Amara
"…promised you wouldn’t hurt her."
"…nothing to her, not yet."
Scraps of raised voices found Amara’s gradually recovering consciousness.
"Why the fuck did you have to lay it on so thick?"
"Don’t mess around, Anna. You made this harder than it had to be when you took her in."
Amara’s eyes readjusted in tandem with the feeling of immense pain that throbbed at the forefront of her mind, like a parasite about to break through her cranium. She started to resolve two images that floated beside her – one green, seated. The other auburn, pacing the length of the room.
"I didn’t know."
"No, you just didn’t want to believe it. Stupid girl."
"Don’t treat me like some suckling kitten, Arekis! I’m no Argent fuckboy."
Amara saw the green form suddenly rose and strike the other across its cheek. Then, through the pain, the picture came into focus: there was Anna, bruised and crying, holding her cheek in her hand. Above her towered the muscle-bound lizardman. No longer was he naked now. He wore what looked like a chainmail hauberk over his massive frame, and affixed to his side was a glinting scimitar. His voice was the same deep pitch tinged with the consistency of gravel being ground underfoot.
"You’ll behave like a good kitty, or you’ll get nothing from us. You want the money or not?"
She bowed her face in shame, sniffling a sob. Amara now saw others stationed at the corners of the room. Her eyes darted to identify them all – hybrids. The ones she had seen outside. The ones that had been at the inn two weeks ago. The ones that had probably been watching her this whole time.
"Good girl," the lizard called Arekis was saying, stroking Anna’s cheek with the tip of his drawn blade. "A deals a deal. After all, we never could have verified this one without your help. A first generation Pyromancer, right here in Yarruck of all places. I didn’t even believe the tip off."
He turned his attention to the others in the room, and Amara felt movement on all sides. That’s when she suddenly realized, with a start, that something was tightening around her wrists and ankles.
She was bound to the posts of Anna’s bed. The hybrids surrounded her.
"Don’t be fooled," he told his cloaked associates. "This one’s a killer."
Her eyes flew open of their own accord now, her teeth grinding uncontrollably as she began to struggle against her restraints. She tried to scream but found her parched throat could form no sounds at all.
"Oh, look who’s up," the beastly Yok’ra said above her. He looked down on her with a smirk and fingered her threads of red hair as she writhed like an animal to be freed.
"You caused quite a bit of trouble down South, didn’t you?"
She felt him tug on her hair and rip a great tuft of her locks from their roots. Her mouth opened to wail, and she felt only the water from her own tears rush into her throat.
"Well, sorry to say that your journey ends here, little one," he said as he sprinkled her hair onto the room floor.
He leaned in close so she could see his reptilian eyes, and then she felt his slimy fingers close around her throat. Her legs thrashed beneath her to no avail, and on instinct she willed the power within her to flame into life, to singe all of them and herself, if need be. But not even a spark flickered from her desperate hands.
GLANCE: 0
Her breathing quickened. His nails were digging into the soft flesh of her neck, cutting off her oxygen supply. She could do nothing but stare into his dark eyes as she felt her own world start to tumble into oblivion. As the curtains of unconsciousness began to creep over her again, she heard a single voice cry out from somewhere distant.
"You said you wouldn’t hurt her!"
She knew it was Anna’s voice. The Tigran had gripped Arekis’ leg and he twisted round to beat her with the butt of his scimitar. He took her by her hair and dragged her to a corner of the room out of sight, where Amara heard him beat her with the butt of his scimitar again and again. Between blows she screamed for him to stop.
"Fucking Tigran slut," he spat as he brought his fist down on her right eye and Amara heard a stomach turning gargle escape from Anna that pierced her heart more than any blade could. She had but one last resort to call upon.
Mom, she cried in her mind. Help.
But the only reply she got was mild and neutral.
This was your choice, sweetheart.
Arekis threw Anna across the room and then took her bloodied, beaten pulp of a head over to Amara. He held the gasping Tigran in front of her.
"Take a good look, Glancer," he said. "You should be thanking me: here’s the face of your captor right here."
Amara’s disbelieving eyes darted between the two of them before they settled on the sickening smile of the Yok’ra.
