by Eric Vall
“Oh, okay,” I sighed with relief, and then I went boneless as I let my head fall back against the throne.
Eventually, Cayla and her father descended from the scaffolding and came to stand before us. King Davit had two black eyes, a gash above his eyebrow that needed stitches, and he held himself like a few of his ribs were broken. But he was alive and mostly whole as he stood there with his arms wrapped around his daughter.
“I feared the worst, father,” Cayla hiccupped as she clutched at his torn and dirty shirt. “When we heard Eyton had fallen and you’d been taken, I thought… I thought…”
“Shh, I know,” Davit replied as he dipped his chin and kissed the top of her head. “It’s alright, Cayla, I am alive and relatively fine.” He pressed at the gash on his brow with a wince as he tried to staunch the sluggish bleeding.
“We will get you to the royal physician as soon as possible, Your Majesty,” Mayard said as he hobbled up with his arm still hung in the sling.
Davit’s eyes went wide. “N-Norick? You’re alive?”
“Yes,” the captain said with a nod, “though I can’t say the same for the rest of my men. I only survived because some sorry bastard had poor aim and there was a strategically placed, hay-filled wagon beneath a window.” A scowl twisted the soldier’s face, and then he painstakingly dropped to one knee as he bowed his head. “Forgive me, sire. It was my fault this happened. I take full responsibility, and I will immediately resign my post.”
“You will do no such thing,” Davit replied with a frown. “On your feet, Captain Mayard.”
The red-haired man slowly struggled upright, but he still kept his eyes on the ground. But then Davit stepped forward and grasped Mayard’s shoulders until he finally lifted his gaze.
“Dred caught us all unawares,” the king said firmly. “It is no one man’s fault. I can only hope that you’ll consider retaining your post. Cedis needs a man with your leadership now more than ever.”
Mayard’s eyes swam with too many emotions for me to identify, and then he dipped his head in another bow.
“If you will have me, sire,” he murmured, “I will defend Cedis until the breath leaves my body.”
“And let us hope that is many years hence,” Davit laughed as he squeezed the captain’s shoulders and then dropped his arms. When Mayard stepped back, the king turned to me again.
“I am glad to see you alive and in good spirits, King Davit,” I rasped as I looked up at him from the throne. “Sorry that I’m in your seat, but I’m having a hard time feeling my legs right now.”
“I am glad to be alive, too,” the king replied with a half-smile, “and so you may remain where you are. Thank you, Mason.”
“It was my pleasure, sire,” I said with a half a wave of my hand, “but I have something else I think you’ll enjoy seeing more than my handsome face.”
The king laughed but then dissolved into a coughing fit. Cayla molded herself to his side, and her hands fluttered around him like little anxious birds, but Davit waved her off before he looked back to me with tears in his eyes.
“And what is that, Defender Flynt?” he rasped.
“Take a look,” I replied, and then I jerked my chin to the left of the throne.
King Davit glanced at me with confusion, but then he followed my line of sight, and his eyes nearly bulged out of his skull.
Camus Dred lay sprawled across the floor with his wrists wrapped in stone. He wheezed in pain from his bullet wounds, but when he felt eyes on him, he lifted his head with a glare.
“Pity,” he spat as he scowled at the king, “I had kind of hoped that you would have died of a heart attack.”
“You’re not that lucky, Dred,” King Davit replied coolly, and then he dragged his eyes over the bleeding bandit. “In fact, it looks like you’re not lucky at all now.”
The Bandit Boss bared his teeth in a silent snarl, but he didn’t respond.
“As you can see, sire,” I murmured to the king with a nod at the defeated man on the ground, “the threat of Camus Dred has been neutralized. We charged through the castle and defeated most of his ‘army’ if you could call it that. There might be a few left outside this locked throne room or in the city, but they’ll be easily hunted down now that their boss is done for.”
“I believe you promised to put that bastard in the dirt,” Mayard growled as he glared at Dred. “Numerous times, in fact.”
“If that’s what the king desires, I’ll put a bullet in his head, and we can throw his body from the city walls,” I responded with a shrug, “but before that, and before I pass out, I have questions for our guest here.”
