ARC: Assassin Queen

by Anna Kashina

  His face approached, his kiss like a sharp blade plunged between her eyebrows, piercing her head with a pain she never felt before. A scream froze on her lips as the burning-hot fingers held them shut, the Reincarnate’s other hand caressing her with the tenderness of a lover, his touch shooting through her every nerve.

  Voices flooded into her head, whispering, arguing and screaming all at once. She stumbled away and covered her ears, but that only made it worse. It was then that she realized the voices were coming from within.

  “There,” Nimos said. “We are all one mind now. We can share thoughts and actions. We can all share your gift. Try.”

  She concentrated. It felt as if her body had suddenly multiplied, her mind expanding to enfold the entire room. She sent a movement to its outer part and saw a man over there raise his hand so fast that it blurred. She sent him a command and he drew his sword, cutting the air until his blade became invisible from the speed of the movement.

  She smiled. After such a long time of not being able to use her skill, this felt liberating, her power multiplied and shared by eleven different men. She tried to move them all and they did, in synchrony that made the Majat synchronous training seem like a joke.

  “Who is in control?” she asked, no longer sure if she had pronounced the words out loud. It didn’t seem to matter at all.

  “We all are,” Nimos said. “This is what true unity feels like.”

  She understood now. The feeling was so enjoyable she never wanted to let go. Her pain receded, no more than a memory as she spun across the room, reveling in her new freedom. In this state, everything was allowed. She could do anything at all.

  “The Cursed Dozen is back together,” Nimos said. “And we are ready to face our enemy.”

  Kara wanted to ask the question, but with their unity of minds it didn’t seem necessary. She knew which enemy they meant. The Majat army, coming to obliterate them. Mai.

  The thought brought a strange tingling sensation. She wasn’t sure she wanted to kill Mai, but she knew that to win this war for the Kaddim she had to. One life dear to her was a small sacrifice to make for the greater good.

  She knew for certain that had Mai been in her place, he would have done the same.

  The roar of the starting battle rose over the sands. Here at the back of the stronghold it seemed like a distant echo, but Kyth knew out there the armies were clashing weapons, killing and dying. Without the Diamonds, the tip of their force, the Majat were not nearly as powerful, even with the superior weapons sent from Bengaw, even with all the Shayil Yaran reinforcements they were able to collect. He could only hope that Seldon was capable enough a commander to at least provide the diversion they needed.

  It seemed to be working, at least for now. The back of the fortress adjacent to the small rocky ridge seemed empty, a vulnerable spot in the stronghold’s wall. As the Majat slid over the sands to the base of the wall, lower in this place than anywhere else, they looked like silent shadows, their cloaks blending with the sands, their steps so smooth that they appeared to be gliding without actually touching the ground. Kyth did his best to match them.

  Grappler hooks flew up, two masked and cloaked figures climbing at a speed that made it seem as if someone was pulling them onto the wall from above. Kyth thought one of them was Raishan, but there was no way to tell, with everyone masked and dressed so identically he kept wondering how they all recognized each other. Mai’s staff made the only distinction point. All others carried swords, perhaps slightly different from each other, but for someone of Kyth’s limited knowledge impossible to tell apart.

  “They will recognize you by the staff,” he said to Mai quietly as they waited.

  Mai kept looking upward, as if avoiding Kyth’s gaze. “With the fight we’re facing, it would be unlikely to make a difference. It’s important, however, that each of us fights with our best weapon, if we want to have even a remote chance of holding them off long enough.”

  Holding them off long enough. Kyth wished Mai would talk of victory, the way he always did when he was within earshot of his troops. He supposed it was a useful trait to be able to correctly estimate their chances, but he couldn’t help wishing Mai was at least a little bit more optimistic right now.

  “By the way,” Mai said. “They will start blasting off their magic at our troops out there any time – if they haven’t already.”

