The Gift of Battle (2 page)

Thorgrin,
standing on the violently rocking ship, looked out before him and slowly, in
horror, began to realize what he had just done. He looked down in shock at his
own hand, still gripping the Sword of the Dead, then looked up to see, but
inches away, the face of his best friend, Reece, staring back at him, eyes wide
open in pain and betrayal. Thor’s hands shook violently as he realized he had
just stabbed his best friend in the chest and was watching him die before his
eyes.

Thor could not
understand what had happened. As the ship tossed and turned, the currents
continued to pull them through the Straits of Madness, until finally, they
emerged out the other side. The currents calmed, the ship leveled out, and the
thick clouds began to lift as with one final burst, they exited into calm,
still waters.

As they did, the
fog that had enveloped Thor’s mind lifted, and he began to feel his old self,
to see the world with clarity once again. He looked at Reece in front of him,
and his heart broke as he realized it was not the face of an enemy, but of his
best friend. He slowly realized what he had done, realized that he had been in
the grips of something greater than himself, a spirit of madness he could not
control, which had forced him to perform this horrible act.

“NO!” Thorgrin
shouted, his voice broken with anguish.

Thor extracted
the Sword of the Dead from his best friend’s chest, and as he did, Reece gasped
and began to collapse. Thor chucked the sword away, not wanting to lay eyes
upon it, and it landed with a hollow thud on the deck, as Thor sank to his
knees and caught Reece, holding him in his arms, determined to save him.

“Reece!” he
called out, crushed by guilt.

Thor reached out
and pressed his palm against the wound, trying to stop the bleeding. But he
could feel the hot blood running through his fingers, could feel Reece’s life
force ebbing out of him as he held him in his arms.

Elden, Matus,
Indra, and Angel rushed forward, they, too, finally free from the grips of
their madness, and they crowded around. Thor closed his eyes and prayed with
all he had that his friend come back to him, that he, Thor, be given one chance
to rectify his error.

Thor heard
footsteps, and he looked up to see Selese rush forward, her skin more pale than
he’d ever seen, her eyes aglow with a light that was other-worldly. She dropped
to her knees before Reece, took him in her arms, and as she did, Thor let him
go, seeing the glow surrounding her and remembering her powers as a healer.

Selese looked up
at Thor, her eyes burning with intensity.

“Only you can
save him,” she said urgently. “Place your hand on his wound now!” she
commanded.

Thor reached out
and placed a palm on Reece’s chest, and as he did, Selese laid her hand over
his. He could feel the heat and power coursing through her palm, over his hand,
and into Reece’s wound.

She closed her
eyes and began to hum, and Thor felt a wave of heat rise up in his friend’s
body. Thor prayed with all he had that his friend come back to him, that he be
forgiven for whatever madness had driven him to do this.

To Thor’s great
relief, Reece slowly opened his eyes. He blinked and looked up at the sky, and
then slowly sat up.

Thor watched,
amazed, as Reece blinked several times and looked down at his wound: it was
entirely healed. Thor was speechless, overcome, in awe of Selese’s powers.

“My brother!”
Thorgrin cried out.

He reached out
and hugged him, and Reece, disoriented, slowly hugged him back as Thor helped
him to his feet.

“You are alive!”
Thor exclaimed, hardly daring to believe it, clasping his shoulder. Thor
thought of all the battles they had been in together, all the adventures, and
he could not have tolerated the idea of losing him.

“And why would I
not be?” Reece blinked, confused. He looked all around at the wondering faces
of the Legion, and he seemed puzzled. The others each stepped forward and
embraced him, one by one.

As the others
stepped forward, Thor looked around and took stock, and he suddenly realized,
with horror, that someone was missing: O’Connor.

Thor rushed to
the side rail and frantically searched the waters, remembering O’Connor, at the
height of his madness, had leapt off the ship into the raging currents.

“O’Connor!” he
yelled.

The others
rushed up beside him and searched the waters, too. Thor stared down and craned
his neck to look back at the Straits, at the raging red waters, thick with
blood—and as he did, he saw O’Connor, flailing, being sucked in right at the
border of the Straits.

