Forsaken Hunters_Book Zero of The Age of Dawn_A Prequel

by Everet Martins

  The piano player glared at her, eyes outlined with dark powder. She looked away and continued playing. “Remove your hands from the damned keys!” Brenna growled, smacking her fingers. The piano player gasped, drawing her hands to her chest. Brenna turned to walk away and saw everyone watching her with curious expressions.

  Lillian had to understand. She was likely the only one who could understand her, the only one she’d ever let so close. Baylan draped his arm over Lillian’s shoulder, drawing her against his side.

  Brenna swallowed, striding past them, and starting for the room’s exit. There was a long frozen over part of her chest that felt warmth at seeing Lillian happy. It brought a slight smile to her lips. It was a true smile, not the mask she usually donned to fool the world. At first, Brenna was struck by how at ease Lillian appeared with Baylan while remaining in this shark’s den, then remembered what Lillian could do, how she was a living conduit of Dragon fire. The Tigerians were rats and Lillian was the boot waiting to crush them. The start of her smile faltered. Even rats in enough numbers could kill a much bigger animal.

  “Where do you think you’re going? You can’t go where you please in here!” Haru called, limping after her.

  “I will take care of this, Haru,” Helgar said, clapping a hand on his shoulder.

  Brenna huffed, stopping at a set of closed double doors, and prying them open, sliding them into the walls.

  “Brenna, hold on a minute,” Helgar said cheerfully. Brenna turned, feet rooted to the carpets, hands balled into fists. He stopped at the dessert table, grabbing a pair of cupcakes in one hand while hefting the bill of sale in the other. He stopped in front of her, offering her a cupcake. “Cake?”

  “I tend to avoid sugar. Not so good for my figure, thank you,” she said through gritted teeth.

  Helgar shrugged, walking around her and through the door she had opened, entering a sitting room with even more bookshelves packed with tomes. At the back wall was a blackened hearth, a pair of leather backed chairs in front of its unlit maw. Helgar set one cupcake and the bill of sale on a table and bit into the other, the cake yellow and the frosting white. “It’s good. You should consider trying it,” he said through a mouthful of cake.

  She sauntered into the room, pressing her roaring emotions down. She stared at a bookshelf, not reading the titles but letting the Tigerian text blur in her vision. It was done. They got what they wanted, and it was time to leave. There would always be casualties, she reminded herself. It was only business. Through the parted doors in the adjacent room, Sofor, Lillian, Haru, Baylan, and the piano player watched them with trepidation. Had they sensed her tension? She supposed the incident with the piano player was telling.

  “Don’t like that I discovered your ruse?” Helgar asked with a snicker, lowering himself into one of the two chairs.

  “No. Not that,” Brenna said flatly. “I can’t stop thinking about the man you fed to the Tougeres.”

  Helgar’s lips smacked as he chewed. The walls creaked as a gust whipped at the mansion. “My hands are feeling a bit cold,” Brenna muttered, instinctively reaching into a hip pouch, and slipping on her taloned gloves. The chainmail beneath the armor felt as fine as silk as she tugged them up her arms.

  “I’m sorry, could you repeat that?” Helgar said, taking another bite.

  Brenna slowly turned, resting a gleaming hand on one hip as the other rested easy at her side. “My hands are cold,” she said slowly.

  “No, no. The other thing.”

  A hard smile formed on Brenna’s lips. “You are clearly well read,” she said, gesturing at the books. “I wonder what the heroes from these tales would think of your actions?”

  Helgar sneered. “They perhaps would intervene. But you must turn the mirror on yourself, my dear bounty hunter. Your heart is not without its own black spots.”

  Brenna slowly nodded, an icy chill tracing down her neck. “Yes, you’re right. However, I think a hero’s approval would be an improbable motion.”

  “You think yourself a hero now, do you? Rescuing one of the millions of enslaved?” Helgar snickered, swallowing the last of his cake. “You are indeed a strange woman.”

  “No, not a hero,” Brenna said, the words feeling ethereal. She let out a long sigh, her eyes falling on the bill of sale resting on the nearby table. “That is Baylan’s paperwork?”

  “That it is.” Helgar gestured with his fork. “Have a look, make sure everything is to your liking.”

