Konstantins Crusade English version, E W [most read books of all time TXT] 📗

the symbol that identified the newcomer as a swordmaster of Helike. Twenty other figures in similar clothing followed, armed with spears and, unlike the Shadow Guards, kept them at attention. Damotes ignored the weapons aimed at him as he stepped further into the hall. The dark phantoms were the personal guardians of the high priests, but for Damotes they could have as well been children who stood in his way. Priam knew what he was thinking. The same as him. These men were not warriors. They hid in the shadows, divided into small units in the jungles that surrounded the city to raid the Guards' supply routes. But what would be the value of this all when the walls fell and the fight took place in the streets of the city in broud daylight? Nothing. How would you make these thieves and assassins figth as soldiers when needed?

Damotes  caught sight of the twelve figures on their stone thrones, the kneeling seer and the blood pool. The disgust was clearly visible in his face. One of the Shadowguard men stepped forward to stop him entering the hall completly. The first mistake, Priam thought. The second was to aim the weapon at Damotes.

Priam knew what would happen even before anyone moved. Damote's patience was more than exhausted. With a single, flowing motion, the sword slipped out of the scabbard and severed the arm of the shadowguard opposing him. Blood spurted as the man stumbled back with a cry. The other shadows plunged forward ...

"Oh please. Give me a reason." Damote's face was like a death mask. Pale, tense and somehow appearing ... thin.

The shadows retreated. Two of them helped the injured man to his feet and brought him in a niche. He was still screaming. Screams ... how many of those he had heard here, Priam thought. Oddly, he could hear the voices of the high priests even beyond the overall chaos. As if theirwords were the only ones amplified by the Cavernous Chamber. Paniced questions. Anxiety.

"What are you talking about?" Damotes demanded.

"They want to know what you think you're doing here," Priam translated quickly. At least, that was what most people wanted to know. If only they were not all confused. The voiceless whisper in this room were bad enough.

"This place gives me headaches." Damotes rubbed his temples and sheathed his sword. "What in the name of all saints is happening here? Do you even know what's going on out there? "

Priam translated the question, but formulated it much more politely. The tension in the room was already palpable enough without Damotes insulting the high priest even further. The answer was pretty short. "No."

Damotes sighed heavily and signaled his men to pull back. One by one, the paladins disappeared, leaving him, Priam, and the high priests alone. The Shadowguard did the same and retreated back to the dark corners of the hall, where they became virtually invisible. For the first time, his father looked actualy ... old, Priam thought. Exhausted from all this. And yet he had volunteered the Archons wanted to send an expedition against the emperor. There would have been enough younger swordmasters to do the job. And yet he had insisted. Priam was afraid to know why. Damotes made an effort to collecti himself, but the tired look in his eyes did not quite disappear. And was there not a momentary green glow visible in them?

"The flying city is here," Damotes explained. "The emperor himself has arrived."

 "Finally." For a moment, Priam was sure to have misheared . "Predictably."

He could not say for sure who the twelve had spoken, but for a moment he hesitated to translate the words. Enough to lose patience again for his father. He did not understand what the priests said, but the tone was clear. Calm. Almost carefree.

"Your city will fall. The Emperor himself is here and if we lose the walls, he will simply overrun this place. The time we could hide and strike out of the dark is over. I am here to support you but we have to act now. I can guide your men and try to secure the ramparts. We will not be able to hold them permanently against the flying city, but we can buy enough time to evacuate the outer pyramid level and occupy the next ring. " And it was at that moment that the seer, who had only been watching in silence, began to laugh. The sound was amplified by the strange acoustics of the room, became high and howling, so the priam raised its hair on the hackles.

"Do not underestimate our power. We have the tools here to take care of the Emperor. There will be no retreat. "Again the first of the high priests raised his hand and signaled. A single Shadowguard stepped out of the darkness, a knife in his hand. And stepped towards the seer.

Priam knew what would happen. He did not know what exactly the high priests were planning, but he knew what they needed. Blood. More blood. That of a seer. So now was the moment that Priam had already seen coming. Somehow he was sorry for the old man. He raised so many questions ... Maybe a conversation with him would have told him more about the high priest's plans. The knife flashed ...

