“Well?” Jubilee said, scooting closer to him.
“Be patient,” Fogle said. His wrists were burning with a fire-like sensation. The fire was burning away at his bonds. He fixed his eyes on Brak. The huge warrior’s dripping spear was broken in half. With half in each hand, he impaled one man right after the other. Howling in triumphant rage, Brak held the bloody sticks up.
Out of nowhere, Gondoon Stoneskin, bigger and broader than Brak, stormed over the landscape.
Brak charged with spear heads lowered.
They clashed.
The spears snapped like twigs.
The pair of titans hammered at each other with thunderous blows.
The ogre wrestled Brak down to the ground and started pounding away.
Fogle could feel every jarring blow.
How does Brak hurt an ogre named Stoneskin?
CHAPTER 15
Trinos was down on the floor clutching her gut. The radiant woman’s pain-filled face said it all. Game over.
Do something, Rat. Do something!
Melegal’s fluid limbs were frozen. His tongue clove to the roof of his mouth. In all of his life he’d never witnessed a display of power such as this.
The entire room ebbed. The building’s frame trembled on Trinos and Scorch’s every syllable. Their speech went through the skin and into the marrow.
With effort, Melegal’s hand fell on his double handled dagger.
“Oh, how I’m going to delight in this,” Scorch said to Trinos. With a mere motion of his hand, he twisted the dazzling blade inside her gut.
She let out a cry. “Aaagghh!”
“Hurts, doesn’t it?”
Finally, Melegal eased his blade out. It was instinct more than anything else.
Desperation. I don’t think this blade will even prick his skin. Don’t be a fool, Melegal. Perhaps you should align yourself with him? Pah, and have more needles stuck in my eye? This bastard has to go.
His grey eyes slid over to Venir.
The warrior stood like a statue, his face an angry grimace. The great blade Brool halted in full swing. Sweat beaded and dripped from Venir’s monstrous limbs. His great figure moved a little. The eyelets on the helmet radiated with a terrifying darkness.
“Mercy? How is this for Mercy?” Scorch’s hand lit up with a tremendous fire and blasted into Trinos. The mystic attack drove her body deep into the floor. Scorch poured it on, second after second. The hole in the floor burst into strange flames and started to smoke. “Mercy! Mercy! Mercy!” Scorch cried out. “Mercy is for the weak!”
In the chaos, Melegal’s keen ears picked up the garbled cry of Trinos. Something inside him came to life. A well of bravery ushered forth. As he focused on what he needed to do, the cap started to tingle. The seconds slowed. Things clicked into place. The thief couldn’t hear his own thoughts anymore. He envisioned himself invisible. Focused on the sudden idea that came to mind.
Let’s do it, Rat!
Like a silvery cat, he sprung across the broken boards and bore down on Scorch’s exposed back. Dagger poised to strike, he summoned charges from Sefron’s ring. With two hands on the pommel, Melegal took aim and jabbed the blade with all his might. The charged blade sliced through the skin and slid in-between the neck bones.
Scorch jolted and flopped to the floor. The fires in his hands extinguished.
Gaping, Melegal backpedaled.
Scorch wasn’t moving.
It worked! I did it!
Scorch moved.
Melegal’s heart skipped a beat.
The omnipotent being rose to his feet, turned, and faced Melegal. He gave Melegal a look of disdain Melegal would never forget. With the blade tip still sticking out of the front of his chest, Scorch said in a scratchy voice, “I always knew you’d be a pain in the neck.” Reaching behind his back, he jerked the dagger free.
Melegal tried to back away. “What?” He glanced down. His feet were frozen to the boards. Tingling, his head snapped up.
Striking faster than a cobra, Scorch impaled him.
Glitch!
***
Venir’s reddened eyes darted all around. Trinos was being pummeled one blast after the other. Helm started to throb. It moaned inside his mind. Endless energy coursed through his limbs that strained and groaned.
Move! Blast my skin! Move!