  “I will.” Brenna walked over to the table, examining the few documents. The parchment was heavy and Helgar’s signature elegant. “Everything seems in order,” she said after reviewing the details of the clauses for several minutes. “Baylan… you are now a free man.” Brenna turned and raised the documents, giving him a belly warming grin through the open door.

  Brenna carefully folded the documents and tucked them into one of her pouches. She turned to look at Helgar, whose fingers tapped on the chair’s armrest. “Well, Helgar, with most of my clients, I would shake their hand to conclude our dealings. But with you, I think ‘so long’ will suffice. I do sincerely hope I never see you again.” She turned her back on him and nodded to Lillian. “Masa, Baylan, let’s be off.”

  Lillian nodded back and met Baylan’s eyes. They started toward the door leading into the main hallway which led to the foyer.

  “Wait just a moment, Brenna.” Helgar’s voice cut the air as he rose from his chair. He gestured with his clawed hand, sauntering toward her. “It is a long-held custom in these lands that all business dealings are not concluded until we have shaken hands. To make them official.” Helgar offered his hand, boots rooted to the floor in his study.

  “Fortunately, I am not from these lands,” Brenna said with a polite smile and once again turned her back on him.

  “I must insist!” he roared. “You’re on my property, and thus, I demand it.” Helgar jabbed the air with his expectant palm.

  She turned on her heels and scowled at him, eyes heavy with exhaustion. Brenna became distinctly aware of squealing floorboards as Sofor made his way around to her back, no doubt with his hand poised on a weapon. She collected herself and mastered her voice. “You have a demand? And what do you demand exactly?” She had to give him a chance to veer off this harrowed path. But he only stared at her, eyes unblinking. “You demand that I shake your hand? I apologize, that is something… I simply cannot do,” Brenna said, her chest growing tight.

  “Have you any notion of what I think of you?” Helgar asked, lowering his hand, ears folding back against his head. He took a step toward her.

  Brenna shrugged. “No. And nor do I care what you think of me.”

  One must have a bedrock of principles to guide one’s decisions. If she were to shake his hand, she would be complicit in this plantation’s operation. She would be validating his cruel business and the Tigerian realm’s enslavement of mankind. No, this was a thing she could not do. She wouldn’t allow her soul to be degraded by this dark agreement. Brenna was many bad things, but one thing she could never do was lower herself to agree with this tumor on the world. She felt that by bridging that gap and shaking his hand, she would become her enemy.

  “You can’t accept that you lost,” Helgar said, raising his chin in triumph. “That your ruse failed, and you were discovered. You have no sportsmanship and no honor. I shouldn’t expect much from a bounty hunter, but one can always hope.”

  Brenna resisted the urge to clench her fists, letting her hands stay loose at her sides. “You are one of the most despicable Tigerians I have had the displeasure of meeting.”

  Helgar lowered his voice. “If you want this deal to conclude, according to the law in these parts, you must shake my hand. The documentation in your pouch is worthless without a proper conclusion.” Helgar lightly clapped his hands together before clasping them over his chest.

  Perhaps he would respond to reason. “You would forfeit the marks I paid you for Baylan over a handshake?” Brenna gestured, the razo
rs at the tips of her gloved fingers catching candlelight. “You’re too wise a businessman to waste money.”

  Helgar pointed to her right. “Sofor, if she tries to depart without a proper handshake, take her head, would you?”

  “Gladly,” Sofor growled in Tigerian. His second sword whispered from the scabbard.

  Brenna heaved out a sigh. Sofor slowly walked around to her flank, swords resting easily at his sides. Lillian shuffled her feet, Baylan stiffened, and Haru grunted. Hiko pressed himself against the farthest wall, lowering a book he’d been holding and pretending to read while he listened. Haru hobbled backwards toward Hiko, his cane lightly tapping at the floorboards. Lillian placed herself before Baylan, a wolfish smile daring Sofor to move.

  Brenna turned her head and looked from Lillian to Sofor and finally back at Helgar. She had done a lot of bad things in her life, but there were some things that could not be done. “You truly wish for me to shake your hand?”

  “You must, if you wish to finish this deal.” Helgar grinned, his feline eyes narrowing to slits. He extended his opened palm.

