The Last Pendragon

Chapter 15

Seeing Lyza lie on the ground with black tendrils of energy consuming her sent waves of pain and rage shooting through Kenji. He and Matt leapt from Kharro’s back as he rejoined the dragons in the sky fighting the Zathran, which had chased them here, attracted by the energy stored in Excalibur.

Mages on all sides attacked them—ice, fire, magical swords, arrows, wind, lightning, and more. Matt dodged most of them and used Excalibur to block the rest.

Kenji held his hands out, drawing the energy out of the rune beneath Lyza until it disappeared.

“Kenji, draw energy from the sigil, now!” Matt shouted. “We’re running out of time!” Spheres of glowing green energy shot toward Kenji, so he vaulted over them and then side-kicked an ice spike back toward another mage. At the same time, he drew the energy out of a giant wall of fire that he wouldn’t have been able to dodge. The heat of the flames touched his skin, but Kenji drained it just before it burned him.

Matt used Excalibur to block spears and arrows levitating in the air. It wasn’t until a strike of lightning hurled toward him that he rolled out of the way to avoid it.

Suddenly, a huge blast of energy exploded through the crowd of attacking Mages. Merlin stood there and behind him, an entire army from Shangri-la charged into the fray. Kenji and Matt met the older wizard’s gaze and he nodded.

Kenji immediately held his arms out and sensed the magic from the invisible sigil in the ground beneath the Vergis’ city square. The energy exploded, sending him flying backward and slammed into him as his body collided against a building wall. Agony surged through his limbs that refused to work. The sigil’s magical energy was so much more powerful here, causing tears to form in Kenji’s burning eyes. Groaning, he struggled to his knees, trying desperately to contain it. It flowed in a wild hurricane around him, so loud he couldn’t hear anything and so thick he could barely see the fight with Merlin against the Mages, or Kharro and the other dragons against the World Eater beyond them.

Screaming as the energy plunged through his body, Kenji mentally grasped as much of the energy as he could and sent it flying toward Matt. Still, that didn’t seem to stop the storm of energy that still surged around him. In fact, the violent energy whipped around him faster, seeming to increase and multiply faster than he could contain it.

Pain tore through him and he felt as if his body was being torn apart. Squeezing his eyes shut, Kenji carefully sensed for every last bit of energy and mentally grabbed it all. It filled his body with agony and viciously electrocuted him. Yet even as his body thrashed, Kenji sent it toward Matt.

Too agonized to move, Kenji collapsed onto the stone ground, barely breathing.

*****

Matt watched as Kharro charged toward the World Eater with a wave of fire breath but it floated over the monster like air. It grabbed Kharro's tail and swung him around and threw him.

As magical energy formed a maelstrom around Kenji, Matt had no time to try to help. A Mage conjured a sword and swung toward Matt. Wielding Excalibur like a katana, Matt clashed with him. The Mage blocked him, but Matt was faster as he darted around the man and stabbed him in the back. Matt barely had time to see Merlin forming a giant cloud of rain and lightning that hailed down onto the Bloods and the Mage who had spoken before. Merlin’s magic broke through their magic shields and three of them fell.

The Mage who had spoken before along with the Bloods’ leader closed their eyes and started chanting in what Matt suspected was a much larger spell.

Magical energy surged toward Matthew from Kenji and he froze, for a moment paralyzed by the agony.

*****

Lyza’s eyes blinked open just in time to see energy surging from Kenji to Matt. In the center, Merlin formed spheres of spiked ice around Norak and Orcho as their spell of sharpened wind spun around Merlin.

Orcho teleported away from the ice-spike sphere, but Norak consumed it and formed it into three massive fireballs.

Meanwhile, Merlin used a spell to make his body transparent and as the last of their wind blades traveled through him, he formed back into a solid again.

Lyza forced her limbs to move, which sent waves of agony tearing through her. She groaned as Merlin and Norak circled each other.

Before she could do anything else, Merlin cast magical energy toward her, which energized her.

“This is your fight, Lyza,” he said.

Norak laughed and threw a wall of electrified earth toward Lyza. Merlin’s energy gave her limbs strength, so she lifted her palms and cast a spell that shattered it and sent the shards back toward Norak.

Just as he formed a shield to block it, Lyza continued attacking him relentlessly. With a war cry, she formed ice spikes and hurled them toward him, followed by several dozen fireballs and surges of lightning. His betrayal and the pain he had caused fueled her anger and empowered her.

Norak could barely block her spells as she sent one right after the other toward him. Before he could react, Lyza punched him in the face, her fists covered in magical lightning.

*****

The rest of the magical energy from the sigil slammed against Matthew in a mighty impact. It surged through his blood and he collapsed, but grasped Excalibur, pressing it against the ground to hold himself upright.

Matt grunted, desperately trying to keep his mind awake. White light clouded his vision, but Matt kept his hold on Excalibur. Excalibur screeched and thundered and the energy viciously rolled through his body in agonizing waves.

He took the agony that the energy inflicted on him and forced it through his empty mind and into where he felt the sword was.

The moment Excalibur took the energy, Matt’s eyes returned to normal, but it felt as if every last bit of his strength was gone. He relied on Excalibur to hold him on his knees, unable to lift the powerful sword as it violently shook with the energy of the four sigils inside it.

As his vision returned, Matthew took in the scene around him.

The evil creature ripped through a building far to his left. Large chunks of it hurled down toward Norak and Lyza; neither of them saw it coming.

At the last second, Lyza dodged it by leaping to the right, but the force of it made her collapse to the ground. Her head slammed against the ground as one of the stone pieces threw Norak on the ground beside her.

