Kip’s deception and Gunner’s excellence and a curving, exploding cannonball had done nothing to this immortal except knock his clothes awry.
Abaddon bellowed in that voice that reverberated in tones above and below human ken. “You think any mortal weapon could kill me?”
He leaned over, pained by his long-ago-broken ankles, and picked up his sword, which he’d lost in the blast—now disguised as a cane once more.
“I don’t need to kill you,” Kip said, though his heart dropped.
“What? Are you hoping your father will arrive with the sword?” Abaddon asked, derisive. “He’s a league away, killing that idiot Koios. Do you think with the master cloak abroad that I’d actually lose track of the one blade that can hurt me in this world? No. He’ll not come in time for you. Now, where is my cloak?”
He lifted a foot and casually stomped on Kip’s head.
It felt like Kip had been kicked by a horse. But blubber bounces back. “Get out of here,” Kip said. “You bug me. Ha. Get it? You’re an insect?”
“You can die easy now or you can die over the course of ten thousand agonizing years. Last chance.” Stomping on Kip’s head with each word for emphasis, he said, “Where. Is. My. Cloak?”
That was the magic of the master cloak. Even the immortals couldn’t see it. No wonder Abaddon was a bit put out that Kip had taken it.
“I have a better question,” Kip said, nose streaming blood. “Keep firing as fast as you can. It reloads itself.”
“Enough of this,” Abaddon said. “As fast as—what?”
“A better question than ‘Where is my cloak?’ ” Kip said quickly, “would be ‘Where is my . . . pistol?’ ”
Abaddon reached for his holster to draw his revolving-chambered pistol, Comfort. It wasn’t there to be found.
Teia was fast. She’d always been fast.
A hole appeared through the middle of Abaddon’s left eye as a gush of gases and smoke jumped out of the empty air to Kip’s left. Only the pistol’s barrel protruded from the invisible master cloak. One report followed on another. Five shots. Ten shots. Fifteen. Twenty, as fast as she could fire them, perforating the immortal relentlessly.
Teia said nothing. She wasn’t the kind of assassin to give a lecture to announce her presence.
She also wasn’t usually the kind to miss with half of her shots, but then Kip saw why as she dislodged the master cloak and her head became visible: she was firing blind. She wore a scarf around her eyes and had also ducked her head into the crook of her elbow to shield her light-sensitive eyes from the muzzle flash of the pistol every time she pulled the trigger, only taking a quick, unsteady peek every few shots until Abaddon collapsed, hemorrhaging blood everywhere.
With a word to her, Kip took the pistol from her hand, then stood over the immortal, whose chest and arms were drenched with several shades of impossibly vivid green and black and red blood, the colors already fading in Kip’s sight as the immortal’s life faded and their realms separated once more.
“I know I can’t kill you without the Blinding Knife,” Kip said. “But I can banish you, can’t I?”
He shot Abaddon in his nasty insectoid head. Twelve times. Then his chest a few more. Then the joints of his flailing limbs. Then his stomach—who knew where this immortal kept his heart? No point taking any chances. “Get . . . out . . . of my world!”
Kip kept firing until the color faded and the immortal’s blood boiled, turned to smoke, and blew away with an ungodly stench. The rest of its flesh followed. In moments, nothing was left but Abaddon’s clothing.
“Dammit, Teia. Took your time, didn’t you?” he said.
“Is that a thank-you?” she asked. She was sitting with her head against her knees. “When’d you see me coming?”
“I didn’t. But I knew you wouldn’t sit out a whole battle,” he said. “We’d never let you live that down.”
She gestured to the chain-spear still wrapped around her waist. “Faced an immortal, and I forgot to use your gift. Sorry.” She flashed a wan smile. “I guess it’s aptly . . .” She trailed off. “I’m not feeling so good, Kip.” She twitched. Her skin blanched deathly pale.
He barely caught her before she collapsed.
“It’s gonna be all right. We’ll take care of you, Teia,” he said, his chest tightening.
“I know,” she said. “I know.”
Chapter 145
“Form up,” Big Leo ordered. “One last time.”
They were all standing looking out toward the pirate ships anyway.
“Might as well make an easy target for ’em, huh?” Winsen said.
“Running’s still an option,” Ben-hadad said. “They might not get us all.”
“Says the man with bouncy legs,” Winsen said, but he took his place in the formation.
“I tried so hard to bribe them,” Karris said, resigned. “They shaved my messengers bald and had them beaten. Never even listened to the offers. Offers that would have put us in debt for a hundred years, by the way.”
Dazen said, “This is personal. I sank Pash Vecchio’s great ship, his pride and joy.” In the time it had taken them to safely get back down from the White King’s high platform, the pirate king’s fleet had pulled within range, with a great ship the twin of the Gargantua coming to point-blank. “I guess when you make enough enemies, it’s gotta catch up with you sooner or later.”
Karris sighed, then straightened her back to stand tall. She looked around at all of them as if to lock them in her mind’s eye now. “Where’s Grinwoody?” she asked.
“Grinwoody?” Dazen asked.
“Yeah, he fought with us all night,” Karris said. “Saved me a time or two.”
“Good fighter for an old guy,” Big Leo said.
“He what?” Dazen asked.
“Haven’t seen him,” Big Leo said. “Not since we came out here. Maybe he fell behind?”
No one else had seen him, either, and no one had as much interest as Dazen did in pursuing the inquiry, as they were staring out at hundreds and hundreds of pirates bearing down on them.
“Pirate king’s a mercenary, right?” Ben-hadad said. “So . . . surely he’s gonna want to switch sides again now that the White King’s dead? Right?”
“Ben, Ben, Ben,” Winsen said as if he were a child. “The leadership of one side is dead, and he’s got the leaders of the other side staring down the barrels of a thousand guns. You really think—”
“Not a thousand,” Ferkudi interrupted. “Don’t exaggerate! Twelve port pieces, twenty hail shots, two top pieces, thirty breech-loading swivel guns, six slings, six fowlers, and we don’t have to worry about the culverins and demiculverins and sakers—they’re probably not gonna waste long-range guns when we’re this close, right? And less than half the total could be pointed our direction at once since they can’t broadside us with both sides simultaneously—though with the muskets and pistols all those pirates are pointing . . . And then there’s the other ships—huh. Yeah, maybe a thousand guns, after all. Never mind.”