by Michael Dean
I watched as the twins released their stilettos from wherever they kept them under their lengthy sleeves. Shimmer threw his hand back at them. “No…the only blade you need is the one in the arena. I need your hands free to use it…leave those here,” he ordered as the duo looked at each other again in hesitance as they released the knives.
With all of the grandstanding Shimmer was doing, I completely forgot about the Demon Dagger just sitting, unguarded and exposed, in front of the imprisoned Shade. As he addressed the crowd I started to inch a little closer to the weapon in hopes of grabbing it and possibly free Shade. I didn’t get very far at all before the twins leaped off their platform and landed side by side directly in front of the dagger. The sight of seeing their adored queens ready for battle sent the crowd into pure ecstasy.
“Quiet down…quiet down…that’s not all! Our valiant and brave watchman of the Caverns of the Forgotten will be joining his queens!” The crowd roared in delight as Murgit quit clapping and looked at his Lord in despair.
Shimmer said something to him and then grabbed his reluctant follower, pulling him to the front. I could see Murgit swallow hard as he sheepishly waved at the now insane crowd. With a push, Murgit flew down into the arena, landing on his side in the dirt. The twins looked back at him as he shuffled up and brushed the dirt off his clothes. With impatience, Molina walked back and pulled him to the forefront. All three of them stood in front of the dagger by Shade, only Murgit still looked a little insecure.
“The traitor dies tonight!” Shimmer egged on his supporters and they cheered even louder.
I flapped my wings and prepared for the attack of the trio of vamps, who were now fanning out. The sky was beginning to light up due to the approaching storm. Thunder rolled as a few drops of rain began to fall out of the roaring sky. This set an even darker tone.
Sierra and Molina slid around to my right and left sides as Murgit stayed in front of me. He looked confused as to what he should do, but the twins weren’t. They charged me at the same time and started punching at me. I leaned back as far as I could to dodge their first couple of attacks. It didn’t take long for them to get me in a compromising position because again one of them hit me high as another swept my legs out from underneath me and I fell to the ground on my back.
The twins wasted no time. They punched and stomped at me as I rolled around in the dirt, attempting to avoid their strikes. I was successful in evading some, but not all.
“Murgit…you fool, grab the Demon Dagger, and when we get him where we want him, get over here and kill him!” Sierra called out to the still stupefied watchman. He reached down to pick up the weapon.
They kept throwing blows with their feet and fists and I did everything I could to get back on my feet. With a short window for error, I found the opening I needed and pushed my wings against the ground, which lifted me off the dirt.
I could hear the crowd every step of the way, cheering when the twins had the upper hand and jeering when I would get out of a compromising situation and counter the duo.
After absorbing a few blows from the vampire queens, I was able to grab Molina by the throat and chuck her at her sister. She blasted into her twin and slammed into one wall surrounding the arena. It was a similar to a move I’d used on them before in the ballroom. I gave them no respite and charged straight at them. As soon as they hit I was on them. I grabbed the two of them and slammed their heads together. I made sure to keep an eye on the dagger-toting Murgit off in the distance just in case he decided to get involved, but he didn’t. He just stood in place and held the weapon. It was easy to tell he was frightened.
Rain was really coming down now and my attention stayed on my rematch with the girls. I picked up Sierra and threw her about fifty rows up into the crowd. Then I grabbed Molina and punched right where her steel covered heart rested. It was hard and it thudded when I struck her, but she flew back on her butt and slid across the arena floor. I lunged after her and buried a knee in her chest when I landed. In a mad flurry, I punched her repeatedly in the face.
Being sure to watch my other adversaries, I glanced at the still standing Murgit and then turned to find Sierra. Good thing I did because I saw her jump from the stands with a cocked fist coming down at me. She didn’t get a chance to land it because I shot up from pounding Molina and nailed the oncoming Sierra under the chin with an uppercut from hell. I hit her so hard that she actually flew out over the top of the stadium.
