‘Truly impressive.’ His bony hands applauded. ‘Imagine my shock. I had no idea females could even use nethra, much less to such. . ends.’
‘It’s a curse,’ she repeated, more to herself than to him.
‘Whatever you choose to call it, it’s worthy of the attention of Sheraptus.’ She felt his eyes wander over her, felt his grin grow broader. ‘Other appreciable qualities considered. ’ He thrust his hand towards her like a weapon. ‘So, if you would please rise — our business here is concluded and we must be off.’
He was right, she thought as she looked up. The hall was largely abandoned now, the battle concluded in the moments when she had held her eyes tight and asked questions no one would answer.
Who had emerged victorious, she could not say.
The defeated lay dead in the dozens, stacked in heaps, strewn across the floor, floating listlessly in the pools of salt water. Flakes of ash drifted lazily on the breeze as the pulsating, fleshy sacs still burned like grotesque pyres. There were grunts called out in harsh tongues, iron scraping on stone as the longfaces hurried back to their vessel, leaving the bodies of their comrades where they lay.
Of her own companions, there was no sign.
Not such a bad thing, she reasoned; they wouldn’t have seen what she had just done. They wouldn’t have known she had the power. . the curse to unmake people, to reduce them to nothing. Dreadaeleon’s magic still left ash behind, Gariath left bodies in his wake. Of her foe, there was nothing left: no skin, no bone.
No soul.
She had not the strength to explain it any more, to justify it to them, to whoever Sheraptus was, or to herself. She could not bear to look upon the arm masquerading behind its pink softness, concealing the crimson and gloom. Three times had it emerged, two times it had left nothing, a thousand times had she looked up to the sky and asked why.
And a thousand times, no one had answered.
The male looked up at the sound of a wailing, warbling horn and frowned. ‘The time has come to depart, I’m afraid.’ He scrutinised her through his white eyes. ‘It has been a long day. Frankly, I am not sure you are worth the trouble it would take to bring you along.’ He snapped his fingers, sending a blue electric glow crackling at the tips. ‘Your arm will have to suffice. You can keep the other parts.’
Asper looked up as he levelled the finger at her, watching the sphere of lightning grow. It was not with apathy that she stared, but weariness, relief that came with the grim knowledge that there was only one way to ensure there would never be a fourth time.
The male muttered a word of power. The electricity burst forth with a loud cracking sound. Asper stared at it through eyes with no more tears to shed. The male’s own stare went alight with energy. One more word, she knew, and it would all be over.
That, too, was not such a bad thing.
‘BURN, HERETIC!’
A wall of flame erupted between the two of them. The electric blue faded as the male recoiled, snarling angrily. He turned, more annoyed than anything else, to regard the boy standing at the end of the hissing fire.
Dreadaeleon looked ready to keel over at any moment. His coat hung loosely, tattered in some places, bloodied in others, from a body that appeared shrunken and withered. The veins creeping up from his jawline and the violent quaking that seized his body suggested that whatever damage had been done to him was by his own hand, his magic having eaten at him deeper than any blade.
Asper could muster no excitement at his appearance, nor concern for his frailty. She felt a twinge of scorn, diluted by pity. All this meant was that someone else had to die before her curse could finally be lifted.
‘Ah.’ The male longface smiled at the newcomer with the familiarity of two old friends meeting. ‘I was wondering who that was.’ He glanced at the wall of flame and, with a word and a wave, reduced it to a sizzling black line upon the floor. ‘Decent enough work, really. I was beginning to wonder if any of your breed could use nethra at all.’
Dreadaeleon tilted his head to the side. The male grinned and held up a hand.
‘Apologies. “Magic” is your word for it, I believe.’
‘We have laws for it, too,’ the boy said sharply. ‘There are rules to practice by.’
‘Law. . rule. .’ The longface shrugged. ‘I have not learned those words yet. They sound like weakness to me, though.’ He smiled. ‘I suppose I should not be too surprised, though, since all your language seems to convey varying degrees of that. From my home, we-’
‘Clever,’ Dreadaeleon interrupted, taking a step forwards. ‘I’m less interested in where you came from and more in how you’re still standing.’
‘Ah, after this, you mean?’ He gestured over the burning sacs, the seas of ash. ‘Duty, I suppose someone of your breed might call it. The underscum are in our way. Sheraptus desires them dead and. . well, look. The price one pays for nethra would be a further detriment. Thusly. .’ He snapped his fingers, smiled. ‘We removed it.’
‘Impossible.’
‘We do not know that word, either.’
‘How many of you are there?’ the boy demanded. ‘How many heretics remain?’
‘Perhaps you refer to males, the only ones capable of nethra.’ The longface shrugged. ‘Not so many, but if power were not a rare quality, any thick-of-skull female could do it.’ He glanced sidelong at Asper. ‘Speaking of which, I have business with this one. If you had claims on her arm, you must live with that disappointment.’
‘Arm?’
