The Sage stalked toward him, and the Hunter retreated. He needed to get the Abiarazi away from the altar. He couldn’t let the Sage activate the power of Enarium to free the Devourer.
“You cannot stop me, Hunter,” the demon growled as he stepped within arm’s reach of the rune-covered altar. “Not this close to getting back all that was taken from me. I don’t need to kill you to access the power of the gods.”
“Killing me is the only way you get that power.” The Hunter slipped closer, moving on the balls of his feet, light as a dancer. “The moment you lose focus, the moment your eyes so much as leave me, Soulhunger will drink your blood.”
The Sage’s gaze darted to the altar and the darkened runes yet to flare to life. His brow furrowed and his lips twisted into an irritated frown. “So be it. This shouldn’t take long.”
The Sage took a long step and lunged, sword tip extended toward the Hunter with perfect execution. Yet the movement was surprisingly slow for a demon. The Hunter saw it coming with enough time to knock the slim blade aside with Soulhunger and bring the iron dagger whipping around at the demon’s throat. The Sage barely managed to leap backward to evade the blow.
The Hunter barked a mocking laugh. “The price of giving up your Abiarazi power. You became human to enter Enarium, so now it’s time you feel what it really means to be human.” He bared his teeth in a snarl. “Let’s start with pain.”
He rushed the Sage in a blitz attack, his daggers swiping so fast his hands blurred. Only the Sage’s longer reach and quick retreat saved the once-Abiarazi from being gutted. The Swordsman’s blade carved a long furrow into the demon’s arm. The Sage let out a little cry of pain, then leapt backward.
The Hunter stared at the wound, waiting for the flesh to blacken from the iron’s poison. Blood welled up from the cut bright crimson, untainted by rot.
Another side effect of being human, he realized. The Sage was no longer susceptible to iron. However, the sharp blade would kill him dead enough. A fair trade, I’d say.
He had faced Abiarazi before and knew to fear them. The demons were stronger than he, faster, some of them—like the First, the Third, and the Warmaster—far more skilled in the ways of war. This…thing before him, the human who wore the face of the Sage, was something different. He had the skill of the Sage, yet lacked the speed, strength, and stamina. With a grin, the Hunter attacked.
To his credit, the Sage fought with a controlled precision that put the Warmaster’s furious rage to shame and far surpassed even the First. His movements were economical, deliberate. The rapier flashed with such speed that the Hunter couldn’t find an opening in his guard. He couldn’t get too close—even a minor wound from that thirsty blade could kill him—and he couldn’t simply hack the Sage to ribbons. He needed to somehow take the demon down and lock him away in the Chamber of Sustenance to feed Kharna without killing him.
Easier said than done.
He wielded Soulhunger in his right hand, using the iron dagger as a main gauche to deflect the Sage’s lightning thrusts. Though he managed to keep the long, slim rapier from touching him, he couldn’t break through the Sage’s impenetrable defense. Anytime he stepped within striking range of his daggers, the Sage used the edge of his rapier to cut at the Hunter. Had it been a simple steel sword, the Hunter would have accepted a dozen slashing wounds to get close enough to the Sage. But this Im’tasi weapon was anything but simple.
Frustration mounted within the Hunter as the humming in the Illumina grew louder. The vibrations between his feet changed to a tremor that threatened to knock him off balance. He and the Sage both staggered as the pulsations in the violet-glowing gemstone pillar grew more intense and set the towertop room swaying.
The Hunter pictured himself riding the deck of a swaying ship—he’d always hated ships, which explained why he’d only ever ventured across the Frozen Sea once. Only this time, instead of waves crashing into a wooden vessel, he rode a swaying tower hundreds of paces tall.
The Sage seemed equally disoriented by the unpredictable movement of the Illumina. He wobbled and staggered, nearly dropping his sword as he clung to the altar for support.
The Hunter saw his opening. The Sage’s eyes had dropped from the Hunter to the glowing blue runes lighting up the altar. His sword arm had lowered, his free hand gripping the stone lip. In that instant of distraction, the Hunter sprang for the demon with all the force in his legs. He leapt across the space in two great strides.
