“It’s time, then,” he said solemnly. “What’s the plan?”
“Marin wants to try to convince them that this is all some big mistake. She doesn’t want to believe what happened at the keep is true,” I said, shaking my head. “Her plan won’t work, but it should provide us with a nice distraction. We’ll leave as soon as she reaches them.”
He scratched his chin in agitated thought. “That seems dangerous.”
“It was her idea,” I shrugged. “The sister of the King’s Shield should have some level of respect; not enough to make a difference for us, but at least enough to keep her safe.”
Marten sighed. “Fine, fine. As long as my girls are safe.”
“No matter what happens today, I can promise you that,” I said firmly. He held my gaze for a long time with his brow furrowed, but eventually nodded and went back to finishing preparations. I sped back across the yard to where Marin still sat against the house. “If you still want to help us, now’s your chance; the guards are only a few minutes away.”
She jumped to her feet, scanning the horizon. “Is my sister with them?”
“Fortunately, no. It looks like they sent the entire Third Company, under the leadership of Commander Savitz.”
Her face lit up at the name. “Commander Savitz knows me! He was always kind to me whenever we ran into each other in the city.” She clapped her hands together excitedly. “I know this is all a terrible misunderstanding, somehow. I promise I’ll get it sorted out!” Without waiting for a response, she turned and ran out to the road.
I watched her go with a mixture of annoyance and worry. “Marin!” I yelled after her before she disappeared from view. Her head snapped back around as she skidded to a stop. I clenched my jaw, then let out a sigh as I shook my head. “Be careful.” She flashed a large smile, then turned and disappeared from sight. I kept track of her progress through my Detection, watching as she closed in on the encroaching wall of soldiers.
Lia and Hana appeared in the doorway carrying the final crate between them. Hana gave one final, longing look back into the house, then turned back to me with determination. “That’s everything. We’re ready.” I followed them to the barn and helped to load the crate into the wagon. As Marten’s cart was made specifically for hauling cargo, there were no passenger benches in the back; I shoved enough of the boxes to one side to make a small sitting space for the three of us, then hopped out to let Lia and her mother enter.
“Are we ready to go, Lux?” Marten called back to me.
“As ready as we’ll ever be. The crates are packed and loaded, and your girls are safe,” I answered. Staring off through the wall of the barn, I watched Marin as she reached the Third Company vanguard. “When I give you the signal, start driving, and don’t stop for any reason.” I started to move back to enter the wagon and begin the trip, but I froze in place as the scene in my mind unfolded.
Marin stood in the center of the road with her hand outstretched towards the front line of guards. The men stopped and glanced back and forth in confusion, then looked back to their commander as he rode his way to the front of the formation. He stared Marin down with harsh eyes as she waved and began to speak. After she said her piece, he leaned down and whispered into the ear of the closest guard, then turned and rode away without further acknowledgement. Marin’s face flushed as she realized she had been snubbed, and she shouted enthusiastically at Savitz’s back as the two leading guards slowly shouldered their crossbows.
I was already sprinting down the road by the time her scream rang out across the countryside. Both of the fired bolts had found their target: the first had torn through the side of her bicep, while the second lodged itself deep into her chest, just below her left collarbone. She fell to the ground as she scrabbled desperately at the wounds and writhed in pain. Two guards pushed through the front lines and stalked forward, drawing their swords as they moved to put a permanent end to her suffering.
The clouds of dust that kicked up from beneath my pounding feet gave away my position, and I saw the advancing guards falter in their approach. The slight hesitation was all I needed to close the remaining distance between us before they could reach Marin, and I launched toward the closest guard with a fully powered uppercut. His torso gave way beneath my fist as his bones shattered, and his lifeless body sailed over the assembled column of guards ahead of me. I spun sideways and caught the second guard in the temple with such extreme force that his head separated from his shoulders and flew across the road, where it smashed against a tree like an overripe melon.
