She’s trained as a grappler.
The revelation didn’t exactly surprise her. Nonetheless, it did mean she would have to be more careful whenever she landed a physical hit. Any part that connected could be used against her.
Selene danced from side to side, her weapon still firmly clutched between her hands.
The water wielder decided it was time to try a different strategy. She called on her usual water gloves. An aqua lion formed on her right hand. On her left hand a screeching hawk made of see-through blue liquid had taken form. The water animals were some of her favorite weapons to use. They were light as a feather, but as soon as she made contact with her target, they would harden. It was this mix of soft and hard that made them her go-to ability.
The iron chain came down again. Aya brought both hands up, and the animals crashed into it. She skidded back a few feet, not expecting the power behind the attack. The trio of swords lifted and came down once more. This time Aya didn’t challenge the attack. Instead, she moved her hand and put her fist over the end blades. With all her might she pushed down, giving the attack more power. The blades dug into the hard earth.
The empress grunted as she struggled to get her weapon free. Aya pressed her advantage, closing the distance between them. Selene let go to meet the incoming attack, but it was much too late.
Aya rocked punch after punch into the mask. The mask pulsed with adrenaline as she took out its frustration on it. The mask represented everything she hated about the Suteckh. It had to be destroyed.
The white mask fractured through the middle. A punch later it shattered into a dozen pieces and fell to the ground. Selene rubbed her head, struggling to remain on her feet.
Aya brought down her fist one more time, sure this would be the final attack.
Rage in her eyes, Selene surrounded her own hands with a dark aura. The black mass intercepted the animals. Aya watched in horror as a black mist leaked into the water, turning the water into dark energy. Aya dissolved the aqua animals a second before they were fully overtaken by the dark mist.
That was close
, she thought. Had she allowed the darkness to take over, it would no doubt have corrupted her energy.
Now that the battle had slowed down, Aya finally got a glimpse of her sister without the mask. The same features from when she was a little girl remained. The years, however, had given her a rough edge that had been absent when she was a child. She had long almond eyes, and a scar running down her right cheek. It looked to be the work of a sword. Her lips and her eyes were rimmed in a jet-black line.
Seeing her sister’s face after so many years caused something inside her to stir. She wanted to hold her close and protect her from the evils of the world. To protect her from the monster they had made her into.
“Please,” Aya pleaded. “Our family may have betrayed us. The Suteckh may have brainwashed you, but you’re not alone. You have me. I love you, Selene.” She extended her hand. “Let me help you.”
“I…I…” Her sister clutched at her head.
I’m getting through to her. Aya continued to talk. . “The sister I knew would have never hurt anyone. She loved Va’siel an every living thing in it.”
“Why is the bird on the ground?” asked three-year-old Selene. “It should be up the air flying with all the other birdies.”
Aya examined the strange way the white bird hopped from side to side. It flapped its wings, hoping to lift from the ground, but every time it was rewarded by crashing back down after lifting a few inches into the air. The culprit seemed to be a small cut under its right wing.
“It’s hurt,” said five-year-old Aya. The sisters were out playing on the prairies of Ladria. Their game of hide and seek had been interrupted by the discovery of the dove hopping along one of the many rocky paths that cut through the grass.
The younger sister said softly, “We have to help it.”
“We can’t take the bird home. You know father will not let us bring it into the house.”
“He doesn’t have to know. I won’t tell him. Neither will you.”
Aya’s lips twisted as she thought about it. The truth was that she didn’t want to leave the bird out where a predator could snatch it.
“Preetttty pleeease,” begged Selene.
“Fine,” said Aya, giving in, “but not a word about this to father. You know how he gets about this kind of things. Deal?”
The youngest Nakatomi took the bird in her hands, caressing its feathers gently. “Deal.”
Aya took one step closer to her sister, drowning out the vision of long ago. “Take my hand.”
Selene whimpered and mumbled under her breath. A moment later she became eerily silent. When she looked up, all the doubt was gone from her face. Only a hateful gaze remained.
“I am the Blood Empress! You cannot trick me with your mind games.”
“Mind games? I’m a water wielder, Selene. I know nothing of mind wielding.”
“No… no. You must be a dual wielder.” The Empress’s voice was frantic as she ranted in an uncontrolled, breathless gibberish of connected words. “Yes, that’s it. You’re a dual wielder. You’re planting images in my head that aren’t really there.”
“No.” Aya lowered her voice. She needed to get through to her sister. “Being close to me is obviously waking up something inside you. Don’t fight it.”
