“Thinking…?” Unfazed by the rejection, Hazamareth returned her arm to its resting place across her left knee, twisting a silver coin across her fingertips. There was a slight burning left in its wake, but due to her years of frequent contact with the poison she hardly seemed to notice. “The beast has left corpses for weeks now all along the main road. If it steals away on a ship there will be a slaughter all the way to Ryekarayn. The sad, little humans could not possibly stop it.” She paused, fingers pressing tightly against the coin as she watched a ship vanish into the horizon. “And yet,” she continued slowly, flicking the coin back into the bag at her side, “I doubt we’ll see it attempt to gain access straight onto any of these vessels. Stowaway, perhaps?” She cocked her head slightly and blinked in consideration. “Wouldn’t that be a marked leap of intelligence for the creature.”
Tsuki tilted his head at a mirrored angle. Was there any other option for the beast? He could not see one. He pressed his hands into his stomach for warmth. Away from the shelter of the trees, the ocean breeze bit into their flesh with animalistic savagery. “So many scents, I can’t distinguish him anywhere around this place… Gods only know where he has gotten himself already.”
He squinted down the sharply sloping hill. The dockyard was awash in Ryekarian humans and cargo. Thirty-two ships lay docked along the coast, bows creaking as they rocked in the waves. Men making their last daring trips of trade before they fled from Saebellus and his insane, petty conquests.
The humans lumbered to and from the ships, hauling goods in and out of the cargo holds, stopping to perch atop unloaded crates for long swigs of rich ale. It was easy to distinguish their elven counterparts—polished, pristinely dressed, and working ceaselessly at their tasks. Yet they too were rugged and scarred, attesting to the illegal activities they participated in with the humankind.
But worse than the stench of all of them—human and elf alike—was that of rotting fish, olfactible even over the waves of salt and the perfume of city flowers. While the workers below were unbothered, Tsuki grimaced enough for the lot of them. Still, he preferred it to the countryside they had spent the last few weeks gallivanting across. There was something about the bustle of cities, the variety of aromas, the tooth and nail fight for survival that made it so… civilized.
Hazamareth had clearly been watching him. “There will still be ale left in Elarium when we are finished,” she reassured.
Tsuki’s irritation subsided at her endearing attempts to pacify him. She was ever aware of the cause for his surly behavior. He offered a slight smile of apology. “You damn well better,” he smirked, finding it impossible to remain resentful. At least, at her. The enduring cold was another matter entirely.
Beside him, Hazamareth’s mood was considerably lifted by his smile; her chin elevated to a distasteful observance of the port. Certainly it was too cheerful for her taste. She tapped the side of her jaw thoughtfully. “He’s probably in there now,” she ventured. “Somehow, he must have gotten inside.” But her pleasant mood could not mask her skepticism.
Tsuki did not blame her. Hours before, she had ventured alone through the streets, but had unearthed no sign of the beast. Without Tsuki’s olfactory perception, such a result was unsurprising. The beast had moved with unnatural speed, sweeping from one poor soul to the next, to keep the victims at an unbroken one-a-day. It was not like the other creatures they had hunted… It was smarter than those driven only to kill. Despite its supposed lack of knowledge of the outside world, it seemed to be learning swiftly. The beast had even begun to drag the bodies off the main road and stash them within the forests. Whether it had a true sense that it was being followed, Tsuki doubted. But that made it all the more dangerous. Preemptive caution—an understanding of its actions.
This was no ordinary demon of Sheolra.
As the beast grew more apt at hiding its trail, they had come to rely on scent as their primary form of tracking.
Tsuki inhaled deeply, suggesting to his comrade that he was doing his part. ‘You better not be considering what I think you are,’ he growled to himself. But she was. He could tell she was. ‘He’s probably in there now,’ Tsuki scoffed as her words echoed in his mind. While Hazamareth’s face was smooth and stoic, her tone had been all too suggestive.
But this was one city Tsuki had as much interest in not entering as Elarium had interest in keeping him out. Its grand architecture and towering walls could not sway him. Nor its prestige as Sevrigel’s capital of the south. Nor even its fame of elven luxuries. He had glimpsed its prison once, and that was more than enough a taste of its hospitality for him.
