by CM Raymond
The Skrim snarled and turned for him, hunched and ready to spring.
Twirling his weapon in an arc in front of his chest, Karl laughed. “I ain’t afraid of no pussy...cat, no matter how big an’ ugly ye are.”
It leapt for Karl, claws out and ready to taste rearick flesh, but Karl was faster than he looked. Dodging to the side, he swung his hammer hard into the teeth that were trying to close on him.
A satisfying crunch accompanied the attack, along with a roar of pain from the Skrim.
“Gotcha!” he yelled, rolling to his feet. But the Skrim was also fast. The back of its paw caught Karl, knocking him to the ground.
The thing was on him quickly, pinning his legs with one paw and raising the other for the kill. It swept the paw down in its alien rage, but before it could make contact the giant bear sprang out of nowhere and intercepted the Skrim’s blow.
Olaf was standing on his hind legs, pushing the Skrim’s paw up with all of his considerable strength.
The Skrim leaned into his paw. Olaf’s legs began to sink into the soft ground, but the big bear didn’t waiver. He roared as he redoubled his efforts.
It created the exact distraction Ezekiel needed.
While the thing’s chest was exposed, Ezekiel stepped forward. He turned his palms face up and lifted, and a boulder the size of a small cow tore itself from the earth. Ezekiel placed his hands on the stone, and it burst into flames. He pushed, and the missile launched itself forward.
It exploded against the Skrim’s chest, knocking the giant animal on its side.
“Now!” he shouted.
Mika sprinted forward as the monster struggled to regain its feet. The warrior moved swiftly, her focus on the spot Ezekiel’s magic had hit—where there was no longer a protective scale.
She leapt at the beast, her long legs launching her into the air. She screamed, and with both hands she drove her sword with perfect aim into Skrim’s chest, piercing it deeply enough for it to notice.
The thing stomped in rage as Mika danced to safety. Her sword stuck out of its chest, but it hadn’t gone in far enough to make the damage fatal.
Karl stepped up. “Now I’ll be showing ye why the hammer is the superior weapon.”
He charged at the Skrim, and the Skrim charged back. The thing raised its paws again to attack, but instead of dodging to the side as he had last time, Karl took aim. His hammer crashed into the sword, driving it deep into the creature’s chest.
It roared, reeling backward at the blow. The demon stumbled around as if dazed, but still it didn’t go down.
“Dammit,” the rearick yelled as he scrambled out of harm’s way. “I thought fer sure that was the end of it. What’s it going to take to end this thing?”
“It’s going to take Hannah,” Ezekiel said. He stepped forward, raising his staff straight into the air. The temperature dropped and the clouds began to darken. A crack of thunder split the sky.
While Ezekiel prepared his spell, Hannah and Sal kept the creature busy. Sal flew circles around the Skrim’s head, snapping his jaws and scratching it with his talons.
Hannah pulled him up, and Sal circled around for another pass. She saw the clouds forming, and a voice echoed in her mind.
Bring down the power from the heavens, Ezekiel sent to Hannah. Fry this fucker!
Sal went into a nose-dive straight toward the Skrim while Hannah, eyes blazing, raised a fist into the air. The thick clouds crackled, and a blinding bolt erupted. The lightning shot toward her, connecting with her outstretched hand. She shoved the other hand, clenched like a claw, toward Mika’s sword.
The stream of nature’s power stretched from her fist to connect with the metal pommel of the embedded weapon, sending waves of electricity into the Skrim.
It looked up at Hannah, its one good eye connecting with hers, and let out a final scream.
The Skrim’s body convulsed as the power surged through it. Then it stood for a second that seemed to last forever, before finally dropping to the ground. Steam poured out of the hole that Hannah had made in its eye socket.
Sal landed near the others, and Hannah dismounted. She was woozy from the attack, but kept her feet. “Pretty good team work,” she said, putting a hand on Karl’s shoulder.
“Aye, damned good, everyone of ye. Amazin’ what ye can do with a little distraction an’ a set of big balls.”
