“Now!” Tannard growled. “Defend yourself, Prototopoi.”
With an apologetic look, Hykos brought up his huge sword and attacked.
Chapter Thirteen
Brother Modestus moved faster than Evren thought possible. Before the crossbows had even released their deadly missiles, the Cambionari knight leapt over the edge of the wagon and dropped to the ground. One bolt thunked into the wagon’s side where the priest’s groin had been. The second flew high and clattered off a boulder beyond the road.
Suddenly, Modestus charged out from the shelter of the wagon, right at the bandit leader. Sunlight glinted off the razor-sharp edge of his sword and the pounding of his boots echoed loud in the stillness.
The bandit leader, caught off-guard, never had time to reload his crossbow. With a yelp, he half-dropped, half-hurled it at the charging priest. Brother Modestus lashed out with a quick sword stroke that severed the crossbow string and knocked the weapon out of his path. Before the bandit leader had time to clear his sword from its sheath, the priest was on him.
Evren didn’t bother to watch—the outcome was inevitable. Instead, he spun toward the bandits on the opposite side of the road. With a flick of his wrist, he dropped the throwing knife from its place in his wrist sheath and into his hand. His arm whipped up and forward, his fingers releasing the slim blade at just the right moment. The knife spun end over end, the blackened blade a dark blur in the bright morning sunlight, and buried to the hilt into the chest of the second crossbow-wielding bandit. The man gaped, mouth hanging slack, and stared down at the blood gushing down his tunic. His crossbow fell from numb fingers and tumbled into a crack between the boulders.
“Get down!” Evren shouted and shoved Hailen to the floor of the wagon’s driver box. “Stay here!”
He leapt down from the wagon and charged the two bandits clustered nearest him. One wielded a rusted sword, the other a pair of single-edged daggers as long as Evren’s forearm.
Evren whipped out his own daggers—two long, inward-curving, double-edged blades with thick medial ridges called jambiyas, weapons native to Vothmot. They were the perfect knives for his compact size and well-honed muscles: long and heavy enough to knock aside the clumsy thrust of the bandit’s long sword, with a curving edge that gave him the power to punch it through the man’s patchwork boiled leather armor. Blood sprayed as he pulled it free and swung around to block a dagger strike from the second bandit. With the quick, ruthless efficiency the Hunter had drilled into him, he opened his opponent’s throat.
He spun back toward his first opponent and found the man on his knees, staring stupidly down at the crimson spilling from his chest. Evren paused long enough to kick the sword out of his hands—no sense risking a blow from the dying man—then raced back toward the wagon and the bandits on the far side of the road.
Brother Modestus had already brought down the bandit leader and a second bandit, and was now carving his way through the three remaining men. To Evren’s horror, he saw three more bandits slinking between the rocks. In seconds, they’d reach Modestus and fall on him from the rear.
“Watch out!” he shouted. “Behind you.”
Brother Modestus leapt backward and spun to face the new threat, just in time to block a savage thrust aimed at his spine. The bandit stumbled, off-balance as his blow was knocked wide. Brother Modestus brought him down with a quick chop.
Evren raced around the front of the wagon and attacked the bandits that had been tangling with Modestus moments earlier. The first to face Evren fell beneath a horizontal blow that laid open his throat. Evren knocked aside two quick swipes of the next bandit’s long sword, dodged a dagger strike from the third, and nearly died as his back struck hard stone. Only his quick reflexes, honed through years as a thief and his training with the Hunter and Kiara, kept him alive. He managed to throw himself to one side. The blade clanged off stone a finger’s breadth from his head.
As he moved, he lashed out with the blade in his right hand. The razor-sharp edge opened a deep gash in the man’s leg, just above the knee. The wound did little real damage but slowed the man down long enough for Evren to regain his balance. He met the bandit’s wild swing with a cross-body blow that slapped the sword aside. His right-handed thrust punched the tip of his jambiya into the bandit’s gut. A quick flick of his wrist sent the tip slicing to the right, opening more flesh, muscle, and organs.
