by Tim Marquitz
The beast saw him coming and turned to face him, giving him a feral grin of ruined teeth. Despite the tremors that rattled his body and the voices inside his pounding skull that screamed of the stupidity of what he intended, there was no turning back. He ducked low as he barreled forward, stepping beneath the sharpened claws that waited to tear his flesh from bone. As he did, he whipped his arm overhand, his fist and the orb crashing into the cheek of the Grol.
The crystal orb shattered as it struck and he could feel the razored shards wreaking havoc upon his palm, hundreds of tiny wounds opened all at once. His knuckles sang out, the stout skull of the beast like punching stone.
Unable to slow his charge, Cael slammed into the Grol. Through the blur of his thoughts, he imagined he knew how the beast had felt when it had crashed into the wall.
He being the smaller of the two, Cael was bounced backward, falling away from the beast. As he fell, he spied the sharp claws that hurtled toward him, their tips striping the flesh at his chest, just below his collarbone. He hit the ground, his head snapping back into the trash, agony burning at his hand and torso.
A horrible, inhuman screech tore at his ears and drew his attention from his wounds.
Cael looked up at the beast through eyes that refused to focus and wondered at the flickering red and orange halo that seemed to flutter about the Grol. He blinked away his tears as the young girl appeared at his side, tugging at his arm to pull him up.
The shriek continued as the Grol thrashed about, swatting at itself as though covered in wasps. Cael blinked once more as he was hauled to his feet, his vision clearing.
The beast was engulfed in fire. At his cheek clung a tiny, crimson beetle that shimmered brightly. The licking tongues of flame that seemed to spew from the beetle’s pincers, flickered with malevolence as it tore at the Grol. Flesh seared to black beneath its touch. Cael was assailed by the foul stench of burnt fur as the girl pulled him down the alley.
As if realizing the creator of its torment intended escape, the Grol leapt forward seeming intent upon sharing its fiery demise. Its scream grew more ragged, sharper as it set its sights upon them. Cael and the girl stumbled backward into a wall, having lost sense of their direction when the flaming beast charged. Their backs against the unyielding stone, their arms entwined, there was nowhere to go. It loomed before them, enshrouded in dancing flames. The fury in its boiling glare was a palpable heat that struck in advance of its claws. Cael stared into its eyes and saw only death reflected there.
A heartbeat later, he saw nothing in its eyes.
Just feet from where they stood, the beast went rigid, its eyes rolling in their sockets. It twitched and crumpled into a burning heap. Out of the back of its skull a javelin protruded, its tail still trembling from the force of its throw.
Cael looked up to see bright yellow eyes staring at him from a smiling face encircled in dark gray fur. At the Pathra’s back stood Zalee, the awkward expression of her face clearly one of fury.
“You are a fool, Cael.” She strode rigid to his side, each step made with certain effort. “The fate of Ahreele rests in the hands of the relic-wielders; in your hands. What would we have done had you been slain?”
Cael met her weary glare, angry at her chastisement but yet he could understand her point, one he hadn’t taken into account when he’d rushed off to save the girl. He glanced at her as she clung to his arm in wide-eyed wonder, dirt smeared across her face. He looked back to Zalee. “I’m sorry,” he told her in an attempt to soothe her anger, though his tongue would not stop there, “but what purpose is there in saving Ahreele if we only intend to stand by and let its people die?”
Zalee drew herself up and stared at Cael. The Pathran emissary chuckled behind her. After a quiet moment, the Sha’ree shook her head, the slightest glimmer of a smile gracing her narrow mouth. “There is much to learn in this world, young Cael. I must keep in mind that I will not always be the one to teach.” She turned away. “Come. We must see the princess to safety.”
“I would have her come with us,” Cael said, gesturing to the girl.
Zalee glanced over her shoulder at her and then back to Cael. “Then be quick, the both of you.” She strode toward the street.
The Pathra waved them on. “Waeri,” he said, introducing himself. “Your courage has made this warrior proud.” He put his arms about their shoulders and ushered them away from the rank scent of the fallen Grol.
