Chapter Fifteen
Neith
“They’ve retreated,” the blue-haired woman tells me.
I glance over at her, finding her watching me cautiously with a slight smile on her face, covered in blood splatter and with a headless corpse of the vamp creature at her feet.
I grin, “Nice work.”
“Thanks,” she says. “You too.”
I frown, “Well, my sword didn’t get to taste his blood, and I didn’t get to see the life drain from his eyes, so I didn’t do that great.”
She chuckles, “I like you.” She pauses, “And actually, taking a snake shifter's fang is absolute agony, and it’s the kind of pain that doesn’t just fade or get fixed. It will be a constant reminder of you and what you did to him.”
My smile widens, “Perfect. That makes me feel a little bit better.”
“Yealite won’t forget you know, he doesn’t forget anything. You have a target on your head,” she warns me, the worry in her eyes strangely heartwarming.
I shrug, “Don’t worry, it’s not the first, and it won’t be the last time that I have a target on my head. Hell, I’m pretty sure I’ve got four or five targets on my head as we speak. What’s one more at this point?”
She grins, and then her expression becomes serious again, “Who the fuck are you? I haven’t seen you around the settlement before, and everyone knows everyone here for safety.”
“Erm, I’m Neith,” I reply. “I’m not sure how to explain why or how I’m here.”
“Vague,” she replies, her eyebrow raised in halfhearted suspicion.
“Styx!” Someone yells from outside of the tent, obviously heading in our direction, “Please tell me that crazy fire woman is in there with you!”
“Should I be concerned?” I ask.
I expect her to joke, but she’s gone completely pale, looking terrified. She points at the dead vamp by her feet, all of her confidence and fierceness gone. She begs, “Please, you killed him.”
The sword in her hand disappears, and I realize with shock that she has an enchanted weapon, like Asael.
She is terrified, and I’m not sure why, but if she wants me to say I killed the fucker on the floor, then I killed the fucker on the floor.
I move over to where she is and say, “Quickly, wipe your face and then take this.” I hand her my shirt. I always wear a tank underneath on a job, just in case.
She looks so grateful but doesn’t say anything as she quickly does what I’ve told her, handing her blood splattered shirt to me.
Whoever is quickly approaching the tent is going to realize that there is something going on if I’m suddenly wearing clothing that matches what they’re all wearing, and I can’t risk it. Not with the amount of fear still on this fierce woman’s face.
So I burn her shirt until there’s nothing left, and I vaguely register my surprise that the fire that burns it is bright pearlescent white.
That’s odd.
I don’t have the time to wonder why it’s a different color from the usual fire that I use to burn stuff, or any of the ones that I have previously seen.
I’ll figure it out later.
I switch places with Styx, so that I’m by the body while she scoots under the bed with the other woman, and they huddle close together. They look so similar that I would be willing to say that they were sisters, or at least related in some sort of way.
“There you are,” a man says as he rushes through the tent entrance, his eyes landing on me, and moving to the body at my feet.
“Nice work. Look, I don’t care who the fuck you are, or how you got here, you helped, and you kept my charges safe,” his eyes dart to the women under the bed.
I do not like the way he said charges. He kind of sneered it.
There was no warmth or caring in his tone at all.
He doesn’t give me a chance to respond as he rushes on, “Please, for the love of the goddess, stop the screaming.”
“Huh? What screaming?” I ask, genuinely confused for a moment because I’m not screaming, and the women under the bed aren’t screaming. Then I hear it.
Apparently, I tuned out the screams of the guy that I set on fire when I first arrived. He’s still burning, which is pretty cool, and maybe slightly disturbing. At least it would be if it weren’t for the fact that he killed a child and definitely deserves it.
I don’t know how he’s still burning and yet still alive, but it’s certainly an effective torture method that I will definitely be utilizing in the future.
“The soldier you set on fire. None of us can get close enough to him to end his life,” the guy explains, his eyes narrowing slightly. His eyes fill with malicious greed, “That’s quite a gift you have. I haven’t seen any with magic like yours before.”
Ahh, there’s the real him. I would be willing to bet that he thinks he has some clever plan that will no doubt involve kidnapping me and either selling me or using me for his own advantage.
I’ll have his head before I allow that to happen.
