Betrayer's Bane

by Michael G. Manning

  Emma glared defiantly up at them, but her mind was blank as she searched for some solution. Four still active, Father’s down, Ryan struggling to escape the spellbeasts…, her mind sorted through her options rapidly, but she couldn’t see how she would save her brother and escape their opponents in time to make a difference.

  And then five more She’Har appeared, running toward them to give support to their brethren.

  Without thinking, Emma sent her aythar outward, ripping at the earth to create a wall between them and their new attackers. Tons of earth rose in a massive wave but she knew immediately that she had made a terrible mistake, she had over-extended her power, leaving herself with nothing left. Her body was already trembling in reaction as her strength left her.

  The surging earth made everyone pause for a moment and Ryan found himself momentarily free of the attentions of the spellbeasts. Rolling to one side he stood, but before he could do more a spellwoven blast of focused power tore through the earthen wall. It was a wild shot, the sort that almost certainly should have missed, but in combat sometimes the worst luck was the only luck to be found. It tore through Ryan’s enchanted shield as he unwittingly took to his feet in exactly the wrong place.

  Emma felt his pain and shock through their link briefly before he collapsed. She saw his body topple, his left arm gone and blood pouring from both his shoulder and one side of his face. Her mouth was open, as if she might scream, but no sound emerged. One of the burned She’Har dropped into the pit and moved toward her, wrapped in a shield and holding a deadly looking sword of spellwoven aythar.

  She tried to raise her power, to defend herself, but nothing happened. She was empty and her death was bearing down on her. Emma snarled in impotent fury, but deep down she was no longer sure if she cared any longer.

  A scream echoed from the direction of the She’Har’s reinforcements and Emma’s antagonist paused, turning his head as he focused his attention for a moment on the area outside the pit.

  Emma simply didn’t care. Drawing again on her aythar she focused what little strength she could summon into one hand, activated her tattoos and drove her enchanted hand through the She’Har’s chest. Hot warmth enveloped her wrist as her opponent died and Emma staggered, falling to her knees as the he fell onto her, grasping weakly at her shoulders.

  She shoved him aside, trying to disentangle herself. Some of the hot water from her earlier attack had gotten into the pit, turning the soil at the bottom into mud. Before she could rise another of the spellbeasts dropped down, crushing her into the muck. Her strength was returning, bit by bit, but it was all she could do to activate her defensive tattoos before it landed on her.

  The claws on its massive glowing paw failed to pierce her shield, so instead it pressed down, forcing her face beneath the surface of the mud.

  She didn’t have the strength or the will to fight anymore. She struggled weakly, mainly from panic, but her resolve was gone. Ryan’s dead. The light vanished as her head went completely under. Her shield kept it out of her mouth and nose, but there was only a small amount of air between it and her skin. It wouldn’t take long before she began to suffocate.

  Relaxing her muscles she gave in and decided to use her remaining time to watch what was going on above.

  Tyrion was still conscious, but his wound was probably fatal. Ryan was gone. Emma could find no sign of him, other than the large splash of blood where he had fallen. Did they take his body? she wondered.

  It didn’t look as though they had the time to do anything as mundane as move a body. Brigid had arrived. The loincloth she had worn was gone and she ran among the She’Har utterly unshielded. Blood had coated her from head to toe. Emma was sure if she had looked on her with her eyes she would have been dyed in scarlet.

  Brigid danced among her enemies heedless of their attacks. The enchanted chain whipped and wove around her as though it was possessed of a life of its own. It deflected, and generally destroyed, any spellweaving that came close to her, but that was not its primary purpose. When it wasn’t busy defending its user, it was constantly flicking outward, making almost casual strikes at the She’Har that were now trying to escape her.

  The first to face her were the lucky ones, Brigid killed those quickly. A light strike could easily remove an arm, a leg, or more likely, a head. The She’Har didn’t recognize their peril immediately. They confidently attacked her from several sides at once, but with each failed assault another of them fell.

  It almost appeared accidental at first, as though luck had blessed her during the course of defending herself, but it soon became apparent that that was anything but the case. Most of the spellbeasts were shredded as they came to the aid of their creators and when there were only four of the She’Har left they turned to flee.

  Or rather, they tried.

  Brigid killed one, and hamstrung the others in the space of a heartbeat. She could have removed their legs just as easily, but she chose to wound her remaining prey rather than end her pleasure too soon.

  And she’s been wide open the entire time, noted Emma, but she knew that the She’Har had never had a chance, not using spellweaving anyway. It was too slow, and weapons made purely of magic fell apart when they came into contact with the enchanted steel.

  That was the advantage of the raw magic humans used. It was as quick as thought. Ordinarily the superior nature of spellweaving easily overcame that advantage, but Brigid’s enchanted chain completely unbalanced the old equation.

  The only person here that might have stood a chance against her would have been me, Emma realized. Her signature attack, a rapid-fire lance of pure force was the only thing that might have gotten past Brigid’s chain. And even that would be useless if she bothered to use her defensive shield. She felt a moment’s pride for her psychotic sister.

  Emma’s heartrate had increased dramatically during the fighting, but not from adrenaline. She was suffocating and her heart was desperately trying to compensate for the lack of fresh air.

