“You aren’t touching my blood, you crazy freak!”
“Are you sure?” Jason asked, then chanted out a spell.
“Your blood is not yours to keep, but mine on which to feast.”
Red life force started shining out of Jonah’s body, streaks of dark colours reflecting the afflictions he was suffering. Red light streamed away, through the air towards Jason. Jason threw his arms back, pushing his head forwards with a wild and hungry grin. The life force vanished into his face as he moaned with pleasure.
“You’re seriously messed up!” Jonah said as his remaining life force returned to his body. He could barely stand now, blackened veins visible under his skin.
“You’re not looking so good, Jonah,” Jason said. “Don’t worry; I can clear that right up.”
He raised his hand like a weapon.
“Feed me your sins.”
The red light appeared again from within Jonah, but this time the tainted colours poured out into Jason, leaving the dim light of Jonah’s life force clean.
“Refreshing,” Jason said, as if Jonah’s affliction were a cup of iced tea.
The curse and poison were cleansed, but the bleeding continued and Jonah was too far gone to rally.
“You said you would show me what it means to fight a Geller,” Jason said, walking slowly forward. “But I’ve fought Gellers, Jonah, and I’m not sure you live up to the name.”
Jason stepped onto the water, walking past Jonah to Claire’s body. Jonah could barely keep to his feet as he turned to face Jason, almost stumbling into the mud. He watched Jason, standing over Claire’s body, grip the elf’s long, blonde hair, stained dark by muddy water and her own blood. He pulled her up out of the water.
“Look at your friends, Jonah. You were meant to protect them, but they died helpless and agonising deaths. Like you will. I’ve seen what it means to fight a Geller, Jonah. This is what it is to fight me.”
He let Claire drop back into the water.
“Just end this, you sick lunatic,” Jonah said, glaring defiance.
Jason walked casually up to Jonah, who could barely stand, let alone fight back. Jason walked around him, looking him over like a slab of meat in a butcher shop. Jonah lacked the strength to turn and face him again. Jason shoved him in the back and Jonah toppled into the mud. Jason stepped forward, pushing down Jonah’s head with his foot.
“I’ve never seen anyone drown in mud before,” Jason said.
In the viewing room, the window went dark as Jonah’s feeble struggling came to a stop. In the aftermath, there was silence.
68
Good News For Clive
The common room of Jason’s inn was a sprawling, luxurious space, with dining area, bar and lounge. Jason was in the lounge area with Rick Geller, who had sought him out in the early hours, eager to discuss their fight. Jason was quickly realising that Rick was obsessively dedicated to training, even compared to other Gellers.
To Jason's surprise, he bore no animosity against Jason for the loss or wariness over his tactics. Instead, he was excited to encounter a fighting style unlike any he'd encountered before.
“It was incredible,” Rick said. “Sometimes people can get lax in the mirage chamber because it isn't real. The way you got in our heads, though? You had me making rush decisions, panicking. I’ve watched the recording at least half a dozen times, and I just keep screaming at myself to do something different.”
“There’s a recording?” Jason asked.
“There certainly is,” Rick said. “It’s all from our perspective, so you’re barely in it until the end. You’re always this crazy threat, lingering just out of sight. That crazy laugh, that creeps me out. It really felt like you’d lost it.”
“A lot of guys ignore the laugh,” Jason said, “and that’s about standards.”
“Hannah thinks you’re amazing.”
“Isn’t she the one I ambushed, cut her throat and strung her up to use as a shield?” Jason said uncertainly.
“She saw most of it from the control room,” Rick said. “She had copies of the recording made and she’s been showing them off to people.”
“Why would she do that?”
“Hannah’s very spirited,” Rick said. “Always ready to go, ready to try anything. She’ll take almost anything, good or bad, as an experience worth having. She’s kind of amazing.”
“Oh?” Jason said, arching his eyebrows meaningfully.
“Not like that,” Rick said.
Jason shook his head. It wasn’t that long since he was a teenager himself, but it had been a hard exit, relationship-wise.
“Don’t let it just sit there,” Jason said. “Tell her and find out one way or the other. Trust a guy who didn’t for far too long.”
“The others are mixed in their reactions,” Rick said, forcibly steering the topic in a new direction. “Henry is a little scared of you, I think. Claire is ready to stake you out and leave you to the marsh ants. More for what you did to her sister than her, but she didn’t like those leeches. Were you actually controlling them?”
“That’s my familiar, Colin,” Jason said.
“Colin? Wait, your familiar is a swarm of leeches?”
“That’s right.”
“Swarm-type familiars are really rare,” Rick said. “I’ve seen more dragon and phoenix familiars. The only other swarm type I’ve seen is a gold-ranker back in my home city. He has these fire hornets that suicide attack to inflict a burning condition, and when they kill something, a bunch more hornets burst out of it.”
“Nasty,” Jason said. “How did Jonah take how our fight turned out?”
“Jonah can be obnoxious and strong-willed, even to his own detriment.”
“I won’t hold that against him,” Jason said. “I’ve been guilty of that more than once myself.”
“Well, you’ve earned his respect,” Rick said.
“Seriously?” Jason asked. “How does that work?”
“Jonah can be prideful, and quick to look down on people,” Rick said. “He respects strength, though. He doesn’t care if you’re a king or a commoner; show him you’re capable and you have his respect. He just needs to stop making snap judgements about people before he knows what he’s talking about.”
“Also something I’ve also been guilty of.”
“I think you might have startled Humphrey quite badly, though,” Rick said. “I don’t think he realised you had that in you.”
“I’m not sure I did either,” Jason said. “I think that might have been bubbling up for a while. I’m really surprised you don’t have more of a ‘burn him, he’s a witch’ attitude.”
“You’re not actually some kind of blood-thirsty lunatic, right?”
“Of course not,” Jason said. “It was just a persona. I might have got carried away with it, a bit, though. I felt so… free, afterwards. Like I finally started pushing back on all the pressures I've been feeling. Still, you really aren’t freaked out?”
“You don’t know a lot of adventurers, do you?”
“I know a few.”
“Once you know more, you’ll understand. As long as the Adventure Society isn’t sending people to hunt you down, anything is on the table. Fear, misery, despair. If those are your weapons, use them. If you have them and you don’t use them, you’re an idiot. Of course, that’s a generalisation. Everyone has their own opinion.”
“Humphrey?”
“Humphrey.”
“I should talk to him,” Jason said. “I don’t have enough friends to start scaring them off.”
“In my experience, it’s best to just leave him be,” Rick said. “He’ll work things through and then come find you.”
“Alright, thanks,” Jason said.
“So when are we having a rematch?”
Jason went downstairs to the common room. He was dressed in cool and comfortable clothes: loose tan pants, colourful shirt and sandals. He was about to set off on a contract, but there was a decent travel time and he could change clothes in little more than an instant. He might as well travel comfortably.