With the initial threats thoroughly eliminated and any potential new combatants stunned by the bloody massacre that had taken place before them, I knelt to the ground and scooped Marin gently into my arms. She flailed wildly until her eyes found my face, after which she immediately buried her head in my chest and sobbed, clinging desperately to my neck with her good arm. Blood continued to spill from the bolt that impaled her chest, soaking her neck and dress with an expanding crimson stain.
I left as quickly as I had arrived, sprinting back down the road to the Corells’ barn with overly enhanced speed. My mind raced three steps ahead, already formulating a new plan for dealing with Savitz’s men; I had initially hoped we would be able to avoid an encounter altogether by leaving before they arrived, but the assault on Marin changed things. I just wanted to run. They’ve lost that mercy now.
Marten jumped to his feet when he saw Marin’s condition, but my focus was too deep to hear what he shouted as I passed him by. I raced to the back of the cart and carefully climbed inside, where I found Lia and Hana already kneeling beside a prepared bedroll. She nodded to me as I laid Marin out on the thin cushion. “You know how these work,” I stated confidently, pulling the needle and two silver orbs from my bandolier and setting them on the nearest crate. “She’s already lost a lot of blood. You’ll have to work quickly.”
I turned to leave, but Lia caught my arm and held me insistently in place. “Are you going to be okay?” Although they were well out of sight, her eyes stared directly at the jagged black scars that covered my right hand, and I understood the true cause of her worry.
“I’ll be fine,” I answered, managing to put on a small smile. “Compared to Attetsia, this will be a walk in the park. Nobody gets in the way of our adventures anymore.” I leaned in and kissed her forehead, then nodded to Marin. “Now, you have a job to do, too. Best get to it.” She released her grip on my arm to pick up the mana needle, and I left her to her work. Marten was still shouting at me as I returned to the front of the wagon.
“Damnit, Lux, I told you that was too dangerous!” he yelled angrily. “I told you she—”
“You were right, Marten,” I shouted over him, “but that’s not important right now. It’s time to go. Drive as fast as you can, and don’t stop for any reason. I’ll explain everything when I catch up to you.”
He sat dumbfounded for a moment, trying to puzzle out my instructions. “When you catch up?! By the Primes, Lux, what are you talking about?”
“Just GO!” I yelled, dashing out of the barn before he could protest any further. To my great relief, I heard him spur his horse a moment later, and the wagon rumbled its way to the road and took off in the opposite direction of the Third Company. The head of the column of soldiers had just come into view around the bend as the wagon raced away, and I heard their cries of alarm as they tried to mobilize a response.
I stood in the center of the road and calmly waited for them to approach. Come and see the consequences of your King’s orders. Come and see what happens when I don’t hold back.
***
2. DECLARATIONS
“What are your orders, sir?”
The sound of Savitz’s grinding teeth echoed in my ears and put a smile on my face.
“Sir, their wagon is escaping. Should we pursue them?”
“Take three squads from Kohl’s platoon back to the fork, and lead them West,” he barked down to the questioning soldier. “Find t
he girl with the braided black hair and bring her back here, alive. Kill the others.”
“Right away sir,” the soldier replied, flashing a quick salute. “What should we do about—”
Two sharp cracks and a shriek of pain sent the soldier to the ground as his legs buckled at sickening angles. Savitz’s horse whinnied nervously and shied away from the man as his nearby comrades rushed to assess the situation. A ripple ran through the column of men as the agonized cry of the crippled soldier set them on edge. Savitz let out an aggravated growl and pointed down the road to where I stood, a few hundred yards away. “Lieutenant Kohl, send out the wagons. I want that man dead.”
The sea of soldiers parted to reveal a caravan of familiar transport wagons, each filled with a full squad of ten men in heavy armor. Savitz watched them pass by from atop his destrier, then turned his back on me as he began to retreat into the column. His warhorse made it three steps before the tortured screams of a dozen men filled the air, and he spun to find the lead wagon engulfed in a crimson wildfire. The horse that pulled it panicked and broke free of its lashings, leaving the wreckage an impassable blockade in the center of the road.
