Chapter 30
Pagosa Springs, Colorado
Brir
We sprinted in the almost comforting cloak of darkness, the cold air prickling over my skin like a thousand icy needles. The world was a blur, dominated by the roar of gunfire and the thunderous echoes of Soren's arrows. My heart drummed heavily in my chest as if trying to burst through, a primal rhythm permeating my every vein.
We broke away from the side of the building, rushing towards the soldiers. As soon as we came into view, Soren stopped firing at the front of the building and kept his arrows to the far side. The rain quickly put out the small fires.
With a deep growl, Leonovus leaped forward, a blur in the darkness. His speed was staggering. In an instant, he was at the walls of the warehouse, scaling them with an awesome ferocity. His claws dug into the building's exterior like it was made of butter.
Merrick was on my left, his muscled form barreling through the storm like a force of nature itself. He pulled his kitous back and leaped for the first soldier. Its wide arch came down with a thud right onto the man’s shoulder with a sickening thud. He fell to his knees.
My heart pounded as the world around me broke into chaos. Once a soothing background whisper, the rain now pounded on the hard earth like an unrelenting drumbeat. Each arrow Soren released was a blazing missile streaking through the sky, each impact echoing like thunder in my ears. My grip tightened on my sword, my knuckles white.
Leonovus moved like a demon through the darkness, his figure a mere shadow. His claws gleamed under the sporadic bursts of light from Soren's arrows.
Merrick was by my side, completely silent, muscles taut, eyes focused forward. I could see his chest rise and fall with steady breaths. Despite the fear that gripped me, Merrick was a rock—constant, unwavering.
I sliced through the first human I came upon. He’d been too distracted by Soren's arrows to even see us. Leonovus yowled from the roof before he plummeted down to the ground right onto a pile of humans clustered together. His claws dug into them, the razor-sharp tips tearing them open. Blood poured down Leonovus's hands. It wouldn’t take long for Leonovus to lose himself.
Leonovus was everywhere I looked, slicing into delicate skin. His claws sunk into one man’s Kevlar with a horrifying crunch. Tearing through what should have been bulletproof.
The sight was out of a nightmare, a deadly ballet choreographed by the Gods of War. Leonovus was a creature of pure wrath, his form blurring from one location to the next, a rain of scarlet marking his trail. He was in a blood rage now. His mind bent towards one thing and his body the weapon of his warpath.
The air became a dizzying mix of blood, sweat, and rain. Merrick was a whirlwind of ferocious strikes.
Leonovus was on the soldiers before they realized it, his claws slashing through the air. His movements were brutally elegant, a dance honed in countless battles and victories.
Merrick was by my side, matching my pace stride for stride, his unwavering presence a bastion amid a whirlwind of terror and violence. His face was set in grim determination, and his eyes were sharp and alert despite the chaos roaring around us.
Fear knotted my gut, but there was no time for hesitation. Chaos erupted around us; screams filled the air, punctuated by gunfire and the untamed roar of the storm. Yet I found a strange calm within it all. A single focus as we rounded the front of the warehouse that the soldiers were guarding.
Artemis.
His name echoed in my head, driving me forward and transforming my fear into a fierce determination. The objective was clear: save Artemis. I tightened my grip on my sword, its hilt slick with the sweat of my palms.
Kill them all.
As we broke through the enemy lines heralded by Leonovus's wrath and Soren's bombardment, I noticed Arya's sword glittering ominously in my grip. The steel blade had darkened.
The sword cut through the air with a sharp whistle, meeting the hardened body armor of another adversary. The man buckled and collapsed, a gurgling sound coming from his throat as his life trickled away.
The blood seemed drawn to the blade like ferrofluid to a magnet.
I felt a strange thrumming in its hilt. The blade was heavy with the weight of the blood it had drawn, yet somehow, it seemed to sing. The whooshing air around the blade literally whistled as I wielded it.
The storm drowned out screams. Each time I cut down one, another would take his place. The sharp, stinging scent of gunpowder mixed with the humid musk of blood and earth.
There were more soldiers than we had anticipated. Men poured from the warehouse door, all clad in body armor, wielding weapons that glinted under the harsh glow of the fires caused by Soren’s arrows. The air was heavy with the scent of fear and blood, metallic and raw.
