Savage Lands

by Stacey Marie Brown

  “War-wick! War-wick!”

  The man himself strolled into the pit as if it were a sunny afternoon, and he had nowhere to be.

  My attention flickered to the spot in the stands where I had seen him sitting a moment ago, which was now empty. Fuck. This guy really did move like a ghost.

  His fans went ballistic, banging and thumping. The metal under my feet vibrated so violently it rumbled up my spine, wobbling my legs. None of it seemed to faze him. Not taking any notice of the crowd, he rolled his neck and shoulders, stretching as if he had recently woken up from a nap. The giant towered over Warwick, but strangely, it didn’t minimize him at all. Where the giant took up the immediate space around him, Warwick Farkas took up the room, his presence shoving against my skin and down my throat.

  Not an ounce of emotion fluttered over Warwick’s face as he prepared to fight this creature.

  A buzzer sounded through the room, the chants quieted down, and people watched the two men circle each other. The giant swung first, his movements quicker than I figured. Warwick didn’t even try to make a move. Goliaths usually moved slower, making it possible for the Davids to win.

  Not this one. The giant was swift and not at all clumsy with his actions, his large fist grazing Warwick’s head as Warwick dropped to the ground, rolling away and jumping to his feet so smoothly it looked choreographed.

  Warwick’s actions were efficient and controlled. Standing right in front of the beast, he somehow slipped in closer, jabbing the brute in the gut. The giant looked confused, waving his arms around as if he was batting at a fly, allowing Warwick to slip around and kick him in the back of the knees. The giant dropped to the ground, and the crowd sang with brutal enthusiasm.

  The giant roared, his expression pinching with fury. He clamored to his feet, whirling back to Warwick. In a blink, the Wolf was already behind him again, fisting him in the back of his spine.

  Crack!

  His hand ricocheted off bone, and the giant bellowed again. He tumbled to the ground, his back curved in pain.

  “Warwick, we love you,” a woman screamed. For a second, his eyes darted to the stands, stopping on me. Or that’s what it seemed like. I knew there was no way, but the fire in his aqua eyes tore through all the voices, people, and commotion to find mine.

  My gaze dropped to see the giant reach for the stick Rodriguez had left on the ground, still coated in blood and matter, directing it toward his enemy.

  Behind you! For a second, it felt as if I was down in the pit with him, yelling in his ear, but just as quickly it was gone.

  Warwick swung around as though he heard something, but not fast enough. The spear drove deep into his hip.

  Warwick’s form jerked, but he made no noise, his muscles locking down as he tore the harpoon out of his flesh and tossed it to the side as the giant got back up. The giant was in pain, saliva dripping down his chin as he growled at Warwick.

  The Wolf lowered his head in fury, rolling back his shoulders, done playing.

  The giant leaped for him. Warwick dropped, cracking his arm against his knees, bending them the wrong way. With a cry, the beast toppled over, panic and pain on his face as he crashed onto the ground with force. Dirt sprayed up, clotting the air and spewing debris as if a bomb had gone off.

  Warwick leaped onto the man’s back, wrapping his arms and legs around his thick neck.

  Shouts and cheers of excitement thundered through the stands.

  “Blooding! Blooding!”

  The giant rolled, thrashing against Warwick’s hold, whipping them back and forth vehemently, smacking the Wolf against the dirt and slicing gashes into his face. Blood trickled down Warwick’s temple, but like a boa constrictor, the legend coiled up tighter, his jaw locking as he tried to hold the massive man in place.

  “War-wick!” People throughout the arena shouted for him.

  The giant’s bulk twitched and flopped as Warwick tightened his hold even more, crushing his windpipe, snapping his neck. The monster’s body went instantly limp, sagging into Warwick. He held on a few more beats before Warwick released his arm, shimmying out from under the giant’s weight.

  The crowd went insane: jumping, screaming, chanting, and clapping. He stood up, wiping the blood off his face with his arm. He glanced up, and once again, I swore his gaze met mine through the throng of people, way up where I was seated. Unsettling aqua eyes burned up into the stands. It felt like they had the power to part the crowd and land exactly on me, ripping the oxygen from my lungs.