Men broke ranks and fled in all directions as the second wagon in line joined the conflagration, adding another group of screams to the choir. “Stop! Hold ranks!” Savitz commanded, to middling effect. He began a charge forward through the smoke and fleeing men to the front of the column, but only made it halfway before his horse seized up beneath him and toppled over, throwing him hard into the dirt. The horse remained motionless on the ground for a moment, then suddenly regained its senses and ran off in the opposite direction.
The commander rolled to his knees, grasping the shoulder he landed on with a grimace. He took a moment to climb to his feet before stalking forward to stand in front of the men that remained in formation. “Damn you, Lux,” he shouted, enraged, “enough of these tricks! Quit being a coward and face me like a man!”
I closed the distance between us in a few seconds, stopping just far enough away to send a cloud of dust billowing over the commander. “I think you’ll come to regret that, sir.”
He coughed as the dirt settled over him in a fine layer. “Always so cocky,” he spat. “Whatever illusions of power you think you have will shatter, here and now. I defeated you in Atsal with a dozen men and took you prisoner. This time, you won’t be given that mercy. Not after what you’ve done.”
No mercy. My mouth curled into a grin at the thought. “You seem to have forgotten, Savitz. You didn’t beat me in Atsal; I gave myself up willingly when you threatened the life of an innocent girl. A habit you clearly insist on upholding.” I waved my hand at the burning carts behind him. “Do you honestly think you stand a chance against me now that you lack your trump card?”
“This perversion of the Primal Fire won’t save you against the full might of the Third Company,” he warned me sharply.
“How many of those men do I have to slaughter before you realize the mistake you’ve made?” I took a step forward and drew my sword from its sheath, pointing it at his face. “I’ll give you this warning only once: tell them to retreat, or I will massacre every man under your command.”
Savitz spat in the dirt between us. “If you think I would retreat after what you did to my s—”
“Do NOT misunderstand me, commander,” I interrupted. “These are your last few minutes alive in this world. I am not giving you a chance to leave; only the men who follow you. You lost that right the moment you gave the order to murder Marin Sesaude.”
There was a soft click followed by a mechanical whirring somewhere to my right as a crossbow fired a bolt directly at my head. I slid deftly to one side, dodging the attack and turning to face my assailant in a single move, and was delighted to find one of the crossbowmen who had shot Marin was the culprit. A bolt of energy raced out towards him, snaking up his body to the base of his neck where it burrowed through to his spine. With a flash of my sword the energy activated, and the man’s eyes rolled into the back of his head as his vertebrae shattered to dust.
The tenuous link I shared with the soldier through my mana immediately flared with the intense, familiar pain of the void. My scarred hand tingled with sudden energy, and the primal desire that lurked deep within my mind awoke for the first time since my fight in the Attetsian plaza. YES.
No. I withdrew my energy from the lifeless guard and used it to overwhelm the presence, forcing it back to the dark corner it came from. You don’t get to control me anymore. The hunger disappeared as quickly as it had arrived, and my mind returned to a focused calm. The exchange was nearly instantaneous, and I took a moment to give the remaining bowmen a knowing look before I returned my attention to Savitz. “What, nothing to say in your defense?”
“I don’t need to defend myself to you.” His voice quavered with an overwhelming rage as he stared me down. “My orders are to kill you, and those who associate with you. No exceptions.”
“Listen to yourself, Savitz!” I yelled, letting my contempt for Virram bleed through into my voice. “I thought you were a good man once, but it’s clear I was wrong; you seem happy to serve the man who so easily orders the murder of his own innocent citizens. What the fuck has he done to earn such blind devotion?! Is it his name? The big chair he sits in? His fancy crown?” I reached down to my belt and unhooked the woven golden circlet, placing it at a crooked angle on my head. “Will you listen to me now?”
He brandished his mace at me with a snarl. “Enough! I’ve endured your slander for far too long already.” Savitz let out a mighty bellow as he charged forward, swinging his mace with both hands. I lazily stepped aside and let him blow past me, stumbling over his momentum.
