“Glivet, get the hell out of here and go sober up.” Silas waved his brother off from the table and stood up. “Come on, son. Come back to the table. No one is laughing.”
Nero looked around at his family. They all appeared concerned and no one mocked him, but it all felt too late. Like the Cattlemen Guild Leader, the sacrifice for his goal was too great. He would give up all the accolades and go back to being a nobody lobster farmer if it would bring the 8th Regiment back. He would give it all up just to bring Flavius back.
“It’s too late. You thought I was going to die… and I did.” Nero chucked the jug of wine off into the darkness and gestured at himself. “I saw her down there. I saw Death in the woods outside Duransk and she claimed me. The Nero you all want back is gone and all that’s left is this husk being paraded around the land; a trophy for a victory we just fucking made up.”
Nero heard Helfria trying to explain things to the Septimus family as he stormed out toward the carriage. This was probably quite the embarrassment for her, but he didn’t care. He just wanted to get drunk and pass out.
Chapter 17
“Fix her!”
Chev’El jerked awake and gripped her bow taking in her surroundings without moving her head. The light covering of snow concealing her shook along with her body and she struggled to regain control. The cold threatened to steal the life right out of her, but that wasn’t what threatened her poise. Soft as the wind, she sang a soft ballad Sevictus had taught her long ago to help calm her.
This time it didn’t work.
Chev’El chanced that no others were close enough to spot her and sat up, rubbing her arms against the cold. “Stop it. Just… stop it. You had to. This is what you came back for. You had to.”
The man’s voice stayed in her mind for over a week as she avoided detection by the bands of strange, fur-collared Greimere warriors prowling the forest trying to sniff her out. She had not expected to hear the voice crying out with anguish in the Rellizbix tongue. She had waited outside the wall for days hoping to catch the blue-haired warrior at a pause. When her opportunity arrived, she barely noticed the man beside the warrior on the wall; a man who in the dim torchlight looked almost Twileen.
Her arrow sailed true, hitting the warrior right in the lethal zone. The call went up and she made her escape before anyone could reach her spot, but as she fled she heard the scream.
“Fix her!”
At the time it had been merely an unexpected morsel of oddity. Not something she needed to prioritize over survival. As the days carried on, her mind kept going back to it, making her sick the longer she thought about it. Someone inside those walls mourned the warrior. Some man with knowledge of Rellizbix, perhaps a man from these lands, wailed in desperation for someone to save her.
The blue-haired warrior had been dear to someone. Judging by the howls and cries that followed, the entire Greimere loved her. Chev’El had taken this beloved warrior from them all with a single arrow. And this proud warrior never had the opportunity to defend herself.
Chev’El avoided looking at her arrows. Every time she did, she thought of what the barbed tips did to her prey while hunting. Her mind assaulted her with images of carving the muscle aside until she reached the broadhead and then gingerly pulling it free of sinew cords. She remembered the time she impatiently yanked an arrow free from a deer and pulled its innards with it; of how the ripped colon had soiled all the meat with filth. Her mind would then substitute that deer for the warrior before Chev’El could shut off her thoughts.
Even if the mystery man had known not to try to pull the arrow free, he still would have knelt there helpless as the woman bled out and died.
Chev’El risked a long pull from her water skin to help shake the sleep off. Hard lumps knocked around inside where more of her water had frozen overnight even though she had tucked it close against her side. Nausea from hunger tore at her gut, but she lingered too close to the fort to risk hunting. Packs of the fur-collared hunters roamed further and further out from the walls. They seemed more at home in the cold than any Saban or Twileen.
Almost hourly, she also ran across short, skittish creatures with black fur. The hills were thick with them walking in lines, wearing all manner of things on their heads. For the most part they seemed laughably oblivious to everything. One even waved at her before carrying on without alerting anyone.
Chev’El heard a noise to the left but fought against snapping her head in that direction. Predators watched for movement and the beings that hunted her were definitely predators. She slowly lay backward, slipping into her dugout as her head tilted toward the noise. It could have been nothing: a rodent or bird.