“I’m Ellora,” the young girl said, her voice cracking. She spared a grateful glance at the Pathra, then another for Cael. “Thank you.”
Cael could only nod, his voice having suddenly deserted him. They were at the wall a silent moment later, Zalee having found another rope to haul them up with.
Within just minutes they were over the wall and moving fast toward the sheltering shadows of the forest. Lathah burned at their backs, the sounds of battle growing ever dimmer. Cael cast a glance back just as one of the great spires came tumbling down, adding its dust to the whirls of black smoke that shrouded the city. He looked to the princess and her family, Ellora, and felt a pang of sorrow on their behalf, for he knew what it meant to lose his people and his home.
He whispered a prayer to Ree for all those that who remained behind. They would need the goddess now.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Lost in the fugue of battle, Arrin knew only the rhythm of his sword and dying cries of the enemy that fell about him.
He had meant only to delay the Grol as the Sha’ree ferried the princess and her family to safety, but the beasts seemed intent upon bringing him down, their eyes only on him. As they had on his return to Lathah, they seemed to hold back, as though they still intended to capture him, rather than kill. However, that hesitance did not stop their advance. There were far more than Arrin had imagined.
They flowed from the streets and alleyways and hurled themselves with fervor upon the merciless death of his sword. For every two he laid low, three burst from the murky smoke to claim their place. When a section of the Eighth’s wall crumbled without warning, the Grol spilled through en masse, filling the spaces to Arrin’s rear, cutting off their route of escape.
Kirah remained behind him to keep the beasts from his back. Unsure of her skills when they’d first engaged, Arrin had grown comfortable with her prowess. Aided by the power of the ancient Sha’ree bracers, she had added her own fair share of corpses to the growing mounds of dead Grol that lay in the streets about them.
He could hear her snarled grunts as she sunk the point of her spear into the furred flesh of yet another Grol that had slipped past. Her happy trills, which had emphasized each kill at the start, had faded, the excitement long worn into a mundane grind as the beasts continued to advance upon them.
Where there had initially been short lulls in the waves, the growing numbers of beasts in the ranks had stolen such pauses from them. Arrin swept left, certain Kirah would fill the gap, and set his blade upon the closest Grol. The gape of its throat cast but another coat of warm blood over Arrin’s arm and chest. He dripped crimson, the blood of the beasts a thick, wet blanket that hung upon him. The tart scent of bile and body fluids, the Grol coating the street in as much shit as blood, was stirred about him. It was a stench he could not quite ignore. He snorted it from his nose as he battled. Reddened streamers trailed over his mouth and chin.
His hilt slick with claret, he held his sword in a white-knuckled grip to keep it from slipping from his grasp. He cleaved the guts from another Grol as it closed, and set the point of his sword to work at the eyes of another. His ears rang with the effort, the sound of his breath loud inside his head.
He fought and fought, taking the head of a beast and neutering another, leaving the last behind to howl its loss until Kirah sent it to the grave. Severed hands spun in the air about Arrin, casting off reddened trails that whirled in their wake, their owners dead before their lost appendages struck the ground.
Arrin flowed under the song of the collar. The sting of its ma
gic that flowed thick through his veins, drove him on, giving him the strength to carry on.
With no thoughts for anything but the destruction of his enemy arrayed before him, Arrin suddenly realized it was there no longer. He slowed his heart and brought his body to a halt. He stared out at the mass of Grol that snarled and snapped from a distance, their lines having drawn back beyond the reach of his sword. He heard Kirah at his back as he wondered at the beasts’ sudden loss of temerity.
They had not fled, but they had pulled back and now stood their ground, more of their number piling up in the ranks at their backs, but not advancing.
“Look,” Kirah spoke into his ear, her voice raw with exertion.
Arrin glanced over the heads of the gathered Grol and spied their ranks splitting at the rear. More of the Grol pushed their way through the lines, and even without seeing what threat they brought to bear, Arrin knew they were possessed of the Sha’ree relics. He could feel the energy of them.
He glanced over his shoulder at Kirah and could see that she too knew what approached. Her expression was one of weariness, its pall not hidden by the rebellious sneer plastered in red across her lips. She would not last much longer.