With titanic effort and everything heaving inside, his knees began to bend. Brool, warm and eager in his white knuckled hands, beckoned to slice. To slaughter. To destroy. The blade started to move.
Scorch’s torrent of power came to an abrupt stop. His jaw dropped. His head snapped back with wide-eyed horror.
Venir caught sight of Melegal. Somehow the rogue had managed to ram a dagger into Scorch’s back. Venir’s mind let out a triumphant cry.
Yes! You dirty rat!
Helm still throbbed. Danger.
Venir felt the hold on his body weaken and took an exhilarating step forward with his axe half swinging. His limbs seized up again.
Bish!
Scorch rose with a tired, aggravated, and evil sneer on his face.
Venir could feel the man’s rage.
Run, Melegal, Run!
Striking quicker than an arrow’s flight, Scorch buried the dagger hilt deep in Melegal’s chest.
The thief collapsed, bleeding out on what was left of the floor.
Venir’s jaw became unhinged. “Nooooo!” Powered by the armament, his massive frame busted out of his unseen bonds. His steps were slow. Agonizing.
Scorch turned to face him. “Impressive.” The sound in his voice was rough. The hole in his body sealed up. He cleared his throat. “Much better. Now—”
Venir still moved, straining against an invisible pool, thick like molasses.
“It’s striking that you are still moving. Interesting. You must be the one the underlings fear so much. It seems your armament gives you a tactical advantage.” He slid out of Venir’s path and pushed Brool’s point away. “One can’t be too careful.”
Muscles bulging and popping, Venir kept charging through the force. In his mind, Helm screamed for vengeance.
“Hmmm, seems that it would be best if I removed from you this mystical vesture.” Scorch lifted a brow. The lines in his forehead creased.
The armament remained. Its power coursed through Venir’s mind like a raging river.
Scorch threw his arms up. “Impossible! It has a will of its own!” His face beaded in sweat. Worry filled his eyes. Desperately, he searched all around. “Ah!” He marched over to where the mystic sack lay and picked it up. He eyed it. “How clever. Such well-concealed power. And if I can’t control it, I must destroy it.”
CHAPTER 16
The City of Bone. A gemstone of coal in the world of Bish. Floating high above its great stony walls, Sinway chuckled. Below his robes and feet was nothing but mayhem. Carnage. Sheer terror. Their screams were delightful. Tingling to his ears.
“Oh how much I enjoy it.”
He gazed down at the hordes of people on the other side of the wall. Their decrepit ranks were dwindling now. At one time they had come to Bone to find refuge from the underlings sowing discord throughout the outlands. Now that enemy was within. Master Sinway clutched his fist.
“I relish it!”
He floated downward and landed on one of the parapet walls.
Underling warriors, dark haired and bright-eyed, took a knee. Many were tattooed with skin carvings. Others, pierced with bone and strange shaped metal. All fierce, cruel, and loyal to the end.
Sinway let out a chit.
The underlings got back to work. They cranked back a small catapult then loaded a human man’s body into the scoop. They covered him with pitch, set him on fire, and launched him head over heels into the crowds gathered below. The body smacked full force into a man riding a horse. The underlings burst out in chitters and loaded another body into the scoop.
On the ramps, bodies of men, women, and children were being hauled up in carts
and wheelbarrows. Sinway had ordered a hundred deaths a day until he said stop. He wanted Bone devastated. Its population of men and women exterminated. Bone was his. Now and forever.
A ruby-eyed commander in a tunic of black leather approached. He saluted. “Master Sinway, are you pleased?”
“No. I see bodies flying, but I don’t hear any screams.” He narrowed his iron eyes on the commander. “Bind them. Burn them. Launch them alive.”
***
Elypsa led the way through a narrow series of caved illuminated by the soft blue glow of the underlight.
Master Sidebor, glad to be in a decent set of robes and shoes, followed behind her. No one else was with them. Not even the Vicious, to his surprise. And they were far, far away from Sinway castle.
“At some point are you going to tell me where we are going?” He didn’t want to admit that he didn’t know where he was, not that it mattered. The Underland wasn’t a place where underlings ever got lost. The caves and caverns were endless, however.
