Life And Death Decision - Chapter 8 8

“We did, right? His body crumbled away into dust.” Tyme said, looking down a hall when we reached an intersection. “Where is grandma?” I closed my eyes, focusing on where the magic pulled me.

“There. We’re getting closer.” I moved over, raising my shield up to ready myself for an ambush. I offered a short prayer to the gods, getting the four of us shrouded in light that lingered on our weapons. “Just beyond this door. Everyone…get ready.” I placed my hand on the wood, taking a deep breath before giving it a strong push.

Waiting inside, with his eyes aglow with a sickly green light, was the same lich we vanquished earlier. “Oh, it’s you again. You lot reduced the numbers of my army by a fair amount, don’t you know how hard it is to find sturdy corpses?” He walked around the room, gesturing toward the pile of random stuff in the corner. Bodies, trinkets, bits of furniture, all of them were just placed on top of each other; on the top of the pile was Rose’s grandmother, unmoving.

“You monster! We’ll kill you this time for sure!” I could feel my blood start boiling, but before I could even cast a spell Baz ran ahead, his sword arcing over his head.

“Such insolence! Defeating me is impossible for your ilk.” He raised up a magical barrier to block Baz’s sword, pushing the blade back before he walked backward. “I will use your bodies to bolster my army, then I’ll trample every village and city on the continent under my foot!”

“Shut it!” Our archer let an arrow fly from her bow, sinking it right into his right eye socket. “We’ll never let you.” She ran up to fight alongside Baz, pulling out a dagger from her belt. While she yelled, I was busy weaving together a spell. Familiar rings of light appeared around our wrists as Baz regained his footing and slashed at him again. He chipped away at the barrier, slowly thinning it before he managed to cut through on the third swing.

“I’m not done yet!” Baz took a deep breath, adding more force to his blade in an attempt to push it through. He got it a bit deeper before his face got grabbed by the lich.

“Insect! Die!” A cold mist wrapped around Baz’s head, getting him to fidget and shiver before the lich threw him to the ground. Baz, still shaking, flared some embers out of his nose, warming himself up.

“Stay away from my village!” Rose was furious, slamming the branch into the ground and sending tremors through the ground as the floor cracked and churned around the lich, also affecting Tyme and Baz. The archer leaped up, hopping from rock to rock until the ground settled down; Baz wasn’t so lucky, however, getting crushed by the earth that got kicked up. I lost sight of the lich due to all of the movement, only finding him again when a beam of white light struck the child’s chest. “AH! Cold!”

“I won’t be defeated here!” The lich screeched, raising his hand and pointing his finger at me. Light gathered, a dark purple colored light that nearly blackened the area around his hand, forming a small orb on his fingertip. He brought his arm up, swinging it down as I shut my eyes to brace myself for the pain.

“Tyme!” Rose yelled, the pattering of her footsteps getting me to open my eyes a peek. The kid was running at full speed, racing against the ray of magic that was heading for Tyme’s chest. She intercepted it, pushing our archer to the ground, and getting struck by the spell in her stead. She fell to the floor, convulsing as the light from her cyan aura faded away. “Are you…okay?” She muttered before her eyes shut and her strength left her.

“Rose! Hey! Wake up!” Tyme desperately tried to shake her awake, but it was no use. Her light had already flicked out. “You…” She rose to her feet, gripping her dagger tighter than ever before. “I’ll kill you!” She rushed the undead monster, swiping in her fury fueled state. But they weren’t focussed, weren’t aimed correctly.

“You’ll join her soon enough!” He reached out, grabbing her by her wrist as he leaned his head closer to her face. Quiet, shadowy whispers came from his mouth, piercing Tyme’s mind as every word was laced with malicious magic. Her eyes lost their flame, widening in fear as her legs began to tremble.

“Get a grip!” I yelled out, weaving the light around my wrists into a spectral sword that I made float beside the lich. I brought the edge down on him, rending the remnants of his cloak with the life energy that Wiltop blessed me with. “Don’t lose your cool and die here!” The ground around our enemy turned into a vibrant and lively green, erupting into vines and branches made of light that burned whatever necromantic magic away from his body.

He collapsed onto the floor along with Tyme, the latter trembling and muttering to herself while the former slowly crumbled to dust. “Go save her!” Baz ran up to us, carrying the kid’s body in his arms as I watched the body fade away. “You have that diamond, right? Come on hurry!”

“Sage! Please!” Tyme muttered, crawling toward me and gripping onto my pants. “Please!”

I reached into my bag with a heavy heart, eyes trained on the olive-haired kid that was laying lifeless in Baz’s grasp. I knew that it was too dangerous for her to come with us. Why didn’t I stop her? Why couldn’t I do anything? I glanced over to her murderer, seeing the dust slowly get carried by the draft in the room. It was dark in here, the only light came from the sword and our wrists. It was hard to see, but I could swear that I saw that…thing, that shadow that tried to abduct me.

“Did you see that too?” Baz muttered, pointing at the remnants of our foe. “It looked like it took something from the body.” It was actually here! What did it take? Was that how he came back to life? It was not the time for questions or hesitations, I couldn’t let him come back a second time. I closed my eyes and let out that pulse I used to track down Rose’s grandmother, this time looking for that thing. It was moving below us, around one or two floors beneath us.

I bolted out of the room, running with all my might to close the distance. Up, down, round and round, this crypt’s halls weaved and turned around; had I not been following the spell, I’d have definitely gotten lost by now. Five minutes passed before I managed to catch up to it. The creature was sliding around the floor, one of its tendrils shielding a small glass marble. The room itself was small, only around 10 feet wide, and pretty barren, the only thing was an unlit lantern-looking cage.