  “They haven’t.” Kyth kept his senses open, seeking out the smothering waves of Kaddim’s mind magic he had learned to counter even at this distance. It seemed strange that no magic of any kind was being projected over the forces storming the stronghold from the front. Had the Kaddim given up already? Or were they anticipating Kyth’s arrival, saving their strength to destroy him. Kyth shivered. With Kara in their midst, this was the most likely explanation, but he knew it was useless to think about it at all.

  He cast his net wider, searching until he sensed another kind of magic in the distance, more subtle and confined, coming from the depth of the fortress.

  “I believe I know where they are,” he said.

  Mai glanced up again. Kyth couldn’t see anything over the looming wall, but the Diamond must have gotten a sign. His hand flicked up, relaying a signal to the waiting men. More grappling hooks flew up in unison, creating a path onto the wall. A Ruby nearest Kyth handed him the edge of a rope, then lowered his black mask back into place.

  “You’ll have no trouble climbing this, will you?” Mai said.

  Kyth sighed. Last time they stormed a fortress together, Mai nearly left him behind, assuming the Prince could use a grappler hook as well as any of his men. Kyth had been training since then, and while he still wasn’t confident he could throw it as well as the rest, he found no difficulty climbing a rope over a rough stone wall that provided plenty of footholds.

  He didn’t feel the need to reply as he grasped the rope and hauled himself up, less speedy and graceful than anyone else around him, but nearly as efficient.

  The path led them along the wall, down a steep flight of stairways, into a winding passage that descended deeper into the fortress, the coolness of its stone walls scaring away the remains of the desert heat. There was not a soul in sight, but as they moved on, Kyth finally felt a blanket of force projected toward the troops fighting outside of the fortress and sent out a wisp of power to counter it. He was amazed at how easy it felt to quench the Kaddim magic that had seemed such a challenge before. But he knew all this was but a fraction of what awaited them ahead.

  The corridor they were following became wider, looping around toward the large double doors at the end.

  “They’re in there,” Kyth said.

  “Are you sure they’re all inside?” Mai asked quietly.

  “Yes. And they’re waiting for us.”

  “How close do you need to get to the Reincarnate to do your thing?”

  “I need to be touching him.” Kyth glanced away. The Kaddim must know it too, and they would probably throw everything they had at preventing him from getting within touching distance of their leader. Even if they failed, forcing a man with the Reincarnate’s enormous power into an intimately close contact seemed impossible. For the first time since leaving Ayalla’s place where he learned what he needed to do, Kyth started considering if he had been insane to agree to participate in this kind of a plan.

  The power he was sensing from within the chamber ahead seemed strong enough to blast out the doors. As he waited for the Majat to take positions, he briefly wondered how one man like him, not even a good fighter, could possibly be enough to counter this kind of a force. He bit back the thought. Focus on what’s important, Mai had said. Right now, it seemed like the best advice.

  Mai was firing out hand signs, men fanning out around him. The Jades had readied their bows, taking cover behind the wall protrusions that would keep them out of the immediate range if they were met by bowmen inside the room, while also giving them clear shots at the defenders. The rest of the Majat lined up along the wal
ls, ready to rush into the room as soon as the way was clear.

  “Just remember,” Mai said quietly. “Don’t try to fight any of them, no matter how tempted you feel. Stay behind us.”

  Kyth swallowed. “I will.”

  “Get ready, then.”

  Kyth summoned his force, extending a shield of protection against mind magic over their entire waiting group.

  Mai raised his hand to give the signal when the doors flew apart on their own, as if pushed by a force blast from the inside. The Kaddim were accepting the challenge.

  The Jades released their arrows in waves, met by a crackling sound from the inside as the defenders cut them down. The rest of the Majat disengaged from the walls, pouring inside like a noiseless flood, and Kyth rushed forward inside their ring, keeping close behind Mai.

  It took all his concentration to maintain his protective shield at the sight that opened in front of him. Several dozen fighters moved with a speed and precision that seemed impossible, darting around in a deadly dance. Kyth thought he had seen the best before, but stepping into this battle made him realize he hadn’t seen anything at all.