Thor wasted no
time; he reacted instinctively and leapt up onto the rail and then dove
headfirst over the edge, into sea.

Submerged,
startled by the heat of it, Thor felt how thick this water was, as if he were
swimming through blood. The water, so hot, was like swimming in mud.

It took all of
Thor’s strength to swim through the viscous waters, back up to the surface. He
set his sights on O’Connor, who was beginning to sink, and he could see the
panic in his eyes. He could also see, as O’Connor crossed the border into the
open sea, the madness beginning to leave him.

Still, as he
flailed, he was beginning to sink, and Thor knew that if he didn’t reach him
soon, he would soon sink to the bottom of the Straits and never be found again.

Thor redoubled
his efforts, swimming with all he had, swimming through the intense pain and
exhaustion he felt in his shoulders. And yet, just as he neared, O’Connor began
to sink down into the water.

Thor felt an
injection of adrenaline as he watched his friend sink beneath the surface,
knowing it was now or never. He burst forward, dove down underwater, and gave a
great kick. He swam underwater, straining to open his eyes and see through the
thick liquid; he could not. They stung too much.

Thor closed his
eyes and drew upon his instincts. He summoned some deep part of himself that
could see without seeing.

With another
desperate kick, Thor reached out, groping the waters before him, and felt
something: a sleeve.

Elated, he
grabbed O’Connor and held on tight, amazed at the weight of him as he sank.

Thor yanked, as
he turned and with all his might aimed back up for the surface. He was in
agony, every muscle in his body protesting, as he kicked and swam for freedom.
The waters were so thick, held so much pressure, his lungs felt as if they
might burst. With each stroke of his hand, he felt as if he were pulling the
world.

Just when he
thought he would never make it, would sink back down to the depths with
O’Connor and die here in this awful place, Thor suddenly broke the surface of
the water. Gasping for air, he turned and looked all around and saw, with
relief, that they had emerged on the other side of the Straits of Madness, in
the open waters. He watched O’Connor’s head pop up beside him, saw him, too,
gasping for air, and his sense of relief was complete.

Thor watched as
the madness left his friend and the lucidity slowly returned to his eyes.

O’Connor blinked
several times, coughing and gasping out the water, then looked to Thor,
questioningly.

“What are we
doing here?” he asked, confused. “Where are we?”

“Thorgrin!”
called a voice.

Thor heard a
splash in the water and he turned and saw a heavy rope land in the water beside
him. He looked up and saw Angel standing up there, joined by the others at the
rail of the ship, which had sailed back to meet them.

Thor grabbed it,
grabbing O’Connor with his other hand, and as he did the rope moved, Elden
reaching down with his great strength and yanking them both up the side of the
hull. The other Legion joined in and pulled, one yank at a time, until Thor
felt himself rising through the air and, finally, over the rail. They both
landed on the deck of the ship with a thud.

Thor, exhausted,
out of breath, still coughing up sea water, sprawled on the deck beside
O’Connor; O’Connor turned and looked at him, equally exhausted, and Thor could
see the gratitude in his eyes. He could see O’Connor thanking him. No words
need be said—Thor understood. They had a silent code. They were Legion
brothers. Sacrificing for each other was what they did. It was what they lived
for.

Suddenly,
O’Connor started laughing.

At first Thor
was worried, wondering if the madness was still upon him, but then he realized
that O’Connor was fine. He was just back to his old self. He was laughing from
relief, laughing from joy at being alive.

Thor began to
laugh, too, the stress behind him, and the others all joined in. They were
alive; despite all odds, they were alive.

The other Legion
stepped forward and grabbed O’Connor and Thor and yanked them back to their feet.
They all clasped hands, embraced joyfully, their ship, finally, entering waters
with smooth sailing ahead.

Thor looked out
and saw with relief that they were sailing further and further from the
Straits, and lucidity was descending over all of them. They had made it; they
had passed through the Straits, albeit with a heavy price. Thor did not think
they could survive a trip through it again.

