“My sister,” Kadya said. “I believe you’re mistaken—”
“I’m not.” Siemhouk’s voice was firm. “That’s you.”
“Why would you …?”
“We all have our reasons for doing what we do, haven’t we? You for leading the expedition, and for returning, and trying to hide the demon you carry. I, perhaps, for wanting to free that demon from within you.”
Aric held the sword near Kadya’s throat, ready to strike if need be. “Sheridia …”
“Eleventh from the right, nine rows up,” Sheridia said. “Amoni, Sellis, Myrana, you’re ready?”
“Ready.”
Aric didn’t dare rip his gaze from Kadya. Behind him, he heard the rustle of motion, and then the stone sculpture that Siemhouk claimed represented Kadya began to glow with a yellow inner fire. After a few moments of that, it burst apart, stone flying everywhere. Several templars cried out when bits of rubble struck them, but nobody seemed badly hurt.
Before Aric’s blade, though, Kadya began to change. Her flesh undulated, shifting color, changing texture. It peeled away in long strips, revealing another layer beneath, this one mottled and gray-green and sickly. Her chin grew long, her jaw jutting, the bones of her brow reshaping themselves, bulging out. Stubs of horn pushed through her flesh above eyes that turned yellow-green, and tusks flanked her nose. Tentacles burst from paper-thin flesh.
To the shock of nearly every templar in the plaza, Tallik revealed himself.
Aric had seen the demon before, in visions, so although he was appalled and surprised, he knew more or less what to expect. Siemhouk, too, appeared not to be taken off guard.
“You’re Tallik,” she said.
“I am,” the demon said. His voice was rough, gravelly and sibilant at once, as if leaking out through a rocky passage. He shook off shreds of Kadya’s skin, like they were some web he had walked through.
“You’ve lost your host.”
“Don’t need her,” Tallik said.
“You’ll need a host of some kind, though.”
“For a while, I did. No more. The energy here, the strength … it fills me.”
“It’s not for you to have,” Siemhouk said. “It’s spoken for. But if you’ll swear fealty to me, the one who freed you—”
The demon laughed, showing two tongues. He extended arms and tentacles out toward the templars, then slowly curled them in. He might have been drawing the very life force off the onlookers. As his hands and arms curled toward his sides, and his tentacles rolled up, he began to grow. He was already taller than Kadya had ever been, and broader. But with everyone watching, he gained inches, gained pounds. Before he was done, he towered over Siemhouk and even Aric.
“I like it,” he said, chuckling again. “The power here, it feeds me.”
“It’s not for you,” Siemhouk said again. This time she sounded nervous, and Aric realized they were really in trouble. She had acted like she could control this thing that she had helped unleash. If she couldn’t, then they all might be doomed.
“Whatever I desire is mine,” Tallik said. His voice boomed, echoing off the massive walls surrounding them. He laughed, and his laugh shook the trunks of the agafari trees. “I desire power, so I take it. I desire vengeance, against the world that turned on me, that summoned me here and then imprisoned me, and I will have it.”
Aric held out his sword, but its point was closer to the demon’s waist than his throat.
“Kill the demon!” Mazzax shouted from nearby.
Good idea, Aric thought. If only I could.
The demon extended his hands again, and his tentacles. If he sucked more power from the assembled templars, Aric didn’t want to know how big he would get, how strong.
So far, this plan had not worked as he’d hoped. Any moment, Tallik might start killing, destroying, seeking his vengeance.
With little to lose, Aric stepped forward and sank his blade in the demon’s body.
The sword burned. Aric could barely hang on to the grip, it grew so hot. The demon tilted his head down to look at Aric as if he were an insect, some sort of biting pest he could swat away.
Aric drew the sword out, and saw Tallik flinch. He thrust it in again, through the demon’s waist. Pulled it out before it was too hot to touch.
“I-I’ll start with you, then,” Tallik said. He curled up a tentacle and unrolled it quickly, aimed at Aric. When it hit it would knock Aric from the dais, possibly kill him.
Aric sliced through it, and the tentacle’s tip fell wetly to the dais floor. The rest of it curled away again, regrowing the severed part as it did.
“You don’t like steel,” Aric said. “You were imprisoned beneath tons of steel for all those years, and there’s a reason why. You can’t stand it.”
The demon raised clawed hands and brought them toward Aric.
“Aric!” Sheridia cried, from the ground behind the dais, Myrana by her side. “We’re with you!”
He didn’t know what she meant, but suddenly, his blade glowed, much as the sculpture of Kadya had. Not with the same result in mind, Aric hoped.
He struck at Tallik’s hand. His blade sliced flesh and the demon jerked his hand away.
Heartened, Aric dropped into a defensive position. As long as the demon attacked him physically, he could defend himself. Sooner or later, though, Tallik would launch a magical attack. At that time …
He didn’t want to think about that.
Stab him.
He heard the voice, Siemhouk’s voice. But he heard it in his mind, not through his ears. He had already tried stabbing. It hurt the demon, although possibly no more than it hurt Aric. Steel bothered Tallik, but could it kill him?
Stab him, Aric!
Siemhouk’s voice sounded in his head with more urgency than before. She knew more about this kind of thing than he did. He drew his sword back and Tallik swatted him with the back of his hand.
The blow knocked Aric flying off the dais, into the crowd of templars. He crashed into some and fell to the ground amid a tangle of limbs and bodies. He lay there for several long moments, stunned by the impact of the demon’s huge hand. His sword had been flung from his hand.
Aric shook his head. Blood sprayed from his nose and lips. He touched his jaw, which was tender, and wondered if it had been broken. He held his medallion in his fist, letting the steel give him strength, and he reached toward the sword. It skidded across the stones into his open hand.
The templars didn’t attack him, but they backed away, clearing a space and eyeing him as if he might suddenly go berserk. The real danger, though, was Tallik, up on the dais. He was reaching out to the templars again, drawing their power into himself, growing ever larger. Templars seemed to shrink as Tallik stole their life force. Faces wrinkled, flesh puckered, shoulders stooped. Those who had been young moments before suddenly looked like old women.
Ruhm, Amoni and Sellis clambered onto the dais to stop him, but Tallik batted them away easily.
Then Tallik left the dais, charging into the midst of the templars. He lashed out with fists and tentacles. He squeezed a templar until her ribcage cracked and caved in, tore the head off another, swept a third’s legs out from under her and stomped on her skull when she fell. Templars blasted him with spells, but he simply drank in the magic aimed at him and grew more powerful still.
That won’t work, Aric. Siemhouk’s voice in his head again. She remained on the dais, watching the carnage with a gaping mouth. Only steel can stop him. You must stab him again.
Aric tried to work through the panicking swarm, heading toward Tallik even as templars tried to flee in his direction. He didn’t think Siemhouk’s idea would do anything but get him killed. He didn’t have any better ideas, though. And if Tallik could so easily get the best of hundreds of templars, then he couldn’t be allowed to move through Nibenay and the rest of the world.