Legion of Shadow (105 page)

820

You are thrown against a stone wall, hitting it with force. There is the taste of blood and something wet against your face, as you crumple to the ground, moaning with pain.

‘Look!’

You hear a cry from your left and the sound of booted feet.

Dizzily, you open your eyes, feeling nauseous as the stone chamber spins around you in a blur of colour.

‘They’re bleeding. It looks bad.’

The voice belongs to Nyms. You feel strong arms about your shoulders, helping to support you as you mumble groggily. ‘Where am I?’

You feel a cold palm against your forehead. Struggling to focus, you can make out a white shape. Then there is a flash of white light. You flinch away from it, fearful that you are being
transported once again. But instead, you feel a comforting warmth flow through your body, taking away the pain and restoring your vision.

Lansbury straightens, looking down at you with a petulant expression. ‘What happened?’ she asks briskly. ‘One minute you were there and then . . .’ The medic snaps her
fingers.

With Nyms’ help you struggle back to your feet. Caeleb is watching you from the other side of his room, his helm removed and held under his arm. His eyes are narrowed, his expression one
of distrust. ‘We deserve an explanation,’ he adds sternly. ‘We were about to leave you here.’

You glance over, to see that the anomaly has drifted away to the other side of the room, its sparkling sheen barely visible in the pale light from Lansbury’s staff.

‘I think I moved back in time . . . to the past . . . Wait!’ Your attention immediately shifts to the skeleton of the tomb robber, still lying sprawled amongst the dust and
cobwebs.

‘I don’t understand.’ You frown, walking over and kneeling beside the skeleton. ‘Why hasn’t this changed? ’ You look up at Lansbury, begging for an
explanation. ‘I absorbed the magic. He was a Nevarin.’

The medic shrugs her shoulders. ‘Time is a complex weave – it is not a single thread but many. If your story is true, your meddling may have changed one aspect, altered a single
thread, maybe others, but the weave will still follow its course.’

Nyms blows out his cheeks. ‘I think I preferred it when I was just hitting things. Can we do that again, please?’ Spinning his blades, he follows Caeleb out of the chamber.

You get back to your feet, still frowning. ‘I wonder why he was here – what he was looking for.’

‘We rarely get the answers we seek,’ sighs the medic, prodding the skeleton with the end of her staff. ‘Even less so from the dead.’

Nodding, you give the skeleton a final cursory glance before leaving the room. Turn to
902
.

821

You kick off from the rooftop, spinning and twisting over the glittering sea of bodies, firing bolts of black fire into their ranks. As bodies are blown aside in a rising
crescendo of shrieks and snarls, you come to a perfect landing in front of Avian’s shield. The creatures surrounding him pay you no mind – their black chitinous bodies a chaotic
mishmash of scorpion and spider. Curved, barbed tails pummel against the glowing shield, whilst their giant mandibles spit sizzling globules of venom over its surface, attempting to burn their way
through.

‘No, you must run!’ gasps Avian, his eyes going wide. ‘There’s too many of them!’

With a snarl of fury, you dive into the creatures’ midst, hoping to buy time until aid can arrive. You must fight:

Special abilities

At the start of each round, choose the scarron you will be attacking. If you win, you can roll for damage against that scarron (or multiple scarrons, if you have an ability
that lets you do so). If you lose the round, then your chosen scarron will strike back as a single opponent.

If you manage to survive to the start of the
seventh
combat round, with Avian’s shield still intact (i.e. it still has
health
), then turn to
785
.
(Special achievement: If you defeat all the scarrons before the end of the
sixth
combat round, then turn to
868
). If you are defeated, then you may return to an
earlier point. Restore your
health
, then turn to
885
.

822

At the end of the corridor, another passageway branches to the left, ending in a statue of a knight, his head bowed. In the wall facing you is an open doorway, leading through
into a small high-ceilinged room.

‘Arthurian’s treasure vault,’ you state dourly, stepping through into the cobwebbed space. All of its treasures are now gone, stolen by thieves or by Zul’s minions.

‘This is a dead end,’ growls Caeleb, gesturing to the statue at the end of the passageway. ‘We’ll have to go back.’

‘Hmm . . .’ Lansbury raises her staff and walks forwards towards the knight. Her white light picks out its detailed features – a young man, with a fringe of hair curling out
from beneath a chainmail coif. His eyes are closed, his hands resting on the pommel of his sword. Lansbury leans closer, then reaches forward with a finger, pushing the stone at the centre of the
sword’s guard. There is a click followed by a deep rumbling, as the statue slides back into a hidden recess, revealing a secret archway in the wall.

‘Good find,’ grins Nyms, nodding with approval.

Caeleb shoulders through the group. ‘Let’s finish this,’ he murmurs. Turn to
842
.

823

You follow Nyms, knowing that the swordsman is worryingly outnumbered by the necromancers. However, a blast of black light sears down from the sky, slamming into the ground and
sending you reeling backwards. Another series of blasts pepper the courtyard, spraying you with dirt and black ash.

‘Look to the roof! There’s a ranger!’

