Hands of Fire: Chapter Eleven
The second arrow hits close to the first, and Kaith feels the terrible crunch of bone as the impact shatters his shoulder blade. There’s black at the edges of his vision that turns white hot when he tries to reach back and unsling his bow.
Just as he hears the whistle of another arrow, Rhyssa shoves him to the ground and covers his body with her own, and the pain in his shoulder makes him want to pass out or vomit or both.
“Rhyssa. Run,” he gasps.
“Not without you.” Slinging his good arm around her shoulders, she grabs his waist and half walks, half drags him forward. The bow digs into his back, and Kaith cries out with each step, tears carving tracks down his face. “I know it hurts,” she says between labored breaths. “Keep moving, Kaith. You’re doing great. I’ve got you.”
He can hear people behind them, shouting and laughing, heavy steps crashing through the underbrush. At least a dozen men, by the sound of it, no doubt sent by Amara.
Another whistle. Rhyssa lurches to the left, dragging Kaith with her. His weight makes her stumble, and he can feel her body shudder when it scrapes against a tree. There’s a sharp crack as another arrow hits the tree trunk.
“Keep running!” Rhyssa calls, hauling him forward once more. He stumbles at her side, his whole back on fire. Every so often Rhyssa pushes him to the ground and flings herself on top of him. He wants to tell her to stop protecting him, that she’s more valuable, but the pain has him clenching his jaw so tightly he’s afraid his teeth will shatter.
Every time she pushes him down, the arrows drive a little deeper into his flesh.
Every time she forces him back up, it gets a little harder to keep running.
“I can see it, Kaith,” Rhyssa pants. “Just ahead. The trees change. That’s the Unclaimed Lands, right?”
He manages a nod.
“See? We’re going to be fine. We just have to get across the border. Then it’ll be fine.”
But Kaith knows they’re not going to make it across the border. These men are toying with them, letting them run and savoring the hunt. As soon as they realize where Rhyssa is running, the game is over.
They’re not going to make it.
“Just leave me,” Kaith orders as she tries to pull him forward once more.
“Shut up.”
“You’ll never make it this way.” He rips his arm free of her grasp, trying to push her away from him.
“I’m not leaving you,” she protests.
“Rhyssa.”
She turns her face away, tears in her eyes, and something in him cracks. This is the end for them. He won’t get her to Nortund. He won’t see her join the Academy or finally come into those glorious powers. He won’t see her cheeks flush with embarrassment or the sparkle in her eye when she’s pretending to be mad at him.
“Rhyssa, look at me,” he pleads, and when she turns, he lifts a trembling hand to her cheek. “You have to leave me. You can make it on your own, I know you can.”
“You’re coming with me.” Her voice cracks.
Before he can tell her the truth—that he’s not going anywhere—his legs give out beneath him.
“Kaith, get up.” Rhyssa slips her hands under his arms and pulls. He tells his legs to move, to help her, but they don’t listen to him. “Kaith, please, get up. You have to get up!” His head tips back. He sees the wetness on her cheeks, the fear in her brown eyes, Amara’s men stalking out of the trees with their weapons raised.
“Run,” he begs as the world goes black.
“Get up,” Rhyssa repeats, shaking Kaith’s shoulder. She grabs his arms again and heaves, but even leaning all her weight back, she only shifts him a few inches. “Kaith, please, I can’t carry you!”
Her power is roaring in her body, rising up at the danger it senses. She tries to leash it, but it bucks against her hold, and the scent of smoke fills her nostrils. Use me, it seems to beg, eager for release. Let me protect you. Let me save him.
The men closing in on them are laughing now, almost giddy that their prey is tiring. She scans their faces, looking for Amara, but there’s no woman among them. Hot anger bubbles up in her stomach, her throat. Anger that they’re being hunted. Anger that Amara won’t let him go. Anger that she doesn’t even have the decency to come after him herself, that she’d let these men hunt him like an animal.
Rhyssa stands as tall as she can and lifts her hands. “I won’t let you take him.”
