by Kallysten
“What are you doing! Let me down!”
Ignoring her protests, Aedan ran toward the house, glancing back twice to check that Bradan was still holding their enemies at bay. He would have to use his sword soon. Aedan hoped to be back by his side by then.
He finally reached the house and rushed in through the open door. He set Dame Vivien down none too gently and pointed a finger at the floor as he growled, “Stay. Inside!”
She glowered right back at him. “I’m not some useless—”
But Aedan didn’t want to hear it. He stepped back outside and banged the door shut behind him, wishing he could lock it. He wasn’t sure he trusted Dame Vivien not to be foolish enough to come out again.
A knife in each hands again, he ran back to Bradan.
“How many?” he called out to him.
“Six, I think.”
Two teams, then. It wasn’t just a random reconnaissance team lucking out. They’d known someone was there. They’d been waiting for someone to step out so they could strike at the shields at the one moment when they were vulnerable to an attack.
“Two of them channeled just when we were coming through,” Bradan said, slightly out of breath. “Their Quickening mixed with mine. I can’t hold them off anymore.”
Aedan thought fast. They needed the shields to hold. Dame Vivien’s safety depended on it.
“Then let’s go out and fight. We only need to disable the channelers, then we can jump back behind the shields.”
Aedan stood by Bradan’s side, close enough that their shoulders pressed together, and he could have sworn he could feel the surge of Quickening as Bradan gestured at the shields one last time before drawing out a Quickening sword. Maybe what Aedan felt was his brother’s blood pulsing through him to the rhythm of the Quickening. How Aedan missed that feeling...
He pushed the thought away with a shake of his head, and they stepped through the shields together. With one quick look around, he put a name to each of the guards, mentally ranking them by how dangerous they were. He’d planned to take on the channelers right away, but he couldn’t give the vampires a chance to strike first. Serlin in particular was much too good; he’d taught Aedan to throw his knives and never miss. And then there was Ciara…
Aedan charged at Serlin with a roar, his knives raised in front of him. Bradan was only a step behind him, guarding his back—as was only right.
* * * *
Vivien had never been as infuriated in her life as when Aedan carried her inside and pointed at the floor when he ordered her to stay, as though she were a recalcitrant puppy. She would have shouted at him, but he only made things worse by slamming the door in her face.
She was not going to let him treat her this way. She wouldn’t let anyone treat her this way. She wasn’t a child, she wasn’t defenseless, and she refused to hide behind anyone.
Muttering under her breath, she ran through the hallways, back to the armory. She put on some armor first, her hands trembling in her haste as she set the chest and back plates over her shoulders. She fumbled a little to tighten the leather straps. The armor had been made for someone taller—for a man—but it would do for now.
She grabbed a helmet, too. When she slid it on, the back pressed against her ponytail uncomfortably enough that she pulled it up again, tugged the elastic off to free her hair, then lowered the helmet again. Her peripheral vision was practically nonexistent, but she could work with that. The metal felt cool against her forehead; solid. It strengthened her decision. She picked up a sword from the hooks on the wall, choosing the same thin, long blade as she had that morning; it resembled her old épée closely enough, she hoped. She wished Brad had practiced with her when she asked.
She ran back with the weapon at her side and her heart beating to the steady rhythm of her determination. When she first stepped outside, she lost her breath. It was completely dark now, and she couldn’t see Brad or Aedan anymore, or even the fighters she had glimpsed outside the shields before Brad had taken her back in.
The shields… That was it! They had to be outside the shields!
She hurried forward, pausing only briefly before she stepped through the shimmering curtain of magic. Earlier, in the evening light, it had looked like a wall of sunlight; now it was like a sheet of cascading dark water. In seconds she reached Brad, with Aedan a small distance away. She took a moment to survey the fight. Opposite the twins, three men and a woman were all dressed in the same black uniform as the men Aedan had killed back in the woods. Another man lay on the ground, face down and immobile.
Aedan was battling one of the men and the woman. She wielded knives liked Aedan did, while the man fought with a sword. The weapons gleamed under the light of the full, oversized moon, flashing like strikes of lightning, ringing like heavy wind chimes in a storm.
Brad was also confronting two opponents, but he seemed to be having a harder time of it. That morning, he had sparred with two swords against Aedan’s knives, but now he only held one as he danced back and forth between his adversaries’ knives and sword, expending more energy to stay out of their reach than to disable them.
Vivien had no clue how to fight against knives, but she could do sword on sword—or at least, she hoped she could. Was she fooling herself, thinking that her fencing experience would transfer through? She had to try, though; she couldn’t let Brad get hurt on her behalf without at least trying to help.
Brad threw her a quick glance when she stepped next to him and parried the sword that was slashing toward him. In that brief instant, she could see the deepest of worries in his eyes and furrowed brow, and she was sure he would order her to go back inside the house like Aedan had. Instead, he pushed back his knife-armed adversary, giving Vivien more room to fight the swordsman.
