Blood of the Underworld(115)

“Hello?”

She lifted her palm toward him, and fire leapt from it as if it were the gullet of a dragon. Tarlak flung himself onto his back, crossed his arms, and enacted a protection spell. The fire swarmed around him, bathing the rooftop, but it did not touch his skin. The strength to keep the protection going weighed on Tarlak, and the spell of invisibility around him vanished, not that it was doing much good. When the fire subsided, Tarlak rolled to his knees, then pushed to his feet.

“Not bad,” he said, wiping some ash off his yellow robe. “My turn.”

Shards of ice flew from his hands, their points deadly sharp. A dozen shattered across the rooftop of the inn, each one missing their mark as the woman dove side to side, faster than Tarlak could adjust. Without slowing she ran for the edge, and when Tarlak hurled a bolt of lightning, she vaulted into the air, over the blast and across the thin gap between the two buildings. Before landing she crossed her arms, and another wave of fire lashed out, like she was the center of a great explosion. Tarlak braced himself, once more summoning a protection spell. The fire hit, and this time he felt the heat of it on his skin. He gritted his teeth, poured more of his strength into it.

When the woman landed, she pressed her palms together, and the burst of fire was tremendous. But Tarlak had had enough.

“Remember this?” he said, pulling out the sword hilt from his pocket. The crystal on it flared to life, and all about him the fire died as if it had never existed.

“You have Nicholas’s sword,” she said.

At the woman’s shocked expression, Tarlak grinned.

“Just the hilt,” he said, twirling it in his fingers. He’d had Brug remove the blade, and then over the course of a few hours, he’d replenished the magic in the crystal, turning it back to clear. “I must say, I thought it cheating. Shame Nicholas died before I could tell him so.”

The woman rushed him, abandoning the fire. Tarlak took a step back, but she was faster, and her kick connected with his midsection. He let out a gasp as the air was blasted from his lungs. She swiped at the sword hilt, but he clung to it as if his life depended upon it. She unleashed a flurry of punches, half of which he failed to dodge. Her fists struck his face, his chest, and when he collapsed onto his back she fell atop him. Tarlak tensed every muscle in his body as she put his head into a lock, her slender arms choking tighter and tighter.

“What good is that sword if you can’t cast either, you damn fool?” she asked, driving her knees into his stomach so she might apply more pressure on his neck. The hand holding the hilt was caught by her legs, but his other was free, and he pressed it against her chest in a futile attempt to push her off. As the arm of his robe fell back, he saw her eyes go wide, catching sight of the blue tattoo glowing across his wrist.

“I can cheat, too,” Tarlak gasped as her panicked grip loosened.

The magic within the tattoo enacted, flowing through his hand and into her chest. It was a solid force, like an invisible battering ram blasting her entire body, and it hit with a tremendous boom. Her head arched back, her arms flailed, and Tarlak winced at the sound of a dozen breaking bones. Her body flew several feet back, landing in a sprawl atop the roof. Tarlak stood, tossed the sword hilt aside, and rubbed his bruised neck.

“Think I might have overdone it,” he muttered. He glanced at the tattoo, which was already fading from his skin. His entire arm ached, and it itched where the ink had been.

Never again, he swore.

Haern leapt up to the rooftop, landing silently mere feet away from the body. He was bleeding at the shoulder, but seemed otherwise fine.

“Dead, too,” he said, letting out a curse. “Need someone alive.”

He turned and leapt back off, toward the alley where Brug and Delysia had been waiting. Tarlak rushed after, and he peered off the rooftop to see where the fight continued below.

Brug stood protectively before Delysia, hunched over with several daggers sticking out from the creases of his armor. He still held his punch daggers, and he kept them up at the ready. Behind him, Delysia cast a barrage of spells, blinding and disorientating their opponent, the rail thin and final member of the Bloodcrafts.

“Come on,” Brug was saying. “You can do better than this!”

The Bloodcraft seemed to agree. He flung several more, but Brug kept in his way. Most bounced off his thick platemail, except for the one that sailed wide, missing because of a blinding white light that flared from his sister’s hand. Tarlak shook his head, relieved the two could fight in such a odd but effective pair.

The man pulled out several more daggers, and through rapidly blinking eyelids tried to find a way around, to get close without enduring the priestess’s barrage or Brug’s daggers. He apparently saw none, and then his chance was gone. Haern emerged from the shadows behind him, striking him hard on the back of the head with the hilt of a saber. The man dropped, his body going limp.