“Quiet!” Leon hissed. “Do you want to give us away?”
Justin shook his head, frightened but also desperate. “No! You can’t make me stay behind! Lizzy’s going to be my wife!”
Ahead, Ril stopped and looked back, incredulous. Usually Leon didn’t feel too much emotion from him, though as his master he could. Ril didn’t like to share, and Leon didn’t pry. Now, though, he felt shock and surprise from his battler, and over it all a terrible, confusing pain.
“You?” the battler managed. “Marry Lizzy?”
Justin was pale, but he forced his chin up. “Yes. As soon as we’re home.”
Ril stared at the boy, and suddenly his emotions were gone, all of them. Leon felt emptiness so thorough that it was like the battler was dead. “Fine.” He turned and kept walking no faster than before, even as a few seconds later he passed another battler. It never even glanced up.
Leon stared at Ril’s back, wondering if he’d just missed something very important. There was something there, something he should recognize…something he couldn’t see or didn’t want to see, but that was close, just about—
Justin tugged on his shirt. “I’m going with you,” the youth demanded. “I don’t care what you say. I’m going to rescue Lizzy.”
“Fine,” Leon relented, echoing Ril. From the look in the boy’s face, he’d follow them even if they did try to leave him behind. Given that, it would be safer for everyone to keep him close at hand. “But don’t do anything unless I tell you.”
While Justin beamed at that news, Leon wished he himself felt a little more confident. They had barely a day to find and rescue his daughter, with no idea even of how or where she was being held. Still, they’d found the city she was in and were traveling as fast as Ril could lead them to her. They had more advantages than he’d expected in the first few hours after learning of her kidnapping.
Ril walked ahead in the street, dodging people and garbage, his shoulders as relaxed as if he were strolling across the market square back home. But as he led them around another corner, he stopped. Ahead towered a wall, fifty feet or more in height and made of sheer stone. At the base, gates let through men and a few odd women with the dark tans and loose clothing of locals. Many of the men had tattoos over their chests and shoulders. A battler stood guard, watching all who passed.
Leon froze and swore under his breath. No one was paying attention to them now, but he had no doubt that would change the instant they tried to go through that gate. There were even signs posted that forbade entry to any nonnative, punishable by death. Obviously, Lizzy had entered, Leon thought bitterly. Apparently they had different rules for slaves.
Ril considered the gate for a long moment, and then glanced over his shoulder at Leon. Turning, he walked to the left, parallel with the wall. Leon followed silently, Justin next.
The battler led them for more than a mile, away from the bustle of the main gate and to a portcullis that was locked but unguarded. On the other side was an empty park filled with ornately arranged rocks and sands of different colors, a few strategically placed desert plants growing at the center of each design. It would have been beautiful if the plants weren’t long dead from lack of sun, and if the park weren’t strewn with garbage. Rats scurried past.
Justin put a hand on one of the bars and pulled. The portcullis was solid. “Can you break it?” he asked.
The battler gave him a scathing look. “And bring a thousand of them down on us? Are you stupid?” Instead, as Justin flushed, Ril went up to the gate and stepped through.
His leg barely fit, and there was no way he could slip his head and shoulders through the bars—even a small child would have trouble. Nonetheless, Ril pressed his shoulder against the gap, and a moment later he changed just enough. His shoulder went first, then his hips, his clothes and body rippling as he squeezed himself through. Leon saw pain on the sylph’s face, but Ril just kept going. His head raised as though he was trying to keep himself above water, Ril pushed his face through next, gasping once it was on the other side and back to its normal shape, and then he did the same with his chest. Lastly, he lifted his other leg through and stood on the other side.
“Wow,” Justin breathed.
Ril didn’t respond. He stood there for a moment, just breathing, and then stumbled forward. Standing up against the gate, Leon could barely see the edge of his objective: a crank-driven wheel and chain designed to be turned by several men. Ril grabbed it and started to pull. The chain went taut as the sylph threw his strength into it, enwrapping the teeth of the wheel and forcing the portcullis to rise on squeaky hinges.