 

Chapter 9

 

 

 

Damotes responded quickly. Steel struck steel as he drew his own knife and deflected the shadowguard's obsidian blade. The stone cut a deep notch into the metal. Sparks sprayed, scorching his face before he could protect it, then pushed the guard back violently. The skin of the shadow, overgrown with unnatural scales hardened on the blow, ripping at his own skin, even through the heavy gloves it wore. Still, it did nothing weakening the force of blow, sending him to the floor.

 Immediately the man's skin began to change and he became one with his surroundings, disappearing.

"No." Damotes turned to the high priests. He only looked over the stranger they had chosen as another sacrifice. A savage, no question about it, dressed in ragged skins and with matted gray hair. The man did not seem to realize his position as thin smile played over his features. Almost as if the spectacle around him amused him royally.

 "Enough." His own words surprised him. The tiredness in it. "There will already be enough blood shed today. If you really think you need to make more sacrifices, do so. But do not expect me to continue to watch this barbarism or I will take my men and leave this city to its fate. "

An empty threat. He could not leave this city any more than the high priests. He did not have enough men to brak through the siege. A sortie would only mean the death of everyone and they knew that. He had come to the city with a thousand men, but not even two hundred full-fledged paladins. The rest were auxiliaries. Men who had trodden the path of the hundred trials in part without ever ending it, and without the experience or equipment of any of those legendary dragon hunters. At least this place lacked dragons, he thought. That was something after all.

Silence had fallen over the hall. He looked at Priam. The boy seemed exhausted, he thought. The archivist's pale blue robe, which he wore over his lightweight Mthril armor, made him look pale and the reflection of the single light source did the rest. Maybe it had been wrong to take him with him, thought Damotes. The boy was no warrior like him. His talents lay in other areas. And that's why he needed him here.

"Priam, ask them if they would rather count on my help or see me try carving a path through the siege. I don’t care which it is, as long as I don’t have to endure this any longer.”

Priam nodded and translated his threat. Presumably he made his words a little easier to swallow for the priests, but Damotes did not care. His boy might not be a warrior, but in one case he was definitely superior to him. He could talk. Maybe other swordmasters would have seen that as a disappointment. Damotes, on the other hand, felt a warm pride about it. Had not Laos himself first won over the people with words before he reached for the sword. Words were just as much a weapon as steel. Like rituals. That brought him back to the present. As before, no one had moved. Eventually, however, one of the high priests made a sign, and again one of the shadows emerged from the darkness. This time without a knife. For the second time that day, Damotes had the sword wander back into its sheath. He promised himself that there would not be a third time. Everything here made him nervous.

One of the high priests said something and Priam translated for him.

"He will live if that is your wish," the boy explained. "But they need his blood."

With these words, the shadow grabbed the seer by the wrist. The man grimaced, but did not say anything, just watched calmly as  his captures knife drew a cut across his wrist. The wound was not deep, but it was bleeding. Strong. A few drops fell to the floor, forming a small trickle that flowed to the center of the chamber. Another sign and more shadows seized the seer and led him out of the chamber.

Damotes did not look after them. His gaze hung on the thin, red trail left by the Ice Nomad on his way out of the chamber.

The blood, he thought, was just a mask. An excuse. He did not know much about sorcery, but the power behind it did not need sacrifices of flesh and blood. Damotes only wondered what this masquerade was for. It was a spectacle for their people, which  regarded them as gods. A display of who had power over life and death in this city. Once it had not been different in Helike. Alleged gods had ruled over mortals and claimed them with body and soul for themselves. With blood. Here the high priests and there the dragons. And yet they defended this place. The thought made him uneasy every time. The Archons had given the order. Maybe Helike's safety was worth abandoning a few principles from their point of view. He would have to trust that they were right. And do his duty. However, he did not oppose what would happen now. The rituals might be masquerade. But the magic was real. Damotes could feel the air in the room seemed to condense, the fine hairs on his arms stood up on end as the high priests began to sing. Words he did not understand, but made the stone of the hall shake. And their singing was answered. The magic was real, and it made his bones ache and evoked whispering voices mingling with the elders' chorus.

Whispering that came out of the darkness, not from the waiting Shadowguard, but from the air itself and it strained his nerves.

Voices that shouted and screamed and ... suddenly disappeared. From one moment to the other there was only ghostly silence.

The high priest that sat at the right end of the arch of stone thrones,