  Brigid tormented her near helpless enemies now, making shallow slashes that left them bleeding without killing them. Oblivious to Emma’s plight as she toyed with them, Brigid laughed as she sent bits of flesh flying. She had never been happier.

  I guess I’m going to die anyway, thought Emma. The observation didn’t bother her. She had already lost the one thing she had left to live for. Her heart fluttered like a bird’s, completely unlike the slow thrumming of the earth beneath her.

  Emma opened her mind. If she was going to die, she might as well do it right. Brigid would die too, but she knew her sister wouldn’t mind if it meant that a far greater number of the She’Har would die as well.

  This is for you, Ryan. And then Emma exploded outward, losing her humanity and becoming something far different.

  There was no immediate physical sign. Her body continued to die, but it was a tiny thing compared to what she had become. Emma reached down and began unbinding the ties that held her molten rage at bay. She began not where she had been, but on the side of her that would send her fury most directly against the Centyr Grove.

  The ground jumped, making Brigid stumble and miss her latest strike. Her last plaything died instead of merely losing more skin. Seconds later a booming rumble found her ears and she saw smoke rising in the distance, in the direction of the Centyr Grove.

  Layla appeared, crouching over Ryan’s unconscious form as she lost control of her invisibility. Jordan stood beside her, fear written on his face as he felt the earth lurch again. He released the man he had been dragging and Tyrion slumped to the ground.

  “Brigid!” shouted Layla. “We have to go!”

  Brigid stared at them, struggling to make sense of the world as her bloodlust slowly faded. “Emma! We have to get her first.” Leaping down into the pit her chain made short work of the spellbeast holding her sister down in the mud. Pulling against the sucking force of the mud, Brigid lifted the other girl up from the ground.

  Emma’s skin was grey and sh
e seemed to weigh far more than she should, but Brigid used her will to lift her sister up and out of the pit before settling her gently beside the others. She climbed out then, reaching out to join her hand with Jordan’s to make it easier for him to teleport all of them together.

  The ground shook once more and a strange smell filled the air, a choking stench that made it difficult to draw breath.

  “Wait,” said a weak voice.

  Everyone stared at Tyrion in confusion as they realized he was speaking.

  “Not yet,” he told them. “This is too soon.”

  “This place is coming apart,” insisted Brigid urgently. She looked at Jordan, “Take us home.”

  Tyrion growled and waved a hand at Emma’s body, “Move her and she’s dead.”

  “She’s still breathing, Tyrion,” said Layla. “He’s delirious,” she told the others.

  Jordan moved to obey but Brigid was watching her father carefully. She knew better than to doubt him. “Wait,” she commanded. “What do you think we should do, Father?”

  “Let me try to stop this,” he answered, struggling to find breath.

  “He’s dying,” said Jordan bluntly. “I’m taking us back.” He reached out to put his hand on Emma.

  Brigid was not a woman to hesitate. She had already made her decision. The decision she always made. “Touch her and you die,” she warned. “We let him do what he can.” Razor sharp steel had already encircled the Mordan mage, hovering dangerously close to his throat.

  “He can’t do anything in the state he is in. If we wait we’ll all die,” argued Layla.

  The fist that caught her jaw came almost too quickly to see. Layla fell back, stunned.

  Brigid loomed over her with the light of madness in her eyes. Her hair hung heavy with sweat and blood and her skin was covered in dirt and gore. She pointed at her dying father, “You live to serve him. If he asks it, then we die. Would you rather die now, or wait a little while?” Even while her attention was fully occupied with the female warden, Brigid’s chain never wavered as it hung close to Jordan’s throat.

  Layla nodded, casting her eyes downward in submission.

  Brigid looked at Jordan, “Put a defensive shield around us while we wait.” Then she addressed Layla again, “I see you already stopped most of the bleeding. Hide us while he works.”

  Chapter 23

  Just a few more small shifts and the last restraints would be gone. Emma might have smiled if she could remember what facial expressions were, or represented.

  All she had left was a goal. Accomplish that and then she could rest. Vaguely she remembered pain and loss, but that was fading quickly. One more release and it would be over.

  But part of her was refusing to respond.

  Another presence was there. It was smaller, stranger, and less like her, but its will was strong. It held on to the key she needed, frustrating her attempt to destroy the things growing above her.

  No, came its voice. You must not do this, not yet, not now.

  The words were alien, but the meaning behind them reached her somehow. She ignored them, trying instead to envelop the thing that resisted her.

  You’ll kill many, but not all. Save your rage and we can finish them entirely, but not now.

  The concepts assailed her mind, forcing her to think in ways she wanted to forget. She wanted to reject them, but to do so she needed her own words. Her self contracted as she searched for a means to express her denial.

  Death! That was her answer, but she shrank further as she found the word.

  Patience.

  No.

  Return with me, Emma.

  She tried to argue, but she couldn’t find the way. Annoyed, she continued to shrink, until finally she opened her mouth and screamed.

  ***

  “Water,” said Tyrion. Once again his mouth was impossibly dry. His body felt both hot and cold at once.

