire, releasing the younger elf’s soul. Couldn’t. Could not.

  Beyond rage, past weeping, he turned to Firelord, Miche and V47 Pilot, who were there in his head and his heart.

  “Take him,” he pled, in a hoarse, shaky whisper. “Keep Filno safe. Don’t let the darkness have him!”

  Sherazedan’s stabbing limbs and lashing tentacles had resprouted in thousands. Val couldn’t stand to see Filimar’s body invaded and used as a puppet, like so many others, outside.

  Then the Shining One, Lord of Battles, reached through their contact to take that awful burden out of his arms, if not from his heart.

  “He will not be dishonored, Valerian,” promised his god, the last in all Karandun. “As you sheltered me, so I will keep him from further harm. Go now. Do what is needful.”

  Filno vanished from sight, transferred by Firelord into the nearest safe place, which was the shrine system. There at the heart of reality, much continued to happen. Through Firelord, Val could now strike backward and forward in time. From Miche, he’d gained the ability to fly, along with a dragon-pearl’s luck and endurance. With V47 Pilot, he could slip through dimensions and see using “drones” that he launched from his armor.

  Before all of that, though, Val put aside sorrow and rage for cold reason.

  “He’s expecting a hero,” said Miche, inside of his mind. “Let’s give the monster something else he won’t see coming.”

  Made sense to Valerian. See… maybe he’d never leave this terrible place. Maybe he’d kill the old lich and be forced to take his position as the linchpin of reality in a badly glitching machine… but he could certainly put up a fight in the meantime.

  Miche’s reverse spell flowed over Val as a horde of people burst into that tendril-laced, spherical void. Riding Vernax and Sawyer were Alexion with a gnome, and Villem with a young, red-haired elf. A flight of Quetzali fighters came after them, led by… Alfea? Sporting a long, feathered tail and a spear?

  The exiled prince went after that fated sword, which hovered high overhead in Sherazedan’s tentacled grip. Vernax back-flapped with great golden wings, blasting flame at the oily tendril. Alexion vaulted off of the dragon’s back, racing over a bottomless abyss, leaping across on whipping tendrils and spell-summoned magical steppingstones. He slashed with his sword at a spot heated to glowing by Vernax, while the gnome fired rocks from a slingshot.

  Sawyer the griffin screamed aloud, crunching down on that writhing limb with his powerful beak and curved talons. The jaws that bite and the claws that catch stretched the tentacle thin as a strand of black hair… and that’s when the paladin struck, channeling Oberyn’s last bit of power.

  The tentacle snapped with a hissing chord. The fated sword plunged from its loosened grip, falling free. It went from black to cold, neutral grey, tumbling toward the abyss and destruction. Then young Hallan (all that was left of a very brave crew) threw himself off the griffin. Shouted,

  “Varric, help me!” as he flailed through the air to first fingertip-brush and then clutch Destroyer’s cold hilt. No, not just him. His older brother and all the dead crewmen of Falcon, as well.

  The red-haired young elf looked wildly around. He was no longer falling through battering, whistling, buffeting wind. He’d been saved by the sword, but it wasn’t his and he knew that.

  Then a figure swooped over to face him. An elf, but with bat-wings, dark hair, a lashing tail and red eyes. The stranger reached out a clawed hand, saying,

  “I cannot take Destroyer from you, Captain, or it will turn once again to evil. You must trust me and give up the sword willingly.”

  They were surrounded by screeching and diving Quetzali warriors. Bright as rainbows, fierce as north wind, the serpent folk battled to slice through a storm of rampaging tendrils and needle-sharp limbs. Vernax thundered and roared in their midst, searing each truncated nub. Sawyer fought alongside the dragon, with a paladin once more astride. At the void’s center, a banshee wailed ever louder, wreathing Sherazedan with her death-song, draining his manna.

  The noise was incredible. Deafening. The choice here and now, more than one young elf could safely make on his own. Hallan hesitated. Sensing his confusion, the stranger said,

  “I am not very good. Maybe I wasn’t meant to be… but I promise you, Captain, that I will take the blade you have lost everything for and wield it in the service of Order. Like your own, my heart is held together by scars. I have nothing left but a chance to save you and Cinda, along with these few who remain. Please… trust me.”

  Hallan looked at him. Swallowed hard and then nodded, handing over the sword.