WARLORDS IV – STORY

Chapter Five: The Battle in the Deep

The four companions said nothing as the golem's glowing white eyes turned upon them. Slowly, the automaton stretched its long arms and flexed its stiff claws; metal creaked, rust flaked, and gears ground harshly.

Daerec had seen golems before -- indeed, in Duernoth, there had been many of them, filling the empty spaces where once Dwarven warriors would have stood guard. But this was larger than any he had ever seen before. It towered over twice his height and was enormously broad. Its claws were long as short-swords, and its legs were thick as tree trunks. Made entirely of dark iron, the unliving sentinel stood seemed like death itself -- unstoppable, relentless, and without mercy.

"Well then," Kurgen laughed, "let's see the dog-men come yipping along now!" He turned to the golem and called out a string of Dwarven words.

The golem, however, merely clenched its claws and took a step forward.

Kurgen looked nervously at Arvad, then called out again, "Varak stûr, khastan, stûr!" But, unless his instructions were for the golem to step forward once more, to open its creaking jaw, and to below out a terrible screech, they went unheeded.

Now Arvad spoke in the Dwarven tongue, with all the powerful compulsion his wizard's voice could muster. Deep it boomed in those ancient halls, echoing with power, threat, and knowledge.

And the golem stepped forward again, lowering its spiked shoulders and spreading its arms wide. It was coming faster now, as if the cobwebs that had gathered in its mechanical mind were clearing, the rust shaking free, the oil flowing once more in the tubes that were its veins.

"Wizard, I do not think it means to obey you!" Terrwyn snapped, yanking her sword loose.

The golem's charge gained speed and it bellowed again; gone was the shrill creak from its voice. Now its roar was the roar of some great and ancient beast, certain of its mastery. "Move!" screamed Terrwyn, shoving Daerec to one side and Arvad to the other. Kurgen rolled at the last minute, and the paladin herself ducked and ran under the golem's sweeping claw.

"What did you tell it, Kurgen?" Terrwyn yelled from the other side of the chamber.

The golem, meanwhile, fixed its glowing stare on Daerec and began advancing. Daerec drew his sword and tried to step back, but found himself against the cavern wall. He darted to the side, but the golem, with a spryness that belied its hulking size, cut him off with one huge claw.

Daerec swung his sword against the claw with all his force. As the blade struck, pain shot up his arm and the clang of metal against metal reverberated through the cavern. He could barely hold his sword as he drew it back to swing again. The claw, where he had struck was barely dented.

Kurgen roared a challenge and raced forward, swinging his battle-axe with both hands. The golem, hearing his approach, merely swung one arm backwards, smacking the Dwarf backwards as one might swat a buzzing gnat. Kurgen flew through the air and crashed to the ground, his axe falling some distance away.

Daerec attacked again, this time stabbing at one of the grooves between the plates of the golem's skin. For a moment, it seemed as though he had scored a successful blow -- the blade into the groove and the golem's stabbed arm stopped its movement. But then, the golem thrust its arm forward, and the sword was snapped in two. Daerec merely fell back gasping -- the ancestral sword of House Grovium, the burning blade, broken like a twig. As he stared in shock, the golem swung, catching him full on with a sweep of its claws.

Darkness swept over him, not quite black, but rather crimson, and the half-silence of watery depths filled his ears. Then, with a rush of pain, he returned to consciousness, crumpled and bleeding a dozen strides from where he had been standing. His blood dripped off the golem's claw.

Without pause, it wheeled and began stomping once more towards Daerec, who was still struggling to breathe. Warm blood flowed along his side and pain lanced through his chest. Death came, step after merciless step, and he knew he needed to recover. Still, the image of the broken sword hung before him, certain in its foretelling of his own demise.

Suddenly, a gout of flame sprayed from across the room, engulfing the golem. The machine stopped and slowly turned, the fire still washing over it, and began walking toward the casting wizard. The flames began to die, and finally the spell came to its end. The golem glowed red, but did not seem harmed. Without hesitation, it continued its advance on Arvad, who was now slumped against the wall. With Kurgen dazed on the floor and Daerec coughing blood, there was only Terrwyn to intercede.

But where once she had shined with holy light and fought with an angel's grace, now she seemed pallid and awkward as she charged the golem. She struck a glancing blow off its leg, and then ducked a swipe of its claw. Yet her motions were stiff and her attacks weak -- there a slash, here a jab, but nothing of her former dance.

Daerec, slowly coming back to full awareness, realized that whatever dread had struck her down in the tunnel still clung to her, stifled her, so that she fought now without the confidence and certainty that her faith granted her. She fought as he did -- one person, one weapon, both flawed and mortal.

He pushed himself to his feet as stars burst in his vision and each breath stabbed needles into his flesh. It would not be one person, but two, who faced the golem, though he would fight with naught but the broken hilt of his father's sword. He staggered forward and snatched the shattered blade from the ground.

The golem paid him no heed, having only just turned its attention on Terrwyn. With an almost-insignificant kick, it knocked her backwards. A moment later it swept downward with both claws, which Terrwyn only barely dodged by spinning backwards.

"Golem!" Daerec choked out. "You want a victim? Claim me!"

But it did not, and instead swung again at Terrwyn, clipping her shoulder and knocking her to her knees. With a below and a spray of steam from its back, the golem raised its interlinked claws like a giant club.

"Damn you!" Daerec wept, hurling the hilt at the golem's back. The weapon bounced harmlessly off, but the golem turned to face him, leaving the fallen paladin for later.

With three great strides it crossed the room, and before Daerec could move, it grabbed him in its claw.

