The Last Winter (The Circle War Book 2)

by Matt King

  They tossed him from one to the other, taking turns slamming him against the pillars while they taunted him with ear-piercing screeches. Eventually, they let him fall. He landed with a crash, his ribs and legs taking the brunt of the blow. He couldn’t feel his feet, or his hands.

  When his bones finally healed to the point where he could feel pins and needles in his limbs, he sensed a rumbling on the ground. A second shudder followed. When he looked up, two of the Ysir were on either side of him. The third landed behind. He stood and watched as Icomedes came swooping down to the ground, kicking up a cloud of dust as he landed. In his hands were two double-sided axes. A long arc of yellow sunlight reflected off the edge.

  “A hunt too short,” he said in disgust. “Your fight is through, Law-son. Now I will have my trophy.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  The room was dark except for a row of narrow windows around the top edge of the wall, where August could hear the murmur of the people outside. He cursed to himself behind the metal muzzle wrapped around the bottom half of his face. His hands and feet were bound to the wall, his swords taken. More than anything, he wished they had left him deaf, not mute. Hearing the people outside was too painful. No matter where he positioned himself in the room, he couldn’t hide from their voices, a constant reminder of why he’d chosen to sacrifice himself, and how he’d failed.

  The bright light of midday eventually turned to orange, then a deep shade of red before the sun set. He wondered if it would be the last time for them.

  No, I can’t think like that. There’s still a way to save them.

  And he knew what it was, so why was he still looking for other ways?

  His choice seemed pretty clear, even if it was a choice he didn’t want to make. If he didn’t give Meryn up, Amara would let everyone on Earth die, while she and her champions got away without a scratch. If he did tell the truth, though, who’s to say that Amara would keep her end of the bargain? This was the same woman who ordered a nation full of people killed just on the off chance that he might die along with them.

  As darkness settled over the room, he realized that no matter what happened, he’d seen his last sunset. There was no question about that.

  Sleep eventually took hold after he’d stared at the walls for hours, but it was a shallow, fitful sleep dominated by nightmares of hearing Velawrath’s arrival before he could do anything about it.

  His eyes shot open at the sound of something slamming against the door to his cell. Another thud followed, like someone falling on the floor. He held his breath as the door creaked open. A shadow slipped through the opening. Footsteps sounded on the stone floor, coming to a stop before he could see who it was.

  Thin red lines appeared in the darkness, each traveling along a branching network until he was looking at a skeleton of glowing blood vessels in the shape of a man. Then he saw the eyes form, two pulsing red eyes staring back at him like a pair of twin suns.

  Gemini.

  Gemini moved along the wall until he stood beneath the rays of moonlight coming in from the windows. He seemed larger than August remembered, no longer the little kid playing dress-up in a SWAT uniform, but a grown man who was built as powerfully as he looked.

  “If I take that muzzle off, will you scream?” he asked.

  August shook his head.

  The power beneath Gemini’s skin swelled in a pulse, keeping him in a thin halo of red light. He walked to August’s side, seemingly unafraid to get as close as he was. He bent down and placed his hands on either side of August’s jaws. August could feel the sting of heat on his skin. With a sharp crack the muzzle broke apart, falling in pieces on the ground.

  “Does Mommy know you’re up this late?” August asked.

  Gemini answered with a snort, returning to his spot on the wall.

  “It’s been a long time. I see that crackne of yours still hasn’t cleared up.”

  “And how’s the stand-up career coming?” Gemini asked. “Probably hard to find a place around here that still has four walls, I guess. Or an audience.”

  August fought to keep his cool. “What do you want?”

  “No more jokes? Disappointing. It’s been over a year now. I was expecting better material.”

  “What do you want?” August repeated.

  Gemini shrugged. “Suit yourself.” He looked back at the door before continuing. “I heard you talking to them when you came in today.”

  “Before she sent you to your room?”

  “Before I left,” he replied frostily. “You were warning them about something. I want to know what it was.”

  “I warned them about Velawrath,” August said.

  Something flashed across Gemini’s eyes, something like excitement mixed with hope. “So it’s true.”

  “What’s true?”

  “Nothing,” Gemini replied. “What do you know about him?”

  “I know he’ll be here soon. I know he’s going to kill every living thing in his path, including you.”

  “Is he powerful?”

  “Don’t get your hopes up. He’s a living planet. You can’t fight him.”

  Gemini smirked. “You’d be surprised what I can do.”

  August felt like strangling the smile off his face. “I’ve seen what you’re capable of. I also know you’re too chickenshit to do it when someone else is around to stop you.”

  That took the smile away. “If you’re so eager to try, there’s no time like the present.”

  August held up his shackles in answer. “I don’t think it’s in the cards, but believe me, I’d like nothing more.”

  “It’s too bad these people think of you as some kind of monster. I wonder if they’d be disappointed to know you’re the weakest of us all?”

  August bit his lip and looked away. There was no use getting angry. What could he do? Even if he was strong enough to break out of his chains, killing Gemini wouldn’t stop Velawrath.

  But it would be justice, and that’s what those people deserve.

  “What about the woman with you? And the animal. They here to attack, too?”