Once I knew she was safely out of the way for a few seconds, I turned my attention back to Molina, who was staggering to her feet. I darted back to her and hit her in the back of her head with my forearm. This knocked her face into the dirt. I straddled her back and pummeled her. I was winning, and the spectators, along with Shimmer, knew it.
“Murgit! What are you waiting for, you blithering idiot? Kill him…kill the traitor now! Aid your queens or suffer the consequences! You will suffer a fate ten times worse than anything he can dish out if you continue to stand there!” The crowd roared in agreement and Murgit stared up at his master, still clutching the dagger. Then he looked down at me. I was still keeping an eye on him while beating Molina.
I saw him take a deep breath and start running at me with the dagger cocked and ready to stab. He was to me in seconds, but I was ready. Just as he tried to stab me with the weapon, I grabbed his thrusting arm and bent it backwards, breaking it. Murgit screamed in pain as I took the dagger out of his fingers.
“I told you, if I ever got free, I’d kill you.”
With those words, I freed up one of my hands while holding onto the dagger with the other and punched him through his chest. I watched the face of my old tormentor strain in pain as I pulled his heart out of his chest. In seconds, Murgit was no more.
The crowd moaned at the sight of the easy defeat of one of their well known figure heads. Then they went silent. Only the sound of the falling rain hitting the landscape could be heard for a few seconds.
Knowing that speed was the key here, I needed to get my attention back on the twins, but I wasn’t fast enough this time. Sierra had leaped back into the stadium and kicked me square in the back, which caused me to hit the ground face first and slide into the arena wall. The crowd screamed in approval.
I managed to hang on to the Demon Dagger and rolled off my stomach. Sierra charged at me with the speed that only a vampire possesses and was on me in a second, trying to yank the dagger out of my hand. Molina was still dazed in the background and barely able to get back on her feet.
She did her best to pull the dagger from my grip, but she wasn’t strong enough. I grabbed her by the wrist and broke it. Sierra let out a blood curdling scream as her bones shattered. I took the dagger and placed it in my belt before whipping around her, putting her in a strangle hold, and cranking her neck. It cracked and crunched, and before I knew it, she was looking at me…from her backside. I released her and she fell to the arena floor. Shimmer screamed in defiance at me as I stalked the unsteady Molina.
When I got to her, I picked her up with almost no retaliation out of her and slammed her hip over my knee. It was if the crowd could feel her pain. They called out in the same manner Molina did when she buckled. Then, I looked up to the furious Shimmer and started breaking his mistresses’ legs, slowly and methodically. I concluded that if I couldn’t figure out how to take their hearts out yet, I might as well bust some bones to buy me more time before they healed again.
When I dragged the broken body of Molina over to her battered sister to do more damage, I took my eyes off Shimmer momentarily. The next thing I knew I felt a hand slide around my front side, pulling the Demon Dagger out of my belt. I turned to defend myself against a potential stab. When I turned, there was Shimmer. I blocked his wrist with my arm as he went to stab me through my back. Unsuccessful with his sneak attack, he kicked me squarely in the chest. That was one of the strongest kicks I’ve ever felt. It had so much force that it knocked me up a few rows into the wild crowd. The nervous vampire sp
ectators scurried to get out of my way when I landed. They remained nowhere near me.
“Enough!” Shimmer called out to the crowd and his fallen queens, who were now starting to heal as their bones straightened out. “Leave this field of honor, you’ve disgraced me. Head back to my castle.” The twins bowed and leaped up to the section with their thrones and exited behind them. There must have been a door somewhere behind there.
“The time for games is over. This traitor must fall…now.” The mass cheered at his proclamation, well, those that weren’t anywhere near me did, anyway.
I got to my feet and soared back into the arena.
“Now my friends, you get to see the fall of a traitor. Justice…has…come for the demon!” Shimmer raised both of his arms in the air, still sporting the Demon Dagger in one hand as if he’d already defeated me. Lightning struck in the clouds above us as he held his arms up, almost as if he was controlling the skies himself.
