Bright blood, as red as the jungle flowers in the garden at the House of the Warriors, sprayed the trees, coated Sky Knife, gushed out of the gaping slit in Stone Jaguar’s throat to the ground below.
Instead of collapsing, Stone Jaguar grew in size as if still bloated with power. “You’ll never defeat me!” he screamed. Flames burst into the air around Sky Knife’s head. He screamed and shielded his eyes from their glare. Rocks whizzed by his head. Sky Knife curled up in a ball to protect himself.
A rock hit him solidly in his wounded shoulder. Sky Knife cried out. Above him, Stone Jaguar laughed. “You’re dead!”
Sky Knife uncurled himself. He had come too far and lost too much to give in now. He pushed himself through the air toward the other sorcerer. “No!” he shouted. “You’re the one who’s dead!” Sky Knife shoved his hand into the gaping hole in Stone Jaguar’s neck, reached back until he found the hard solid bones of Stone Jaguar’s spine. Stone Jaguar’s eyes widened in fear.
Sky Knife let the power of Bone Splinter’s sacrifice flow through him, down his arm, into his hand. He squeezed the other man’s spine until it snapped with a loud crack.
Sky Knife let Stone Jaguar drop. Stone Jaguar reached out at the last moment and grabbed Sky Knife’s ankle, sending him plummeting after Stone Jaguar into the blue waters of the cenote.
Sky Knife screamed at the pain that lanced through him when he hit the water. Then all screams were taken from him as cold water rushed down his throat.
36
Sky Knife used the last trickle of energy in him to push himself to the surface. He came up, spluttering and coughing. A strong hand grabbed him by the shoulder and hauled him halfway out of the water onto a rock.
Sky Knife gasped for air. “Stone Jaguar,” he said. “Where…”
“He is gone,” said a heavily accented voice. The king. “He fell into the water and has not come up.”
Sky Knife relaxed a moment. The power that had coursed through him before had left him, but a trace of the love that had touched him remained. Bone Splinter—and the chic-chac—had not left him. He hoped they never would. “Thank you,” he whispered to them both.
“It is I who should thank you,” said Storm Cloud. “But don’t you think we should leave now?”
Sky Knife raised his head. “The cenote…”
“Is no more,” said the king. He slapped Sky Knife on the shoulder. Sky Knife’s heart leaped in surprise at the familiarity. He blinked and scanned the area. He saw what the king meant. Instead of a cenote, there was now a pile of rubble. Small deep pockets of water remained, but the vertical walls no longer existed.
Sky Knife laid his head back down on the rock as the morning sun broke over the trees. Blackness threatened to overwhelm him, but it was a comforting sort of blackness that promised rest.
The king shook Sky Knife back to wakefulness. “I owe you my life,” he said. “My kingdom. Anything that is mine you may have. You have only to name it. Wealth, status, power—they are all yours to take.”
Sky Knife could no longer hold the darkness back, but he smiled. The king had promised he could have anything he wished. Well, there was something he wished very badly indeed—provided Jade Flute agreed.
He would go to the love-gift vendor and buy that rabbit. And if Jade Flute spit on his gift, he’d try something else. But Sky Knife had a strange feeling she’d accept.
The comforting tingle at his throat seemed to chime in agreement and an echo of Bone Splinter’s laughter rang in his ears. Sky Knife sighed as darkness overtook him. He let himself slide into well-earned and much-needed pleasant dreams.
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters and events portrayed in this novel are either fictitious or are used fictitiously.
SKY KNIFE
Copyright © 1997 by Marella Sands
All rights reserved.
A Forge Book
Published by Tom Doherty Associates, Inc.
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New York, NY 10010
Forge® is a registered trademark of Tom Doherty Associates, Inc.
eBooks may be purchased for business or promotional use. For information on bulk purchases, please contact Macmillan Corporate and Premium Sales Department by writing to [email protected].
First Edition: September 1997
eISBN 9781466889187
First eBook edition: December 2014
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