“Aya,” said Selene. Her voice was pleading. She screamed once more and clutched her temples. “It hurts, Aya. They opened me up. They… they…”
“Don’t listen to her, Great Blood Empress,” came a sudden voice Aya had not expected to hear. Standing behind her sister was the man she had once called father. He put his hands on Selene. “She’s an enemy who wishes to rob you of what is rightfully yours. You mustn’t allow it, your highness. Finish her off.”
Aya ground her teeth as she moved toward the councilman. “Don’t you dare touch her!” A sudden whip of dark energy forced her back.
Mr. Nakatomi’s cruel lips twisted into a smile. “I’m glad I followed the Blood Empress. I was certain you would find a way to interfere, Aya.”
The introduction of her father had reawakened the trance Selene had fallen under. Her hands were covered with a black mass. She moved toward Aya, focused on finishing her.
“So be it,” said Aya, realizing that in order to help Selene, she was going to have to defeat her alter ego first. It was time to finish off the Blood Empress once and for all.
“It’s flying,” said the young Selene. “We did it. We really did it!”
Aya looked up at the bird, who had now taken off and joined a nearby flock. It had been three weeks since they first found the bird and, against all odds, they had managed to nurse it back to health, or at least that was what the younger sister thought.
“Do you think it will be fine, Aya?” Selene looked up at her with begging eyes.
Aya felt an ounce of guilt as she spoke. So she looked away, hoping that not seeing those sweet, tender blue marbles would make lying easier. It didn’t. “Yes. It will join his bird friends, and they will fly through Va’siel. She will live a life of fun and adventure.” She did not have the heart to tell her that the bird they had found died a week ago and that she had snuck to the market to buy another one to replace it. As Selene hugged her, though, some of the guilt drifted away. Selene was her baby sister. She would do whatever it took to protect her.
“Die!” screamed Selene. Spit of rage dripped from her lips.
“Kiya!” thundered Aya. Water sprang up around her.
The dual screams rang off the thick earth walls as the sisters took after each other, each determined to end the other at all costs.
Chapter 34
Falcon sat motionless, holding Faith in a tender embrace. He faintly made out the sound of footsteps beside him, followed by heavy breathing. The person moved closer. Falcon remained motionless. He knew who it was but didn’t care. All he wanted was to remain close to her.
“What is the meaning of this?” sneered Shal-Volcseck.
The young Rohad did not bother to turn. He was certain that the chaos lord had discovered that the emblem he took from Faith held no more holy energy.
“You killed her,” he said. “She was my friend and you took her from me.”
“It is the way of the world,” said Volcseck matter-of-factly. “People kill for land, love, lust, power, greed, or any combination of those reasons. It is a vicious cycle that I set out to stop long ago.”
“Stop!” For the first time, Falcon forced his gaze away from Faith and to the murderer. The faint light of the moon distorted his hard-to-see features, making him appear more monstrous than Falcon had envisioned. “You who have murdered thousands of people throughout your life have no right to speak of how you tried to stop it from happening.”
“But I have. All those murders were only done for the greater cause. I needed to get hold of an element of every emblem. I did what I had to do to attain them, and I would do it again.” Falcon and Volcseck’s eyes met, and for the first time he saw what had always been there. A lack of humanity long lost by centuries of killings. An impossible desire to save the world from something it could not be saved from. It was this idealistic view that made him such a menace. For in Volcseck’s eyes, everything he’d done up until now had been for the greater good. His next words further confirmed that. “If I could only get ahold of each element, I could bring forth an ability that would destroy all of Va’siel in a single day.”
Falcon did not say a word. Instead, he wiped the tears from his face and set Faith down. He moved her hand over her without much thought. A see-through rainbow-colored blanket of holy covered the girl.
“I see” said Volcseck. He hummed under his breath. “She passed on her power to you. Then perhaps there is still an opportunity to wash away the sins of this world. I will kill you and take the holy energy.”
Hardly paying attention, Falcon opened a space rift, and lifting Faith’s body with wind, pushed her in. He gulped as her corpse lay silently on the snowy mountain. The blanket he had put over her would ensure that she was safe and no wild animal could get to her.
He turned his attention back to the man who had taken so much from him. He wanted to hate him, to loathe every fiber of his being. The compassion that Faith had left within him made that impossible. Every time he felt the chaos rise, it was quickly put in check by the holy dwelling within. The chaos power wasn’t quenched, or snuffed completely out. It remained raging in his chest, but unlike before, the chaos and holy seemed to be working together, feeding off each other and growing stronger from the newfound harmony they shared.