The man’s sword was broader than her own, but shorter, and of the two of them she was the only one wearing armor—or so she told herself to try to calm her racing thoughts. She’d never fenced at night, never fenced barefoot on slippery grass, never with actual weapons designed to kill, or with the intention of really hurting someone. It took only two seconds for her to realize how new this was: as long as it took her adversary to take a few steps to the side. Of course; they wouldn’t be fighting in a straight line. What else would be different? She’d have to remember that there were no points to rack up now. Allowing him to touch her so she could hit him too was a no-no.
Had she made a mistake stepping in?
She chased the thought away with a deep, deliberate breath. She didn’t know if she could do this, but she was certainly going to give it her best. The image of Anabel, kidnapped, captive, maybe hurt or worse, reinforced her resolve, so that when the man lunged at her, she was ready.
Her adversary’s sword slashed straight down at her. She parried the blow, trying to redirect the blade to the side. A basic move for her, but the weight of the sword made it trickier than it ought to have been and her grip on the hilt wavered a little. The man noticed, and in the light of the moon, she could see his amused smile.
“This isn’t a game for little girls,” he sneered. “Why don’t you just come with me before you get hurt?”
She recognized him, then—recognized that sneer. He was the man who had backhanded Anabel, who had made her bleed. Vivien’s blood felt like it was starting to boil.
“Like you hurt Anabel, you mean?” she spat.
She lunged and her feet quickly found their rhythm again. It had been a long time, yes, but she hadn’t forgotten anything. She slipped back into the frame of mind that allowed her to follow instincts taught to her by endless drills. She needed to anticipate and gain that split second over him, that blink that would let her weapon hit.
For a few moments, they moved back and forth, each testing the other and seeking the best opening. The man struck again, and after deflecting Vivien hit back. Had she had her épée in hand, Vivien had no doubt she would have touched him. She still had trouble adjusting to the weight and balance of the sword, though. It didn’t
help that her thighs were beginning to burn as she called on muscles she hadn’t used so intensely in a while.
His blows were all strength, hers focused on speed, but neither was gaining the upper edge. She was beginning to suspect he was actively trying not to wound her; his mistake.
From the corner of her eye, she could see Brad’s and Aedan’s fights. One of Aedan’s opponents was dead. That left the three of them with one adversary each. Somehow, Vivien found herself wishing she’d finish her fight first and prove to them—prove to Aedan, mostly—that she was far from the defenseless princess they seemed to believe she was.
With a new determination filling her, she cross-stepped, lunged, and flicked her blade around the hilt of her opponent’s sword. He reacted, but too late: the point of her sword stabbed into his wrist. She remembered winning a tournament when she’d earned her fifteenth point with this exact move; the blood shining on her blade felt like no victory, though. As angry as she was with that man, she realized at that moment, she wouldn’t be able to hurt him, not truly, and certainly not kill him.
He, on the other hand, didn’t look like he would have a problem doing either thing anymore. He looked at his bleeding hand, then back up at her. His eyes were blazing, and he all but growled. As he raised the sword with both hands over his head, it seemed to glow with an inner light, as though it were suddenly molten metal. Vivien’s heart stuttered, and she retreated too fast, barely failing to fall on her ass.
“I’ll show you, you little—”
His threat ended in a gargle of blood when Brad’s sword suddenly pierced his side, slipping right under his raised arm. The man’s sword stopped glowing as he toppled forward. Vivien hurriedly retreated so he wouldn’t fall on her. When he hit the ground, the handles of two knives were sticking out of his back. Vivien couldn’t have said if the sword or the knives had killed him, nor did she care.
For what felt like an eternity, she couldn’t tear her eyes off him. Another person dead for trying to hurt her; and to think just two days earlier her life had been so safe, almost boring...
“Get back behind the shield, Vivien. Please.”
It was the pain in Brad’s voice that pulled Vivien’s eyes to him. He was back to fighting his opponent, but while earlier he had held his sword with both hands, now one of his arms hung at his side, blood dripping from his fingers. Beyond him, Aedan was holding his own against the woman; they now had only one knife each.
“I can help—”
“They’ve lost all their channelers,” Aedan shouted with a glance toward her. “When you’re back behind the shields they’ll have no reason to keep fighting.”
It sounded much too easy, like Aedan was only trying to give her a reason to go back. On the other hand, how could she help when she didn’t think she could stomach killing anyone?
All she had to do was take a few steps back. The moment she crossed the shields, the night was suddenly darker, thicker; the moonlight didn’t pierce the barrier, nor could she see or hear the two fights mere feet away from her. Her hand clenching repeatedly on the grip of her weapon, she waited, more afraid than she could have expressed, for Brad and Aedan to reappear. What if they didn’t? What would she do, then, alone in a strange world with the only two people she knew dead because of her?
CHAPTER TWELVE
Blood and Oaths
Bradan glanced back to reassure himself that Vivien had entered the shields again, and he swallowed back a sigh. She’d held her own pretty well for a while against the guard, but by the end Bradan had been truly afraid for her. He tried to focus on his adversary. Bradan had managed to draw blood twice, but his sword was made of Quickening, not silver, and the guard’s wounds closed almost immediately.
