Oliver attempted to keep close but was occasionally distracted by the carvings on the walls. There were carvings of giant snakes, alligators, and turtles, each in a different pose and carving style. He recognized one that looked like the statue he had seen before he was attacked from behind, one that looked like Viperelix and Sermantra, and a few that looked like Nikita. Some of the carvings were of Nikita killing a human or were carvings of her halfway into a shape shifting. Others were of Nikita surrounded by a carving of a giant winged snake, and she was receiving something from the snake either through a bite or by holding an orb above her head.
Nikita and Oliver arrived at an empty wall where Nikita pushed a stone with a small, snake engraving. A section of the wall opened and Nikita entered the dark room beyond. Oliver followed cautiously. The door closed behind Oliver, leaving him and Nikita in the dark. Nikita felt around the floor for the torch she usually left not far from the door. She found it in no time and kicked it up with her foot, catching it in her outstretched hand she then used her dragon fire. She exhaled a small column of flame, lighting the touch on contact. Oliver’s eyes gazed in wonder as she lit the torch with fire that cast a warm glow on Nikita’s face.
When Nikita was done lighting the torch she headed towards the far wall, when she got within a few feet of the wall Oliver saw that it was covered with all sorts of blades. There were swords of various kinds, daggers of various sizes and uses, throwing knives, and even a couple of throwing daggers with a long length of chain attached at the end or the hilts. On a table next to Nikita were a pair of gloves and a pair of topless shoes. Nikita put on the gloves and shoes and triggered them revealing retractable blades in the lining of the gloves that could also be thrown, and blades in the sole of the shoes that weren't removable.
Oliver headed towards the wall and examined the weapons until his gaze landed on a pair of katanas with a familiar design on the blade. With Nikita’s permission, he removed them from the wall for his use. On each of them was an image of the Great Snake flying towards the tip of the blades.
Nikita stood next to him and grabbed her preferred arsonal, a pair of each: plain daggers, crescent shaped daggers, venom injecting daggers, acid resistant daggers, and long daggers. Nikita looked at Oliver out of the corner of her eye as she placed the long daggers into their sheaths and took note on his number of weapons.
“You will want more than just two blades if we are to get out alive. Might I suggest these?” Nikita said as she held out her right hand and offered him a bow and quiver with nine arrows. Oliver looked at her confused, but took the bow and slung the quiver over his head and left shoulder. “The bow will never break, the arrows never miss, and the quiver never runs out of arrows,” Nikita explained as she finished putting the last venom-injector dagger into its sheath.
Once they were done they left the hidden armory and extinguished the torch. They made their way to a hidden room that was once a praying chamber, but now served as Long Fang’s seat of power. Nikita motioned for Oliver to hide in the shadows as she would draw Long Fang’s attention. Oliver stuck to the shadows as he crept along the wall to a spot thick in shadow. Once Nikita saw that he had made it unseen, it was her turn. She walked into the room, up towards Long Fang’s new throne. Dagger clan warriors formed a pathway to the throne and when they saw Nikita walk past them, they attempted to attack her. They didn’t even get close before Nikita shot a wave of magic at them forcing them to sail backwards and hit the wall.
Nikita stood at the base of the throne as she looked up at her with hate and a challenger’s gaze. “Long Fang, you will leave now or I will be forced to use more persuasive methods,” Nikita demanded as she leveled a long dagger at her. She was standing with her left side to the throne with the dagger in her left hand.
Long Fang laughed then responded coldly, “You think you can defeat me with a little knife? I will make your death slow and painful, girl.”
Long Fang stood and activated her blade gauntlets, and Oliver saw his chance as he aimed an arrow at Fang and took the shot. The arrow sailed straight towards Long Fang, who was unaware. Nikita saw the arrow out of the corner of her eye and knew that it would hit, so she smiled wickedly. Long Fang yelled out in pain as the arrow had hit her in the side below her ribs. Nikita smiled as she lunged at Fang, a long dagger in each hand and roaring her battle cry.
