The Brazen Blade

by Billy Wong

  "That's it?" Leroy asked. "Not even sticking around to share battle stories?"

  Kath smiled. "I think she probably knows enough battle stories for a lifetime. It's just the way she is... unless she's also trying to preserve her mythic aura."

  Zack looked back at Volgox's immense carcass. "Well, if anyone deserves a mythic aura..."

  She turned to the Unstained. "Since the dangerous serpent is now dead, I take it your order's role will be much less important if even necessary?"

  Christopher sounded hesitant, as if unsure what their purpose would be now. Understandable. "That sounds about correct. I suppose we might not need you to guard us until we recruit new members then, given we can probably afford to check on Vilig less often. The temple, we can deal with ourselves later."

  "Thank you for all the help you've already provided, though," Fred added. "Without you, we wouldn't be here today."

  Kath shrugged. "Without you, Zack wouldn't be here today. So we can call it even."

  "It seems like we're free to do as we please now," Zack said. "Where should we go first?"

  "I'd like to go home and see my family again before doing anything else. I know it's far, but do you guys mind coming with me?"

  "I don't mind at all. Should be plenty of things along the way I haven't seen before. And, we can stop by Apsenia and visit my folks too."

  "Any stock that produces a thoroughbred like Kath must be an excellent family!" Leroy said. "I'd love to meet them. Any chance we could make a trip south after too?"

  "Sure. I think you'll like my dad. He isn't quite as loud about it as you, but he has some of the same manly drive."

  Zack snickered. "So do you Kath."

  "Stop trying to be Marty! By the way, I wonder if we'll ever see him and Quinn again?"

  "We could make time to visit them someday. But probably not at school."

  "We're heroes," Leroy said, "and as such we should petition the Iron Sword school to let us back again."

  "I highly doubt me and Zack will be allowed back. Maybe you could be since it's a first offense."

  "Then I won't go back either as a form of protest."

  She slapped his back. "Good man. That monster fighting guild is looking like a fine option."

  They headed back through the mountains with the Unstained, then said their farewells and parted ways. After journeying for several days on the long road towards home, but before the trio had even passed Genbald, they heard Fred's voice call to them from behind. "Wait!" Kath looked to see him stop and stand there panting. Once he'd caught his breath enough, he continued, "Sorry, but we need help again."

  Already? "What's the problem now?"

  "We decided to check on the temple just to see how hard it would actually be to clear out. But when we got there, we didn't see any of the monsters that had attacked it before. Instead, there was a trail of blood leading towards it, which when we followed it seemed to have come from the direction of the mountains." He swallowed. "And then, Christopher sensed the presence of a divine serpent..."

  "What?! Are you saying Volgox is alive somehow?"

  "No, Volgox is definitely dead. But it might have had an almost-ready-to-be-born offspring that survived, and for some reason chose to make our temple its lair."

  She had read that in spite of whether they identified with one gender or the other, the great serpents could all give birth. She supposed Volgox might have had enough mass to cushion an unborn child from the fall. "And what do you want us to do about it? The serpents seem intelligent, so unless they automatically share the disposition of their parent, I'm not sure we should be all that hasty to kill this one."

  He spread his hands uncertainly. "We haven't decided to kill it, or what to do with it at all yet. We just figured we could use your help since we don't know if me, Christopher and Helen would even be able to do anything by ourselves."

  "We were already deep into this," Leroy said. "So we might as well see it through to the end."

  Kath agreed, "Yeah, it's a little annoying to be delayed again, but it wouldn't feel right to leave them to their fate not knowing if they'll make it. Zack?"

  He glanced back towards the distant mountains they had been heading towards until they turned around. "I was looking forward to finally seeing that mountain pass we always skip, but I guess putting it off for a few more days won't hurt too bad. Yeah, let's help them. Although, we won't have Deidre with us for this god-serpent..."

  "Don't worry, it's a newborn. It has to be a lot weaker than the full grown version."

  They picked up Christopher and Helen at the castle and traveled to the temple. It turned out to be smaller than expected, a roundish building tucked into a mountainside niche. Anything that fit in there couldn't be nearly as bad as Volgox, Kath told herself. They entered the main temple lobby, where visitors must have enjoyed the murals and taken in the lore back in the day. How things changed. Shriveled white-clad forms lay at the foot of those same walls now stained with dried blood. Fred and Helen cringed at their sight, while Christopher just averted his gaze. Kath wondered sadly if any of them were family to her companions, though it would be hard to recognize most in their current state.