Bradan’s only chance was to behead him, but it was easier said than done when the man wore a neck shield to protect himself against that very thing. Not all vampires did; Aedan certainly never did, as far as Bradan knew. There didn’t seem to be such a thing as standard armor where guards were concerned.
As the four of them continued to circle each other and fight, Bradan found himself back to back with Aedan.
“How bad?” Aedan asked.
Bradan didn’t reply. He was trying very hard not to think about his arm, and how warm his blood felt running down all the way from his bicep to his hand.
“Didn’t you say they’d retreat when she was out of reach?” he asked instead, slightly out of breath; it had been a long time since he had channeled continuously for more than a few minutes, and the blood loss wasn’t helping.
“They should. Ciara is just trying to punish me.”
Bradan frowned as he parried his opponent’s next attack, deflecting one knife then the other in quick succession. Ciara... Aedan’s Maker.
He couldn’t stop himself from glancing toward Aedan and the woman who wielded a single knife as though it were an extension of her body; Bradan wasn’t sure why she had thrown the other knife at her own man. She was as beautiful as Aedan had said, her features sharp and feminine despite her boyish haircut, her curves somehow flattered by the guard’s uniform she wore. Her expression, however, was one of pure anger, the intensity of the emotion betrayed by how pale her eyes were.
Bradan instantly knew why she was still standing, why she wasn’t even hurt after battling against Aedan since almost the beginning of the fight. Aedan would never be able to hurt her, let alone kill her, but he was too stubborn to abandon the fight. And since Bradan had no way to kill his own opponent short of channeling enough Quickening to burn himself out...
His mind made up, he angled his path toward Aedan. When he was close enough, he released the channeling that had created his sword and instead brought up a small shield around Aedan and himself.
“What are you doing?” Aedan snapped.
Bradan didn’t reply. Instead, he encircled his twin’s waist with both his arms and marched him toward the safety of the house shields.
“Traitor,” Ciara called after them, the first word Bradan had heard her utter.
Aedan started to resist like he wanted to keep fighting. Wincing at the pain lancing in his arm, Bradan pulled harder, drawing both of them to safety.
“Why did you do that?” Aedan growled, his eyes like glittering ice, when Bradan released him.
“Would you have killed her?” Bradan shot back at once, holding his gaze without flinching.
Aedan frowned, then looked back toward the shields. They hid what lay beyond, but for a moment, he stared as if he could see right through them.
“What took you so long?” Vivien demanded and stepped toward them. Her eyes were wide with worry as they ran over Bradan. She had removed her helmet. Her ponytail had come undone and wild hair framed her face. “I thought you’d be right behind me!”
She dropped her sword and helmet to the ground to throw her arms around him. As startled as he was, Bradan had the presence of mind to raise his left arm so he wouldn’t get blood on her. He started to close his right arm around her, but froze when he caught Aedan’s thunderous expression.
“I told you to stay inside the house. Were you trying to get yourself taken? Or killed?”
Bradan couldn’t remember his brother’s voice ever being so cold before; he couldn’t remember his eyes gleaming like this, gunmetal death rather than their familiar blue-gray. Bradan’s arm curled around Vivien, and he shifted their bodies so that he stood between her and Aedan. He couldn’t believe that Aedan would ever do anything to hurt her in any way; and yet, at that moment, looking into Aedan’s eyes, Bradan wondered how well he still knew his brother.
It didn’t help that Vivien pulled away and faced Aedan, fury burning as hot in her eyes as it was icy cold in his.
“And what right do you have to tell me to do anything?” she asked, her voice shaking with outrage, her chin raised high as she tried to stare Aedan down. “What right do you have to put your hands on me?” In a flash, she bent down to pick up the sword she had dropped and although she held it poin
ting down, it was clear she was ready to raise it should Aedan provoke her. “Don’t you ever dare touch me again,” she said, each word cool and precise. “I can take care of myself. I don’t need you to treat me like a child.”
For a long moment, Aedan did nothing more than stare at her. Then his nostrils flared, and he all but bared his teeth at Vivien.
“You can take care of yourself?” he repeated. “Then why did you need us to kill that guard for you? And why are you hurt?”
She huffed. “I’m not—”
“You’re bleeding. Your leg. It’s cut.”
Vivien peered down. Bradan did the same. There was a small cut on her thigh, maybe an inch long, the fabric of her jeans barely stained by a trace of blood.
“That’s nothing,” she said with a shrug. “I didn’t even feel it.”
Aedan didn’t reply. He didn’t need to. What he thought was all too clear to Bradan when their eyes met.
They had to keep her safe. It was their one goal, the one thing for which they were ready to give anything. Bradan had lived in the Otherworld for a dozen years, most of them alone, away from the one person who was now his entire family. Aedan had given up far more when he had become a vampire.
When Vivien had stepped out with a sword, helmet, and armor, Bradan had had a second to decide: should he let her help him or send her back inside? He’d seen her fight before. He had gone to the same fencing club she had. They had fenced different weapons and he’d never been in direct contact with her, but he had often watched her. The sword she held now was very different from her old épée, but she was good, and both he and Aedan had been close enough to help her if she got in trouble; he had let her join the fight. He realized now that it was a mistake and so was his decision to take her beyond the shields.