Oathbreaker: A Dark Fantasy Web Serial

"Alken! Wake up, damn it!"

I shot awake, and the shaking hand on my shoulder flinched away as I reached for my dagger.

It took me a moment to realize where I was. The irkwood still. The heady stench of Olliard's chimera and the cold night air were like ice water over my head.

My sleep had been deep and black. The ring on my right hand felt warm against my skin, and the black stone swam with red eddies. Another dream. One I wouldn't remember.

I forced myself back to reality, turning to meet the panicked eyes of Olliard. His fringe of gray hair stuck out wildly in all directions, and a bead of sweat formed on his brow. Night still clung tightly to the forest. All was silent, and the campfire had burned down.

Why had they let the fire burn down?

Then I realized it as I looked around. "Where is Lisette?" I demanded.

"Gone," Olliard said, his voice tight with fear. In the background, the chimera Brume rested on her haunches, fearful breaths snorting out of her huge nostrils in misting plumes. It had become intensely cold, despite the late spring warmth we'd enjoyed for the journey so far.

I stood, on guard, and Olliard rose with me.

"I woke just a few minutes ago, and the fire had gone out." Olliard swallowed and adjusted his spectacles. "She wasn't here. I thought, perhaps, she might have had a call of nature, but…"

"But she's too sensible to wander off into an irkwood," I finished for him.

I worked quickly, redoing the laces on my boots, grabbing my belt and dagger, freeing my axe from the bundle I'd been keeping it in for the comfort of the healers. Last, I threw on my cloak against the unseasonable chill.

All the while, I focused my senses on the forest around me. Clouds had moved across the sky, casting everything in an impenetrable black only broken in our camp by the lanterns Olliard had kept lit. He had one in hand now as he paced at the edge of the camp, agitated and impatient.

I focused on the sense of cold. It wasn't natural. I felt anger in it.

"You stay here," I told the doctor. "I'll find her."

"To hell with that!" Olliard rummaged around in his cart. When he turned, he held a cumbersome object in his hands, the lantern tied at his belt. A crossbow.

It was a beautiful piece, a work of art. The brown wood had a smooth, almost shiny finish, and the metal had been worked with detailed inlays. It seemed almost too hefty for the thin man, but he held it with a familiar ease.

Odd thing for a physiker to have.

Seeing my questioning look, Olliard's lips formed a tight line. "Pays to be careful."

He had already loaded a bolt into the device. It had little in common with the simple yew pieces the guard in Vinhithe had used. The crossbow had a complex loading mechanism, and parts I wasn't familiar with, including two levers in addition to the iron trigger.

I couldn't say whether I made the decision because I didn't want to waste time, or because of the wicked looking crossbow, but I nodded. "Fine. Keep behind me, and don't point that thing where I'm standing."

Besides, Lisette was his companion. He had a right to go.

"Stay, Brume." Olliard patted the chimera's boar head. "That's a good girl."

Brume let out a distressed grunt and snuffled at the doctor, then shrank her enormous bulk against the cart. The wooden vehicle creaked at the beast's weight. She wouldn't be going anywhere, I suspected.

"How are we going to find her?" Olliard asked me. "Can you track?"

"In a way," I said. "I'll lead. You just keep close, and keep that lantern up."

He didn't question it. We moved into the forest. I led, following the eerie sensation I felt in the air. We ducked under the curse wards Lisette had placed at dusk.

"Why in all the world would she leave the safety of the wards?" Olliard asked, perplexed.

"She might have been made to," I said, my eyes wandering the dark. I'd taken a lantern too, and its pale light gave ominous definition to the trees.

"I thought spirits couldn't get through barriers like that," the doctor muttered. "Not to mention, I thought they couldn't approach a campfire without permission."

"The Law of Draubard," I agreed. "That's just for the dead. Wil-O' Wisps and other fae things don't play by the same rules. Still, you're right about the wards."

I glanced back at him. "Likely, nothing came in. She was probably lured out."

And I'd been too deep in my sleep to notice. My jaw clenched in frustration. What had called the young cleric out into this darkness? The denizens of this ancient wood, or…

Was this my fault?

I forged into the dark.

We found Lisette in a small clearing. She hadn't strayed terribly far from the camp, all told.

I spotted a distant light at first, and thought perhaps it belonged to one of the lanterns Olliard kept. They were alchemical pieces, of the sort becoming more popular across the subcontinent in recent years. They produced a light closer to greenish white than yellow, and could burn far longer than any torch.

I realized soon enough that the light I saw belonged to nothing fashioned by human hands.

Approaching the edge of the clearing, I got a better look at what lay ahead. Towering trees, some older than kingdoms, rose high into the black sky, their twisted canopies intermingling into an oppressive barrier. Within that ring, the young adept stood still.

