CHAPTER TWELVE
KYRION
I charged forward, my boots thumping against the flagstones.
Roderick Battis knew the maze like the back of his hand, and my only course of action was to retreat along the paths I had already explored, reach the outer wall, and escape.
Once I was free of the psionic dampeners, I should be able to sense exactly where Vesper was and clearly communicate with her.
I sprinted along one path after another, but it didn’t take me long to realize this was one race I was going to lose.
Roderick’s armored boots must have had a propulsion system to increase his speed, because his footsteps were quickly growing louder and closer.
The Hammer was swiftly running me down, and I wasn’t going to be able to escape the maze before he caught me.
Change of plan. I was going to have to make a stand and fight Roderick on his own turf.
Up ahead, another junction appeared. I didn’t have time to stop, look around, and study my options, so I took the right path. I rounded a long, large curve, entered a biodome, and skidded to a halt.
My gaze snapped back and forth. Honeysuckle vines, blue-moon peonies, and other flowers, marble statues, stone fountains, but no energy shield overhead.
This was the same garden biodome where Roderick had confronted me a few minutes ago.
Fuck. I thought I’d been heading toward the outer edge of the maze, but instead, I’d just run around in a giant circle.
A sharp whistle shrieked out, making me flinch in surprise. The sound intensified with each passing second, like a high-speed train was bearing down on me. On instinct, I lunged to my right.
Crack!
Roderick’s war hammer slammed into one of the House Battis castle statues.
The black marble exploded at the hard, jarring impact, and red sparks shot up into the air like fireworks.
I lifted my hand and threw up a psionic shield, using my telekinesis to send the sharp shards of stone spinning away from me.
The hammer plowed through the air until it hit one of the honeysuckle-covered walls.
The weapon bounced off the metal underneath the greenery and dropped to the ground.
Roderick sprinted into the biodome, stopped, and snapped his hand forward.
A wave of telekinesis rolled off him, and the hammer lifted off the ground.
I whirled toward Roderick and reached out with my own telekinesis. If I could get my hands on the hammer, then I could crack through the other warrior’s armor and break every rib in his chest.
Sparks of red and blue fire crackled, hissed, and shot off the lunarium weapon, and the hammer zigzagged wildly back and forth through the air as Roderick and I played tug-of-war with our telekinesis.
I snarled and lashed out with even more power.
The lunarium turned more blue than red, and the hammer lurched in my direction.
Roderick growled and made a scooping motion with his left hand.
A chunk of stone from the smashed statue lifted off the ground and hurtled toward my face.
I jerked to the side. The stone sailed through the air where my head had been, but the motion broke my concentration, and the hammer streaked through the air and settled into Roderick’s hand.
“You’re already so desperate.” The other warrior clucked his tongue in mock sympathy. “I expected more from the infamous Kyrion Caldaren.”
Roderick twirled the hammer around in his hand, then dug his boots into the ground and launched himself at me.
Suddenly, Vesper’s seer power surged, even though I wasn’t trying to use her ability.
Time slowed down, as though I was watching battle footage one frame at a time on a holoscreen, and one thing after another caught my eye.
The glossy gleam of Roderick’s armor. His knuckles bulging as he clutched the golden hilt of his war hammer.
The lunarium weapon glowing a vivid, angry red in a reflection of his psion power . . .
Time snapped back to its normal flow, and Vesper’s power sluiced off me like water. At the last moment, right before Roderick would have smashed his hammer into my chest, I snapped up my hands, grabbed hold of the statue rubble, and flung it at him.
The heavy stones punched into Roderick’s chest, knocking him off course. The other warrior hit a wall and bounced off. He landed hard on his knees, although his Scarab armor absorbed the bruising impact.
Roderick’s head snapped up, and he quickly climbed to his feet. His dark brown eyes gleamed almost as brightly as his lunarium hammer, and another wide grin split his face like he was wearing a grotesque mask that showed every single one of his perfect white teeth.
He was enjoying this. Everything I did to fight back and keep myself alive fed into his sick fantasy that he was an alpha warrior and the ultimate hunter. Sadistic bastard.
My inner monster roared with rage. I snarled, lifted my hand, and grabbed more of the statue rubble with my telekinesis. I threw chunk after chunk of stone at Roderick, but he used his hammer to bat the debris away.
I reached for even more of my telekinesis, throwing the stones faster and faster. Roderick snarled and upped his own tempo in response, but his hammer was still a large, heavy weapon and much harder—and slower—to wield than the rubble.
A chunk of stone flew past Roderick’s defenses and clipped his left shoulder.
Another chunk battered his right thigh, then two more chunks slammed into the center of his chest and knocked him back.
