02 - Lords of Destruction

by James Silke - (ebook by Undead)

The light was not coming from behind the girl. It moved across the small stage as she moved, not following her, but with her. And there was only one answer for this. The white light was pouring forth from her soul, radiating from her body, shooting forth from the naked portions of her flesh.

  The sharkman’s body shook with a searing jolt of electric pain, then the feeding frenzy balled inside his two bellies like fists, and thrust him forward, spreading his jaws wide. His human mind was gone. Primordial instinct had taken control, and he dove forward, vaulting through the air like a great white shark. He crashed through a cage, dropping his sword, and slammed into a group of tethered horses, scattering them.

  When he got back to his feet, the music had stopped and the slavers had jumped to their feet, parting in front of him. But the white light still stood on the auction block. It streaked forth from a small, dark-haired girl with eyes wide and mouth hanging open. There was the movement of a figure on the roof of the wagon behind her, but the light made it indistinguishable.

  Baskt found his sword and marched for the stage, with the slavers backing away on all sides.

  A crossbow bolt screamed in the air and nailed the sharkman in the left shoulder, half turning him. But he kept moving. He did not feel that kind of pain. He never had.

  Without looking at it, he ripped the bolt out and tossed it aside with the plate of living armor that came with it. He leapt onto the stone auction block facing the girl, and a young man jumped down from the roof of the wagon. He landed gracefully, and stood between Baskt and the girl with a sword in his hand. Rage blotted his face, and the light coming from the girl glowed like a halo around him as he charged.

  Baskt caught the young man’s striking blade with his sheathed sword and turned it. But it came back again, spinning on its own axis with more skill than the sharkman had expected. He fended it off, then slapped it with the sheath, and the blade spun out of his attacker’s hand. A scream came from the girl.

  Enjoying it now, Baskt stepped in and kicked, driving his foot into the gut of the slight body. The young man flew backward with a grunting gasp, hit the girl and drove her back against the wagon. She half screamed, and gasped. His lithe body tumbled forward, fell to the auction block on its hands and knees.

  Baskt kicked the seemingly inert body aside, but as he did, the young man’s arms took hold of his leg and tried to throw him. Baskt staggered two steps and drove his fist into the young man’s back. There was a gush of air, another scream from the girl, and the young man sank facedown. Baskt raised a foot to crush his head, and the girl leapt on him.

  Baskt caught her by the shoulder, shook her until her fight was gone, then set her down. He kicked the unconscious young man off the block, then sniffed the girl, making certain that the scent of blood came from her. It was within the light, just as Tiyy had said it would be.

  He laughed insanely, took hold of her by the throat and thigh and held her high over his head, shaking her whimpering body. “It’s her! It’s her! I’ve found the bitch!”

  Surprised shock, then disappointment creased the slavers’ faces. They drew together, chattering among themselves with consternation and disbelief.

  Baskt howled with delight and dropped the girl back on the block in an upright position. She staggered under the impact, and he gave her a poke in the ribs that made her gasp with pain.

  “You gave me a lot of trouble, slut,” he said, “and you’re going to pay in kind for it!”

  He poked her again, making her double up and hold her stomach, gasping. Suddenly she pivoted toward the door of the wagon, and his arm slashed at her, as fluid as the tail of a shark. The flat of his hand caught her flush on the side of the head. It was a toying blow. But his blood was up, so it was much harder than he had anticipated. She flew sideways, hit the auction block with a pained grunt and rolled off the edge out of sight. All he could see was her radiating light rising behind the rim of the block. Then she reappeared, crawling on all fours amid a flurry of white light. She got about five feet, then collapsed, gasping.

  Baskt started toward her, and again thunder rolled through the hot desert sky. Lightning flashed. He hesitated, his eyes on the dark cloud to the south. It had passed over the mountains, and its misted edges were reaching for En Sakalda. More thunder ripped from its dark, heavy body, and lightning cut through it, striking at the ground. Then the cloud covered the sun, and the sharkman felt cool relief as a shadow moved over him.