The vampire mass went into hysterics as they were about to witness their King go into battle.
“Then, after I crush the love-struck demon, right here, in front of you all…I will take the girl for my own! Ushering in the reign of another Queen! A new Queen!” The crowd exploded in excitement.
“Everyone is invited to the Ball of the Dead afterward to honor my beautiful bride…Shade Lewis!” He pointed over to my near lifeless, soaking wet girlfriend. The vampire horde cheered on.
“But first…” Shimmer looked at me through the fat rain drops. His long wet hair nearly covered his face, but those blood red eyes peered at me menacingly. When the lightning struck above us, it lit up his face momentarily. I watched as he lowered the Demon Dagger, tucking it in through his belt loop, then he grinned. For the first time in awhile, I felt real fear.
He was on me in a blur. I had never seen punches thrown as fast as those he landed on me. I’d try to block one, only to get pounded somewhere else on my body twice. He struck me from every angle. I couldn’t keep up with his speed. There was no way to train for such lightning quick movement. I was able to block a blow here and there, but overall, he was landing pretty much everything he threw.
The crowd was worked into a frenzy as they could see Shimmer was dominating me. I thought to myself in all the madness that he could just pull out the dagger in one of the blows he was throwing and I may not be able to even see it coming. I mean, I was doing the best I could. When I tried to counter, I was too slow and he would move out of the way with minimal effort.
He was beating me to a pulp. He whipped me as I stood, then when I would fall, he would beat me some more. I tried to retaliate with my wing cocoon maneuver but he was so fast and accurate that he was able to strike me enough through it that when I tried to thrust my wings out to blow him backwards, it just didn’t have much force behind it. He kept picking me up with one hand and throwing me into sections of the arena. I crashed into the wall.
Every time he tossed me around like junk, he’d play to the crowd, holding up his arms in triumph. After he’d get his recognition, he’d stalk me. I’d do everything in my power to counter attack, but he’d just dart around me in that blur and dodge everything I slung at him. He’d pummel me more, and the cycle continued.
I was getting exhausted. It was getting to the point where he could stab me with the Demon Dagger at any point, but the arrogant showman in him continued to appease the jubilant crowd. It fed his ego and he loved it, so he kept toying with me. I took that as his only weakness.
I figured I’d try to use my speed to get some distance between him and I, then fly out of the arena. I knew I wasn’t faster than him, but maybe I was quick enough to get him out of the Cavity so I could potentially level the playing field by using the elements of the landscape outside of the arena to my advantage.
When I got a second to breathe from the beating while he riled up the masses, with all the strength I had left in my body, I blasted onto my feet and ran with everything I had. Shimmer stood in place and watched as I ran to the opposite end of the stadium, stretched out my wings, and went into flight.
I looked back to find him and couldn’t believe my eyes. Shimmer literally jumped into the air, bouncing and leaping from seat to seat, deck to deck among the spectators, higher and higher in mere seconds until he jumped off the top of the arena, and tackled me in mid-air before I could completely clear the arena itself, I was still within the depths of the mountain the Cavity sat in. I was high and angled enough to curve over the top of the arena, causing us to slam into the side of Devil’s Tooth Mountain. I clung to the rocky terrain and did my best to shield myself from his blows.
Shimmer hung on to the mountain with one hand as he pulled back and gut punched me over and over again with the other. Then he leaned back from the mountainside and raised his fist to the falling rain. The lightning kept striking just a couple miles above us. The crowd looked up and roared in approval. I took this moment to shoot out in front of him, freeing myself from being pinned between him and the side of the mountain.
I rocketed myself as fast as I could, looking back the whole time now that I was aware how nimble and quick Shimmer actually was. The Vampire Lord glared up at me and leaped and crawled up the side of Devil’s Tooth after me like a scurrying spider. He caught me as soon as I got to the outside edge of the cavern, tackling me again. I reached down and pulled out the Demon Dagger from his waist and released it. It fell through the air and disappeared back down into the arena below.
