The Demon Lord Is An Angel
Chapter 313: Meting Out - Dismissal

Chapter 313: Meting Out - Dismissal

With the Gales added to their number, the five of them set out after a long rest.

Azalee slept a bit longer as Bowbo let her ride atop his head. It didn’t seem to discomfort him at all, given his neck was wider than his skull, if he even had one. Amarena had never much looked into sloth demons... and most demons never did, for that matter.

They were too tough to kill for the same amount of mana one could get out of lesser-demons. As far as she knew, no nothrotian had ever evolved past their post-imp state, which was where Bowbo was.

Halie seemed oddly happy despite the presence of her most obstinant stalkers - though to be fair that was a relationship she had caused by delaying them for so long. She even engaged them in conversation.

"I had a daughter... over a century ago. Perhaps not as talented a mage as she wanted, but she was quite the actress, which is rare amongst giants."

"Where is she now?" Brigit asked.

"Norneau, keeping an eye on a certain criminal. Enny and I last spoke... almost twenty years ago now. I would have liked to apologize to her for what was said." Halie chuckled ruefully. "Stubborn, stubborn girl."

"Sounds like our boy," Brigit acknowledged.

Amarena’s eyebrows knitted together. She was about to ask a question when Darlae suddenly shouted, "Everyone... we have a problem!"

Hurrying to the crest of the hill Darlae was on, Amarena beheld a massive battle underway.

At the edges of the city’s shield, which went past the walls and into the ground, Valrian Knights and guards did battle with demons... and the Isegartians were losing.

A steady retreat was mounting towards the gate, with the Knights for the most part holding the demons at bay as they fought for every backward step.

The army was set to encircle the entire arc of the city, with larger demons waiting in the wings for their chance to approach the walls. At the very center of the army, a massive platform was borne aloft by a half-dozen large demons, and atop it stood a tall, regal-looking demon of a type Amarena didn’t recognize, but whose sheer depth of rich, black mana could only belong to one man...

Kainur Satanos... the Black Star of Pride.

Even Kir’s father did not have so much power...

Halie straightened her back, took a deep breath, and sighed out.

"Wives Gale... Amarena... I must admit, I have lied to you."

"What?" Amarena exclaimed.

"Though it has cost me my honor, I have delayed the right of your justice," she admitted to the Gale wives. "Though it has cost me my integrity, I have made you think you were weak when you were already strong," she said to Amarena. "The purpose of our journey to Hotterton was not simply to see proper justice done... it was to lure the three of you to here... to now."

"What are you saying?" Darlae asked, drawing her battlestaff.

Halie drew a scroll out of her storage. "The answers you seek, and more, are written here. You will find they match the scroll you gave Amarena when you returned from retrieving the shard of her mother’s soul."

The Gales looked at Amarena, their eyes accusingly heartbroken.

"I didn’t show it to her! I swear!"

"You need not have," Halie said. "I knew the questions before we even met. I was told what to expect, who to expect, and where I should go to see things through... what I should do." Halie stored the scroll. "Wives Gale, I forfeit the duel that was owed, but in exchange, I charge you with one last quest."

"Now hold on-" Darlae raised her voice.

"I am speaking!" Halie shouted over her. "Do not deny me my final words."

Darlae bit back her emotions and waited, and Amarena realized she’d put hands to her swords, ready to defend her teacher.

"Kainur Satanos is here. Centuries ago, for killing his son, he destroyed Valria... though the Angels also had a hand in that. In six days’ time, the walls will fail. When that happens, I shall battle Kainur... and fall."

Amarena’s heart caught in her chest. The idea of Halie dying was terrible to her, even if her teacher had lied to her for years, she had also made her much stronger in both body and mind.

"Before that happens, I will send you as far as I can. Get to Norneau, and warn the Valrians there that a second Sundering is at hand. Do you accept this charge?"

The Sundering referred to the destruction of Valria when it was an empire... when the Knights first rallied to preserve what was left... What would they have to rally to if Isegart fell?