  “If there is no other way, I suppose I must concede to my better,” Brenna said with an exaggerated shrug. She put on her best smile, striding toward him, the index finger of her right hand extended. The moment before they touched, her hand flashed up and over his waiting hand. Helgar’s expression faltered, and her smile broadened as her finger tore a red line across his throat. A second after, a stream of blood spurted from his neck.

  “What?” Helgar gurgled, eyes wide. He took a few staggering steps back into a bookshelf, hand reaching out to a table for support. He missed and hit the ground with a thud, toppling over a bottle of whiskey, the glass shattering.

  Haru shrieked as if his throat had been the one that was slit. “No! Helgar! No! No!”

  Twelve

  Blood

  Lub dub. Lub dub. Lillian’s heart thumped in her ears and pulsed in her guts. Lub dub. She stared agape as Helgar careened to the floor. Brenna started laughing and turned to look at her. It was the way she would’ve wanted to die. “Lillian, I apologize. I couldn’t help myself.”

  Before she could finish turning, Sofor was on her. His blades were vipers, drawing back and finding homes in Brenna’s back. They plunged in and were ripped out, thick ropes of blood following their exit. Brenna screamed in pain, back arched as she crumbled to the floor.

  Haru screamed and hobbled over to Helgar, openly weeping.

  “Brenna! Brenna!” Lillian roared, hot tears filling her eyes. She gripped the Dragon in her veins. Its tireless flames lit her nerves in a conflagration of rage. A sword of Dragon fire materialized in her hands. She rammed it into Sofor’s belly and dragged it up to split him into squelching halves. Flesh crackled and blood boiled into white globs.

  Hiko dashed for the hallway, knocking over cakes and toppling candles. Lillian hurled a fireball and struck him in the head, splattering everything around him in bright blood, brains, and bone fragments. Baylan ducked, hands pressing over his ears as flames licked the curtains, setting them ablaze.

  Lillian didn’t see him anymore. She was the Dragon incarnate, and all would know its ravenous touch. She channeled air and tore the exit doors free from their hinges, sending them smashing against the far side of the main hallway.

  A taskmaster charged down the hallway at her, brandishing a machete. She summoned a salvo of flaming darts. She flicked her fingers, filling his torso with a dozen smoldering holes. Blood sprouted like a fountain from each wound, and he crumbled on legs that no longer functioned.

  Lillian’s eyes blazed with the Dragon’s swirling fire, her body glowing with a golden aura. A figure came running down the stairs from the third floor, crossbow in hand, and letting it loose at the wounded man. The arrow thunked into his dying body, not perceiving Lillian as the true threat. She hurled a fireball that tore through his torso, splashing the porcelain wall behind him with his innards. The top half of his body tumbled down the stairs, his legs disconnected and resting against the handrail’s balusters.

  Another Tigerian shifted into view a foot from the disconnected legs. Doors opened and closed from countless rooms. Lillian sent a flaming dart through his head, creating a gaping cavitation wound the size of her fist at the back of his skull. The Tigerian stumbled back, crashing through a window. A gust of cold air tunneled into the hallway.

  The front door ripped open, revealing four Tigerians gripping metallic weapons that caught the moon’s glow. Lillian laughed and tore them apart with a great arc of fire, bisecting the group into shrieking halves. Blood misted the foyer’s walls. They would all pay the price owed and pay it in blood. For Brenna, for the enslaved, for her tortures.

  The echo of thumping boots carried in from the night air, signaling reinforcements. She leaped into the adjacent hallway at the hum of twanging bowstrings. At least ten arrows tore across the smoking bodies, thunking into walls. “Shit!” she breathed, listening as they fanned out in the main hallway, stepping over their ruined brethren. The hallway became of pall of curling smoke.

  They pulled and shot and shot again, arrows flying in every direction. Lillian slumped against the wall and inched her head out. An arrow whispered past her cheek, cutting a line under her eye. She fired a flaming arrow of her own in return, cutting into the shooter’s neck and blowing out a streak of blood. Apparently, not all the Tigerians she had targeted had perished. A few whimpered in agony, muttering curses and praying to their foul gods. The Dragon and the Phoenix gods were the only truths in this world.