“Feeling anxious?” She had a sultry sway to her walk. Graceful. Erotic. Dangerous. Though it covered her body in dark leather and underling chain, the ensemble only enhanced her perfect features. Two fine blades hung on her hips. Throwing knives were strapped crisscross over her back. And her boots had a narrow heel on them. “I think you are. Maybe it’s because you are so old?”
“Ancient is more like it.” Sidebor didn’t like walking, but Elypsa had insisted he do it so that they didn’t draw attention to themselves. “My older body was bigger and better, but this one seems to be doing fine.”
“Yes.” She came to a stop and faced him. She put her hands on his neck. “I want to know more about that. Master Sinway has told me very little.” She played with his ear. “Tell me.”
Sidebor’s black blood stirred. He placed his hands on her splendid hips and gently pulled her into him. With a dry throat, he said, “It’s hardly uncommon that underlings change bodies. At least in my day it wasn’t.”
She pushed her perfect breasts into him and smiled into his eyes. “I know there’s more to it than that. I want to know everything.”
“Then you’ll have to keep working at it.” He didn’t know if she knew anything about Scorch or not, but he suspected she knew something. Sinway had tipped her off, and it was eating at her. He slid his hand over her rump. “But you look like a good worker.”
“Oh, I’m a wondrous worker.” She clutched a handful of his hair and squeezed it tight. “My hard work always gets me what I want.”
His good eye bore into hers. “And what exactly do you want?”
She pushed him away and started walking again.
Sidebor played along. “So you don’t want to tell me what you want. I see.”
“Well, what do you want?” she asked.
“At some point, you,” he said, pushing his long black hair back. “Other than that, well, I’m not so sure how to talk about it. Sometimes ambitions can change.”
“We are conquering the outlands. The City of Bone is ours. Does that not excite you?”
Sidebor rubbed his chin. In centuries past there’d been nothing else that he lived for. He had been there, in Bone, when he was young. The underlings had controlled it once that he knew of. He always wanted it back. But now all of that had changed. His encounter with Scorch had changed his thoughts. Scorch the meddler had exposed him to a power he never dreamed of. He’d slipped into the meddler’s mind. His discovery, almost accidental, had unleashed a secret. A mind that could build entire worlds. Now, everything he’d ever wanted seemed so small. “Seeing you is all the excitement I need.”
“Hah. A flatterer. That’s so atypical of a Master Underling and well beneath a Lord.” She stopped in her tracks, turned, and drew her swords. “I suspect that your life might not be worth keeping around after all.”
CHAPTER 17
Wracked with pain, Trinos fought to keep it together. Scorch was killing her, blow after blow. That devastating stab wound to her belly had almost done her in. She’d never felt anything like that before. Whenever he twisted the knife, the excruciating pain made her want to escape life into death.
Somehow she still held up. Something inside her wouldn’t give in. She still wanted to fight. Not just for herself but for everyone on Bish.
I will not falter!
She ripped the knife from her belly and drew back to strike.
That was when Scorch pounded her again. Through the planks. Into the dust of the earth. Burying her in a grave, his attack was unrelenting as the suns. It tore at her mortal fabric. Then it stopped.
Her charred body smelled of burnt hair and skin. The air around her suddenly cooled. Icy. Painful. But she lived. Would she live to fight another day was the question. Something nudged her. She rolled over on her side and found herself facing the large orb eye of Eep. Like a bird, he cocked his head from side to side.
“Mistress, what is your ordersss?” said the imp with a busted wing dangling from his back.
Looking at the charred flesh on her hands, she groaned. She had a plan. She needed to hang in there. Stick with it. But she wanted to run. Hide. Scorch would never find her if she didn’t want him to.
“Mistress?”
“Eep, what do you want to do?”
“Destroy.”
A grim smile formed on her cracked and busted lips. Something the mortals said came to mind. Fight or Die. Sifting through the dirt that half covered her, she found Scorch’s star-bladed knife. She wrapped her trembling fingers around it. “Then what are you waiting for, Eep? Destroy Scorch!”
