by Joe Jackson
Kari nodded silently, and soon they were at the mouth of the cave. They did their best to ignore the wretched stench from the refuse pile and from within the cave itself. The entrance was quiet but they could hear the sylinth moving around inside. After gesturing to Kari briefly, Erik started forward slowly and kept tight to the wall to try to make as little noise as possible. His heavy plate and chain armor wasn’t designed for stealth, though, and soon there was a hiss of surprise. Erik dashed into the cave and Kari followed close behind him.
“By the gods,” Erik muttered, stuttering to a stop. Kari came in behind him and her reaction was nonverbal but just as surprised. It was no ordinary sylinth: the creature towered well over nine feet tall when it straightened itself out. Its tail extended just as far, and the demonhunters quickly realized the kill would not be as straightforward as they expected.
A pale blue glow lit the chamber as Zalkar’s symbol drew itself on Kari’s breastplate, and her swords began to drip with red blood though they’d been clean only a moment before. Kari circled to her right, putting the massive creature between her and her partner, but its reptilian eyes moved in opposite directions to keep both of the demonhunters within its sights. It let out a long hiss, apparently amused, and picked up a massive spear with blades at both ends. It twirled the weapon menacingly, lashed its tail, and regarded each of its enemies.
“Is this the best they sent?” it asked venomously with another hissing chuckle. “Two pathetic whelps to take on Ressallk, the greatest of Sekassus’ sons? I will kill you and rape your corpses, and then deliver them to my father to do the same.”
Kari had no time to attack before the creature closed its eyes and the hood of its cobra-like head fanned, and a wave of mental energy pulsed out from it. It struck her like a wall of wind and she staggered back under its crushing weight. Kari shook her head as images manifested themselves in her mind’s eye, and the creature attempted to insert itself into her memories as an ally. Kari tried to sort through the images the creature placed in her mind to build a false web of trust stemming from a history that she knew was not true, but she couldn’t easily dismiss it. The creature was her friend. They had spent so many years fighting together, clearing the lands of their enemies: the people who threatened war for no good reason.
You trust me, its sibilant voice echoed in her mind. I am like your father, you love and respect me, and together we battle our enemies.
Kari’s eyes opened slowly and she scowled at the sylinth. Its mental assault had nearly fooled her, and were it not for the creature comparing itself to her father, Kari wasn’t sure if she would’ve seen through it. The sylinth brought its weapon up before it defensively, narrowed its eyes, and hissed threateningly, but then it flashed its long, venomous fangs in a wicked grin and slithered to its side as Erik came forward. It took Kari only a moment to realize that he was under the demon’s influence, and she brought her twin scimitars up before her defensively.
Ressallk moved to the side, where it placed one end of its spear into the ground and simply stood watching. The arrogance of demons never ceased to amaze Kari, but she brushed those thoughts aside at Erik’s approach. Kari drove Erik’s blades aside with her right blade as he rushed in, and she slapped him in his armored rump with her left. She hoped it might shake him free of the demon’s influence, but it served only to enrage him, and he came in once more with a measured, careful combination. She knocked his half-hearted swings aside easily and gave up ground, but she circled to ensure she didn’t get pinned against a wall or between Erik and the sylinth.
Erik seemed to be considering a new angle of attack, so Kari moved to beat him to the punch. She corkscrewed, hitting high-low-low-high with her blades as they came around, and she kicked the inside of his knee with a strong thrust as he blocked the final high blow. Erik stumbled back, tripped over an outcropping of stone, and clattered to the ground in his heavy metal armor. For a moment he appeared to be breaking free of the demon’s hold on him, but then he rose to his feet with a snarl and approached again. Kari sighed; she was hesitant to demonstrate too much fighting her companion, since she didn’t want the demon to learn her reactions and strike sequences before she actually engaged it. But Erik was no slouch and she could only afford to toy with him for so long before she would have to wound or even kill him.
His next move surprised her: he led with his longsword. Though Kari was familiar with changing her own sequence of attack, she had never seen Erik do it in all their days practicing together, and she wondered if the sylinth was partially controlling his actions. She brought her right scimitar across in an upward swing to deflect the unexpected thrust, but she was thrown off her rhythm and couldn’t bring her weapon back quickly enough to stop his follow-up slash. She spun after her initial parry and brought her left blade around to stop his own scimitar, but he cut high over her block and slashed through her wing, tearing through the membrane and severing the outer bone support.