Once again, Roderick’s armor absorbed the brunt of the blows, but he had to lower his hammer to maintain his balance.
I snarled again and stalked forward, pressing my advantage. All I had to do was bean the other warrior in the head and daze him. Then I could rip the war hammer out of his hand and beat him to death with his own weapon.
Roderick regained his balance and glowered at me, as though I’d upset his script for how this was supposed to play out. He lifted his left forearm to his lips. “Activate the blasters in section forty-seven!” he yelled at the holoscreen embedded in the armor.
From the corner of my eye, I saw a glint of metal jutting out of a wall. I whirled in that direction.
Pew! Pew! Pew!
Blaster fire zinged out from the hidden nozzle. I spun to my right, avoiding the sizzling orange bolts, which slammed into a cluster of blue-moon peonies and blew them to pieces.
More bolts zinged through the air. I tried to spin out of the way again, but my boots slipped on some broken stones, and I staggered directly into the line of fire. I gritted my teeth and snapped my hands up, using my telekinesis to deflect the dangerous streaks of electricity.
Pew! Pew! Pew!
One of the bolts slipped past my defenses and slammed into my right forearm. Hot, electric agony exploded in my arm, sizzling down into my fingers and up into my shoulder. The acrid stench of my own burning skin flooded my nose, my heart pounded, and my stomach roiled with nausea.
I immediately threw up a psionic shield, walling off the hot, pulsing agony in a small, distant corner of my mind, but a different kind of pain rose to take its place.
The velvety ribbon of Vesper in my mind stiffened in shock, as though she too had felt the sharp sting and intense burn.
I grimaced. As much as I enjoyed being connected to Vesper, I hated that our truebond exposed her to so much of my physical pain.
But Vesper’s shock made me even more determined to kill Roderick. This sadistic bastard was not laying a single finger on her. My inner monster snarled with rage, and an answering growl rumbled out of my throat.
To my surprise, Roderick threw his head back and laughed. “What a fun game,” he crooned. “Let’s see just how much damage you can take, Kyrion.”
I clenched my hands into fists and lunged at the mocking lord, but he darted away from me.
“Activate secondary wave!” he commanded, although I couldn’t tell if he was talking to the holoscreen on his forearm, or Jeffrey, or both.
Another glint of metal appeared on a different wall, and a second nozzle jutted out of the greenery.
Pew! Pew! Pew!
More blaster bolts zinged through the air. I ducked behind a bubbling fountain and let it take the brunt of the blasts.
Pew! Pew! Pew!
Water sprayed everywhere, and chips of stone cracked off the fountain, zipped through the air, and stung my head, face, neck, and hands like angry wasps.
Between the two blaster nozzles, I was in danger of being pinned down, something I couldn’t afford with Roderick still clutching his hammer and creeping closer.
“What’s the matter, Kyrion? Did you really think I was going to play fair?” Roderick called out in a mocking voice. “A hunt would only be fair if the hunter gave the animal a weapon, and we both know that’s never going to happen.”
Anger sizzled in my chest, but it was quickly extinguished by cold, ruthless determination.
Roderick didn’t need to give me a weapon.
I was an Arrow, an assassin, and one of the best warriors in the galaxy.
I had spent years surviving one battle after another, whether it was a physical fight against Techwave soldiers or a psychological duel against Callus Holloway, who never failed to twist a verbal knife in my gut.
I didn’t need a weapon—I was the weapon.
Pew! Pew! Pew!
Blaster bolts kept streaking through the air, obliterating more and more of the fountain. I couldn’t stay here. If the bolts didn’t kill me, then Roderick would with his hammer. I needed to get out of this biodome and find Vesper.
Pew! Pew! Pew!
Another round of bolts slammed into the fountain. The instant they stopped, I surged to my feet, snapped my hands up, and grabbed as many chunks of rubble as I could with my telekinesis. Then I flung my hands and my power out and sent all those pieces hurtling toward the blasters.
Crack! Crack!
Crack! Crack!
The chunks of stone slammed into the blaster traps. One nozzle exploded at the impact. A ball of fire streaked upward, and the surrounding honeysuckle vines smoldered, adding an oddly sweet perfume to the ozone stench in the air.
A chunk of stone clipped the edge of the second nozzle, making it spin in the opposite direction.
Pew! Pew! Pew!
This time, Roderick was the one who had to duck blaster bolts. He cursed and threw himself down onto the ground behind a castle statue, despite the armor he was wearing.
The bolts kept zinging in Roderick’s direction, pinning him in place. I whirled around and sprinted for the nearest path, heading away from my enemy and into a different, unknown section of the maze.