  A towering sculpture of Vilig and Volgox fighting, intertwined with Vilig having the upper hand, stood at the back of the room. When they approached, a man with long graying hair stepped out from behind its base. He was huge, six and a half feet tall, both muscular and fat around the middle, with a large-boned face and thick lips. He wore a fur cape over heavy armor, and carried a massive halberd in one hand. "Finally you come. I was beginning to wonder if you would muster up the guts."

  "Who is this clown?" Leroy asked. "Some random enemy we never saw before showing up to extend our trials?"

  Fred explained, "It's Randall Stonearm, the deposed warlord we thought might be behind Volgox's revival until we found out Gabriel was." All of the Unstained drew their weapons, Helen's being a well polished shortsword.

  "Oh."

  "Volgox would have been too hard to control," Stonearm said. "But legend hinted he might have been with child when he fell. So I watched and waited to see the outcome, saved the babe by cutting it out of him, and now..." He struck the statue with his halberd, and the stone head of Vilig broke off and crashed to the floor.

  In response to the noise, a powerful yet childlike voice issued from deeper within the temple. "Father, are the murderers of my birth-father here?" The section of wall around a door crumbled as a head too big to fit smashed through. The creature resembled a relatively thinner and much smaller version of Volgox, yet still gigantic. It lacked the mane of tendrils around its neck, which Kath figured might develop with greater maturity. More and more of the serpent slithered into view as it encircled the chamber, and them. She felt so tiny being surrounded by a single adversary. It regarded them with contemptuous eyes. "You are the ones who slew my sire? You look small and weak."

  "We didn't kill him," Zack said. "O-our ally did."

  "They were involved, and that girl personally brought the person who killed him to do so." Stonearm pointed at Helen. "Do you not see what a good chance for revenge you have?"

  "Yes!" The serpent opened its mouth, and a bolt of lightning shot out. The Unstained jumped aside, but suffered scratches to their hands and faces as chips of masonry flew up from the floor.

  "Why are you attacking so quickly?" Zack asked. "Can't we talk this out? What are you going to do with a god-serpent foster son anyway?"

  "He would reclaim his dominion and expand it," Helen said, "at the cost of countless lives! We cannot allow a brutal man like him to have control of such a power, he must be stopped!"

  "And you'll stop me?" He leapt into the fray, took a halberd swing at Helen which she barely dodged, but then connected with his followup uppercut. Lifted off her feet, she flopped to her back out cold.

  "And here I was beginning to think only male warriors got knocked out in one shot," Zack said humorously.

  Despite the gravity of the
situation, Kath grinned. "You've been lucky in terms of the women you meet." She drew the special sword and prepared to charge Stonearm. "Now let me show you how it's done-" She felt something moving towards her and spun to find the serpent's maw drew rapidly near. Lightning flew. She sidestepped, but its head continued forward. She hacked at its nose, wasn't sure if she did any damage before its lower jaw struck her and knocked her down. She rolled out from under it, saw Leroy make it flinch back with a blow near the eye only for it to flick him across the room with its tail. Zack looked completely petrified, shooting crossbow bolts that bounced off with no apparent effect, and she didn't blame him. The thing was so huge, she too had no clue what to do. Deidre said Kath would've had a chance against the serpent she slew before? Well, she probably had a lot more experience fighting big things before that...

  The Unstained weren't doing any better in their battle. Fred was out of the fight just like Helen, a red welt on his face indicating he had also been punched down, and Christopher barely warded off the blows of the much heavier man which often staggered him even when blocked or parried. Leroy struggled to his feet, only for the tail to coil around him and raise him into the air. "How long do you think it will take for me to crush you in that metal shell?" it taunted as his armor began to bend inward and he grimaced. But, Kath noted, blood oozed from a cut on its nose. She could hurt it.

  She lunged at its tail, plunged the sword in low at a thinner point and ripped it upward with the full strength of her arms and core. Her blade burst out the top and Leroy dropped to the ground as the portion holding him went limp. The serpent screamed in pain and spit lightning at Kath, who couldn't dodge in time. Hurled to her back by the blast, she lay there shaking uncontrollably while pain flooded her chest. Swordlike fangs swooped down. She just managed to raise her shield to punch it in the teeth, but the impact more sent her sliding away than it probably hurt the beast. Leroy chopped at its neck, but didn't seem to draw blood before it used the side of its face to bat him away like a nuisance. Zack had run out of ammunition and slashed away at the serpent's flank, but it ignored him. It turned its attention back to Kath as she forced herself up. This wasn't good... one on one she doubted she could last longer than a few more attacks, and Leroy and Zack with their weapons couldn't do much to help.