The Sage spotted him at the last possible moment. His right arm came up, the point of his sword thrusting toward the Hunter’s heart. Too late, the Hunter brought Soulhunger whipping across in a cross-body block. The tip slid a finger’s breadth from his armpit, but the sharp blade carved a line of fire into the unprotected underside of his arm. Again, mind-shattering agony flooded him as the blade sought to consume his life.
But the Hunter’s momentum carried him onward. He crashed into the Sage and bore the two of them to the ground. Even as he fell, the Hunter reached out to grip the Sage’s right wrist. His fingers closed around flesh and squeezed with every shred of strength. The demon—no, a human now—let out an agonized shriek as the loud crack of bone echoed in the Illumina’s uppermost chamber.
Steel clattered on obsidian as the Sage’s sword fell from his fingers. He scuttled backward, crawling on his legs and posterior like a one-legged crab, his shattered right hand clutched to his chest.
“Your reign ends today,” the Hunter snarled down at him. He kicked the fallen sword behind a Chamber of Sustenance, out of the Sage’s reach. “No more innocents will suffer at your whims. The day of the Abiarazi has come to an end.”
The Sage’s eyes flashed. “Kill me and you’ll never know what happened to your daughter!”
The Hunter froze, the words tearing at his heart. “You…know?” he managed to gasp out.
“Of course I do.” The Sage nodded, and the fear dimmed from his eyes, his expression growing smug. “Trust me, I know everything that occurs on Einan. You think one little child could walk from Enarium without my knowledge?”
The Hunter studied the man, and it felt as if he stared at a stranger. He had the same features as the Sage, yet he seemed somehow…diminished. Perhaps, in giving up the last of his Abiarazi blood, he’d given up the last of his power. He looked like a scared, desperate man fighting to stay alive. A man that would lie—a very human trait—to save his own skin.
Once, the Hunter had fallen prey to the demon’s lies. He had been deceived, manipulated into fighting the Warmaster and defeating the Sage’s bitterest rivals. Yet the Hunter that had fallen for the Abiarazi’s deceit had been a lost, confused, searching Hunter. The Hunter who stood here now had found his wife, had learned the truth of his past, had come to see his true place in the world. There was still so much he didn’t know—like where in the bloody hell his daughter was—and so much he had yet to learn. Yet he no longer felt that same desperation that had driven him before. He had answers, he had the truth of himself.
“No.” He shook his head. “You don’t know.”
“Of course I do!” the Sage snapped. “Believe me when I say there is nothing—”
“That’s just it.” The Hunter pressed Soulhunger’s razor-sharp edge against the demon’s throat. “I don’t believe you. I don’t trust you. You’re lying again, just when you lied about wanting to bring your family to be with you, or wanting to help me or Hailen. You lie like most men breathe. So no, I won’t be listening to a Keeper-damned word you say.”
The Sage’s eyes widened, then narrowed, and fire flashed. “You’re making a mista—”
The Hunter cut off the Sage’s words with a fist to the face. The once-demon’s head snapped backward, blood sprayed, and he sagged to the ground, unconscious.
He stared down at the slim figure of the Sage, with his perfectly manicured eyebrows, angular nose and chin, and thin-lipped mouth. Hard to imagine he’d once been the most powerful creature on Einan.
The Hunter
seized the Sage’s collar and dragged him toward the open Chamber of Sustenance. He lifted the unconscious man from the floor and dropped him onto the stone cradle, then stopped. He had no idea how to connect the Sage to whatever fed the power to Kharna.
But Taiana might know. She’d found a way to disconnect the Bucelarii—perhaps she could understand how to reverse the process and tether the Sage to the Chamber.
He turned and rushed to Taiana’s side. She had pushed herself upright, the pain faded from her expression. The wound had healed enough that it no longer leaked crimson, but her face was still pale from loss of blood.
“Drayvin, is it true?” She reached for him, gripped his arms. “Does he know where our Jaia is?”
“No.” The Hunter shook his head. “It’s just another of his lies.”
“How do you know?” Taiana fixed him with a hard glare.
“I don’t.” The Hunter spoke the words with effort. “I want to believe that he knows something—more than anything, Taiana, I want to know what happened to our child—but the risk is too great. Kharna told me what will happen if the power of Enarium is activated now. We can’t take that chance.”
