Holy Opposites 51

	Toller’s goggles showed him a scene that was turning against him.  He dropped his last smoke pellets and ran for the door into the church.  He spotted two bodies in front of him, directing people away from the fighting, and raised one hand.  “Stone shape!” he cried, dropping a piece of clay at his feet as he ran over the threshold.

	The floor dropped out from beneath him.  He kept charging up the ramp that formed beyond the sudden gap in the floor and leaped over it.  His old heart was pounding.  This would be his chance to redeem himself in the eyes of the Master!  He just had to find –

	Ah, there.  A young girl rounded the corner and spotted him.  Her hands flew to her mouth and she started to scream before Toller’s fist took her square in the face.  She dropped like a stone into Toller’s arms, and he took off out the front door, past the clawing hands of several monks.


	Axio sprinted past the fleeing cultist and reversed direction.  He slammed into the running man’s midsection with a tooth-jarring impact.  The cultist folded, dropping both unconscious children.  Axio snatched up both of them before their heads could hit the ground.  Two more cultists ran by, with nearly a dozen people from the temple in hot pursuit.  Bodies lay strewn around the hillside and garden, most of them unmoving.  The column of black smoke flattened and started bleeding down the hill towards the street below.

	The Paladin set the bodies down and sprinted in the wake of the cultists.  He was unencumbered, but they knew where they were going.  The one in the distant front extended his lead, but the second one slowed as the weight got to him.  Axio followed and narrowed his lead, vaulting over benches and scattering passers-by.  The lead cultist vanished into a building.  Axio gritted his teeth and put on one last burst of speed as the slower cultist stumbled with their weight of his human cargo.

	Axio barreled into the cultist’s back and rammed his hands under the other man’s arms.  He pulled the children out of his hands and kicked his leg forward into the cultist’s backside.  The Baneite stumbled and fell, and Axio was on him.  He set the children down as quickly as he could and lunged onto the man’s back. “You son of a bitch,” he snarled.  He slammed his arm into the cultist’s head and slammed it into the cobbles.  With a loud crunch, the cultist’s nose shattered.  Axio rolled clear and rose to his feet.  The street was dissolving into panic as a handful of cultists ran for the building with the Church of Ryaire hot on their heels.  Some quick-thinking pedestrians had seen the fight and were moving to surround the cultists, but one pushed through the throng with a girl in his arms and made a break for the building.

	A girl with long, pale hair.  Axio’s skin went cold as he saw the man running with his sister Triera in his arms.  “NO!” he screamed, throwing himself through the crowd.

	The cultist ducked his arms and ran into the building.  The fat human kicked the door shut in Axio’s face.  Axio was so far gone in his rage that he simply ran through it, splintering the wood.  He ignored the wave of pain on his face and sighted the fat cultist puffing down a shallow staircase and through the door at the bottom.  Axio flung himself down the stairs and through the door, nearly landing on the cultist.


	Toller felt defeat on his heels.  He couldn’t outrun the vengeful Paladin, but he could still serve the Master.  He summoned the last of his strength into his burning arms and hurled the unconscious girl through the panels of the wardrobe in the corner of the basement.


	Axio screamed in wordless anguish as Triera vanished through a shimmering skein of light.  The light disappeared an instant later.  He grabbed the cultist by the collar and lifted, slamming the man’s back against the stone wall.

	“Where did you send her?” Axio screamed.  “Tell me!”

	“The Master will have her,” the cultist wheezed.  Sweat was running down his arms and chest, and he looked barely able to stand.  “That’s all… you need to know.”

	Axio grabbed the fat human’s neck and squeezed.  Toller scrabbled at the huge hands that were choking the life out of him, but it was like trying to fight the weight of the planet.  “BRING HER BACK!” Axio roared, in a voice that shook the walls.  Divine light and absolute terror alike flashed in his gemstone eyes.  “OPEN THE PORTAL!”

	“Make me,” the cultist sneered as his face turned red.

	Axio dug his fingers into the man’s neck.  Wild, horrible hate flooded his angelic face.  Toller’s fractured mind recoiled from the deific wrath before him.  Before either man could speak, though, a Watch officer came flying through the door.