  He’d chosen not to think about Aeris since he left her to find the camp. “No,” he said. “They were here as a decoy. Like me.” Saying the words took the wind out of his chest.

  Gemini looked disappointed. “So there’s only Velawrath.”

  “I told you, you can’t kill him.” His shackles clanked against the metal cable anchoring him to the wall. “I don’t know what happened to you. I don’t know how Amara convinced you to do what you did, but if there’s anything left inside of you that’s human, you’ll save those people in the city.”

  “Save them?” Gemini said with a scoff.

  “They didn’t do anything to you. You and I signed up for this war, but they didn’t. They don’t deserve what’s coming for them. You have to convince Amara to get them off this planet.”

  “They deserve what’s coming and more. All those people down there, they aren’t innocent. They’re the same people who hurt me my entire life. The same people who laughed. The same people who thought they were so much better. The same people who used their fists when words weren’t good enough.”

  “You’ve got to be shitting me,” August said. “All this time—all this death—and your excuse is that people were mean to you?”

  “Mean?” Gemini said. The red light surged beneath his skin. “They were cruel. And the ones who were supposed to care the most were the worst of all.”

  “You think Amara cares about you? Is that it? You think she gives a rat’s ass whether you live or die? I got news for you—none of them care. We’re nothing to them. They’d just as soon let us die if it meant they had a chance to live.”

  “Well that’s where you and I agree,” he said. “But I’m not in this for them anymore.”

  “Then who are you in it for?”

  “Myself.”

  August tensed his wrists against the cuffs.

  Gemini edged closer. “I always won
dered what it would feel like to kill a champion. When I kill people like them,” he thumbed over his shoulder, “their energy is a rush, but I’m guessing a person like you would be…something better.”

  August launched himself off the floor. The bindings around his legs held him fast to the wall.

  “Come on,” Gemini said with a smile. “Let me feel it. Or do you need your swords to fight?”

  August spoke through gritted teeth. “I don’t need swords to kill you.”

  The answer brought a smile to Gemini’s face, stretching the red cracks on his cheeks. He walked forward and looked down at the metal rope between August’s feet, placing his hand on one of the shackles. August felt a spike of heat just before the metal cracked and clanged against the floor, first on one foot and then the other. Gemini reached for one of August’s hands next. The metal glowed red at his touch, snapping along the center as though it had been cut by a knife.

  “Remember,” Gemini said as his hand hovered over the last shackle. “You promised not to scream.”

  As soon as the metal fell away, August shot forward and tackled him to the floor. He pulled Gemini up with his arm around his neck and drove him head-first into the wall. Gemini wavered on his feet. August let loose with a flurry of punches, each one feeling like it had more force than the previous. When Gemini tried to cover his head, August took him by the hair and slammed him into his knee. He held tight with both hands and repeatedly drilled his head into the stone, unaware at first that he was screaming as he fought.

  Gemini went down holding his hand to his head, but he never went out. August dropped to the floor, swatting away Gemini’s weak attempt to hold him at bay. He took him by the throat in one hand and started punching with the other. He hit him until he couldn’t feel his hand anymore, until he could barely lift his arm above his shoulder. His punches slowed to nothing. He looked down at the dazed face of Gemini with his chest heaving. Every breath felt like needles through his lungs.

  Gemini spit a streak of blood onto the floor. “Do you feel better?” he choked out.

  August gathered enough breath to speak. “Some.”

  The room disappeared in a rush of red light. Something hit him like a train, throwing him across the room. His head cracked against the wall. His muscles seized, rocking him violently from side to side as if he was being electrocuted. He had no power to stop it. He was cooking from the inside. As the pain squeezed his body in a vice, he clawed at the surface of his suit, trying to dig his fingers into his arms to rip himself apart and end the agony once and for all. Blood flowed out of his eyes and ears. He screamed hard enough to tear his vocal chords apart.

  Gemini took him by the throat. “How do you feel now?!”

  The smell of cinder rising from his body filled his nose and mouth.

  “Look at me,” Gemini said.

  August kept his eyes shut, trying to break through the ebbing pain.

  “Look at me!”

  With his vision still blurred from blood and tears, he opened his eyes lazily and looked around the room. He could barely focus on the red light shining from Gemini’s eyes.

  Laughter leaked out of Gemini in fits. “This is what I was supposed to be so scared of. This is what they tried to keep me safe from. They don’t understand. You are nothing to me. Nothing!”

  The light in Michael’s eyes swelled. As they did, a prickling heat rose around August’s eyelids.

  A woman’s voice shouted in the room. “Michael! Leave him alone!”

  Gemini kept his scalding stare on August. “This is the last thing you’ll ever see,” he said. “The one person you’ll never be able to kill.”

  August screamed again, opening fresh wounds in his throat as his eyes caught fire. His vision dimmed, then disappeared altogether, extinguished with a sickening pop. The world was gone, replaced with waves of stabbing pain as the skin burned away from his face.

  “Michael, you will stop this! I need him alive!”

  Gemini let go of his throat, taking the pressure of his burning stare with him.