  Sweat trickled down her temples and fell in rivulets down her back. She hadn’t used this much of the Dragon’s strength in years. The debt of its gift already weighed on her, urging her to take rest. Somewhere an alarm bell madly sounded.

  Wonderful. She pressed her back against the wall, chest working like bellows, searching for a target in the cloaking smoke. She poked her head out and saw a writhing Tigerian. She tossed a fireball in a narrow arc, shearing its leg off at the knee and throwing out a gout of embers. He threw his head back in an angry yowl, blood bubbling from his lips. She ducked back into the hall. She had to conserve her strength, stick to spells that drew less power like flame darts and arrows.

  More boots pounded into the foyer, and she dared a glance. “Kill her!” someone roared. Crossbow hammers fell, bolts ripping through the wall around her and the wall behind it. Plaster kicked out clouds of white dust that stung her eyes and clung to her neck. A priceless vase exploded, raining shards against her front. A painting depicting a Tigerian general slipped from its hook, impaled upon a knife of plaster. “Ah!” She yelped as something scourged at her thigh. She flicked her eyes down to find that a bolt had passed through her quadriceps, thankfully having missed major arteries judging by the way the blood only oozed. If only the Dragon could mend wounds, she could stop hiding. Everything, even the Dragon’s lent strength had limitations.

  The Tigerians loaded and fired in a staggering volley, leaving no periods where bolts were not flying. A section of trim where the hallway met the foyer tore off the wall, spun and crashed at her feet, splinters spraying and wood roaring.

  And then they stopped.

  Flames crackled, and the walls groaned. Lillian peered across the hall at a whimper and spotted a pair of human slaves gripped in each other’s arms. They were spattered with blood, theirs or the Tigerians, it was impossible to judge.

  She breathed. Debris settled, and glass crunched under heavy boots. A lone Tigerian braved the threshold, creeping out from the foyer and into the main hall. He drew closer, his breath a hoarse rasp. He was so close she could smell his nervy stink. She summoned twin daggers of fire flickering in her grip. She stared at the hall’s ruined corner, waiting for the brave one to appear. He drew closer and leaped into her vision. He loosed, but the bolt went wide, slamming into the ceiling, and he yelped in frustration. He discarded his crossbow, charging at her with claws drawn and porcelain teeth gleaming.

  She s
et her jaw and met his charge with a scream, driving her daggers up into his guts in one, two, three hard upward thrusts. With each punch of her blades, blood bloomed from his upper back, and his flesh cooked on her fires. His claws ripped at her upper back, tearing ruby swathes of fabric free from her dress and rending her back with deep cuts. She punched and punched until her hands were hot with his blood, and his body slumped in defeat. She flicked her gaze up, fearing they might have used his attack to move into line of sight to fill her with bolts and arrows. But none moved.

  “No more running,” she hissed. She growled and dove out of hiding and into the main hall, throwing a ball of fire at the group predictably still huddled in the foyer. Two remained for but a second longer, their sides ripped apart and throwing red entrails against the ornamented walls. She rolled across the floor to the middle, pressing herself flat against a dead Tigerian, using its corpse as a shield.

  More Tigerian taskmasters poured into the house through the main door, jumping over the fires feasting on the dead. Hammers snapped, and bowstrings hummed. She pressed herself flat against the body and heard their projectiles tearing into its flesh, throwing Tigerian blood over her in warm droplets. She lifted her head and summoned flaming darts around her like buzzing insects. Her eyes stung with the corpse’s blood, and she had to blink it away so she could see.

  Her vision finally cleared, and she sent a dart hissing across the gap. Trailing black smoke, it blasted a hole through the center of a Tigerian’s head. Another Tigerian shouted curses and fumbled an arrow. As he bent to snatch it up, her dart took him in one of his big glowing eyes, sending him onto his back, shrieking in pain. “Humie cunt! Ah! My eye! Fucking bitch! My eye!”

  Not seeing any other targets, Lillian slowly rose to stand. Everything moved like mud, the Dragon’s exhaustion beating on her back. Or had she perhaps lost too much blood? She looked down at her thigh, still oozing red snakes around her knee and down her shin.