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THE NINE BEAST HELMETS III - Beasts of the West
I. Black Angel and Returning Blade vs Eagle
Spreading his artificial wings, Black Angel glided up to stand on top of the main wall around the fortress. He turned, knelt down and grasped Magulu's upstretched hands to give an assist. When the armored warrior was ready, they both leaped down into the courtyard, breaking the fall with bent knees and fingertips touching the stone flags.
Magulu of the Seven Swords was encased in a long tunic of tough boiled leather covered with metal rings, his arms and legs left bare and his long sword sheathed at his left hip. In contrast, Stephen Weaver was a striking sight. His tight black flightsuit was contrasted with a red stripe running down the outside of each arm and leg, his own helmet was modern combat model with goggles and a respiratory mask.
Most dramatic were the two wings which stretched from head to heel, had a seven foot spread when fully open and were constructed of taut nylon over aluminum tubing. This made them look more batlike than avian. Weaver's levitation made him perfectly capable of flight by himself, but the wings added stability and tight maneuvering.
"How long has this joint been abandoned?" he asked in a voice made hollow by the speaker in his helmet.
"More than a generation," came the reply. "Melgarin still tend extensive farmland and pastures to the West, but most of Evaho has been reclaimed by the Cojobes."
"An experiment in colonialism that didn't work out," Black Angel grumbled. "Seems to be the way that empire building ends up."
The courtyard had piles of fallen leaves that wind had pushed up against the walls, great cracks ran across the masonry from exposure to the elements. In the center of the open space stood a fountain which had long since run dry, marked by a life-size marble statue of a rearing horse.
The fortress itself was a simple three-sided structure, rising up ten stories high in the freezing night air. Each wing was topped with a cylindrical guard tower, but not a single light showed in any of the narrow window slits. "If I stumbled over this without knowing better, I'd figure this place is empty," Weaver said.
"Three wings of a castle, three ranks of the Helmets," Magulu responded. "Beasts of the East, Beasts of the West, Beasts of the South. We do not know which we will face."
"Might as well get this party started," the Black Angel said. He walked boldly up to the massive front door made of oak planks braced with horizontal iron bands and found it was ajar. "Oh man. Well, not the first trap I stuck my fool head into." As his gloved hand pulled the door open, from the roof of that wing a red firebolt shot upward to explode in a thunderous burst of light. Both the echoes and the flare hung in the air.
"We know no one in this stronghold is still asleep," Magulu remarked as he followed Weaver into the building. That drew a snort from the Black Angel. They entered an open chamber with a ceiling so high that the staircases on either side rose to a second floor showing open doorways. Torches flickered in wall brackets, revealing not a bit of furniture or furnishings. This entrance hall had been stripped down to bare stone floor and walls. Dust covered every surface, and the lack of footprints made Weaver lower his guard a bit too much.
For the occupant of that room did not need to walk across the floor.
A sharp twang sounded overhead and a thick arrow thumped against the Black Angel's chest, bouncing back off without doing any damage. Under the tough material of his flightsuit was a layer of the flexible Trom armor. It would take more than even a skillfully shot arrow to make Weaver even feel an impact.
High up near the vaulted ceiling hovered a muscular figure in coarse robes belted at the waist. He had a cylindrical quiver across his back and was fitting another arrow to the string of his short recurved bow. The iron helmet he wore was fashioned in the semblance of a fierce Eagle head. This was one of the three Beasts of the West.
With a crack, Weaver extended his wings their full spread and hurtled upward. The Eagle had placed himself in a strike position and loosed an arrow that pierced the tough fabric of Weaver's artificial wings, pinning them together like a needle sewing two pieces of cloth shut. Black Angel lurched as his balance was thrown off. He hovered uncertainly. The Eagle came in fast in a predatory dive and kicked Weaver squarely in the head, his boots smacking against the rigid flight helmet with gusto. Unsteady to begin with, Black Angel spiralled in a rough circle to the floor.
The Eagle Helmet wearer laughed heartily, notching another arrow to his short bow. He swung around to look back at the Seven Swords fighter and received an agonizing surprise. The Returning Blade had spun end over end to sink its point deeply into the Eagle's right thigh, touching the femur. The Beast Helmet man screamed at the unexpected pain, dropped his bow and grabbed the sword with both hands.