Kari screamed in pain and stumbled away from her partner, but she spun suddenly and cut across his throat with a blind slash. Her blade ripped through his throat guard, bringing forth a spray of black blood, and she pushed in to continue the attack, blind to how much damage she might’ve done to him. The blade fell from Erik’s right hand and he reached up to his wounded neck. Kari cut under both of his arms and inside both of his knees in a dazzling pattern, severing the straps of his armor. Even as he started to stumble, she tucked her right arm close and drove her shoulder into him, leveling the much larger male.
Kari stared down the demon and approached Erik warily, and she worked to get her emotions back under control. Erik’s eyes came up to meet hers, and Kari could see that he was finally free of the sylinth’s grip. He grasped at his throat, breathing uneasily and with a slight gurgle, and Kari was glad to see what damage she’d done was not immediately life-threatening. It wasn’t often she hit someone in blind fury – certainly not a friend – but she was left with little choice when she considered the prospect of being killed by a demon-controlled Erik. Her partner shook his head no ever so slightly at her approach, and he motioned for her to forget him and go after their enemy. Kari continued to watch Ressallk, but she knelt beside Erik and struck him cleanly in the chin with her sword gripped in her fist, knocking him out cold.
Kari grimaced. The wound to her wing was a sharp pain that she fought to push aside, and she folded her wings tightly behind her to try to avoid more damage. She stepped over her fallen companion and made her way to the center of the chamber. There she faced down the demon, which stood with its weapon still tip-down before it, regarding her with narrowed eyes. Kari came to a stop a dozen feet away and crossed her blades before her chest, and then she slid the left down the back of the right, banged them against the cave floor, and spat on the rocks before the creature. “You will pay for what you’ve done to the czarikk,” she said. “When I’m done with you, you’ll beg for death, and I’ll send you to your father with my name on your lips.”
The creature let out its hissing laugh once more. “Boldly you speak, but look about you, woman: you stand in my home, and I have taken your partner from you without even lifting my weapon against you. Surrender yourself to me, I will take your life quickly and you will feel nothing when I ravage you.”
Kari shook her head slowly. “Snake, you just said that to the wrong person,” she said.
She brought her blades up and stalked in toward the demon. It towered over her and its dual-bladed spear came at her in a deceptively simple one-two combination that it finished by spinning the haft around its hand and then uppercutting with the lower blade. Kari dodged the attacks easily by hopping out of range of the first two and then spinning back in around the third, and she ducked low and threw a pair of crossing slashes at the sylinth’s lower belly. She knew her enemy well and struck where it was least mobile: since it was unable to hop out of the way, it brought a spear blade down to stop her first swing, but her second cut a shallow gash along its lower belly. It
was a minor hit, but the creature hissed in anger, and Kari used a heavy flap of her wings to hop back out of attack range.
She yelped in pain and nearly swooned, her knees threatening to give out, but she kept the presence of mind to not reach for her wounded wing. Getting her legs solidly back beneath her, she circled and slapped mockingly at the spear blades that came at her as the sylinth closed and attacked. Kari was patient and acclimated herself to her enemy’s fighting style, just as she had done to Erik, Typhonix, and countless other warriors before. They exchanged a few more routines, and though Kari was unfamiliar with the type of weapon Ressallk wielded, she wasn’t particularly impressed with its skill. Ressallk was clearly a capable fighter, but she laughed in the back of her mind at the thought that it might be the greatest of its father’s sons.
Kari shook away the thoughts and deflected yet another attack sequence. She reminded herself that she was under the influence of her deity’s presence. Her skills were formidable, to be sure, but her reactions were just a little quicker, her swings had a little more bite, and her parries were stronger than normal, all on account of her lord’s influence. She knew she wouldn’t win the battle if she were to take her god’s strength for granted and waste the opportunity. She had to keep her wits about her, to stay focused only on killing the creature and making sure she survived. She was not here for glory: she was here to enact justice and protect her charges, and she had sworn an oath to her deity and the czarikk that she would not fail.
