by Rob J. Hayes
The demons were fast and strong but Henry wasn't slow her own self and she had many years of experience in the sadistic art form of murdering folk. The first demon to reach her, a stone-faced skinny beggar of a man, died as would any unprepared fool thinking she was no more than the girl she looked. Henry ducked under his heavy swipe and used the man's own force as he overbalanced to gut him with one blade while the other she drove up through the base of his skull. The carcass dropped, leaking beautiful red that the dirty brown dusr lapped up quickly. Either the Arbiter's magic worked or these demons weren't near so un-killable as folk seemed to claim. Not like the demons at Hostown. Not like Hostown!
The next demon was different, an old man wrinkled from years beyond counting and dressed in the tatters of a robe, his long white beard trailed down near to his waist and his mouth contained only one tooth. Despite his appearance the man moved like wolf, loping towards Henry and springing at her covering an impossible distance. He took her unawares, maybe because of the way he looked and maybe because her reverie, and she barely turned his sword strike in time to stop being skewered. The blade slid along her leathers and cut a small slice into her side. She growled in pain and limped backwards, refusing to clutch at the bleeding wound but she could feel it growing wet. Not one kill in and she was already on the back foot.
The old man didn't let up his attack. He took two more loping steps left and leapt at her again raining blow after heavy blow down upon her. Henry gave ground, parrying blows where she could and dodging others. Her daggers were simply no match against the weighty sword the man used, at least not at this range. She timed her strike perfectly, waiting until the man was swinging and side-stepping the strike, leaping close and putting both blades into his chest again and again and again. Hot red blood spurted out over her clothing and hands and face. The old demon lunged at her again, but only managed to pull Henry's hat from her head as his quivering, bloody body toppled to the ground.
Two down. Henry marked off the kills in her head. After all this was done she'd wait until Anders boasted about his own body count and upstage him by mentioning hers, making sure it sounded off-hand. Of course she would need more than two to properly humiliate the fool but judging by the demons pouring into the square she would have the chance for plenty more.
This time three of them came at her. Two men and woman, all of middle age, the woman in a blue shift and the men in fancy suits, they looked similar; brothers maybe even twins and they attacked her in unison as the woman attempted to get around behind her. Henry feinted towards the men then turned, ran at the woman and attacked, knocking away the bitch's feeble counter with ease and gutting her like a fisherman to his catch. More red watered the earth turning dust to sticky mud.
The two men came on, ignoring their fallen comrade as if she were nothing but dead meat to begin with. Henry glanced around the battlefield. Plenty of demons surrounding the Arbiter, not Thanquil, the other one but he seemed to be holding his own. Anders was nowhere in sight, likely long gone and hiding in a cupboard. Thorn was nearby, grunting and grinning in equal measure with more than a few bodies littering the ground though as Henry watched one of those stood back up and came at the Black Thorn again. No sight of Suzku either and that worried her most. Something about the big Honin made her comfortable, made her feel stronger, made her feel less inclined to kill. She liked it. She liked him. Most of all she liked herself when he was around.
Her foot bumped against a wooden porch and she almost tripped. She'd barely even noticed she was retreating. The twins didn't miss a beat, they took her moment of confusion to attack. Coming at her from two sides, one attacking high, the other low. She stepped into the attack of the demon to her right, blocking with both daggers and pushing as hard as she could. The demon pushed back harder and before Henry could recover punched her in the face. She felt her nose break, cartilage snap and pop and pain, so much pain she couldn't help but gasp and that brought about a whole other set of problems. She swallowed blood, red and beautiful and streaming from her nose into her open, gasping mouth. Metallic, sticky and crimson as the prettiest of sun rises.
She felt more than saw the sword coming. Her vision was swimming with colours that she couldn't name and pain blurred even those but she knew something was coming. Years of being an murderer had given a warning that screamed at her when she was about to die. She dropped to her knee and felt the blade skim her head, likely took a few hairs with it. Then she pushed back onto her feet and stumbled away, hit the wooden porch again and tumbled into the building, rolling back onto her feet and facing the gaping doorway.
