'The Battle of Devil's Tomb' by Matthew T. Summers

“It’s over.”  The words were matter-of-fact, without any fear in them.  A final resignation imbued the words from the castle steward.

“It does appear that way, does it not?”  Sadly, the king looked down from his fortress onto the waves of fighters below them.  For eons, the war had raged between the humanoid races and the demonic races; now, they were reduced to one small bastion of resistance, one tiny group of humans facing overwhelming odds in one last attempt for survival.

The castle had been magically carved into the side of a white marble cliff, with the only access being a thin bridge carved from stone.  The bridge span over a majestic crevice known as Devil’s Tomb… an ironic name, the king mused, as now the Castle of Devil’s Tomb would become mankind’s tomb as well.

For the demons had found them.  Humanity had always had one fatal flaw that the demons knew they could exploit; greed.  Offer a person enough money, and they’d betray even their blood race for it.  And it had only taken one…

The mages were doing what they could to stem the tide, of course.  But magics were draining on the mind and soul; mages had to rest.  Fighters had blades of enchanted steel, forged by the now-extinct races of Dwarves and Elves; but men had to sleep sometime.  Demons did not.  A demon could run from one end of the continent to the other, without pausing for food, water, or rest.  And therein was the final underlying facet to their constant victories…

For the humans were, for all their accomplishments, only human after all.  Even now, the demons had reached the front gates, and were demolishing the haggard forces guarding them.  Every human that fell took six or seven demons before he died, but thousands more remained behind, even more that hadn’t even yet crossed the damnable bridge to reach them.

Time was the only factor now.  The king looked to the blackened skies, and did something he hadn’t done for many, many years… a quick prayer to the only gods he knew still remained.  All the peaceful gods had been hunted down by the demon gods… only the gods of war and famine still existed. 

And considering their plight, the king focused his prayers to the gods of war.  Famine could do nothing at this stage of the game, but perhaps War could at least give them more of a fighting chance…

A sudden lull in the fighting caught his attention, and he looked down to the battered front gates.  Humans and demons alike were staring toward the sky, a mixture of blood lust and fear mingling with, of all things, an aura of awe and admiration.  Confused, the king’s gaze followed that of the warriors…

And gaped in shock as a flying steed soared over the pillars of the castle, with a rider astride the magnificent stallion.  The beast was jet black with eyes of fire, and its wings were easily the span of ten prone men.  Each stroke of those powerful wings sped the beast and rider away, propelled faster than even magic would be able to do.

The rider was a female from her lithe frame, and she was garbed in a magnificent suit of armor, the likes of which none had ever seen.  The little light that was afforded by the hateful sky reflected off of the metal with an almost audible sigh of joy.  But what grabbed the onlooker’s attention the most was the weapon she wielded.

A lance of solid steel, obviously enchanted by the glimmering aura that surrounded it, and beautifully carved and engraved with multiple colored gems of unknown value.  She hefted the lance with ease, obviously comfortable both with the weight and the usage of such a magnificent weapon.  Engraved on both the lance and the chest armor of the woman was a single crest, that of a baker’s muffin. 

For a long, eternal moment, the steed came to a rest on the castle walls as the woman spared the king only a single glance.  Then, with a battle cry in a language no one understood, the horse and rider were off, plummeting toward the demonic forces.  The lance was brought to bear immediately, the tip pointing the exact impact that could be expected.

The first wave of demons perished almost immediately, their blood-red bodies exploding upon almost any contact with the metal of the lance.  The rider had merely to swing it around her, and demons would vanish in gouts of blood and gore.  The steed fought as well, incinerating anything close to it with gouts of magical fire from its eyes.  If any strayed behind and attempted to attack from another direction, the beast would slam the demon with one of its wings, shattering bones and splitting skulls with the force. 

Renewed and inspired by their sudden savior, the humans followed down the path the strange woman carved from the host of demons surrounding them, fighting any that survived the wrath of the mighty warrior.

Within a matter of minutes, ground that had been lost gradually over the course of weeks had already been reclaimed.  The demons began to retreat, none wanting to come anywhere near the horse and rider.  Finally, the demons had been pushed back to the bridge, and the woman was forced to dismount.

The demons on the bridge tensed, knowing she could not wield her lance on the confines of the stone span… but undaunted, the woman pulled a sword that appeared to have been made from the darkest midnight stone.  Somehow, the light around her bent toward her, as if pulled by an irresistible force into the blade.  After a few more words to her steed, the woman charged onto the bridge and began the chaos anew.

For a few minutes more, it seemed that the tide had indeed turned into the hands of the humans.  But one of the mages took an arrow just as he was releasing a might bolt of lightning, and his dying hands could not control the ball of electricity.  The lightning slammed into the mighty winged steed, which let out a cry of pain unlike any had heard before.  For the briefest of heartbeats, the beast stood, still regal and proud; then, unceremoniously, it dropped to the ground, twitching in its throes of death.

The fighting stopped on both sides of the bridge, and the woman turned her back to the demons without a care.  Her eyes took in the sight of her dead steed, and even the wind held its breath.

The world paused as time ticked inexorably forward, until the woman shook her head sadly.  Her voice rang out, clear and precise.  “I came at the will of the gods of war, and this is how you repay them.  I fight for your forces, I slay those who would eradicate you, I shed the blood of your enemies.  For this, you have killed my friend and solemate.”

She turned back towards the demon forces, which were staring at her in utter fear and horror.  “However, I must do as the gods command; I will save you from the demons, forever.  No demon will be able to reach you again for as long as a single human is alive.”

She raised her sword, which began to shake as she uttered words to an incantation so ancient, even the stones had forgotten the language.  With a final scream of war, she sliced the blade down, cutting through rock and stone as if they were water.  The stone bridge rocked with the impact, the magic from the spell shattering its foundations and collapsing the structure almost immediately. 

With a massive crash, the bridge began its descent into the depths of the Devil’s Tomb, taking demons, humans, and the warrior alike with it.  A cloud of dust and debris obscured the light for a time, and when it was clear again, the effects of the spell came into clarity.

The demons, which had no ability to fly, were on one side of the gorge; the humans, also bound to the land, were trapped on the other side.  With food and water supplies already severely diminished by the siege of the castle, the warrior’s words rang true.   She had ensured that no demon would reach the humans while the humans survived; by the time they would be able to cross the Devil’s Tomb gorge again, the humans would have long since died of starvation and water deprivation.

The gods of famine do not like being ignored.