I could barely feel my hands and feet I was so exhausted at this point, but I forced myself to look at the defeated Bandit Boss.
“Oh?” King Davit asked with a frown.
“What the fool said,” Dred grumbled from the ground. “I don’t have anything to say to you, Flynt, so you might as well go ahead and kill me.”
“You’ll find I can be rather persuasive,” I growled as I removed the stone binding him to the floor. Then I nodded to Aurora, who leaned down, grabbed Dred by the scruff of his collar, and dragged him upright.
He cried out in pain, and his knees buckled as he tried to put weight on them, but the half-elf hauled him to his knees and then forced him to kneel in front of me. She clamped one of her hands over his shoulders and held her sword poised and at the ready in the other.
“You’re going to answer my questions, Camus,” I snarled softly as I leaned forward off the throne, “or my machine and I are going to peel you apart piece by piece before Aurora burns them to cinders. Understand?”
Dred’s face had gone red, and his pupils were pinned with pain. Blood was smeared at the corner of his mouth, and I could tell he was biting his cheek to keep from crying out again.
“I’ll take your silence as a yes,” I growled. “So, first question, what do you know about the attacks that plagued Cedis a few weeks ago? The ones with the chimera and possessed farmer.”
“I… told you,” Dred ground out, “I don’t know anything.”
“No,” I corrected, and Aurora pressed down harder on his shoulder, “you said you wouldn’t tell me anything. Big difference. I’m willing to bet you know quite a lot.”
Dred bared his teeth again. “Well, you’re wrong, magic boy. I don’t know anything about the attacks. All I know is that I saw Balmier and his men scramble to do something and fail epically. I realized the king was weak, and that this was a hell of an opportunity. So I gathered up every criminal in Cedis and told them I could make them rich. Gold, land, women, whatever they wanted, I promised. Within days, I had nearly a hundred men at my disposal. Then I started to take what this godsforsaken world owes me.”
“You mean you started to murder people and steal from their corpses,” I bit out as a blinding headache began to pound behind my eyes.
This time, Dred actually managed a smile. It was crooked, and his teeth were tinted red with blood, but a spark of mocking arrogance was back in his eyes.
“Blood and sacrifice, Flynt, just like I said,” he rasped. “That’s where real power comes from. Now, that’s all I have to tell you, so if you’re going to kill me, get on with it. I do have one last request though.”
“Oh really?” I scoffed in derision.
“Yup,” Dred replied with a nod, and then his eyes leered over my shoulder. “If you could be so kind as to remove your shirt, Princess Balmier, I want my last sight to be a pretty one.”
Rage spiraled through me, and before I knew it, I had clenched my hand into a fist, drew my arm back, and sent it rocketing into Dred’s jaw. Since I was so weak now, it didn’t send him sprawling, but it did snap his head to the side. Aurora kept her hand firmly clenched over the bandit’s shoulder, and as she jerked him back upright, the fabric of his shirt ripped. The collar gaped open, and I suddenly caught sight of something on the skin below his collarbone.
At first, I thought it was blood, but then I
realized the red lines had a purpose to them. They crisscrossed in interesting patterns to form a swirling mark. The symbol looked familiar, and then realization crashed down on me with the force of a freight train.
“You’re runed,” I gasped as my eyes darted back to Dred’s face.
Because that’s what the mark was. A rune. Similar but not identical to the ones I had found on the beasts in Illaria. Similar to the one Cayla saw branded into the forehead of that farmer.
Dred spat blood to the side, and when his eyes came back to mine, a shiver raced down my spine. Gone was the cocky showman. Gone was the arrogant bandit. Something different swirled in his gaze now. Something dark and hateful.
“You do know something,” I snarled. “I’ve seen those runes before. Who gave them to you? Was it your master? Who is he?”
As I said the word “master,” an eerie expression crossed Dred’s face. The pain from his injuries seemed to melt away as did his burning anger. In its place rose a strange calm and an unsettling smile.
