David Baldacci - The Finisher

The last image was somehow the worst. I was on a flying steed, dressed all in chain mail, like the female I had seen. I was fighting. I had a sword in one hand and the Elemental in the other. Bodies were falling all around me as I cleaved and thrust my way through a horde of attackers. And then it hit me directly in the chest. The light entered me in the front and left me in the back. The pain was unimaginable.

I watched myself look down at the wound. The mortal wound. The next instant I was falling through the sky, down … down … down….

I tried to scream but nothing came out. I felt the creature on my back tightening its grip around me. I swung my arms back and tried to hit it. But in hitting it, I was only striking myself. I had thought fighting in the Duelum was hard. I would take a thousand Nons trying to crush my skull over this. This was so awful, all I wanted was to die.

The thing was gripping me so tightly I could barely breathe. My chest was rising and falling in increasingly constricted space. I knew at some point soon it would have no more latitude to operate. But I didn’t care. Right now I had no desire to live. The nightmarish images became darker, smaller, but their potency somehow grew immeasurably with each passing moment. I was being dissolved from the inside out.

I’m not sure how it came to me because I don’t really remember doing it. My hand reached down to my waist. My breathing was so labored now that any upcoming breath could very well be my last. I managed, despite the crushing weight I felt, to slip Destin free.

I gripped it in both my hands, which of course were now part of the creature’s hands. I flipped it upward over my head and felt it settle around the creature’s neck. I crossed my arms as fiercely as I could. This, in turn, made Destin replicate that movement. It encircled the creature’s neck and then tightened. If this didn’t work, I was truly lost. I pulled with all the strength I had left.

I heard a gurgle, the first sound the creature had made since it stopped crying.

The next thing I saw struck me first with horror and then with relief as the chain grew lax. The thing’s head hit the floor in front of me, bounced once and then lay still. Slowly, an inch and a sliver at a time, I felt the grip of the thing begin to ease and then fall away. In three excruciatingly long slivers, it was gone. My mind cleared. I rose on wobbly legs.

I didn’t want to because I thought it might have turned back into John, but I finally had to stare down at the evil thing that had very nearly killed me. It was turning black and was shriveling up before my eyes.

I turned and ran as fast as I could. Only this time I knew where I was going because the darkness inside wherever I was had started to lift. It was as though the evil dead thing was absorbing all the blackness in here into itself, allowing the light to shine once more.

When I saw my reflection just up ahead, I sped up and leapt, my hands outstretched. I flew through the looking glass, tumbled to the hard marble floor, and was up in an instant. I turned to stare back at the looking glasses. All of them were starting to fade. In less than a sliver, they disappeared. But I had glimpsed once more the intricate designs on the wooden frames. And this time, I remembered where I had seen them before.

The Adder Stone safely in my pocket, I raced down the steps and out through the side door of Stacks. Freed from the place, I soared into the air, Destin in fine working order after being freed from the glass. I had to get back to hospital as fast as possible.

SLIVERS LATER, Ilanded as near the place as I dared. I sprinted the rest of the way, pushed through the doors and raced down the hall. Another sliver passed and then I was back in Duf’s room. Breathing hard, I skirted around the sheet that hung from the ceiling giving the space some privacy.

Then I stopped dead. The cot was empty. The room was empty. Delph and his father were gone. I rushed back down the corridor, thinking only terrible thoughts, the next worse than the previous one. There were no Nurses or Mendens in the passageways, so I started poking my head in each room I came to.

Wugs in various states of ill health or injury peered back at me from their cots. Heads bandaged, faces red and swollen, lungs hacking, legs bound in plaster, arms tethered to bodies — none of them was Duf. I had to believe many of them had been injured on the Wall construction, yet none so badly as Duf.

When I came out of one room I heard the scream. I looked wildly about because I recognized the voice. I hustled toward the sound, rounding one corner and then another. The screams kept coming and then they abruptly died out. I reached a set of double doors, pushed them open and hurtled into the room, panting from being out of breath, my broken nose pouring blood and throbbing. I slowly straightened and looked upon the horror in front of me.

Duf lay on the table, a sheet covering the top of him. As I looked down below, my stomach gave a lurch. There was nothing there. His legs below the knees were gone. Duf was covered in sweat and unconscious, something for which I was dearly grateful.

Delph was just standing there, his big hands tucked into fists, his great chest heaving, the tears spreading over his cheeks as he peered at what was left of his father. I looked at the Menden who stood there with blood smeared across his white gown and a vicious-looking saw in one hand. A Nurse stood next to him, staring anxiously at Delph.

I drew closer to the cot. Where Duf’s legs had been were just stumps. I could barely find the breath to keep my lungs going.

“What happened?” I asked breathlessly.

“Cu-cut ’em off,” said Delph. He was teetering. “Just cu-cu-cu —”

I gripped his hand and looked at the Menden. “When did you do this?”

He was staring at my injured face, but then focused on my question.

“Finished about a sliver ago. Delph didn’t want it done, but it had to be done. Otherwise, we’d have a dead Wug.”

“A sliver?”

The Nurse pulled me away from Delph and said in a low voice, “He tried to stop the Menden.” She pointed to his torn gown and battered face. “It took five Wug orderlies to manage him while the Menden performed the amputation. He said you were coming with something that would help Duf. And we did wait, for a bit, although we knew that was nonsense. You never came back, so we had to get it done. You understand. Medical matter.”

I couldn’t find the breath to speak. My mind was so full of things that it was impossible to form a response.

A sliver. A bloody sliver. Why did I take so long? Why did I lose the bloody Stone in the first place?

Duf’s legs were gone. I didn’t think even the Adder Stone could help. Still, I slipped it from my pocket, thought of Duf with his legs fully healed and then waved the Stone over his stumps, disguising the movement by pretending to straighten the sheet.

I held my breath, waiting for the legs to be regrown. And I kept waiting. And nothing happened. Finally, sick to my stomach, I let go of the Adder Stone and it fell to the bottom of my pocket.

The Menden came over and studied my face. “What happened to your nose?”

“Duelum,” I said absently. I doubted whether he would have known this was a lie or not. And I really didn’t care.

“Do you want me to attend to your injuries? I can reset your nose.”

I shook my head. “It’s nothing,” I said in a hushed tone. And it was nothing. “You just … you just tend to Duf.”

I went back over to Delph. “I’m so sorry,” I said. “So very sorry.”

He sniffled and rubbed his eyes. “You tried, Vega Jane. I know ya did. Just ran out of slivers, didn’t we? Just ran out of …” His voice trailed off.