Lost in Phantasm (Merlin Fanfiction)

Part 14: "One Last Snatch"

The minute Merlin left his back, Bandiras wheeled about and uttered a loud shriek that carried far over the noise of the crowd. Having done this, he bore down into the fray with his sharp horn at the ready. Arthur focused his energy to protecting his mount and himself on all sides, swinging his sword and slashing away at the Underworlders.

High above the fray, Merlin struggled against the clutches of the bat. The beast held him by the chest, its claws tearing at his sides. Pierson, meanwhile, had purposely directed the bat to do so, for it put him at a perfect vantage point to reach the Chain hanging around Merlin's neck. The young warlock was forced to ignore the pain in his sides and push away Pierson's grasping hands with his own.

"Give it to me," Pierson rasped, sounding like the old man he should have been. "It's mine!"

The gyth glinted in the sunlight as the bat wheeled again. Merlin fought waves of torment as he narrowed his focus to one objective: get the gyth while Pierson was distracted by the Chain. He waited till Pierson overcompensated and leaned too far over the side of the bat, and twisted alongside the bat's neck. His fingertips came in contact with something hard, and he pulled.

At the same instant, a shriek erupted right next to Merlin's head—but it was not the bat. It frightened the bat, so that it released Merlin suddenly, and he fell, screaming, still clutching the object, right onto the waiting back of a gryphon! It took a few seconds for Merlin to comprehend what had happened.

"Kharrah?" he gasped.

She crowed in greeting. Merlin looked up to see Lily, Caleb, and a host of other Phantasmians—fairies, gryphons, dwarves, and unicorns—falling upon the enemy.

Merlin glanced at the object he had taken from Pierson: a small flask. Kharrah banked like she was going to dive into battle.

"No!" Merlin cried, "Get the bat! Pierson still has the gyth!" Kharrah obediently charged for the offending beast.

Arthur cheered wildly when the reinforcements came. He was so amazed to see the two giants taking on the Cyclopes, the gryphons falling like furry harbingers of death upon the minotaurs, and the unicorns charging at the ogres while the fairies served as a very painful and pervasive diversion, that he almost failed to see the werewolf charging straight for Bandiras' left flank. Reacting as swiftly as he could, Arthur swung his sword and parried in time to prevent any lasting damage to the unicorn, but the wolf caught the force of the blow and turned it back on Arthur, throwing the young knight from his mount.

Arthur dropped his sword as he fell, but it landed right next to his hand. He had just enough time to grab it while Bandiras turned upon the wolf, stabbing it deep in the flank. The wolf threw back its head and howled, seeming to stretch out in the same moment. When Arthur blinked, there stood before him a large, strong man covered in thick dark hair, with blood dripping from a wound in his leg. The man snarled at Arthur as it grabbed a rapier from a fallen goblin. Arthur barely had time to put up his guard before the werewolf lunged, point at the ready.

The swords crossed, but Arthur, as the more experienced swordsman, readily assessed all the ways he could use his adversary's fury and weight versus the flimsy, fragile rapier as weapons in his own favor. He pushed back only slightly, to allow the werewolf to increase momentum, then he wrested out from under him, intending that the large man should stumble forward and break his own blade in the fall. 

That, at any rate, was the intent. When it happened, the werewolf was very close to Arthur, close enough to heave a breath laced with the stench of rotting carrion in his face. Arthur staggered before the breath, and could not throw himself away fast enough. The werewolf stumbled over the top of him, and Arthur just barely seized his chance to slip his sword inside the man's ribcage, killing it as it fell. His ploy succeeded, but now he was trapped under the body of the dead werewolf. Push as he might, he could not move an inch. He could only wait and hope that Merlin succeeded in his own venture.

Merlin and the gryphon tumbled about in midair, locked in combat with Pierson and the vampire bat. The Chain flopped around Merlin's neck as Kharrah banked and wheeled. Pierson fought to bring the two animals head to head, so that he would be close enough to grab the Chain from Merlin's neck. Finally, he got his wish.

Kharrah flew in close and attached to the bat's body with all four claws, rending and tearing without mercy. The bat ceased flying to scratch back with its wing claws, hanging the entire weight of itself and two humans on the strength of Kharrah's wings. 

Merlin and Pierson were so intent on wrestling each other for their respective pieces of the Phantasmagyth that they did not notice how much Kharrah was dipping until Merlin nearly got a minotaur's mace in his face.

"One more go, and then we have to pull away, Kharrah," he called in her ear.

Pierson was too busy scrabbling for the Chain to realize what Merlin was about to do.

"One, two—three!" Merlin put every ounce of strength he had into a desperate lunge for the gyth, and the instant his hand closed around it, he yelled, "Go!"

Kharrah released the mangled bat, and Pierson with it! The trouble was, Merlin did not realize until too late that Pierson had a hold on his jacket. The jerk when Kharrah pulled away was sufficient to release that hold, but not before it pulled Merlin halfway off the gryphon's back. He fell, shortly after Pierson, and the gyth bounced out of his grasp.

"No!" he gasped, and hit the ground hard. Merlin had only struggled to his knees by the time Pierson was out from underneath the dead bat and stumbling toward the place where the gem lay. Desperate, Merlin seized a goblin rapier and lunged with all his strength at Pierson, catching him across the thigh.

Pierson collapsed just inches short of his goal. Merlin pushed himself just a bit further and nicked Pierson on his outstretched arm.

"No!" Pierson howled like a wounded animal. He tried to reach out with the other hand, but by then Merlin was on his feet, standing over the gem. 

He pricked Pierson's hand, then leaned over his fallen adversary and picked up the gyth. He held it against the Chain around his neck, and it clicked into place. Instantly, Merlin felt its power coursing through his entire body, and the Phantasmagyth glowed with the blinding light of a thousand stars.

"STOP!" Merlin declared, his eyes glowing golden as the power coursed through him.

Every Underworlder immediately cringed and shrank away from the light. The fighting ceased.

"Bandiras!" Merlin called.

"Yes, Master of the Phantasmagyth," The unicorn appeared at Merlin's side.

Merlin shook his head and slipped the Phantasmagyth off his neck.

"I am not destined to be the master if anything," he declared, and slipped the Phantasmagyth over the Guardian's head.

Bandiras tossed his head. "Underworlders, begone!" he thundered. There was a terrific earthquake, and when the commotion ceased, not a single Underworlder—living or dead—remained on the surface.