Chapter 11
Chapter Eleven
Iryana squared her shoulders, begging her vision to steady. Anger coursed through her blood as she stared down the dakya, pacing at the opposite end of the pit.
They were at an impasse, both panting. It watched her in a way that made her nerves twitch.
Blood oozed from the dakya’s wounds, matting its fur, and Iryana could only hope the wounds were catching up with him. But she was battered and exhausted, unsure if she’d be able to outlast him.
She had to do something soon, something different, or that would be it. If she died now, already, Hadima would lose all hope. But the beast was too good at keeping himself protected and not tiring as quickly. Her thoughts spun.
With a stupid, desperate idea in mind, Iryana charged the dakya like she had every time before. They had the dance down, but where she normally dodged, Iryana leaped instead.
The dakya shot beneath her, horns tore against her shield along her stomach, knocking the wind out of her. But she grabbed one of his horns, her body slamming against his back.
A moment of shock nearly gave the beast the opportunity to buck her off, before Iryana squeezed her legs around him. She struggled to hang on, gasping and clinging to his transparent hair, and dropped the spear in favor of her knife. She could feel his growls reverberate through his body.
Iryana clamped her thighs around the dakii’s back, knowing she would only have moments before he rolled or slammed her into a wall.
With all the force she had left, she drove the blade into the base of his skull. The dakya spasmed, and she shoved it deeper.
If her blade had been a metal-forging, the dakya would have died long ago, but her knife was the next best thing: made by a metal-forged smith with hammer and anvil forgings. No unforged blade could be stronger.
Iryana cried out as the dakya threw her off, her knife still embedded in his neck.
She climbed to her feet, muscles shaking. The dakya ambled toward her. Had she failed? She searched the ground around her for weapons, but her spear was too far.
Heart racing, Iryana summoned her shield, but an ache tore through her, and it merely flickered.
She braced, but the dakya collapsed, twitching. She kept watching, waiting for it to get back up, but the dakya slowly stopped moving.
She had done it. Every muscle in her body relaxed, knees dropping to the dirt.
Iryana looked down at herself in wonder that she was still alive. Rips and tears covered her clothing. Blood, both black and red, coated her hands. Dirt seemed packed into every crevice of her armor.
The buzzing around her quieted, a buzzing she had forgotten was there, and then she heard the cheering.
She looked above the pit for the first time since the battle began. The soldiers were hooting, shaking their fists in the air. They were celebrating her kill. Her survival.
They would have celebrated her death just as loudly.
She hated it. Hated their eyes on her, hated the expectations they had now. This show of skill had been unavoidable, but now she would have to continue to match or outdo it to impress them.
With the high of the battle still supporting her, Iryana managed to climb the ladder that was thrown down to her.
It was Vaneshta who helped her up over the lip.
“That was awesome,” Vaneshta laughed, slapping Iryana on the back.
Iryana hid her wince, looking to the others. Darish looked at her differently than he had before. More carefully. Pyetar barely glanced her way, still brooding over the railing like he hadn’t moved at all.
A smirk tilted her lips. Poor, disappointed Pyetar.
“Well, the little guardian isn’t half as useless as I thought.” Darish chuckled, like he was pleased at this turn of events. “In fact, I think I know how to fill the hole on one of the teams in my squad.”
Pyetar turned at that, eyes boring into the back of Darish’s head, but it was Antar who spoke. “Seems a better use of her talents than laundry duty.”
Darish walked up to Iryana, a challenge in his eyes. “No one will say you’re untrained now. You can handle going outside the wall.”
Iryana tried to calm herself down, tried to focus on what he was saying.
Everything hurt, and she felt a little lightheaded.
She had impressed him, right? And he was offering her a difficult job, one outside the stifling walls of the fort.
One where everyone would be focused on the dakii that could be lurking in the trees and not on her.
Still, she couldn’t help the anxiety, the unease, that came with those expectations. With the feel of failing.
“She’s unforged, Captain. And a recruit,” Pyetar pointed out. He was trying to hide it, but she could tell from the tightening of his shadowed eyes and tense jaw he was angry.
Darish looked at Pyetar. There was hesitation there—worry even—but Darish hid it well. It seemed Pyetar even made his superior officers nervous around him.