“So you know of my master then,” he said in a soft and even voice.
“I know he’s a prick that’s been terrorizing multiple kingdoms,” I growled. “What is his name? What game is he playing at?”
“Game?” Dred echoed as he tilted his head to the side. “Dear, stupid boy. This is not a game. My master has a plan. A vision. He will see this wretched world destroyed in flame and be reborn from the ashes. The attacks were just the beginning, just enough mayhem to test the strength of his enemies. Soon his fire will stretch over all Cedis, Illaria, Nalnora, and every kingdom all the way to the sea.”
“Nalnora?” I said as I tried to latch onto something in his crazy rambling. “Your master is going for the elves next? Why?”
“Because they do not see,” Dred murmured as he widened his eyes so that I could count every bloody broken capillary in his sclera. “Just like you do not see. You, Mason Flynt, are an obstacle my master did not account for. You could destroy his vision. And that I just cannot allow.”
Before I could respond, the Bandit Boss threw himself backward against Aurora. The half-elf wasn’t expecting it, and the two of them tumbled backward down the steps in front of the throne.
I gasped in surprise as I lurched forward, but then Dred burst up from the floor and came at me. He tackled me, and my spine smashed into the throne before we fell sideways. My companions shouted in concern as we smashed into the floor in a tangle of limbs. I struck the ground with a grunt, and the air whooshed out of my lungs, but Dred didn’t give me a chance to recover. He brought his hands up and wrapped them around my throat, and I choked as he pressed down. His eyes were wild and empty above me, and his face was serene and at odds with the rest of his body.
Spots of color danced across my eyes as I gasped for breath, but rage and adrenaline burned through my veins hotter than any wildfire. I reached up and grabbed at Dred’s wrists, and when I managed to pull his hands a fraction away from my throat, I jerked my knee up and sent it straight into his ribs. Air exploded from the bandit’s lungs, but he didn’t cry out in pain. Hell, he barely even blinked as he tried to grab my throat again, and there was such a dead look in his eyes it made my skin go cold.
I kneed him again and again, and when he finally coughed up blood on my chest, some of the struggle went out of him. I seized the opportunity to get my feet between us, and then I launched him away with a solid two-footed kick. He flew back several feet before he crashed into the ruined throne room floor and crumpled into a heap.
I jumped to my feet as I yanked my revolver from its holster. Aurora and Cayla were beside me in an instant, but I couldn’t hear their voices over the roar of blood in my ears.
Dred lifted his head and immediately locked eyes with me. I could tell with one look that he wasn’t going to stop until one of us was dead, so when he tried to struggle to his feet, I thumbed back the hammer of my gun and took aim.
“One last chance, Camus,” I rasped, and my throat felt raw and bruised. “Tell me who your master is. Tell me about his plan.”
The Bandit Boss cocked his head at me again, and blood trickled from the corner of his mouth.
“You shall soon see,” he intoned in a flat voice, and then he stumbled forward with his arms outstretched.
I put my finger on the trigger and squeezed twice. The first shot slammed into his gut, and the second one buried itself in Dred’s sternum. The bandit careened backward but didn’t fall, and then he lifted a hand and touched at the crimson liquid gushing from his chest.
He raised his head and smiled at me, and at that moment, he barely looked human.
“Blood and sacrifice, Mason Flynt,” he gurgled as more scarlet fluid bubbled from his mouth. “Just like… I said.”
With that, he grabbed the collar of his shirt and tore it in half, and a gasp caught in my throat as I saw the runes that were carved and branded into every inch of his torso. I tried to take in all the harsh red lines and black swirls, but as Dred’s blood gushed down his chest and out from his gut, the runes began to glow a crimson red.
Every hair on my body stood on end as the zap of magic arced through the air except this time was different. It was less like a static shock and more like a taser. I jerked backward as every instinct in me screamed to run.
“Get out,” I murmured through numb lips, and then when the runes began to grow brighter and Dred began to laugh, I screamed it. “Get out! Run! Go!”
My eyes darted to the door, but then I remembered I had sealed it shut. There was no way out.
