Брайан Макклеллан - Wrath of Empire

But there was no shout, and the hoofbeats grew louder. He frowned, looking over at Celine. The sound was coming from the east. Unless Ibana had found a shorter route, she should be coming from the north. “What kind of horse is that?” he asked Celine.

She tilted her head to listen. “It’s light,” she said. “Maybe an Angland racer?”

“It’s not an Angland.” Styke got to his feet. The road from the east was on the other side of the church. The problem that unsettled him was that he did not recognize that hoofbeat, not entirely. It sounded like …

He rounded the church to spot a small group coming toward him on Dynizian mounts. There were six of them – four men and two women – wearing regular Fatrastan traveling clothes and not outwardly armed. They had the red hair and freckles, but their horses precluded them from being Palo. Styke felt the hair on the back of his head stand on end as they came to a stop on the other side of the graveyard, barely sparing a glance for the pile of corpses.

“Who are they?” Celine asked.

“Go back to the horses,” Styke said. “Find Ka-poel. Both of you go to the edge of town and wait for me.”

“What do you …?”

“Now!”

Celine set off at a run. One of the horsemen broke off from the others and began to trot after her. Styke put himself in the man’s path. That seemed to be enough, as the rider simply switched his attention from Celine to Styke. All of the riders were staring at him.

“Are you Ben Styke?” one of them asked in heavily accented Adran. The woman speaking had a scar across her left eye. Whatever had caused it had barely missed leaving her half-blind.

“Who wants to know?” Styke slowly reached for his knife.

The man whose horse Styke had blocked pointed at Styke’s chest. He spoke in Dynize, but it was close enough to Palo that Styke could understand most of it. “Look at his size. He’s a crippled giant with gunshot wounds. Has to be him.”

“Ji-Orz, go keep watch,” the woman with the scar said. One of the men broke off and headed back the way they’d come, remaining on horseback on a nearby hillock. “You are the man they call Ben Styke, correct?” she asked.

Styke’s feeling about these Dynize grew worse and worse. He took a half step back. The group was far too at ease to be soldiers. Styke could see the bulge of knives beneath their coats, but none of them carried a firearm. He tried to remember the Dynize title “Ji,” but he didn’t think he’d ever heard it before. “I am.”

The nearest one leaned over in his saddle, peering at Styke. “You think it was just a story? I can’t imagine an old cripple like him killing Ji-Kushel.”

Styke’s blood ran cold as he remembered the name. Kushel. The dragonman he’d killed in Lady Flint’s muster yard. “Ji” was the title for dragonmen. He felt a small bead of sweat break out on the back of his neck and wrapped his fingers around the hilt of his knife. Six dragonmen. Styke nearly died fighting one .

“We were sent by Ka-Sedial,” the woman said, “to kill the man who murdered one of our brothers in single combat. You killed Ji-Kushel?”

Styke had the sinking feeling that he was about to die. He fought the feeling, flinging it from his mind with a growing annoyance. Six dragonmen. Whoever this Ka-Sedial was, he had no intention of underestimating Styke. “Yeah,” he said. “I killed him. I popped his head like a zit.”

One of the other dragonmen snorted in derision. They glanced from one to the other, barely suppressing smirks. They didn’t seem all that worried that Styke had murdered one of their comrades.

“Ji-Matle,” the woman said, “go secure that girl.”

Ji-Matle flipped his reins, urging his mount forward into a casual trot that belied any kind of urgency. He came abreast of Styke and looked down at him, shaking his head. “I still don’t believe it.”

Styke stepped sidelong in front of the horse, jerking his head back from Ji-Matle’s quickly drawn blade, and rammed his boz knife through the neck and up into the brain of the horse. It spasmed, and blood fountained from the wound to cover Styke’s arms. He shoved, pushing the dying creature over as Ji-Matle leapt free with startling dexterity.

The dragonman landed in a crouch, looking at his horse in dismay. “You’re strong,” he noted, looking over his shoulder at his companions.

“Finish him quickly,” the woman said, “and we can be back in Dynize by the end of the month.”

“You really think they’re going to let us go home with a war on?” Ji-Matle asked.

“We have Ka-Sedial’s word. Would you question that?”

“Of course not.”

Despite Styke’s display of strength, none of the dragonmen seemed at all concerned about the danger. While they spoke, Styke circled around to the horse and knelt by it, sawing at the neck with his blade as if making sure the creature was dead. The warmth of its blood felt slick between his fingers, and he whispered an apology.

“Come now, Ben Styke, you have already killed my horse,” Ji-Matle said, gesturing with a bone knife.

“I’ve got a knife like that,” Styke said, still kneeling by the horse. “It belonged to your friend Kushel.”

The woman’s eyes narrowed. Ji-Matle looked to her once again, as if for guidance. “Where is that knife?” she asked.

“Left it with a friend on the other side of the country,” Styke lied. “I just want you to know that I used it to cut out Kushel’s tongue and eyes before he died, then I took a shit in his mouth.”

The woman spat. “These Kressians are all damned savages. Kill him, Ji-Matle, and we will be gone.”

Ji-Matle frowned, appraising Styke for several seconds before darting forward and drawing a second knife. Styke caught sight of the dragonskin armor beneath his duster just as Ji-Matle leapt over the dead horse, swinging his knife downward.

Styke whipped his left hand out of the horse’s neck, flinging warm blood into Ji-Matle’s eyes and then rolling out of the way of the swipe. He came out of his roll and reversed directions as Ji-Matle barely managed to stick his landing and stumble toward the graves. He dropped one of his knives, pawing at his eyes. Styke ran at him on the balls of his feet, boz knife forward. Ji-Matle swiped blindly, slashing through the left arm of Styke’s jacket, the blade biting into his skin. Styke did not slow, ramming his own knife into Ji-Matle’s groin and plowing him over.

Ji-Matle continued to struggle despite the life flowing out of him, reversing the grip on his knife and swinging for Styke’s side. Styke caught him by the wrist and slammed Ji-Matle’s elbow against a marble gravestone, bone erupting from the skin. Ji-Matle refused to scream, still attempting to fight until Styke grabbed him by the face and smashed his head against the same stone.

The fight was over in seconds. Styke dropped the crumpled figure at his feet, fingers covered with blood, brain, and bits of skull. It seemed like his whole body was slick with warm blood – from the horse and from Ji-Matle – and he turned to face the dragonmen.

They stared at him as if in disbelief, looking at him and at the corpse of their dead companion. The woman spoke. “Ka-Sedial was right not to underestimate you, Ben Styke,” she said quietly. “Kill him.”

The word had barely left her mouth when a blast went off nearby and the top of her head exploded. Her mouth remained open, her face fixed in an expression of mild annoyance, before she toppled off her mount and to the ground.

Both Styke and the remaining dragonmen looked for the source of the blast, only to see Celine sitting astride Amrec less than twenty yards away, partially hidden by a nearby house. She held Styke’s carbine in both of her hands. She trembled visibly, and immediately began to reload the carbine.