I shrug, “You are mistaken, I simply set the spear on fire. He must have been covered in some kind of accelerant. I can certainly come and try to help put him out though,” I reply pleasantly, making sure that I even smile sweetly.
He narrows his eyes, his gaze immediately filling with suspicion, as they move to the dead vamp at my feet. It wouldn’t prove anything other than the fact that I can fight, but we both know that he doesn’t believe that I didn’t use magic to keep the soldier burning.
There’s a reason why I didn’t just admit to it, though. I am in an unknown realm, and I don’t know how long I’m going to be here for or how to get back to my realm. I need to play this extremely carefully. I know that he wants me, and I need to ensure that I do not get trapped by him.
Unfortunately, that means that rather than staying with them, learning about the realm I’m in, and resting, I’m going to have to get out of here as quickly as I can.
He nods, but there’s an underlying threat to his voice as he replies, “That would be very much appreciated. Once it’s all taken care of, we can feast and get to know one another better. I’m sure that you are tired after your journey.”
Again, my smile is sweet and naive. It’s far better for him to underestimate me, I reply, “Sure, that sounds great. Let me just help the women out from under the bed. They’ve had quite a fright.”
He waves his hand dismissively and looks at them both with disgust, “Leave them. They’re only slaves. They will be beaten for their insubordination and cowardice.”
Oh, hell fucking no. Fire lights my veins as fury burns through me. A threat to me is one thing, but I will not stand for a threat to them.
To be fair, I was just looking for an excuse, and this is the perfect fucking excuse.
I don’t think about the consequences.
I turn around, several things happening at once, a part of my magic that I haven’t encountered before reaches for the man. I feel my eyes glow, although I make sure to keep my wings hidden, even as my claws lengthen.
With glowing eyes and claws, I could be anything, but my wings will definitely give me away, and I can’t have that.
The new magic plunges into his chest, holding him immobile and silent. It finds his soul and searches.
“Guilty, guilty,” the Voices chant. “This one is damned.”
I nod in agreement with the chanting Voices, aware that they’re connected to the new magic somehow, and realizing that Raiden was wrong, they aren’t the voices of the dead. Even though they do behave in a similar way. No, these voices are so much more.
They always have been.
In a voice that is my own but is so much more, I look the doomed man in his eyes, “Thadius Bleufornt, I find you guilty. Your Soul is damned, your heart is black, and your life and afterlife are forfeit.”
My clawed hand plunges deep into his chest, wrapping around his heart and pulling it free, leaving behind a burned and blackened hole.
He looks at me with knowledgeable terror etched in his gaze as I close my hand, and his heart turns to dust, and with it his soul.
The magic pulls back, and I’m so fucking glad that the knowledge of what just happened stays.
“Who the fuck are you?” Styx asks, as she climbs out from under the bed despite the fact that the other woman is trying to stop her.
“Neith,” I reply, repeating my answer from before, and then sigh as I answer her other question. “I don’t fucking know.”
Understanding crosses her expression, “Neither do I.”
“Well, that definitely makes us friends,” I grin, and she nods, matching my smile, while the other woman looks at us both with fear.
The fact that Styx didn’t run away from me screaming after the little show that I put on is extremely telling about the shit she’s been through.
Or maybe it just means that she’s bat shit crazy, either way, I think we’ll get on great.
“Seriously, thank you.” She tells me, darkness and shadows crossing her gaze.
“He was going to do more than just beat us, and we are trapped here. Every time I try to escape, they bring me back, and the punishment is worse. I’m difficult to kill, and they take advantage of that.
He was going to bind you to him as well.
He didn’t believe that you didn’t use magic to set the soldier on fire.
Not that I think anyone would have believed it, especially since he’s still burning.
He has ways to keep you under his control. ”
Her words confirm what I already suspected, so it’s not a surprise to me. I don’t like the hollowed look that crosses her expression when she talks about him.
Unfortunately, I do understand why it’s there.
I frown, “Are you still bound to him?”
She shakes her head, a huge smile lighting up her features, “No. His death broke the binding.”
“Thank fuck,” I reply with relief.
I know what he did, the knowledge is there. I judged his soul. He can rot in the cells of the Luciorekis, may they torture him for eternity.
Wow. Knowledge is just spewing itself at me right now. I have no idea where it is coming from, but I'd better still fucking have it when I wake up.