Brigit answered her. "We’ll do it if you give us the scro-" Before she could say the last word, a portal opened up underneath her, depositing her in a green field bathed in golden light.

"Bri!" Darlae raised her weapon and got two steps closer, but fell through her own portal a moment later, landing next to her wife.

Halie had just turned to Amarena when their other companions spoke.

"That looks like fun," Azalee said.

"Can Bawbo go? That grass looks yummy."

With a flick of her wrist, Halie sent them down, and Amarena finally saw that she’d put the portal through the ground underneath the pair, which resulted in a small cascade of frozen dirt.

Halie let out a breath. "My apprentice... I am truly sorry for deceiving you. The key to mastering your power has been with you all along." Halie reached, and Amarena let her draw the soul stone out from under her breastplate. "You are more than strong enough to survive this."

"What could be worth your honor and integrity?" Amarena asked.

"The future," Halie said. "The world is about to end, and times harsher than any before lie in wait. I was shown this by an Oracle... as well as the path to our survival."

"The Valrians?"

"Everyone." Halie took a long breath. "What’s happening in the sky is the result of an imbalance that has gone too long without correction. A doom no one remembers because the evil that started it was so long ago... a time older than the names of Heaven and Hell..." she shook her head. "Compared to survival, the life one woman... everything I hold dear... even if it were only the Valrians who died, I would call that a bargain. I don’t have enough time to tell you... but if you bring him here, one day you will have answers."

"Him?"

"Kir. He will save those who shelter in the citadel when I cannot. Something of the Knights will remain, and one day, you will lead them."

"You want Kir to kill Kainur Satanos?" Amarena asked. Kir was strong, but strong enough to challenge a Duke that considered him a threat? Suddenly she felt Halie start to flex her power.

"I will handle Kainur. I need Kir to kill... me..."

The light sensation of tearing was all the warning Amarena got as Halie held onto her mother’s heartstone, letting her apprentice drop into the same field as their companions.

"Halie!" Amarena shouted as she fell.

She landed on her back, her eyes locked onto the sad face of the woman she’d never really gotten to know. She saw as Halie reached up, and stabbed the shard into her forehead. Rippling, dark veins began to crawl down her body, and her already giant form began to grow and strain, breaking free of her armor as it failed to contain her...

And then the portal closed, and she was left staring at the sky... at the moon of Hell, with its wide-open eye, glaring through the film of smoke whose wisps could be seen like shimmering tendrils reaching out for Ayther.

"Where are we?" Azalee asked as Darlae helped Brigit to her feet.

"South, that much is certain," Brigit said. "Ugh, I left half of our things in that city..."

"Nothing we can’t live without," Darlae said. "Though it would have been nice to have some riding raptors."

Amarena looked around, spotting mountains to the north. She searched until she found one familiar-looking peak.

"We’re somewhere around Lakebarrow... I think."

"That would put us only three or four days from Norneau if we hurry. We can use the Guild teleporter in Montmorency," Brigit calculated.

"I brought our gold with us, but I don’t think I have enough for five people. The city certainly won’t let a demon in, even if the Adventurers Guild would let us transport him," Darlae added.

"I won’t abandon a child out here," Brigit said.

"I wasn’t suggesting it, I just meant that if we can get Bowbo into the city, we’d need to get into the guild and out on the teleporter fast."

By now, Amarena knew the Gales well enough to know that they would stick to Halie’s request out of pure stubbornness if nothing else. They were women who ultimately played by the rules, even if just their own, and no doubt they also wanted to see their son again after so long...

She found herself missing Kir, too. Dreading the idea of watching him kill her teacher...

Shaking the thought out of her head, Amarena let out a harsh, guttural scream that stopped the Gales’ conversation.

It was a scream that acknowledged that the time for justice was past.

That the time of survival was hers to ward.

And there was only one rule to survival.

One rule that had been held sacred by her mother, Leviathan, and all of the Wrathlands.

The rule of the strong...

She needed to be strong.