P.C. Cast - Burned

“I get it. I have one chance at this. I’m ready,” Aphrodite said.

Sgiach touched her Guardian’s forearm. It was the lightest of caresses, but it caused a rippled reaction throughout Seoras’s body. He paused in the downward stroke of another slice. His gaze remained on Stark, but with a voice like gravel, he said, “ Mo bann ri? My queen?”

“Call him back. The Prophetess must speak to him.”

Seoras’s eyes closed as if her words wounded him, but when he opened them he retorted with a low growl, and said only, “Aye, wumman . . . as yie wish.” He placed the hand that wasn’t holding his dirk on Stark’s forehead. “Hear me, boy. Yie must be returning.”

Stark staggered backward, instinctively holding up his own broadsword so that it was by accident and instinct that he deflected the killing stroke from the Other, that being who was him and yet wasn’t.

“Why are you doing this?” Stark shouted.

“I already told you. The only way you can get in here is to kill me, and I’m not gonna die.”

The two Warriors circled each other warily. “What the fuck are you talking about? You’re me . So if I get in there, how can you die?”

“I’m part of you. The not-so-nice part. Or you’re a part of me, the good part, and I fucking hate even saying that. Don’t act so damn stupid. It’s not like you don’t know about me. Think back to before you pussied out and swore yourself to that goody-goody bitch. We knew each other lots better then.”

Stark stared, seeing the tint of red in the eyes and the harsh set of his own face. The smile was still there, but the cockiness had turned cruel, making his features familiar and alien at the same time.

“You’re the bad in me.”

“Bad? That’s just a matter of which side you’re on, isn’t it? And from the side I’m on right now, I don’t look so damn bad.” Laughing, the Other continued, “ ‘Bad’ is a word that doesn’t come near to describing my potential. Bad is a luxury. My world is filled with things beyond your imagination.”

Stark started to shake his head, wanting to deny what he was hearing, and his concentration faltered. The Other struck again, slicing a thick furrow down his right bicep.

Stark lifted the broadsword defensively, surprised there was an odd burning but no pain in either arm.

“Yeah, doesn’t hurt much, huh? Yet. That’s ’cause the blade’s too fucking sharp to hurt. But check it out—you’re bleeding. A lot. It’s only a matter of time before you can’t keep that sword lifted anymore. Then you’re done for, and I’ll get rid of you once and for all.” The Other continued, “Or maybe we’ll play. How ’bout I have some fun and flay you alive, piece by fucking piece, until you’re nothing more than a bleeding carcass at my feet.”

From his peripheral vision, Stark could see that the heat he was feeling was the warmth of the blood that was pumping steadily from the two wounds. The Other was right. He was going down.

He had to fight—and he had to fight now. If he kept hesitating, kept being purely defensive, he would die.

With an action that was completely instinctual, Stark lunged forward, striking out at his mirror image, at everything, anything that could possibly be an opening in his guard, but the red-eyed version of him blocked each move easily. And then, like a cobra, he struck back, sliding through Stark’s defenses and hacking a long, deep wound in one thigh.

“You can’t beat me. I know all your moves. I’m everything you’re not. That goodness crap has made you weak. That’s why you couldn’t protect Zoey to begin with. Loving her made you weak.”

“No! Loving Zoey is the best thing I’ve ever done.”

“Yeah, well, it’ll be the last thing you’ve ever done, that’s for—”

Stark was wrenched back into his body. He opened his eyes to see Seoras standing over him, dirk in one hand, the other pressed against his forehead.

“No! I have to go back!” he cried. He felt like his body was on fire. The pain in his sides was unbelievable—the force of it pumped adrenaline through his system. His first instinct was to move! Get away! Fight!

“Nae, boy. Remember yie cannae be movin’,” Seoras said.

Stark’s breath was coming fast and hard as he forced his body to stay still—stay there.

“Get me back,” he told the Guardian. “I have to get back.”

“Stark, listen to me.” Suddenly Aphrodite’s face was there above him. “It’s Heath that’s the key. You have to get to him before you see Zoey. Tell him he has to move on. He has to leave Zoey in the Other-world, or she’ll never come back here.”

“What? Aphrodite?”

She grabbed his arm and brought her face down close to his. He could see the blood in her eyes and was jolted by the realization that she must have just had a vision.

“Trust me. Get to Heath. Make him leave. If you don’t, there’s no one who’ll stop Neferet and Kalona, and it’s over for all of us.”

“If he’s to be returnin’, he must be goin’ the now,” Seoras said.

“Take him back,” Sgiach said.

The bright edges around Stark’s vision began to go gray, and he struggled against being pulled under again.

“Wait! Tell me. How—how do I fight myself?” Stark managed to gasp.

“Ach, ’tis quite simple really. The Warrior within yie must die tae give birth to the Shaman.”

Stark couldn’t tell whether Seoras’s words were a response to his question, or whether they came from his memory, and he had no time to figure it out. In less than a heartbeat, Seoras grabbed his head with a viselike grip and dragged the blade across Stark’s eyelids. In a searing, blinding flash he was once more facing himself as if he’d never been gone. Although disoriented by the pain of the Guardian’s last cut, Stark realized his body was reacting quicker than his mind could comprehend, and he was easily defending himself against the attack of his mirror image. It was as if the line of the last cut had revealed a geometry of strike lines into the heart of the Other that Stark had never known before, and, because he’d not known it, maybe the Other did not know, either. If that was so, he had a chance, but only a slim one.

“I can do this all day. You can’t. Damn, my ass is easy to kick.” The red-eyed Stark laughed arrogantly.

As he laughed, Stark lunged, following a strike line that pain and need had revealed, catching the outside edge of his mirror image’s forearm.

“Fuck me! You actually drew blood. Didn’t think you had it in you!”

“Yeah, well, that’s one of your problems; you’re too damn arrogant.” Stark saw the hesitation that rippled through his mirror image, and a hint of understanding whispered in his mind. He followed that thought as naturally as he’d lifted the broadsword in defense and glimpsed the strike lines all across his body. “No, it’s not that you’re too damn arrogant. It’s me. I’m arrogant.”

His mirror image’s guard wavered. Stark understood completely then, and he pressed on. “I’m selfish, too. That’s how I killed my mentor. I was too selfish to let anyone beat me at anything.”

“No!” the red-eyed Stark yelled. “That’s not you—that’s me.”

Seeing the opening, Stark struck again, slicing into the Other’s side. “You’re wrong, and you know it. You’re what’s bad about me, but you’re still me. The Warrior wouldn’t be able to admit it, but the Shaman in me is beginning to understand it.” As Stark spoke, he drove relentlessly forward, raining blows down on his mirror image. “We’re arrogant. We’re selfish. Sometimes we’re mean. We have a bad fucking temper, and when we get pissed off, we hold a grudge.”