“Men of the Third Company!” I shouted to the remaining soldiers. “Your commander has failed you. He has put his own sense of honor above your lives.” Without turning to look, I ducked beneath another attack, extending a leg backwards to hook Savitz’s foot and send him tumbling again. “There are people who need you back in Yoria. Do not throw your lives away for this man’s blind devotion. Instead, drop your weapons and run. Run back to your King and tell him that I will kill any and every man he sends against me.” The commander’s yells grew increasingly frustrated as his attacks flew uselessly around my lithe form. “You have five seconds to decide.”
I spun to slap away another failed attack, then turned my head to stare intently at the front line of soldiers. “One!” I shouted in unison with the explosion of another troop transport. “Two!” Without warning, I whipped around and threw my sword into the crowd of frightened guards, impaling the second bowman who had shot Marin through the chest. “Three!” I recalled the blade and parried the commander’s mace, spinning the weapon out of his hand.
As I had hoped, the closest men threw their swords into the dirt and turned to sprint away. At the sight of the vanguard breaking ranks, others began to follow suit, and by the time I turned to confirm with my own eyes what my Detection had shown me, Savitz and I were alone. Disarmed and disheartened, he pulled a dagger from his belt and lashed out desperately at my throat. I caught the blade in my gauntleted hand and pulled it from his grip, then knocked him to the ground with a heavy blow to his already injured shoulder.
After a few labored grunts of pain, he managed to climb to one knee. “Even if you kill me...your life is over. You can’t run from an entire kingdom.”
“That’s your mistake, Savitz,” I said, kneeling down to his level. “I’m not running anymore. I might be leaving the country, but I’m not running.” I placed a steadying hand on his shoulder. “Virram threatened my family: the people I love, and the only reason I have to live. On my life, I’ll burn your whole fucking kingdom to the ground to keep them safe.”
He tipped his head up to meet my eyes, revealing a face set with disdain. “You don’t have the mettle. Behind all that bravado...you’re just a coward.”
In one swift motion, I flipped the dagger in my palm and stabbed him through the eye,
embedding the blade deep within his skull. I let his body fall as I stood and brushed the dirt from my knee, looped Virram’s crown back into my belt, then turned and sprinted away to find my family.
---
The Corells’ wagon appeared at the edge of my Detection after a few minutes of running, and I breathed a small sigh of relief. Marin was resting peacefully on a bedroll with her injury wrapped in makeshift bandages created from her ruined dress, which were clearly visible under one of Marten’s shirts that she wore for modesty. Lia was also asleep against a stack of boxes, still holding the mana needle and both silver orbs I had given her. Hana sat between both girls with her hands in her lap, looking between them both at regular intervals with concern.
Marten had followed my orders well; the wagon sped across the countryside as fast as the horse could pull it, even as the sun began to disappear behind the horizon. If Lia had been awake, it would have been a simple matter of getting her attention through Detection and relaying the message to stop up to her father, but as things stood, I simply increased the mana to my enhancements and kept running.
When the wagon was finally within visual range, I shouted to get Marten’s attention. His head appeared around the side of the wagon momentarily, and it rattled to a halt a few seconds later. He jumped down from the driver’s bench and stood with his arms crossed at the back flap, waiting for me to arrive. Hana’s face appeared from behind the flap, and she smiled when she spotted me approaching. I skidded to a stop and put my hands on my knees, taking a moment to catch my breath and muse on the limits of my physical endurance. “Thanks for stopping, Marten. I was—”
With my enhancements still in full effect, I saw Marten’s punch coming with ample time to dodge the blow. I knew I deserved it after everything I had put him and his family through, so I activated my Pain Reduction and stayed in place, angling my head slightly to the side to lessen the chance of injuring my jaw. From the look of his form and the force with which his fist connected with my face, I could tell that Marten had at least some experience with fistfighting, and I made a mental note to ask him about it at a more appropriate time.
Restart Again: Volume 3 Page 3