Shimmer scolded me on what I thought was a brilliant maneuver.
“You think that will save you, hero? You’ve only delayed the inevitable and prolonged your suffering.” He crashed me onto the outer edge of Devil’s Tooth and we began to roll, still fighting one another, down the steep decline of the mountainside. Only the sounds of us struggling and rolling could be heard as we fell out of range of the noise bubble coming from the vampire crowd inside the mountain.
We must have rolled about halfway down the muddy mountain before we came to a stop. I was nearly out of gas and feeling every bit of our fight. I was weak from the beating. The fall took something out of Shimmer as well because he stumbled to his feet, sucking in air as he hunched over to address me.
“Why do you persist, Leo? Why pursue what you cannot have?” The storm flashed and roared around us as the rain kept falling.
I positioned one leg under me before the other and barely got to my feet to answer him. “I push forward because I have no other choice…what is it exactly that I cannot have?” I wiped away the raindrops that streamed down my face.
“Your freedom…the girl…your quest is in vain, Leo, surely you must know that.”
“Must know what?”
“That your thirst for Diccittidel will only end in your death…it is futile to continue.”
“If I’m already dead, what else do I have to lose?” I spoke sarcastically. I knew what he meant, my permanent death…total extinction, but I wanted to stall to gather back some lost strength.
“You’re a damn fool! Give up this futile endeavor and you and I can take over the world. Push out Christian. Together we can do this. Be what you are, Leo Cutler.”
His offer might have been tempting for any other demon, but I’ve dealt with Shimmer enough now to know he can’t be trusted in any deal. There was no way I would take him up on his offer, but I needed to buy more time for recovery and humored him.
“How do you propose we do that?” Shimmer smiled and approached me.
“I have a plan, but I need a demon…a demon of strength, like you, Leo.”
“Christian would crush us both, Shimmer.”
“Then by your own admission you see that your task of Diccittidel will be to no avail. You admit that he can demolish you…you know you will die if you confront him…hell, you’re about to die now.”
I have to admit, he was making some sense but I still wasn’t falling for his sales pitch. He could see I was deep in thought, but not about his offer. I was trying to figure out how t
o beat him.
“Stop torturing yourself, Leo. Do what is in your nature to do…become greater than you could have ever imagined…join me.” He bent down, picked up a sharp rock, opened his palm and cut it; then he extended it to me. He was offering me the blood seal, like I was offered in the past by one of his cronies. Just like before, I knew he would eventually find a loophole to screw me over.
I looked away from him and then turned back to him. “But you’re still going to take Shade as your own…aren’t you?”
Shimmer recoiled his hand back just a bit and smiled. “C’mon, Leo, even you know having a human around is a liability. You’re smarter than that. Look at all the trouble she’s already gotten you into. Don’t be an idiot…you don’t need her.”
“And you do? She’s not a liability for you?”
He grinned again and lowered his hand. “Unlike you, I’m still partly mortal and have…mortal urges. She’ll still be alive, boy. Isn’t that what you want…her safety? She will always be safe with me.” He chuckled.
I sported a cynical half smile and looked away again.
“If you can answer me this question honestly…I’ll join you, and together we can take out Christian.”
A huge smile came across his face. “Continue.”
“Would you have taken the same deal from Geoffrey Lonecrow if he’d offered it to you for Temperance?”
A look of shock came over his face and he stepped away from me.
“How the hell do you know about that?”
“Answer the question, Shimmer. Would you?”
Shimmer snarled and slammed into me in a rage. He was holding me in a bear hug as he raced back up the side of the mountain. I couldn’t use my wings because he had them in his vise-like grip. Before I knew it we were back at the top of Devil’s Tooth, about to go over the edge back into the Cavity arena.