Chronicles of Death

It took over a day to reach the next mark on the map. Circling the town overhead, she noted there were no military tents. The next General had moved on since her meeting with Raven over a week prior. Their tracks were clear along the dirt road. But something bothered Katya. Something was wrong.

There were no signs of life in the town, which was larger than the last.

It was early evening and there were zero people mulling about. Even in the grimmest of towns, people still had to work, and the roads were usually busy. These were abandoned. Almost.

Except for one.

A singular man stood in the middle of the main road as if waiting.

Perched on the rooftop she realized she had been discovered.

He was waiting for her.

Her motives had been discovered.

Katya landed outside of town, hungry and tired. She used a spell to hide the keys she’d already taken so even if she was beaten, they would not be found. Then she buried her bags in the forest. Katya had learned long ago to never assume victory was at hand. She was a confident and competent warrior, but anything could happen in battle. Better to be paranoid than screwed.

Then she approached the town hidden beneath her cloak. The sun had sunk below the horizon.

Adrenaline pulsed in her ears. With the magic of Vrana, she hid her face with feathers. Anonymity would be crucial. The man standing in the center of the road had not moved. He was armored.

It was just as she had expected. Her gut was rarely wrong.

“Stop. You there. Don’t move.” He ordered. She did. He was recognizable as a General. His armor was dark green, and he held a helmet of the same color beneath his arm. His skin was dark, and his hair was darker and shaved on the sides. His brown eyes bored into her. “I have been waiting for you to arrive, hunter.”

Katya said nothing, hand on the hilt of her sword. He was ready for her. No more cowards cloaked as warriors.

“Tell me, sir. What is your name?”

Katya smiled. Naturally, he suspected she was a man. Naïve. His assumptions would be his downfall.

“You are the one who killed my comrades. Yes?”

Katya bowed low and swept her arm to the side as if to introduce herself. She did not have a masculine stature, but she was armored, tall, and strong. The magic of Vrana helped to obscure her identity.

“I would say that I was impressed had Alev not been a slob and Aither not been a glutton.” He spat to the side in disgust. “I am Torrance, General of Earth. Gifted with rare pact magic from the strongest of Gods. You should be wary.”

Sure.

He then held his long sword at the ready.

“It’s my key you desire. Am I correct in assuming?”

He talked too much. She bowed her head again.

“I told them, but no one would listen. If you wish for my key, then you must fight me. A fair, true fight. I sent my soldiers to the next town and told them to await my return in the morning. If I do not arrive, they are to assume me dead.” He held up his hand and the key dangled from a chain wrapped around his fingers. This was definitely a trap. “No games. Just you and me. If I die? You take my key. If you die? Then the world is a safer place.”

He continued to be wrong. But she would fight him anyway. Katya drew her blade. Torrance grinned and tossed his helmet aside.

Foolish.

“Oh, how I have longed for a real fight. With the war over? There isn’t much for me to do but wait and order fools to menial tasks. You intrigue me, stranger. Perhaps you will be the challenge I crave.”

Of course, he talked this much. Why wouldn’t he? Men like him loved the sound of their own voice. She took a step closer, blade in hand.

He swung his blade threateningly but not at her. At nothing. His grip was steady.

They circled each other, sizing the other up in search of weaknesses and truths.

“You have seen battle. A true warrior has patience.”

He was baiting her into conversation. She ignored him and watched his footing. He was careful and experienced. She expected it to be a trap. For him to be baiting her into something nefarious. The key was now wrapped around his wrist. She could cut off his hand and make a run for it if need be. But she could also kill him.

She was willing to give him a fight before she decided what he deserved.

He made the first move. So much for patience.

He lunged.

Katya twisted his blade with her own and knocked it back. Their swords clattered, steel against steel. But Katya had a stronger and steadier hand than he did. She’d been fighting for years. That and the power of the ancient demon she’d made a pact with gave her an advantage.

Their blades met again and again until they were caught in a battle of strength. He hoped to overpower her and throw her aside, but she came out the victor. With a twist, his blade was knocked to the side and his balance with it. He stepped back, adjusted his footing, and then shook out his hands before readying his blade once more. Katya had not been easily overpowered even before her pact with Vrana.

Katya would show him patience. She waited for him to come to her again. Torrance was getting angry. He growled and swung, throwing too much weight behind his blade. Brute force only worked when an opponent could be thrown off by it. Katya expected it.

She flipped backwards as he lunged and stabbed. She knocked his blade downward with her own. The brutal force of each of his blows sent her moving backwards, away from his swings. Katya blocked, continuing to knock his blade aside. Torrance’s frustration was palpable. He lunged and she leapt atop the railing of a nearby porch. Then she dodged another blow, leaping over it before knocking his sword aside. With a quick backswing, she sliced his cheek. He bled, stumbled back, and lost the grip on his sword. A crimson line traced his strong jaw.

She took the initiative to kick the sword far from his hand, then bowed and held her sword threateningly toward his chest. Withdrawing a second blade from his hip he stepped back.

“Now!”

Shit.

There was the trap. He’d lured her there.

The door to the building behind her flew open and a soldier stabbed. She knocked the blade away and ran along the porch, leaping over the railing at the end, and rolling onto the ground but she’d chosen her direction poorly. Two more soldiers emerged from the alley at the end and came at her with blades. She deflected them both but as she turned, there was a sickening thunk.

An arrow pierced her armor and went right into her shoulder.

