I spent the points without ceremony.
Two Abyssal Smoke Vials. One Adrenaline Blood-Stimulant. Balance dropped to one hundred twenty.
The items appeared in my hands.
I walked to Kaelen, drove the stimulant into his uninjured thigh, and stepped back.
His eyes snapped open.
He gasped and sat up hard, one hand reaching for a sword that was not there.
The stimulant forced color back into his face, but the damage to his arm and shoulder remained.
"Voss... the Herald - "
"Dead," I said. "But fifty men are waiting at the bottom of the stairs. We leave now. You walk. You do not fight."
Kaelen looked at the ruined doorway, at the rain, at the two women. He nodded once. The shame of his ruined arm stayed in his face, but he got to his feet. He swayed once, caught himself on the wall, and stayed upright.
I lifted Seraphina from the cot and strapped her to my back with the heavy leather smuggling belts. The weight settled against my spine. Her breath touched the side of my neck.
"If I fall, you fall," I told her.
"Then do not fall."
Isolde already held Kaelen’s belt. Black shadow mana gathered faintly at her fingertips.
"The vials will kill all light and most sound," I said. "Isolde calls positions. I clear the path. Kaelen keeps Isolde moving. No one stops."
We stepped out into the rain.
The cold water hit hard.
It washed the last of the monster blood from my coat and ran down the straps holding Seraphina.
The stone stairs dropped steeply into the dark forest below.
Far down, orange torchlight and one bright golden lantern marked the Vanguard line.
I pulled the corks with my teeth and threw both vials.
They shattered in the center of the formation. Black cloud erupted and swallowed the light in seconds. Shouts turned muffled, then almost vanished.
"Move."
We went down fast. The weight of Seraphina kept my center low. Kaelen’s boots slipped twice, but Isolde’s grip on his belt held. The abyssal smoke closed around us like cold water.
Absolute dark. Absolute quiet.
Isolde’s voice came clear and close. "Three paces. Two men. Heavy plate."
I stepped forward and thrust. The shortsword found the gap under a chin. Hot blood hit my knuckles. The man dropped without a sound.
"Left. Spear."
I ducked. The shaft grazed the top of my head. I stepped inside, grabbed the wood, and drove the blade through the man’s chest. Iron Body carried the force through the plate.
We kept moving. Isolde called. I killed. The smoke drank the noise and the light. The Vanguard formation became a scattered collection of blind, deaf men dying one by one.
"Two more on the right. One has a shield," Isolde said.
I shifted.
The shield man came in low.
I caught the rim with my free hand, yanked him off balance, and put the blade through the side of his neck.
The second man swung wild.
I stepped past the cut and drove the point under his arm.
The weight of Seraphina never shifted wrong. She kept her head steady against my shoulder and did not speak. The trust was absolute.
Kaelen’s breathing stayed harsh behind us. The stimulant kept him upright, but every step cost him.
"Five more paces," Isolde whispered. Her voice was starting to fray. "Smoke ends soon."
I stepped over the last bodies and out into the open rain.
The forest around the base of the cliff was quiet. We had cut straight through the center. Behind us the black cloud still held the rest of the knights. Some of them were still shouting, but the sound stayed muffled and distant.
My lungs burned. The straps dug into my shoulders. Seraphina’s weight felt heavier than it should. Rain ran down the leather and soaked through to my back.
Isolde released Kaelen’s belt and pressed one hand to her temple. Using the shadow sense inside the smoke had cost her. Small dark veins stood out under the skin at her wrists for a moment, then faded.
"We are through," Seraphina said against my neck.
I scanned the dark trees. Nothing moved yet. The rain kept falling in heavy sheets. Somewhere a night bird called once and went silent.
Then Isolde’s voice changed.
"The ground. The blood."
I looked down.
The rain should have washed the blood away. It did not. Thick dark streams from the men I had killed crawled across the mud against the slope. They gathered into glowing purple lines, forming a wide geometric circle around us.
A calm voice spoke from the edge of the trees.
"Very impressive, Voss."
Cleric Silas stood at the far side of the circle. Silver staff in hand. No guards. Only that quiet, satisfied smile. Rain plastered his clerical robes to his thin frame, but he did not seem to notice the cold.
"You killed the Vanguard," I said.
"I used them," Silas answered. "The Herald was never meant to finish you. I needed the violence in their blood. You provided it perfectly."
He tapped the staff against the glowing lines. The circle flared brighter. The mud under our boots began to warm.
"Cardinal Vane’s ritual needs an immense quantity of fresh, violent death to crack the first lock on Malzareth. You finished the work for us. Thank you."
I felt the pull of the circle like a hand around my ankles. The blood lines pulsed once, twice.
Kaelen shoved Isolde hard toward the trees. "Out of the circle!"
I grabbed Seraphina’s straps tighter and ran for the edge. The purple light climbed. The earth cracked under the last step.
Silas raised his arms.
"The first lock is broken."
A pillar of corrosive purple energy erupted from the center of the circle.
The force slammed into us like a wall.
I hauled Kaelen with one hand and kept Isolde in reach with the other.
We crashed into the trunk of a rotting pine just outside the glowing boundary.
Bark scraped my shoulder.
Seraphina’s weight yanked hard against the straps.
The pillar burned the clouds above into a sickly red. The corpses of the Vanguard were already gone, vaporized to fuel the breach. The smell of ozone and cooked iron filled the air.
Silas stood unharmed at the crater’s edge, eyes rolled back, jaw unhinged in pure fanatic joy.
"The seal is cracked!" he shouted. "The first lock holding Malzareth is broken!"
The purple pillar shrank, condensing downward into a shifting mass of pitch-black liquid that rose from the crater. It looked like boiling tar. The pressure radiating from it was worse than the Herald. My Iron Body reacted on its own, heat rising under the skin.
Isolde dropped to her knees and clutched her head. "My eyes... the curse... it’s burning."
The black mass twitched toward her voice the moment she spoke.
Silas pointed his staff. "It recognizes the anchor. Let the fragment claim its home!"
The tar shot forward.
I stepped in front of Isolde and raised the shortsword, even though I already knew steel would not cut it.