James West - Shadow and Steel

“Slaughter them all,” Ke’uld grated. “Spare only the Izutarian. The reward for his blood will be great.”

Belina fired an arrow without thought, and it glanced off the man’s chest, as if striking stone. For a moment everyone, human and demon alike, stood stock-still.

“The flesh of some demons are near invincible to mortal arms,” Adham cautioned. “We cannot know which can withstand us, until it is too late.”

“Then we fight those we know can and will die,” Ulmek growled. Without warning, he whirled and charged the Alon’mahk’lar. Damoc joined him, then Adham and Belina, Nola and Sumahn, then all the rest.

In heartbeats, enraged howls filled the alley, joined by the reverberating clamor of steel meeting steel.

Under it all was another sound-one Belina would never forget, if she survived the hour-the sound of the dead striking the ground.

“Do you know where you are going?” Robis called.

After running a little farther, Leitos halted. He cocked his head, and took a few deep breaths to quiet the blood rushing in his ears. “Do you hear that?”

Robis mimicked his posture. “What do you-”

Leitos cut him off with a sharp gesture, and he slowly turned his head, listening. As his heartbeat smoothed, he heard it again. Shouting . A moment later, those shouts became a din of hellish screams.

He was sprinting before he registered the racket of steel beating against steel. Behind him Robis protested, but Leitos kept on. There was only one reason this day for fighting in the black city of Armala.

Down one wide street and up another he ran, each step faster than the last, his pace dictated by the nearing clamor of hard-fought battle. Inhuman roars told him the foes he would find, before he skidded around a corner.

Alon’mahk’lar, five or six at the least, stood bunched together at the end of an alley. The muscles of their immense backs knotted, as they fought against a hidden foe. Whomever the Sons of the Fallen counted as enemies, Leitos counted as friends.

Just as Robis caught up, Leitos loosed an arrow into the base of a demon-born’s skull. The creature straightened as if poleaxed, made a half turn, and fell into one of its companions. With a throaty growl, the second Alon’mahk’lar tripped and went down under the first creature’s weight.

Before any others could react, Leitos quickly sent two more arrows into the throng. One more Alon’mahk’lar fell, but the other jerked the offending shaft from its shoulder with a deafening roar. The rest turned to face the new threat.

“A little help?” Leitos said to Robis, drawing the fletching of another arrow to his cheek.

Whatever Robis said was lost to the sharp twang of the bowstring slipping off Leitos’s fingertips. The shaft buried itself in the eye of the Alon’mahk’lar still clutching the arrow it had yanked from its shoulder.

Before the creature toppled, the remaining demon-born charged. In their wake, scattered across the breadth of the alley, Leitos saw men and women, sprawled in death. Yatoans.

Robis made a strangled sound at the approach of the demon-born. Leitos did not bother looking at him. The bow dropped from his fingers in favor of grasping his sword and dagger. Bracing his feet, he made ready.

“Jump clear before they reach us,” he warned sharply, “or they will trample us under.”

He had no chance to notice if Robis understood, before the Alon’mahk’lar fell on them, cudgels and swords and axes whipping the air where he had just been. Leitos tumbled over the paving stones, and hastily bounded to his feet. He swung his sword backhand at a flashing blur, felt the steel bite hard and deep, then he was rolling clear once more.

Catlike, Leitos sprang up, and raked his sword across the Alon’mahk’lar’s blunt snout. Howling, the creature flung back its horned head. Scarlet droplets fell like a hot rain upon Leitos’s face. He swiped an arm across his eyes to clear them. The effort was wasted.

Vision gone red, he tracked his foe’s movement. The bulky shape charged, and he threw himself out of reach. The demon-born closed again, growling. An instant later, Leitos heard a rush of wind. He ducked, just avoiding a spiked cudgel aimed to tear off his head. The Alon’mahk’lar swung again. Leitos leaped back, sucking in his belly. The beast pressed the attack, and this time Leitos’s evasion failed. A spike clawed into his scalp, and threw him. Leitos flayed at the air in a bid to right himself, but landed in a jumble.

He lay gulping air. A ringing buzz filled his ears, muting the tumult of battle. He felt the thudding tread of the closing demon-born in the paving stones beneath him. Writhing like a slug, Leitos rolled to his side. Imagining that cudgel falling against his skull, he heaved himself up and staggered away, slashing his sword to keep the Alon’mahk’lar at bay.

Stinging tears had cleansed most of the blood from his eyes, and the demon-born’s triumphant gaze battered Leitos’s confidence. He was weak, and his limbs refused to work right. The Alon’mahk’lar advanced, unscathed, save for the slash across its snout.

The demon-born rushed in, face contorted, teeth bared. Lurching drunkenly, Leitos ducked under the beast’s swing, and ripped the tip of his dagger across the Alon’mahk’lar’s belly. His sword followed that raw scarlet line, plowing a deadly furrow that instantly sprouted a crop of coiled innards.

Leitos spun past the Alon’mahk’lar, hamstrung it, and then chopped his blade into the back of the creature’s neck. The blow was weak, but the sword was sharp, his aim true. Silent and stiff, the demon-born fell limply to the ground.

Before Leitos could savor his victory a voice, worse than even the heart-stilling tongue of the Alon’mahk’lar, filled the air. “Take the Izutarians!”

Leitos turned sharply, taking in a tableau of butchery. All the demon-born were down, hacked to pieces by the few remaining Yatoans. Adham and Belina stood over a twitching Alon’mahk’lar a little way off; Nola and Sumahn, pressed back to back, held their swords at the ready; Damoc, his face bloodied by a cut running from his temple to his nose, was down on one knee, with Daris hovering protectively over him. Despite one arm hanging lifelessly at his side, and blood dripping off his fingertips, Robis went to Damoc, and helped him stand.

Ulmek strode purposefully toward the alley, and the gathering of Brothers. Even had their eyes not flashed silver, Leitos would have known they were his brethren no more.

Ke’uld and Halan hesitated only a moment before advancing to meet Ulmek, while the rest of the Brothers spread out in an expanding crescent at their backs. They noted Ulmek’s approach with disdainful glances, but ever their eyes rolled toward Leitos and Adham, their desire to take captive one of the last of the Valera line palpable.

Every part of his being told Leitos to flee. But Ulmek was his leader now, and Ulmek showed nothing of taking flight. They would either survive together by steel and blood, or they would die together.

“For the Crimson Shield!” Leitos shouted abruptly. He raised his sword and dagger, and charged.

“Give the command, Fauthian,” urged the Kelren shipmaster. The grotesque brands covering his shaven skull flushed in anger at Adu’lin’s reluctance to let his band join the fight. “The Alon’mahk’lar are down. Why do you wait?”

When the time comes for you to enter the fray , Adu’lin thought, having already decided the fate of the sea-wolves, you will not be so eager . Neither did he waste a moment acknowledging the bow-legged brute at his side, or any of the Kelrens waiting on the flat rooftop at his back. Ever had they been unthinking weapons, crude and loathsome, barely worth keeping alive.