	“Paladin!  Where did they go?” he demanded, before his eyes caught up with his brain.  “He’s with them?” the Watchman demanded.

	Axio slammed Toller’s head back against the stone wall, knocking him out cold.  “Yes,” he said, and all the rage left his body in a wave.  He sank to his knees and dry heaved as horror flooded in to fill the gap where hate had been.  “They took my sister, Watchman,” he managed, before he collapsed into inconsolable sobs.


Chapter Thirty-One:


	Cavria crouched before Solen, resting a hand on his head.  The ancient cleric had taken a brutal hit in the melee; blood and matted hair covered his hair.  Dreblin and Cadderly were injured but alive, and two of the other friars were badly wounded.  So far, they counted one monk, eight cultists, and seven children dead.  Five children were missing.

	The High Succubus’ blood boiled, though she hid it well.  She hadn’t known the young friar well, but he had been there at dinner tables with her, joined her in prayer.  This was an insult to Ryaire.

	“The children,” Solen muttered deliriously.  “Where are they?”

	“We’re working on it, Solen,” Cavria vowed.  She struggled to keep her temper in check.  Over two dozen children were still present, and they were in no shape to be witnessing her break down.  Some were catatonic, clearly lost to their trauma, while others simply sobbed or paced in anger and fear.

	What kind of horrible, atrocious monster would do this?  She knew the answer, of course.  One such a being had created her.  Bane’s willingness to hurt total innocents as a simple act of spite appalled her.

	She heard heavy footfalls behind her and saw Axio stumble his way up the hillside towards the ruined garden.  Her heart ached as she saw him pause and stare in horror and grief at the ruined garden.  The vegetable patch had burned away from the fallen torches.  The wall was a ruin.  The ground ran red in places.  Worst of all were the little bodies of the victims of the bomb, scattered about, some in pieces.  It was a sight she knew would haunt her for years.  She could only imagine what it was like for the kindly Aasimar.


	Axio wobbled up next to his grandfather and fell into a crouch.  Cavria and Solen looked at him in shock.  “They took… they took Triera, grandfather,” Axio sobbed.  Tears stained his shirt; Cavria could see his hands shaking.  He was even paler than usual.  “They got her.”

	Solen grabbed Cavria’s shoulder and forced himself upright despite the dizziness.  Cadderly looked up from beside them in alarm.  “What?” Solen demanded.  “They got Triera?”

	“They… they threw her through a portal,” Axio managed.  “They threw her through.”

	Cavria clenched her fists.  “This was a targeted attack, then,” she said darkly.  “They knew the children would be here.”

	“And Triera was in the kitchen during the fighting,” Cadderly recalled.  “They had to have looked for her.”

	Axio heaved and nearly vomited.  Pure, animal fear curdled his stomach.  It was bad enough to fight such evil when it was purely theoretical, worse yet when the innocents were clinging to his tabard and begging for him to lead them home, but now… his own sister…

	A strong hand grabbed his chin and forced his vision up.  Cavria’s magically disguised eyes met his and fixed his gaze.  “Listen to me,” she said.  “We are getting her back.  Do you understand?  We are getting her back.”


	Suivi stood uncomfortably in the corner, looking at the carnage.  He had done what he could in the fight, but he was just one man.  He had tripped a few cultists and saved a child from the flailing blows of one monk, but he had taken a few nasty hits himself in all the chaos.  He suspected at least one monk had mistaken him for the enemy.  He watched the family drama play out in the triage corner and gingerly cleared his throat.  “This portal you saw,” he asked carefully, “was it still intact?”

	Axio looked up at him and wiped his tears away.  “Yes,” he managed.

	“But it closed?”

	Axio glared at him.  “I would have pursued him if I could!” he said angrily.

	“Then I should get down there and see if I can figure out where it goes,” the spy pointed out.  “We may be able to follow them.”

	“Go!” Solen said.  He sank back down on the stone and coughed feebly.  For all his power, he was still a very old, tired man.  “Go, find the path.  Let money be no object.”