29. The Darkness Floods In
The Darkness Floods In
Despite the pain radiating throughout his chest and narrowing his vision into a darkening tunnel, Alobaz couldn’t let the enchantress die.
Why he would fight to save the life of his would-be assassin, he didn’t understand. He just knew that he had to.
Drion arrived first. The magnificent stallion gave one look to the dagger protruding from Alobaz’s chest, stamped furiously, then lowered his head and knees to allow Alobaz, who usually mounted by leaping onto his tall back, an easier job of it.
Drion had done this for Alobaz many times before on multiple battlefields, but it had been decades since the sh?dread had needed to.
“No. I’m okay. I can wait,” Alobaz said to Drion, who likely meant to whisk him quickly to the castle, where his wound could be tended to.
The creature was undoubtedly magical. He seemed to comprehend everything Alobaz ever told him; he just wasn’t able to speak back in response.
Drion scoffed, his big nostrils flaring in an obvious, Yeah. Right. He snorted again, seeming to add, You’re a fucking moron, Alobaz thought.
“I probably am being a moron,” Alobaz said.
Drion nodded his large head, bursts of shadowy smoke puffing from his nostrils, then tipped his head down as if to say, Get the fuck on my back, already.
Still kneeling beside his enemy, Alobaz smiled sadly at the creature who’d long been a loyal friend. As much as the remaining Bazrian Seven, Drion would never betray him.
“She’s dying. If I let you take me, she’ll die alone.”
Drion stamped a clawed dragon-like foot.
“I know you don’t care … but I … do.” Just as softly, Alobaz added, “I can’t let her die.”
Sh?dreads had the general structure of a pegasus, with the body as of a horse but the wings of a dragon.
His armored scales, snout, claws, horns, and dragon teeth were dark as tar, and as substantial to the touch, but swirled with shadows, much as the abyss did, as the walls of the castle did.
They were creatures both of the Ethers and of the Opalese, as awe-worthy and inexplicable as any of this world’s mysteries.
They were formidable adversaries in battle, and invaluable allies, both on and off the field.
Drion in no way resembled a person of any sort. But Alobaz could still read his expressions just as easily. His nostrils were still flared, his thick lips pressed outward, pitch-black eyes wide and hard, ears tucked tightly back behind his horns. Drion was seriously pissed off.
He glared at Alobaz, for whom the black trees of the forest were swirling in the mist—or was he the one spinning? When Alobaz didn’t recant his idiotic decision, Drion reared those strongly muscled front legs of his that had killed many times with a single strike.
“No,” Alobaz yelled. His cry came out as a strained croak, which only enraged Drion more.
He slammed his legs down.
They crushed the ground a hair from the temptress sprawled on the forest floor.
Where she lay dying.
Slowly slipping away.
The ground had trembled from the force of Drion’s wrath. Yet she hadn’t flinched.
His claws had raked her arm, exposed, unprotected flesh. She seemed beyond the pain of those four new gashes.
Her smile was dreamy and unwavering. Her eyes—those warm golden eyes the likes of which Alobaz had never before seen—were looking far away.
She was slipping through his hold.
When Drion reared again, Alobaz flung a hand out to stop him. He wobbled. His balance was more shit than he’d thought.
He nearly fell on top of the temptress’ abdomen, where blood now pumped slowly, less geyser and more babbling brook whispering its final utterances before drying up. He landed awkwardly half against the ground, half on her knees. The impact jolted the blade sticking out of his chest.
He groaned. The world swirled and tipped—
When he next blinked, only then did he realize that he’d closed his eyes. For how long, he had no idea. But now all his friends, the additional soldiers stationed on the island, and the rest of the sh?dreads, surrounded him—and her.
Alobaz was still slumped over her legs. He swung his head around to look at her. The world’s edges darkened, but he blinked back the encroaching tunnel hard enough to keep it at bay.
The blood from the wounds he’d sliced into her barely dribbled now. Maybe she’d died while he was passed out. He glanced at her face. She still smiled that placid smile, gazing far away as if peering into a dream, a world beyond this one.
“Baz,” Moncho growled.
Slowly, reluctant to look away from her, he looked for Moncho.
His friend crouched beside Lev, Night, Ed, Félix, and Zi, looking like it wasn’t the first time he’d called his name. His broad face was scrunched with worry.
Ed and Night turned, gestured urgently at someone behind them.
Skeet, a lanky curero with a young-looking body but an older-looking face, ran around them and skidded to a stop beside Alobaz.
Immediately, he began rummaging in his bag of healing supplies that had seen as much violence as Skeet had. It was a beat-up, scarred leather.
“I need him flat on his back,” Skeet said, his attention fixed on his bag. He drew out a pile of cloths and bandages, murky tinctures, a potion that glowed red in its vial, a needle and thread, and a utility knife.
Alobaz’s eyes closed for a moment, and suddenly Moncho and Night were on either side of him, sliding him off the temptress and lowering him onto his back.
“Hold him down,” Skeet said. “Shoulders and legs, one to each. Hold him good. I don’t want a repeat of that time after the pygmy ogres.”
Ah, Alobaz thought as if in a fog. Some thoughts came fast, others took forever to coalesce.
The last time I was stabbed in the chest. Skeet had removed the blade without anyone bracing.
Startled, he had thrown Skeet off, flinging him against a nearby rock so that Skeet had blacked out and an apprentice curera had to do the stitching.
Alobaz couldn’t make out who had his legs, but they were pressing down hard. He tilted his head, searching for the enchantress. The arch of his back tugged on his wound. A grunt slipped out. The tunnel was back, bearing down on his vision.
“Stay still,” Night said. “Stay down.”
“Can’t let ’er … die…” He was slurring. Not a great sign, really. Unlike Lev, he hadn’t imbibed anything more intoxicating than human blood.
From somewhere, Lev scoffed. “Of course we can let the bitch die. She tried to kill you, Baz. Fuck ’er hard, and not in the fun way. She dies.”
Alobaz tried to shake his head. It wasn’t working. His head rolled. His chest burned like flames were raging inside it.
“Can’t,” he mumbled. “Keep ’er alive.” He tried to use his command voice. It faltered.
Zi tsked from his left. Or maybe it was his right. He couldn’t tell.
“She’s a s?nglure. She’s not dying unless we drain her and take her head.”
“We are gonna drain her and slice off that pretty head of hers, though, right?” Lev asked.
“She wants to…” Baz swallowed, the bobbing of his throat feeling like too much effort. “Wants to…”
“Shut the fuck up, bro,” Lev said. “Rest. You’re in bad shape.”
Alobaz’s head lolled. “Wants to die.”
Which meant she could die—with her head still attached and blood, however much, in her veins.
“So let the cunt die,” said Ed, cold as the damp ground beneath him.
It seeped through his vest, his shirt, and straight into his bones.
Ed was nice to everyone—until she had really good reason not to be.
“Exactly,” said Lev.
“Save…” Alobaz whispered, the words starting to fail him. “…her.”
His vision darkened. He held on as hard as he could.
Fast and furious, he blinked. “Save her,” he ordered, more clearly.
This was the general, not the man.
Neither the general nor the man had reason to spare the assassin who tried to kill him.
“Sa—”
A hand latched on to his arm.
Alobaz swam through the darkness, searching for a face.
Félix.
The elf’s expression was hard, stoic. Reliable. “I’ll make sure we save her,” he said. “Now rest.”
Skeet counted down from ten. At the count of seven, Alobaz felt himself falling into the ground, dissolving into the mist. His hearing muffled. When Skeet yanked the blade out, Alobaz returned to his body for an instant—then he stopped fighting the darkness.
He let it flood in.