  The Kaddim were dressed in white – a strange choice of color that contrasted their usual black-hooded robes. Kyth quickly realized the reason for this choice, undoubtedly dictated by the inside knowledge of the Majat style. In the room’s vast space, it made the attackers and defenders sharply distinct from each other, making it easy for the fighters tell friend from foe. The Kaddim were clearly intending to press their advantage in skill and put each of the Majat warriors into the spotlight.

  The Kaddim defenders were numerous, but the Cursed Dozen stood out from the rest, twelve pale ghosts, terrifying in their skill and unity and in the way they reacted so instantly to each other while being on the opposite sides of the room. As the first wave of the Majat rushed in, six of them dropped to the floor all at once, sliding underneath the attackers’ arms like streaks of white wind, landing behind. If Mai hadn’t spaced his men in two rows, this one move would have taken the enemies straight into the heart of the formation, leaving Kyth, in the center, defenseless against them. Even now, as the fight erupted, each of the Majat fighters was surrounded, the black and white flashing leaving any observer instantly disoriented. As Kyth paused for a very brief moment, two black-clad Majat fighters fell beside him, others stepping in to take their place.

  Kyth shook off the stupor and rushed forward to where Mai’s staff darted between his attackers like a streak of black light. He distanced himself from the fight, his eyes drawn to the square stone slab in its center, and the hooded figure by its side, in a space all the Kaddim fighters left clear, as if avoiding an invisible shield.

  The Reincarnate stood in statue-like stillness, his outstretched palms pointing to the ground. Drawing on the Destroyer’s magic. Kyth clenched his teeth. This was his target, and nothing else mattered until he took it down.

  The spiders on his shoulder stirred to life, darting off his shoulder into the midst of the fighters. He heard a scream, and one of the white-robed figures fell back, taking down a Majat with him. He could see more furry shapes scurrying over the floor, but now that the enemies were alerted, it would take much more effort for the spiders to get through. He quivered as he realized how much scarcer the defenders around him were. He was running out of time.

  In the heat of the melee he couldn’t possibly hope to touch the stone slab, but he could clearly see its smooth surface, hewn into a perfect rectangle. He extended his senses, reaching inside the stone, through the humming force of the Destroyer’s magic that infused it. Calling back his training with Ayalla, he imagined the meshwork of tiny lines holding together the elements of the stone. Without these lines, the stone would lose its shape, reduce to a pile of dust that could be blown away by a merest breath of air…

  He distanced himself from the clashing and screams around him, so close that he could probably expect a hit of a blade any moment now. Calling forth the shiny lines holding the shape together, he blended them with the air, lifted them, ordered them to dissipate.

  A hissing sound, like a sharply indrawn breath, wafted through the chamber. The weapon clashing became uneven and he heard another scream beside him.

  He opened his eyes.

  The stone slab was no longer there. A rectangle of dust lay in its place, so fine that the sweeps of the fighter’s blades disturbed and unsettled it. The Reincarnate stood in front of it, staring at it wide-eyed as it slowly lost shape, blowing around the chamber. The flow of magic ceased, the oppressive mind power no longer rolling through the room.

  One task down. Kyth clenched his teeth as he glanced around the room. The rows of fighters seemed thinner on both sides, the floor strewn with bodies, gleaming with streaks of blood. The Majat ring around him had reduced to six men, fighting with the determined efficiency of the doomed.

  Kyth gaped. He had expected the destruction of the stone to weaken the Kaddim, to disturb their unity and skill. The only effect he could sense right now was that they had stopped any attempts to use their mind magic to suppress anyone in this room, or outside their fortress. They were lending their entire skill to their fighting link, and Kyth could do nothing about it. He had to take down the Reincarnate.

  Another Majat staggered and collapsed, the three Kaddim around him regrouping to circle around the man fighting at the front. Mai. Kyth recognized the staff.

  His heart fell when he saw Kara leading the attack, the two Kaddim at her sides crowding on Mai, leaving him very little room to defend against her. His staff flew in perfect patterns, at least for the time being holding his own against the impossible odds, but there was no way he was going to be able to hold off for long.