Arrin looked back to the empowered Grol that marched toward them and knew he too grew close to the end of his energy. Soon his arm would slow, his sword would slip, and then they would be buried under the furious wave of tooth and claw. It was inevitable.
He glanced about to see Grol still lurking at every turn. There would be no flight for them. He let a tired sigh slip loose. In his carelessness, his overconfidence in the beasts wanting him alive that he’d led Kirah to her death. He had betrayed her trust, her father’s, and even that of the Sha’ree. He had sworn much to them that he had no certainty in, speaking only hollow words. Perhaps he had meant them when they slipped from his tongue, but here amidst the crush of the Grol army, he could but laugh at their obvious emptiness.
“I’m sorry,” he told Kirah as he stared at the wall of beasts ahead.
She set her hand upon his shoulder. “If I am to die today, then it is with much glory. Only honor and peace await me after, Arrin Urrael, as it does you. I am without fear.”
“Then you are a fool, Kirah, as your brother said.” He turned his head to smile at her. “But then what am I to have led such a fool?” He looked back to the Grol. “If this is to be our last, let us at least take upon them such a toll as to live on forever in legend.” He would not let them take him. He raised his sword, quelling the trembles that shook his hand. “Come and die, beasts. If you would have our flesh this day, you would earn it at the cost of thousands of your brethren.”
Kirah howled at his back. He felt his skin prickle at the determination in her roughened voice. Their time had come, but they would make the most of it. They would not be buried in the earth, but in a sea of Grol blood. It would have to be enough.
The front rank split before them and dozens of long-snouted Grol separated from the lines, confidence apparent in their gaits and sharpened smiles. Like the beasts that had ambushed them in the woods, each of these wore the bronze bracers at their wrists and each glimmered green. They stood without weapons, their clawed hands held ready before them.
Though he had not known what to expect when he first fought their kind, he now had their measure, but that brought him no comfort. Even had he been fresh, Kirah at his side, he could not win through. He had been bested by four of the beasts that had held back in hopes of capturing him. He saw no mercy in the eyes of the empowered Grol that stood before them. They had come to end their resistance and Arrin could see no way of stopping them.
They drew closer, the Grol spreading out only slightly to keep Arrin and Kirah from lashing out at more than one at a time, but yet close enough for all of them to strike. These were the true warriors of the Grol, not the chattel that bled out upon the cobblestones.
“It was an honor,” he said, willing the last vestiges of the collar to furious life. Her reply was lost to the wind as he leapt at the Grol.
He darted in high, only to drop low. He had learned his lesson the last time, for all its value now. His blade crashed into the bronze of the first Grol’s bracer, crushing it about its wrist. The beast reared back and howled as Arrin moved for another. He pressed the advantage while it was still his; he armed with cold steel, they with only flesh, no matter how enchanted.
The Grol lashed out at him and he shifted right, cleaving the sharpened tips of its fingers off as he swept by. Kirah came from behind and landed her spear in its throat. In her off hand she bore a short sword shaded in wet red, clearly scavenged from the dead at their feet.
Arrin launched himself at another beast as Kirah veered off the opposite direction. He heard the clang of metal and the pained cry of a Grol behind him as he skewered the red eye of one before. The beasts closed about him.
The advantage had gone.
He felt the sharp burn of claws at his back, their line searing from his shoulder to his hip. The blow staggered him and he spun to keep the Grol in sight. He snapped his blade out to catch one of the charging beasts in the shoulder, the point sinking in but doing little to slow its advance. Before he even struck the ground, he felt his hand ripped from the hilt of his sword, the muscle at his forearm torn from the bone. He stared at it in disbelief as he crashed onto his back, blood spilling from the wound like wine from a shattered goblet. Tendrils of skin and muscle flapped in the wind of his fall.
The collar did its best to mute the pain but the Grol gave it no chance. A beast shredded the meat at his ribs and Arrin threw his uninjured arm in front of his face, narrowly diverting the claws that sought his eyes. They instead tore at his elbow, several dripping flaps of skin left in their wake.