He scoffed, muttering a curse below his breath. Despite the great number of years that had passed, he could not imagine they had forgotten him. It was certainly fresh in his mind… One of the largest infections of bloodthirsters he had ever uncovered.
But the favor he had done for the damn elven city—the country—was not recognized by such ignorant elves.
When the elves had found him in Sel’ari’s temple, surrounded by those pretty little bodies, they had been more eager to torture him as a murderer and sentence him to die than to understand why such a violent act had been inevitable.
A wave crashed along the hill’s crest, spraying them with salt. Tsuki grimaced, howling further misery into his internal recesses.
Hazamareth’s elbow caught him sharply in the side, rebuking his visible bitterness. “Alright, that’s enough,” she barked. “He’ll kill again before he attempts to board a ship.”
“Yes. And then he’ll be easy to find,” was Tsuki’s matter-of-fact reply. He scowled at the vision of Elarium’s citizens. “We can wait for him at the docks after he’s made a fresh kill. The scent of blood will cling to him, and he’ll be easy to track: the less time inside Elarium, the better.” ‘Less risk for us.’ He left the last words unspoken.
They could not save everyone.
But the implication was enough to banish any semblance of Hazamareth’s patience. “Up,” she snapped, and, as it was unlike the half-elf to give orders without Tsuki’s full accord, Tsuki stood.
“I want you to know I am not going into those damn sewers,” he grumbled. “If you could smell what I smell you wouldn’t be so eager to go prancing about in their shit.” But he knew that Hazamareth would not buy his excuses. The half-elf gathered exactly what he was thinking. They had travelled too long together for her to not know.
“Quit acting like such a Sheolran imp,” Hazamareth chided him with her usual disregard for Tsuki’s qualms. “I will watch your back.” Her hazel eyes flashed with command. “Now let’s go. I am not waiting for the beast to murder someone.”
Tsuki scowled. Hazamareth’s aversion to letting the beast have just one more kill was irking. Understandable, but irking. Ever the challenging path.
‘Damn it, Hazamareth. Strengthen your spine.’
But before Tsuki could cede to her demands, he caught a familiar scent riding the wind. Faint, even to him, but he had grown too accustomed to the sensation to miss its passing.
His nostrils flared. “Blood, Hazamareth. I believe it’s too late.” Especially being upwind of the city, Tsuki could not deny that he smelled enough fresh, elven blood to warrant a wholly gruesome death.
Hazamareth offered little reaction as she resigned herself to the information. She nodded once more toward Elarium, her mind now clearly focused on the task ahead, and stepped staunchly through the grass. “Well, you got your wish—so let’s make this short.”
Tsuki fell in beside her, slowing their gait to a casual stroll down the hill. The great walls of the city rose up like a cliff, extending toward the sky in a soft silver-grey that glowed with orange hues in the setting sun. The accenting towers glinted with pale yellow windows and golden balconies. Yet the haughty elven naivety and nauseating grandeur disgusted Tsuki. With all their pretty buildings and fancy artistic scribbles, the elves had much to learn before they realized the world was not made of gold and good fortune. T
he world was a dark and gritty place, and the elves lived in deliberate ignorance of it all. A human city, with its practical taverns and grounded inhabitants, was far more his preference—especially now in a location where elven ignorance had the entire city guard on the lookout for the very head that was about to offer them salvation.
As they slipped into the throng and passed beside the city watch at the entrance, Tsuki felt, for a brief moment, like the creatures he hunted. He tucked his chin down.
“Watch yourself, half-breed,” an elf mumbled below his breath as Hazamareth was jostled into him.
Tsuki let out an external sigh, feeling as though all attempts at discretion were about to be for naught. ‘Half-breed?—Damn it. That’ll do it.’
Tsuki tensed, anticipating the furious and violent response of Hazamareth, but to his surprise, his comrade ignored the elf. Perhaps a flicker of wisdom rose above her anger, reminding her that they did not need attention drawn to them right beside the city watch.