Then she caught sight of them: three of the fur-collared hunters. She had already disturbed her snow covering too greatly to try to hide from them. They would sniff her out at any moment.
Only three of them.
As she watched the three men draw closer to her, she wondered if they had given her a nickname inside the fort yet. She also wondered with grim indifference what they would do to her when they inevitably captured her. It would certainly be slow and awful; she had killed enough patrolling warriors in the past few weeks to warrant torture.
Gently, Chev’El pulled her bow and arrow from the resting place before her. Her movements barely agitated the snow atop her. The lead Greimere scout did not slow as she put him in her sights.
The man’s head snapped to the side with the impact. He turned to the side before dropping lifeless into the snow. The other two found her instantly just from the one shot. She reaffirmed her hatred for their race and popped up from concealment, drawing a second arrow and bracing for the blindingly quick charge. She had to wait until they were right on her or they would dodge the arrow.
Both remaining scouts dove behind a wide oak. Chev’El furrowed her brow and glanced to the sides. A second later she heard one of the scouts blow a horn.
Chev’El relaxed her bow and looked to the South, where another horn sounded. “Dammit. Took them long enough to get serious.”
She slipped her bow over her quiver and bolted forward climbing a tree before her and racing across its limb to the next tree. Her frozen limbs warmed quickly with the exertion, but the growing numbness took a toll on her balance. The two men were still hiding behind the trunk of the oak when she dropped between them. Her left hand buried her slender dagger into the left scout’s neck; her right chucking her hatchet into the other hunter’s chest.
She snatched her hatchet from the dying man, pushing forward and sprinting for the waterfall. A quarter mile to the northeast, a tributary of the Pisces ran off a 60-foot cliff. She used it as one of her escape routes. She just hoped the water below was moving too fast to freeze.
Three figures emerged from the trees and blocked off her path, all of them carrying spears. One of the dark-skinned women put a horn to her lips. Chev’El put an arrow through the horn and the warrior’s mouth before she could sound the alarm. Her next shot found the shoulder of the woman on the left. The remaining warrior took cover behind a tree.
Chev’El deviated from the path and left the survivor behind. Killing one more enemy was not worth getting ringed in. Another horn blasted to the East. Someone must have caught sight of her. She pushed harder, keeping her bow in hand.
The beast’s pursuit reached her ear seconds before it closed on her. Chev’El dropped into a roll as the giant black wolf soared overhead, snapping at the air where her head was a moment earlier. She came up from the roll and fired off an arrow as soon as she saw her target. The wolf had already cleared a good enough distance from her in that short time and lunged out of the way of her arrow. The rider dismounted; a dark-haired, petite thing no bigger than her.
The girl drew a gum ash bow and loosed an arrow right between her eyes. The archer knew enough about Chev’El’s skill and technique to keep her wolf out of range, but that logic worked both ways. From that distance, Chev’El had enough time to catch sight of the arrow. She snatched
the shaft out of the air right in front of her, spun it between her fingers and sent it back at the archer in an eye-blink. The shot was wide by several inches and sailed past the Greimere archer. Chev’El did not have time for careful aim, but then that skill was not meant for accuracy; she had learned it to scare the shit out of anyone bold enough to challenge her with a bow.
It worked. The archer took cover to the side and her beast stayed out of range.
Chev’El flanked them and pushed onward. She was so close to the waterfall. She heard a howl behind her; the archer was on her trail and alerting everyone to her position. It did not matter. In minutes she would be out of their grasp.
She broke through the tree line near the waterfall and skidded to a halt. Between her and the falls, right in her path, stood a huge male Rathgar with a large, double-winged battle axe in each hand. His massive, bare chest bore numerous scars and the strip of white hair in the middle of his head rippled in the chill wind, which did not appear to affect him. Steam curled out between his lips and his crimson eyes locked onto her.
