Survival’s funny. Some wear it like a whisper, others like a scream. Mine’s a scorched skeleton of flame-forged rage that keeps me upright. Keeps me moving forward.
There’s not much that’s wet and squishy left in my chest. It’s all hard and hostile, impervious to things like caring for the likes of Tarik Relaken. In fact, even if he were a pile of shit on the pavement, I’d still go out of my way to stomp on him.
Perhaps that makes me a monster, too.
I don’t dissect the thought, shoving it out of the way as I move up a stairway on the inside of the wall’s southern half, zigzagging up the levels, past doors shut up for the slumber. I keep going until the wall is just that—wall. No more dwellings bored into the sides.
Folk don’t like to live so close to the clouds, the air this far up feeling … borrowed. Like it doesn’t belong to us.
Like it belongs to the dragons.
A shiver scuttles up my spine, and I turn south down a lengthy wind tunnel that yawns to the view beyond the wall, packed full of clouds so close I could almost reach out and scoop handfuls of their heavy underbellies.
When I’m only a few long steps away from the deadly plummet to the ground below, I dig into my pocket and ease off my iron ring, exposing myself to a riot of song that threatens to mince my brain into a fine sludge.
Fucking … mayhem.
The tendons in my neck stretch, the veins in my temples pulsing with too much rushing blood and song.
I tune my mind to the highest frequency—like tightening a sound snare—then cap the opening with a sieve, isolating Clode’s manic melody blaring at the top of her billowy lungs. The Goddess of Air works up a howling eddy that makes my veil flutter about, a lopsided grin stretched across my face.
She wants to play.
So do I.
The hairs on the back of my neck lift, Tarik’s footsteps drawing closer …
Closer.
Come on, you slimy fuck. Make your mo—
His hand latches onto the back of my neck, and he shoves me against the wall face-first, using his weight to pin me in place.
My skin crawls at the heft of him. The disabling might of a male determined to take whatever he wants.
I feign a whimper. A small jostle of desperation.
“Shh, shh, shh,” he rasps against my ear, making my blood curdle. “Be a good little null.”
Rage explodes beneath my ribs as I consider how many others he’s done this to. How many have been swallowed by his gluttonous greed like they’re nothing more than a snack.
No more.
I lift my boot and bite down on the metal cap crowning my back molar. With a click, an iron pin spears free from my heel. “Glei te ah no veirie,” I whisper-sing, the words a strangled ache in my mouth, spat free. Coaxing Clode to siphon almost every wisp of air from Tarik’s lungs.
She giggles.
Tarik sucks a strangled gasp through the compacting organs, and I stomp the nullifying pin through the top of his boot. Biting down on the cap a second time, I shoot the pin so deep between Tarik’s fine bones and tendons that the only way to be rid of it is to hack through his own ankle and sever the appendage.
Precautions.
I doubt Clode would loosen her hold on his lungs, but damned if I’m letting him set Ignos on me with a few blazing words. The God of Fire loves to feast, and I’d rather be skinned alive than have him gnaw on me.
Again.
Tarik’s grip loosens, and he stumbles back, limping, boots scuffing against the snow while I brush my hands down my gown and straighten myself. “Tarik fucking Relaken,” I mutter, easing the runed dragonscale blade from the secret pocket of my bodice, this one sharp enough to cut through bone like butter.
I turn, head cocked to the side, looking right into his wide, bloodshot eyes—anticipation prickling in the tips of my fingers. “Are you having a Creators-blessed slumber?”
His eyes bulge, then narrow on the blade I’m twirling. He loses his footing, crumbling against the far wall, mouth agape while he claws at his throat.
Guess that’s a no.
His chest convulses, barely a thread of breath whistling down his windpipe, doing little to inflate his suctioned lungs. Just enough to keep him present until he’s heard my well-prepared speech.
Once, I watched somebody drop a line beneath an icy lake and reel a long, slithering eahl to the surface. It squirmed in the snow, iridescent scales glinting as its mouth gaped and gaped until it became chillingly still.
This game always reminds me of that, except I felt sorry for the eahl.
I feel nothing for Tarik bar the ferocious desire to slit his throat before he ruins any more lives. But not yet.
First, he needs to suffer.
I move forward, gaze flicking between his hands, trying to decide on a preference. Tricky—they’re both so similar.
“One of the other Elding Blades might have eased you into death the gentle way,” I muse, deciding on the right. I grip it and yank, slicing my blade through his wrist so fast I’m certain he doesn’t realize what’s happened until I’m waving the severed appendage at him. “Probably would’ve done this after you were dead.”
Unfortunately for Tarik, I have a special well of rage I reserve specifically for folk like him.
He gawks at me, clawing at his neck as if his hand is still attached, blood spewing from the gory stub—his mouth so wide I can see his tonsils.
“Perhaps I should explain,” I say, pulling a wax bag from my pocket. I stuff my new hand inside and tug the drawstring tight. “You see, I was roaming the Undercity and stumbled upon your little business.”
Little is an understatement. His sprawling establishment is like a city of its own, fit with an amphitheater-sized battle pit, sleepsuites for those who never want to miss a duel, and cells of caged children. Nulls he’s snatched off the wall or purchased from desperate parents who lack the wealth to keep them fed, certain they’re buying their younglings a fighting chance at life.
A chance to battle their way to supremacy.
None of them looked malnourished, but there’s more than one way to starve a soul.
“I tried to free your captives, some of whom—I might add—were in dire need of a healer to mend their small, broken bodies.” I wave the laden bag at him, shrugging. “Imagine my disappointment when I discovered I required your handprint to open their cells.”
I can tell by the panicked look in his eyes that he’s not imagining hard enough. That he’s too caught up thinking about himself.
I lump the bag on the ground atop a pile of snow that’s blown in as he fumbles, jabs his remaining hand into his pocket, and yanks out a blade. I seize it from his paltry grip, clicking my tongue before I stab it through his thigh.
“Not that I knew who you were at that point,” I murmur, watching him quiver and convulse.
Relishing it.
His face turns redder than his garb, the veins in his temples and neck bulging as I slice his bloodred tunic open, bare his chest, then snag his other hand that won’t stop grabbing at me. I hoist it high, flatten it against the wall, and use my blade to pin it in place so I can focus on my task.
His entire body spasms again, wetness leaching down his trousers.
“Funniest thing. The next dae, your bound found a way to reach out to us. You know who we are, of course. The Fíur du Ath.”
From the Ashes.
His features crumble.
I lift my skirt and pull another blade from the inside of my boot. “She’s lovely, your bound. Striking. I’d barter the entire contents of my coffers that you purchased her too—hoping the brown bead she wears would guarantee you powerful offspring.”
More strangled jerks, his heaving chest slicked red from the blood pulsating free of his severed stub. It doesn’t elude me that he’s now painted in the color he loves so much.
The color he boasts.
Head tilted to the side, I study my crimson canvas, dragging the tip of my blade across the expanse of his chest. I plant a little pressure down the length and begin to carve my crude code into his flesh.
“She said you do terrible things to her. To others,” I say while I slice.
Slice.
Slice.
“To anybody you can get your grubby mitts on.”
R.
Rapist.