Eep flashed all of his razor sharp teeth and said, “As you wish!” Blink!
The commotion above got her moving. She crawled out of the dirt and raised up above the planks. The imp was striking Scorch from all directions. Blinking in and out. Appearing and disappearing. Claws lashing out. He was a pest. A hive of bees.
Roaring with fury, “Be gone!” Scorch snared Eep by the neck. The imp’s clawed feet tore through his skin and robes. Scorch’s hands flared with white hot fire.
Eep let out an ear-splitting screech. “Eeeeeeeeep!” His rough skin started to smoke and bubble. Chunks of skin peeled off and drifted away like burning embers. The imp let out one final cry. “Eeep!” And then poof! He exploded into ashes.
Trinos snaked out of the hole and struck Scorch in the heart.
The ash-covered man looked down at her with agony in his eyes. “If it didn’t kill you, why would you think it would kill me?”
“I wasn’t trying to kill you,” she said from her knees. “I was trying to distract you.”
“Really, from what?”
Slice!
Brool’s blade tore Scorch’s head from his shoulders. The mammoth man, Venir, kicked Scorch’s body to the floor and started hacking away with fury.
Chop! Chop! Chop! Chop! Chop!
Legs and arms were separated from Scorch’s body.
His head, somehow, had rolled up on the neck and started speaking. “Stop, you brute! Stop!”
Venir stormed toward the head.
Rays of light blasted from Scorch’s eyes. On swift feet, Venir leapt over the blast and came down spike first with his axe. He stabbed Scorch’s skull to the floor.
Thoom!
A tremendous gust of wind knocked everyone over.
Trinos slammed into a wall. Blinking, she started wiping the dust from her eyes.
Venir approached. The fierce warrior was covered in blood and grit. He took Trinos by the elbow and lifted her to her feet.
“What are you doing?” Trinos asked.
He half-dragged her across the shattered room.
Scorch’s head still had the axe stuck in it. All of the skin was gone from the bone. Only the skull remained.
Venir stopped in front of his friend, Melegal. The frail man’s chest was covered in blood. No life seemed to be in him.
“Fix him,” Venir ordered.
“I have little power left in me,” she sa
id.
He gave her a stiff nudge. “Then it will have to do.”
She took a knee and laid her hands on Melegal’s belly. The wound was deep. Fatal. Time was quickly running out. She summoned all that she had left. Her hands glowed. His wound started to stitch up. She removed her bloody hands and gasped. “Sorry, that’s all I have left.”
Melegal wasn’t moving.
“It’s up to him now,” she said, “as to whether he wants to live or not.”
Kam, Joline, and Jasper rushed inside. “What happened?” Kam said. She was holding Erin tight.
“It is over.”
Jasper’s eyes landed on Melegal. “Nooooo!”
CHAPTER 18
Jab! Stab! Jab!
The underlings filled Georgio with holes.
He screamed. “Aieyyee!” Being a regener didn’t mean he didn’t feel pain, and nothing hurt more than steel hitting bone.
The underlings were on him like rabid hounds. Unrelenting. Hungry.
Georgio wrestled one down and squeezed his fingers into its neck until he busted its windpipe.
The underling that was latched onto his back chittered.
These fierce little men are like ticks.
Georgio found a loose dagger on the ground and jabbed the one on his back in the eye. Puffing for breath, blood charged by battle, he felt another one stabbing his back. He reached back, fingers clutching.
A sharp blade bit his fingers.
“Ow! Blast you, fiend! I’ll show you!” He jumped up and flopped all of his weight on his back.
Crunch!
A gust of wind burst from the underling’s lips. Its grip loosened.
Georgio wrestled out of its hold, turned, and stabbed it in the leg.
It screamed. Its dark red eyes burned with rage.
Georgio grabbed its ankle, jerked it toward him, and started stabbing. “How’s that feel?” Glitch! “Huh?” Glitch! “How does that feel?” Glitch!
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