The next series of attacks by Volcseck were sudden and precise. Falcon dug his hand into the ground and pulled the energy from it. His entire arm was now encased in a thick skin of earth. With it he blocked the attacks from the lance Volcseck had produced.
Seeing the bloodied weapon that had been used to murder Faith awoke a fire that stemmed from his chest and filled his body with untold power. The lance drove, tip first, at his chest. With the earth-encrusted hand, he took hold of it. Still gripping it, he released the earth and changed it into poison. The green ooze dripped over the flesh, and Falcon felt it vibrate and wheeze as it dissolved into nothingness.
Volcseck’s eyes grew wide as he released his lance. The small part of it that was still intact fell to the ground, emitting the sickening stench of rotting flesh. The veins and arteries running through it beat a few more times, and like a dying heart, its falls and rises dwindled. A moment later it’s thumping ceased.
You’ll be able to hold sway of chaos, but all the elements, even the ones you’re not particularly gifted with, like poison, darkness, and mind. The balance that holy provides will allow this.
Faith’s words rang inside him. She had been right. The elements that had once proved a struggle now were second nature. As easy to control as moving his hand. He didn’t think about it, he simply did it.
A gush of water rose from the ground, keeping him high in the air. Two tornados, one of earth, the other of fire, raged around him. The power of wind kept their ferocity constant.
Volcseck did not seem fazed by his opponent’s mastery of the elements. He came at Falcon with fierce determination.
Falcon readied himself; this was to be the ultimate challenge. This time, he was ready to face it head-on.
~~~
Senses still reeling, Keira weaved between the massive legs that continued to come her way. She had blocked the attacks time and time again, and her aching arms were beginning to complain. The truth was that she simply couldn’t continue to intercept the blows. Each one sent her stumbling ten feet back.
“The end be near!” cheered Melousa. She brought her fists together. Her veined muscular arms came down.
Keira did a triple backflip, landing clear out of the queen’s grasp. The opponent she was facing was a master of raw power. There was no strategy, no tactics. She did not need them. Her thick skin and inhuman strength made such things completely unnecessary.
Other warriors might have cowered before such a fearsome foe but not Empress Keira. She saw Melousa’s strength as her greatest weakness. She relied too heavily in it. It was this overreliance that Keira was hoping would lead to Melousa’s downfall.
With the sight her cub provided, Keira made out the faint blur of the large woman studying her. The empress and the queen moved in for an exchange.
Keira barely grazed Melousa’s hand and moved aside, letting the woman fly forward with her own momentum. While the queen staggered, Keira brought two fingers onto her opponent’s neck. Before they could make contact, Melousa regained her footing and blocked the attack, forcing Keira to move back yet again.
If only she had been blessed with Melousa’s freakish strength, she could have ended this duel long ago.
Melousa pressed once more. Punch after punch was deflected to the side by the empress. Keira kept waiting for a sign that her foe was tiring. A loss in power, heavy breaths, or an obvious slowing in the movement. The queen, fueled by anger, seemed to be getting stronger by the second. Each attack forced Keira to use up more and more of her waning stamina.
A swinging kick moved toward Keira’s head. She dodged to the side. Sticking to her strategy, she redirected the leg to her right. As she did, Melousa jumped in the air, throwing her other leg up. The empress did not have time to react. The hard sole rammed her chest.
All the air in her body left her at once as she was thrown clear across the hall. She crashed into the wall, webbing the marble tile into countless fissures.
Had it not been for the years of training she had undergone, the hit would have surely knocked her out cold. But Keira was a warrior, and this was not the first time she had been dealt such a crippling blow. She slowed her breath and ignored the pain bubbling up within her.
The quick footsteps of the queen, who seemed to be certain of her victory, thundered toward her.
“Yer be dead!”
The kick came in so close that Keira’s hair stood on end. She ducked under the leg and brought up both her fingers, digging them into the back of the queen’s knee. The big woman screamed as her leg gave out. Keira roller her hand into a fist, careful to leave the middle knuckle a few centimeters ahead of the rest. With all her might, she pressed the knuckle directly into the end of the purple bicep.
Melousa staggered to her feet, keeping a wary distance from Keira. She stretched her arms and legs, trying to regain a sense of composure. It was obvious she hadn’t expected the counterattack from a foe she had thought to be defeated.