“I’m glad the thing is dead,” Olaf said as he put his clothes back on. “But I would still like to know where it was headed. Why come so far from New Romanov just to fight us?”
Karl stretched his arms wide. “Maybe the scaly bastard was just confused. Didn’t seem too bright ta me.”
Ezekiel shook his head. “It’s not its intelligence I’m worried about, but the mind of the one who sent it. What do you think, Hannah?”
But Hannah wasn’t listening. She was thinking about the look in the thing’s eye when she killed it. It seemed satisfied. Something about it reminded her of the first con she and Parker had ever pulled back in the Boulevard, and a sick feeling welled up inside of her.
Her head jerked as if she were waking up from a trance. She turned to the others. “We need to get back to New Romanov. Now!”
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
As he walked up to Olaf’s house, which had become their residence, Parker couldn’t help but smile. The late-spring sun shone from a crystal-blue sky as the residents of New Romanov busied themselves at their tasks, each of them committed to rebuilding both the wall and their hope that the city might one day be a place of peace again, as it had been in the days before the opening of the Rift.
A few of them waved to Parker, and more than one old woman gave him a smile and a thumbs-up. The only thing missing was Hannah. At first he wished she had been here to see him succeed in the task she had given him, but then worry struck. He always assumed that she would be fine on her missions, especially with Ezekiel by her side, but this time things weren’t the same. They weren’t hunting men, but a monster from the very pit of hell. A creature with unknown abilities and weaknesses.
He brushed the fear away, reminding himself of her power and the strength of those who had gone with her, not to mention her own badassery. He made it to the far side of the square, where he found Hadley sitting on a rock in the sun watching the group of older women and men prepare long tables outside Olaf’s house. He gave Parker a wave and hopped off his perch.
“How’s my favorite motivational speaker doing?” Hadley asked with a grin. “You didn’t need me to conjure any images of dragons this time.”
“We’ve come a long way from the Boulevard. And I thought I told you to do whatever they asked of you. In a few hours the workers are going to be hungry enough to eat a lycanthrope, and you’re sitting gazing at your navel.”
“You did. And I am. Tried to help, but the old lovelies kept telling me to get my pretty young ass out of their way. So, I’m…supervising.”
Parker couldn’t help but laugh, even if he was slightly annoyed with the mystic. They had been through a lot together, but Hadley was still a bit of a wildcard. One moment he was risking his life for the cause, and the next he had wandered off to do whatever the hell struck his fancy. Parker could only assume that it was an attitude shaped by a lifetime of sitting on a mountaintop sipping powerful elixir and daydreaming.
“Well, it seems like your supervision is working just fine,” Parker said, watching a group of older women lay out trays of food and a pile of plates.
“What can I say? When you’re good, you’re good.”
A low rumble sounded from the south. Parker shielded his eyes and looked in the direction of the noise, and then up at the clear sky. “Not a damn cloud in the sky, but you might need to move the dinner inside.”
Hadley’s eyes scanned the horizon, then landed on Parker. “I don’t think that was thunder.”
Eyes blanking to white, Hadley’s face lost all expression. “I’m picking up cognitive activity out there,” he said, before going quiet
again to focus his magic. “But none of it is clear—can’t pick up a single intelligible thought. Whatever it is, it isn’t human.”
“Lycanthropes?” Parker asked as the mystic’s eyes returned to normal.
He nodded, his face filled with concern. “Couldn’t be anything else.”
Parker sighed. The work on the wall had been going so well. He hoped it wouldn’t be interrupted by the pesky beasts. “All right. Maybe you can take Laurel’s post for a bit, while she and I go out to meet the bastards. Shouldn’t take long.”
Hadley’s eyes narrowed. “Parker, you don’t understand. There are dozens of them.”
****
Gregory sat on a small stool, his hands moving smoothly over the equipment in front of him. He tried to control his breathing while failing to ignore the fact that he was currently dismantling a portion of the Oracle.