"Yeah," he scoffed. "She sold you out. We’re Argents, see? It’s our job to hunt down freaks like you. But we can’t interfere directly with a town’s affairs unless the town makes a request. So, when this one took you in, hey, as law-abiding citizens it was our duty to pack our things and move on, right?"
She heard the other hybrids in the room chuckle with him.
Support the author by searching for the original publication of this novel.
"And we would’ve done. We’d keep watch, sure, because I knew you had the smell of Glance filth on you the moment I saw you at that inn. We’d wait for the right time. Patient hunter gets the kill in the end, after all."
His smile grew as Amara herself began to put the pieces together.
"But I couldn’t prove it till this little whore came to us and told us she’d offer you up on a silver platter for a few bits of coin and safe passage to Lucent, of all places. Yeah, she knew what you were, alright."
He threw Anna to the ground and gave her a stout kick in the back of the neck. Then he motioned to one of the others and threw a pouch of coins at her head.
"Let it not be said that Arekis of Caer Argent doesn’t honor a deal. That’ll get you your passage, alright. But I’d probably save a little if I were you. You might want to get some of those scars looked at."
Anna just curled up on the floor, coddling the pouch of money like it was her own child. As Amara watched her, something swelled up in her chest. Swelled up, and broke apart, like a raging river smashing through a shuddering dam.
"I’ll bet you thought she actually cared about you," Arekis tutted from above her. "A shame you had to learn at such a young age that you can’t trust a whore as far as you can throw ‘em. But, no worries. This’ll be the last lesson you’ll ever have to learn."
Anna’s eyes met Amara’s from behind her bloated wounds and reflected shame. She barely mouthed the words ‘sorry, sorry, sorry’ as she lay there, on the verge of throwing up.
Again, Amara felt the thing deep inside her twist and break. There was something happening just below her chest.
Mom, she said in her mind. Please.
The Voice was cool. Calm amidst the storm of rage.
You must now listen to me, my daughter.
Her rage-filled eyes were suddenly drawn to the lizard-man’s sword being drawn from its scabbard.
I’m listening.
Are you, dear? Or are you just desperate?
"Afraid the journey won’t be pleasant for you," the Yok’ra said. "See, you’re wanted alive. Don’t know where, and don’t care – that’s for old Azran to decide. Point is: I’m a careful man, like the great Jael before me, and so I’m not going to risk you casting any more spells. Our ointment will keep your throat at bay, but those hands and feet of yours are going to have to go."
Her mind screamed at her last thread of conscious thought that wasn’t even hers.
I’ll listen to no one but you from now on. No one else but you!
She felt the hybrids clench down on her limbs, strengthening the ropes that bound her and keeping her held down with their inhuman claws.
Anna screamed on the floor, but she was nothing more than a nuisance to these murderers now.
I need a promise, darling. The Voice said.
Amara’s eyes flew to the ceiling as she felt the cold steel of the scimitar travel up her body.
"Don’t worry," Arekis said. "Just have to mark where I’ll make the incisions. I’ll make it quick. You’ll probably pass out after the first one."
I promise! She bellowed in her mind. I’ll listen to you. Only you mom. Only you!
Okay dear, the Voice told her as she looked on the Yok’ra testing his swing. I need you to let me in. You’re going to feel a little funny, and a little dazed, but you must trust me, sweetheart. I can help you, but it will spend most of my strength. And it will hurt.
The Lizard man grabbed her leg and positioned his blade.
I trust you.
There was that feeling again, deep in Amara’s bowels. It was like a rodent scuttling up her insides, chewing through her stomach lining and tearing passed her organs to burst out of her head. And as the feeling of crawling doom reached its crescendo, the voice of her mother boomed in her mind with more power than she’d ever felt in her life.
Tell me what you want, dear.
Her eyes were drawn to those of the weeping Tigran who watched her from the floor, her face a broken mess of its former self. No longer could Amara smell the wisps of honey that seeped into her bones each time Anna had held her arm, or experience the warmth of her thin hairs play across her skin as they slept together. Now, she saw merely a creature sniveling on the ground as it held its prize in its filthy paws: the prize that Amara represented. Just a sack of gold coins held by a sack of flesh and fur.
Fur that would burn up good.
Anna met her stare in the moment before Amara’s mind went blank. She was looking at her when she mouthed the words she wanted so desperately to scream in the eyes of the cat, even as the Tigran moved her own lips to tell her she was sorry again.