Kari tensed as Ressallk approached once more, and she waited for the most opportune moment to counterstrike. Tumureldi’s style was primarily one of counterattacks, capitalizing on opponents’ mistakes, and trying to frustrate them to the point where they would lose composure and attack recklessly. Tumureldi won dozens of fighting tournaments and duels, and led a more-than-successful career among the elite rangers of the shakna-rir empire on Terrassia, thereby proving that his style was not just one of showmanship, but of undeniable skill. Karian Vanador had been his sole student: the only person whose character and teachability had ever impressed the king enough to share his secrets. She trained with him for a grueling nine months, listening to his lessons, practicing routines, and sparring with arguably the greatest sword-fighter to ever walk the face of Citaria. She’d entered his tutelage with only rudimentary knowledge of the scimitar, but had left a master, possessed of a fighting spirit and a style that left most slack-jawed. She was good enough, she realized, to beat Ressallk. She had all the tools: the experience, the style, the reflexes, and the strength to cut down even the son of a demon king. And everything she had, everything she brought with her along with what the Tesconis siblings taught her was being augmented by the power of her god.
Ressallk’s right arm flashed forward suddenly, but Kari ignored the coming attack, recognizing it was a feint. She tucked and rolled like Aeligos had taught her, came up to her knees beside it, and took a double swipe at the demon’s exposed side as she spun to her feet. Ressallk cringed slightly in pain as she cut a little deeper into its scaly armor and drew blood, and it turned to bring its weapon before her. Kari pressed the attack, quick stepping in and to the sides at angles to present a hard target to hit while battering the sylinth’s defenses with wicked, sinuous strikes that gave the impression of a scorpion fighting a snake. The demon worked furiously to defend itself and offered little offense while Kari buried it under a flashy routine designed to infuriate it.
Ressallk coiled its tail and Kari broke off her attack, bracing her blades before her as she quick-stepped backward. The demon stopped when she recognized its intention, and it hissed in anger, lashing its tail violently side to side. Ressallk’s hood flared out once more and Kari felt the push of the mental attack against her, but her determination and the presence of her deity’s power turned it aside harmlessly. Kari turned to an angle and pointed low at the creature with her front blade while her right blade arced high over her head like a scorpion’s tail. “Is that the best you’ve got?” she taunted it. “I’ve beaten an erestram before; I figured you’d be tougher.”
Ressallk’s eyes narrowed and it hissed and flared its hood once more, though no mental attack came this time. Instead it spat suddenly, and Kari was barely able to turn her head and bring her uninjured right wing up before her as a shield. Kari flapped her wing quickly to try to get the poison off of it, and was relieved to find the venom wasn’t caustic. Sensing no ill effects from the venom, she returned to her earlier posture and smiled confidently. Ressallk came in once more, feinted to draw the woman in to attack, and brought the haft of its dual-bladed spear up to block the obvious attack from her scorpion-tail blade. Ressallk then moved to block her other sword before she even began to follow up on the combination, but Kari surprised him when it was her right sword again, not her left, that came in for the second attack. She struck the haft of the demon’s weapon again and again, all the while moving her left blade in a distracting pattern as her head swung side to side, and she rang out a seven-hit sequence that bit deep into the wooden haft of Ressallk’s weapon and threatened to sunder it.
The demon tried to back up and moved to parry her right blade when Kari quick-stepped in, but this time her left blade flashed forward. The sylinth cried out in frustration and fear as she landed a second seven-hit combination upon the haft of its weapon, all coming from her left blade. The dual-bladed spear snapped in two in Ressallk’s hands, and the demon nearly fell backward, but it righted itself at the last moment and coiled its tail. Kari did not miss the coiling and was already dodging to her left when the demon sprung at her. Its envenomed fangs snapped on a mouthful of her hair where her body had been only a blink of an eye before, but it was unable to grip her silky strands in its maw.
Kari slashed as she fell, an off-balance and off-target strike that drew blood from the side of the demon’s neck, but again only from a minor wound: its scaly armor was quite thick. Her hand touched the ground and she gritted her teeth, crushing her knuckles beneath the pommel of her sword to cart-wheel and come up on her feet once more. She had a flash from her training under Tumureldi and, on instinct, she spun left as she stepped right, and her left blade came around and ripped through one of the demon’s eye sockets when it attempted a second bite.
