8. Azzie
Eight
Azzie
“Berserkers really will take any opportunity to spill blood.” I let out a noisy breath at the whole blood oath display and holstered my knives. “Can we do this now?” Despite the exasperation I let show, I was grateful Davyn was here. What he did for me, from containing Ulf to the promise? I liked it more than I should if I wanted to walk away from him when this was all over.
“It’s your funeral, Ginger Kitty.” Ulf held the door open.
I didn’t like how many rings he wore. Not because I had an issue with men and jewelry, but after last night’s encounter I was wary of what the accessories did. I’d also learned that fighters who wore those kinds of adornments were either bluffing or using the metal to cause extra harm.
Davyn growled. “You first. We’ll follow.”
If this was a trap, I doubted it mattered if Ulf entered before or after us, but there had to be a reason he was putting up with all of blood oaths and Davyn hurting him, to work with me. I would’ve walked away the moment I saw him if I weren’t grasping for answers.
Ulf shrugged and walked in, with Davyn next and me last. Fine with me—Davyn was as great a view from behind as from every other angle.
“Is your grandfather here, or has Ulfgaroar moved on?” Davyn asked.
Ulf led us through a dimly lit hallway, the scents of rubber and grime radiating from the heated aluminum around us. “He’s not with us anymore.”
“He was a great fighter.” Davyn sounded almost reverent.
Ulf nodded. “And he died the way he wanted. In a glorious battle.”
The way I understood it, a newly created Berserker wasn’t immortal; they simply healed more quickly. The longer they lived, though, the tougher they got, until they were all but unkillable. I assumed it was the same for those who were born Berserker, and I suspected Davyn was close to unkillable.
“That must’ve been one hell of a fight,” I said.
“It was.” Ulf’s voice went tight. “And if I’d been allowed to partake…”
He’d have died, like his presumably thousand-year-old grandfather. No reason to rub salt in the wound.
Ulf let out a loud cough, as if clearing his throat, and pushed another door open, to reveal a large room with a concrete floor. The epoxy paint was stained dark in places, and a few drains dotted the room.
Not the least-welcoming place, but the sight put me on the defensive.
“About earlier—both outside and last night—” Ulf looked at me. “It wasn’t personal.”
And this was his version of an apology. “It was about the fight. I understand.”
“Exactly.” His smile was a toothy grin that reminded me he was hiding things, and the sight curdled my gut.
“So…” I was tired of the back and forth. “Is there some sort of ritual I need to follow, or can I just ask how we do this?”
His smile grew. “Davyn, give Ginger Kitty some room.”
I could correct him. Tell him my real name or at least my real fake name, but I’d been called far worse by the people who trained me.
Davyn didn’t look happy about backing up, but ten minutes ago, he crossed meters faster than I could blink, to attack Ulf.
“I’m good,” I assured Davyn anyway.
He shook his head. “We’ll see.”
“The way this works is simple,” Ulf said. “You show me what you can do, and we go from there, as far as strength is concerned. “
I moved my feet a hint further apart, dropped one arm, and left the other up, to attack or block as needed. “Against you?”
“No.” Ulf’s reply was overlapped by another growl from Davyn. “Against you.” He snapped, and a movement caught my attention out of the corner of my eye.
I whirled toward the shape, already reaching for a knife again. What lumbered toward us looked like a vaguely human-shaped dummy, made of coarse beige fabric and filled with something lumpy.
As it got closer, its appearance shifted, and by the time it reached us, I was staring at a mirror image of myself. Aside from the fact that she wore pink kitty ears and a belt with a tail.
“Cute.” Sarcasm dripped from my voice.
Ulf chuckled. “Isn’t she?”
She didn’t move or even so much as blink. Her chest didn’t even rise and fall. Could I learn how to be that much of a blank slate?
“What else do I need to know?” I asked. There were always rules, and it was important to keep them in mind.
Ulf grabbed my wrist so quickly I didn’t have a chance to react. One of his fingers was extended in a long claw that pricked my ring finger.
The dummy-me held out her hand, and he squeezed a few drops of blood onto her.
The fact that the exchange wasn’t enough to make Davyn react didn’t make me feel any safer. I yanked my wrist back as soon as Ulf let go, and sucked on the bleeding finger. At least the asshole used my left hand.
“Now she knows everything about fighting that you do.” Ulf took several steps back. “You beat her or she beats you, and the fight is over. Only you or I can stop the fight otherwise.” He cast a pointed look at Davyn. “Under threat of intense pain.”
“That’s it?” It sounded simple. There was a catch. Always. “What aren’t you telling me?”
“Nothing that’s important for you to know before the fight is over. Speaking of— holmgang .”
At his shout, dummy-me circled me.
Apparently, we were starting.
Fine with me. Being predictable in a fight and expecting other people to do the same got a person killed. Which was why, when she moved into a karate kick, I expected the feint and ducked under the spinning punch she ended with.
My foot flew for the small of her back, caught her off balance, and knocked her to the ground. She rolled and came up on her feet, as I jumped to kick her in the face.
I wouldn’t fight this way in a friendly match, but she wasn’t holding back, so neither would I.
She’d already twisted away when I landed, and sprang upright using her hands, catching me in the left thigh with her knee.
The shock of pain rocketed through me, and I stumbled with a grunt. As I turned to counter her next attack, I caught a glimpse of Ulf. I expected a smirk, but he looked focused.
I caught dummy-me off guard this time, when I knocked my shoulder into her stomach. She doubled over. While she didn’t make a sound, Ulf did. If I weren’t following up with a sweeping drop-kick, I would’ve looked.
She was ready, jumping to come down hard on my leg. I jerked away from her foot, and she hit the floor, landing on one knee.