Standing thirty feet below, Magulu of Danarak held out his open hand and summoned the weapon to him. This was the special property of the Returning Blade, infused in the sword ages ago. Slowly, despite his enraged resistance, the Eagle Helmet man was tugged downward by the blade embedded in his leg. Fighting the pull only made the wound worse. He shouted both from pain and anger, reached to his belt and drew a long narrow-bladed knife, thinking how it was just the thing to slide through the Seven Sword's face.
Stephen Weaver twisted the round buckle on his chest and let his wings fall to the floor. He did not want to waste time trying to free his wings and then fastening them back on to their harness. Even without their help, he was still the most gifted levitator in the Midnight War. He took three running steps and launched himself upward from the floor exactly as if he had used a springboard. Accelerating as he rose, Black Angel swung his body around and drove both feet deep into the Eagle Helmet's stomach. That doubled the already distressed man up, making him lose the last vestige of concentration.
Without his conscious mind controlling the helmet's gift, the cult member dropped straight down and landed poorly. The thump of impact had a grim finality to it. Even with the Eagle dying, the Returning Blade still dragged his body across the floor as it strove to go to its master's hand.
This fight at least was over. Weaver alit, picked up his wings and began disentangling the arrow from the nylon. "Drat darn heck," he said mildly.
Magulu had tugged his weapon free from the Eagle's corpse and cleaned it before returning the sword to his scabbard. He had the face of a typical Danarakan... very dark-skinned, strong-jawed, with the distinctive hooked nostrils that had always been prevalent in that realm.
"Seeing this man dead gives me great satisfaction," Magulu told his new colleague. "Danarak has suffered much from the Nine Beast Helmets. They have pillaged and looted, they have slaughtered entire villages, except for young girls that they sell as slaves to the Darthim and Nekrosim."
Holding his folded wings under one arm, Stephen Weaver said, "I just realized there's something you don't know about me." He unclasped his own modern helmet with one hand and pulled it up off his head. Weaver was an American black man, lighter in tone than Magulu, with a thick mustache and friendly expression. He grinned now as he saw the Seven Swords' reaction.
"Ah. I see we have more in common than I thought," Magulu said.
"Always glad to help a brother out," Weaver responded.
( the rest of the story )
I. Black Angel and Returning Blade vs Eagle
Spreading his artificial wings, Black Angel glided up to stand on top of the main wall around the fortress. He turned, knelt down and grasped Magulu's upstretched hands to give an assist. When the armored warrior was ready, they both leaped down into the courtyard, breaking the fall with bent knees and fingertips touching the stone flags.
Magulu of the Seven Swords was encased in a long tunic of tough boiled leather covered with metal rings, his arms and legs left bare and his long sword sheathed at his left hip. In contrast, Stephen Weaver was a striking sight. His tight black flightsuit was contrasted with a red stripe running down the outside of each arm and leg, his own helmet was modern combat model with goggles and a respiratory mask.
Most dramatic were the two wings which stretched from head to heel, had a seven foot spread when fully open and were constructed of taut nylon over aluminum tubing. This made them look more batlike than avian. Weaver's levitation made him perfectly capable of flight by himself, but the wings added stability and tight maneuvering.
"How long has this joint been abandoned?" he asked in a voice made hollow by the speaker in his helmet.
"More than a generation," came the reply. "Melgarin still tend extensive farmland and pastures to the West, but most of Evaho has been reclaimed by the Cojobes."
"An experiment in colonialism that didn't work out," Black Angel grumbled. "Seems to be the way that empire building ends up."
The courtyard had piles of fallen leaves that wind had pushed up against the walls, great cracks ran across the masonry from exposure to the elements. In the center of the open space stood a fountain which had long since run dry, marked by a life-size marble statue of a rearing horse.
The fortress itself was a simple three-sided structure, rising up ten stories high in the freezing night air. Each wing was topped with a cylindrical guard tower, but not a single light showed in any of the narrow window slits. "If I stumbled over this without knowing better, I'd figure this place is empty," Weaver said.
"Three wings of a castle, three ranks of the Helmets," Magulu responded. "Beasts of the East, Beasts of the West, Beasts of the South. We do not know which we will face."
"Might as well get this party started," the Black Angel said. He walked boldly up to the massive front door made of oak planks braced with horizontal iron bands and found it was ajar. "Oh man. Well, not the first trap I stuck my fool head into." As his gloved hand pulled the door open, from the roof of that wing a red firebolt shot upward to explode in a thunderous burst of light. Both the echoes and the flare hung in the air.