“Hurry,” Leon cautioned, hoping no one would hear that wretched squeal. It was terribly loud, echoing in the otherwise-quiet midafternoon.
Once the gate was high enough, Leon dropped to his belly and squirmed beneath, well aware of the sharp spikes just above his back. Once on the other side he scrambled to his feet and turned to Justin…who actually balked, staring fearfully at the gap below and the dead park beyond. Leon didn’t pause. “Come now or we leave you there,” he warned. There was no time for waiting.
The youth swallowed convulsively and scrambled through, the gate now high enough that he could nearly crawl.
Ril reversed the wheel, letting it drop back with a further low squeal and a thud. He hurried back to them, wincing, which was a blessing in disguise—if he had been standing alone by the wheel, they might have realized he’d lifted it alone, which no human could do.
As it was, the guards still struck him first, in a fluke that Leon realized later likely saved the battler’s life, and by extension his and Justin’s, since their attackers would have killed them all immediately if they’d known what Ril was. The first green shape that dropped hit the battler across the back of the head. Ril’s arms flew up as though he were trying to surrender, and he pitched forward, landing unconscious on the ground hard enough that he probably would have knocked out all of his teeth if he’d been a man. Twenty other battle sylphs landed, summoned by what, Leon didn’t know—the squeal of the gate, the thud of its closure, the heartbeats of three men who weren’t Meridalians in a place where they didn’t belong? He didn’t have time to think much more as they grabbed him by the throat and hauled him off the ground, shaking him. He heard Justin screaming, but then they threw him down beside Ril and that was the last he saw.
Chapter Fourteen
The sand was fine and gritty underneath their feet, a pale tan color that darkened to black in many places. The arena around them was oval in shape and large enough that a man would have to take a thousand paces to cross the narrowest part. At the edges, removed from the main wall by at least two lengths of a man, five-foot-thick barriers rose twenty feet into the air and extended to either side for thirty, ostensibly to give a person something to hide behind. The main walls were fifty feet high, and tiers of seats ascended for a dozen rows on three sides. Every seat in the arena was filled, the spectators cheering. A quartet of gates led into the complexes underneath.
Leon took all of this in as he was led with the others up a ramp from the holding pens and out one of those gates. His wrists were chained and the men who watched them were armed. Leon eyed Ril. The battler was chained as well, his eyes narrowed.
Wait, Leon thought at him as hard as he could. Wait.
There had been battlers in the caged area where they woke, where they were told their sentence was to fight for their lives in the arena. There were also battlers floating overhead, gathered around an ornate spectator’s box set high above the wall at one of the narrower ends of the oval. The opposite end of the arena was empty, probably so no one could look directly on the exalted presence in that box.
Whoever it was they were expected to fight, Leon and his companions had to wait for an opening to escape. Perhaps they could go over the wall at the opposite end from that box, or maybe through it. Maybe through one of those gates. Maybe if they won they’d be granted their freedom, though Leon doubted it. He didn’t have hig
h expectations about their chances at all, but he refused to give up. He had to hope.
“What’s going on?” Justin sobbed behind them. “Why are they doing this?” He stared at the guards. “Why are you doing this?” They didn’t answer, and Leon couldn’t. Not yet. Whomever they were fighting, they had to be ready. Rather, he and Ril had to be ready. Leon didn’t expect any help from Justin in this.
The guards led them to the center of the arena, nearly dragging Justin. Ril walked easily at Leon’s side, looking calmly around. He glanced down at the blood-soaked sand and back at his master. Run when you get the chance, he sent. Lizzy is south, maybe three miles away and underground.
Leon stared at his battler and shook his head.
Do it. Listen to me for once. Run and save Lizzy.
Leon shook his head again. They would all get out of here. Leon had been fighting with a sword since he was fifteen years old, and even weakened he knew that Ril could defeat any group of armed men. They would survive this.
Leon, Ril explained, this place smells of battlers. That’s what we have to fight.
The guards unlocked their chains in the center of the arena and left the three prisoners there, tossing down a trio of swords as they trotted away. Frantically, Justin snatched one up, staring around fearfully as the crowd started to chant.