Ulf chuckled, though the sound was strained.
Davyn would stop him if he tried to interfere.
How did I know that? For some reason, I trusted Davyn to make sure the rules were followed here.
I’d trained in dozens of fighting styles, and Ulf hadn’t lied when he said this golem had my skills. Anything I did, she mimicked. I even recognized those moments when I might pull too far left or miss an instep, where she did the same. Things I’d tried to correct in my own fighting but never quite worked out.
Could I use that to my advantage? I always swung too wide with an uppercut. Could I make her throw one?
I tossed a punch and dodged, waiting for her to use the same counter I usually would. I lost myself in the fight, but every time I landed a kick, Ulf reacted, and every time she hit me, he seemed almost giddy.
Could he feel a bond with the golem? Was he using this as some sort of?—
The dummy launched into another spinning kick. Fuck , I liked these more than I realized, based on her actions.
Movies and TV got a lot of things wrong about fights. For instance, one like this, even if it only lasted a few minutes, was exhausting. No matter what I tried, dummy-me had a counter. This was more like shadowboxing than it should be, except the shadow fought back. My arms ached from blocks, and my thighs and shins weren’t doing any better.
She swung high, and I dropped low with a tight kick to knock her off balance. She jumped over my leg, backflipped, and landed on her feet.
“What the fuck?” I didn’t know how to do that kind of in-air somersault. It was movie-magic bullshit.
She followed up with an identical kick to mine that knocked me on my back. Dummy-me moved faster than I could fathom, straddling my waist. Before I could kick her off, she buried a knife in my shoulder with one hand and reached for my hip with the other.
The hip where a scabbard was connected to my belt in this reality, while the rest of the sword was hidden in a pocket reality.
She fumbled, unable to grasp the hilt.
Davyn roared and charged, knocking her off me with a backhand. She flew across the room as he shouted again, this time in pain. She slammed into the wall, and the formless dummy slumped to the ground with a thud, at the same time that Ulf grunted in what sounded like pain.
“You only look like me, bitch ,” I screamed at the shapeless sack. It didn’t do me any good, but it distracted me from the agony tearing through my shoulder. No one could draw the sword but me, no matter how much else they could do that I couldn’t. “And you fucking cheated .” I spat at Ulf.
Davyn’s arm from the elbow down was a scorched and unrecognizable mess.
Ulf turned on him. “I told you only she or I could stop this.”
Davyn gritted his teeth and grunted, as blackened flesh turned pink, and then pale as it returned to normal. “Heal her, now .” He stared down Ulf.
“I can’t.”
My vision swam. I was getting real sick of passing out in front of these assholes. The pain was fading, and that was a bad sign too. If I pulled the blade out, I might bleed out, but I’d rather not stay pinned to the ground. That would be a slower version of the same thing.
The growl that rolled from Davyn’s chest was both terrifying and comforting.
I was also woozy.
“You have more enchanted jewelry than a volva, and you love the fight,” Davyn said. “Don’t try to tell me you don’t have any trinkets that heal.”
“I work with immortals.” Ulf’s voice was hard.
“You sell your services unlocking power in potentials.” Davyn didn’t back down.
Ulf’s smile was wicked, and his teeth extended, becoming fangs, while Davyn’s bear was coming out, if the extra fur on his arms and neck was any indicator.
Fucking berserkers . The words wouldn’t push past my lips, but I could still move my free arm, and I needed a distraction. I grabbed one of my throwing knives and tossed it at the same wall dummy-me had bounced off. “Go fetch, boy.”
Ulf gave me a withering look. “What the fuck was that?”
“If you let me bleed out to spite Davyn, you break the blood oath.” There was my voice.
“ Gods damn it. ” Ulf knelt next to me. “This is going to hurt.”
“No shi—” My scream cut me off when Ulf pulled the blade from my shoulder.
He hovered a hand over the wound, and a soft glow emanated from one of his hands. Icy warmth spread through my shoulder, and the pain spiked again, before fading. My vision stopped wobbling, and my head no longer felt like it was going to slam its way through the earth.
The thing no one talked about when it came to being healed magically was that it didn’t feel quite right. The body expected to take days or weeks or months to mend, the flesh remembered being torn apart seconds ago, and then it was fine.
Davyn offered me a hand, and I let him pull me to my feet. The instant I was standing, he was between me and Ulf.
I wasn’t having that, and I moved next to Davyn. Both men needed a moment to cool down, and I waited silently for them to tuck their beasts away.
Ulf looked fully human first, and he shrugged. “It didn’t work.”
What ? “Just like that?”
“The trick is to make you think you’re going to die, and sometimes it unlocks what a potential is looking for.”
If that wasn’t the stupidest, most cliché… “And if it doesn’t work, the person you’re working with dies?”
“You’re still alive,” Ulf said.
I twisted my mouth. “The prophecies don’t say I die here.”
“And you believe the prophecies.” Was that mocking in his voice?
The prophecies had been there all my life. I knew them as well as I did how to speak. “I believe them enough.”
“Then it doesn’t matter if they’re true or not; you’ll never truly think your life is in danger, and I can’t help you.” Ulf turned away.
Davyn blocked his path. “You could have told her that up front.”
“It doesn’t work if I do that.” Ulf glanced back at me. “But I was right—you’re a fighter, and you’re good. You can still go up against me if you want.”
Arrogant, asinine fucking?—
“No,” Davyn said.
I pointed at him. “You don’t speak for me.” I looked at Ulf again. “But no.”
“Why not?” That was definitely Ulf taunting me. “It’s not as if I can kill you.”
Right. Exactly. And that wasn’t doubt worming its way into my thoughts. “Thanks for nothing.” I turned and walked out, and Davyn stayed by my side.