Both of them were unconscious, but there was no way to tell if Lyza was alive or dead.

The World Eater clawed Kharro as he tried to use his talons to slice its rounded face. Kharro howled in agony and collapsed on the ground as a silver cloud appeared around him.

Merlin inhaled and his skin flashed a bright blue as he filled himself with magical energy. The cloud around Kharro disappeared and he stumbled backward in his human form, covered in blood. Yet somehow, with Merlin by his side, they stood face-to-face with the Zathran as it roared.

With a groan, Matthew desperately tried to stand up, hands still grasping Excalibur as it hummed.

The World Eater turned its hideous face toward it.

With a wild cry of agony, Matthew leapt to his feet.

Merlin formed a sword for himself and Kharro. They both charged the Zathran head-on as it opened its mouth to swallow them whole.

Matthew threw Excalibur toward the Zathran’s open mouth. Merlin and Kharro darted out of the way. Excalibur slammed against the evil creature as it lumbered forward.

Excalibur shined and the magical energy inside it tore through the monster’s body.

It began to fall.

Lyza stirred from Matthew's right. Kenji was collapsed against a wall across the square, but still in danger.

Matthew used his feet to shove Lyza out of the way as he sprinted toward Kenji.

He collapsed on Kenji as the creature's body tumbled toward them.

*****

Kenji woke just as Matt landed on top of him. The World Eater hurled straight for them, but by the time Kenji blinked, it exploded. Dark energy as black as a starless sky surged in a sphere around them.

Kenji could feel the energy burning everything in its path. Stones from the buildings turned to ashes, bodies of the creatures, even a dragon, and several dozen mages. Merlin’s skin glowed but instantly faded.

On pure instinct, Kenji threw out his hands and drew the Zathran’s energy into himself. Raw agony unlike anything he had ever felt before pounded furiously through his body and his eyes turned coal black. Distantly, he heard someone screaming but he never realized it was him.

“Kenji!” Matt gripped his arm and for the first time, Kenji could actually sense his brother. “Send it to me! To Excalibur! Now! Or it’s going to kill you!”

Kenji tried. He actually tried, but this energy was wild and untamable. No matter what he did, he couldn’t control it.

I’m here… a screeching voice whispered in his mind. Piece by piece, Kenji’s memories faded into darkness, until the World Eater’s image appeared everywhere in his mind.

“M—Matt…” he choked. “Y—you have to…” Kenji lost his voice as the energy viciously whipped between the two brothers.

Matt held out Excalibur. Blue energy burst through the blackness around him for a moment. As the World Eater’s energy spun toward Excalibur, it faded to blue and disappeared.

Little by little, the World Eater’s energy withered away. As the last of it finished consuming Kenji’s body, he collapsed onto the ground. It hurled toward Excalibur, and the sword completely shattered in a mighty explosion.

Everything around Kenji instantly vanished.

*****

Lyza stared in shock as a pulse of magic energy exploded around Matt and Kenji and rolled across the entire hidden island of Vergis. King Arthur’s statue in the center of the square crumbled into dust as the force of the explosion threw Lyza backward. She looked back at the square where they had been and her heart twisted.

The Zathran, Matthew… Kenji… they were all gone.

She screamed in horror and grief and agony, her thoughts in a blur, unable to process what had happened. Her eyes snapped toward Norak who slowly stumbled to his feet. “NO!” Lyza cried out.

Merlin cast a spell to paralyze Norak, who eyed her with a widened gaze in terror.

Breathing heavily with sobs tearing through her body, Lyza lifted her arms and stood over Norak as she chanted in runic. “Betrayer, criminal, death awaits you. I call upon the magic within to end your life.” She threw her hands toward Norak and the spell of death took hold. Without regret, Lyza shot it toward him.

His body collapsed on the ground and instantly turned to ash.

Lyza cried out in pain, not noticing Kharro kicking Orcho to make sure he was dead, as she stumbled backward.

Lyza sobbed and collapsed to her knees where Kenji and Matthew had been.

They can’t be gone, she thought in horror. Her heart constricted and she shook her head, not believing it. They can’t be dead. They can’t be. Not Matthew and Kenji. Their faces passed through her mind, their smiles, and what brief moments she had gotten to spend with them. Stomach twisted, heart clenched, a harsh lump in her throat, Lyza shook her head furiously.

Mages gathered around her and stared at her, Merlin, and Kharro in shock.

Anger and rage gripped her. All of this to save the world to break the curse for Mages who didn’t deserve it.

“T—the curse... has been broken. Ma—Matthew and K—Kenji... gave their lives to save the world from the... The creature. They saved you! They did it to break the curse and now you're free.” Lyza’s voice rose to hysterics. “Are you happy? They're dead!”

Rage and pain consumed her and she screamed unintelligible words, turning her sorrow into sound. She screamed for herself, for the Mages who were no longer her people, and for Kenji and Matt, the two brothers who had become the only family she had. Yanking her hair, she pounded her fists into the stone where Excalibur had once been trapped. Her screams morphed into hysteric cries that slowly died down.

Lyza lost all sense of time as she distantly felt Kharro’s arms pulling her into an embrace. Her mind blanked out and she had no idea how long he carried her or where he took her. Deep inside, she didn’t really care. It was over. Once, that thought would have brought Lyza peace. Now, it only brought her pain.

“What am I going to do now Kharro?” Lyza whispered.

Kharro traced her cheek with his finger. “You’re going to live, Lyza Pendragon. You’re the last of your family bloodline. But you’re not alone. I promise.”

Lyza was the last… The last Pendragon.