“There!” called
out Matus.

Thor turned with
the others and followed his finger as he pointed—and he was stunned by the
sight before them. He saw a whole new vista spread before them on the horizon,
a new landscape in this Land of Blood. It was a landscape thick with gloom,
dark clouds lingering low on the horizon, the water still thick with blood—and
yet now, the outline of the shore was closer, more visible. It was black,
devoid of trees or life, looking like ash and mud.

Thor’s heartbeat
quickened as beyond it, in the distance, he spotted a black castle, made of
what appeared to be earth and ash and mud, rising up from the ground as if it
were one with it. Thor could feel the evil emanating off of it.

Leading to the
castle was a narrow canal, its waterways lined with torches, blocked by a
drawbridge. Thor saw torches burning in the windows of the castle, and he felt
a sudden sense of certainty: with all his heart, he knew that Guwayne was
inside that castle, waiting for him.

“Full sails!”
Thor cried out, feeling back in control again, feeling a renewed sense of
purpose.

His brothers
jumped into action, hoisting the sails as they caught the strong breeze that
picked up from behind and propelled them forward. For the first time since
entering this Land of Blood, Thor felt a sense of optimism, a sense that they
could really find his son and rescue him from here.

“I’m glad you’re
alive,” came a voice.

Thor turned and
looked down to see Angel smiling up at him, tugging on his shirt. He smiled,
knelt down beside her, and hugged her.

“As I am you,”
he replied.

“I don’t
understand what happened,” she said. “One minute I was myself, and the next…it
was like I did not know myself.”

Thor slowly
shook his head, trying to forget.

“Madness is the
worst foe of all,” he replied. “We, ourselves, are the one enemy we cannot
overcome.”

She frowned,
concerned.

“Will it ever
happen again?” she asked. “Is there anything else in this place like that?” she
asked, fear in her voice as she studied the horizon.

Thor studied it
too, wondering the very same thing himself—when all too soon, to his dread, the
answer came rushing out at them.

There came a
tremendous splash, like the sound of a whale surfacing, and Thor was amazed to
see the most hideous creature he’d ever seen emerging before him. It looked
like a monster squid, fifty feet high, bright red, the color of blood, and it
loomed over the ship as it shot up out of the waters, its endless tentacles
thirty feet long, dozens of them spreading out in every direction. Its beady
yellow eyes scowled down at them, filled with fury, as its huge mouth, lined
with sharp yellow fangs, opened up with a sickening sound. The creature blotted
out whatever light the gloomy skies had allowed, and it shrieked an unearthly
sound as it began to descend right for them, its tentacles spread out, ready to
consume the entire ship.

Thor watched it
with dread, caught up in its shadow with all the others, and he knew they had
gone from one certain death to the next.

The Empire
commander lashed his zerta again and again as he galloped through the Great
Waste, following the trail, as he had been for days, across the desert floor.
Behind him, his men rode on, gasping, on the verge of collapsing, as he had not
given them a moment to rest the entire time they had been riding—even
throughout the night. He knew how to drive zertas into the ground—and he knew
how to drive men, too.

He had no mercy
on himself, and he certainly had none for his men. He wanted them to be
impervious to exhaustion and heat and cold—especially when they were on a
mission as sacred as this. After all, if this trail actually led to where he hoped
it might—to the legendary Ridge itself—it could change the entire fate of the
Empire.

The commander
dug his heels into the zerta’s back until it shrieked, forcing it ever faster,
until it was nearly tripping over itself. He squinted into the sun, scrutinizing
the trail as they went. He had followed many trails in his life, and had killed
many people at the end of them—yet he had never followed a trail as enthralling
as this one. He could feel how close he was to the greatest discovery in the
history of the Empire. His name would be memorialized, sung of for generations.

They ascended a
ridge in the desert, and he began to hear a faint noise growing, like a storm
brewing in the desert; he looked out as they crested it, expecting to see a
sandstorm coming their way, and he was shocked, instead, to spot a stationary
wall of sand a hundred yards away, rising straight up from the ground into the
sky, swirling and churning, like a tornado in place.