The bandit screamed and fell, his body tripping up his companion. In the instant the man looked down to avoid trampling his fallen comrade, Evren leapt forward and drove both daggers into the man’s chest and throat. The bandit died with a wet gurgle.
A piercing wail of pain sounded behind him. Evren’s heart stopped. Hailen!
The cry came again, too deep and growling to have come from the eleven year old’s throat, accompanied by a stream of curses.
Evren whipped around to find Hailen standing atop the wagon, knife held in the defensive grip Evren had drilled into him. Blood stained the tip and edge of the blade. One of the bandits had tried to scramble onto the wagon and earned a slash across the face for his efforts. Hailen attacked again with the short, quick thrust of a knife fighter. The man fell back with a grunt, pulling the blade free from his chest, and fell to the ground beside the wagon.
Five sprinting steps brought Evren to the bleeding bandit and his boot crunched into the man’s face. Shielding his movements from Hailen with his body, Evren drove his dagger into the unconscious bandit’s chest, just next to the wound Hailen had inflicted. His thrust, however, drove between the man’s ribs and sliced smooth heart muscle. The bandit didn’t move as his blood pumped onto the dusty road.
Silence.
Evren’s lungs burned, his heart raced, and his fingers clutched the hilts of his daggers in a vise-grip. Everything around him had gone dead still, the only sound the snorting of the horses and his own gasping.
Then came a pained grunt from ahead. He looked up to see Brother Modestus on one knee, left hand gripping the hilt of a dagger protruding from his side. With a rumbling growl, the priest tore the blade free and hurled it away. Wincing, he cleaned his sword on the fallen bandits’ clothing then sheathed it.
The priest turned toward them. “Either of you hurt?”
Evren shook his head, his eyes fixed on the wound in Modestus’ side. “That looks bad.”
“I’ll be fine.” Modestus gave a dismissive wave with his right hand. “No major organs or blood vessels hit.” He strode back to the wagon with a determined step, his face once again that expressionless mask. Yet, when he tried to pull himself up onto the driver’s seat, he growled at the pain of his wound.
“Ride in the back,” Evren told him. “You need to rest and heal.”
Brother Modestus looked ready to protest, but the pain seemed to make him reconsider. “Just a short rest,” he rumbled. “Then I’ll spell you at the reins.”
Evren shook his head. “We can handle the driving.” He turned to Hailen. “Spread some blankets in the back, right there.”
Hailen scrambled over the seat into the back of the wagon. It took Modestus two tries to pull himself into the back and onto the makeshift bed, but he refused Evren’s offer of help with a growl.
“I’ll be fine,” he rumbled again. “A bit of rest, and I’ll be right as rain in a few days.”
* * *
Brother Modestus’ wound didn’t heal. Instead, it worsened.
Evren changed the bandages frequently, ripping up two of his own tunics for dressings, but still infection set in. Much of their limited water supply went into bathing the wound to no avail. Evren had no salves or unguents to use, no knowledge of the plants in this part of Einan to find something for a remedy. By the end of the first day after their encounter with the bandits, Brother Modestus had slipped into a feverish state. The priest moaned, muttered, and mumbled incoherently.
Brother Modestus lived for three more days, in and out of consciousness, sweat dripping down his pale face and soaking his clot
hes. On the morning of the fourth day, their sixth out of Voramis, Evren awoke from a fitful night of rest to find Brother Modestus awake and staring at him.
“Listen,” rasped the grizzled priest. “There’s something…you must know!”
Evren scrambled over to the wagon and Modestus’ side.
“You must…continue the mission.” The priest fixed fever-bright eyes on him. “Must retrieve…the Blade of Hallar. The prophecy…cannot come to pass.”
Evren’s brow furrowed. “Prophecy?”
What’s he talking about? The priest appeared lucid, but he’d been in and out of fever dreams for the last day. Is he even coherent?
“The Prophecy…of the Final Destruction!” Modestus struggled in vain to sit upright, but slumped back to his blankets, too weak to lift himself. “Reverentus…didn’t tell you?”
“No.” Evren shook his head. “He said nothing of any prophecy, and definitely none that involved the Blade of Hallar or any Final Destruction.”