“Burn!” I filled the room with divine fire, scorching the tips of my clothes in the process. Covered in soot and radiating heat, I saw that shadow curl away from the heat, withing in pain as the fire burned it away and left only the marble that rolled around on the floor. I picked it up between my fingers, looking inside and watching a strange mist swirl inside of the glass. “You’re not coming back this time.” I crushed it in my hand, hearing the wails of the lich echo out and seeing wisps of smoke escape between my fingers. For good measure, I dismantled the lantern-like device as well; the shadow brought that orb here for a reason. I took a few breaths to calm myself down. “Well…I can’t revive her anymore. I’m out of time.” I sighed, walking back to the others slowly.

“Did you get it?” Tyme looked at me, having calmed down but still kneeling beside the kid’s body while brushing away the hair that covered her face. I nodded, not wanting to speak. “Let’s go back. Let’s give her a proper burial.”

“I…how about the other victims? Are any of the missing people still alive?” I asked, but both of them just lowered their heads. Based on their reaction, I figured that things weren’t going well.

“Can’t you at least try to revive her?” Baz picked up the fresh corpse, slinging Rose onto his back. Both of them pleaded for me to attempt the resurrection.

“I…do have a spell, but it takes an hour. Even if I did that, it wouldn’t-”

“Just do it! Sage!” Tyme rummaged in my bag, pulling out the diamond I had and shoving it in my hands. I lowered my head, could I really do it after so much time has passed? But they forced my hand; they literally forced my hand by placing it on Rose’s back. I started the spell, walking slowly as we made our way back to town. I sighed as I zoned out, letting the gift of life take over my body in an attempt to pull her back.

It was warm to my touch, like a nice bath before bed. Calm, quiet, a paradise for those that have passed on. “It’s nice, isn’t it? I try to make it as comfortable as I can.” Wiltop joked, his voice guiding me along. “You’re really going to try this?” I looked over in the direction his voice came from, finding a young boy that looked no more than sixteen or seventeen years old. Human in appearance, Wiltop gave me a smile as the two of us continued walking.

“Yeah. You never know what’ll happen, right?” I replied as I felt someone take my hand. I looked over, seeing a faint female figure. Her features were hard to see, her entire body shining bright enough to make me squint. She seemed to have noticed my struggle, dimming the light to reveal her visage. A human around the same age as Wiltop, an apologetic look on her face.

“Sage. I’m sorry I couldn’t be of much help recently. I…”

“Thalis now is not the time. We’re here.” The life-giver’s voice made both of us halt our march. It was still warm, but now a chilling wind blew into my face. From the scene before me, wails of the dead and damned howled out into the endless abyss. “Sage, extend your hand and the soul will grab onto it.”

“Alright.” I did as I was told, reaching out to the lifeless void as the hands of the poor souls tore into my arm. It hurt, their nails scratching my skin and rattling my bones. I winced, wanting to pull it back and nurse my injuries, but I had to persevere. For half an hour I endured, nearly losing hope when I felt a different sensation grasp my hand. “There!” I grabbed onto it, pulling with all my strength to try to make it cross over to the land of the living.

We were in a back and forth, only moving by one or two inches at a time. The hands of the dead had continued their assault on my limb, the pain nearly causing me to let go. But I managed to tough it out, getting the soul’s hand out. But it wouldn’t be so easy, the other souls attempting to pull her back. The sudden resistance, the pull of thousands of fallen men and women, I couldn’t fight them all off. My foot began skidding, I was losing ground. “Sage!” her radiance yelled, her arms wrapping around my chest as she pulled me and the soul to safety. “I’m sorry…” I heard her say as the spell faded and my senses returned to my body.

“My work here is done, take care of yourself, Sage. You too, Thalis.” I could faintly see a hand waving me goodbye as my sight returned.

I blinked a few times, my eyes adjusting to my new location as I tried to get my bearings. We were closing in on the village entrance, the kid still on Baz’s back. I had my hand fastened to her with some rope, couldn’t they have just carried me too? I suppose not, seeing as all of us were covered in blood and Tyme was in need of an arrow resupply. How long had I been out? I untied my hand, rubbing the rope burns and inspecting my arm; the wounds I sustained from those souls weren’t real, but at the moment they burned like fire. While I had my hand on her back, I felt something I didn’t feel from the kid before, a pulse. I frowned, walking ahead of Baz. “Let’s get her home. Let her sleep in her bed until she asks us to explain some things.”

They both nodded, greeting the guard at the entrance before the three of us walked over to the house. It was empty, even grandma was gone now. Now she really had nothing. What should we do with her? What could we do for her? I pushed those thoughts down for the moment, watching silently as Baz tucked her into one of the two beds in her room; we could tell because it was filled with toys and clothes that fit her body. The three of us left, waiting in the living room while discussing the next part of our adventure.

“So, what do we do now?” Baz asked, rolling his shoulder as I walked over to tend to his wounds. “We should probably tell the mayor of this town, as well the neighboring ones. Who knows how far that shadow went to get those bodies?”

“We should…but…” Tyme removed her armor, stretching her body as she made herself a bit more comfortable since we were in a safe environment. “I’m more worried about Rose. It really is too dangerous for her to come along, you were right.” She was sad, the look of guilt on her face was clear to see. “But what can we do now? She’s not safe with us, but she also has nowhere else to go.”

“Maybe we can ask someone to take her in? Then again, she can probably make a living for herself since she has magical powers.” Baz thought aloud, puffing black smoke out of his nose. It hurt seeing them both like this, I had to do something.”
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“Guys, there’s something you should kno-”

“Who are you!? Where’s my mom and dad!?” Standing in the doorway of her room with her hands up in a fighting stance, the kid glared at us with a cautious fury, though her fear was visible in the trembling of her body.