  He unconsciously touched the scabbed armor plates at his shoulder, then strode for the girl, and a darkness blotted out her light. It was made by a man holding a large axe, a Barbarian wearing nothing more than a loincloth and his pride. He was nearly as big as Baskt, and it pleased the sharkman almost as much as the prospect of rain.

  The torturous desert had finally provided him with a worthy distraction.

  Twenty-Seven

  THE WILD PLACE

  Gath, crouching below the auction block, stared up into the sharkman’s cold death eyes and snarled. His muscles swelled, and his burnished flesh pulled over bone and cartilage. Every sinew and nerve told him that he finally stood at the threshold of that world he searched for, and that Baskt held the key.

  A smile gathered on his face, surfacing as naturally and inevitably as blood rising in a new wound. It was raucous and untamed, and he realized that there was humor lurking in this world he hungered for. But no mercy, no kindness, no sentiment and no glory, honor or justice. Here the only redemption was the laughter of the strong.

  He laughed, low in his throat, and ground his booted feet into the soil, holding the earth between his legs as instinctively as the wings of the hawk hold the wind. His arms hung beside him, loose and dangerous, and his hand held his axe with the same assurance as his arm carried the hand.

  There was suddenly no hurry. They were sharing that momentary, menacing truce that rises between beasts of prey when they confront each other.

  He lowered his weight to one knee and reached back blindly for Robin, keeping his eyes on the center of Baskt’s balance. Feeling her warm bare arm, and her body stirring under it, he asked, “Are you hurt?”

  “No,” she said breathlessly, “it’s nothing.” He felt her small hands surround his biceps and tug on it as she pulled herself to her knees. Her breath was hot on his naked shoulder. “Why… why is he here? How did he know?”

  “I don’t know,” Gath said, still watching the sharkman. “It does not matter now. Go to Brown John. Quickly!”

  “All right,” she said. But her hands hesitated, and one touched the hair of his unprotected head. “But…”

  “Go,” he interrupted harshly. “I cannot risk wearing it.”

  Her fingers trembled against his arm, telling him she knew he took the risk for her, and he felt her lips press into his shoulder. Then they were gone, and the sound of her bare feet danced through the silence. He rose slowly, his eyes and senses measuring the fighting ground, the direction of the sunlight, the bystanders.

  The slavers had backed away from the auction block to avoid any bit of gore accidentally thrown up by the impending battle, but not so far that they might miss it. The bat soldiers had come down from their rocks and were perched on nearby boulders with their furry heads just above the smoky drifts. Brown John had carried the unconscious bleeding Jakar to the wagon, and Robin now joined him there, helping the bukko load him aboard.

  Gath sensed Cobra standing beside his stallion behind him, then he heard her.

  “I’m here,” she said, a ring of desperation in her voice that was almost childishly afraid. “I have the helmet.”

  He shook his head, once, telling her he did not want it. She pleaded, “You must.”

  By way of reply, he took one stride forward and jumped onto the auction block, landing about ten feet away from the demon spawn. The sharkman betrayed no reaction.

  Gath’s body was cocked for balance but relaxed. That primordial patience which is the immaculate grace of the hunting animal was flowing through his bloo
d. But he saw no patience in Baskt’s eyes, only bravado.

  The creature, with noisy growling, two-handed the hilt of his broadsword, whipping it sideways, and the sheath flew off flamboyantly, clattering against the side of the wagon. Before it had time to land on the auction block, he rushed forward, delivering successive overhand blows.

  Gath deftly deflected both with the blade of his axe, and his eyes turned red with inner fire, drawing excited gasps of exclamation from the onlookers.

  Gath did not hear them. He was at work, charging Baskt with his hands spread wide at the extremities of the axe handle, holding it horizontally like a quarterstaff. The handle took Baskt across the chest and drove him against the side of the wagon. Both demon and wagon groaned in complaint, and the sounds encouraged Gath. Applying pressure, he slowly forced the sharp blade of the axe toward the sharkman’s shoulder.

  Suddenly the demon spawn’s body convulsed, like a whip of solid muscle. The spasm culminated at his chest, which acted like a hammer, and drove the axe handle back into Gath’s throat. The impact sent the Barbarian staggering backward, gagging for air.