Against his will, Arrin cried out as jagged teeth sunk into the meat at his side. His vision tunneled, encroaching black swallowing the world around him. The tuneless hum in his ears grew louder as he wallowed in the overwhelming pit of agony. The remnants of his sight were blocked by the furred bodies of the Grol as they swarmed over him like hounds fighting over a bone, grasping at him, pinning him down. Unable to see if Kirah had fallen, he hoped her death was swift.
A guttural cry slipped through the haze that had settled over him and he was suddenly aware he was laying still upon the hard cobblestones, the jostling hands and jaws of the Grol no longer tearing at him. He felt overly warm, as though he sat too close to a campfire, waves of heat wafting over him.
All around him he heard the sounds of battle, the dull impact of dead flesh hitting the ground. Steel clattered on stone and the dying cried out. The voices could only be Grol. He couldn’t help but smile for it must be Kirah set upon the beasts.
He heard her voice calling his name, the syllables drawn out serpentine by the hum at his ears. He opened his eyes to see a blur dotted with white hovering before him. He heard Kirah’s voice again and blinked his eyes, the wavering image before him slowly coalescing into Kirah’s speckled face. Worry crowded thick in her purple eyes. A narrow smile brightened her lips.
The sounds of war continued to ring inside his ears.
A glimmer of sense returning to pay momentary visit to his mind, Arrin lifted his head to see furred bodies flung past. Despite the limitations of his vision and the speed at which they traveled, it was clear the beasts little resembled the Grol Arrin had come to know, most so mangled as to be nearly unrecognizable.
Kirah hunched beside him and slid her arms beneath his back. He felt her ministrations as dull pressure, his flesh too battered to feel pain.
“Come, Arrin. We must move,” she spoke in his ear.
He cast his eyes past her, his wavering gaze alighting on the gate to the Crown. He stared for a moment, realizing no Grol were amassed before it, the street clear save for the piled dead. Kirah jostled him about as she drew him up into her arms, but he felt no pain. A cold numbness was about him.
He looked in the direction the flying beast parts had come to see a yellow-green
ghost striding toward him. Its whitened eyes settled on him, its expression unclear. It reached over and lifted his chin, glancing at his throat before meeting his eyes. Arrin saw a glimmer of green and silver at its wrist and he could feel the subtle waft of power as it reacted with that of his collar.
“You are Arrin Urrael?” the ghost asked, Arrin at last recognizing him as Sha’ree.
Kirah answered for Arrin when he could not, his tongue too thick inside his mouth.
“Zalee speaks true of you.” He glanced at the bodies that littered the streets. “If you would see Ahreele saved, you must travel to Ah Uto Ree and tell them Uthul would have them train you in our ways.” The slits of his eyes shifted to Kirah. “Take him and flee. I will keep the Grol from your backs.” A trickle of crimson fluid oozed from his eyes. “If I do not meet you upon the road, tell my daughter I have gone to Ree.”
Without another word, the Sha’ree turned away and strode toward the howling Grol that advanced at a run, their numbers too many for Arrin to count.
Kirah wasted no time, dashing away down the clear street opposite the Grol army, and toward the open gate. Arrin was bounced about as she carried him, his vision blurring at the motion. He cast a hurried glance over Kirah’s shoulder to see the Sha’ree amidst the swarm of beasts. Green glimmered at his wrists as he plowed into their ranks. The beasts closed upon him, trading blow for blow. The Sha’ree faded from sight behind the crush of Grol bodies.
Arrin could see him no more.
Darkness closed about him.
He could see nothing.
Chapter Thirty-Six
Arrin watched as the land of his birth fell to the savage horde of the Grol, the last of the glorious spires tumbling to the earth before his eyes. Too far from the city to hear the howls of the beasts or the cries of his people, he felt the rumble of the collapsing tower, but he could see little beside the flames that fluttered in the growing light and the billows of dark smoke that enshrouded the mountains. Though he had often dreamed of Lathah, the city a beacon of hope in his darkest of hours, it would be this view that would haunt his sleep from this day forward.