Sothe took the lead, another leap taking her into the middle of the red-?eyes, and she almost absentmindedly flicked a blade out to slash a man’s head from his shoulders. The nearest turned to engage her, but she was already moving, cutting a bloody swath through the press. It was like watching a master swordsman fight children, children made of soft dough who came apart at her slightest touch. Splashes of blood sprayed across Sothe, streaks of red dripping from her polished skin.
Winter drew her own saber as more of the red-?eyes charged. Alex, just behind her, raised her hands and shot them down methodically, sending a single bolt of shadow through the head of each attacker. One woman ducked, avoiding the shot, and came at Winter with a short sword. The red-?eye feinted left, and nearly got around Winter’s parry. There was no time to pull away and riposte.
Instead, Winter let the woman’s momentum carry her onward, and slapped her off hand against the red-?eye’s arm, unleashing Infernivore. The hungry demon surged into her opponent, and Winter felt the crimson thread of the Beast withdraw rather than face it, leaving the red-?eye an empty shell. Winter stepped away and let her collapse just in time to see a young girl coming at her with a long kitchen knife, her blond hair spiky and crusted with blood and dirt. Winter thrust by instinct, and the girl willingly impaled herself, letting the saber sink into her belly as she thrust the knife at Winter’s arm. Winter hastily grabbed her wrist before the blow could land; she once again called on her demon, and the girl’s body slid limply off her sword as the Beast withdrew.
Up ahead, a half dozen red-?eyes had thrown themselves at Sothe, ignoring her knives and trying to bear her to the ground by sheer weight. For a moment she staggered, even as she stabbed one opponent repeatedly. Then her white wings snapped out, throwing two enemies away from her, and she dropped her knife to put her hands around the necks of two more. She hurled them into the rumble with a crunch of rotten wood and shattering tile. She grabbed the last pair and slammed their heads together so hard that both skulls shattered, washing Sothe’s hand in bloody fragments.
Really fucking glad she’s on our side. The two red-?eyes that had been knocked away were climbing to their feet only to be neatly speared by Alex. That left nothing moving in the courtyard aside from themselves, but there was still no sign of Jane.
Winter interrogated her senses, but Infernivore was so agitated by being denied its meals that it was hard to tell if it still felt another demon. “Alex! Can you feel it?”
Alex nodded, breathing hard. “It’s definitely here.” She frowned. “There’s something—”
“The tents,” Winter said. “She must be in there.”
Sothe jumped again, landing in the center of the three tents and scattering the ashes of a dead campfire. She grabbed the fabric of one and pulled, tearing the pegs from the ground. The interior was empty, so she turned to the next.
Something happened to the air in front of the tent, something that hurt Winter’s eyes even to look at. The air twisted, shimmering with iridescence like a raven’s wing. Sothe was picked up and hurled backward with tremendous force, clipping the top of a ruined building in a spray of splinters before impacting with the outer wall. Stone crunched, and a whole section of curtain wall collapsed in a rising cloud of dust that was quickly sucked into the shrieking sandstorm.
The tent was hurled aside, and a black-?clad figure rose slowly to its feet. It was a man, at least seven feet tall and almost skeletally thin. His clothes hung off him like funeral garb from a desiccated corpse, loops and folds of black fabric draped over him like a second skin. His face was invisible behind a dark mask made from tiny chips of obsidian. For a moment he looked in Sothe’s direction; then he turned toward Winter and Alex.
“Penitent!” Alex hissed. She raised her hands, but before she could unleash her power, another weird ripple surrounded her with bands of color. There was the start of a scream, abruptly cut off, and then she was pinwheeling through the air, landing hard on the rocky ground of the courtyard.
“That’s better.” The third tent flap opened, and Jane emerged, followed by two hulking, leather-?armored brutes with glowing red eyes. “As I was saying before we were so rudely interrupted, Winter, I thought I’d left you in Murnsk. Much against my will, I might add. Jane so wanted your company.” The Beast tapped a finger against the side of its head. “But you had to be obstinate.”
Saints and fucking martyrs. Winter raised her saber, not daring to look and see if Alex was all right. Jane hopped lightly up to a broken beam, spreading her arms for balance. Her hair had grown back, the long, silky red that Winter remembered. Her clothes were rags, her skin grimy, but she moved with such effortless grace that none of it seemed to matter. Even now, like this, Winter felt a twist in her chest at the sight of her.
“You’re probably wondering,” Jane went on, gesturing at the Penitent, “who this fellow is, since I don’t allow interloping demons in my bodies. He’s really a fascinating case. I found him in the dungeons under Elysium.” The tall, skeletal figure in black turned to stare at her, and Jane shot him a smile. “He was locked away for heresy, you see. He’d come to believe that the Beast of Judgment should cleanse the world of humanity, since our sins are so very many. Because he attempted to free me, his fellow Priests of the Black had thrown him in their darkest hole to be tortured. They removed his tongue, lest he spread his blasphemy. Pity he was right and they were wrong!”
“Don’t listen to her,” Winter said in Murnskai. “The Beast isn’t an answer for our sins. It’s a demon. You should be trying to destroy it!”
“I wouldn’t bother,” Jane said. “What he wants more than anything in the world is to be a part of me. And I’ll grant him that, in time. Once you are dead and the Thousand Names are mine, there will be nothing left in this world that can threaten me.”
Winter felt a trickle of sweat run down her cheek. Jane and the Penitent were at least fifteen yards away, too far to cover in a quick dash. And whatever his power is, it’s fast. She looked up at the whirlwind and wondered if the Steel Ghost could see what was happening. I need some kind of distraction. As long as I can get to Jane, it doesn’t matter what happens afterward...
“No need to wait around all day,” Jane said. “Kill her.”
Helplessly, Winter raised her sword. As she moved, space twisted around her, a shimmering distortion forming at each of her wrists. The blade fell from numbed fingers as an unstoppable force lifted her into the air, her shoulders screaming as her feet left the ground.
The Penitent cocked his head curiously. He put Winter in mind of a child pulling the legs off a spider. He held up one hand, fingers spread, and the two twists in space started to drift apart, taking Winter’s arms with them. It was a gentle, unstoppable movement, like the turning of a waterwheel. In a few seconds, Winter was stretched as if pinned to a rack. The force kept pulling, and she started to scream.
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