Phoenix Unbound
Page 15
The creature continued its odd swaying back and forth as if deciding whether to take the hunt to the new, unwary prey or stay with the ones it had cornered but couldn’t yet reach.
A telltale soft inhalation made Azarion spin around, yank Gilene in his arms, and clap a hand across her mouth. “Don’t,” he ordered.
She glared at him over the edge of his palm. Against his callused skin, her warning cry came out as nothing more than vibration and heat. She remained undeterred, drawing in another breath through her nostrils to try again.
Azarion shook her, disrupting the breath so that she coughed into his hand instead, wetting it with a spray of spittle. He lowered his head until his nose almost touched hers. “Those men and their dogs are here to capture me, not rescue you. Do you understand the difference?”
She was desperate, and desperate people did foolish things. His colossal mistake in choosing Midrigar as a sanctuary was testament to that.
She stood rigid in his arms, and the breath from her nostrils gusted across the back of his hand, but her gaze turned thoughtful. Her eyes slid to the side where the creature continued to hover. It stretched out a misshapen arm to casually rake its talons across the spell wall, trailing sparks in its wake.
“Do you understand?” Azarion repeated. She nodded slowly, and he eased his hand away. “If you lie . . .” He left the threat implied.
“I won’t scream,” she assured him in a whisper.
“You give your word?”
“No, but I give you my understanding.”
It would have to do for now and was the thing he wanted from her most.
A voice rang clear in the chilly air, furious and frustrated. “What is wrong with those fucking mutts?”
Another voice answered. “It’s Midrigar, Captain. “Theys knows it’s haunted. So do the horses. You’ll not get ’em past the gate neither.”
“Then we go in without them. Load your crossbows. First sight of the gladiator, shoot to wound, not to kill. Herself wants him alive.”
“No mercy in that,” another voice chimed in.
“Not our problem,” the captain replied. “And if any of you lily-livered fucks refuse like the hounds and horses, I’ll shoot you myself, and it will be to kill. Now move!”
More sounds from the north gate traveled to Azarion’s ears; the tramp of boots, curses, and prayers as the tracking party entered Midrigar on foot.
The monster’s tongue writhed like a worm impaled on a hook as it slurped a path up its own skull as if in anticipation of a feast. It slapped the spell wall a final time—a wordless promise that it intended to return—before loping down the rubble-strewn avenue toward the invaders.
Azarion watched it dwindle out of sight before releasing the agacin. She shuddered and tossed the blanket aside. Azarion kicked the packs out of the way. He didn’t need extra weight to slow him down. He was impaired enough by his own injuries as well as those the agacin suffered. He held on to the knife. A blade might not work on the otherworldly hunter, but it was effective against a human adversary.
Listening for the chanting of ghosts or the monster’s distorted buzzing that signaled its approach, he heard nothing except the voices of the men drawing ever closer to their hiding spot.
A strange popping bludgeoned his ears as he stepped across the charcoal circle. The agacin gaped at him when he held out a hand to her and gestured for her to follow him.
“How did you do that?” She glanced down at the circle and back at him, befuddled.
“It’s a simple ward. Protects us from demons and wights who try to get in and traps them if they try to get out. We’re neither, so we can move in or out of the ward as we please.” He crooked his fingers to signal her. “Come, we can’t linger.”
“What if it comes back?” Her eyes darted toward the path the creature had taken.
Guilt plagued him, along with the harsh lash of self-recrimination. He’d thought Midrigar a tragic example of the Empire’s worst brutality, a dead city populated by harmless ghosts. How wrong he was.
The agacin had accused him of sheltering in a grave, and he had shrugged off her fear. He wasn’t afraid of ghosts. The Sky Below was dotted with numerous barrows in which his people sometimes took sanctuary with their livestock during dangerous storms and kept company with the occasional lingering shade.
Midrigar wasn’t a barrow or a necropolis; it was something much more. Something infinitely dark and malignant. Both prison and gateway, it trapped its dead and allowed things like the faceless hunter to cross over, find a different hunting ground from the one it stalked in some other, strange world.
“Oh, it will come back,” he said softly.
His declaration gave her feet wings. She flew past him, pausing briefly to shake her head when she crossed over the warding circle’s invisible barrier.
Azarion caught up with her. “We run for the gate we entered. No stopping, no crying for help.” He suspected those pleas would come from the opposite direction at any moment.
The trackers still called commands to each other, their voices fanning out in a widening arc as they searched for him. The monster had yet to attack, but it was only a matter of time.