“It’s happened before.” Darish shrugged. “And if she’s willing to take the risk, I don’t have a better alternative right now.”
Were they short-staffed? Pulled too thin? Iryana tucked that bit of information away, too.
“You really want her guarding your back?”
“Does my back need guarding?” Darish straightened and squared his shoulders.
Iryana stepped closer to them, not interested in watching them stand off. “I’m in.”
“Good.” Darish turned to Vaneshta. “Let the rest of the team know.” And then he shouted for everyone to head back.
“Congratulations.” Vaneshta smiled at her, a tension around her eyes that wasn’t there before, and then headed into the pit. Hopefully to gather the weapons, because Iryana didn’t have the strength to climb back down there at the moment. At least she hadn’t broken Vaneshta’s spear.
The horde of spectators abandoned the pit as quickly as they’d congregated around it, seeming to be in a rush to get back to their duties and training. Iryana stood to the side, the world a bit of a blur as she received a few claps on the back as soldiers passed her by.
The high of battle was dissipating, and Iryana could feel her muscles starting to shake, the cold filling in the spaces her energy vacated. She was not looking forward to walking all the way back to the barracks, but the sooner she made it back, the better.
Then she noticed Pyetar was still standing there, staring at her. Her eyes fell to his black belt again.
Iryana marched up close to him and spoke low enough that only he could hear. “I don’t know what your problem is, but I am here to stay. Get over it.”
She finally felt like she had a chance. Watching and fighting the dakii was one of the few things she was good at. Iryana had no intention of Pyetar getting in the way.
“I don’t care what you do,” he growled back.
“Liar.”
“You are inconsequential, and soon they will see you don’t belong here. Then you’ll be running back home. You know nothing about surviving here.”
“I know enough.” Iryana took a step back, stumbling a little as she did so.
The anger kept the shaking at bay until she made it back to her room and collapsed onto the borrowed blankets.
She followed Darish, still adjusting the issued armor as she hurried to keep up.
It felt off compared to the guardian armor she was so used to, that had been fitted to her.
Now she wore mismatched pieces that clearly weren’t designed to fit together—some steel, others made of leather scale mail.
She tried not to let the unsettling way they hung on her body bother her. Tried to focus on other things.
They left the barracks yard onto the large wood-block street that followed the walls all around the fort. Frost still dusted the edges of the road, although it would melt quickly once the sun was high in the sky.
On one side, the stone walls of the barracks stood two times her height, and on her other spanned the massive height of the wooden fortress walls. Thick, interlocked logs stacked up impossibly high, bound with earthwork and gravel at their base. She felt small between them.
It was early, but not as early as she used to start her chores. The sun had begun its climb into the sky, though it hadn’t yet surpassed the great mountains to their east. Only the almost-full Mud Moon hung above them. She’d lain in her bed for hours waiting for Vaneshta to wake up.
She’d been at the fort for less than a week, and she was already heading on her first assignment with her new team. It felt too quick.
Based on the number of people out and about, it seemed few rose early. The morning-shift guards were just stirring to take over from the second night shift. It would be a good time to move about unnoticed, she realized.
When they weren’t on missions or training, the soldiers had time to themselves.
Most of them seemed to spend the time socializing in the hall, but others took the time to work out or gather with their friends around the fort.
This meant that usually there were people wandering around throughout the day.
A group of soldiers waited for them at the corner of the barracks, and with every step closer, Iryana’s heart beat louder and her throat tightened.
She had to ingratiate herself with this team, convince them to accept her. Something even her family couldn’t do.
That thought made her feel dizzy.
Then she remembered who they were. Soldiers. Thugs. She didn’t care if they eventually grew to hate her when they discovered her secrets. When she messed up. They just had to believe for a little while that she wanted to be there, that she belonged there. Just long enough.
The panic retreated a little.
Vaneshta inclined her head when she noticed Iryana trailing behind Darish. There was a pinched look to her square face, a furrow of her thin brows.
There was that wariness in her eyes again, a tightness like when Darish had recruited Iryana for his team. Vaneshta had been quiet the last night, and not knowing what to do otherwise, Iryana left her be.