"We know no one in this stronghold is still asleep," Magulu remarked as he followed Weaver into the building. That drew a snort from the Black Angel. They entered an open chamber with a ceiling so high that the staircases on either side rose to a second floor showing open doorways. Torches flickered in wall brackets, revealing not a bit of furniture or furnishings. This entrance hall had been stripped down to bare stone floor and walls. Dust covered every surface, and the lack of footprints made Weaver lower his guard a bit too much.
For the occupant of that room did not need to walk across the floor.
A sharp twang sounded overhead and a thick arrow thumped against the Black Angel's chest, bouncing back off without doing any damage. Under the tough material of his flightsuit was a layer of the flexible Trom armor. It would take more than even a skillfully shot arrow to make Weaver even feel an impact.
High up near the vaulted ceiling hovered a muscular figure in coarse robes belted at the waist. He had a cylindrical quiver across his back and was fitting another arrow to the string of his short recurved bow. The iron helmet he wore was fashioned in the semblance of a fierce Eagle head. This was one of the three Beasts of the West.
With a crack, Weaver extended his wings their full spread and hurtled upward. The Eagle had placed himself in a strike position and loosed an arrow that pierced the tough fabric of Weaver's artificial wings, pinning them together like a needle sewing two pieces of cloth shut. Black Angel lurched as his balance was thrown off. He hovered uncertainly. The Eagle came in fast in a predatory dive and kicked Weaver squarely in the head, his boots smacking against the rigid flight helmet with gusto. Unsteady to begin with, Black Angel spiralled in a rough circle to the floor.
The Eagle Helmet wearer laughed heartily, notching another arrow to his short bow. He swung around to look back at the Seven Swords fighter and received an agonizing surprise. The Returning Blade had spun end over end to sink its point deeply into the Eagle's right thigh, touching the femur. The Beast Helmet man screamed at the unexpected pain, dropped his bow and grabbed the sword with both hands.
Standing thirty feet below, Magulu of Danarak held out his open hand and summoned the weapon to him. This was the special property of the Returning Blade, infused in the sword ages ago. Slowly, despite his enraged resistance, the Eagle Helmet man was tugged downward by the blade embedded in his leg. Fighting the pull only made the wound worse. He shouted both from pain and anger, reached to his belt and drew a long narrow-bladed knife, thinking how it was just the thing to slide through the Seven Sword's face.
Stephen Weaver twisted the round buckle on his chest and let his wings fall to the floor. He did not want to waste time trying to free his wings and then fastening them back on to their harness. Even without their help, he was still the most gifted levitator in the Midnight War. He took three running steps and launched himself upward from the floor exactly as if he had used a springboard. Accelerating as he rose, Black Angel swung his body around and drove both feet deep into the Eagle Helmet's stomach. That doubled the already distressed man up, making him lose the last vestige of concentration.
Without his conscious mind controlling the helmet's gift, the cult member dropped straight down and landed poorly. The thump of impact had a grim finality to it. Even with the Eagle dying, the Returning Blade still dragged his body across the floor as it strove to go to its master's hand.
This fight at least was over. Weaver alit, picked up his wings and began disentangling the arrow from the nylon. "Drat darn heck," he said mildly.
Magulu had tugged his weapon free from the Eagle's corpse and cleaned it before returning the sword to his scabbard. He had the face of a typical Danarakan... very dark-skinned, strong-jawed, with the distinctive hooked nostrils that had always been prevalent in that realm.
"Seeing this man dead gives me great satisfaction," Magulu told his new colleague. "Danarak has suffered much from the Nine Beast Helmets. They have pillaged and looted, they have slaughtered entire villages, except for young girls that they sell as slaves to the Darthim and Nekrosim."
Holding his folded wings under one arm, Stephen Weaver said, "I just realized there's something you don't know about me." He unclasped his own modern helmet with one hand and pulled it up off his head. Weaver was an American black man, lighter in tone than Magulu, with a thick mustache and friendly expression. He grinned now as he saw the Seven Swords' reaction.
"Ah. I see we have more in common than I thought," Magulu said.
"Always glad to help a brother out," Weaver responded.
( the rest of the story )
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