He would not be able to close the distance with those axes in time, however, and Chev’El fired off an arrow before he could try. The Rathgar raised his axe without breaking eye contact and the arrow struck the wooden handle, between the blades. He glanced down at the arrow, embedded in his axe and then looked back to her.
A smile crossed his lips and he chuckled, deep and rumbling.
Cursing, Chev’El swapped out her bow for her dagger and hatchet and charged the Rathgar. Big men could be easily intimidating, but they also moved slower. She just needed to avoid the first swing and hamstring him, then she would be over the falls to her exit. He roared with laughter and stepped forward to meet her.
His axe swung for her head and she ducked low, swiping for his midsection with her dagger. The big man moved quicker than she expected. She pulled her strike and moved her head at the last moment as his armored knee grazed her chin. She dropped to her side and rolled away, avoiding the next axe swing. The Rathgar stood his ground and focused on her, the smile still beaming across his face. He would not take the offensive and risk her slipping past him.
She had not yet faced anyone from the Greimere like him. With such monstrous size, he shouldn’t have been able to move so gracefully.
The sounds of pursuers grew louder behind her. She had to outmaneuver him now or take on a whole group.
Chev’El drew her bow and dashed at him. As she closed in on him, she fired an arrow at his head. He lifted his axe to block the arrow and as he did, Chev’El dropped, landed on her hip and slid between his legs. Passing under him, she pulled an arrow and when she popped up to her feet she drew her bow right at the back of his head.
The Rathgar had already spun on her and before she could loose the arrow, his axe smashed through the Black Fir bow, ripping it from her hands. She saw the other axe shoot out like a lethal jab and she pushed off, desperate to escape the man’s reach.
Chev’El avoided the blade and back-flipped out over the waterfall. She had made it past the warrior, though she dreaded the day she had to fight him again. She looked below her as she began to drop toward the lagoon below.
The water did not move.
It’s frozen.
Chev’El would not survive hitting ice from a sixty-foot plummet and she could not tell how thick the ice was. Time slowed to a crawl as the glass-like surface zoomed closer. Even if the ice were thin, the initial impact would crush her.
Chev’El’s hand moved on its own. She yanked the hatchet from her belt loop and muscle memory took over. She nearly threw her shoulder out launching her weapon at the ice with such force. The blade hit and cracks spider-webbed across the surface a second before her feet impacted.
Fire exploded through her soles and ankles, even as she plunged into the bone-chilling water. She kept her mouth shut, stifling a scream to keep the oxygen in her lungs. A glint of steel caught her eye and she reached out to snatch her hatchet as it sunk next to her. She would need it to break through the ice down the river. The gentle current beneath the ice carried her further away from her enemies.
A shadow passed over her as she swam and she looked up to see a green giant in hellish armor standing on the iced-over river.
Chev’El tried to swim out of the way, but the cold water stole the strength from her. She watched helplessly as the behemoth raised a long-handled axe and crashed through the ice. Thick, muscled arms reached through the hole in the ice and grabbed her skull. Chev’El grit her teeth against the strain in her neck as she was lifted out of river by her head.
She looked forward at a hulking, female Rathgar’s snarling face. Her arms dwarfed those of any Saban man she had encountered and the woman did not struggle to hold an eighty-pound Twileen up in outstretched arms.
She also could not block Chev’El’s blade when she drove her dagger into the warrior’s gut, up to the hilt.
The Rathgar grunted and pain washed over her face. Anger quickly replaced it and the Rathgar tossed her into the air. Chev’El hung suspended for a half-second; long enough to withdraw her dagger and try to drive it into the warrior’s neck. Then the woman slammed her fist into Chev’El’s chest.
Chev’El thought she was going to break apart into six pieces when the warrior hit her. The air fled from her collapsing lungs like deer from a forest fire and she did not hit the ground for three heartbeats. The back of her skull bounced off the ice when she landed and her body slid across the frozen river into the bank.