  Kyth clenched his blade. He knew it was stupid to try to rush them and be killed. Yet, he could also see how this focused attack on Mai was changing the layout of the battle, the remaining Majat rushing to Mai’s aid, the Kaddim moving to intercept them. More arrows flew from the Jades lodged outside the doors in the hallway, only to be cut down by the defenders’ swords.

  One of the three Kaddim around Mai crowded on him, so close that their arms nearly touched. Kyth concentrated, choosing a perfect moment to send a spider toward them. Preoccupied with the battle, the Kaddim reacted too late. A shrill cry echoed through the chamber and the white-robed man collapsed. Kyth shifted his attention at once, targeting the attacker on Mai’s other side. His screams reverberated through the chamber as two spiders latched onto his neck.

  Mai’s body unfolded like a whip, his staff descending in a perfect arch to hit the man in the chest. Kyth could tell that it was only a light wound, but it gave him a chance to call more spiders. And then, it was Mai and Kara, fighting one on one.

  They were so perfectly matched that for a moment it was easy to forget that this was a fight to the death, and that right now Kara was an enemy, driven by an alien mind. They anticipated each other like no other, her swords flying around his staff, each blow met with a perfect counterpart. Yet, it was clear that Mai was already too exhausted. He staggered, falling back under the force of Kara’s blows. She pressed on, kicking his staff away, crowding on him until he had nowhere to go. Her blade descended straight down, into the spot between his collarbones.

  Time slowed as Kyth watched Mai’s body fold backward, skidding to the floor at his feet. For a brief moment, it seemed like a nightmare that couldn’t possibly be true. Then the reality caught up, reverberating in Kyth’s gut with a feeling of hopelessness worse than anything he ever felt before. His eyes locked on Kara, her face just as calm as she stepped over Mai’s body and raised her blades again, advancing on to him. Too far gone. He wanted to scream, to shake her back to her senses, but he knew that he had to run with all his might, for letting her reach him would mean certain death, would negate everything Mai sacrificed himself for.

  Two Majat stepped into her path and the fighting resumed. Kyth snapped back to alertness. The whole fight just now took only a few seconds, yet he
couldn’t possibly spare even this much. Mai was dead. After the few remaining Majat fell, no one was going to protect him and enable him to complete the task. It was now or never.

  He gathered all his force as he rushed at the hooded figure standing still in the center of the room.

  The Reincarnate darted backward as he saw the menace, surprisingly quick yet not nearly fast enough for the enraged Kyth, rushing at him head-on. His coal-red eyes glowed as he watched Kyth’s approach. Even without the stone, the power he emanated seemed enormous, making the air around him seem thick like a cocoon. Kyth reached through it and clasped the Reincarnate’s face, drawing toward him, covering his lips in a kiss.

  The Reincarnate’s skin was burning hot, the taste of his magic gagging, like the reek of death itself. Kyth forced away all these sensations as he gathered the entire power boiling within him, drawing on the elements, searching for the bonds that held the man’s body together, calling forth the fire. Power crackled around them like a gathering storm as they stood there, locked in a lovers’ embrace. Fire. You’re going to burn, bastard. Kyth clasped on tighter, pulling the bony man into him, wondering if the power that raged within him was going to consume them both, now that they were so close they felt like one. He didn’t care. He committed all of himself to this bond, not holding back anything at all.

  His vision filled with two glowing red eyes, bulging and twisting out of their sockets. Steam rose off the Reincarnate’s skin, burning his face and hands. He distanced himself from the pain, focusing on holding his power steady, drawing on the fabric of the world, disintegrating the body in his grasp through agony that seemed to last a lifetime.

  A silent shudder shook the walls of the stronghold, and Kyth sensed it extend out, spreading over the sands and rocks of the desert like a tidal wave. Steam enfolded him, hotter than the pits of hell. He heard the Reincarnate’s screams, and his own, briefly wondering if he had gone too far, if the power of the elements he had called on was going to obliterate his own body too, and all life around them.