“Find the sword!” Modestus cried in a hoarse voice. “Stop the prophecy…and save the world.”
He slumped back, his eyes falling closed.
“Hey!” Evren grabbed the priest’s collar and shook him. “Hey, wake up.”
Modestus’ eyes fluttered open for a moment, but closed once more.
“How am I supposed to do anything if I don’t know about this prophecy?” Evren shouted, trying to wake up the priest. “Tell me what I need to know!”
But Brother Modestus was beyond hearing. The Long Keeper, god of death, had gathered the priest into his arms.
* * *
Evren buried the priest a short distance from the road. The soil was rocky and bone-dry, and Evren had only Modestus’ sword to use as a shovel. The sun had risen high into the sky by the time he rolled the priest’s heavy body—stripped of its armor and weapons—into the shallow grave and covered it up.
Hailen helped as best he could, somber and silent the entire time. His eyes were wide and rimmed with tears.
Evren knew the boy had seen more death in his short lifetime than most people. Though the Hunter, Kiara, and Evren had tried their best to shield him from more, there was no way to escape reality now.
He glanced over at Hailen. “We should say something for him.” What to say, he didn’t know.
Hailen knelt beside the mound of dirt and closed his eyes. “May the Beggar God smile on you,” he said in a quiet voice, “and guide you on your journey to the Long Keeper’s arms, where you will know peace and joy forever more.”
Evren bowed his head and repeated the words in his mind. He knew the truth—there was no Beggar God, no Long Keeper, just a handful of ancient Serenii that primitive humans worshipped as gods—but the fallen priest deserved better than a silent burial. The words were for Modestus’ sake, not his.
But, as he finished, he felt a new burden weighing on his shoulders. He and Hailen were alone in the middle of nowhere, too far from Voramis and too low on food and water to turn back now. Their only hope lay in going forward to Shalandra. Thankfully, he needed no map to find his way—as long as he kept traveling south on the road, they would reach their destination.
And what happens when I reach the City of the Dead? The Cambionari have no idea we’re coming, and we have no way to prove who we are.
He’d have to do it on his own. He’d steal the Blade of Hallar and keep Hailen safe. He’d learn about this Prophecy of the Final Destruction and find out what, if anything, could be done to avert it.
Somehow.
He had no choice. If a dying man’s words were to be believed, the fate of the world now rested on his shoulders.
Chapter Fourteen
Issa refused to cry out as Hykos landed blow after blow on her arms, legs, sides, shoulders, and back. Hykos struck with the flat of his blade, yet even through the protective layer of her armor, Issa could feel her muscles pounded like steel beneath Killian’s hammer. Pain radiated through every fiber of her being, turning her body sluggish, slowing her attempts to dodge, evade, or block the blows. Her gauntleted hands had long ago gone numb.
And all Invictus Tannard shouted was “Harder! Faster!” He looked on with the dispassion of a butcher studying a block of meat, watching Hykos carve her to pieces.
Hykos’ expression revealed nothing, but remorse filled his eyes. He dared not hold back his blows, Issa knew, dared not disobey his commander’s orders. The Archateros struck and struck again until Issa fell to her knees, her hands, and finally her face.
“Enough!” The single word, barked like the cracking of a whip, echoed faint through Issa’s all-consuming agony. It took her a moment to register the cessation of blows.
A shadow hovered above Issa. “On your feet, Prototopoi.”
Issa wanted nothing more than to lose herself to unconsciousness, to drown in the torrent of suffering that washed over her. Yet she could not, would not, give Tannard the satisfaction of victory. She forced herself onto one pain-numbed arm, then the other, until she pushed herself up to one knee.
Even the slightest movements proved agonizing, but she forced herself to lift her head, straighten her back, and finally stagger upright to her feet. She stood, swaying, her jaw clenched so tightly she feared she’d snap her teeth or shatter bone.
Tannard came to stand in front of her, his hard, bearded face inches from hers. “Pitiful,” he snarled. “And you dare to call yourself a Keeper’s Blade?”
Issa gave no reply. She knew his type—she’d encountered many such among the Indomitables that patrolled Shalandra’s lowest tiers—he simply expected her to stand there and take the abuse. She could take as much as he dished out. He could knock her down but she would always get back up.