  A hand lifted his head and a cup was pressed to his lips. Greedily he slurped at the cool liquid within but before he could get his fill the cup was withdrawn.

  “More.”

  “Slowly,” said Kate. “You can’t have too much at once.”

  “I’m thirsty…”

  “Your stomach can’t handle it,” she answered patiently.

  “How long…?”

  “They brought you back yesterday. We’ve had this conversation twice before already. You have a fever…,” Kate’s voice cut off abruptly. She sounded upset.

  Tyrion turned his senses inward, examining his injury. What he found should have alarmed him, but he didn’t have the energy for that. His heart beat rapidly, fluttering weakly in his chest. That and the thirst meant he had lost a lot of blood, but what shocked him was what he found in his belly.

  Everything was inflamed. A large portion of his stomach was missing, and his intestines looked as though they had been torn apart and crudely put back together.

  He knew from his time in the arena how serious gut wounds were. Even relatively minor injuries sometimes led to death days after a battle, but what he hadn’t understood then was why. Thanks to the loshti he knew now, but the knowledge did little to comfort him.

  The contents of his stomach and intestines had spilled into his abdominal cavity and the fever Kate mentioned was the product of a raging infection. Without expert treatment he would be dead within a day or two.

  Even the best She’Har healers had a poor rate of success when dealing with a septic abdominal injury. Normally, if someone in the arena survived an injury like his, they could deal with it by immediately cleansing the peritoneal cavity.

  He was already far beyond such strategies.

  The ancient humans had once had chemicals that could have given him a decent chance, but the She’Har had only learned enough of their medical treatments to tease him with knowledge that there was a way—a way that was far beyond his reach.

  “Emma?” he asked.

  Kate brushed his hair back from his forehead, “She’s with Ryan.”

  “He survived?”

  She nodded, “Barely, but he is in worse shape than you, and his face…”

  If the boy had made it this far he had a decent chance, assuming his wound didn’t go bad. On the outside he might look worse, but Tyrion guessed it was the opposite. “And Brigid?”

  “She’s just outside the door, with that wicked looking chain of hers,” said Kate.

  That made him want to chuckle, but all he got for his trouble was a painful choking cough. Kate watched him anxiously as a full minute passed before the agony subsided enough for him to talk again. “None of us would have made it back if it hadn’t been for her and that chain.”

  “Layla told me she threatened to kill anyone that tried to move you.”

  “I’m surprised we aren’t still there. I don’t think I ever woke up to tell them we could leave,” he observed.

  “You would be, if Emma hadn’t woken up and told them it was alright,” explained Kate. “I’m worried about her, Daniel. We already knew about her problem, with Ryan, but now that he’s hurt—I’ve never seen her like this.”

  “Like what?” he asked.

  Kate paused, pursing her lips before continuing, “To be frank, like you. She’s angry and intense. She won’t leave his room, not even to sleep. We already have enough psychotic people around here.”

  “She’ll be fine if he lives.”

  “You say that, but I’m not so sure. I almost think it would have been better, for both of them, if he hadn’t. He’s disfigured. Half his jaw is gone, and his left arm, he’ll never be the same. The only thing she cares about right now is him, and every time she looks at him you can almost see the anger building up inside her.”

  “Ahhh,” said Tyrion, “to be young and in love.”

  Kate was aghast, “How can you joke like that? It’s horrible.”

  He looked up at her with bloodshot eyes, “Because I’m just the same, only I’m disfigured on the inside. Now I get to watch my children turn int
o twisted younger versions of myself.”

  “And that makes you happy?”

  “No, but I think if I started crying right now it might finish me,” he told her honestly. “Is that Inara over there?” he asked, referring to the infant in her cradle nearby.

  “She’s sleeping.”

  “I want to hold her.”

  Kate protested, “You’ll wake her. It took me forever to get her down.”

  “I don’t think I’m going to get many more chances, Cat. Please…”

  She stood up, turning her face away, but his magesight showed him the sudden tears that were filling her eyes. “Don’t say that,” she said, rebuking him, but she went to the cradle anyway. Kate knew as well as he did that he was probably right. Leaning over the crib she gently lifted her daughter and brought her over before nestling her against his shoulder, inside the crook of his right arm.

  By some miracle Inara hardly stirred, drifting back into deep slumber almost as soon as she was settled. Tyrion couldn’t move much so he contented himself with watching her and listening to her tiny heart beat. Inara’s innocent breathing was the very antithesis of almost his entire life. What have I ever done to deserve even this brief moment? he wondered.

  “You should rest too,” suggested Kate after a while.

  “I’m not sleepy,” he countered. Just dying.

  Kate frowned, “Then would you mind talking to Brigid?”

  “About what?”

  “First, tell her to stop glaring at everyone that tries to come in, but most importantly, she needs to take a bath.”

  That piqued his interest, “A bath?”

  She sighed, “She came back covered in blood and while she did rinse most of it off she still needs a proper bath. She won’t leave the doorway, and she smells atrocious.”

  Pain seized him as he fought to keep his chest muscles relaxed. The urge to laugh was almost irresistible. When he had finally regained control he answered, “Actually I need to talk to her. I’ll mention a bath while I’m at it.”