Chapter 24 #2
As Casimir mirrored my movements, he also sheathed the obsidian blade, though not before shooting me a condescending wink, the fucker.
I shook my head to clear my irritation. Okay, Arden, you’ve got this. I performed a quick mental checklist. My chin was tucked in to protect my throat, my feet were shoulder-width apart, which meant it was time to assess my opponent for weak points.
As Casimir narrowed his predatory gaze on me, my courage faltered. Did he even have any weak points?
But then I recalled something August used to say after our practices on the piste: Every opponent has a weakness. You must root it out and exploit it.
I resigned myself to dodging his attacks until I could identify what his weak point was. Mirroring one another’s movements, we paced the room in a circle, muscles tensed, eyes vigilantly watching, waiting for the other to lunge.
“Did you know that this blade is so notorious, it has its own name?” Casimir asked, a smile playing across his lips.
He was trying to distract me. A clever enough tactic, I thought.
“No, I didn’t,” I answered.
As he opened his mouth to reply, I lunged at him, hoping to grasp the element of surprise. He dodged my attack more quickly than I’d expected, but as I surged past him, he caught my arm and tugged, throwing me off balance. I nearly staggered to the floor, cursing as I caught myself.
The Darkseer laughed quietly as I stumbled and spun around breathing hard. “Nice one.” He smirked, still stalking me. “Too bad it was pitifully predictable.”
Backing away, I gritted my teeth and gripped my knife harder. I much preferred fencing to this, I thought. My gaze darted to Casimir’s feet, searching for an opportunity to push him off balance. But his feet were as graceful and lithe as his tongue.
Without warning, he lunged. I realized his intent just in time to dodge the attack.
I hurled my body to the left, barely avoiding a collision, but Casimir never once moved his blade in a slashing motion.
His goal then was not to harm me, but to grab me with his opposing hand. He wanted to disarm me.
Well, I thought, I had no such qualms about slicing him. Not that I wanted to grievously injure him, but it would be gratifying to humble him, just a little.
Casimir smirked as though he could read the bloodlust on my face. “Allow me to give you a few tips for fighting Daemons. Above all else, maintain distance. If you allow a Daemon like me to get close enough to touch you, it’s over.”
“Thanks for pointing out the obvious,” I deadpanned as we continued to circle one another.
“Did you know this blade is called the Umbra Noctis?”.
I didn’t deign to reply, but this did not deter Casimir.
“Would you like to know how it earned its name?” he pressed.
I ground my teeth in frustration. He was trying to distract me by talking about that gods-damned dagger.
Hoping to catch him by surprise, I swung out, aiming for his left arm, which remained unprotected, but he knocked my wrist aside as though it were made of paper.
It was all I could do to keep my grip on my blade as I stumbled and growled in vexation.
“This isn’t your usual sort of dagger,” he went on, smiling crookedly at my obvious irritation. “The obsidian is enchanted to absorb venom and poison.”
I faltered, momentarily forgetting what I was supposed to be doing. A dagger that could absorb poison?
Casimir continued, “Umbra Noctis is Latin for Shadow Blade. When wielded by an expert assassin, its victims never see death coming.” His finger traced the edge of the blade.
“Well, that, and it’s bloody sharp.” He smirked.
“You can see why I felt uneasy about leaving a weapon like this in the hands of someone like Zhara.”
I ground my teeth in anger. “And you were going to train with it? What if you’d cut me by accident?”
“You really think I’d be so careless?” he queried, moving closer, circling me.
I copied his movements, my breaths coming harder now. My gaze darted from his face to his dominant hand, assessing for signs of an impending attack. I could feel the next one coming; his energy hummed through the air like a storm just before lightning struck.
“Don’t think I haven’t noticed the way you watch me,” he cut in. “I don’t need to taste lies to know when they’re falling from your lips.”
I knew he was goading me, trying to lure me into distraction, and fuck if it wasn’t working. Anticipation crept around me like a shroud, every limb in my body taut and braced for his attack.
“Fine,” I spat, rising to his bait. “Maybe I don’t trust you not to accidentally slice me with that thing.”
A hiss slipped past his lips. “I figured as much. Try and remember your training. Or maybe you should just pretend I’m August,” he added.