  Then he jerked his head away, spun around, and strolled out of the pit in the same lazy, cocky manner he’d walked in. While Rodriguez fed off the crowd, Warwick seemed ambivalent to them. And they loved him more for it.

  Four guards came in to drag the dead giant away, struggling to move him. It was then I realized Warwick didn’t use a weapon, choosing to kill the monster with his bare hands. The bloody broken spear still lay right where he chucked it.

  He never needed it.

  “Wow,” I muttered to myself in utter awe of this man.

  “Told you.” Tad slowly turned to me, grunting. His back curved farther over, his hand on his hip, a puff of pain coming from him. “You had to see this for yourself.”

  “Yeah.” I inhaled. No one could have described this scene to me in a way that would have prepared me, with its deafening noises, assaulting smells, and violent energy. It was an onslaught of extreme emotions, thrilling and exhausting, which left a trail of acid burning in my stomach and throat.

  A bell rang through the arena, sounding dim compared to the chants around me for the last hour.

  “Curfew.” Tad tilted his head at the sound of the bell. “Better get to your cell. You don’t need any more lashings.” He pointed to my face and exposed bruises, the evidence of my beating.

  With Kek in the lead, the three of us made our way out of the pit and into the hallway.

  “See you tomorrow, little lamb.” Kek winked at me before slipping into a crowd heading down a corridor.

  “I also bid you good night.” Tad hobbled off in another direction, swept up in the throng of people.

  The masses moved me along, bouncing and smashing into me like bumper cars as we all tried to file into the dim tunnel toward our cell level. The crowd thinned as more exited toward their block.

  For that hour, I had forgotten about my aching body and torn flesh. Now exhaustion swallowed me, my eyes aching with the need to sleep, my shoulders heavy from the long, brutal day.

  It was a moment—a stupid lapse in judgment. I had briefly let myself relax. Let my guard down.

  It would be the last time.

  Because when you lowered your defenses, that was when the monsters attacked.

  Chapter 14

  A fist smashed into my skull, and pain sliced across my vertebrae with a blast as my wounded face smacked the floor. My nerves lit up like fireworks as my bones thumped on the rough ground.

  “Bitch!” A boot struck my torso, hitting the bullet wound. I jackknifed into a ball, forcing a groan from my lips. My head swirled with confusion, agony slowing down my thoughts, making it harder to understand what was going on.

  “This kurva is already acting like she owns the place. Thinks her pretty face will get her everything as it did on the outside.” A woman’s voice spoke over me. I twisted my head to see the attacker. The blonde human from the laundry room stood over me, her unpleasant face scrunched with hate. Two other women in gray stood on each side. One was of what I guess to be Japanese descent, stocky with graying black short hair; the other appeared to be of more Slavic origins with weedy light brown hair in a tight braid.

  “You think you’re already a big fish here?” The blonde snarled down at me. “First day and getting in cozy with the Druid and a demon?” She snapped her fingers. “Girls. I think she needs to learn her place, don’t you? Where she is on the totem pole here…where the stanky fish belong.”

  Her two minions nodded in agreement.

  The brunette
minion stepped up, her boot treading over my hand. Cartilage and bones cracked and popped under her weight. A scream bubbled in my throat, but I pinched my lips together, a grunt huffing through my nose. She looked to be in her forties, rough and worn. Leathery. She was very lean from lack of nutrients. Her sagging expression showed she had nothing left and nothing to lose.

  “That’s not how it works here,” the blonde snarled, brutal energy dancing off her. Clearly, she loved the power trip, especially having her backup team. She wanted me to cower. “You earn your place here, fishy, and you have yet to earn anything.”

  “She looks fuckin’ familiar.” The brunette shoved her boot to my neck, leaning over, her lids squinted, trying to figure out where she knew me from. The fear I might be recognized locked up my expressions. Being in Istvan’s world made me very known; images of Caden and me along with Istvan and Rebeka circulated in the society gossip magazines and papers in Leopold Weekly. I hoped with no dress or makeup, far from the elite world, no one would recognize me, not placing the charity princess in the House of Death. But my unique features could be the very thing that outed me. “Doesn’t she?” She peered over at the leader, her voice harsh and coarse.