“But Drayvin, our child!” Her voice was hard, determined. “We must find her.”
The Hunter gripped her hands with a strength to match hers. “We will. But after the danger to the world has passed. After the Sage is sealed, his life force going to feed Kharna.”
Taiana pulled back, anger flashing across her face.
“Besides, you said Kharna spoke in your mind, right?” The Hunter reached for her again. “If the Sage truly does know, Kharna will get it from him.”
Hope sparkled in Taiana’s eyes. “You’re right,” she breathed. “We will find out what he knows.”
“But first, we have to find a way to shut this down.” The Hunter turned to the console.
“Shut it down?” Taiana sounded confused. “Didn’t Kharna tell you the power needed to be activated? Not to free him, but to feed him.”
“And to do that,” came a new voice, “we’re going to need the boy.”
The smell of muddy leather, citrus oil, hops, and pine oil flooded the Hunter’s nostrils, accompanied by the scent of Vothmot kaffe, worn metal, smoke, and sandalwood. The Hunter whirled and found a tall man with long, braided red hair, a bushy beard to match, and eyes the color of midnight holding Hailen by the throat.
Chapter Forty-Five
“Step away from the altar,” Cerran snapped. “We have come too far, suffered too much, to fail now.”
The red-bearded Bucelarii wore the blue breastplate of a Blood Sentinel, and blood covered him from head to toe. Kalil stood behind him, clad in the same armor, equally gory. Both held spikestaffs, but Cerran’s grip on Hailen’s throat was the true threat.
The Hunter’s eyes flashed toward the boy. “Don’t be afraid, Hailen. I won’t let him hurt you.”
“I know.” The words were said in a quiet voice filled with faith. Hailen trusted that the Hunter would protect him.
Cerran tightened his grip on the boy’s neck, making Hailen wince and squirm in his grasp. “I have no desire to hurt the boy. If anything, we need him alive and unharmed. His Melechha blood will sustain Kharna and, coupled with the power of Khar’nath and the Keeps, we can seal the rift once and for all.”
The Hunter’s blood ran cold. They want to lock Hailen in a Chamber, use him to feed Kharna power? If they activated Enarium with Hailen in the Chamber, could the boy survive?
“No!” His growl reverberated through the towertop chamber. “Kharna showed me the truth, reminded me that we all swore to protect the world by sustaining him. But not like this. Not by sacrificing the lives of the innocent.”
“What is the life of one innocent compared to a thousand, or a hundred thousand such lives?” Cerran’s brow furrowed as he stared down at Hailen. “With this boy’s blood and the lives of those still remaining in Khar’nath, we could have enough to close the rift.”
“Could,” the Hunter snarled. “You would gamble all those lives on something that might work?”
“Yes.” Cerran replied without hesitation. “I spent four and a half millennia locked away to feed Kharna, the bargain we all struck long ago. But I am free now. I will not be trapped in that empty existence for a moment longer, not if there is another way. If this boy’s blood will suffice, I will gladly trade his life for my freedom.”
“But don’t you see?” Anger burned in the Hunter’s chest. “Long ago, we swore ourselves to serve Kharna. We made a choice to sacrifice. But you cannot choose for someone else. Saying you are willing to trade his life for your freedom is precisely what our forefathers would have done. By your words, you prove you are no better than the Abiarazi that we swore to hunt down.”
“I am nothing like our forefathers!” Cerran’s black eyes flashed. “I have killed, but in the name of protecting this world, of upholding the oath we swore to Kharna. But what of you, assassin?” His tone was sharp, edged with vitriol. “You who killed for gold and for pleasure. Of any of us, you are the one who bears the greatest resemblance to the monsters that brought us into this world.”
Once, that accusation would have cut the Hunter to the core of his being. He hated everything about the Abiarazi and hated that their blood ran through his veins. Yet now he knew the truth about the Abiarazi, about the Devourer’s taint in their minds. More than that, he knew enough truth about himself to understand why he had done what he’d done.