A figured blurred out the torch light from outside. Henry couldn't see it clearly through the blood and pain, didn't really care to. She flung her knife at what was most likely its head and heard a dull thud. The blurred figured slumped to the floor by the wall and one behind it roared in anger. Henry threw her other dagger. The figure rushed her. First she was off her feet, then the whole world slammed into her back driving the air from her lungs in a bloody gasp. The demon slashed at her with claws the seemed made of metal, one tore bloody strips out of her chest and the other hit the side of her head, felt like it tore her left ear off but Henry wasn't in any position to look for a mirror to find out. She reached up, quick as a snake and grabbed hold of the demon's head with both hands, finding the eye sockets and pushing her thumbs in as hard as she could. The demon tore at her arms but Henry didn't let go, ignoring the searing pain and pushing, pushing, pushing.
Another fist hit her in the side of the head. She saw it coming, last ditch attempt by the demon to dislodge her. It worked. She fell away and scrabbled to safety. As far away from the raging creature as possible, up against a wall and she watched it. It slammed into one wall, then staggered back and slammed into the other. Its face was a crimson mess, even in the dark of the building Henry could tell that, and it gripped its head with both hands, screaming and thrashing. Finally it staggered backwards out into the street and away from the building, a mixture of walking, stumbling and collapsing only to regain its feet and start again.
Henry waited, she wasn't certain how long. The pain in her arms, her chest, her belly and her head were a constant pulsing throb that she couldn't ignore. Gingerly she reached up and touched a hand to the left side of her head. Her ear wobbled. Didn't really seem like a good sign, a wobbling ear, especially not with how much it was hurting.
“Get up,” she said to herself her voice shaking like a tree in a storm. “GET UP!” This time she screamed at herself.
There were folk counting on her. Thorn, Suzku, hell, even Anders. She couldn't just sit in a corner and cry, hoping the demons would pass her by like they had in Hostown. Like she had in Hostown.
She wiped tears away from her eyes only to realise her hands and arms were soaked in blood, hers and the demons. Something about that seemed to lend her strength. The sight of blood always had, something regal about blood, something primal, beautiful. Henry forced herself to her feet, blocked out her pain and picked up her daggers, one from the floor, one from the demon's face. She stepped back out onto the street, took a quick look around the battlefield and went in search of her crew.
Anders
Anders leapt backwards then lunged with his rapier scoring a searing gash across the man's ribs and releasing a yell of triumph that would have cowed even the manliest of sparring partners. If the sparring partner facing him now felt anything, either pain or pleasure or even mild discomfort, he showed it not at all. He ignored the bloody wound, already closing by the looks of it, and came at Anders with axe swinging. Anders, knowing that an axe against a rapier spelled a bad match up in his direction fell back, giving ground yet again.
The problem was, Anders lamented, he simply wasn't much of a fighter. He'd caused his fair share of death and possibly another man's fair share as well, but he was never very good at the actual killing. Barring a couple of accidental murders, his assassination of Farin Colth at the behest of Drake and a few guards or criminals
, the distinction between the two here in the wilds often left him confused, he didn't really have many kills to his quite infamous name.
Another of the demons joined the fray, this one an astonishingly beautiful woman with fine features, firebrand hair and a single exposed breast. Anders tripped, tumbled away from her and then scampered away from the man with the axe. It was strange but even amidst the chaos and bloodshed he still found the site of a pale, exposed breast arousing. Reminded him of Rilly. Reminded him of Henry.
He regained his feet and met his opponents head on just like his father had claimed a real man should. Of course the big man complete with axe and beautiful woman complete with short sword did nothing to bolster his courage.