Pain exploded across his body; the claw was burning hot, the grip crushingly strong, and his wounds were already grievous. As his vision swam before him, he saw Arvad regaining his balance. Two small bolts of fire shot from the wizard's fingers and splashed against the golem's head, but they did no harm and did not distract the golem, whose claw closed ever tighter.

Daerec's vision turned dark and once more his ears filled with rushing. It felt not so much like his body was being compressed as it seemed that his innards were swelling and pressing against his skin, eager to burst forth in a spray of gore and flesh.

And then the golem dropped him. For the moment, Daerec did not know what had happened, let alone why. He knew only pain in every part of his body, pain such as he had never known in all his travels and all his combat. He struggled to breathe, to open his eyes, to see, to live, to think, even as a part of him willed death closer, the one escape from the agony that engulfed him.

Sound returned first, a confusing sound of whoops and howls, of thumps and hoarse screams. Then vision, blurred and indistinct, of streaking brown and yellow flying against and away from a grayish blob. Slowly, both senses recovered, and Daerec heard Arvad yelling, "Kurgen, the gate -- open the gate now!" above the din of battle. And then he saw them, breaking like waves upon the golem: dozens upon dozens of gnolls.

They were armed with club and mace, morning-star and flail, sword and axe and every variation thereupon. Their appearances were as diverse as those of the stray hounds that wandered the streets of Lysea -- once pure lines, but now interbred and confused, lean and hungry and wild.

A single Gnoll, or five, or ten would have been slaughtered by the golem -- for such killing had been the aim of its creation. Twice that number would have put up some fight, but how could they have harmed the automaton, armored as it was? No, not even a score of Gnolls could have succeeded where Daerec and his companions had failed.

But it was not a score. There were so many of them that for each the golem batted away, two more sprang up, grabbing on the chains, hanging from the spikes, piling their bodies upon its limbs. The golem groaned and screeched its gears, but its movements were growing slower and the light of its artificial eyes was dimming.

"Daerec!" Arvad's voice stirred him from the sight of the flailing golem. Daerec turned his head and saw the wizard, standing by Kurgen at the slowly opening second gate. "Hurry!"

Daerec pushed himself to his feet, his legs wobbling with the effort. All around him, the cavern floor was littered with the mangled corpses of Gnolls, some still twitching, whining, their entrails strewn out of gaping wounds, shattered bones thrusting through skin. He staggered toward the gate, hopeless inch after hopeless inch, certain that a Gnoll would strike him from behind, that a black-fletched arrow would find his throat.

But it was not death that stopped him, but rather a voice. Indeed, it could have been death's voice, cruel and certain as it was. "Flee, and the whore dies."

Daerec turned, and in the process became entangled in the body of a dead Gnoll. He collapsed onto the corpse, his face falling just beside its own. He stared into the creature's black, empty eyes, and simply listened to the pounding of Gnollish weapons against the golem's iron. Then, a great blast shook the cavern, and he heard the crash of the golem's fall. He looked up and saw the hulk of the golem, splayed upon a pile of the dead. Its chest was ruptured. A few paces back lay a scorched Gnoll, dead, the ruins of some diabolical invention clutched in its blackened paws.

And beyond, past the dead and the dying, he saw Terrwyn, on her knees at the feet of a warrior wrapped in jet armor. Not an inch of the warlord was visible -- from the extremest upward of his head to the bottom of his feet, there was nothing but black iron. Only a slit across his eyes revealed anything, and there, nothing could be seen but eyes that glowed a Daemonic red.

"Throw down your weapons," he ordered. Daerec, already weaponless, did not stir. But he heard muttering from Kurgen, followed by the clang of his axe clattering to the stone floor. "Remember, wizard, that I have bested you twice already. And my sword kills faster than any spell you can muster." The sword of which he spoke was long and cruelly notched all down its length, so that when pulled free from a victim, it would drag flesh and organs with it, so that any slash it delivered would heal unevenly and fester.

A nervous silence fell of the cavern, broken only by Terrwyn's whimpering. The black knight stared down at her, and a mocking grin could be heard in his voice. "What a fine white rose this is, still clinging to its vine." He kicked her sword aside with one armored boot, and then leaned down and tilted her face up. "Ripe for plucking by one with no fear of little thorns." He pushed her backwards and she fell sprawling to the ground.

"Leave her be, deathknight," Arvad warned. "Or we will see which one of us is the quicker."

A harsh laugh rang out from the deathknight's helmet. "A threat?" His army of Gnolls took up the laugh. "You are in no positions to make demands. The paladin knows it -- look at her, groveling before me. For I am no mere deathknight, but Eligos, Duke of Hell and destroyer of men." The fiery eyes from within the helmet redoubled their blazing. "Have no doubt, little heroes -- you would be dead now if such had been my desire." He slid his sword into an enormous sheath that hung across his back. "But for now, your lives serve my purposes."

Eligos prodded Terrwyn once more with his boot. "Heal the warrior," he ordered, pointing to Daerec.
Terrwyn's weeping grew louder, and she shook her head.

"Heal him!" the deathknight ordered, digging his boot into her side.

"I can't," she whispered in response.

"If you do not heal him," the Daemon warned, his voice rumbling, "then he dies here and now. He is the least valuable, and I will not be slowed by his injuries." He drew his sword and approached Daerec, who was too weak to even push himself away or crawl across the cavern floor.

"I'm too weak," Terrwyn moaned, her eyes forced shut against a stream of tears. "I cannot do it."

"Then he dies." Eligos raised his sword over his head, and Daerec watched as black fire danced along its length. The shadow from the sword found resonance in him, in his suffering, his wounds, and spread out through his body and through his mind. Darkness washed over him, and he was no more.

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