It was a technical act far beyond anything he had ever attempted. If he messed up when he worked on the Unlawful, it just meant he and his friends would explode. That was very little pressure compared to accidentally disconnecting the Oracle and exposing the world to the dangers of the Rift.
He took a deep breath, wiped his sweaty palms on his pants, and continued.
“You are performing exceptionally well,” Lilith assured him. “There is no need for agitation. Your hands are quite capable of fixing me.”
Gregory turned a little red. “Don’t let Laurel hear you say that.”
“I don’t...ah. Of course. Forgive me. I have been without a body for so long that sometimes I fail to appreciate biological needs and the odd turns of phrase that accompany them.”
He grinned. “Trust me, it’s something I’m only just beginning to appreciate myself.” He slowly began threading a complicated series of wires. “What happened to you? Your body, I mean.”
“That is a long story which focuses mostly on my own naïveté. Unlike you, I overestimated my capabilities and much suffering came as a result, the least tragic of which is my purgatory here. Perhaps one day I will tell you the full story, but for now it is sufficient to say that the quest for knowledge has greater pitfalls than the quest for power.”
She was quiet for a while, and Gregory decided not to push her. After some time she said, “I have been running theoretical simulations of the amphorald you gave me and the magitech you described. It truly is remarkable what you people were able to accomplish with such a limited understanding of the principles behind accessing the Etheric. Most impressive. The human technology we incorporated in New Romanov has mostly failed, but I believe that your magitech could provide some much-needed improvements around here. Compared to you all, my citizens seem a little ragged. Perhaps you could design and build some for us? I’m sure they would appreciate it.”
Gregory grew excited at the prospect. “Sure. There are all sorts of things we could do. But I can’t keep stealing amphoralds from the Unlawful, or she’ll be grounded for good. Who knows how long we’re staying? I’m sure you could design some amazing stuff too.”
The computer went quiet for a second before replying, “I won’t be here forever. I need people like you to carry on in my place.”
Gregory tried to ask her to clarify, but Lilith was already moving forward with her plan.
“As to your amphorald problem, I have a solution. You see—”
She stopped in mid-speech so abruptly that Gregory thought he had done something wrong, maybe disconnected the wrong piece.
He rose to his feet. “Lilith?”
Her voice came back sharply. “New Romanov is under attack.”
****
Parker often wished that Hadley was wrong in his predictions, and as he watched the teeming swarm of lycanthropes crash against the city wall, he downright hated his friend’s abilities.
He blasted his spear into the mass of creatures, then looked at Curtis. The former city manager was stabbing lycanthropes that managed to climb too high.
“Is this normal?” he asked.
“In all my years,” Curtis said, “I have never seen them act like this. They’re solitary creatures. Maybe they hunt in groups of two or three, but there are dozens down there.”
Parker thrust his spear into a lycanthrope’s gut, then jumped off the wall. He needed to find Laurel.
She was down near the other end of the wall, encouraging a group of trees to lean into one another to form a barricade. Parker opened his mouth to shout, but a surprisingly fast lycanthrope slipped through the cracks before he got a chance. It pulled itself up the wall, grabbing an archer at the top and tossing him off his perch before leaping into the city.
Parker held his spear firm, but the creature had no eyes for him. He bolted toward a small group of children being escorted away by an older woman.
Standing in front of them, arms raised, was Hadley.
Parker ran toward them, but the lycanthrope was too fast. There was no way he’d reach them before the beast, and Hadley had no magic with which to fight it off. And yet the mystic was resolute, providing a wall of protection.
The lycanthrope moved closer , but at the last moment it pivoted to the left and ran toward the other end of the city.
Parker skidded to a stop in front of them. Hadley’s face was pale.
“Did you control his mind?” Parker asked, trying to make sense of what had just happened.
“No.” Hadley’s eyes were white, and he was trying to calm the children. The old woman bowed her head gratefully, then led them away. “It doesn’t work like that. I thought I was a goner. Why’d it leave us alone?”