  August immediately rolled to his side, touching his shaking fingers to his eyes.

  They’re gone.

  Even as the pain subsided and his healing took over, his body continued to shake. He kept willing his sight to return. When it didn’t, his chest constricted as panic set in. “I can’t see,” he said. His hands searched the air as he tried to gain his bearings. “I can’t see!”

  A gentle hand took his. He swatted it away.

  “Don’t touch me!” he yelled.

  Amara’s voice was soothing. “Please. I only want to make sure you are all right.”

  “Leave me alone!” He pushed himself across the floor with his feet until his back hit the wall.

  “He’s fine,” Gemini said. “I didn’t kill him.”

  “You have put my plan in jeopardy,” she said. “I want you to leave.”

  “But—”

  “Now.”

  He stormed out of the room. The door slammed shut behind him.

  Amara let August listen to the sound of his shuddering breaths for a pause before she spoke again. “I am sorry for what he did,” she said. She was close. Maybe standing over him.

  He said nothing. He kept thinking that his eyelids were blinking, eyelids that were no longer there.

  “It is a shame that Meryn led you to this place, to this end. None of this was Pyra’s plan.” She moved away without waiting for a response. Her steps were soft and steady as she walked across the cell. When she spoke again, her voice lost its soothing tone. “I will send for you at sunrise. After, I will see to it that you will not suffer in the end, no matter your choice.”

  The door clicked shut, sounding very much like the hands of a clock striking midnight.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  The moon was nearly at its apex, shining down on Aeris as she sat alone on the slope of a hill with the light of Amara’s city a small glow on the horizon. She surveyed the carpet of stars above the fortress with a scowl, looking for signs of Velawrath’s arrival.

  Let him come. I am ready.

  Her eyes fell away. Even though she was resigned to die, the sentiment no longer felt true. She looked back to Amara’s city. It was the longest she’d been able to focus on the light. Each time she saw it, she was reminded of August and she’d look away before the visions of his fate invaded her thoughts.

  There is nothing I can do.

  Even that didn’t feel true. She squeezed her fingers in a fist.

  “What would you ask of me?” she yelled out as she took a rock and threw it into the weeds. She jumped to her feet and turned away from the western sky.

  She imagined Dondannarin’s reply. You can make sure he is not alone in his final moments. After all he has done, you can’t leave him to suffer.

  She thought back to her conversation with Dondannarin after Paralos first gave his offer. Whether or not Aeris would accept was not up for debate—she would do what she must to save her people. Her choice was whether or not she would do it alone. The look on Dondannarin’s face was still as vivid in her thoughts as the night she had spoken to her. She was resolute, her eyes challenging Aeris as they always had, daring her to raise a fight.

  “You will not face this by yourself,” she had said. “I won’t allow it.”

  “I can’t ask you to do this,” Aeris replied.

  “You can’t ask me not to. I made a promise to your parents that I would protect you until I could no longer hold a chakram. The last I checked, I could still throw it farther than you.”

  “Those days may be behind you, old woman,” Aeris replied. “I have the power of the gods in me now.”

  “Then it may prove close, for once.”

  They shared one of their final laughs that night. Dondannarin was the first to stow her smile. “I will gather a few of our warriors when the time comes.”

  “No. No one else.”

  “Those I ask will have a choice and that choice is not up
to you. Now, repeat to me the words I taught you as a child.”

  Aeris replied in a resigned voice. “I will live this life until happiness steals my final breath.”

  “Or?”

  “Or I will die as a warrior with weapon in hand and the name of my fallen on my tongue.”

  Dondannarin had lived up to those words. She died a warrior with both chakrams at her side. If she thought hard enough, she could hear her speak her parents’ name with the last of her breath.

  And what will I do? How will I face this death?

  She looked back over her shoulder, letting her eyes focus on Amara’s city. This time, she let the images of August’s fate settle, kindling the fire building inside her. I will go down as a warrior, as Dondannarin before me. And I will not go down alone.

  But will I be able to save him alone?

  Her thoughts turned to Shadow as she scanned the countryside on the edge of the winter storm. She could make use of the beast if she could find her, but finding her could be impossible. The horizon seemed endless and the forests few and far between. Despite Amara’s healing, the land was still devoid of life. She hadn’t seen a living creature since she watched the caravan walk away with August in it.

  An idea took hold. August had said that Shadow was once like them, able to heal her wounds. That meant that she had some power of the gods inside her, which also meant that she was not bound to mortal necessities.

  Such as food.

  If what August said was true, and that Paralos had taken her power from her, that meant that the beast would be hungry. If she could lure her out, maybe she could jar her memory somehow. It would be dangerous to even attempt it. If Shadow couldn’t regain her memory, then there would be no stopping the beast, not if she was dying of hunger. If Shadow wasn’t at full strength during their first fight, she shuddered to think of what kind of damage the monster could do if she was desperate and healthy.

  Dangerous or not, she had to try. She focused on putting herself in the mind of the beast. Where would she go if she was hungry? Her first thought was of the forests, but the trees were far too sparse in this part of August’s world. Even if there was life in the plains, Shadow would never be able to hide herself well enough to stalk her prey.