She didn't wear her brown robes and apron. The girl had gone out barefoot, wearing just a thin shift suitable only as an undergarment, which couldn't have provided any warmth in this bitter air. Her pale blond hair hung loose around her shoulders, and she had her head upturned.

Mist coiled through the trees. It seemed to grow thickest around Lisette. It glowed as though reflecting strong moonlight.

Yet, no moon shone through the overcast sky.

Seeing the same thing I did, Olliard began to rush forward, his apprentice's name on his lips. I stopped him with an upraised arm.

"What?" He asked, almost growling. He looked afraid, and relieved to see the girl alive.

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"Don't approach her," I told him. "She's ensorceled."

I could make out shapes in the mist. Gaunt, sharp, hollow eyed.

"Forest spirits?" Olliard asked, his throat bobbing as he swallowed.

"Worse." I took a steadying breath and stepped into the clearing, letting the mist part around my legs. "Stay back. Do not fire that thing. It won't do any of us any good."

Olliard obeyed me, and I focused my attention on the girl. She swayed slightly from side to side, as though moving to some slow tune. The near invisible shapes moving in the mist swirled around her, circling like predatory fish.

"Lisette," I said. "Look at me."

She didn't seem to hear me. I could hear her voice — she muttered something, an unceasing torrent of words too low for me to make out. The mist writhed. It spilled out of the surrounding trees, like blood pouring into a hollow. There was no wind, no stars, no moon, no ambience of night.

Yet all within the clearing shone stark, illuminated by witch light. It made everything look unreal, as though we stood in an endless abyss, a sea of black.

"Lisette," I tried again in a firmer voice. "Do not heed them."

I could hear sounds emerging from the glowing fog. Whispers, which grew more agitated as they took of note of me. They knew me.

Lisette suddenly spoke louder, so I could hear her words. "But I didn't—"

She wasn't speaking to me. Her voice cut off with a choked sob. Hugging her own arms, she spoke again. "I was scared. I didn't want them to die. I was just scared."

I narrowed my eyes, focusing on the presence in the mist as I moved forward at a slow, steady pace. I could hear it better now, too.

"You abandoned them."

"Left your sisters to die."

"The ones who brought you out of war, out of hunger…"

"They made you family, and you just watched them DIE."

Lisette sobbed openly now. "I'm sorry! I didn't want to die. I'm sorry."

"Those soldiers butchered them."

"Hunted them like beasts."

"Laughed while they did it!"

"They killed them. Raped them."

"You just watched!"

"Coward. USELESS."

"Should have died in the mud with your parents."

"Just another dead peasant. No one would have missed you."

Lisette sank to her knees, pleading for the voices to stop. I knew well enough they wouldn't.

I drew in a deep breath of freezing night air, pulled from the warmth within me, and poured aura into my voice.

"Lisette."

"Look. At. Me."

Lisette stiffened. Slowly, as though pulling against a tight grip, she turned to face me. Her eyes were haunted, deeply shadowed as though she hadn't slept in many days, and her white face beaded with sweat despite the cold.

Again, the mist writhed. Ghastly faces formed in it, their eyes empty pits, their silent screams forming like melting wax.

"Leave her," I snarled at the dead. "You have no quarrel with this cleric. She had nothing to do with your deaths."

I stopped when I'd reached the girl, standing over her and facing the writhing fog. As I'd intended, it directed its attention at me.

"You."

"Murderer!"

"Failure."

"Deceiver!"

"TRAITOR."

"I've earned your curses," I told them, standing firm. "She hasn't."

More distinct shapes began to form in the deepening mist. Ungainly crawling things, long limbed and emaciated, all bone and ghostly sinew, with bestial heads and hair like writhing tendrils. They skulked and crawled, the light in the damp air condensing until they became near solid phantasms, potent as the spells the knights of Vinhithe had cast into their air.

Real enough to be dangerous.

"Playacting the knight again?" They laughed at me in a score of voices.

"Do you think she'll be grateful?"

"Do you expect she'll let you have her as reward?"

"We know what lurks in that heart of yours, you wanting beast."

"Does she not remind you of her?"

My jaw clenched with fury. Even still, I kept my voice low and calm as I could.

"I know you are all in terrible pain, but remember what you were. You've suffered enough. I do not want to hurt you."

Hate boiled from the spirits. They had become like forms of silver fire, sharp as glass and bright as slivers of a baleful moon.

"Hurt us!?" They hissed.

"We have become this because of YOU!"

"We will never give you peace."

"Never let you rest!"

"Your sins will follow you into damnation, oathbreaker."

I bit down hard on the bitter emotion I felt then. I swallowed my shame, and lifted the axe. The brassy sheen of its alloy reflected their lambent forms. When I spoke, flickers of pale fire flickered between my teeth.