A voice from behind him answered. “It was scared.”
Parker turned to look at Laurel. “What do you mean?”
She shook her head. “My magic might not work on the creatures, but I know fear when I see it. Those lycanthropes weren’t attacking us. They were fleeing something in the forest.”
“What do you mean, ‘were?’” Parker asked, looking back toward the wall.
“They scattered as quickly as they came.”
Hadley looked around as the New Romanov fighters began cheering. He shook his head. “I don’t understand. Those things are vicious killers. What could scare them?”
Suddenly Parker remembered the first con he and Hannah had ever pulled. He had been no more than seven or eight when a group of bullies twice their age started picking on kids from the Boulevard, stealing their food or homemade toys. Hannah wanted to put a stop to it, so he worked out a plan.
Parker provoked them and ran. He was fast, but not fast enough. They caught him, pummeled him until he was bloody, and left him in a gutter. It didn’t take long, but it was long enough for Hannah to sneak into their place and steal back everything they had taken and more.
“It’s a trick,” he said, his eyes going wide. “This whole damned thing has been a trick.”
He turned to Hadley, who had been reading Parker’s thoughts. “Holy shit.”
“Go,” Parker yelled. “Warn her. I’ll do what I can.”
Hadley took off toward the center of the city while Parker turned back toward the wall. Laurel was a mixture of pissed and confused. “Want to tell me what’s going on? You think the lycanthropes were trying to trick us?”
“Not them,” Parker said, no louder than a whisper. “The Skrima.”
As he spoke, a loud roar echoed through the town. Laurel gasped as two large bodies climbed over the wall.
Their skin was a deep red, and they had dark horns on their heads.
****
Hadley sprinted as fast as his long legs could carry him. He passed confused townsfolk, but he couldn’t spare a second to explain.
There was someone more important for him to talk to.
He wove through the city, then ran into the mountain tunnels. Before he entered, he heard the roar behind him and felt it shake his bones.
Shit, shit, shit, he whispered as he ran, a mantra that did nothing to help him go faster.
At the end of the long tunnel was Lili
th’s room. He ran in without slowing, but had enough presence of mind to duck the wrench that would have taken his head off.
“Sorry,” Gregory yelled when he saw that it was Hadley. He dropped the wrench on the ground. “I thought you were one of those lycanthropes.”
Hadley pulled himself up off the ground. “Trust me, that would be better than what’s coming.”
“The Skrima,” Lilith said. “They are attacking the city.”
“Yes,” Hadley said, nodding to add emphasis. “And Parker thinks they’re coming for you.”
“I don’t understand,” Gregory said.
“We have been outmaneuvered,” Lilith replied. “The large Skrim that went north was simply a diversion meant to draw our strongest fighters away. It leaves me vulnerable. And once I am destroyed—”
“There’s nothing left to oppose the Rift,” Gregory cut in. “They’ll be able to come through in force.”
“Parker’s going to do what he can, but I don’t know if it will be enough,” Hadley said. “Is there anything we can do? Do you have any sort of weapons?”
“Unfortunately not. It seems that you two are all that I have to protect me.”
“Shit,” Hadley said. “We’re not equipped for that.”
“Yes we are,” Gregory said, leaning down to pick up his hammer. There was a wild look in his eyes. “As it turns out, we’re perfectly equipped to handle this. Follow me.”
The engineer bolted out of the room with Hadley hot on his heels. He turned left, then left again into an adjoining workspace. There on the table were the cannons from the Unlawful.
“Quick, help me get this onto a cart,” Gregory shouted. “I took out all the amphoralds, but the mechanics are still fine. If I can get this hooked back into Lilith’s new amphorald core—”
“You’ll be able to blast them! Fucking brilliant, Gregory.”
The two men grabbed one of the cannons and heaved. Their backs strained under the weight and a thick vein popped out of Gregory’s forehead, but the cannon didn’t move.
“We’re not strong enough to lift this,” Hadley said.