“Which way is it?” she asked, sniffing as indignantly as a Sel’ven who had misplaced a polished boot in a pile of horse dung. And then abruptly, wisdom darting away with a mocking laugh, she hurled the elf out of the way with such vehemence that the bastard was flung to the ground.
And there was the woman Tsuki had expected. There was the human blood that refused to take shit from those god-damn elves. There was a good lack of common sense.
“Northeast,” he replied with a grunt as he stepped over the cursing elf. He spat as he passed, pushing himself into the crowd. But he enjoyed the ferocity with which his comrade responded to the elf’s prejudice. No bowing of the head or inane groveling.
Ah, the good old human blood pumping through their veins.
But despite Tsuki’s delight, he was swift to step into the nearest dark alleyway and lose the eyes of the unamused. “To business,” he grunted, hearing the soft footsteps of Hazamareth on the cobblestones behind him.
He inhaled heavily, the tangy scent of blood filling his lungs. The corpse was not far. When they reached it, the blood clinging to the beast’s body would, expectantly, be enough for Tsuki to track it down.
And then they’d kill it. He rested a hand eagerly on the hilt of his sword.
They wound up the city’s gentle hills, the trail becoming almost tangible, and finally halted before the back wall of a final alleyway.
‘The smell must be strong enough for even Haz, now.’ Yet she made no attempt at silence. ‘Gods damn it. Always fearlessly clanging around!’
Tsuki gestured sharply at the woman to cease the arming of her crossbow. This… was not what he had expected. Tsuki raised his hand and flared his nostrils. This smell… this intensity of putrid waste and rotting clothes…!
He stifled a gag; there could be no doubt.
‘Still there?’ Hazamareth mouthed, hazel eyes widening as she realized the meaning of his gesture.
‘Still there,’ Tsuki repeated to himself, giving his comrade a cautious nod. Every muscle in his body rippled with tension as he prepared for the inevitable confrontation. Then he dared to expose his face into the alleyway beyond.
But no massive figure came darting for his throat. Instead, a hunkered, still form was visible in the darkness: the beast crouched near its victim, its great shape eerily statuesque.
‘It’s still there…’ This was the first time the beast had remained near a death for so long. But its back was toward them. ‘What is it doing…?’
Tsuki stiffened abruptly. Rose blossoms and recently dyed silks…? There was someone else present. Not the corpse, but someone alive.
‘Is that… a child?’ he deduced as he strained his eyes against the dim light.
Yes. A child. Tsuki’s lips parted in disbelief.
The beast was hiding from a child.
Tsuki rested his hand on his silver blade, then stopped. A second brat had appeared from around the corner, sidling up to the first.
“What is it?” the first child whispered in a high, little squeak, slinking closer to the body.
Tsuki heard the slight tink as Hazamareth resumed the preparation of her crossbow. He swiftly jerked his hand in rebuke.
“Elsaela, d-don’t go near it!” the little boy stammered. “Elsaela!”
‘Damn it!—Where are your parents, you little street urchins?!’ Tsuki swore. At this rate, they were going to have two more bodies on their hands. Worse still, if the beast used them as a shield, Hazamareth would most certainly refuse to take the shot!
Tsuki’s fingers curled tightly around the hilt and he began to slide his blade free. ‘Before they get too close…!’
Yet before either he or Hazamareth could blink an eye, the silhouette pivoted, turning and rushing toward them in a single, rapid lunge.
Tsuki’s instincts sent him reeling, lurching back into the false safety of his dumbstruck comrade.
The creature was infinitely faster. There was no hesitation, no surprise from the beast—as though it had known all along that the two mercenaries were nearby. It locked eyes with Tsuki, clutching him by the skull and hurling him into Hazamareth with force enough to shatter average bones.
Then, without breaking stride, it tore off into the alleyway behind them.
“Damn it,” Tsuki moaned, scrambling to his feet and flinching at the pain that speared through his spine. “What was it doing?!” He glanced over his shoulder at the corpse: the children were gone.