"Your quarrel is with me, seydii, and there will be plenty of other nights to settle it."

"Perhaps this will be the last?"

A silver form burned itself into reality almost within my reach, lashing out with crooked talons. Flinching, I caught the blow on the edge of the axe, ripped it aside in a shower of sparks both real and phantasmal, then swung with a roar.

The axe cleaved through the spirit, and it erupted. Amber fire ate away at silver, and the wraith loped into the forest as it burned, wailing with agony.

Regret settled in me, very much like the onset of great weariness. Even still, I brandished the axe, sweeping it to one side as a trail of golden fire — the aureflame — traced its cut. My voice echoed with power when I spoke.

"I do not want this fight. This fire will hurt you. Go."

I put a pleading note into my voice. "Please."

But their hate had reached a crescendo. Wailing in voices like shrieking metal, the wraiths surged forward. Lisette let out a cry of fear, and Olliard shouted something from the clearing's edge.

I closed my eyes, breathed in deep, and spoke the words of an Oath.

"I am the torch on the winding path. The keeper of the gifted flame. I guard against the night, and guide those who wander it."

I am the shield. I am the spear.

The power allowed into my soul surged like a roaring fire. It scorched me, angry and broken in its own way as these silver ghosts.

But it heeded my command, and I shaped my aura into an Art.

A ring of pale light, chased with images of branches and leaves in an autumnal wood, burst to life around me and the girl. It scattered the mist, brightened the night, cast away the cold. All for a moment.

Then the phantasms faded, leaving faint impressions of themselves in the air that lingered for several moments, and the amber light condescend into a faintly shining circle around me, so I became like one of Olliard's lamps.

Lisette looked up at me, her blue eyes reflecting the pale golden light as though she looked directly into the sun. Her mouth fell agape.

I ignored her, keeping my attention on the wraiths. They had recoiled from my magic, but remained at its edge, their bestial faces snarling. I held my axe in both hands, the head poised under my chin, the oak handle parallel to my chest.

"You would turn our own gifts against us!?"

The wraiths hissed at me.

"Blasphemer!"

"This was his gift," I reminded them. "And Hers. And you've become the very thing it was made to repel. It doesn't have to be this way."

The light around me had already begun to fade. My forehead beaded with sweat, and the aureflame…

It hurt. I could feel it crawling through my veins. My skin began to blister here and there, and my mouth felt terribly dry. I clenched my jaw, ignoring the pain.

The wraiths laughed.

"The Alder's fire is withered. It turns against you!"

"You will go like the rest."

"I will take you all with me," I promised them. "Begone."

I made the word an auratic command, spiking it with energy. Suggestion and compulsion is far more effective on spirits than living mortals. They scattered, screeching in rage.

"This is not over! We will haunt you to your death, Headsman!"

"But not tonight," I said. "And not them."

"You are no protector." The darkness writhed with the scorn of the dead. "You already failed this land, and now its wounds fester."

"GO!" I roared.

And they went, scattering into the black woods. As sudden as an ending dream, the forms of silver fire faded away. The glowing mist went next, leaving all the irkwood in an impenetrable veil of shadow.

The light around me remained. It rippled, growing brighter. I grit my teeth, fighting against the violent surge of power flaring out of me. Lisette winced at the brightness, casting a hand up over her eyes.

No. Not here. Not where others would be hurt. I grit my teeth, focusing on the words of vows emblazoned into my memory, into my soul. As familiar to me as my own skin, my own heartbeat.

My flesh peeled, My lips blistered. The ends of my copper hair flickered with fire, emitting a burnt smell. It caught at the edges of my cloak, already singed from past times, and ruined it further.

I forced myself to calm. I focused on my breathing, let my racing heart steady. The tension in my muscles, with effort, relaxed. I lowered the axe.

The fire withered, and the amber light faded. Soon enough, the girl and I were left in total darkness. I heard a hollow thump, and only then realized my right hand had gone limp so the head of the axe had fallen down to the grass. I managed to keep hold of it, barely.

"Lisette!"

Olliard raced forward, illuminating us again with lantern light. He held one in hand, his crossbow in the other, a second lantern tied at his belt — I'd given him mine before moving into the clearing.

Shaking with fear and shock, Lisette clung tightly to the old man as he knelt next to her. I let them be, clenching my teeth against the scalding pain racing across my skin, and within it.

I'd been badly burned. My flesh had peeled along my arms and neck, leaving angry red marks. I couldn't get moisture into my mouth to swallow, and my throat felt dry as a desert. Smoke trailed into the cold air around my shoulders.

Olliard blinked up at me, afraid and awed at once. "What are you?" He asked.

I couldn't answer, couldn't even draw in half a breath to speak. Lisette answered for me, her blue eyes calm and wary as she lifted her head from the doctor's shoulder.

"He's a paladin."