Shield
Math focused on shifting himself magically to the entrance of the gaping hole the monster had torn in the carriage’s side.
He couldn’t see at first—nearly his undoing, as a blast of icy cold grazed his ear.
“Kaven? What are you … how…” Nuhzar hauled himself upright with effort. “Why are you dressed like a Souna?”
“Really? That’s what you’re worried about, Nuhzar? My outfit?”
Math eased down the tilted floor toward where Alik Nuhzar had strapped himself to a cargo tie-off.
Alik didn’t look great. The armor had done its job, mostly—but the chest plate was gone, ripped clean off. He clutched his gathered cloak to his stomach, where a wide red-black stain had spread.
“Please tell me you’re not holding in your intestines,” Math said.
“Very well,” Nuhzar replied. “I won’t tell you.” He was pale—from blood loss, maybe shock.
“Now I know you’re dying. That’s the second joke you’ve ever made.” Nuhzar looked briefly bemused, which made Math swear.
Nuhzar hadn’t been joking.
Math dropped to his knees beside him in the cramped space. “You closed the wound?”
“You take me for an amateur? There’s internal bleeding.”
“Right…” Math pushed Nuhzar’s hand aside, pulled back the cloak, and lifted Alik’s arming doublet. The Idallik Knight didn’t protest, although Math couldn’t tell if that was because of desperation or just how badly he was injured.
If Math had to guess, he’d say the grimmock’s strike had torn off the breastplate with one claw, while a smaller claw on the same paw had opened a gash from the base of Nuhzar’s rib cage to the top of his opposite hip.
The wound had been closed, but it was still puffy and slick with blood, the surrounding skin bruised and swollen.
Nuhzar’s breathing was shallow and rapid, his skin clammy.
Closing the wound hadn’t necessarily been the best choice—Nuhzar wouldn’t have had time to clean it first. Even setting the internal bleeding aside, there was the looming risk of infection. Still, Math would’ve done the same.
The thing was …
The injury wasn’t all that different from ones he’d healed before—with Kai, or even himself. If anything, it was less severe.
“What are you trying to do?” Nuhzar’s voice was sharp, suspicious—and Math couldn’t blame him. Nuhzar knew exactly what Math should be able to do magically, and this wasn’t it.
“Don’t worry, asshole,” Math said. “If I wanted you dead, all I had to do was ride away.”
“Fuck you.”
Cursing was a bad sign. “I thought we’d established I’m not your type?”
Nuhzar actually laughed—then groaned in pain. “Fuck. I hate you so much.”
“You do? This hasn’t all been an elaborate courtship? Gods, aren’t I embarrassed. Now shut up and let me fix this. We’re running out of time.”
As if on cue, the carriage lurched as the grimmock slammed into its side. Math forced himself to ignore their impending doom and focus on Nuhzar’s injury. Nuhzar, in turn, clenched his teeth to keep from screaming.
A rending, twisting sound tore through the wreckage—coming from the wrong direction. He felt a flicker of Kai’s attention through the bond, thick with warning.
Math lifted his head, only to see the carriage wall shift and open into a doorway. Kaiataris stood on the other side.
“Hurry!” she called. “The beast will realize something is amiss at any moment.”
True enough. Especially if it hunted by scent, not sight—which would explain why blinding it had not worked. It was possible those stalks weren’t eyes at all.
“What—?” Nuhzar protested.
“No time.” Math grabbed his arm and hauled him to his feet. As he shoved Nuhzar toward Kai, he said, “He has internal bleeding. Get him to safety and hide his scent if you can. I’m going to lead the grimmock away.”
He yanked the bloody cloak away from Nuhzar and wrapped it around his arm.
Math half expected Kai to yell at him, to forbid something this reckless. She did not. Her eyes narrowed as she looked at him, and she visibly swallowed, concern bleeding through their link. Then she placed a hand on Nuhzar’s arm.