Through the rain and dust, you see Nyms cutting his way through a group of shades, summoned by one of the mages. You tear your eyes away, quickly scanning the roof of the tomb . . . as another
blast of black fire hurtles in your direction.

You dodge aside, as the spell rips past you and slams into the stone tablet, leaving a charred fracture running across its base. Turning back to the fray, you notice that the blasts are coming
from a small balcony set above the door of the tomb.

Quickly, you race towards the steps that lead into the building, but are drawn up short when you see that the pillars either side of the entrance are now glowing with purple light, casting a
flickering barrier across the doorway.

There is a cry from behind you. Turning you see that Nyms is now surrounded by shades. Two of the necromancers have already fallen to the rogue’s blades, but the remaining two have now
retreated behind a pillar of stone, summoning further spells to bring down the swordsman.

More blasts tear into the ground; one of which hits Nyms and sends him sprawling backwards into the ash. He is quickly on his feet again, wincing with pain, as the shades rush in to attack.

‘Any help would be appreciated!’ he scowls, slicing his magical blades through the ghostly apparitions.

Your shadow mark courses with dark magic, heightening your senses and bolstering your strength. In an agile blur of cold fury, you charge into the black-robed mages, cutting them down before
they have a chance to retaliate.

Leaping over their smouldering bodies, you hurtle onwards, towards the stone tablet. Its base is now fractured and crumbling; the neat inscriptions broken by zigzagging cracks. Throwing your
strength and magic against the stone you break through the last of its shaky foundations.

You dodge out of the raining rubble, as the immense tablet topples forward towards the domed building. Swiftly, you leap onto its topside and race forward along its length. At the last possible
moment, you kick off from your makeshift bridge and dive through the air – landing agilely on the narrow balcony to face your surprised assailant. Turn to
784
.

824

Ravenwing rallies his men, pushing them deep into the ranks of the shadow spawn. Their dark general has fallen – and already they seem to have lost their edge, their ranks
becoming confused and ill-disciplined. They are no match for Ravenwing’s militia: drilled to the limits of perfection, flowing from defensive shield formations into penetrative wedges of
whirling death in an instant, giving the black guard no mercy, no chance for retaliation.

You are about to rejoin the battle when a deafening boom rips out across the sky, throwing you to your knees. For a moment, you cower, as the noise continues to bear down on you, almost a
physical thing that pummels against your body, throbbing in your ears.

Then black snow begins to fall, settling across the blood-streaked ground. You look up to see that the doom orb is no more – where it had been hanging in the sky, there is now only a huge
black cloud of ash, as big as an entire city.

‘The mages did it,’ you gasp. ‘They destroyed the orb.’

There are cheers from all around you, as the resistance realise that their victory is now assured. For the shadow spawn, it appears they have arrived at a similar conclusion. Shrieking and
wailing, the demoralised rabble turns and runs, scrabbling across the square like a dark plague of rats. Ravenwing’s men are already finding their feet, quickly forming up again and ready to
give chase. If you have the word
rival
on your hero sheet, turn to
858
. If you have the word
companion
, turn to
918
. If you have
the word
apprentice
, turn to
907
.

825

The anomaly’s sparkling strands are almost hypnotic, blurring into intricate patterns of light as they dance before your vision. Mesmerised by its gentle radiance, you
find yourself moving closer and closer, until you are almost touching its glowing, rhythmic form.

Then, in an instant, the web-like strands wrap around you, encasing you in a suffocating prison. There is a scream from somewhere behind you – then you are enveloped in a white light. You
feel yourself falling forwards. Frantically, you put out your hands to cushion your fall, but there is nothing to hold on to – the space is empty, featureless. Then there is a rush of cold
air followed by another flash.

You land heavily on your stomach, the air punched from your lungs. Rolling onto your back, you gasp for air, your whole body trembling.

‘Lansbury?’ you croak.

There is no answer.

Something is wrong . . . different.

As you push yourself up, you realise that you are in the same chamber, but it has somehow changed. It is darker, night time – the rough-hewn walls cut by shadows of flickering torch light.
Rain pours in torrents from the open shaft, the rain glittering as lightning flashes overhead.

You catch the sound of dirt being scraped beneath a boot heel . . .

Agilely, you spring to your feet, your weapons drawn and ready.

In the corner of the room, a figure is watching you. They have one hand around a lantern and the other gripping a jewelled dagger.

‘Who are you?’ he snarls, his voice shaking with anger. ‘Are you more spirits to punish me?’ A peal of maddened laughter echoes around the chamber. ‘Yes, yes. You
are here to test me. Test my faith.’

He cautiously circles around you, a flash of lightning picking out his grime-stained features. The man is thin and wan, clad in a tattered black coat. It hangs open, revealing the faded remnants
of a military uniform. Between his long and ragged hair, you catch a cruel smile.

‘Did you think I would fail?’ he spits with scorn. ‘I am a great man. I was not born to this.’ He holds out his dagger, his hand shaking. ‘I can cut you, yes
– yes. Do you bleed, spirit?’

You glance past the stranger, towards the entranceway in the far wall. It appears to be blocked by something. There is no sign of the skeleton or your companions.