A faint to the left and a dodge to the right and Anders laid another slash across the man's ribs and again it didn't seem to phase the brute. Hopping backwards Anders caught a glimpse of the Black Thorn hacking away in the midst of four men at once. It was a sight to behold and one Anders truly hoped he never had chance to be beholding again but it was the bloody axe that caught his eye and the faint golden glow it had. It could of course have just been a trick of the light but it sparked off a memory in Anders drunken mind and he shoved a hand into his pocket, bringing out a strip of paper.
With a short prayer to his father's Gods Anders sliced the paper in two with his rapier and was rewarded with his own glowing weapon.
“I'd say we're on more of an equal footing now, ay? Still fancy your chances?” he taunted.
Neither demon responded with anything more than a feverish attack that, despite his glowing sword of someone else's righteous glory, had him once again falling back which, he knew quite well, was another word for retreating, which in turn was another word for fleeing and that was something he was more than accomplished at.
The beautiful woman tripped on her own tattered dress and despite Anders first instinct to help her up, and steal her purse, he pressed the dubious advantage by launching himself in a frenzied and quite possibly suicidal attack on the man with the axe. One inch-perfect dodge, complete with wordless cry of terror, later and he was inside the man's reach with a foot of steel lodged at an impressive angle through the demon's abdomen. He was rewarded with a roar of pain. Anders was just about to congratulate himself on a job well done when the man stopped roaring and looked down upon him with all the fury of hell in his eyes. With a girlish squeak of terror Anders withdrew his blade from the man's gut and instead thrust it up through his neck and into his head. The demon teetered for a moment, a ghastly breath escaping from his lips, before toppling sideways wrenching Anders sword from his hand.
The other problem, Anders had to admit, was that he was thoroughly alone. He had always been much better with a crowd of folk who liked or at the very least tolerated him. They lent him courage and he in turn strove to be better in their presence. Here, on his own and in only his own presence, he was well aware that he was a close-to-useless drunkard with a distinct dual loyalty issue regarding his employers. With a heavy sigh he reached down to pry his rapier free. Unfortunately the beautiful woman-demon thing had other ideas and, disregarding her need for a sword, chose that moment to slam into Anders tackling him to the ground.
They wrestled there for a while amidst the dust and dirt and each moment was a terrifying lifetime for Anders. She was without a doubt stronger and faster but Anders had grown up with a lifetime of surprise wrestling encounters and, while he hadn't enjoyed a single one of them, he had learned how best to defend himself. With a variety of twists, turns, pushes, locks and one cheeky handful of breast he dislodged himself from the woman and scampered away looking for his rapier. The demon, not to be outdone, came at him again long before he found his sword.
Discretion, Drake had once told Anders while blind drunk on a type of rum as black as tar, is without a fucking doubt the better fucking part of valour. It was a lesson Anders took to heart and it had saved his life on more than one occasion. This, he fervently hoped, was one of those occasions. With that in mind he turned tail and ran.
He sprinted past blood and violence and bodies and bodies rising once again to join in with the blood and violence. He spotted a friendly-looking doorway, one that stood open and inviting, and turned for it. Anders wasn't entirely certain why he thought the building would be safe but then he was acting more on instinct than anything else and instinct told him four walls and a roof would inevitably be safer than no walls and no roof. Anders' instincts had a habit of leading him into trouble and they did not disappoint.
He skidded to a halt in the hallway of the dilapidated shack and slammed the door shut just in time to hit the screaming, but beautiful, demon-woman in the face with the sturdy slab of timber. Then he turned to find himself confronted by yet another woman, this one considerably less beautiful and considerably more armed. A long sword to be precise and a sharp-looking one at that.
“Ah...” Anders said holding up a couple of placating hands. “Now my dear I wonder if...”
The woman leapt at him snarling, long sword swinging. Anders threw himself sideways into a face full of moulding wall and slithered away into the nearest room well-aware the creature behind him was hot on his heels. He made it half-way across the room before something loud shattered across the back of his head causing him to topple and crash to the floor taking a table with him.
