The War Without End – Episode 1.4
Ebon accepts Marann’s call for a truce and then trembling with barely contained emotion he drops to his knees to help Blanca. She is soaked in her own blood, her breath rattles in her throat. There is nothing that can be done for her.
At first Ebon is angry. “Is this the will of Pholtus?” he cries out “Pholtus the righteous… the just? Is this what he calls justice?” but then his rage turns to sorrow and he begs “Please… Please don’t let her die”
Almost in reply a pale blue glow begins. It is not clear where it emanates from but it expands out around Ebon and Blanca and once it subsides she is physically healed, though she still cannot be roused.
Shilaze examines Blanca but whatever is wrong with her is beyond her skill. She tells Ebon that they must get Blanca back to the Fortress of the Second, but first there is still Marann to deal with.
“Go” Shilaze tells Ebon “finish your battle, I shall keep your sister safe within my care.”
While all this has gone on Marann has been on his knees praying. Ebon waits for him to finish. After a few minutes more Marann rises to his feet and declares, “Apostate, you and your sister are to be brought to justice. That is the will of Pholtus. Do you yield?”
“We will not yield” Ebon replies resolutely “We have done nothing wrong. If you believe this glaive that I hold to be an icon of the Church then you can have it, but my sister and I stay here”
“The glaive is immaterial” Marann dismisses impatiently, “It is the crimes of the unfaithful that must be answered for… To arms”
And so the battle begins again.
Initially Shilaze holds back to protect Blanca as she has promised and leaves Ebon, Kai, Korbin and Massingleigh to face Marann, Marann’s two hounds and the two remaining Enforcers. However it soon becomes apparent that Massingleigh and Korbin have been bewitched in some way and are unable to take any significant part. As a result the fight swings in the Enforcers’ favour.
Though Ebon badly injures one of the Enforcers causing him to withdraw, he himself is wounded and is hard pressed to defend himself from further harm. Meanwhile Kai keeps the opposition off balance by tripping them with his spiked chain, but Marann counters by expertly protecting himself with his Tower Shield.
Seeing her friends in trouble, Shilaze gently rests Blanca down and joins the fray. The battle swings back in the friends favour.
After a short while Marann surveys the scene once more and seems to determine that the fight is slipping away from them. He orders his men to withdraw. Not wanting to prolong the fight the friends let them pull back.
“Apostate, is your resolve strong enough to face the faithful of Pholtus in single combat?” Marann challenges.
Ebon is severely wounded and can see that Marann is attempting to manipulate the situation in his favour, but he is not willing to back down. He gestures to the blood that seeps between the plates of his armour. “It is hardly a fair contest when I am injured and you are unharmed”, he snarls.
Fortunately Shilaze is also wise to Marann’s tactic and, to the Enforcer’s consternation, starts to heal Ebon with a Wand of Healing while the two men face each other ready for the duel.
“No matter” Marann declares haughtily “Pholtus will shield me from harm. Ultimately justice will prevail”
When Ebon is fairly well healed, Shilaze withdraws and a lengthy combat ensues. The two men probe each other’s defences for some time, attack followed by riposte. Blows are parried or dodged. They weave around the crates in the warehouse, testing each other out.
For a long time it appears to be a stalemate but gradually the power of Ebon’s attacks begins to wear Marann down. The duel starts to slip away from the Enforcer. Ebon offers him the opportunity to surrender but he refuses to yield. Finally Marann is too slow to block a mighty swing of Ebon’s glaive. It deflects off the top of Marann’s shield and embeds itself in the side of his head with a sickening thud. He falls to the ground dead.
Ebon steps back, he is troubled by what he has had to do but he was given no choice.
“Take the body of your leader. We have no quarrel with you”, he offers to Marann’s men.
“Be gone Apostate, your presence offends us” one of the remaining Enforcers retorts, before turning his back and leading the others in a hymn to Pholtus.