“GO! We’re losing it!” Hazamareth hollered, sparking his mind into focus. She scrambled for her scattered bolts, spitting a wad of blood from her lips where Tsuki’s skull had cracked smartly against her ashen face.
Tsuki lunged into motion. Lose the beast? Never. He whirled and dashed down the alleys after the massive creature, grasping for the visage of the beast in that brief contact. Eyes… All he could remember were the piercing, yellow, serpentine eyes.
And fear. Not his own fear. Its fear.
The beast feared him.
He skidded around another corner as the creature’s scent changed direction. He caught a glimpse of its heels disappearing around the bend ahead.
‘Got it,’ he thought smugly. This was not the terrifying beast Saebellus’ captain had described it as.
He slowed, hunching slightly as he neared the curve. His fingers trailed along a series of barrels as he passed, tapping softly. The darkness would have been a challenge for any other human, but he could clearly distinguish the broken stones at the back end of the corridor, the fishermen’s barrels long left empty to gather dust, and the seamless white marble that veered to the path of his prey.
It was the scent that unnerved Tsuki. The wretched odor remained immobile, warning him that the beast had halted somewhere out of sight.
Tsuki edged forward, leather armor creaking defiantly as he crept. Gods damn it, it was like having Haz right on his heels! With a determined lunge, he swung around the corner of the alleyway, blade drawn back for the blow.
He was met instantly. It was a blur of shadow, a sudden shift in the darkness. Without pause, it caught his sword in its massive, bare hands. Tsuki threw his body urgently backward and out of reach, attempting to slide the blade free. But the beast’s hold was like iron. With a savage snarl, its great hand tightened and yanked the sword toward the ground.
Tsuki held on for just a moment too long; his body was whisked off balance with the creature’s force. His fingers flew free, grasping desperately for balance.
And then the beast raised the sword by the blade and broke the hilt upon him with terrible force.
Tsuki’s lack of stability cost him the ability to dodge: the weapon collided with his shoulder like a pole on a humlid ball, flinging his body into the wall beside him with a booming thud. Agony shot through his torso as bones threatened to shatter beneath his throbbing flesh.
He stifled the pain with a single groan and threw himself frantically away from the oncoming fist. It smashed down where his skull had been and a terrifying crack shot through t
he stone, forked like lightning.
Inwardly, Tsuki recoiled. He had seen what the creature was capable of doing to a man. He rolled onto his side and pushed himself up, his weakened shoulder nearly buckling his arm out from underneath him. He felt the breeze of the second fist pass by his cheek, spraying broken cobbles into his wheezing mouth on its contact with the stone.
The miss offered only a moment’s reprieve. Before Tsuki could stagger to his feet, he was wrenched upward by his fractured arm. Even as the inevitable event pounded through his brain, his instincts thrust his clammy hands futilely before his skull.
But the blow did not come. With a screech, the beast lobbed Tsuki away.
Tsuki’s arms crept from his face in time to see a second bolt rip through the beast’s heart. His stomach leapt and he let out a strangled cry. It was the only pitiful sound he could manage at the sight of his god-damn glorious comrade and her silver bolts.
The beast’s yellow eyes tore wide. Its second cry of agony echoed down the alley like a roar of ungodly thunder. Tsuki glimpsed its huge wings silhouetting as it poised for a position of… but he realized too late.
Offense.
The beast hooked Tsuki by the arm and, with a horrific bellow, slung his body once more into Hazamareth.
The crossbow dropped from her thin fingers as she made a valiant attempt to soften the blow. The two tumbled across the cobblestones and into a nearby barrel, the wind thankfully knocked from their lungs as the old fish rot splintered about them.
“What in Ramul was that?” Hazamareth rasped as the beast vanished down the alleyway.
Tsuki was already scrabbling to his feet, his shoulder aching in comradery with his spine. “Well, let’s follow it!” he heaved.
The two half-hobbled, half-sprinted in pursuit, boots flopping against the narrow streets, eyes darting in the pale sunlight that snaked its way to the floor of the city.
‘Just wounded?’ Tsuki’s jaw tightened as the beast yet increased its distance.
Heroes or Thieves (Steps of Power 2) Page 28