  Baskt followed not far behind, leading with his face in the manner of a shark, jaws agape, and raising his sword high over his head.

  Gath dropped to a knee, wheezing and clinging to his axe, and saw armored legs driving for him. Staying low, he instinctively shortened his grip on the axe and dove forward, turning sideways in mid-air. His hip took out one leg, his elbow the other. Baskt flew forward over the Barbarian’s body. Gath’s hip hit the stone block, and he thrust his axe up at the demon’s descending belly.

  Baskt twisted fluidly in mid-air, like a fish in water, writhing away from the blow. The axe sliced across his belly armor, removed several plates, leaving smears of blood across his chest, and continued harmlessly into the air.

  When Gath rolled upright, Baskt was on his feet facing him. His heaving belly had already stopped bleeding, and the bluish-white sheen of new growth was rising where the armor plates had been, replacing them.

  There were hoots of approval and grim laughter among the slavers, and groans came from Gath’s comrades.

  Gath considered briefly the fact that the demon’s armor replaced itself, giving it the respect it deserved, then began a search for the Lord of Destruction’s weakness. He worked the sharkman around until a shaft of sunlight penetrating the gathering clouds was in his eyes, and tinted membrane descended from the demon spawn’s lids, to cut the glare. No advantage there. Gath then retreated until Baskt was working with the side of the wagon on his right. It should have cramped his right-handed swing. But Baskt took no notice of the wagon’s presence, his sword cutting through the wood as if it were butter. He tried other tactics, but the sharkman was oblivious to all of them, and Gath went on the defensive.

  As he blocked and dodged and ducked, his blood began to boil in his veins, and the red glow in his eyes grew brighter and brighter. Pain began to burn his flesh inside out. It ate into his brain, but brought no new tactic to mind, only rage and more pain.

  They continued to work.

  Sparks showered their bodies as axe and sword met solidly. High-pitched tearing howls rent the desert when they sheared across flesh. Gath became drenched in sweat, and it formed puddles in the depressions of the hard stone auction block. Baskt began to fume at knee joints and elbows, and an oily slime surfaced on his fleshlike armor. Its putrid stench of dead fish mixed with the drifting smoke hanging over the camp, and stung Gath’s nostrils and eyes.

  They worked some more, until Gath’s head hung low over his swarthy body. His pride was squirming and swelling in his gut. Then it spilled out, like a contagion. It spread into muscle and bone and to the very ends of his skin and hair, affecting how he stood and moved. It did not straighten him, as normal pride would. It bent him low, like the proud panther. It seared through nerve and brain and blood, and keyed itself to the same guttural pitch of the howl that ripped out of his mouth.

  He charged inside the swing of Baskt’s sword, and again caught him across the chest, holding his axe handle like a quarterstaff, and drove him back against the side of the wagon. The demon crashed into the splintered wood, and his upper body crushed through it into the interior of the wagon. Then his fluid body once more convulsed like a whip.

  Gath anticipated the serpentine blow. He let go of the axe handle just as the demon’s chest was about to hammer him, and grabbed Baskt’s throat, driving the fingers of both hands under the living neck guard of his helmet. When the blow came, Gath grunted painfully and flew backward, his arms extending. But his fingers, half buried in the sharkman’s meat, hung on, and Baskt came flying after him.

  Gath hit the stone block with his naked back. The blade of the axe, which had dropped between them, turned on impact and caught against a ridge, momentarily standing upright with the cutting edge exposed. It sheared through Baskt’s shoulder armor and penetrated the socket before being wrenched free. The demon dropped his sword, but Gath saw no reaction in his death eyes. This Lord of Destruction felt no pain.

  Baskt lay on top of Gath. His upper jaw was raised and protruding, as if it were not attached to his skull. Gath held it off with both hands squeezing Baskt’s throat, and the jaws snapped in front of the Barbarian’s eyes. Two rows of saw-toothed teeth stood upright in the lower jaw as it swept up to meet the upper. They collided with enough force to remove a forty-pound bite of castle wall, but only fed on strands of stray black hair.