A man in the middle steps forward, face spread in a lazy grin. “And what are you going to do to stop us, love? You going to fight us? Try to kill us?”
“If I have to.”
“Do you know what’s going to happen to you?” he asks with a sneer. “We’ll drag you back to the Arch Duke. He told us he’s gonna kill you nice and slow. Let his men cut you open to see where all that power comes from.” Hello, little mage.
“Don’t come any closer,” Rhyssa warns with more bluster than she feels, hoping he can’t see the way her whole body shakes as she puts herself between him and Kaith.
“And Amara has big plans for Kaith, here,” he continues, prowling closer. “She’ll string him up by his wrists and cut the disobedience right out of him. Over and over and over again until there’s no fight left.” It’s dangerous to wander alone.
Use me, use me, use me, use me.
“If you touch him”—Rhyssa turns up her palm and lets the smallest tendril of her power free, watching a flame bloom to life in her hand—“I will burn you alive.”
But the man only laughs, spinning a knife lazily in his hand. “You can try.”
With a deep breath, Rhyssa focuses on that well of power churning in her gut, feels its edges, its depth, its hunger. She tries to carve out a piece of it, just enough to save them, to help them run—tries to open the hand clenched around it and let a little seep through the cracks.
She pushes her hand forward, but the flames don’t obey here. They jump from her palm to the ground where they fizzle out, and the men surrounding her laugh as they close in. She feels the hot sting of tears in her eyes. She wills the flames to return, and only sparks answer her call.
She can’t do this.
They’re going to die.
Anyone ever tell you that you think too hard, princess?
Focus on directing it instead of stopping it all together.
Maybe the key here is just to let it go.
Rhyssa glances down to the man at her feet, blood pooling from his wounds. Wounds he got for protecting her.
“I’m not leaving you,” she whispers, for his ears only.
She opens her hand, unclenches the fist around her power, feels hot flames rise to life as smoke wafts off her hair, her skin, her clothes. Heat rolls off her body in waves, the forest warming around them, and she feels it searing into her but for once it doesn’t hurt. It doesn’t scare her.
It feels like coming home.
“I’m not leaving you,” she repeats. “She can’t have you anymore.”
She lets go.
When she raises both arms, a line of flames rises with them. A few of the men take a step back, brows furrowed. Rhyssa lets the flames grow hotter, shifting from vivid orange to blinding white. Sweat drips into her eyes, mixing with her tears, but she doesn’t feel the sting anymore.
This time, she sweeps her arms forward and the fire follows her command, shooting away from her body like a whip as the air crackles around them. Something like hope bubbles up in her chest as she watches it.
I did it, Mother, I took control. I—
The men drop to the ground, and as her power surges harmlessly over their heads, she realizes that she still has no idea how to aim.
And her attackers look angry.
The leader charges forward. She dives out of his path and throws up her hand. The flames come before she even calls for them, but then his fist smashes into her jaw and they sputter out. The force of the blow knocks her to the ground. Somewhere to her right Kaith is groaning, and she tastes blood in her mouth from where she bit her cheek.
He grabs her by the hair and hauls her up. Her feet scrabble for purchase but she can’t get her legs underneath her. He hits her in the stomach, pushing the air from her lungs, and her scream is little more than a gasp as he jerks her head back and presses the tip of the knife to her neck.
“The Arch Duke wants you alive.” The knife digs in deeper, a bead of blood trickling down the column of her throat. “But he never said we had to bring you in one piece. I think I’ll start with your face. Bring the mage bane!” he shouts to one of the men behind him.
Someone appears at his side, an uncorked vial in his hand, and then a hand is on her face, fingers digging into her jaw, forcing her mouth open as they pour the bitter liquid down her throat. They hold her mouth closed before she can spit it out.
The haze takes hold almost instantly, the fire in her gut banking, and it can’t end like this. It will not end like this.
