The Codex Lacrimae: The Book of Tears

Chapter 17: Perdition's Flames

While Grimnir made his final observation, Ríg tried as hard as he could to kill Clarinda Trevisan.

Use Arngrim and strike without mercy, Aurelius! The Codex Lacrimae shouted in his mind, its voice cutting through the shrieking howls of the Singing Sword.

The Norns and Mimir were there when the Codices got cast into Ginnungagap, they were there when Dietrich and Taliesin slew the other Lore Masters and cast my brothers and sisters into the abyss! Ever have the Norns been jealous of the Codices, and ever have they worked to destroy us. Let your sword arm begin our revenge!

"Buon Dio, it's the Codex and a haunted sword," Clarinda grimaced, clearly hearing both the Dark Book's voice and blade's music in her mind. She brought the quarterstaff to block Ríg's overhanded stroke, then flipped the heel of the weapon into his chin.

Ríg stumbled, reeling as much from her riposte as from struggling against the sword. "Get...away!" He managed to say before lunging at her again.

"Urd, run!" the Venetian sea-captain ordered the Norn as, without looking, she spun and swung Gungnir vertically in the air behind her.

Ríg's sword clanged hard against the dense wood of her quarterstaff, and this time it was her turn to stumble sideways against the fury of his assault.

"Go!" the teenage girl urged her mentor. "I didn't let you die at the Well, and you're not dying here, either!"

"You are though, Norn!" Ríg snarled, rushing with the blade. "Anything to stop your constant talking!"

Clarinda hopped backward over the chamber's threshold, and passed into the broad hallway. The evasion gave her enough space to sweep the staff upward, again managing to deflect his sword. The impact shivered through Gungnir, though, numbing the girl's right arm from elbow to hand, but the wood held. She gritted her teeth as he came again, knowing that without the magic of the staff, his strength would have overpowered her from the first strike.

Ríg obviously shared the impression, for he smiled and tried to press his advantage by clutching at Gungnir, trying to wrench it from her.

The move was a mistake he wouldn't normally have made, and a foolish one against as experienced a quarter-staffer as Clarinda. She knew every balancing point possible with that wood.

When Ríg thought he had a secure grip and raised the sword, Clarinda kept a firm grasp and swung around on the other side to kick at his face. She felt a satisfying crunch against his left cheek and he fell back and disappeared.

Clarinda thought that a runeporte had opened beneath the knight, so quickly did he drop from view, but then she saw a shadowed stairwell behind him.

She dashed to the top of the stairs in pursuit, partly hoping that he'd been knocked unconscious by the fall, but also praying that he'd avoided a broken neck. She stopped short, stunned.

A multitude of orcs, Draugr, goblins, skeletal creatures, and Kludden were emerging into a vast chamber from a strange clouded area at the stairway's base.

Ma che diavolo?she wondered. No, not, 'what the hell?' but fromHel! Those creatures are part of the Wilde Jagd, or I'm a marinaio di acqua dolce!

A black-habited nun stood to the left of the smoking, emerald green runeporte. She directed the fiends up the stairs toward Clarinda, but stepped back as Santini's tumble brought him into the very midst of the squad.

Clarinda squinted, sensing something strange about the manner in which the nun's legs swayed and shifted in the grey vapors billowing into the stairwell.