  “All privileged bitches look the same to me,” Blondie snarled, cracking her boot into my stomach wound again.

  I shoved down the unbelievable pain screaming over every inch of my body. This was the first time anybody had ever successfully snuck up on me. Ever. And it pissed me off that it was this common bitch.

  Suddenly, my injuries, lashings, the fact I had only eaten a slice of bread for dinner, and my blood loss didn’t matter.

  Like Bakos had told us, enemies waited to attack when you were at your weakest. There was no excuse. I let my guard down. My mind circled the scenario, assessing all the places they had me at a disadvantage.

  Use your weakness against them.

  “I don’t need to earn.” My gaze met hers. “I. Take.” I waited a second to let her absorb my intention. My fingers wrapped around the foot on my neck, and I yanked hard. Using the energy of her fall, I swung my legs up and kicked out, my boot cracking against the blonde’s face, flinging her back into the rail.

  “Mio, get her,” the blonde screamed at her Asian friend.

  As I tried to scramble back to my feet, Mio’s stubby leg slammed into my gut, knocking my ass back to the ground with a gush of air. The lean chick leaped back on her feet and rushed me, kicking and scratching at me.

  “You bitch!” I heard the blonde snarl, joining in with her friends.

  Come on, Brex! Get up. I tried to conjure energy from the depths of my soul, knowing I could take these three, but it leaked out of me like a blown tire. The lesion from earlier had torn open again, spilling blood down my side and face. My gunshot wound burned as my skin tugged.

  A kick to the gut curled me over with a cough, my brain shutting down. They continued to beat me until I was coughing blood.

  From a distance, a whistle snapped off the metal, shrilling the air. “Stop!”

  The three paused, looking down the walkway.

  “Enough,” a man’s voice boomed down to us.

  “Grab it,” the blonde hissed to the brunette. She slunk past me into my cell.

  Steady footsteps running down the metal catwalk vibrated beneath me.

  “Come on, Dee.” The blonde motioned to her friend, who was already running away.

  Dee leaped over me, her arms filled with my blanket. The three of them bolted off. My lids fell closed, my body no longer able to fight the pain coursing through me.

  I could hear the guards yell after them, their footsteps stopping when they got to me.

  “Damn. They broke her good.” The sultry voice reminded me of the guard on the front gate when I first arrived, the pretty one who resembled a horse-shifter.

  “Human-on-human crime.” Another one snorted. “Like we give a fuck. Just drag her in.”

  “She looks in need of a healer,” the first man replied. “She came in with a bad injury. Looks like she’s already been whipped and beaten since.”

  “Why do we give a shit? Just a human. One dies, we get ten more,” the second one with a nasal voice huffed. “Just think of it as a test. She makes it through the night, then she’s a survivor. She doesn’t? Oh, well.”

  The sounds of the noisy prison echoed around me, but the first guy kept silent.

  “Such a fuckin’ bleeding heart, Zander,” the second man snarled. “We had to hide for centuries because of humans. They deserve everything they get. Come on, help me drag her in.”

  I was in so much pain it all blended together as they dragged me in.

  “Fuck. They took her blanket too.” Zander’s voice drifted over me softly.

  “Not been a good day for the human. Tomorrow is not lookin’ any better.” Nasal laughter drifted from my cell, but every sound and feeling started to slip through my fingers, my body letting go, wrapping darkness around me. Right as I drifted off, I thought I felt a hand smooth across my temple, words drifting over me like a wisp of wind: “Fight. You need to survive.”

  “Dammit, Bitzy. Stop sticking your fingers up her nose.” A yelled whisper fizzed in my ear, dragging me quickly to consciousness.

  And agony.

  The pain swept in instantly, forcing a groan from my lips before my eyelids even opened. Vomit pooled in my stomach, and I had to suck in slowly to keep it from coming up. I felt no central point of pain. It drenched every cell, every muscle, every nerve. My head pounded, sharp daggers piercing my brain every time my pulse thumped.

  A chirp echoed in the cell, and I willed myself to open my eyes.

  “Don’t bitch at me. You’re the one who woke her up.”

  Opie. My brain clasped on to awareness at the same time it wanted to shut back down and hibernate for months.