As if it heard his thoughts, a piercing scream rent the quiet accompanied by the eerie buzzing. The witch blanched, her eyes black and wide.
Azarion gave her a none-too-gentle shove. “Run.”
Her back arched away from him. Whether from his touch or her response to his command, he didn’t know, but she bolted down the steps and into the street, toward the gate. Azarion loped beside her, looking back every few paces to see if they were followed.
More screaming threaded the wind, human made inhuman by an indescribable torture. In the distance, the dogs had gone silent.
They passed in front of the broken temple’s grand entrance with its impenetrable darkness. A final prolonged shriek rose and fell in hideous rhythm before abruptly dying. Azarion lengthened his strides, grabbing the witch’s hand and nearly lifting her off her feet as they ran.
The buzzing returned, a wetter, more saturated sound that came from their left. The hunter now hunted them. Azarion forgot the pain of his cracked ribs and the way his lungs burned with every panting breath.
The gate. The gate was so close and the creature eating the distance between them even closer. He gripped the knife in the hand not holding on to the agacin. There might well be armed survivors outside this gate, waiting with their arrows and their dogs. His chances of winning a fight against such odds were nonexistent, and the witch’s fate grim, but better that than death by Midrigar’s monster.
That wet, gurgling buzz filled his ears. The agacin’s hair whipped behind her like a flag as they hurtled through the gate and whatever new threat awaited them in the shadowed tree line. The creature emitted its own shrieking fury behind them but didn’t follow. Azarion didn’t stop to look back but continued to run with the witch toward the forest.
A figure suddenly emerged from a clump of shadows cast by the trees. A Kraelian tracker, his bloodless features twisted in horror, raised his crossbow and aimed at Azarion. The witch gasped and wrenched herself free of Azarion’s grip.
He didn’t stop, didn’t hesitate, and flung the knife. The blade caught the man in the chest, hard enough to make him stumble back a step before falling to the ground. The loaded bow landed in the grass beside him.
Azarion slowed and skirted the fallen tracker before retracing his steps. The dead man stared at the forest canopy above him with sightless eyes. Azarion jerked the knife free and wiped the blade on the grass before resheathing it. He retrieved the bow, along with the quiver of quarrels beside the tracker, and gave a quick reconnoiter of the tree line, looking for another Kraelian tracker to materialize. None did so, and he turned his attention to the agacin.
A telltale soft inhalation made Azarion spin around, yank Gilene in his arms, and clap a hand across her mouth. “Don’t,” he ordered.
She glared at him over the edge of his palm. Against his callused skin, her warning cry came out as nothing more than vibration and heat. She remained undeterred, drawing in another breath through her nostrils to try again.
Azarion shook her, disrupting the breath so that she coughed into his hand instead, wetting it with a spray of spittle. He lowered his head until his nose almost touched hers. “Those men and their dogs are here to capture me, not rescue you. Do you understand the difference?”
She was desperate, and desperate people did foolish things. His colossal mistake in choosing Midrigar as a sanctuary was testament to that.
She stood rigid in his arms, and the breath from her nostrils gusted across the back of his hand, but her gaze turned thoughtful. Her eyes slid to the side where the creature continued to hover. It stretched out a misshapen arm to casually rake its talons across the spell wall, trailing sparks in its wake.
“Do you understand?” Azarion repeated. She nodded slowly, and he eased his hand away. “If you lie . . .” He left the threat implied.
“I won’t scream,” she assured him in a whisper.
“You give your word?”
“No, but I give you my understanding.”
It would have to do for now and was the thing he wanted from her most.
A voice rang clear in the chilly air, furious and frustrated. “What is wrong with those fucking mutts?”
Another voice answered. “It’s Midrigar, Captain. “Theys knows it’s haunted. So do the horses. You’ll not get ’em past the gate neither.”
“Then we go in without them. Load your crossbows. First sight of the gladiator, shoot to wound, not to kill. Herself wants him alive.”
“No mercy in that,” another voice chimed in.
“Not our problem,” the captain replied. “And if any of you lily-livered fucks refuse like the hounds and horses, I’ll shoot you myself, and it will be to kill. Now move!”
More sounds from the north gate traveled to Azarion’s ears; the tramp of boots, curses, and prayers as the tracking party entered Midrigar on foot.
The monster’s tongue writhed like a worm impaled on a hook as it slurped a path up its own skull as if in anticipation of a feast. It slapped the spell wall a final time—a wordless promise that it intended to return—before loping down the rubble-strewn avenue toward the invaders.