“Eighty-nine! Eighty-nine! Eighty-nine!”
Leon stared at Ril, ignoring the crowd. “What?”
I’ll try and distract him. Save Lizzy. Please.
The chanting rose to a roar, the crowd on their feet and screaming. Across from them, on one of the longer walls of the oval, a gate like the one they’d been brought through rose. Justin took one look and ran screaming to hide behind one of the free-standing walls. Leon and Ril stood alone.
A horror came through the gate, shaking the ground as it walked. Colored a nearly ludicrous shade of pale blue, hairless and leathery, it was huge, the top of its head nearly as high as the arena walls. It stood on four legs, massive claws digging into the ground, and its body was round and bloated, its head rising up on a thick neck high above. Its tail was long as well, tapering to a point. The beast’s eyes were tiny, its mouth filled with so many fangs it couldn’t close completely. It stepped into the arena and roared, its tail lashing.
What kind of sick joke was this? Leon wondered. They were seriously supposed to fight this thing with swords?
Ignoring the weapons left in the sand, Ril rushed the massive thing. Leon swore and dove for the blades, grabbing one up in each hand as he chased his battler.
Ril was blindingly fast, moving across the sand so quickly that the roar of the crowd changed to amazement. The blue monstrosity growled, turning to face him, and lashed out. Its jaws came together with a tearing crash, but Ril dove out of the way, rolled to his feet—and was immediately hit by the thing’s flailing tail. He soared backward and slammed into one of the solitary walls so hard that rubble exploded out around him.
“Ril!” Leon shouted. What was he thinking?
The monster roared and charged, mouth wide. Ignoring Leon, it went for Ril, looking to finish what it started, so Leon swore and ran wide of the thing. Ril wanted him to go down that ramp and seize the chance of escape, but Leon couldn’t leave him. Even for Lizzy, he couldn’t leave him. Not like this.
Half buried in the wall, Ril coughed in pain and watched Leon circle behind the big battler. Idiot! Why did he never listen? If the world were fair, masters would have to obey their battlers.
Wincing, he shoved himself free of the wall, dropping down to land on one knee in the sand. The crowd had thought him killed by the impact, and they roared at the sight of him moving. So did the battler. Its size and shape limited its speed, however, and Ril jumped to his feet, running at an angle away from the thing and Leon. His energy he still hid inside him. His opponent didn’t realize what he was yet. Even if he didn’t have only enough energy for one really good blast, the thing would only give him a single chance—if that. But the monstrous sylph was cocky, used to easy victories.
It turned with him, undeniably fast enough to snatch a sprinting human, and closing in, it moved to catch him in its jaws. Ril was faster, though, slipping free just as its mouth slammed shut behind him. And then Leon, who would never have been fast enough to escape the creature had it been after him, ran up behind and hamstrung it.
The battler screamed. Its right leg buckled, the tendon severed, and it threw its head back, shrieking until the entire arena echoed with its cries. It tried to turn and bite Leon in half, but its crippled hindquarters slowed it down. Leaving one sword transfixing the leg, Leon escaped under its huge belly.
The battler hit him with its hate, but Leon had carried Ril on his arm for fifteen years. A battle sylph’s aura was one thing he’d long since learned to ignore. He didn’t even slow. Chopping with the second sword, he sliced cleanly through the tendons on the back of the left leg. The thing’s entire hindquarters collapsed, and the battler sat down hard, its now-frantic bite still missing the evasive human, who was continually diving over its tail and back.
To try and run away would only get his master killed. To continue staying close would mean death as well. Ril changed direction and ran straight for it, putting on as much speed as he could. The thing’s attention was focused on Leon, so it didn’t see him coming, but it did hear the crowd roar at his approach. Frantically, it tried to turn.
Ril put all his strength into a sprint and jump, arcing high over the thing’s head. Well clear of its teeth, he was completely upside down for a moment and rotating almost thirty feet in the air. From the silence in the stands, he knew he’d revealed what he was—which meant that even if he did kill this thing, the dozen battlers hovering overhead would take him next. He had to survive, though. If both he and Leon died, Lizzy would never be free.
