Beam’s POV: Day 9

Solitaire was lying still, blood fountaining from his arm, body twitching with pain, strength leaving him. He was hurt, and it was my fault.

It was my fault because I’d gotten myself hurt in the first place, and left us trapped in debt. It was my fault because I’d been too slow, too weak and too fragile to fight a stupid animal on my own. It was my fault because, for all my years of training, I’d never learned how to kill something, only to win matches.

The animal was recovering, but everything seemed to be moving in slow motion now. Snowflakes dropping as if they were falling through syrup, wind howling long and drawn out like a wolf’s cry, pain blossoming across every inch of me like cold fire.

I stood there, staring, regretting, silently apologising. And then the troll took its first step towards my friend. There was no thought left to be done after that, only action.

My sprint took me to it in moments, and my eyes caught it swinging around for a slash at my chest long before the motion was complete. I dug my heels in, using the thick snow to halt myself by digging a pair of trenches in the pale carpet, coming just short of the jagged talons that swept out at me. The troll was off-balance now, all its weight had been behind that swing and it hadn’t a human’s motor control or knowledge of momentum to mitigate the torque. I’d judged the spacing and time perfectly. This was my chance.

My last kick had worked nicely, so I threw another one, this time aiming low. Aiming perfectly. My shin caught the creature right in its belly, crashing into the back of Shango’s still-jutting knife, driving it inches deeper inside. A roar of pain and a stream of crimson told me it was a success.

I struck before the fucker could recover, jumping and landing a drop-kick into its chest while it was already stumbling away. I’d never have tried the move against a human, for one very vital reason.

I didn’t want to kill a person, and punting someone backwards wasn’t the sort of move that let you avoid such risks. Redacle had educated me on what a mistake that mindset was.

The troll fell, on its back now, and Shango was right beside me while we stomped and kicked at its skull. Blood still gushed from it, slowing its moves by the moment, but it managed to climb even in spite of us. Like an adult being wailed on by little kids.

Well that was fine; as Solitaire was fond of saying even kids could kill an adult, they just needed a bit of guts and something pointy.

“The knife!” I screamed at Shango, sensing that he’d not do much to help me physically. “Snatch the knife up.”

Bless him, he was smarter than me. I might’ve been left confused about which one, panicking, adrenaline shattering my thoughts. He realised instantly that Solitaire had landed a stab before going down and dropped his weapon. Without a word Shango lunged for the fallen blade while I kept kicking away. It was up, then it was pouncing at me, slowed by its weakness and easily sidestepped. My elbow came down on that magic spot in the back of its neck, the one everyone’s taught never to go for in sparring, the one that’ll get you kicked out of an MMA circuit for the danger in hitting it. I felt the connection with a satisfied snarl, and watched the troll fall again.

Then Shango hit it.

He wasn’t a strong man, nor a heavy one, but he was moving at a full sprint, and he did the smart thing of bracing his knife outstretched with the handle against his own body. All of his momentum was behind that knife, and it stuck the full length of its blade into the troll before he bounced off on impact.

Another roar, another distraction as it thrashed in the snow, trying to stand and stave off this unseen attacker at once. I was about to hit it again when I saw how much more blood was bubbling out, and then thought better of it.

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The troll took a long time to die, but it managed it eventually. Veins emptying themselves out into the ground, body weakening, slowing, then stopping. Shango and I took a moment longer to examine its corpse before we were confident about not being jumped again.

Then our focus turned immediately to Solitaire.

He wasn’t as hurt as I’d been, at least judging by his continued consciousness. The arm he’d been hit at had been shredded, talons carving deep into him like meat cleavers, but the wounds, although viciously severe, had already been bound by some scraps of cloth he’d pocketed from the bandits. That might’ve been the only reason he was able to even look clearly at us while we approached.

“How are you holding up?” I asked, kneeling down beside him. Solitaire gave me my answer by swearing, slurring, and spitting into the snow. We took that as an indicator of urgency.

