The Nightmare Lady surged forward, hurling herself with arms and legs right at him, but faster was her tail. Its wicked blade flew at him, tip aimed right at his chest.
No thought. No time to plan. Scorio bent his will to his Heart and commanded it to ignite. With a whoomph it did so, his Heart disappearing behind a veil of pale black flames, then scales erupted across his arms, his robes disappeared as his hands turned into sinuous gauntlets, and terrible power flowed into him, a deluge compared to that which he’d felt as a Cinder.
Scorio snapped his hand up and caught her tail, stopping it cold. He closed his fist just below the base of the blade. Its tip nicked the broad muscle of his chest, the slightest scratch that caused a bead of black blood to swell and roll down.
The strength coursing through the Nightmare Lady’s tail was tremendous; she yanked it back even as she kept coming, seeking to haul him off his feet. So he simply released it, his talons emerging as he did so, six inches long and white-tipped, the sensation of heat radiating down into his palms.
Then she was on him. Her own clawed hands—puny-looking in comparison to his own—lashed at his face, raked at his chest, then furled into a fist to come at his jaw in a mighty cross.
Scorio gave ground, bemused. Had she grown slower? Or always been this slow, and he slower yet? He raised his scaled arms, which deflected her attacks with impunity, blocked each blow with precision, then swayed aside so that her cross missed by an inch.
Stepped back and hopped up, knees to chest as her tail whipped under him. Landed and threw the first blows of his own.
A simple combination. Jab, jab, cross. The blows flew from him, his strength full behind each, and the Nightmare Lady blocked the first and decided to not block again. His knuckles crunched into her black exoskeleton, near-shattering it across her forearm. She tumbled backward, movements haphazard, then threw herself into a sideways roll only to burst up, her tail acting as a spring, hurling herself into the air against all probability and moment to fall upon him with terrible speed.
But Scorio found himself able to track her. He pivoted, saw her tail lancing down at him from the left, the true attack, the screaming demon that fell upon him no more than an attention-grabbing feint.
So he threw himself aside, under the tail, came up on both feet, and hurled himself at her as she landed.
Again the Nightmare Lady gave ground, swaying and dodging, tail flashing out at him, seeking to impale him from every side, from behind, even. Scorio felt his enjoyment grow, his anger with it, and with greater and greater violence, he smashed her blade aside until at last he saw the opportunity and brought his claws to bear.
The white-hot talons sheared through her segmented tail, causing a gout of dark blood to burst forth as the large triangular blade crashed to the ground and tumbled away, the stump of tail still attached to it flexing and flopping from side to side.
The Nightmare Lady leaped back with a cry, her tail lashing and casting sprays of blood with each flex, to drop into a crouch and regard him with something akin to utter hatred.
Scorio didn’t sneer. Instead, he stared at his burning claws and flexed them, causing their white-hot tips to ripple. Then he glanced up at her. “Give in?”
The Nightmare Lady screamed and ran at him, pushing herself to the bleeding edge of her capacities. Her blows came in a flurry, a storm that he less saw and more intuited, weaving and slashing his own claws at in a frenzied parry.
Some of her attacks got through, but any that landed on his scales were deflected. Still, she gouged open three deep, parallel grooves across his chest, cracked her knuckles so hard across his temple that he staggered, then clubbed him around the back of the head with the remnants of her tail.
The blow was prodigious. Scorio lurched forward, right into her killing blow: a taloned thrust into his gut that would have pierced right to his spinal column.
But he was made of sterner stuff now. His head cleared, his wits remained sharp throughout, and he caught both her wrists with his clawed hands, stopping the thrust and imprisoning her other at the same time.
The Nightmare Lady screeched and beat at him with her segmented tail, but Scorio ignored the blows. Hunched his shoulders, tucked in his chin, and applied pressure on her wrists. He felt them creak, the black surfaces bend beneath the pressure. Slowly, inexorably, he forced her down, first into a half-crouch, then to one knee, then both.
Her tail cracked against his back, hammered at his legs, beat at the sides of his head. But Scorio ignored the impacts and stared down into her horrific visage.
“It’s over,” he growled. “Surrender.”
“Never,” she hissed and lunged forward to head-butt him.
The blow would have cracked rock. Scorio fell back, released her arms, and through the explosion of light that filled his vision saw a shadowed form leap at him.
Instinct caused him to sway aside and slam his fist forward. Something heavy fell upon his arm, claws scrabbled at his shoulders, raked at his chest, then clasped his wrist.
Blinking away the pain, Scorio saw that his fist was buried deep in her gut, just as she’d tried to do to him. Steam was rising from the wound as his claws caused her blood to boil.
The Nightmare Lady stared down in something akin to fascination, and then she looked up and met his gaze. “Not bad,” she croaked, releasing his wrist. “But you forgot about one thing.”
Scorio narrowed his eyes. “What thing?”
“Did you hire the circus?”
Scorio blinked, and in that second of confusion, the Nightmare Lady’s claws passed through his throat.
The pain was terrible, sudden, but worse was the sense of his very being gouting out through the wound, great jets of blood and vitality streaming forth, faster than he could countenance. Desperate, he reached up with his free hand, pressed his white-hot claws to the flesh, some mad hope driving him to cauterize it, something—but it was too late.
Scorio blinked, sagged. The Nightmare Lady’s grin was wide, but he met it despite the pain. He wanted to speak but couldn’t, couldn’t do anything but summon his rapidly disappearing strength to bend down and then thrust his embedded fist straight up through her torso, the wicked claws shearing through organs and who knew what else, to close around her heart and shred it.
The Nightmare Lady’s sulfurous green eyes widened, and then she was gone, disappearing right off his arm.
Scorio staggered back again, then fell. Lay there, clicking and gagging, blood pooling around him, waiting for the world to go dark, which it finally, mercifully did.
With a gasp, he awoke upon the bier. Reached up immediately with his hands, which had reverted to their human form—and clasped at his neck. Unbroken skin met his touch, but still, he coughed and fought off the urge of being strangled.
“Easy,” said Leonis by his side. “Ignite. You’ve done this before.”
Scorio summoned his Heart and sought to set it to burning, but the mana reservoir was too low; he willed it to burn, but nothing happened.
Instead, he closed his eyes, massaged at his neck, and worked on breathing smoothly. The pain was terrible, dwarfing the scrapes and cuts that he felt across his body, but slowly it dimmed, and at last, he was able to draw a deep breath without triggering another bout of coughs.
“Guess it didn’t go well,” said Leonis, helping him up to sitting.
“No, it went all right,” rasped Scorio, rubbing at his neck. He gazed over at where Naomi sat hunched over, hair waterfalling before her face. Lianshi was by her side, looking tentative and desiring to be helpful without quite knowing how. “At the very least, she died before I did.”
Leonis’s eyebrows rose. “You’re serious? Well. With these new abilities of yours, it looks like the odds of our doing well in the Gauntlet just rose a notch.”
“Maybe higher than that,” said Scorio. He coughed again to clear his throat, but the pain wouldn’t quite go away. “Naomi agreed to accompany us.”