As I opened my mouth to retort, he rushed forward, seizing my wrist with one hand and twisting my arm at the elbow, throwing me off balance.
The air whooshed from my lungs as my back slammed against his chest. He squeezed my wrist until my fingers loosened, my blade falling to the floor with a clatter.
It all happened so fast, I could do nothing more than gasp in pain and surprise.
“Don’t give rise to my bait,” he growled.
I struggled to free myself from his iron grasp, but Casimir only pinned my dominant arm behind my back, eliciting a sharp pain and a whimper from my lips. His breath tickled my ear as he laughed softly. The sound of it sent a shiver dancing along my spine.
“Are you afraid of me, Farrow?”
“No,” I grunted. I lashed out with my free hand, trying to connect nails to skin, but only finding purchase in his leather jacket. He snaked his other arm around my back to grab my free wrist and twisted it behind me. With both arms locked in his grip, I was trapped.
“Clearly, you needed this practice,” he said, his tone far too patronizing. “What’s it going to take to get you to fight back?” he hissed into my ear as I bucked against him, trying to free myself.
He hardly seemed to have to put forth effort to hold me in place. “Come on, Farrow. Unleash your anger, I know it’s in there. Fight me.”
Every opponent has a weakness.
Casimir was a stronger fighter than me in every way; agile and quick, his movements honed by decades of practice.
I was already weakened from nausea and exhaustion from the repeated onslaughts of his glamour.
Casimir was too confident, too assured of his edge over me, and I needed to claw back my power in this fight.
My only hope of gaining an advantage over him was to root out his weakness and exploit it.
“Why do you care so much that I fight back?” I rasped out, my voice sounding strained.
When he hesitated, I froze. Oh.
And there it was. I saw my path ahead clearly. “You do care, don’t you?” I guessed, releasing a peal of laughter that I knew would only aggravate him. “You want me to trust you blindly, and you can’t stand that I don’t. Why is that, Casimir?” I taunted.
For a split second, his arms tightened around me, and then faltered, and I knew I’d hit my mark.
But I was ready. The moment his fingers loosened around me, I sprang into action, kicking out hard against his ankle.
In his haste to maintain his balance, he released my right arm, and with as much force as I could muster, I thrust my elbow into his throat.
Casimir choked in surprise and pain. I whirled away from his reach, panting in triumph.
I shot him a smug smile. “Looks like I’m not the only one who needs a little practice.”
He choked out a laugh between coughs. “You can be a real asshole sometimes, you know that, Farrow?”
“You’re one to talk,” I snarled.
To my surprise, he shot me a crooked smile. “I didn’t say I didn’t like it.”
Cautiously, I mirrored his movements as he relaxed out of his fighting stance.
“Catching your opponent off guard isn’t a bad strategy,” he admitted. “Though I’m not sure your particular approach will work on anyone else.”
His features had smoothed into a cool mask once again, but something ferocious was boiling just beneath the surface.
I had gained the upper hand, and it had taken him by surprise.
By speaking aloud a truth he was too afraid to acknowledge, I had exposed him, made him vulnerable. And he didn’t like it one bit.
“You wanted me to fight back,” I reminded him. “Maybe you just don’t like it when I play dirty.”
He gave a conciliatory nod, his gaze trained to the stone floor, the obsidian blade resting at his side. “No, you did well.”
“But?” I pressed him.
“No buts, Farrow. You gained an edge over me. Exploiting your opponent’s weakness is a smart approach.”
I averted my gaze as I mulled over the implications of this declaration. Were Casimir’s feelings for me his weakness? He’d all but confessed as much. But now, as if determined to punish me for my indiscretion, he stepped closer, confronting me with the truth I’d spoken into existence.
“Why don’t you say it, Farrow?” he said, his voice low and cruel. He was inches from me, his breath warm against my skin. “Say it,” he commanded.
But I couldn’t. If it was true, then why had he rejected me earlier? Perhaps he was merely toying with me. He’d goaded me into fighting back, and I’d done the same to him.
I turned my cheek, refusing to even look at him.
But he wasn’t having it. Cupping my face roughly in one hand, he tilted my chin so I had no choice but to meet his gaze. I nearly flinched at the rage I saw there, swimming beneath pools of honey. The smile he gave me was full of poison.