They raised their guns, forming a line in front of the door.
“Merrick!” I screamed, diving for cover behind a military truck right as a storm of bullets peppered the vehicle.
Merrick ran toward me, swerving narrowly to evade a new spray of gunfire. He skidded behind the truck with a grimace on his face and a fresh gash adorning his arm.
Light tore right over our heads as Soren's arrow cut across the sky, slamming into the men who were shooting at us. I felt the wave of heat as the explosion shook the truck.
Amidst the ringing silence that followed, I could hear the distant cries and groans of injured men.
We didn’t waste the opportunity.
We fought our way through the disoriented soldiers towards the warehouse door.
I followed Leonovus's lead and slipped behind stacks of crates and abandoned machinery. We pressed ourselves against the cold metal surface of a massive container as another round of gunfire started. The humans were no longer firing blindly. They could aim now, ignoring the arrows raining down on them. Their bullets ricocheted off stone and metal.
Leonovus looked at me for just a second. His eyes were nothing but blown color, glittering ominously. His fur was on edge, making his body look larger as his puffed-up tail sliced back and forth.
“I will stay here and deal with the rest of them. Get to the door,” Leonovus shouted over the gunfire. His tone was guttural as he fought to keep his sanity.
“No, we shouldn’t split up!” Merrick told him. Leonovus's limbs were shaking, and his fur was stained with the blood of the bodies of the men he had killed.
“I need you to run. I won't know the difference in a minute who is the enemy,” Leonovus snarled.
A man ran towards us, his gun raised. Leonovus’s hand reached out like lightning and wrapped his claws around the man's arm, yanking the soldier forward. His other hand reached up and ripped his head back before he sunk his teeth into the soldier's neck, ripping the flesh away.
“Leonovus!” Merrick hollered, reaching out and grabbing his shoulder.
Leonovus spun around, hissing. His pupils were slits now. The color was the only thing left in his eyes. He could no longer see us. He no longer knew who we were. Merrick pushed me back as another soldier came barreling towards us. Leonovus was on him in seconds, tearing at him, claws dug into the man's chest. Gripping the bones of the soldier’s ribs, the Valeti snapped them from his sternum. He exposed the human heart that he was digging out of the man's chest while he was still alive, all while the man screamed, thrashing under Leonovus.
“Let's go,” Merrick said. His eyes were wide as we watched the Valeti tear out the human heart.
Leonovus leaped over the crate and moved faster than the humans could probably see. His claws mangled the flesh of another human. He jumped onto the back of another, biting deep into the side of the soldier's neck. Arterial blood sprayed over the ground as he ripped through the man's artery.
As Leonovus became a whirlwind of savagery, Merrick propelled me towards the warehouse. We sprinted through the chaos, narrowly avoiding gunfire and bodies strewn on the ground like discarded toys.
A soldier ran in front of us. I raised my sword and plunged it into his chest. The blade almost seemed to sing as it fed from the human. Pulling it free, I ran through the door that Merrick was holding open.
He slammed it behind us almost instantly, quieting the battle that was outside. Merrick picked up a nearby chair and wedged it under the door handle.
The sound of a gun cocking pulled my attention in front of us. A soldier was pointing a handgun directly at my head.
I raised the sword to defend myself, squeezing the handle so tightly that something sharp punctured my palm right as the gun discharged with a terrible boom.
A purple shield erupted from the sword.
The bullet streaked across its surface and embedded itself into the wall.
Merrick rushed forward, his kitous swishing down and slicing the man's shoulder where it met his neck.
With a choked gasp, the soldier's gun clattered to the floor, and he crumbled, his lifeblood spilling over Merrick's weapon. The sound of the soldier's demise echoed in the mostly empty building, amplifying the dread that roiled in my stomach.
“What the hell was that?” Merrick asked me.
I looked at my stinging palm. A small hypodermic needle emerged in the sword's hilt, coated with a shimmering liquid that seemed to glow under the bleak light when I pressed on the grip. I frowned, turning the sword around in my hand to get a better look at the strange mechanism. The hilt had a sophisticated design adorned with symbols and glyphs, but their meaning eluded me.