She stumbled but did not fall or even shout. She held her blade at the ready despite the pain racing through her neck and down her arm.

A man stood in the distance with a bow and arrow in hand. She ran toward him, the other soldiers pursuing her.

A fair fight her ass.

Her grip was weakened. There was nothing to be done to help it. They would pay. Each and every one of them.

Chivalry was beheaded by their hand.

Katya’s feathered guise faltered.

She rushed the archer who now panicked to nock another arrow. She leapt at him, and he turned to flee but was too late. Katya’s hilt smashed into his face, and he fell. She slit his throat before he struck the ground. Then she was grasped by the three soldiers who had pursued her.

They tried to drag her to the ground, but she dug her feet in, dropped her blade, and grasped her dagger from her hip so she could still stab at close range. She sliced the arm of one of the men, then ducked and stabbed him in his thigh. He screamed and she leapt from his arms.

Her cloak was grabbed, and she was overwhelmed, thrust face first into the mud, a knee driven into her back. She grasped the sword that had fallen nearby but it was pried from her fingers. The dagger she moved closer and kept hidden beneath her cloak.

“Hold him down!”

The arrow digging into her shoulder was miserable. Torrance stood behind her as she was dragged onto her back. Blood stained his face from where her blade had struck. Torrance kicked her right between the legs.

Classy.

“Pathetic. I would never challenge a pig to a fight of honor.” He laughed and pulled the hood from her face. There was almost nothing left of her magical guise, and he was clearly shocked by what he found. “A woman?” The soldiers’ collective grip lessened. A grave mistake.

She struck one of the soldiers hard in the face, kicked another and then flipped onto her feet, discarding the cloak as it was grabbed. One of the soldiers dove at her and she sliced but he did not stop. The dagger was knocked away and she was dragged back to Torrance. One even had the indecency to strike the arrow. The head dug ever deeper within flesh and muscle. Torrance punched her in the gut. She struggled against the soldiers, but they held her too firmly and she was shoved to her knees. Torrance walked around her, then returned to face her and dragged his blade across her jaw as if to get revenge for the blood she’d drawn.

She did not make a sound. He would not get the satisfaction of seeing her pain.

“I never would have expected. Women do not fight like that.”

Go ahead, she thought, keep talking like that.

“Lovely even. A rarity. A man surely taught you to fight this way. What drives you? I think you’ll find we can be quite agreeable.” Torrance had completely changed his attitude upon seeing her face. “Tell me.” He grasped the arrow and twisted it further into her flesh. The pain made her hunch forward and sweat dripped down her brow.

Katya was seeing red. He would pay.

Torrance laughed, taking a step back to study her.

“Bind her tightly and take her with us. Come now, woman, to your feet. Obey.”

She was pulled to her feet, but they would not be taking her anywhere. Once she was steady, she became sudden deadweight, forcing the two men holding her to drop. Torrance laughed, making a joke about the frailty of women. He must have thought she fainted. With a deep breath, she used the anger surging through her, making her hands shake, to channel the magic of Vrana. Shadow surrounded her along with the men holding her prisoner. She knocked one in the nose with her elbow, and cartilage fractured. She kicked the knee out from beneath the other. With a roll she found her dagger and slit the throat of one soldier and drove the blade into the face of the next as he blindly came toward her.

Aided by her fury, the shadow magic crushed them with her shout. Their bones broke, their shattering and crunching echoing through the streets. Their screams were drowned out by the carnage created by her spell.

Panicked, Torrance withdrew his sword from his hilt but by the time he had, the blade of her sword was beneath his chin. His dark eyes met her green ones. She hoped he saw his errors flashing before his eyes.

“What are you?”

“A woman.” Katya slit his throat before he could say another word.

Blood poured in crimson rivers over his armor, and he sputtered, then fell back onto his knees. There was a terrible, satisfying realization behind his eyes. Katya watched him bleed out then with a yell cut his head clean from his shoulders. The men behind her were no longer screaming. She released the spell and they fell to the ground.

She drove her blade into one soldier’s chest and waited for the light to leave his eyes. The other soldier was crawling away, choking on his own blood. She pressed her boot to his back and then sliced his head off before he could plead for his life.

Katya retrieved her dagger and wiped the blood from it and from her sword onto her cloak. Then she returned to Torrance and took the key from his wrist and checked its authenticity. If he really wanted to prevent her from taking his key, then he never would have had it on his person. This was the real deal.

“Asshole.”

Arrogance had been his downfall.

The arrow in her shoulder weighed her down and she walked in a slant. Adrenaline had done its job to keep the pain from crippling her, but it had to be dealt with sooner rather than later. With a yank, she pulled the arrowhead free but carried it with her. She would get rid of any evidence of her existence.

She doublechecked to make certain the soldiers were all dead and that there were no others in hiding. Then she stumbled out of town. There would be no safety in any of the nearby villages.

She retrieved the bag she’d buried then tried to become the raven. The will was there but the strength was not. Instead, she stumbled, as though kicked in the back. She’d lost too much blood and she was no practiced magician. Her ribs were especially painful and her arm, now soaked in blood, was useless. Magic had drained her. It would no longer bend to her will.

She stumbled north through the woods in hopes of putting as much distance as possible between her and the men she’d murdered. She walked until her legs would no longer carry her. Leaning against a nearby tree, she lingered as the world spun. She’d close her eyes for a few seconds and shake off the vertigo then be on her way.

But that didn’t happen.

She collapsed against the tree and unconsciousness took her.