“You’re wrong about one thing, though. I like it when you play dirty.”
I waited for him to retract it, to give some sign that he was joking. I scanned his face, searching for signs of impending laughter—and landed on the tight line of Casimir’s mouth. My gaze flicked up to see his eyes darken.
He was pissed, but still in control of his emotions, if just barely.
I surmised he was begrudgingly pleased with my progress, but he hated the fact that I’d gotten the upper hand. As I glared up at him, I wondered what it would take for him to lose that tightly wound composure. Another second passed before he abruptly stepped away, the mask slipping back into place.
He cleared his throat. “Do you have enough energy for one more round of glamours?”
Between the relentless attacks on my mind and combat training, I was exhausted.
Like a reflex, my stomach churned with nausea in anticipation of enduring his glamour again, but I nodded.
Now was not the time to show signs of weakness, not when Casimir must surely relish the chance to balance the score.
“My guess as to the reason our training has gone so poorly is that the memories you’re conjuring are too complicated. Too personal,” I said. My feelings for August were too messy and gray to sort out in the short span of his visions. “You need to show me someone I really hate.”
If I could taste his glamour just once, I might be able to capture its magical signature, long enough to memorize it.
He studied me closely, his eyes like rough-cut gems in the reddish light. And then he grinned. “That should be easy. You’ve no shortage of enemies.”
I huffed a laugh and allowed myself to feel cautiously optimistic.
“We’ll try it your way,” he agreed. “But then we’ll stop for today. I don’t want you vomiting in the middle of a lecture later.”
I grimaced from my perch on the velvet bench and braced myself for the wave of nausea that would inevitably follow what could only be a brutal vision.
“Ready?” he asked, tentatively reaching out a hand to hover just above my wrist.
I could feel the blazing heat of him mere inches away.
I shut my eyes, and the magic instantly clawed its way in, sinking its teeth into my mind. My thoughts warbled as the room began to shift and spin.
My arms were bound to a chair in a dark, dank room. Something warm and wet was dripping into my eyes, blurring my vision. Blood.
I lifted my gaze to meet a pair of cruel emerald eyes. Evren stood before me, wearing his signature haughty smirk.
“Want another taste, Farrow? Or are you going to talk?”
Blearily, I peered at my surroundings. My gaze fell on a someone lying in the corner of the room, unmoving.
“August?” I rasped. “What did you do to him?” Rage burned like acid in my blood as I glared back at the Bloodweaver. “I’m going to fucking kill you,” I breathed.
“You’re going to kill me? Malcolm’s daughter?” He laughed. “You don’t even know him. What he’s done.”
The corrosive anger coursing through me vanished, all at once. What was he talking about?
What did any of this have to do with my father?
“Fuck you,” I said, spitting out a mouthful of blood along with the curse.
“That temper of yours is going to get you killed one day, Little Arrow.” Evren sneered before his fist collided with my cheek.
I cried out in pain, spitting out a tooth along with more blood.
But I knew those words. They were my father’s words, already burned into my bones, so why was Evren saying them?
He’d never heard them. There was only one logical explanation: that Evren’s words, the venom in them—they weren’t real.
None of this was real. Was this a nightmare?
Why wasn’t I waking up? I was supposed to remember something.
But what? My own blood tasted bitter on my tongue—nauseatingly metallic, but there was something else, too. A glimmer of ash.
It was the metallic tint of magic. A glamour.
“Fight it, Arden.”
The words struck the tepid waters of my mind like a bolt of lightning, thrust from the sky.
Mind whirling, I tried to remember why I was here and how I was supposed to escape—but the glamour gripped me with claws like iron, holding fast. I imagined pushing out that metallic tang, spitting and choking on it, ripping my mind away from this horrible scene.
Fight it. It was Casimir, training me to resist glamours. Casimir, whose name was written on my skin. Casimir, who had concocted the antidote to my poisoning. Casimir, who had held me in his arms and kissed me on the cold veranda. Casimir, who was intoxicating and warm and not ashamed of me—
None of this was real.
My vision began to blur at the edges, the room warping and twisting in a nauseating kaleidoscope of light and color. My skull collided with the floor, and the world guttered into blackness.