Azarion watched it dwindle out of sight before releasing the agacin. She shuddered and tossed the blanket aside. Azarion kicked the packs out of the way. He didn’t need extra weight to slow him down. He was impaired enough by his own injuries as well as those the agacin suffered. He held on to the knife. A blade might not work on the otherworldly hunter, but it was effective against a human adversary.
Listening for the chanting of ghosts or the monster’s distorted buzzing that signaled its approach, he heard nothing except the voices of the men drawing ever closer to their hiding spot.
A strange popping bludgeoned his ears as he stepped across the charcoal circle. The agacin gaped at him when he held out a hand to her and gestured for her to follow him.
“How did you do that?” She glanced down at the circle and back at him, befuddled.
“It’s a simple ward. Protects us from demons and wights who try to get in and traps them if they try to get out. We’re neither, so we can move in or out of the ward as we please.” He crooked his fingers to signal her. “Come, we can’t linger.”
“What if it comes back?” Her eyes darted toward the path the creature had taken.
Guilt plagued him, along with the harsh lash of self-recrimination. He’d thought Midrigar a tragic example of the Empire’s worst brutality, a dead city populated by harmless ghosts. How wrong he was.
The agacin had accused him of sheltering in a grave, and he had shrugged off her fear. He wasn’t afraid of ghosts. The Sky Below was dotted with numerous barrows in which his people sometimes took sanctuary with their livestock during dangerous storms and kept company with the occasional lingering shade.
Midrigar wasn’t a barrow or a necropolis; it was something much more. Something infinitely dark and malignant. Both prison and gateway, it trapped its dead and allowed things like the faceless hunter to cross over, find a different hunting ground from the one it stalked in some other, strange world.
“Oh, it will come back,” he said softly.
His declaration gave her feet wings. She flew past him, pausing briefly to shake her head when she crossed over the warding circle’s invisible barrier.
Azarion caught up with her. “We run for the gate we entered. No stopping, no crying for help.” He suspected those pleas would come from the opposite direction at any moment.
The trackers still called commands to each other, their voices fanning out in a widening arc as they searched for him. The monster had yet to attack, but it was only a matter of time.
As if it heard his thoughts, a piercing scream rent the quiet accompanied by the eerie buzzing. The witch blanched, her eyes black and wide.
Azarion gave her a none-too-gentle shove. “Run.”
Her back arched away from him. Whether from his touch or her response to his command, he didn’t know, but she bolted down the steps and into the street, toward the gate. Azarion loped beside her, looking back every few paces to see if they were followed.
More screaming threaded the wind, human made inhuman by an indescribable torture. In the distance, the dogs had gone silent.
They passed in front of the broken temple’s grand entrance with its impenetrable darkness. A final prolonged shriek rose and fell in hideous rhythm before abruptly dying. Azarion lengthened his strides, grabbing the witch’s hand and nearly lifting her off her feet as they ran.
The buzzing returned, a wetter, more saturated sound that came from their left. The hunter now hunted them. Azarion forgot the pain of his cracked ribs and the way his lungs burned with every panting breath.
The gate. The gate was so close and the creature eating the distance between them even closer. He gripped the knife in the hand not holding on to the agacin. There might well be armed survivors outside this gate, waiting with their arrows and their dogs. His chances of winning a fight against such odds were nonexistent, and the witch’s fate grim, but better that than death by Midrigar’s monster.
That wet, gurgling buzz filled his ears. The agacin’s hair whipped behind her like a flag as they hurtled through the gate and whatever new threat awaited them in the shadowed tree line. The creature emitted its own shrieking fury behind them but didn’t follow. Azarion didn’t stop to look back but continued to run with the witch toward the forest.
A figure suddenly emerged from a clump of shadows cast by the trees. A Kraelian tracker, his bloodless features twisted in horror, raised his crossbow and aimed at Azarion. The witch gasped and wrenched herself free of Azarion’s grip.
He didn’t stop, didn’t hesitate, and flung the knife. The blade caught the man in the chest, hard enough to make him stumble back a step before falling to the ground. The loaded bow landed in the grass beside him.
Azarion slowed and skirted the fallen tracker before retracing his steps. The dead man stared at the forest canopy above him with sightless eyes. Azarion jerked the knife free and wiped the blade on the grass before resheathing it. He retrieved the bow, along with the quiver of quarrels beside the tracker, and gave a quick reconnoiter of the tree line, looking for another Kraelian tracker to materialize. None did so, and he turned his attention to the agacin.