The young empress used this time to steady her breath. Her chest ached, her arms were beyond fatigued, and her vision connection with Maru was growing increasingly blurrier. If only Draiven or Aykori were here. Her connection with them was so strong that seeing through them was like not being blind at all. Maru was just a cub, though, and her connection with her was still a work in progress. Despite the handicaps, Keira grinned. She had hurt the queen. There was something even all those mountains of muscles couldn’t protect. Pressure points.
Melousa seemed to have regained her usual confidence, because she stood straight and said, “It be over for yer, Little Empress.”
If Keira thought the Orian warrior had been lethal before, she had not seen anything yet. With a gut-wrenching shriek, she came down on her like a force of nature. It was unlike anything she had ever faced before.
She parried the first attack, only to have a leg swept out from under her. She front flipped. A muscled elbow brought her back down to the ground. Quickly, she summersaulted back to her feet. The elbow came again. She retreated. The knee flew at her face. Keira retreated once more.
Keira swallowed hard as she realized that there was nowhere else to run. She had been herded into the corner of the hall, like a hog led to the slaughter.
The queen came down on Keira, continuing the hard-to-read attacks. A fist made it past her guard, forcing itself into her gut. Keira slumped forward. She would have crumpled to the floor had Melousa not gripped her thick fingers around the blind girl’s neck.
“Time to die!” Melousa tightened her hold and lifted her victim so that they were face to face.
The gunk of Melousa’s stench filled Keira’s nostrils. She felt her neck bones moments away from caving in. She tried to breathe, but her windpipe had been completely closed. Shoving her panic to the back of her mind, she ran her fists into the side of Melousa’s neck.
The grip loosened, and Keira inhaled the breath her body had been searching for.
Despite the searing pain she felt, the empress scrambled to her feet and took off after her stumbling opponent. The queen was gripping her neck and closing and opening her eyes quickly, no doubt trying to regain the focus of her vision. Keira had no intention of letting that happen. She attacked the other side of the woman’s neck.
It was the blinded Melousa’s turn to panic. She swung wildly, searching for an opponent she couldn’t see. If she had only stopped and listened, she would have heard that Keira had just crouched under her flailing arms. The princess rained down a volley of hits, each connecting on a pressure point. Soleus, Achilles tendon, hamstring, inner thighs. Every part of Melousa was fair game.
The queen retaliated, swiping her hand down. Keira, however, remained on the move. If Melousa attacked from the right, she came from the left. If the hit came from above, Keira sidestepped.
“Arghhhhh!” screamed the queen, after Keira had delivered a precise hit to her knee.
Fuming with anger, Melousa tumbled to the ground. Keira wasted no time in throwing herself over the Orian’s arm and gripping it. It might have been freakishly muscular, but Keira knew that providing pressure at the right spot would…
Snap!
There was another pained yelp from the queen.
Wasting no time, the empress pounced on the left arm. She gave it the same treatment as the right.
Crack!
Keira stepped back, looking down at the heaving queen.
Melousa spit with rage. “Yer be nothing. I will kill yer. Kill yer!” Sweat ran down her face and chest.
The empress kept her tone calm. “So you like to break necks, do you?” She took one glance at the void wielding Rohad sprawled across the floor. Her neck was twisted in an unnatural arc. Latiha’s body, too, was beyond mangled. Every part of her body seemed to be pointing in a different direction.
“Let’s see how you like being given the same treatment.”
Melousa’s eyes widened. “I only be doing as I was told. I cannot be at fault!”
“You came looking for a fight with an empress, and you got it.” She kept her voice conversational as she moved behind the queen.
Melousa tried to stand on wobbly legs.
Knowing full well that any advantage given to her foe could prove deadly, Keira pounced on the woman’s back. Her arms wrapped around the queen’s neck. Melousa fell on her back, crushing the air out of Keira. Nonetheless, the empress tightened her grip. The large woman’s gurgling sounds rang in Keira’s ears. It almost sounded as if she wanted to speak.
“I have heard enough of you.” Keira made one last monumental contraction. Melousa’s legs shot up as she kicked in one last, futile struggle to break free. A minute later it was all over. The thick gargles had given way to a sullen silence.
Grunting, the young empress pushed the dead weight off her.
Maru rushed over to her. Keira took the cub in her hands and held the furry creature close to her throbbing chest. As she sobbed quietly, a bittersweet feeling settled in. She may have vanquished her foe, but it had come too late. Latiha was dead. No amount of victories would ever bring her back.