  Gath, still holding on with both hands, rolled across the stone block, trying to kick the demon off. But Baskt liked it where he was, and stayed. Still rolling, one of Gath’s hands dove for his knife. Its fingers closed on the hilt, and Baskt changed tactics. He wrapped his arms around Gath, pinning the hand between their bodies, and began to convulse, shaking and snapping.

  The spiky protuberances on the sharkman’s armor, like hundreds of small teeth, raked the Barbarian’s arms, chest and legs. Pain seared into flesh and spine. He began to roll in his own blood, and the moisture sloshed over his pinned arm, making it slippery. He pulled hard on the knife, and the blade came out of its sheath. Gath turned it as they rolled, and used the sharkman’s convulsing body to help him drive the blade deep into the living belly armor.

  Feeling no pain, the demon spawn continued to spasm, and the blade drove in repeatedly. Blood drained from the wounds, then suddenly erupted in fountains, and they rolled in that. Locked together. Howling.

  The onlookers stared open-mouthed, stunned.

  It was at that moment that Gath felt a surge of satisfaction shoot through him, a sense of fulfillment that spilled over him, coming from all directions. He was immersed in battle; at the core of the chaos and pain and blood and howling, and he felt a kinship with this territory as he had felt with no other. Not in the lair of the wolf, not in the rain forest at the dark of midnight, not marching at the head of a tramping army. Here death was the only escape, and the only release. He had found the world he searched for. It was that wild place at the center of a battle to the death, and he was home.

  Thunder rolled in the sky above. The ground below shook. Darkness blotted out the sky. The sounds of scurrying men and snorting frightened camels and horses erupted nearby, and a whimpering cry of dread fear. Cobra’s. Then cold wetness pummeled Gath’s struggling back and legs. Rain. A sudden desert torrent was descending from dark clouds overhead, and its heavy drops filled the air, blurring all vision.

  Baskt, growling with cold satisfaction, and seeming to take strength from the downpour, shook with renewed effort, stronger and stronger. The pain of the hundreds of biting teeth numbed Gath’s mind. His grip weakened, and his knife was bludgeoned from his hand by the Lord of Destruction’s twisting hip. It tumbled across the stone and splashed in a puddle of diluted blood.

  Baskt glanced at it triumphantly, and their bodies slipped slightly apart. Gath thrashed for release, tearing at the sharkman’s arm, and it came out of the shoulder socket. Gath discarded the lifeless arm unconsc
iously, kicked free and rolled across the stone, jumping to his feet. Rain pelted his bloody hide and washed him clean in seconds. But fresh blood came as soon as the old was washed away, and he teetered weakly in place, his strength ebbing.

  Through the sheet of rain, Gath could barely make out Baskt kneeling about five feet away. His guts were streaming from his stomach, and he was matter-of-factly stuffing them back inside. The fact that he now had only one arm and hand made the work slow.

  Gath started for him bare-handed. His knee gave way, and he dropped onto all fours. He pushed up, then staggered backward. He kept at it, fell off the auction block and splashed in a puddle at its base. He flung himself over onto his knees, head low and wary. Exhausted. Gasping. The blinding rain obliterated everything beyond three feet. Its roaring splatter covered all sound.

  A softness pressed into his back. The body of a woman. It contrasted so sharply with the world he now inhabited that the pleasure was sublime, enervating. He dizzied at it. Then he heard a grunt of hard effort, as if someone were lifting a weighty object, and Cobra’s arms and upper body fell heavily against his back. He knew her curves and scent. She was heaving something toward his head. He reached up, felt the rim of the homed helmet just as it touched his hair, and stopped it there.

  “You must,” she begged. “He’s too strong. He’s getting back up.”

  Her voice was frantic, suddenly so void of her normal cunning and subterfuge, that it confused him, and he thought for a moment it was Robin behind him instead of Cobra. In that moment he relaxed slightly, and the helmet slid down over his head, imprisoning him.

  He rose instantly, sensing the rush of approaching danger, and darkness and blood hunger boiled through his body. Here within the confines of the helmet was a world beyond the wild place. Here battle held no laughter. The last tie with civilization was broken, and he hungered for the taste of frothing blood on his lips.

  His head snapped up, and directly above him he saw a massive convulsing darkness dropping out of the rain-filled sky. Baskt.