He stopped, his
men beside him, and watched, curious, as it did not seem to move. He could not
understand it. It was a wall of raging sand, but it did not come any closer. He
wondered what lay on the other side. Somehow, he sensed, it was the Ridge.

“Your trail
ends,” one of his soldiers said derisively.

“We cannot pass
through that wall,” said another.

“You have led us
to nothing but more sand,” said another.

The commander
slowly shook his head, scowling back with conviction.

“And what if
there lies a land on the other side of that sand?” he retorted.

“The other side?”
a soldier asked. “You are mad. It is nothing but a cloud of sand, an endless
waste, like the rest of this desert.”

“Admit your
failure,” said another soldier. “Turn back now—or if not, we shall turn back
without you.”

The commander
turned and faced his soldiers, shocked at their insolence—and saw contempt and
rebellion in their eyes. He knew he had to act quickly if he were to quash it.

In a fit of
sudden rage, the commander reached down, grabbed a dagger from his belt, and
swung it backwards in one quick motion, lodging it in the soldier’s throat. The
soldier gasped, then fell backwards off his zerta and hit the ground, a fresh
pool of blood collecting on the desert floor. Within moments, a swarm of
insects appeared out of nowhere, covering his body and eating it.

The other
soldiers now looked to their commander in fear.

“Is there anyone
else who wishes to defy my command?” he asked.

The men stared
back nervously, but this time said nothing.

“Either the
desert will kill you,” he said, “or I will. It’s your choice.”

The commander
charged forward, lowering his head, and cried a great battle cry as he galloped
right for the sand wall, knowing it might mean his death. He knew his men would
follow, and a moment later he heard the sound of their zertas, and smiled in
satisfaction. Sometimes they just had to be kept in line.

He shrieked as
he entered the tornado of sand. It felt like a million pounds of sand weighing
down on him, chafing his skin from every direction as he charged deeper and
deeper into it. It was so loud, sounding like a thousand hornets in his ears,
and yet still he charged, kicking his zerta, forcing it, even as it protested,
deeper and deeper inside. He could feel the sand scraping his head and eyes and
face, and he felt as if he might be torn to bits.

Yet still he
rode on.

Just as he was
wondering if his men were right, if this wall led to nothing, if they would all
die here in this place, suddenly, to the commander’s great relief, he burst out
of the sand and back into daylight, no more sand chafing him, no more noise in
his ears, nothing but open sky and air—which he had never been so happy to see.

All around him,
his men burst out, too, all of them chafed and bleeding like he, along with
their zertas, all looking more dead than alive—yet all of them alive.

And as he looked
up and out before him, the commander’s heart suddenly beat faster as he came to
a sudden stop at the startling sight. He could not breathe as he took in the
vista, and slowly but surely, he felt his heart swell with a sudden sense of
victory, of triumph. Majestic peaks rose straight up into the sky, forming a
circle. A place that could only be one thing:

The Ridge.

There it sat on
the horizon, shooting up into the air, magnificent, vast, stretching out of
sight on either side. And there, at the top, gleaming in the sunlight, he was
amazed to see thousands of soldiers in shining armor, patrolling.

He had found it.
He, and he alone, had found it.

His men came to
an abrupt stop beside him, and he could see them, too, looking up at it in awe
and wonder, their mouths agape, all of them thinking the same thing he did:
this moment was history. They would all be heroes, known for generations in
Empire lore.

With a broad
smile, the commander turned and faced his men, who now looked at him with
deference; he then yanked on his zerta and turned it back around, preparing to
ride back through the sand wall—and all the way, without stopping, until he
reached the Empire base and reported to the Knights of the Seven what he
personally had discovered. Within days, he knew, the entire force of the Empire
would descend upon this place, the weight of a million men bent on destruction.
They would pass through this sand wall, scale the Ridge, and crush those
knights, taking over the final remaining free territory of the Empire.

“Men,” he said,
“our time has come. Prepare to have your names etched in eternity.”