Chapter 23 - A clash of commanding wills (Training arc)

　　"No—he`s mine." That same voice again, smooth and sharp and strictly decisive. It was the woman-warrior, calling the four feral bastards off—they were all bounding toward the prince, tearing dead-hot straight at him. Wild with yearning. To avenge their fallen ally.

　　But time froze, or it might as well have—as soon as they heard the call, they all four stuttered to a stop, restless eyes glazing over. Like magic.

　　The prince had thought her impassive, a mere hapless bystander. The woman-warrior.

　　Wrong.

　　She moved alone and she was calm, walked the beat of her talk, a lean and long stride like a vowel never-ending. Her lithe form adorned though like a predator, sparse and serviceable, lightweight armour only, hide over leather. A short sword and an arm-shield to match. She looked like lightning, so fast. The sound and the fury.

　　"That was my second," she said, her features flat but on the brink, close it seemed to contorting. Something cold and sinister lying just beyond, controlled but only scarcely.

　　"He was nothing to me," said the prince, though not undaunted—the fierce presence of her, an evolved goblin, and one blessed with the force of command, at least in some gradation.

　　"She will die first," said the warrior-woman, the leader, angling her blade at Linaria. "And you will watch her die. Only then will I gut you like you did Uggon."

　　The prince stepped out of the corner, taking care now not to slip—the blood and guts, they had spread. Like shadows at dusk, stretching long and thin and treacherous.

　　"It will not be long now," the prince proclaimed, his spirit strong despite the danger. He had felled one already, a second-grade goblin. His first kill since Vol`krin worth counting. "You will beg me for mercy but there is none. That bastard there, consider him lucky. I gave him a clean death though he soils the ground." A sidelong nod to the body bent behind him, the prince shifting out, his back to the wall no longer. "But for you, it will be slow. I will make sure of that."

　　The leader ignored him; his words were air. But the four henchmen laughed and roiled with bitter hate both, a single sound holding all, their amusement, their indignation—they lived in absolutes alone, the opposites that confined them. Like animals enslaved. Nothing there but the thrill of the moment.

　　"Grab her," said the leader in that voice she had, hard and soft, a shard of glass swathed in velvet.

　　And like clockwork they sprang up all four, gears turning ruthless toward the stranded Linaria.

　　"Stop," said the prince or perhaps he shouted, painstakingly aware all of a sudden that he had no plan—never did, in life and in death. But that was too stark a realization, so he let in but only a sliver.

　　They paid him no mind and why should they? What did he have for bargain or barter?

　　"My locket, the ring, the buckler," swore the prince, "Magestones, green and red—have them all, all three. But let the Lady go." He surprised himself... his tone, it was almost pleading.

　　Again that mirthless laugh, they were all four of them the same. "We have all the loot our hands can carry," said the tall one in afterthought, flaunting his axe, the gilded hilt; it was enchanted. The dimmed-down glow of a magestone in metal.

　　"You think your stones mean much," the leader broke in. "But they are nothing."

　　What a lie that was, the prince thought, but his mind knew better—the leader was clever and she might spin tales... but the four-foot fool was more dim than his metal. Too slow to fib or know fact from falsehood. No. It was true somehow, their lack of interest.

　　"Let me go!" Linaria kicked and flailed at the green hand that grabbed her—it was the lowest one, looking plain and weak and hardly evolved. Taller than a rookie but by an inch or maybe two.

　　There was a word then, a charm or spell though not complete; it was left half-spoken. The world dawned hard and cold like ice, a bolt of the mighty element sputtering forth from the Lady`s hand.

　　The prince felt it come on strong and he wished he did not; it was rough and raw and he longed then for death, the nothing above the something. Gael was gone but the frost was not, the unweathered element. How crass and how unjust, for a fate like that to befall a prince. Damn it all to hell, he thought, going limp and cold and strong with hate—for it seemed that he, too, dwelt only in opposites now.The author`s narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

　　And the bolt, it did little but annoy, half an incantation by half a mage. The flash of frost crashed dead on the man`s plate armour, piercing through, though only slightly; he would feel it for a while, but he would live. Yet another pale injustice.

　　The man backed off, cursing fell in goblin, but another one took his place, a cretin just the same, and he pulled her down, dragged her by her hair to the four-foot fool who was grinning and grinding—the head of his axe etching lines in the earth. He raised it then... and the bonecrusher would be true to its name.

　　Its name. The prince felt a flash so fierce it brought him back to being, bolting through to the broken core. "Stop," he said once more, and this time he meant it. Sparks of blue stacked in a storm around him as again he spoke. "I, Cedric of the Blackrose, prince of Lothrian, command it."

　　A tidal wave cracked forth, slashing like a spectre through the air—so grand was his name and his royal aura, with all things thrown in the firing line. Leximancy. The fire and counterfire. To lose now was to lose it all—such was the price in rising tall but falling short. A curse of madness if he failed.

