What in Amuni’s name?
The stench hit Stefan more powerfully then, rolling in waves. Rot. Decay. Moldy fur. The pungent smell of a wraithwolf.
Shadelings? Here in Benez?
Around his twisted face, the dying man’s flesh sloughed off. Black fur replaced tan skin. His clothes writhed and stretched. The assassin was changing, growing, transforming. Ripping cloth accompanied bulging muscles as shirt and tunic tore. Gangly arms stretched down past the knees, ending in black-nailed claws twice the span of a normal man’s hand. The mouth and nose elongated into a dark muzzle lined with canines. The head thrashed once more, a puppy-like whimper escaped the beast’s jaws, and then it lay still.
Paralyzed by the transformation, Stefan stared openmouthed at the prone form of the seven-foot wraithwolf. From the corner of his eye came a flash of movement.
A fist crashed into his face with a force akin to someone picking up a flagstone and slamming it into his jaw. Something cracked. Lights danced across his vision. Blood filled his mouth with a bitter taste. Stefan stumbled to one side, swinging his sword wildly before him.
A growl rumbled from a few feet away, sending chills down his spine. He shook his head in an attempt to clear his sight. Vision still blurry, he picked out the shadowy forms of his six … no … nine … no …. The images merged into the three remaining assailants before doubling and tripling then becoming one again.
One hand on his broken, throbbing jaw, blood a roar in his ears, Stefan retreated until he rested against a wall. In front, two of the assassins snapped their heads back and howled. With that action, their clothes tore from their bodies to reveal fur instead of skin. Wraithwolves’ leering muzzles replaced human faces. The nauseating stink of death and corruption accompanied the transformations.
Desperately, Stefan sought the Shunyata. If he was going to die, he would do so fighting and take some of the beasts with him. Even as the thought crossed his mind, he gained the Shunyata’s calm deep inside himself and frowned. Why hadn’t the woman changed?
Obsidian fur rippling, eyes malignant green pools, the two wraithwolves stalked to each side as if they had all the time in the world. Stefan’s sword vibrated so hard, it jarred his palm. The woman, face painted in reds and yellows, dimly highlighted by one of the two lamps at the alley’s entrance, raised her hand slowly.
The air around Stefan grew heavy, thick, and constrictive. He gagged, suddenly finding himself short of breath. His weapon felt as if it weighed a hundred pounds.
The woman was a Matus. A Forger.
“Before you die,” she said with an air of nonchalance. “You will reveal to me how you came to possess your sword. You will release it to me and tell me what you know of the Chronicle of Undeath. Resist and your wife and children will suffer.”
Stefan opened his mouth to speak, but words fled him. Throat and lips dry, he squeezed his eyes shut and strained for all he was worth against her Forging. Dear Ilumni, help me. Please. But he knew his efforts were futile. Still, he tried again and again, begging the gods for some kind of strength. His prayers went unanswered. He was going to die and so was his family. Images of Thania and the children ravaged by the savage beasts, souls torn and bodies transformed, brought tears to his eyes. If he could have wept at his helplessness, he would have.
Against his palm, the sword vibrated even more intensely. Heat throbbed through him, scouring his insides. Gritting his teeth against the weight suffocating him and stopping his movement, Stefan willed his sword arm to move. His fingers gave a twitch, his wrist turned and the weapon with it. Such a slight effect brought him a flutter of hope.
Somehow, he knew he would not die. He would be with Thania again. He would spend time with his children again. It was his will, and it would be so.
Stefan opened his mouth in a wordless scream. A tiny concussion rocked his arm, emanating from the sword. The pressure holding him eased.
The Matus’ eyes grew wide.
In a quick motion, the foremost wraithwolf sniffed the air then whirled to scan the rooftops. Its counterpart did the same.
“What-”
Hooded cloak billowing, a man-shaped form appeared in front the Matus. Flames streaked from her hand toward the newcomer. The cloak swirled, and the fire simply dissipated as if gobbled up by the fabric. Before the she Forged again, the shadowy form took a step forward, and sheared her head from her shoulders with a slice of a sword so fast it seemed almost casual.
Completely free of her power, Stefan charged the closest wraithwolf, but his savior was faster still. In a blur of motion, both creatures suffered the woman’s fate. Unlike her, the beasts didn’t fall with blood spraying from the stumps of their necks, they crumpled to black ash which the chilly breeze swept away.
Stefan brought his sword up into a defensive position. The man eased off his hood. Mind partially preoccupied by the weapon’s reaction, the sheer power it had unleashed, the Knight Commander squinted. A gasp escaped his lips when the stranger’s hood dropped to his shoulders.
Kahar, the King’s bodyguard, regarded him with those strange green and silver eyes of his. His face was a blank mask.
In the city, bells began to toll.
“Thania and the children,” Stefan said in a labored breath. “They’re in danger.”
“The King has already dispatched several Alzari to your home.” Kahar bent and wiped his sword on the dead Matus’ tunic.
A weight lifted from Stefan’s chest. “Still, I have to get to them. They need me.”
“No. King Nerian needs you.” Kahar stared off in the direction of Stefan’s home. “Your family is fine. The Alzari have already arrived.”
How could he know this? Stefan opened his mouth to ask, but the expression on Kahar’s face was one of such unflinching certainty he nodded instead. “Do you know her?” He inclined his head toward the dead Matus.
“No, but …” Kahar bent and ripped the woman’s tunic from her shoulder to her breast, exposing a tattoo of a fist enclosed around a lightning bolt. “The Searing Fist. An Erastonian.”
“An Erastonian Matus working with shadelings? Why would they do such a thing?”
“It is man’s tendency to do the unexpected and err toward his own interests. Come, we must leave. When the bells finish, anyone found outside will be considered an enemy and struck down.”
“What? Since when-”
“Since assassins have been trying to kill the King.”
“Lead on,” Stefan said.
Cloak flapping behind him, Kahar set off at a jog, his effortless movements making him appear to glide. Thoughts swirling, Stefan followed. A craving for revenge bubbled into him as he repeated the scene and the insignia in his head.
They emerged from the alley to find streets once filled with revelers now desolate. The occasional person who was still fleeing the warning bells kept their heads down as Kahar and Stefan passed. Kahar stopped a pair of green and gold clad Alzari, instructing them on where to find the bodies and to guard them until the King sent one of the Captains. Accompanied by silver-blue moonlight, they continued along the lamp-lit avenues until they reached the palace.
The need to make the Erastonians pay grew stronger.
CHAPTER 16
“They dare to strike at me in my palace?” Dressed in ebony armor to match his braids, King Nerian paced across the marble floors before his huge throne. The gold and silver monstrosity would have dwarfed the body of a normal sized man, but with Nerian’s giant frame, the throne fit.
“Sire,” Kahar said, “I believe they had no other choice given their other attempts failed so miserably.”
“It’s possible,” Nerian stopped, his eyes ablaze, “but they had to know they would suffer the same fate. Why not hire some mercenary Matii? An Ashishin, a disgruntled Alzari, an Astocan or Cardian Namazzi or one of those crazed Felani Deathbringers. Why use one of their own? Not that any would have succeeded. Why expose that they work with the shade?”