The Stone Sorceress

Chapter 47

Chapter 47

Typhon impaled a troll, who'd endeavoured to bisect their defensive line. The mage was gazing at the rampant demons in the valley when he heard the report of gunfire. Sabriel's long cloak rippled in the breeze as a barrage of bullets broke across hell. The admiral was magnificent with her cutlass next to Skoll, whose roars rose above the demon's cries. A princess uttered incantation after incantation. Shields shone. The 85th planted their feet, and made a last stand.

"There was a fort nearby." Aegis shouted while she pulled her cutlass from a demon's torso. "We won't last on this field."

Typhon knew she was right, "You and Skoll cut a path. Sabriel and I will watch the flanks."

Eros had left them on an open plain, where they had become surrounded. They all knew that they couldn't hold their position, and, as the admiral asserted, there was a nearby fort, where they would stand a better chance. Typhon and the others moved quickly, hewing a path over the corpses of dark creatures.

"Are you alright Aurora?" Sabriel asked as she shot dead the damned rushing the flank.

"Triesto uncantina...." A projectile ricocheted off a shield. "Yes." Aurora looked around at a valley thick with monsters. The green hills and resplendent landscape was now black, dense with demonic fiends, but through the underworld's ranks she saw the fortress. They were close.

Magic illumined the fort when the demons bayed for blood. Aurora's white magic continued to flourish, Sabriel covered the windows, and Aegis and Skoll defended the open doorway. They thought they would hold, seal the tear, stop the purge. The fort was centuries old, but its ramparts were still standing strong. Under its cover the soldiers managed to limit the number of enemy creatures that could attack them at any one time. Hell had been bottlenecked and so five men and women held the entirety of the underworld at bay.

Then a behemoth came. It walked on all fours like an elephant; it was the size of a large house. The beast was covered in purple fur, had burning coals for eyes, and horns like a Triceratops. Its roar sound above all else on the battlefield. It stamped over its own brethren as it made a bee line for the fort, building itself up to greater and greater speeds. When at last it arrived, its fists smashed through walls, it threw the portcullis like a paperweight across the field, and its horns tore open the roof of the building the five hid inside.

The behemoth would not be felled; but they knew they had to stop it because through the breaches it had made, hell had already began to pour in. They were all covered in dirt, and grime when Aurora, fearful for Skoll and Aegis who were almost trampled to death, came to aid them with protective spells; but so concerned was she for them, that she forgot herself. The behemoth spun around, and drove its horn through her.

The chemical reaction in Typhon, set in motion by perceiving Aurora's bloody death, caused a power surge within him. He summoned the rock from beneath the behemoth's feet, which erupted in a column - impaling the cursed beast upon it. Blood showered the battlefield, but he had eyes only for Aurora. Her sanguinary corpse lay lifeless. The princess's pale skin was spotted with blood. Her eyes stared emptily back at him.

The shattered fort had been breached; five were now four. The despairing mage saw his friends fall one by one, until only he remained in the midst of hell. He summoned all his courage for the imminent end, but he was mistaken because it was not his time to die. He saw lights descend from the sky all over the valley, and then, standing over Aurora, he saw Palaestra's killer - Destiny. He was like a Grecian statue cut from marble wearing golden armour and holding a holy sword. He placed his hand over her bloody linen, and revived her. His seraphims did likewise with the others, and then together they fought the underworld.

Ragnarok, the apocalypse, had come to pass. Angels fought demons, a god hacked and slashed through the underworld, and in the middle of all this, Typhon, Sabriel, Skoll, Aegis, and Aurora fought to put an end to the scourge. After hours of fighting, when the valley was filled with the dead, Destiny with a line of angels either side of him, and the five, pushed back the dark creatures that remained. Finally, they cast them back down the waterfall - to hell.

The angels' faces were painted with melancholy. Destiny strode before them. His divine garments were thick with blood - a sadness hung in his immortal eyes.

Aurora said to the god, "Why did you not come sooner?"

Destiny looked at the angels, knowing that he had lost many to the abyss.

"You would have watched from heaven while such evil happened upon Lucretia."

Destiny replied in a commanding baritone, "The world has grown dark. More and more souls descend into hell. Their numbers surpass our own. I wondered why I should sacrifice angels for humans? Humans who have changed so much from how they were made." He looked at each of the warriors around him. "I saw you. You gave me a reason to come."

"Will you stop the devil?"

Destiny looked away, "I once had to face my brother, and so has history repeated itself." A divine pair of eyes concentrated upon Aurora, "Only Eros can stop him now."

Before Destiny left, an angel stepped forward. He gave her permission to speak by a curt nod. She was more beautiful than the others, and she said, "If you see my daughter, tell her that her mother is alright."