Free The Tale of Onora: The Boy and the Peddler of Death by Dylan Saccoccio Page B

gasped for the words. “The only all-night sex being had nowadays is in debtor’s prisons!”
                While everyone laughed, Lugh masked his delight from the joke. “The enchantments shall not maintain themselves, bard!”
                Taliesin brought the xun to his lips. “We don’t need enchantments, R ökkr. We were born enchanted.”
                Lugh allowed himself to finally smile. “And we have a medicine man that is not only a healer, but a poet.”
                “A prophet!” Taliesin replied. “Should the gods decline my offer to join them today, I shall compose a song for Rusvi. It shall be titled, ‘Ye Ole Good Days’!”
                “Decline they shall,” Rusvi’menel replied. “For the gods prefer thee to remain a thorn in my arse rather than a thorn in theirs.”
    His childlike sincerity reminded Lugh as to why they became sworn brothers.
                “Shall I remain,” Taliesin responded. “‘Tis my hope that His Holiness would designate a clean plot for me.”
    Rusvi’menel conceded. “A clean plot for Ye Ole Good Days!”
    Lugh found something to believe in. “For Ye Ole Good Days!”
    The soldiers raised their weapons. “For Ye Old Good Days!”
    Lugh thought of Olwyn. He thought of the secrets he kept and the shadows he crept through to be with her. He thought of his son and the burdens that he would face as a half-breed. He wondered if it were possible to pinpoint where exactly in time people abandoned what made them happy to pursue what made them miserable. He would never live to find out how The Trivium was created or why it was created, but his son would at least have a fighting chance to do what no hero before him could.
    Lugh raised his sword to the heavens and called the lightning by its name. He commanded it to reign upon his blade. “ Nizzre! Rosa pholor ussta velve!”
                Thunder exploded around the Shadekin as the heavens answered Lugh’s call. Lightning struck his blade at intense intervals until it remained in a constant flow and appeared as though Lugh was the source of power.
    The electricity stretched from the sword up through the clouds like a snake squirming to be unleashed. Its radiance flooded everything so brightly that the Oussaneans could see nothing but blackness behind the figures of the Caliphian army.
    The golden irises of the Oussaneans glowed from beneath their dark veils of twilight. Their scimitars and glaives shimmered like thickets of silver willows. They fearlessly charged towards the brilliant aura of the Shadekin. It is said that ignorance is bliss, but on this day bliss was nowhere to be found by ignorance.
                Rotm örder watched the first wave of his Oussanean soldiers charge towards the otherworldly glow of the Shadekin. He beheld Neirym. Her face displayed serene approval of the blood sacrifice.
                Neirym caught Rotm örder’s gaze in her peripherals. She looked at him as though he had gifted her jewelry and handpicked flowers. “Thank you, my lord. A gift for the ages.”
                Rotm örder’s eyes pierced into Neirym’s soul. “Neirym, my sweet angel of death. When all this has come to pass, ye shall know the abyss of my love for thee.”
                Together, they watched the Oussaneans advance towards the slaughter. Rotm örder pitied their misplaced trust in him. It was a much greater prize to be trusted than to be loved, he thought. Trust, after all, is a tyrant’s most useful weapon.
                The first wave of Oussaneans entered the area-effect of the Realm of Somnolence. Their graceful charge slowed into a hypnotic stumble. Every last one of them came to a halt. Their eyes lost purpose and they lowered their weapons. Their minds deserted them and left their bodies exposed to the dentition of the Shadekin.
    Lugh’s eyes burned with electromagnetism.