Chapter 30 #3
The wound stung, but not enough to distract me.
I rushed backwards, wiping blood off my eyebrows and eyelashes before it obscured my vision. He was circling me again, axe dripping with rain and bits of blood from my forehead.
“It surprised me, hearing you screwed over Yeshar even worse than me,” Nikolach said. He was stalling for time, but I needed a moment too after that last exchange, to figure out how to get the axe away from him.
“I didn’t do anything to either of you,” I said.
Nikolach’s eyes were overly bright as he straightened, pain masked beneath whatever drug he was on. “Lies, lies, lies. Losing so much product must have cost him dearly.” He gestured with the axe to our general location. “Why else would he resort to this?”
I frowned. “What are you talking about?”
“Our meeting here,” he snickered again. “Don’t tell me you thought it was coincidence I found you here?”
I had believed it was horrendously bad luck.
“Oh, you didn’t know.” He gave me a predatory grin.
“Poor stupid girl. Yeshar told me the date of the final exam. Where to find you. Can’t even afford to deliver.
Deliberate. No–” He seemed caught in an internal struggle for a moment.
“Delegate. Can’t even afford to delegate his own dirty work anymore,” he made a clucking noise with his tongue.
How had Yeshar known what route I’d follow to Lake Mirae? Fear slithered through me, locking my limbs.
Now wasn’t the time to get caught up thinking about it. Nikolach wasn’t relaxing his grip on the axe at all, despite his injuries. My best bet was to wrestle it away from him.
Diving for the axe’s handle, I put my full body weight into the move like I was trying to grapple it. Nikolach might outmuscle and outweigh me, but having a weapon would even the odds.
He gripped it tighter with both hands, hugging it toward him as we wrestled for it.
The sour stench of dust on his breath was repugnant even beneath the cloying scent of the storm overhead.
He giggled as we struggled. I kneed his shin and stomped his feet, alternating between tugging and twisting to try to free the blade from his hands.
Nikolach kneed me in the gut.
Gasping for breath, I doubled over, releasing the axe and falling back into the muck. He took the opportunity to slice my shoulder as he tore the axe back to himself.
Red hot pain exploded, wound red liquid spilling down my arm. I screamed.
It wasn’t enough. All the training was useless against his superior size, and the unfair advantage of the weapon he held.
The hissing grind of thunder cut off some of Nikolach’s words as he raised the blade over his head. “—no one fucks with me and lives.”
This was it. I was dead.
The Sun glyph could ensure our mutual destruction. It might be a more pleasant way to go.
What would it feel like?
Before I could decide, the whistling rush of air from the strike coming down fanned my face.
Down isn’t done.
I rolled away at the last second, scrambling back up with a fistful of grimey sludge in both hands. One grip held a rock at the center of the mud. The axe was lodged deep into the ground, and Nikolach was struggling to free it.
Lightning flared.
Flinging the mud at his face, he flinched away and wiped it away–as I knew he would.
I didn’t wait.
With the other hand, I pounded the rock into the same ear I’d punched earlier, hard. Blood spilled out from his ear and he shouted a curse. Delivering the blow hurt my shoulder. I kept going, clubbing him again with the rock in the same spot.
Once. Twice. Three times.
He collapsed like the strings on his marionette had been cut, unconscious.
With a guttural snarl, I kicked him with my boots. Aiming for his spine. His kneecaps. His skull.
My rage was bottomless. I slammed my heel down on his elbows, his gut. Kicking his hands, his teeth.
Nightmares didn’t need sleep to haunt the mind. Nikolach had tormented my thoughts for months.
I wanted to bury him, to never live afraid again.
Firm arms wrapped around my shoulders, pinning me before I could inflict any more damage. “Let go!” The voice was familiar. Sarina, or Corra. I strained against their hold, but they had me off balance and temporarily restrained.
Deep visceral instinct rejected the idea of leaving Nikolach injured but alive. He had tried to kill me, this was justice. Self-defense was protected under Ascendancy law.
I’d never let something precious be taken from me again.
“Stop, he’s defenseless!” She shouted.
Nikolach was seeking revenge for the time and freedom I’d taken from him. My righteous fury dimmed with the realization.
What had Yeshar called him, ‘predictably rough’?
He was a dangerous, brutal criminal. But so was I. And between the two of us, I was the greater threat. Without the axe, he was weak by comparison.
Nikolach wasn’t clever, skilled, or quick. He wasn’t even sober. I had Skinscript and Voyager training, and friends too.
I was stronger than him. I’d overpowered him despite his greater height and weight, and outmaneuvered him despite his weapon.
There was no reason to fear him anymore.
Letting my anger dissipate, I sank one more kick into his ribcage before relaxing. It gave a satisfying crunch.
“What are you doing!? Leave him! We’ve gotta go.” I turned, seeing Corra was the one pulling at me. “There isn’t much light left.”
My attention snapped back like a rubber band. The final exam.
“He attacked Sarina in the forest. She’s injured,” Corra explained. “I’m taking over for her to make sure we graduate.”
I very much wanted to kick Nikolach again.
“Is she okay?” I winced as Corra released her grip on my shoulder.
Pain didn’t care what I wanted.
Papa’s Medic knowledge woke up with the awareness of my injuries.
Fetching my scarf, I winced as the movement aggravated my shoulder wound. I wrapped the length of it around my shoulder, securing it with a tight square knot. It hurt a lot, but it was more of a scrape. The blade hadn’t sunk too deep.
“She’ll heal,” Corra said. “Later you can tell us who the hell he is and why he tried to kill you both. Right now, we need to go.”
I gave a terse nod.
We didn’t linger. We ran.
Within an hour, Corra and I reached our destination.
The lake spread out before us in a churning inky mass.
Pandanus and raphia palms rimmed the edges of the lake, with water-logged hibiscus gilding their trunks.
Lake Mirae was the remnant of a series of four smaller lakes that had once existed on Mesmoria.
Over time, the wet season had flooded them until they’d drained into each other, coalescing into one single body of water.
Somewhere beneath these waters, the skeletal ruins of buildings that had existed on paths between those smaller lakes still rested.
Peering through the blinding rainfall, I channeled Perception. A faint tingling sensation from my thigh told me it was working. A buzzing tickled my ears.
Lightning split the air as we reached the lake, sharp with the tang of ozone. It tore open the darkening sky like a gleaming blade, casting the dark waters in an eerie ginger glow and charring a nearby tree. We had minutes before sundown, and not enough of them to count on both hands.
“There,” I pointed to the center of the lake. “A lodge.” It had to be the meeting point. Past the curtains of rain and overcast murk of the storm, it was nearly invisible. I barely made out the pale shape of someone already in the water.
Crossing the lake without a conductor to draw the lightning away would be suicide.
Corra didn’t share my concerns, as she waded into the muddy depths. “See ya on the other side,” she called. Without hesitating, she swam in the direction I had pointed. She moved like a fish, slipping forward with ease.
Unlacing my boots, I left them behind. They’d only slow me down.
Rushing out into the ford, water sloshed as I balanced against the sudden floating sensation pulling on my lower half.