Tannard spat to one side. “To your chambers.”
Hykos stepped forward, but Tannard whirled on him. “She goes alone! A Keeper’s Blade must learn to fight through the pain, to welcome it, to use it to become stronger. If she cannot stomach one simple beating, she does not deserve her place in our ranks.”
Issa clenched her fists; the movement brought a fresh wave of pain. Her palms felt swollen, and she guessed at least one finger had been broken or dislocated. But, even with everything that screamed at her to collapse, to crumble, she took a step.
A small step, barely lifting her foot off the ground. Another shuffling, scraping step.
Her eyes met Etai’s. The Mahjuri girl stared at her with pity.
Another step, then a second and third.
Kellas watched her go. His perpetual arrogant sneer had given way to stunned surprise, perhaps even a hint of grudging respect.
More steps. Slow, painful, her body dragging, her muscles protesting. Yet forward, always forward.
The stone archway into the western wing of the Citadel of Stone seemed an impossible distance away. Sweat streamed down Issa’s face as she moved, soaked through her tunic, turned her palms slick. Her armor and sheathed flammard threatened to drag her down.
Yet still she moved. One torment-riddled, stiff step at a time. Through the archway, into the shadows of the Citadel, and toward the nearest staircase.
Climbing the stairs to the second floor proved agony. She rested every second step, her muscles crying out for rest. Issa fought on, one golden stone stair after another. She refused to give Tannard the satisfaction of seeing her fall.
She nearly wept in relief at the sight of her doorway. Her fingers, numb from the repeated pounding of Hykos’ blade, struggled to grip the door knob. Finally, she grabbed it in a clumsy two-handed grip and twisted. She staggered as the door swung inward. Every part of her wanted to collapse as she staggered into her room, but a huge frame in the entrance cast the room in shadow. When she managed to turn, she found Invictus Tannard behind her.
“You are strong, talented even, but strength and skill are useless without discipline.” Tannard’s stony expression somehow grew even harder. “And by the Keeper, discipline’s what I’m going to teach you.”
“Yes,
Invictus!” Issa managed through clenched teeth.
Invictus Tannard remained silent for a long moment, eyes locked on her. “You are forbidden to rest. Do not sit or lie in bed until the sun sets.”
Issa wanted to cry, to shout at him, to reach for her sword and hack him down. She did nothing.
“Here, if you want food, you must find it, take it, but without being seen,” Tannard told her. “A Blade must be clever and stealthy, even in unfamiliar surroundings. If you cannot steal your meal in the Citadel of Stone, you will not eat, Prototopoi.”
“Yes, Invictus.” The words, edged with anger, burst from within Issa’s chest.
Invictus Tannard stepped forward to loom over her. “The Keeper has no need of fat, lazy soldiers that cannot fight on empty stomachs. A true Blade can do battle even as they die of starvation.” He whirled on his heel and strode toward the door. “We will see if you have what it takes to be a true Blade.” With those words, he left her alone with her pain.
Issa waited until she was certain that he’d gone before letting out an explosive breath, half-sob and half-shout. Why in the Keeper’s name is he doing this? She’d never seen the Invictus in her life, could think of no reason for his enmity. It didn’t matter. He’d singled her out for punishment, determined to break her spirit. Killian hadn’t prepared her for this.
But her grandparents had. Savta and Saba had lived a hard life, yet never once complained. Issa had learned the meaning of work, endurance, and longsuffering from them. Life as an Earaqi could not break her grandparents; life as a Keeper’s Blade would not break her.
She had endured her first lesson. Now came the second. She’d endure that, too.
Theft was common enough in Shalandra that merchants on the Artisan’s Tier hired guards to watch their stalls. Thieves and pickpockets unlucky enough to get caught suffered the removal of their right hand on their first offense, right leg on their second, and head on their third. Issa had rarely tried stealing—she was too big to slip easily among the crowds like Killian’s Mumblers—but this wasn’t Commerce Square. She’d have to figure out how to defeat this challenge based on the specifics of her surroundings.
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