Despite wanting to do nothing more than hold his head and weep for a while Anders knew such vain indulgence would likely cause his probably unavoidable death so he rolled onto his back and wiped away the blood from his face. Blood that tasted suspiciously like wine. He licked his lips.
“Did you just throw a wine jug at me?” he asked the oncoming demon.
She didn't answer just leapt atop him, grabbed hold of his neck and drove her sword into his chest.
Anders Brekovich knew one thing, if he was going to die it was going to be the best damned death scene any man had ever given anywhere and he didn't care if the only ones to see it were the demonic woman who had murdered him and the small grasshopper perched on the nearby window ledge. With that in mind he gave a wail of pain and suffering the likes of which would have moved the hearts of statues. He flung out his arms and cried out the unfairness of it all and finally expelled his last breath. Only to take another.
In fairness to the demon-woman; ugly, scarred, brutish, stub-nosed beast that she was, she looked just as confused as Anders. She lifted her sword up a little to find it lodged in something inside of his jacket. Their eyes met as both of them realised she had stabbed his hip flask. He grinned. Something dark and angry hit the demon, tackling her off of Anders and both her and the raging whirlwind of blades scrabbled on the floor for a moment before that same whirlwind gained the advantage, straddled the demon and started stabbing. It took Anders a moment of laying on the floor dumbfounded to realise Henry had just saved his life again and she was busy checking the insides of the demon for valuables. She of course found only blood and plenty of it. She was in fact dripping in gore before the attack had begun and if anything she was now a little less bloody.
As soon as the demon stopped twitching Henry was up. Her hat long since lost, her face a crimson mask, her left ear missing and her two dark eyes feverish bright and somewhere between intense and causing Anders' bowels to loosen. She extended him a bloody hand. He didn't hesitate in taking it.
“I believe a thank you is in order,” Anders said. “It's possible you may have just saved my life, my lady.”
Henry nodded at the doorway to the room and then to the window and Anders noticed another three demons, two skinny men and one very beautiful, broken-nosed woman, closing in on them.
“Don't reckon it's worth the thankin' 'til it's a fact, Anders,” Henry said reversing the grip on her daggers and readying herself to pounce.
“Then how about an apology,” he said giving her his infamous and well-prepared smile. She ignored it. “I'm sorry about that whole incident with my losing your trust.”
The demons were clo
sing slowly now, wary of Henry and her glowing daggers. “What incident?” she asked. “Ya mean the whole, you workin' fer Drake fuckin' Morrass thing?”
Anders picked up a broken chair leg, it wasn't much of a weapon but he supposed cracking a skull was much like cracking an egg only involving more swings. “Precisely that. I'm sorry.”
Henry snorted. “Ya want ta be sorry, stop fuckin' workin' fer him.”
“One doesn't simply leave the employment of Drake Morrass, my dear. One is usually let go... from a great height.”
“Coward.”
“I never claimed to be otherwise.”
“Ya ready fer this?”
“No.”
“Good enough.” Henry led the charge and Anders followed.
Suzku
They hadn't moved. Neither Pern nor master Kochin. He had yet to see the old master's face but Pern didn't need to see it, he knew its every line, every wrinkle, every scar and every expression. Master Kochin had been old even when Pern was a child, the clan's longest surviving Haarin, never lost a client, never failed the clan. Kochin was everything that embodied the Haarin and he was here to kill Pern.
There didn't really seem like much to say. Pern knew the day would come when a Haarin from his clan caught up to him. He had truly hoped it would be somebody, anybody else but the world worked in its own ways and no amount of hoping would change that. Kochin was Haarin, Pern was Honin. They would fight. One would die. Likely that one would be Pern but he hoped otherwise.
The sounds of fighting started, metal clashed against metal, shouting, screaming, even an explosion or two. Still neither Pern nor Kochin moved. It was a nice night, a slight chill in the air and the lanterns did their best to ward off the darkness. Stars winked in and out of existence overhead and still the two of them faced each other from across the street, no more than ten paces between them.