He twisted in midair over the battler, forcing himself around so that he came down on the thing’s back, midway between the shoulders. Its head shot up, its roar of surprise and perhaps recognition rumbling in its throat. Ril didn’t give the thing any chance to put up defenses; he didn’t have the reserves to cut through a shield. Instead, he stabbed downward with his hands and struck with all his power, holding nothing back.
The battler screamed, a sound no longer arrogant or even afraid. This was a death shriek, for Ril’s energy tore through it, ripping the creature’s mantle apart. The sylph’s physical form exploded, shedding chunks of flesh that vanished into nothingness before they could reach the ground. Its shriek fading to a wail and then a gurgle, the monster became energy that sputtered away into shimmering specks of light.
Ril rolled onto the sand, inhaling the ozone reek of his foe’s disappearing body. His own form, so terribly weak, suffered a shuddering pain that beckoned with the very same darkness, urging him to let go of his flesh and disperse, become energy himself and forget thought, forget life. But he fought that death, forcing himself to his knees as he wondered if the roaring in his ears was the crowd, or if they’d gone silent at the death of their champion. He heard Leon, though, screaming at him. He couldn’t make out what the man was saying. He supposed that was a good thing. It meant he didn’t have to worry about being ordered to stop.
He raised his arms again, hands pointed at the narrow end of the arena without the tiered seats. He could feel that the wall there was thinner, with open space beyond. Everything he had left, Ril took and used, the pain of the subsequent blast beyond anything he’d thought to experience. But the wall exploded in a shower of rock.
Ril fell back, sand stirred by his collapse sprinkling down around him. It felt as though some of it got into his eyes. It felt as though some of it got into his skin, for his body started to fracture, lines appearing all over him as if he’d just fall apart, fall into nothingness. At least it didn’t hurt anymore, he realized distantly. He wouldn’t get to see Lizzy again, but this was a good way for a battler to die.
Hands grabbed him, pulling him up and against something warm, somet
hing with a heartbeat he recognized and a mental touch that he knew as well as his own. Shouldn’t Leon have run? He’d opened a way for the man to escape. That had been the point.
Drink, he heard. Leon had sworn he’d never order Ril again, but of course the man kept doing it. His master had ordered him to find Lizzy in her dreams, though he hadn’t realized he’d done so. He’d ordered Ril to return to his human form instead of killing himself in a dreamwalk-induced attempt to return to his original shape. Now Leon was ordering him to drink and save himself—only how could the man run if he was feeding Ril? What would happen to Lizzy? Ril felt so weak. He might take every bit of life Leon had and still die.
Not that his concerns mattered. He had no choice but to obey. Drink. Leon’s energy was a mist around him, a warm, honeylike haze. Ril touched and absorbed it, drawing it deep. It started to fill the reservoirs inside him, flowing into the pattern Leon had formed in his soul so long ago, and then into those burning chasms he’d created in himself with his attack. But doing so brought back the pain, and he cried out even as he drew more of his master’s energy, his form so starved that the lines continued to spread and deepen.
“You look like a jigsaw-puzzle man,” Leon whispered. His face was streaked with dirt and sweat.
“Run,” Ril whispered. “You can’t save anyone if they take you.”
“I won’t leave you,” Leon told him. “We’ll both get out.”
Not out of this. Not from here. Ril felt darkness rising behind the pain and didn’t know if it was death or sleep. It didn’t matter. He couldn’t fight either, and once he went, Leon would have to go, too, out the passage he’d created for him.
“South,” he reminded his master. “Three miles. Underground. Find her.”
“Ril…”
Leon’s energy was still pouring into him, flooding the body he’d pushed much too far. Ril closed his eyes, not wanting to feel the pain anymore or the weakness. Or Leon’s energy, for that matter, since he’d only keep draining it until they both were dead. Useless. He was useless. He let the darkness flow over him, hoping as it did that Leon would give up and listen to him for once.
The Shattered Sylph Page 13
