The Parasite

Chapter 26: Stormbringer

Blood dripped to the ground, followed by Solomon's sword as he stepped back. The left side of Jack's body was drenched in shadow as he stood hunched over. "Oh there you are." he said as he turned to face Solomon. Solomon could feel the blood racing through his veins as he clutched his decapitated arm, his hand still clutching the sword as it lay on the floor. "I might not be the greatest leader of all time but I just might be clever enough to beat you."

As Solomon backed up toward the machine he suddenly heard a deafening crash from behind him. Turning around, Solomon saw a number of tree branches tearing apart the machine as Henry emerged. "Guess who's back, scumbag!" he shouted as he stepped down from the pile of scrap metal. "Your plan's up in flames and the guild's in shambles, if you ask me you should give up now."

Solomon stemmed the bleeding in his arm and stumbled back into the wall as he attempted to come up with a scheme that would get him out of his predicament. Through a complex mixture of emotions, Solomon felt in a way that defeat was inevitable, although he didn't want to accept it, he looked around searching for an opening, trying to find a way out, until seeing that Henry had let his guard down. Suddenly the wall behind Solomon opened up allowing him to fall into it before closing up again, and just as quickly Solomon emerged from the wall behind Henry and thrusted at him with another sword. The blade pierced through Henry's wooden shoulder, pushing him forward slightly before Henry turned around and grabbed onto Solomon with his wooden approximation of a hand, throwing him across the room.

Solomon slammed down on the other side of the room, near the entrance to the attic. For a brief moment he laid on the floor, realizing that he no longer had any chance of fighting after such a violent change in the momentum of the fight. He had gotten cocky, let his guard slip in his confident hubris for just a moment, only for that one moment to end up killing him. Solomon stood up and turned to the attic entrance, he walked over to see the grand staircase leading up to it that had formed when the mansion was moved. At the bottom of the stairs the last remaining guilders fought back the horrible abominations that had come from the walls as others barricaded the doors, keeping the burning corpses out. With a wave from Solomon's remaining hand the abominations fell limp, and behind him Jack limped forward. "Jack you-"

"I'm not dying here you idiot!" Jack snarled as Henry tried to stop him. Shambling forward Jack came up behind Solomon and in a raspy mocking voice he said "Now, I know it can be hard watching everything you've worked for go to waste, believe me." Jack coughed as he straightened his back and lifted his sword off the floor. "But I'm afraid that's where my sympathy ends." Henry noticed as Jack pulled back the sword and dashed forward yelling. "No wait, we need him alive!" The sword plunged through Solomon's back and out of his chest, before Jack ripped the sword out, spraying blood and sending Solomon tumbling down the stairs as Henry stopped at the precipice.

"What exactly do we need him alive for?" Jack asked as he stamped his sword back into the floor, using it to steady himself. "We needed someone who can get all those guilders under control." Henry said as he watched the guilders regroup at the bottom of the stairs. Jack shrugged. "Can't be harder than convincing a bunch of gangsters to follow you, I'll just do what I always do and run this place myself." Henry looked at Jack with some concern. "In the state you're in?"

"State? What state? We haven't even left the city!" Jack shouted. Henry paused, realizing that trying to caution Jack would only lead to frustration. "Well, do you feel better?" He asked as he looked down at Solomon's slumped corpse. "I'm blind and crippled, not to mention the rest of me has seen better days, and I've still got work to do." Jack said, standing at the top of the stairs with dozens of surviving guilders looking up at him. Henry stood in silence as he considered what he would do next. "So you're gonna stick around here?" Henry asked, turning to look at Jack. "Don't make me repeat myself, that is my first order as the leader of the newly reformed Mages Guild of America. Oh-uh, what about you?" Jack grinned as he spoke, turning to Henry to stare at him with hollow, crusted pits instead of eyes. "Eh, I'm gonna go hit the road, I found what I was looking for so there's no real reason for me to stay around here." Henry walked down the stairs, away from Jack who's curiosity got the better of him. "What was it you found anyways?" he yelled down to Henry. Henry simply waved and said. "I finally found the truth, only took a few years."

As Henry passed Solomon's corpse on the stairs, one of the guilders put together what had happened between the three people in front of him. The guilder charged forward, freezing the air around his hands into razor sharp ice sickles. In one swift motion, Henry tangled the guilder in thorny vines before flinging him to the side. Henry looked down at the guilders and sighed. "Listen, your old leader is dead, the guild itself is a sinking ship, and no one is ever going to trust you again. If you don't want to turn into a bunch of fugitives it's best to stay together, or you can all kill each other, I don't care either way."

The guilders were silent, none of them knew what to do as the revelation of the guild's true nature was as much a shock to them as it was to everyone else. Henry marched past the crowd and left through a window over the barricaded entrance without another word, leaving Jack and the guilders behind to figure things out by themselves.