Ressallk screamed and dropped one of the halves of its destroyed weapon to reach up to its ruined eye. Its face was a bloody mess: Kari had nearly cloven its skull and killed it outright. Its remaining reptilian orb fixed on Kari hatefully, though the demon did not rush to attack again. Kari took in the scene before her, and moved between the demon and her fallen companion. She guessed it was most likely to attempt to kill Erik before being killed itself. Once she saw that it was not following, she knelt beside her partner and touched his breastplate, and confirmed that at the very least he was still breathing.
Ressallk straightened out and took account of its wounds, and it screamed an echoing cry of frustration that forced Kari to press her arms over her pointed ears. Staring her down through a single, narrowed eye, the demon let forth a hateful hiss, then threw back its head and screamed, “Father! I have failed you; spare me and give me the means to kill this insect!”
Kari stood and spoke, but it was not her voice that came forth, and the thoughts behind the words were not her own. She hissed, fixed the sylinth with a glare, and then let forth a raspy chuckle. “Your father has no power here, snake,” she said sibilantly. “For harming my people, your punishment is death, and there shall be no escape for you. This instrument of the gods has been given over to me, and I will drink blessed wine in celebration as she destroys you.”
“What is this?” Ressallk bellowed.
Kari shook her head lightly as whatever presence had taken hold of her to speak gently released her, and she felt a tingle in her mind that manifested as a pat on the shoulder. “I think Sakkrass wants you dead,” she said quietly, and she began to stalk toward her enemy.
“Who is Sakkrass?” the demon demanded. It backed away and held up the
single end of the ruined spear in its left hand.
“The god of the czarikk – the people whose eggs you smashed like a coward,” she said. “You’re pathetic. Is there a spine in that rancid body of yours, or can you only kill children to satisfy your father?” The demon hissed in anger, and Kari continued to stalk toward it, even when it coiled its tail beneath it. “I told you you’d pay for killing the czarikk children. Besides failing your father, you’ve made him a target for the anger of several gods.”
Kari leaned backward, braced herself with one leg, and brought her blades up to catch the sylinth’s head between them as it sprang to bite her once more. Its one remaining eye widened when she pushed back against it, and before that single eye could blink, Kari severed its head. She closed her eyes and turned away as she was sprayed with a blast of foul blood, and she quick-stepped away from the thrashing headless corpse. Kari wiped the blood from her eyes and then pushed her matted hair back to keep it from dripping onto her face, and she watched the demon’s death throes until they slowed and came to a stop.
Once the adrenaline drained from her blood, a heat passed through Kari’s belly and into her chest. She fell to her knees in sudden agony and wondered if she’d inadvertently swallowed even a drop of the creature’s foul blood. She felt as though she’d been poisoned, and she forced herself to her feet and stumbled out of the foul-smelling cave. She staggered desperately toward the stream outside and crashed into the mud. She tried to dip her snout into the stream to take a few quick sips of the cold liquid, but before she could draw in even a mouthful, she curled up into a ball and vomited. She dry heaved twice immediately afterward, so she splashed water onto her face, trying to get the demon’s blood off of her.
Kari vomited again and desperation overtook her as she felt the heat passing from her chest and belly into her arms and legs. It was as though she were burning from the inside out and she nearly cried out for help, but she knew that there would be no one to answer: Makauric was far from the cave and Erik was unconscious. She gritted her teeth in determination and dragged herself halfway into the stream, and at last she forced several mouthfuls of water down her throat. It did nothing to quell the heat that burned at her core, but it didn’t come right back up, either. She took several more sips of the water and dragged herself back out of the stream, where she lay down on its uncomfortable rocky shore and closed her eyes. The heat finally dissipated when it reached her fingers and toes, and her eyes snapped back open and she lifted her head to look around. She was thankful to find that she was not lying in a golden field in her deity’s realm or anything of the sort: she was quite alive and well, and found the strength already returned to her body. She stood up and took off her breastplate, and when she lifted her padded shirt she saw that her lord’s symbol was no longer upon her chest.