  I licked my lips. All moisture had been sucked from my mouth, which tasted like I drank battery acid while something died in there. Forcing my lids open, the face of a brownie and an imp’s two huge eyes took up my entire field of vision. I yelped.

  “It’s a-live!” Opie raised his arms, laughing crazily as if he was acting something out.

  Don’t vomit. Don’t vomit. Cringing, I rolled onto my back, a loud whimper puffing from my lungs.

  A chirp came from the imp.

  “You enjoyed the movie too. Don’t act like you don’t.” Opie sighed, waving his arms at her.

  Chirp.

  “Please, you could not do better,” he replied.

  Chirp.

  “Okay, then go for it. I want to see you do it as well.”

  Chirp.

  “Oh…well…that was pretty good.”

  There was so much talking—so much noise. I curled back into a ball.

  “Clearly not a fan.”

  One eye peeked open at them. Bitzy glowered at me. Raising her hand, she flipped me off.

  “Really, Bitz. Is that necessary? Don’t be sore because she liked my performance better.” He shook his head. “I mean, I am the true artist here.”

  Chirp.

  “I am not a wannabe.”

  “Please,” I grunted, the effort to speak zapping at my strength. “Stop talking.”

  “You really did the first day with gusto, didn’t you, little fish?” Opie stepped back up to me, touching my face with a cloth he held in his hand. Gently, he wiped away the dried blood around my mouth and nose. The whiff of rubbing alcohol bled into my nostrils. “I mean, if you’re going to do something, do it with flair. Am I right?”

  My notice dropped down to the outfit he was wearing. He made a bikini top with steel pot scrubbers and cut leg holes in a pink scouring pad that he wore as briefs.

  “What the hell are you wearing?” I croaked, trying to lift my head, my fingers pressing into my forehead as slowly I sat up.

  “It’s pool day.” His smile lit up his grumpy face.

  Chirp.

  “Okay, fine. It’s my day to scrub dishes in the sink.” He touched
his homemade outfit like Bitzy had burst his pretend bubble. “I enjoy having a little fun with it.”

  A grin inched up my face, but I flinched in pain.

  “Yeah, I wouldn’t smile, blink, move, or even breathe deeply for a bit.” Opie motioned to all of me. “You are a mess, fishy. Looks like you got the advanced new fish orientation. What happened?”

  “Bitches happened.”

  “You just described everyone here. Narrow it down.”

  “Three human bitches.” I rolled my fingers into my temples. “Trying to show me my place in the hierarchy here.”

  “Ahh. Mio, Dee, and Tess.” He nodded. “They love to think of themselves as the leaders of the humans, put anyone new in their place right away.”

  Chirp.

  “I’m sure she fought hard.”

  “What did it say?” I glared at the imp who appeared to be smirking at me.

  “You just became their bitch.”

  “I. Did. Not.”

  “You did lose your blankie to them.” Opie shrugged, nodding to the empty floor.

  Fuck those bitches. They will go down.

  Just not today.

  The harsh morning bell rang through the stacked city, reverberating off the metal like an out-of-tune violin. The doors to our cages slid open.

  Sick to my stomach, exhausted, and in agony, I didn’t want to leave my cell. I simply wanted to sleep the rest of the day. But it would be a victory for them if I didn’t show up. They’d think they broke me. Even three against one, I would not bow to them.

  A guttural cry began in my gut as I used the wall to rise, wrapping my arm around my middle, my bruised ribs protesting every movement. My uniform was spotted with drying blood, dirt, and what looked like vomit, which probably happened in the middle of the night and didn’t remember. I bent over, sucking in gulps of air, slamming my jaw together to keep the tears from spilling down my face.

  Chirp.

  My gaze went to the imp. “What?”

  “She just said you’re a fucking idiot, but hey, I say the show must go on. Good on ya, fishy.” He fisted the air in encouragement.

  Having no energy to fight with an asshole imp, I shut my eyes, conjuring all the strength I could muster. Inhaling, I opened my eyes and took a step toward the door and almost fainted. Grabbing the bars, I watched the flood of prisoners heading to the bathroom, filling up the walkway. Many peered in at me, as though surprised to see me standing. All of them either encouraged or ignored the beating outside the cells the night before.