Chapter 14
Going Home
Oliver dropped the bow and removed the quiver before he charged in to help Nikita with katanas drawn. Long Fang blocked Nikita’s rotating dagger attack and was distracted from seeing Oliver’s approach. Oliver did a downward slash at Fang’s arm, he hit, and Fang’s block weakened. Nikita saw her chance and put all her strength behind her daggers that were scraping against Long Fang’s blade. Fang’s double edged blades inched closer and closer to her throat. “You should have run when you had the chance,”Nikita hissed.
“I will not be defeated easily,” Long Fang roared in defiance as she shoved Nikita back with her blade. Oliver and Nikita tumbled down the stairs that lead up to the throne, with their weapons scattered. Nikita landed on her back, feet arrowed at the base of the stairs, while Oliver landed ungracefully on his face. Long Fang jumped down from where she stood and landed standing over Nikita. She angled her double edged blade at Nikita’s throat before Nikita could unsheath one of the daggers on her arms. “Surrender or die,” Fang said knowing she had Nikita trapped. Nikita slowly unsheathed one of the venom injector daggers that were sheathed on her left leg. Nikita shot her a wicked grin as she teased, “Is there a third option?”
Long Fang looked at Nikita with rage and pulled her blade back about an inch as she prepared to embed it in Nikita’s throat. Suddenly, Fang felt something warm creep down her leg. She looked down at her leg and saw that Nikita had stabbed her in the leg just above the knee. Her leg went weak and she fell to her knees, Nikita rolled out of the way and landed crouched on her hands and the balls of her feet. “You should know better than to corner a viper,” Nikita said coldly. Long Fang shot her a look of pure hate as she got back onto her feet and attacked her, Nikita dodged to the left as Fang ran right past her. She turned and charged at Nikita again with the same results. “You should really get that wound on your leg looked at,” Nikita said motioning to Fang’s leg as she held up the venom injecting dagger she had used on her,” You never know what could be on this blade.”
A look of fear glazed Long Fang’s face as she figured out what kind of dagger Nikita held. Nikita glanced at Oliver, who was laying on the floor faking being knocked out right behind Long Fang’s other leg. “Poison can be a painful thing... unless you’re immune,” Nikita crooned. Fang aimed her gauntlet of blades at Nikita and prepared to fire at her. Oliver saw the danger and struck. He jumped to his feet and caught Long Fang by placing the snake scale blades across Fang’s neck.
Nikita saw the surprise in Fang’s eyes and attacked. She thrusted one of her cresent daggers into Fang’s chest. She pushed the blade in until her hand was against Long Fang’s flesh. Oliver released and backed away surprised, thinking the plan had been to capture Fang. Nikita hissed into Long Fang’s ear,” Sarang morack vernsta Hella. The demons of Hell await you.”
With that, Nikita pulled the now bloodied dagger out of Long Fang’s chest and let her fall at her feet. She dropped the dagger and turned towards the exit. Walking away she didn’t see that the dagger had landed with the tip of the bloodied blade facing Nikita’s back. Oliver saw it land as he picked up the katana that he had dropped, then began chasing after Nikita, since he had no idea how to get out of the temple. At the sight of the bloodied dagger tip pointing at Nikita a foreboding presence seemed to hover over him for a moment before disappearing.
Oliver and Nikita reached the canyon pass after chasing out the remaining Dagger clan soldiers. Oliver had left the snake scale blade hilts at the base of the statue of Great Snake as he had walked past. They entered the canyon pass and walked in silence until they reached the halfway p
oint. There they were met by tattered clothes that covered the canyon floor, Oliver recognized them as the Dagger clan uniform. “Where are the Dagger clan warriors?”
“Look behind you,” Nikita said calmly as she turned to face him. He turned and was greeted by a large snake head that was smiling at him. His eyes went wide with surprise as he jumped away from the snake head. “Viperelix and Sermantra, I take it you dealt with the intruders as they fled,” Nikita said commandingly.
“They didn’t even know what hit them,” answered Sermantra.
“The secret of the canyon pass is safe,” answered Viperelix. Nikita nodded as she waved “Bye” to Viperelix and Sermantra. Oliver felt a shiver down his spine as he thought of what Sermantra and Viperelix might do if they ever got bored of the canyon and came to his home city. Nikita cast a spell on the clothes and they instantly disintegrated. Sermantra and Viperelix thanked Oliver and paid their respects to Nikita before going back to their cave hidden in the shadows. Nikita and Oliver turned for home.