　　He opened his eyes—when had he closed them?

　　They were all standing still, their frames locked and frozen. The four of them feral but with eyes clean on him... and yes, even her. The fifth one, the leader. Though for how long was not clear—she was trying to fight it. Her look was not as theirs, a steady gaze still and not glazed over.

　　Cedric sprang clear, rushing hard and straight at her, fast as a lost long-loved ghost when night dawns. He could end her now.

　　Ah, he was close... so heart-rendingly close—he could feel her; his blade and her breath, but they did not connect. The leader burst free, her mind flayed but no longer; and by the forged gods, she was fast. Her body and his body—they did not obey the same rules.

　　She kneed him hard in the stomach, sent the prince rolling out on the blood-beaten ground. He gasped for air like he did for Gael; wanted her heart as he needed his breath.

　　"You bastard," spat the leader, swirling and swift like a wildcat in heat—she launched herself off, coming forceful, fangs bared.

　　He had worked his way upright, the dishonoured prince... stood buckled and hurting, fending her off if the steel would allow.

　　The prince saw fire then—a flare bucking forth from the front, far away. It was the Lady Linaria, and what a feat for a newborn mage... rallying to his side with a second spell, and again a master element. Dead-on target, too. The flames would swallow the leader.

　　Fast. Impossibly fast.

　　The leader whirled away, the fire flowing off and around. Leaving hardly a mark on her.

　　But the blaze was not done, coming straight for the prince now. And he did not have the same spirit or legs; by the gods, he was tired.

　　Damn it all. The prince surged ahead, thinking not of defence but of taking her with him, hoping to reach and grab hold of her waist. In the red-hot bright blaze, their bodies would join. Meet me in death... a hard hell waits below. Or an egg and the same thing all over, though more scarred and diminished. And he... like a fool he had called on his name. Could he fight off the madness? One way to know. Bring it on. Bring it all on.

　　He felt the fire wrap round him; it was almost a blessing. But then it stopped. Linaria had retracted the spell—a feat fit for a master. Which in some sense she was, in a time long ago.

　　So it was, then.

　　Too late to stop, more in mind than in body; he was in and now he was all-in. The prince doubled down, barrelling forth with his steel still in hand and his legs somewhat steady. Ever on forward, to the leader who stood. Watching and waiting; she was already ready. Her footing not lost from the spin just before.

　　Could he best her in combat, a clean open duel? He did not want answers; he wanted to hurt her, was hurtling no-holds-barred bare at a much faster foe.

　　She set up a block, accepting his efforts. A low-down defence leaving room for a counter.

　　The prince swiped in strong, but her armguard... she caught it. She sliced in turn, a narrow blow with low chance of hitting, but uncounterable—hers was a defensive approach, relying on her greater speed to defeat her opponent.

　　Ah, but then a flurry—she seems to thrive on the fickle and erratic that was her nature, slicing and hewing in rapid discordance, for there was no pattern; some strikes were wild and large, others compact and incisive, and they mixed seamlessly into a non-pattern that the prince could correspondingly not predict.

　　He was beaten back hard, clinging on but barely, staggered and panting. But brave. Not smart. But brave.

　　She came at him again and it was a good time for prayer, though no god worthy of receiving.

　　"STAND DOWN," impelled then a fell voice that could be none but the one.

　　Electricity surged like it never before had and they all stood frozen, the prince, the leader, the other four, and Linaria.

　　It was Gorkon, glowering something fierce at them, his unruly children—so tense was the taskmaster`s intervention.

　　"First raider Zazra," Gorkon said, "What is the meaning of this!?" He stepped closer, and he was old... but his strength was enduring; the man had muscle still on his lightly withered frame. And then of course his aura, the commanding voice of him that hits unlike any other. "You were primed for vice-warchief... yet would assault two of my mark-bearers?" He circled in, striding slowly toward the leader and around her. "No. This cannot stand." He stood before her now, the leader locking eyes with her leader. Her face grew pale.

　　"As you well know," said Gorkon, a soft tone now for he need not shout to impress. "My justice is swift."

　　The leader pleaded but Gorkon reached out, grabbed her by the face. Then he closed his fist.

　　Her teeth cracked and then shattered, like fragile ice falling. A cold hard winter.

　　The prince saw it happen, and he could not move.

　　"And you," said Gorkon, walking coolly at the prince. "Did I not say that my eye would be ever upon you?"

　　"Ye...s," sputtered the prince, presumably to the amazement of all, made mute but present.

　　Gorkon smiled, a twinkle flitting through his one real eye. "And that we would have talk... about your fury and fate?"

　　"Y...es." The prince pushed out the word, thought he might pass out with the next.

　　But that proved, for the moment, unneeded.

　　"Well," said Gorkon. "Then we talk."