“If you would be so good, kind sir,” Kai said to the knight, “your steed is eager for a reunion.”
A terrible ripping sound tore through the other side of the carriage.
“Go!” Math shouted.
“You damn fool,” Nuhzar shouted back. “You’ll be killed!”
“Have greater faith in your peers,” Kai murmured—and then they were gone. She had used her magic to transport them away.
She had cut it close. Math had barely registered her disappearance when the splintering gave way to the grimmock crashing through the iced-over boards Nuhzar had conjured.
Up close, the creature was no more appealing than it had been from a distance—just larger, bloodier, and more dangerous. The gore clinging to its muzzle turned Math’s stomach.
Still, Nuhzar hadn’t been wrong. A few weeks ago, this fight would have killed Math without question.
It might still. But at least now, he could fight back.
Math tore splintered wood from the carriage walls and shaped it into a shield just seconds before the grimmock struck. The impact hurled him out of the carriage, but the creature couldn’t follow.
It slammed into the thorned shield with a shriek of pain, then thrashed—too large to squeeze through either opening. It looked like a fox that had wedged its head into a rabbit warren and couldn’t back out.
The shield wouldn’t hold the creature for long, but it kept clawing toward him, still mistaking him for Nuhzar.
Math scrambled to his feet. Between Kai’s talisman and the shield, he was alive and mostly intact—though his arm was numb from the grimmock’s blow. Distantly, the pain echoed back through Kai, muted but horribly real.
“Oltaxath!” he shouted. “Retreat, but stand ready to charge on my command!”
“Look out!” Oltaxath roared in reply.
The grimmock had given up on escaping gracefully. It tore itself free in an explosion of wood and iron, jagged pieces flying in all directions.
Math raised the shield—and noticed it had changed. The vines had thickened, woven tight with flowers and bright green leaves. It looked as fragile as a patch of dandelions, but it had already withstood the creature’s fury and remained pristine.
Math waved the bloodied cloak. “Over here! Come on!”
Then he ran.
Math knew right away he wouldn’t make it. The grimmock was fast—damnably fast. It would reach him before Math reached the sinkhole.
Math twisted, trying to wedge his spring-green shield between himself and the monster.
His whole body jolted as the beast slammed into him. They went over the edge together.
Math heard someone screaming and wasn’t entirely sure it wasn’t him. They didn’t fall far—the sinkhole wasn’t a canyon, just thirty feet deep at most.
Still, the drop gave Math just enough time to grasp how much trouble he was in: he was going to hit the ground with the grimmock landing on top of him unless he did something.
Math slammed into the muddy ground at the bottom of the sinkhole; above him, the grimmock jerked back as vines and branches wrapped around it like a net. The stems constricted, dragging the shrieking beast toward the lip of the hole.
It fought—Tri-Mother, it fought—tearing free from vine after vine, root after root. Claws shredded, muscles strained, but Math kept lashing it, pulling it inch by inch toward the jagged metal beams until, at last, he drove the creature onto the broken train rails.
That still wasn’t enough to kill it.
“Now!” Math shouted, scrambling backward. “Hit it with everything you’ve got!”
Oltaxath’s riders obeyed.
They thundered past, slashing with halberds, thrusting spears. The grimmock lunged at a rider here, a horse there, but it was facing the wrong way—its arms too short to reach.
Its tail, however, was not. It swept sideways, cracking into a horse’s legs. Bone shattered; the beast and its rider flipped behind-over-head. The horse’s neck broke with a sickening snap, but Math saw the rider crawling away—then out of sight.
Math scrambled back as arrows rained down. Most struck the grimmock, though only a few found real purchase.
A halberd arced over the beast, landing near Math. From the angle, he guessed the injured rider had thrown it—offering a weapon to someone who had none.
He reached for it—and nearly lost his arm as the creature swiped at him. The talisman and shield saved him, but the shield splintered, and his left arm went limp. It felt broken.