Initially, the plan had been to head back to Jhigral with the troll’s corpse behind us, me dragging it all the while, the other two taking turns to pull alongside me so they could rest in-between sessions. We estimated it would’ve perhaps tripled our travel time to do so.

With Solitaire out of commission, though, he was more than just unable to help. He added an extra quarter onto the weight we needed to move. We’d left early enough in the day, but it was already closer to evening than noon by the time we caught sight of the first houses again.

That time left room for a lot to happen, and Solitaire didn’t handle it well. His condition worsened as we went, restlessness increasing, strength fading. Early on he’d been walking alongside us, then behind. Around the halfway mark we’d forced him to lie on the troll and let us drag him. It slowed us less to pull him as weight than it did to match his shambling pace with just a troll pulled at our backs, that’s how weak he’d gotten. Things hadn’t improved by the time we arrived.

He was conscious, and that’s about all that could be said for him. Every few dozen steps I tortured myself with another glance back at him, and the trail of flecked blood clinging to the snow behind us.

Arrival couldn’t come soon enough, and we made a beeline for the magus. Corvan received us reluctantly, but his eyes nearly bulged at the sight of the creature we had with us, face sheet-pale and awed.

“A…Troll.” He noted, dully. “You…Killed it? The three of you?”

Shango and I had agreed to let him do the talking, and yet even he had a note of smugness in his voice as he did.

“It caught us by surprise,” He lied, “Took some quick thinking on our part to take it down, but we managed it in the end. How much are they worth exactly?”

Corvan eyed the creature, then turned back with a sorry smile.

“Alas, despite their ferocity, troll corpses are not worth much as a rule. I could take it off your hands for…Perhaps a few silver off your debt Being generous, they are of some alchemical value.”

“This corpse is worth fifty silver, easily.” Shango contradicted, evenly. It was only then I realised that he’d known the entire time, but the reason for his lie still escaped me. Corvan’s face was beet red at having been caught out.

“Forty.” He snapped. “I’m the only magus who’ll have use for it in this town, and we both know it.”

Shango took a moment to weigh that, and in the end nodded in agreement.

“Forty it is.” He sighed, gesturing to the corpse, then stiffening and carrying on. “...We need treatment for Solitaire, too.”

The magus snorted at that, smugness suddenly returning to his face with a vengeance.

“I can heal him.” He noted. “Of course arcane healing is hard, and expensive. It’d be another…Seventy silver for a wound like that.”

Shango seemed like he was about to accept, face contorted in bitterness, then Solitaire spoke up. He’d been awake the entire time, not nearly as hurt as me, simply lying against the troll, too wounded to move around or even spare enough energy for speech. He spoke now, though, biting tongue cutting out with all the vigour it usually did. His carved-up arm might’ve been a paper cut.

“We don’t need magical healing.” He declared, wincing even at the strain it took him to do that much. Both me and Shango eyed our friend as if he were insane, because he fucking was, but Solitaire only eyed us back defiantly.

“Your arm-” Shango tried, then halted as Solitaire’s voice bludgeoned his own to one side and crushed it underfoot.

“-My arm is badly hurt, but most of the issue is blood loss which has already been stemmed. I’m not getting much worse now anyway, all we need is disinfectant, proper stitching to make sure my condition doesn’t plummet farther and I’ll be fine in a few weeks.”

Shango shot back quickly, affronted by our friend’s suicidal stupidity.

“A few weeks with you out of commission might get us killed.” He growled, but Solitaire had a thoughtful look in his eye at that, soon glancing to the magus.

“Can you give us a moment to speak?” He asked. Corvan grinned, apparently already sure we’d be forking over the money for a magical healing session.

“Be quick about it.” The magus ordered, moving into the back room. The moment he was gone, Solitaire turned back to Shango.

“Quickly, pull that menu of yours up again. I have a sneaking suspicion there’s going to be another change.”