“Mason, what…?” Cayla started to ask, but I didn’t give her a chance to finish.
I spun around, grabbed Aurora and Cayla, and flung them back several feet. Davit and Mayard stared at me with wide eyes, but my magic rocketed toward the surface, and the ground undulated beneath us as I catapulted the four of them to the back of the room. They floundered in the air for a moment, but I didn’t have time to watch them land. I just willed a shield around them as best I could and hoped it would be enough.
I whipped back around to face Dred, but now he was no more than a ball of scarlet light. I tried to command a ball of stone to surround the man, as well as a shield to rise before me, but I could only accomplish half of either before an explosion unlike anything I had ever felt burst out of him. It was like a dozen bombs going off at once. The ground bucked beneath me, then a wall of heat enveloped me, and then I was blown backward by the force of the explosion.
I slammed into the wall, and my head struck hard stone before darkness descended over me.
When I came to, my ears rang, and I could taste blood on the back of my tongue, but nothing felt outright broken. I lifted my head, and my vision swam, but I could see my companions also sit up and looking around in a daze. I inhaled shallowly and began to cough as dust and ash settled around us.
I blinked as I tried to take in the destruction that was the former throne room.
Debris, rubble, and burning splinters lay scattered around the demolished room. I noticed smears of blood and body parts everywhere I looked, and I saw that half of Big Guy’s torso and head looked to be melted a bit.
“Well,” I coughed as I pushed myself upright, “looks like the Big Guy’s fireproofing has his limits.” Then I glanced at the people still getting their bearings around me. “Everyone alright?”
“Relatively,” Davit grunted as he sat up. The gash on his forehead had started bleeding again, and he winced as the blood got in his eye.
“Sorry… about that, sire,” I coughed as I rubbed at the sore back of my head, “that was just the quickest way I could get us as far away from Dred as possible.”
“Don’t apologize,” the king chuckled dryly. “You saved us all.”
“Except for my machine,” I sighed, but I couldn’t stop the smile that bloomed across my face because hey, yeah. We had made it. We were alive, and I could probably fix Big Guy in a half of a day’s worth of work.
“The most important one survived,” C
ayla said in a raspy voice, and I turned to the princess to see her pull Stan out of her shirt pocket.
The stickman looked at the destruction around us and then looked back to me as if to ask, ‘what the hell happened?’
Maybe it was the punch-drunk relief of not being blown to smithereens, or the concussion I probably had, or the fact that I was an inch away from slipping into a magical drain induced coma, but as I looked at my bewildered creation, I tipped back my head and laughed and laughed and laughed.
Chapter 17
With Camus Dred good and dead, our next move was to round up the remaining bandits and put them in the dirt, too, but once I unsealed the throne room, I finally lost the war against exhaustion and promptly passed the fuck out.
The next thing I knew, sunlight was pouring onto my face and my mouth felt like it had never known water.
I struggled upright in bed, and Aurora and Cayla grumbled as I jostled them to consciousness.
“Sorry,” I croaked to the women draped around me, “water.”
I took a cursory glance at my surroundings and deduced by the sterile smell and the bandages wrapped around me that we were in the infirmary. Then I leaned over Aurora toward the bedside table, and I blinked in confusion when the wooden mug of water slid toward me a few inches. I was just wondering if I had awoken with new powers again when Stan stepped out from behind the mug and waved at me.
“Oh, hey buddy,” I chuckled hoarsely. “Didn’t see you there.”
I wrapped my fingers around the mug, and when I lifted my wrist back toward me, Stan hopped on for the ride. He clambered up my arm and came to sit on my shoulder as I guzzled half the water down in three great gulps.
“Hey, leave some for us,” Aurora mumbled with a sleepy scowl as she slapped at my shoulder.
“Sorry,” I rasped again as I pulled the mug away from my cracked lips.
The half-elf blearily blinked open her eyes and frowned up at me.
“Why are you waking us at such an ungodly hour?” she groused.
“Actually,” Cayla mumbled from her other side, “the infirmary is on the western side of the castle which means that it’s probably afternoon.”