There was no time. The creature was already wrenching itself free of the impaling rails. In seconds, it would be loose—and Math would be trapped with it at the bottom of the sinkhole.
Worse, he was starting to feel the edges of magical burnout.
He feinted once, twice, then darted forward to grab the halberd and scrambled back. Bracing it under one arm, the point aimed at the creature, he resummoned the shield and readied himself for a final, desperate charge. The shield was less for his protection than to brace his broken arm.
He had no illusions about survival—but maybe, just maybe, he could drive the blade through its mouth even as it crushed him.
A voice rang out from above.
Math glanced up and saw Nuhzar at the lip of the sinkhole, still clutching his abdomen, circling Sky.
The world slowed. His bond with Kai lengthened, stretched out, a slowing but grounding pulse.
The grimmock, still thrashing and roaring, moved as if trapped in thick sap. An arrow loosed from the far side of the pit fell in the slow, impossible way that things don’t fall. A drop of spittle hung in the air, drifting from the monster’s lips as though through treacle instead of air.
Math had never felt anything like it. He had never cast Sky spells that high. The most advanced version—the one that heightened reflexes this intensely—was a closely guarded secret of the Swords section.
Nuhzar had just cast it on him.
“Ggggoooooo,” Nuhzar shouted—his voice stretched and oddly lower-pitched.
Math went. He tightened his grip on the halberd and used a vine from the shield to steady the shaft. Then he charged, hacking and stabbing at the creature’s face—cutting deep across its nose, cheek, and jaw.
Finally, he found the angle he wanted. He drove forward with all his strength, slamming the shield into the monster’s head before he rammed the halberd into the roof of the creature’s mouth and up, up, into its brain. Then he twisted, hard.
Math scrambled back, graceless but clear of the creature—and was rewarded with an unimpeded view of its death throes.
The grimmock screamed and thrashed, tearing itself open on the rails, the halberd, and the few thorny vines still clinging to its body. Dirt flew, thickening the air as it spasmed.
Then, with a faint whimper, it stilled. Silence fell over the field.
Math didn’t move. He waited, just in case.
But it seemed truly dead.
When the hunters above began to cheer, Math waited, caught his breath, and gave himself a second to recover.
When he thought it wouldn’t make him burst into flames, he traded his summoned shield for a vine and used that to climb out of the miniature crater.
He had to use magic—his left arm was still useless.
Oltaxath met him at the top, flanked by Kai and a still-very-injured Alik Nuhzar.
“Nicely done,” Oltaxath said, giving him a nod before turning away to see to her riders.
“You are injured,” Kai said. It wasn’t a question; Kai cradled an uninjured arm. Despite her own lack of injury, she looked exhausted and worried. It was odd: he would’ve thought she’d be happy about his survival.
“So, you finally did it.” Nuhzar’s voice was a sandpaper whisper. “Took you long enough.”
Math turned to him. “What was that?”
Nuhzar was pale, sweat beading on his brow. He desperately needed more healing. That didn’t stop him from offering Math a tired, surprisingly bitter smile.
“You didn’t even notice, did you?” he said. “You manifested a shield, you fool. Shields are also weapons.”
For a moment, Math felt nothing—just shock, a wave of dizzying disorientation.
He looked down at his broken arm. He’d need healing.
He almost said Nuhzar was wrong—that the shield didn’t count, that he’d only shaped wood from the train carriage. That he couldn’t have finally reached that final milestone. That he couldn’t become an Idallik Knight now—not after he’d finally completely given up on the idea.
Not after Kai.
Except by the end, the shield on his arm bore no resemblance to the original scraps of wood he’d started from—and he knew he could summon it again, even now. He could do it anytime.
Math had manifested his knight’s weapon.
It didn’t feel like a blessing, not with Kai’s despair haunting the edges of his soul. Maybe Nuhzar had said something to her. She must have realized what it meant right away.
Then Nuhzar collapsed, and for a moment, Math envied him.