“No imps,” Crann said, his eyes still on the band ahead. “But you missed one. A nozturel.”
Magnus froze, and spun. His squinted eyes swept over the retreating group for signs of a humanoid figure. He wouldn’t ask himself if it were possible. Not yet. He caught a flash of pale skin, and Magnus nearly went to his knees.
It could be Arvid. From so far away, the figure was a white man with dark hair; his missing shirt made that much obvious. But that was all Magnus could be certain of. That, and his height.
“We can take them,” Nadine said. “We have to try.”
Magnus was already moving. They made their way down the path like charging horses. There was no time for strategy. The plan was simple. Kill the veligiri. Don’t let them escape. Get the Eye.
Arvid.
Magnus waited until the pack of veligiri finally turned, at last noticing their presence. He let loose a roar that was sure to scatter them. The time for stealth was gone. Only one thing mattered now: kill or be killed.
What came next was a haze. Magnus drew his axe across walls of flesh and fought with the red and gray world spinning around him. Crimson and slate blood splashed from every direction as Magnus tore a path forward. He felt like Dag the Fierce, the hero from the stories of old, who’d fought through an impenetrable fortress in a berserker rage to save his hamma. There was no thought to any of his strikes. Only instinct and one, driving need.
He’s here. He’s here. I know he’s here.
At last, he’d plowed a trail, and Magnus stood face-to-face with the man who’d haunted his nightmares. His brother in all but blood. “Arvid.”
Arvid stood tall with his arms at his sides, his axe in hand, though not the one he’d made with Magnus’s help. It was a foreign, ill-fitting thing, like everything else about him. At the mention of his name, Arvid’s eyes swirled and flashed white and silver, just like they had the day the Soul Thieves had robbed his mind and body.
Magnus stared at the real reason he’d come on this mission. This was it. He was here. And they were so damn close. The Eye was here, just steps away from the woman who could use it. And his friend was a mere lunging distance away from him.
A blade-arm charged from the left. The brackish-colored creature was tall with bizarre proportions, long arms and torso but a short, thick neck and legs. Magnus broke away from Arvid. He slid to his knees and ran his axe across the thighs of the slashing creature. He just ducked the swipe of its right razor as it dropped with a howling scream that reverberated off the stone walls. Magnus took its little head off from behind.
Arvid stood watching the scene. He didn’t move as Magnus straightened and turned toward him. Those silver-white eyes continued to swirl.
Magnus lowered his axe and extended one hand. “Come.”
Arvid moved to bolt. Magnus dropped his weapon and lunged for him. He was only vaguely aware that the battle still raged behind him, that his hamma and allies were still at war with creatures bent on their death. But he couldn’t stop himself as he barreled into his friend and took them both to the ground.
Magnus flipped him over. “Arvid! Stop!”
Before he could say more, Arvid struck him across the mouth.
Magnus’s head snapped back. His instinct was to release Arvid and guard himself from a further attack. But he knew better, and he’d wrestled this man nearly every day since he’d been old enough to walk. He held on and tried to roll until he was fully on top of Arvid.
His opponent was relentless. While Magnus was only trying to hold Arvid, his enthralled friend rained down blow after blow, aiming for whatever weaknesses he could find. His neck, his groin, his face.
“Arvid, it’s me! It’s Magnus!”
Arvid snapped an arm loose and sent bent fingers into his opponent’s eyes. Magnus roared and was forced to pull back to keep himself from being blinded. It was all the opening Arvid needed. He crawled out from beneath Magnus and was away before the angry streaks cleared.
Magnus blinked and forced his eyes open. The scene before him was shaky, but Arvid was clearly retreating toward the fortress. Already, he was thirty paces away. Arvid always had been the faster runner.
Magnus jumped to his feet. Fear had him scrambling for his axe. Arvid was getting away. Magnus had to stop him. If his friend sounded the alarm, who knew what would come after them?
Throw it.
Magnus lined up his shot and aimed for the center of his friend’s back. Straight at his spine.
He hesitated. Now Arvid was fifty paces away. A few more seconds, and even Magnus, with all his strength and skill, wouldn’t be able to sink the axe reliably in its target.
Do it!
“Arvid!” Magnus called. If his friend halted, even hesitated, that meant there was still hope. Didn’t it?
Sixty paces.
A feminine cry of pain broke his concentration. He turned. A troll had Nadine caught beneath its foot. Her hips were pinned, and she hurried to retract one side of her lancet so that she might have room to thrust the thing back and then upward into her opponent’s belly. It lifted a club high above its head.
With a cry of impotent rage, Magnus swung his axe and watched it fly through the air. It planted itself in the center of the lumbering creature’s chest, and the monster dropped its club before falling on its rear. Nadine gasped when the weight of its foot left her. Magnus rushed to get her off the ground before one of the nearby blood-seekers saw its opportunity and charged her prone figure.
“Get up, woman.” Magnus hauled her to her feet, then lunged on top of the troll’s body to pierce its throat with a knife drawn from his belt. The creature had been kind enough to remove his axe from its own chest. Magnus snapped it up and whipped around. Arvid was just disappearing around a rocky spire in the distance. Magnus had waited too long.
No.
No. No. No. This could not be happening. He could not have come this far only to have let his friend slip his grasp now. Magnus ran after him. The lead was impossible but, Regna, he couldn’t stay here and watch Arvid get away.
He stumbled over a body. One of the Ebronians. Magnus forced himself still long enough to take in all that was happening. The one other Ebronian prisoner was dead atop a wounded and panting goblin. He’d likely been slaughtered by the veligiri the moment the attack had begun. Azolirum and Crann were locked in battle with the ogre, and Hezek was doing what he did best. Nadine was back on her feet.
A blood-seeker reared up, cutting off his view. Magnus let his axe fly, and it caught the beast in the shoulder. It screamed and dropped into the dirt. Magnus ran up on it just as it was making an all-fours sprint in Nadine’s direction. Magnus roared. It turned and swung its arms out wide. The clawed hands barely missed Magnus’s head as he ducked. When Magnus came back up, he brought his knife with him and shoved it deep into the creature’s exposed ribs until it hit the blood-seeker's heart hidden in the thick center of its belly. It gurgled and collapsed into a heap of white flesh and bony protrusions.
Va kreesha. There were still too many. Had reinforcements arrived? How much time had passed? They had to find a safe place to regroup before they were overrun. Where was Nadine?
“Samar!”
Magnus turned toward his hamma’s voice. She was fighting her way to the Ebronian’s limp body, almost to him. “Is he dead?”
“Take the Eye and go,” Magnus shouted, starting toward her. “They’re coming.”