In any other moment, Asper’s pulse would have risen, mind gone racing for excuses. Now, what did it matter what Dreadaeleon knew? He would be dead. She would follow. Nothing remained to be spoken, nothing remained to resist as the longface took a step forwards.
‘As well as whatever else I can salvage,’ he said, chuckling. ‘An arm is not such an important thing to one who carries no weapons, is it?’ His eyes ran up and down her body hungrily. ‘Particularly when the rest of her can be put to a much more proper use.’
His purple hand extended with the vaguest hint of an excited tremble coursing down his digits. His tongue flicked out, a tiny line of pink sliding across long, white teeth.
‘GET AWAY FROM HER!’ Dreadaeleon’s roar was followed by a racking cough, a shudder in his stance. The longface, if his quirked brow was any indication, seemed less than impressed.
‘This belongs to you? I am sorry in a terrible way, but I must damage your property. I need the arm.’ He waved dismissively. ‘You can have the rest when I am finished.’
‘I said,’ the boy uttered against the hiss of flames, ‘stay away from her.’
At that, Asper’s eyes did go slightly wider. The flames that danced on Dreadaeleon’s outstretched palm were barely stronger than that of a candle, but every moment they burned caused his body to shudder, to tremble. Why, she asked him silently, why don’t you do it? Burn your heretic. Save your laws.
She then saw the longface’s hand, also outstretched, a single finger pointed directly at her. She glanced back to Dreadaeleon. No, she wanted to cry out to him, but had no voice in her raw throat, don’t do it. Not for me, Dread. I want this to happen. . I want-
Dreadaeleon shuddered suddenly. The longface’s grin broadened as the boy shifted slightly, trying to conceal the dark stain that appeared on his lap.
‘Pushed yourself too far, it is apparent.’ The purple man laughed. ‘Is it really worth the shame, pinkling? I am no bloodthirsty female. Step aside, let me do my business, and you may clean yourself in peace. I have no wish to harm a fellow user.’
‘I’m not your fellow.’
‘Whatever laws separate us are as trivial and fleeting as the gods your breed claims to love.’
‘It’s not about laws.’
‘Oh. .’ The longface’s mouth twisted into a frown. ‘All this over a female, then? You do not have many where you come from?’
‘Stop talking about her,’ the boy spat. The sphere of flame growing in his palm bloomed into an orchid of fire. ‘I’m the only one standing in your way. Face me.’
The only one. . Asper let that thought drift into nothingness as the male longface raised his hand, levelled it at Dreadaeleon.
‘Point,’ he said simply, ‘goodbye.’
The longface thrust his hand forwards with a grunt. The air rippled as an invisible force struck Dreadaeleon, his fire extinguished and his frail body sent flying to crash against a pillar. He staggered to his feet, swayed precariously with only a moment to cast a desperate stare in her direction before crashing upon the floor, unmoving, unbreathing.
‘Dread.’ Asper could do no more than whisper, could find no strength. That was going to happen, she knew, he would die before she did, as the only one who had stood in the longface’s way. That was logical.
Why, then, did she want to cry out so much louder?
‘Annoying,’ the male muttered, turning back to her. ‘Perhaps it is worth taking whatever consists of your thoughts to find out what makes you do things like that.’ He flicked his fingers and spoke a word that called flames to his palms. ‘Small steps, I suppose. Arm first. Brain later.’
‘Dread. .’ she whispered again, watching the boy lying motionless in a puddle of salt water.
He could have stayed behind, she knew, he could have crept up on the longface and struck him from behind. If she had died, his laws would have been upheld, his faithlessness upheld. Maybe even proven, she thought.
Instead, he had stood against the longface, weakened as he was. He had died, his pants soiled, face-down upon unsympathetic stones. For what? That he might preserve her? Though he might not have known it, all he had preserved was a curse. And not knowing that, all he had done was give her the few breaths it took for the longface to approach her.
Where was the reason? Where was the logic?
By the time the longface stood over her, all teeth and fire, she had no answer and Dreadaeleon was still dead.
‘Do not think this to be unkind, little pinkling.’ He extended his hand, the fire engulfing it from tip to wrist. ‘It is the way of things, you find, as all others shall. We are netherling. We are Arkklan Kaharn.’ He narrowed his eyes, glowing red. ‘Ours is the right to take.’
There was no cry from her, no protest as he eyed her arm hungrily. She barely had eyes for him and his wicked fire. Her gaze was upon Dreadaeleon, her lips quivering as they sought the words to offer his limp body.
You shouldn’t have bothered, she thought. It’s better this way. . you didn’t have to die, Dread. I did. You shouldn’t have become involved.
‘Forgive me,’ was all she whispered.
All that she heard, however, was the throaty, ragged breath from above. Longface and priestess looked up as one, seeing the massive, red chest that rose and fell with each red-flecked burst of air. They looked up further, past the massive, winged shoulders and into the narrowed, black eyes that stared down contemptuously upon them.