“There is truth in your words,” he told Cerran. “I am a killer, and I will not pretend my motives were pure. I killed because I had no choice, I killed for gold, and I killed to protect those that mattered. I killed because it was in my nature to do so and because I was good at it…so very good.”
He lifted Soulhunger. “I will never be able to atone for all the lives I took. It doesn’t matter that their deaths were in service of Kharna, for I did not do it to save the world. Yet now my eyes have been opened. I have seen the truth, but still I cannot believe that forcing others to die for our own sakes is the right choice. If we have the power to sustain Kharna, then we are the ones that should do so. We will be the ones to sacrifice—we cannot demand others sacrifice in our place.”
Cerran’s face twisted into a snarl. “I will never be imprisoned again. Not after thousands of years. If you are so willing to throw your life away, so be it! But I will do what needs to be done.”
The Hunter turned to Kalil. “And you? Will you kill hundreds of thousands to save yourself?”
The smaller Bucelarii hesitated for just a moment, indecision warring in his midnight eyes.
Hope surged within the Hunter. “We can find another way.” He stepped toward the man. “There has to be another way to—”
“There is no other way.” Kalil’s expression hardened, and he shook his head. “I, too, have spent too long locked away from this world. I will not return to my prison. If you are so keen to sustain Kharna, we will be happy to lock you away.”
The Hunter’s gut tightened. Fire burned through his chest, but it was a heat of sorrow rather than anger. For decades, he had believed himself alone. When he discovered the truth of his heritage, he had learned the Cambionari hunted his kind to extinction. Yet here, in Enarium, he had found others like him. He was not the last of his race. Yet facing these two, he knew he had no choice but to stop them, even if it meant killing them. He could not let them harm Hailen or kill the people still within Khar’nath.
“Please,” he said in a quiet voice. “I don’t want to do this, but I will stop you if I must.”
Kalil stepped forward and raised his spikestaff. “You can’t stop us. There are three of us against you.”
The Hunter arched an eyebrow. “Three? Looks like there are only two of you against…” He trailed off, and dread sank like a stone in his gut. He turned to Taiana in disbelief. “No.”
Remorse filled her eyes, but she nodded. “I’m sorry, Drayvin. I know how much the boy means to you,
but it is the only way to seal the rift and save this world. To save Jaia.”
Her voice, so quiet and sorrowful, hit him like a blow to the gut. “Think of Jaia, Taiana. Think of what you would do if her life was the only thing standing in the way of the end of the world. Would you sacrifice her then?”
Tears sparkled in Taiana’s eyes. “I…” She trailed off, at a loss for words.
“Enough of this!” Cerran snapped. “If you are too soft, too deluded by your time among the humans to do what needs to be done, we will not let you stand in the way of what we have worked thousands of years to accomplish.”
A shudder ran down the Hunter’s spine. Cerran’s words were an echo of what the Sage had just said. The black of the Bucelarii’s eyes seemed amplified by the crimson light filling the black stone chamber.
The Hunter shook his head sadly and raised Soulhunger and the iron dagger. “Then you leave me no choice.” He stepped backward to place all three of the Bucelarii—the two men and the woman that had been his wife—in his field of view.
Kalil tensed, spikestaff held in a low guard position. Taiana held no weapons, made no move. Cerran, however, began sidling toward the altar, one huge hand clamped tight around Hailen’s neck.
The Hunter rushed Kalil, who tensed in anticipation of the charge and prepared to thrust with the spikestaff. The Hunter had no doubt the Bucelarii was fast—like all his kind, his speed far surpassed that of the humans he’d faced. If he had been a soldier during the War of Gods, he had the skill to fight.
Yet none of that mattered. Kalil wielded a weapon of steel, while the Hunter fought with a much more dangerous weapon: determination. He had to stop Cerran from locking Hailen in the Chamber of Sustenance. He would get past Kalil at any cost.
He brought Soulhunger up to knock aside the thrusting spikestaff, then ducked beneath Kalil’s return stroke. The whirling staff cracked into his left arm hard enough to make it go numb, then he was inside Kalil’s guard and driving Soulhunger toward the smaller man’s gut. Kalil twisted at the last moment, and Soulhunger carved a long scrape across his blue breastplate.
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