Chev’El rolled over, desperately trying to suck air back in. Blood dripped from her mouth and when she frantically inhaled, it gagged her. In her left hand, she gripped her dagger like a magical talisman and she clawed at the ground with her right. She could still make it. The giant Rathgar could not chase her down with her stomach leaking out all over the river. Despite the lightning bolts that ripped through her ankles with every step and the daggers that stabbed through her ribs with every breath, she still lived. She could still push onward. She just needed to reach the forest.
A shadow stepped out from the trees and the last bit of warmth left her. She recognized the foe before her. The Rathgar’s eyes shined like sunlight through a blood ruby; her lavender hair raced along her scalp in braided rows; white skulls adorned her leather armor. Chev’El stared across the river bank at the one Greimere warrior that never left the warlord’s side; the one who embodied the spirit of the Badger.
Sevictus once told Chev’El that people carry all the men they’ve killed in their eyes. Everyone hides it, out of guilt for those who did not enjoy it and out of guile for those who did. A skilled observer could look through the most strident disguise to see the death in a person’s eyes.
The Badger hid nothing in her blood-colored eyes. The Rathgar, Darklings and Fur-collars that Chev’El had hunted all revealed a certain amount of death in their eyes, but death as the result of war or fear. Badger’s eyes beheld death in such quantity, death with such sadistic euphoria, that Chev’El hesitated the only time she ever held the woman in her sights. Badger had killed dozens, maybe even hundreds of men before the war ever began… and she wore that death like a black aura of madness and destruction.
Chev’El pulled the dreaded black tube from her pouch and unscrewed the water-tight lid. She hated what the tube contained and her hand shook thinking about the week it would take to cleanse her body of it afterward.
The red-eyed warrior before her did not move to stop her as Chev’El poured a line of the greenish-black powder onto the back of her hand, replaced the tube and then inhaled it all in one quick snort.
She felt the heat flood through her instantly. Her shivering stopped, her pain dulled and her heart raged inside her chest. She turned her head to the side and spit out the blood pooling in her mouth. The shouted protests in her ankles and ribs quieted to soft whimpers and she stood, pulling the hatchet and dagger from her belt.
The Badger smiled and moved toward her.
Chev’El bolted
forward and slashed her weapons across the warrior’s abdomen. The Rathgar barely avoided a gut-spilling wound and kicked Chev’El to the side. Chev’El spun through the kick and drove her dagger at the Badger’s kidney. The stab missed and she moved her head just in time to avoid losing it to the tomahawk that passed over her. Chev’El swung upward with her hatchet and caught the woman in the underarm. She grazed her, but managed to sever a tendon, The Badger howled in pain.
The swing left her open and despite her successful strike, the Badger still caught her open side with a fierce boot. Chev’El felt her broken ribs scream through the dulling effect of the drug as the kick lifted her off her feet. Blood filled her mouth again, but she felt invincible.
The Badger stood over her and lifted her axe for the kill. Chev’El struck out with her left, jamming the dagger through the warrior’s boot and pinning her foot. The Badger howled and dropped one of her tomahawks and reached for the dagger, but Chev’El whirled on the ground, spinning and kicking her arm out of the way. She kicked the Badger in the face and as the woman straightened, Chev’El lighted atop her shoulders, wrapping her wiry legs around the warrior’s head and covering her face with her abdomen.
Hugging her face, the Twileen girl lifted her right arm and swung her hatchet into the Badger’s crown. A grey-green hand caught her wrist before the hatchet found its mark; the Badger anticipated the kill stroke. Chev’El flicked the hatchet into her left hand and curled it over her shoulder and behind her back in time to block the warrior’s tomahawk swinging at her spine. With a grunt, Chev’El hooked the tomahawk blade with her hatchet and wrenched the weapon from the Rathgar’s grip.
The Badger’s disarmed hand snaked around her stomach and in the next instant, Chev’El flew backward as the warrior slammed her to the ground.
Wrath of the Greimere (Hell Cliffs Book 2) Page 13