"It appears this sword isn't as conventional as I thought,” I told him. I wrapped my hand back around the hilt, squeezing sharply. A needle jutted out, pricking my palm and injecting a cool substance under my skin. My vision clouded for a second. As the needle retracted back into the hilt, my vision cleared, and I looked down at the sword in surprise.
There was a small puncture in my palm. Silvery blood was seeping out, glistening in the dim light.
“Arya said she made the sword from her blood," I said. "She didn't mention that it could do this, though."
Merrick's brow furrowed as he carefully wiped the blood from his kitous on the fallen soldier’s uniform. He seemed to be considering something, his gaze flitting between my sword and my wounded hand.
“Thank god it could,” Merrick said, gripping my shoulder before dragging me down the hall. “Let's keep going.”
The front of the building looked like a few offices. The soldiers had been here for a while—marks where the dust had been cleaned away. Empty crates lay discarded. The place reeked of decay.
As we ventured deeper into the building, echoing footsteps sent a chill down my spine. The layout grew increasingly complex, like a labyrinth of steel and concrete designed to trap its victims within its cold embrace. We ventured past derelict offices and through long-forgotten corridors.
Muffled sounds could be heard from somewhere farther inside.
A door down the hall flew open, slamming right into Merrick as a soldier came through, gun at the ready.
“Get down on the ground!” he shouted. He was too close to me. I sidestepped to avoid the gunfire, swinging the blade down. My sword sliced through the arm holding the gun.
Screams of agony echoed through the cavernous warehouse, but I didn't stop. With a swift turn, the blade found another target, the purple glow intensifying with each kill. Beside me, Merrick was a whirlwind of destruction, his kitous cleaving through flesh and bone with ease.
The blood that spilled onto the ground made the floor slippery, and I misjudged my step, sliding on the floor. Merrick caught me under the arm before I could hit the floor.
“You alright?” I asked.
“I'm good,” he whispered as a man turned the corner, gun raised.
Merrick swung his kitous just as the man ducked the attack. The weapon embedded into the wall. Merrick looked at it and then back at the soldier. Before the man could even raise his gun again, Merrick lumbered forward. His large hand wrapped around the man's face, covering it entirely. Merrick jerked the man forward and slammed the soldier’s face onto his knee. The man fell to the ground in the blood that flooded the floor. His body made a splash.
The purple glow from Arya's sword faded as if exhausted from the onslaught. The silence that reigned over us now was deafening, only broken by our heavy breathing and the distant sound of violence outside.
"This way," Merrick said, pulling me out of my trance. We moved forward, opening doors and looking into rooms.
I had just opened another door when we heard boots pounding on the ground behind us.
“Keep going; I will hold them here,” Merrick said, turning towards the sound. I didn’t argue. I needed to find Artemis.
Alone now, I raced down the hall. I flung open a door that made my heart stutter in my chest. My breath froze in my lungs.
There, in the middle of the room, Artemis, bound and gagged, was chained to the cold, hard floor. His pale skin was covered in dirt and sweat, his eyes swollen and bloodshot. His once beautiful hair was now matted with blood and grime.
The chains were wrapped around his body, keeping him on the ground. What was left of his tail lay limply over one of his legs. His eyes lifted to look up at me, wide and disbelieving.
A tall, blond man stood over Artemis with his boot planted on his back, his eyes glinting with manic joy. The man's smile was feral, and his teeth glinted ominously under the harsh fluorescent light.
"Well, hello," he drawled, his eyes flicking to meet mine. He pointed a gun at the back of Artemis's head.
The man was relaxed. His body was loose as he looked at me with a smile.
The shock of seeing Artemis in this state gave way to a surge of pure, unadulterated fury at the sight of the delighted tormentor. A low growl escaped my throat, echoing in the stark room. My hands fisted, knuckles white, and my body trembled with the force of my anger. I drew a breath and stepped forward, letting the door slam shut behind me. My threads pulsed with light as my anger raced through my body.
The man with the gun to my Savase’s head spoke again, the smile never faltering. “You must be Brir. I’m Orion. Artemis has told me a lot about you.”