The Ardent and The Bard

Chapter 17: The Master and His Realm

Shade dug into Cole's pack. He pulled out a pair of healing potions. He tossed one to Unwise, who eagerly gulped it down. After drinking his own potion Shade reached into the bag again. This time he retrieved a weathered roll of parchment and a velvet pouch filled with jewels and tied with string.

"I'm sending you home." He spoke without looking at Unwise.

"What?" The gnome was shocked "You can't...how will you..."

Shade approached her and put the pouch in her hand "Your pay. At least a part of it. You've more than earned it."

Unwise felt the weight of the bag, her face went slack.

"Will I remember this?" The question felt out of the blue, even to her.

"Only if you want to. That's how dreams work. You have a brief moment when waking to decide whether you want to remember what you did, or you forget forever."

"That's some heavy shit."

Unwise sighed. Shade could feel what little will she had for resisting fade away.

"I'm keeping the sword" she finally said.

"Of course."

"If you die here you're going to make me feel like a bastard for leaving you. So don't do that."

"I won't. This isn't how I die" Shade smiled.

"Damn right." Unwise returned the smile.

Shade unraveled the parchment. The ritual was for a portal to the Feywild. It would take her to just outside the Gloaming Court. With a few words in the ancient tongue of elven the green portal opened. They could both smell the the breeze of pine and pumpkins.

"-And stop poisoning Razcoreth. The dream thief is a nice gimmick, but find another way to do it" Shade said before Unwise entered the portal.

Unwise replied with a roll of her eyes. Sword and payment in hand she passed through the portal. It closed silently behind her.

"One less thing to worry about" Shade sighed as he shouldered Cole's bag.

He closed his eyes. The quori were growing in strength. They had witnessed his power and were going to attack them with all their might. Bits and pieces of the walls peeled off and vanished into thin air. Shade extended the scope of his mind. He could see the jagged castle he was in as if he was outside it. He was in one of the towers. The black masses that were the quori were frenzying around his position. He detected a single presence that was not one of the nightmares shinning like a beacon. Cole.

Shade opened his eyes. He had his location. Now just to get to it. He focused his mind. All of his training and skill as an ardent, his power as the champion of a deity, and his ability as a dream shaper was about to be tested. He couldn't help but smile.

Outside the quori tore at the tower chamber. The structure had been there so long that it was not as easily molded as the rest of the Aisling'Am. The walls were almost dissolved. They would have their prey.

The tower exploded into dust. A thousand arrows of light shot out from the center, piercing many of the quori. The arrows circled back and struck again. They weaved through the air like angry hornets, each attack never being the last as they stung and stung again. A temporary distraction as the quori collectively dispelled the arrows into the ether, but not before Shade launched himself through their ranks. Nerull's scythe pointed in front of him he somersaulted through the air at breakneck speed, becoming some kind of crimson sawblade. He carved through the quori distracted by his arrows. The ground was several hundred feet below him but he did not care. Once free of the swarm he skydived to a narrow walkway between two doorways. He imagined himself a bullet. He impacted his targeted ground without injury. The quori above him focused a stream of black bolts at his location. Shade barreled into the one of the doorways to avoid harm. The bolts ripped through the walkway with fearsome force, shattering it. The rage of the quori was unmatchable.

Shade charged down the hallway. He could hear the beasts scrambling in behind him. He conjured a series of walls to block the space between him and the horde. The quori burst through each one with minimal loss in speed. Their shrieks and hisses forming a symphony of terror. They poured through the other end of the hall, chocking it with their bodies. Shade blitzed into them. Gaining greater momentum with each swing of his scythe, he tore through them like a blast of red lightning. The path twisted into a corkscrew. Gravity was no longer a problem as he continued on, running on the walls with the quori hot on his trail.

He was outside again, running along the walls of the fortress. Somehow there were still quori who had not joined the stampeding black mass behind him. They hurled bolts of shadow at him. Plumes of ivory fire erupted sporadically in front of him. The very sky itself seemed to demand his head. Shade weaved between these obstacles. It occurred to him that the quori had gotten complacent in their abilities. Though they were legion they all attacked the same way. The power to shape the world at their disposal and they relied on what had always worked for them. Shade was going to show them what a true dream shaper was capable of.

He leaped from the wall and went back into freefall. He released Lifecutter from his hand, holding it in place with psychic power. Under his power the scythe multiplied into seven copies. Shade launched his weapons at the quori swarm above him. Like the claw of a massive predator the scythes raked the horde. He saw the cloud of smoke that erupted with each quori his creation killed.

The quori rallied. With a collective roar they turned Shade's attack against him. The six copies shot down next to him. They swiped at the ardent. Like hungry animals they assaulted him with their scarlet blades. Shade twisted and turned his body in the air to avoid the onslaught, until he could recall the real Lifecutter to his hand. With it he rapidly deflected the attacks. To the outside viewer he would've appeared like a blur. Sparks flew off him each time one of the copied blades struck the black shaft of the original.

Sensing he was nearing the room where Cole was, Shade shifted his gravity again towards the wall. He increased his weight to that of the greatest of dragons. He crashed through the umber bricks and tumbled onto the floor of the room with another shift in gravity. Instantly he sealed the wall behind him so that neither the scythes, nor the quori could follow.