Rhyssa grabs his wrist, pours every bit of her remaining power into her hands, and even at a fraction of her strength, it’s enough. She feels his skin melting in her grip, smells the stench of burning skin. He’s screaming when he shoves her away from him, and she stumbles over Kaith’s body, landing in a heap on the ground.
The world sways as she forces herself to stand, to raise her hands, to put herself between Kaith and these men who close in on her like she’s a wild animal to be cornered. “You’ll need more than that,” she gasps, but the words are weak. The dose they gave her was strong, and bile is rising in her throat. But whatever happens, she won’t let them take her. She’ll fight until they have no choice but to kill her.
They stop moving. The color slowly drains from the face of the one closest to her. “Come on!” she shouts. “What are you afraid of?”
It takes her a minute to realize they aren’t staring at her, but at something behind her. She feels a puff of ice cold air against the back of her neck.
Holding her breath, she glances over her shoulder and takes in the beast behind her. It stands several feet taller than her, the top of her head barely reaching its chest. It’s lupine in shape, but it has no fur, only sickly gray skin that reeks of carrion. Bits of bone stick out along its body, and she realizes whatever it is, it’s already dead, half-decomposed.
Growling, it circles around Rhyssa, stepping carefully over Kaith’s motionless form. She doesn’t so much as twitch when that rotten skin brushes against her arm as it passes. Behind the creature, she sees a man at the edge of the changed trees with wild gray hair and beard and dirt caked into the lines on his face.
He holds her gaze for a moment, nods, and lifts his hands.
The beast charges.
It kills the first man with a vicious swipe of its claws, slashing so deep into his throat that his head lolls on his shoulders. Before the others can react, it pounces on the next, burying its muzzle in the man’s stomach. That’s when the screaming starts.
The remaining men turn and run, tripping over roots and fallen branches and their own feet, but the beast takes only three mighty strides before it’s on them, tearing at their flesh, flinging them through the air, ripping them apart like it’s a game. Rhyssa watches it all, unable to look away even as her stomach heaves at the carnage.
The man from the forest keeps his arms held high, and she realizes with a start that he’s controlling that monster, guiding its every move, every kill.
“What magic is this?” she whispers.
There’s a flash of movement to her right, and when she turns, she sees the leader of the group creeping toward her ally, knife still in hand. “Look out!” she shrieks.
The man turns his head. She sees his lips moving, but she can’t make out what he’s saying. He swings one hand toward his would-be attacker and it’s like he drains the man’s very life. The skin sloughs off in strips, the bones crack and crumple, and his body has decomposed before he hits the ground, leaving only a skeleton behind.
She turns back just in time to see the beast kill the last man.
She falls to her knees and vomits.
When her stomach finally stops cramping, she crawls to Kaith’s side, pressing her fingers to the side of his neck. Her shoulders slump when she feels his pulse against her fingertips. It’s weak, but steady.
A pair of worn leather boots steps into her vision.
“Please,” she whispers, looking up into the forest man’s face. “Please. They shot him. Twice. He needs a healer.”
The creature slinks up to the man’s side. He lays a gentle hand on its shoulder, and it lies on the ground and stops moving. The body starts to sink into the soil, the earth hungry to reclaim it.
“They gave me mage bane.” Rhyssa holds out her hands, palm up, willing him to see she has no weapons left against him. “I can’t use my magic. I can’t hurt anyone.”
He looks down at her, face unmoving, hand still lifted to where the creature had stood.
“Help us!”
Sighing, he stoops down and slips his arms under Kaith’s back and knees, hauling him up and over his shoulder. Kaith groans, but doesn’t wake.
“Come,” the man says, turning and walking deeper into the forest.
“Where are we going?” she demands, pushing to her feet and stumbling after him.
He points to where the trees are changing, darkening, the shadows between them thick as mud.
She stops at the edge. “You’re taking us into the Unclaimed Lands?”
He pauses and turns to look at her, his expression unreadable. “My home,” he says simply. Then he starts to walk again, taking Kaith with him.
Rhyssa follows the man into the shadows.