Blanca still cannot be roused. With little else that they can do the friends withdraw. They start to make their way back toward the Fortress of the Second. Smog closes in around them and rain falls steadily from above.
After they have been walking for some time, a pale blue glow flickers from a doorway up ahead. A figure leaps out and then sprints past them down the street. The figure is pursued by a huge beast, a scaled worm-like creature with tiny wings. Some might recognise it as a Remorhaz.
The creature comes toward them, bearing down on a woman and her child who are in the street ahead. Without hesitation Massingleigh runs to protect them, but with fearsome savagery the creature attacks, ripping into his flesh and tossing him aside. Fortunately the distraction, though short-lived, is sufficient to allow the woman and her child to escape.
Korbin throws a vial of Alchemist’s Fire and Shilaze charges in. Valiantly she stands alone before the Remorhaz.
Ebon is desperate to aid his friend but he is carrying Blanca and is unable to do so until Kai notices his predicament and offers to look after her.
Allowing Kai to take Blanca, Ebon joins Shilaze facing the Remorhaz. Together the two warriors quickly vanquish the creature. Shilaze plunges her sword deep into its thorax and Ebon follows up with a massive killing blow that cleaves its body in two.
Getting Massingleigh back on his feet they slip away into the smog, hurriedly leaving the scene to avoid the approaching Hardheads. They reach the Fortress of the Second without further incident.
When they arrive, they are met by Zorak Mephston another new member of the tribe. Seeing Blanca, Zorak expresses his concern and goes off in search of a healer.
Later, as Ebon is watching over Blanca waiting for Zorak to return, Heiron enters. To Ebon’s surprise the wizard obviously recognises Blanca. Heiron tells Ebon that Blanca is his sister by blood and also a member of the second tribe. Heiron does not know why but, unlike Ebon, when the Hallam approached her two years ago she declined.
Heiron also intimates that he knew their mother but will say little more of her or their father before they are interrupted by Zorak returning with Derioch Ysarl of the Bleak Cabal.
Derioch carefully examines Blanca and then soberly declares that whatever ails her cannot be easily cured. For the time being at least the best that can be done for her is to take her to the Gatehouse where the Bleak Cabal can look after her. Heiron reassures Ebon that Derioch can be trusted and so Ebon agrees to put Blanca in the Cabal’s care.
Meanwhile Shilaze has been out to apologise to the clerk for them breaking his window a couple of days before. Tragically, as a result of that act the shop has been broken into and ransacked. The owner is now destitute. Shilaze promises to help him get back on his feet by paying the taxes that are due in the morning.
The next day, after Shilaze has helped the shopkeeper, she returns to the Fortress of the Second to find Quelane, a Hand of Heironeous, waiting for her there. Quelane, who is a member of “The Shining Blades of Heironeous”, the Eighth tribe of the Med-Jai, has come at Heiron’s bidding to speak to Shilaze about her future with the Med-Jai.
Notes:
First appearances of Zorak Mephston (Bob Hoskins), Derioch Ysarl (Zoe Wanamaker) and Quelane (Angela Bassett)
A couple of days after this episode Ebon encounters a Wild Elf called Tharviol (Christian Slater) who is the mysterious archer from Episode 1.3. Tharviol maintains that he owes his life to Blanca and that his sole aim is to protect her from harm.
Unbeknownst to the others, Ebon also follows up on his conversation with Heiron and asks the wizard again about his mother and father. To Ebon’s surprise Heiron reveals that it was his own daughter Grisa who made the difficult decision to send her children into hiding when they were very young, in order to protect them from the enemies of the Med-Jai. Grisa is Ebon and Blanca’s birth mother, and they have a half-sister called Grae whom neither of them knew about. Heiron is their grandfather.
Heiron also gives Ebon a magic locket that contains a message in the form of a holographic image of Grisa. The image of Grisa tells the three children that she loves them and is heart-broken to have had to part with them. Grisa updated the recording every time she went out on a mission for the Med-Jai in case she did not return.
