“I was avenging my parents!”
Caleb took a step back at the sheer loathing in her voice, only the fact that her eyes flicked away from him as she said it keeping him from wanting to turn and flee for his life and sanity. He looked through the demons that were slowly, cautiously approaching, to the smirking man behind them.
“Him?” he asked.
“Venadrin,” Elan hissed. “A traitor who betrayed my father and murdered my parents on the orders of demons.”
Well, that explained her hatred, Caleb supposed.
“And now I may have just lost my final chance to end that bastard, thanks to you!”
Caleb bristled. “Not much of a chance! You were about to get killed out there!”
“Better a slim chance than none at all!”
Any counter Caleb might have managed had to wait because the demons had finally decided that caution was overrated and closed to attack. He brought his blade up, defending against the overhead claw strikes. Black ichor splattered his blade and face as the sword bit into the limb that swung at him, but the force was enough to drive him back.
Beside him, Elan was faring little better. The force of the blows she was blocking were shaking her whole body and throwing her back with vicious force. The pair stood shoulder to shoulder, covering each other and inflicting more damage on the demons than they were taking, but there were more of them and each demon was clearly better able to absorb injury than either Caleb or Elan could hope to.
People had ducked away from them, hiding in the alcoves, most of them children younger than either Elan or Caleb. Of the rest, some of the adults were fighting to keep the demons away from them; most were just fighting or hiding in general. For the moment, it was working. The demons were focused on the two who’d opened the fighting so viciously, but Caleb knew that when he and Elan fell, the rest would follow shortly.
He could hear screaming and crying behind him as he fought. The rest of the children were deeper in the temple, back as far as they could go, but it would not be deep enough. With each attack, he and Elan were being forced back a full stride at a time.
It only took seconds, though it felt like an eternity to him, for them to be fighting in the midst of crying and cowering children with the last wall just feet from their backs.
The line of blood, ichor, and bodies strewn across the floor of the temple went back all the way to the opening, but there was nowhere left to retreat to.
Elan yelped, and out of the corner of his eye Caleb saw her stumble. One of the youngest kids had gotten under her feet just as she’d defended a heavy blow, and she went down to one knee as the demon pressed the advantage with a powerful backhand that lifted her from the ground and slammed her into the wall with enough force to make him cringe.
Elan slumped to the ground, dazed or unconscious, and then Caleb was the only one standing as the demons turned their focus on him.
Tired, sweating, and all but played out, Caleb shifted his grip on his blade and got it up to a solid defensive position.
“Well?” he asked through bloody teeth. “Come on then, let’s end this.”
*****
Elan shook her head, a ringing following every move she made and stars popping in her vision as she tried to get back to her feet. She could hear yelling and the sound of fighting around her, but her vision was black with only a hint of light out in the distance, as if at the end of a long, terrifying tunnel.
She stumbled around, realizing that she’d dropped her sword somehow but couldn’t remember when or where. Her hand found a solid purchase, smooth and cold, and she braced herself as she slowly pushed herself to stand straight up. Something buzzed under her palm and Elan snatched her hand back from the surface instinctively, swinging around.
Everything went black again and she felt herself pitching over, causing her to throw her hands out desperately to stop her fall. Again, the smooth, cold surface pressed against her palm and something buzzed against her flesh. She didn’t have the strength to pull back, however, and so she held her hand in place and took deep breaths.
Coming here was a mistake, Elan thought, or perhaps mumbled. She couldn’t tell, and didn’t care.
Strange words came to her, whispering in her ear then with near perfect clarity.
Transport initiated. Execute?
“What?” Elan muttered, blinking as the tunnel of darkness faded a little and she could see the wall she was leaning against. “Transport?”
“Transport Confirmed. Executing.”
“What? Wait, I—”
She was cut off by a flash of white light that overwhelmed her. She fell to her knees, the world threatening again to go black around her as Elan pitched over and threw up her last meal all over the floor.
*****
Kaern put a hand on Simone’s shoulder, shaking his head as he looked over the forces arrayed around the entrance to the “temple.”
“We’ll not fight our way through that,” he said. “He has too many there, and I see a few who’d give me pause in a straight fight. We’ll have to try another option.”
“Such as?” Simone asked, frustrated, still hating the fact that she’d sent the kids right into what had turned into the biggest trap in the whole damn city.
“Your temple,” Kaern said with a chuckle, “is a former military installation. Those were never built with only one way in. Come on, I think I can find the bolt hole.”
“The what?” she asked, nonetheless following him as he led her around.
“A back door,” he answered, leading her around the mound that hid the structure of the temple from the rest of the city. “Planners never built anything with only one way in and out in those days, Simone. There’s always a back door…usually a couple side ones too…”
She shook her head, barely following half of what he said as he continued to mumble while they tracked around behind the temple and then began to move farther away from it.
“What are we doing?” she hissed when they had actually started to approach the city walls. “The children…”
“Are dead or they’re alive. Neither state is going to be changed by us getting ourselves killed through our own stupidity,” Kaern said firmly as he came to a stop near one of the older parts of the city. “Here.”
“Here?” Simone looked at the building they’d stopped in front of. “It’s a tavern.”
“Figures,” Kaern snorted. “Come on.”
She snorted, more frustrated as he led her into the abandoned tavern, looking around until he found a way downstairs to the basement. “Where are you going?”
“Your people built this city around what shelter you could find,” Kaern answered. “The most impressive of which you called a temple…” He had to pause to suppress a laugh, still tickled by that fact. “But it wasn’t the only one that was here when your people chose to build.”
In the storage space below the tavern, Kaern looked around quickly to get his bearings and then walked straight to one of the far walls. He paused and felt around for a moment before suddenly yanking a concealed piece off the wall and gesturing to it.
“If you please, Simone?” He pointed.
She stared at the glowing section of wall apprehensively. “If you please, what?”
“Just put your hand on it,” Kaern sighed.
Hesitantly, Simone did as he asked, surprised by the cold sensation and then the buzz that followed. She started to jerk back, but Kaern reached out and held her hand in place.
“Just a second longer,” he said firmly.
The panel glowed, then grew warmer, and finally faded again. For a moment she thought nothing had happened, but then a grating sound surprised her and she caught a hint of motion in the corner of her eye. Simone turned in time to see a smooth section of the wall sink into the ground, revealing a well-lit tunnel beyond.