  Kath heard Christopher grunt as Stonearm knocked him to one knee. The warlord pushed down on their locked weapons, trying to force his halberd into Christopher's face. Noting that Stonearm faced away from her, she got an idea. She dashed towards the pair, the serpent giving chase. Lightning lanced at her back. She dove under it, rolled up and kept running. Kath came within sword's reach of Stonearm. Distracted as he was, she could have killed him, but she neglected that opportunity.

  Instead, she waited until she got even closer and kicked him hard between the legs from behind making him whimper, then grabbed him around the waist.

  "What a-are you-" he got out through the pain.

  She gave him an additional knee to the groin to keep him from breaking free. "Shush." She looked back. The serpent was close, but not yet, not yet... now.

  Just before it would have bitten her life away, she spun and with a mighty heave, threw Stonearm into its maw. It bit down reflexively, and she heard flesh tear and bones crunch. Then it realized what it'd done. "Father, no!" Sorrow and regret made its voice small, and she knew it felt real gratitude towards the warlord for saving it. Maybe serpents and humans weren't so different after all. But because she doubted they could convince it to stop attacking in time especially now, she didn't stray from her planned course. In the instant it was too shaken to mount any defense, she drove her sword into its eye up to the hilt.

  Its head reared up, pulling Kath off the ground with it while it swayed back and forth. It tried to spit lightning at the ceiling, but the bolts just hit the pulped mess of a body between its jaws and mangled it further. She twisted the blade twice inside its brain. Finally the beast let out a long sigh and toppled over sideways to lay still.

  "Damn, Kath," Christopher muttered, and she thought he was going to compliment her. Instead, he said, "I was hoping we could persuade it to stop being hostile and let us become its guardians if we killed Stonearm first."

  "Well, I didn't have a lot of time to think about that."

  "I don't blame you too much. At least we have our temple back, though I don't know if we really need to stay so close anymore to keep watch over Vilig alone..."

  She supposed she could also technically claim the title of Serpentslayer now, even if it had been a newborn. She wondered what Deidre would think of that. They waited for Fred and Helen to recover, and when they did they thanked Kath and the boys before discussing something in low tones with Christopher. Kath didn't know if her friends tried to listen in, but she let them have their privacy. After a bit, Fred and Helen approached them. "You're starting a guild, right?" Fred asked.

  "That's the plan tentatively," Zack replied.

  "Me and Helen want to join you. Would that be all right?"

  "Are you sure?" Kath looked at Christopher, who leaned against a wall as if in quiet contemplation. "There are only three members of the Unstained Order left, and if you two go..."

  "It's fine. We've all talked about it, and Vilig probably doesn't need a group dedicated just to monitoring him. Even though Gabriel was wrong in his actions, he turns out to be right now about our order being outdated. It's time for us to find a new purpose. Christopher already agreed we could disband, and wants some time to himself to find his own path. But we want to go with you, so we can have some guidance from people with more experience in the world."

  "We can quit if we find it isn't a good fit, yes?" Helen added. "It may turn out a lifestyle that revolves around combat doesn't suit me, but I can give it a chance."

  "I'm sure there will be guild tasks that don't involve front line fighting," Kath said. "But of course we won't force anyone to stay against their will." She shook their hands, and the boys followed suit. "Welcome to uh, the party."

  They split up the money in the temple's treasury and divided the spoils of battle among them, then said goodbye to Christopher and departed. "So I'm wondering," Kath mused as they headed out, "what would be a good name for our guild? 'The Party' doesn't seem ideal for long term."

  "Blades of Youth?" Fred suggested.

  "We won't always be young, and we're hardly looking to only accept young members either."

  "Deidre's Blades?" Leroy said. "Naming it after the object of your affection might do the job of attracting her to it."

  "Ha ha, very funny. How about The Reckless Blades?"

  "Isn't reckless usually a negative term?" Helen asked.

  "Usually, but I was trying to find something to capture our freedom of spirit."

  A smile broke out across Zack's face. "Would Brazen Blades sound better?"

  She thought about it, and it seemed pretty good to her. She glanced at Leroy, who nodded. "Okay. If we don't think of a better name, we will be... The Brazen Blades!"

  They walked on towards the setting sun. One chapter of the journey had drawn to an end, but their journey continued.

  Cover design copyright © Littera Book Designs http://litterabookdesigns.blogspot.ca

  Author Billy Wong is an avid fan of heroic fantasy, with a special love for strong female warriors. He draws inspiration from the epic legends of old, and is on a quest to bring over the top deeds and larger than life heroes back to prominence in today's literary world.

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