After several days of walking Nikita and Oliver finally reached the spot where they had last seen each other, warehouse #17. They stopped for a rest and to let the fact that they had finally made it home sink in. When they woke up, it was night. They had slept for five hours. They got up and started for their home in the abandoned hotel, hoping that Horus, Dakota, Mikey, and Master Kappa were still home. It wasn’t long before they reached the entrance to the hideout, they searched in every room for the others. They heard sounds coming from the dojo as they rushed past only to skid to a halt on their heels, they looked at each other and smiled as the turned back and quietly crept to the doorway.
They peeked in and saw Horus sparring Dakota and Mikey with Kappa watching. No one was looking towards the door so Nikita moved a foot into the room, waited for Dakota to lift his bo-staff and threw one of her throwing knives. The blade hit, embedded into the staff and knocking it out of Dakota's hands. Horus punched Dakota in the gut with one of his ninja clawed hands before ending the fight due to technicality.
“You should be able to handle any attack even if you don’t see it coming,” teased Nikita as Oliver stepped out to stand beside her.
Surprised by the unexpected attack and familiar voice Horus, Dakota, Mikey, and Master Kappa turned to look at who had spoken from the doorway. When they saw that it was Oliver and Nikita they stopped what they were doing and the boys rushed toward them to give Nikita and Oliver a hug. Eventually Oliver and Nikita managed to get out of the embrace. Dakota asked,“What happened? You totally ditched us Oliver!”
“I received another message from Nikita. She told me to come alone, the danger was too high to risk your lives,” Oliver answered.
“I knew he would be able to survive, but Long Fang wanted all of you so she could kill you all through torture. The torture devices there were designed to make it last as long as possible without killing the prisoner,” answered Nikita.
“A reasonable explanation—and Oliver did leave a note,” Kappa said as he held up a note written in Oliver’s handwriting.
Horus asked,“So, what happened while you two were MIA anyway?”
Nikita answered, “That is a long story and Dakota still has my throwing knife.”
“Get some rest, we can talk later—and here’s your dagger,” Dakota said as he handed Nikita her dagger. Nikita took her dagger before she followed Oliver to their rooms. Nikita and Oliver each went to their separate rooms and and collapsed onto their beds and fell asleep.
Several hours past before Nikita woke up to someone nudging her. She opened her eyes and saw it was Oliver with a bowl of mango slices. Oliver grinned,”I know how much you love mangos.”
“Sometimes it’s scary how well you know me,” Nikita said slyly as she took a mango slice and ate it.
“It’s hard not to know you love mango when you have it for breakfast every day.”
“Mmm… good point,” Nikita said as she ate a few more slices,” How come you're already awake.”
“Guess I don’t need as much beauty sleep as you,” teased Oliver as Nikita finished eating the last mango slice.” Besides I bet you’d make a better storyteller if you were well rested.”
Nikita glared at Oliver as she groaned, “You told them that I would explain what happened didn’t you?” Oliver nodded with an innocent smile.
“It might be a good thing since you might mess up and tell them something they shouldn’t know, such as the Reptilian Protector’s secret canyon pass,” Nikita said.
Nikita rose from bed and shook her head and was instantly in a clean set of clothes and her hair was brushed. Oliver headed out and started towards the kitchen, followed by Nikita. They entered the kitchen and were greeted by the others sitting around the kitchen table. Nikita smiled as she sat down next to Oliver. She began to tell the story and left out the parts she and Oliver wanted kept secret—such as his dreams of her.
Oliver occasionally joined in to tell his side of the story. They left out the part about Nikita poisoning and killing Long Fang as well. Horus, Dakota, Mikey, and Master Kappa listened with fascination as Nikita and Oliver told them what they had been up to. Nikita and Oliver smiled at each other as they told the story with ease.
Nikita smiled. She was with friends and had a home. She didn’t have to be on the run anymore and that was all she could ever ask for. “I have to protect this new life I have from the one person that threatens it. The one person that wants me dead. Luckily I have the Serpent’s Gift to help,” Nikita thought to herself.
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