Let them burn.
The lizard man’s scimitar descended, but the last thing Amara saw before she blacked out was the neon-black letters that sliced across her eyes:
GLANCE Channel: Auriel’s Frenzy
GLANCE type: PYRO
Fire Damage 100pts in 10ft
Repulsion 60ft
Then the walls of the world came crashing down.
----------------------------------------
Her eyes opened to a world of fluffy white.
The freezing sensation of the snows kissed her face and hair, but it was not the cold chill of the air that she felt run up her spine. Instead, she felt the hairs on her arms stand on end, and she reached back to find her long hair singed to half its length. She retracted her hand to see that her nails were blackened and her fingers shaking. Around her, the trees of the Yarrukian forest consumed the skies, but their chilled stillness offered her no calm. She felt heat graze her back, and she knew before she even turned that Anna’s house was burning.
She weakly crawled around to see the budding flower of flame fill the cold sky – its blackened, smoky tip sending tendrils of billowing onyx into the air as the townsfolk cried out for help. She could hear their feeble cries even here.
She rose on her shaking knees to see that the house wasn’t just on fire – it had exploded. Where once it stood now there was nothing but the flame. A towering inferno that had spewed from her own fingers.
The embers of the fire nicked the trees around her, and she looked around to see if there had been any other survivors. She saw nothing but empty snows.
"Mom," she croaked, her voice still nothing more than a beast-like whisper.
The Voice responded, but it was only a weak echo of its former self.
Darling, I am fading. I have spent myself.
Amara’s heart leaped in her chest.
"Mom!"
Shh. Listen, Darling. You must go.
She couldn’t take her eyes off the raging bonfire she had created. In there was her life for the past two weeks. The only friend she’d ever had…the traitor.
You must go! The Voice tried to shout.
Amara’s eyes narrowed. Shadows were appearing from within the inferno.
She felt her legs skitter like a newborn lamb in the snow.
North, Amara. You must go North. Run. Run and…
"Mom?" Amara asked aloud. "Mom!"
An arrow flew passed her cheek, grazing her broken hair and embedding itself in a tree beside her.
It had been fired by one of the hybrids limping forward from the inferno, and only now did she hear the crazed voice that bellowed through the sound of the fire and the screams of the burning townsfolk.
"Kill her!"
A scimitar glinted in the distance, attached to a bulging mass of scales and blood that was sprinting towards her from the fire’s center.
Run!
Amara had already broken into a maniacal sprint before she even heard the command. She ran without the breath to do so, her chest still pounding with pain and anguish while her head was filled with the image of Anna’s broken, crying face before it was wreathed in the glowing threads of her power.
Her cloak caught on loose branches and ripped, exposing her legs and tearing into her side with a sharp, piercing pain. Another arrow flew passed her just as she fought against the desire to stop and collapse. But she was not afraid. She would not – could not – let mom’s sacrifice go to waste. Mom was the only one who cared. She was the only one who ever cared. She’d been a fool to trust anyone besides her.
She lurched forwards as she felt a ripple of pain shoot up her spine and saw that an arrow had embedded itself in the small of her back. Her legs barely obeyed her command to push forwards, even as she heard the tell-tale sounds of her pursuers approach from behind, through the trees. But still, she limped on. She didn’t look back.
Is this how that cat-slaver felt, two years ago? Is this how Anna had felt in that moment just before she’d been consigned to the flame? Were Father’s thoughts muddled like this before she ended him?
No, she thought. They all gave up, in the end. They had no power. I have power. I can do this. I can make it home…
Another arrow lodged itself into her left elbow and she tripped over a ridge to fall into a deep ditch cut into the frozen forest. She rolled down the ridge and tasted dirt as her head pounded against the ground. By the time she’d hit the bottom she could barely move at all.
She reached out with her bleeding arm, teeth gritting with her determination to continue even as she felt her body give up. Her mother was gone, and she had been left for dead.
She swallowed her fury and sorrow both as a shadow appeared in the snow in front of her. She clawed at its looming black mass on the white canvas that was to be her grave. She’d defy the finger of death till the end. She’d survived worse.
"Come on then," she croaked, spitting blood on the shadow’s head. "Just try and finish me off."
But the voice that belonged to the shadow was quiet and grim, wheezing like it was under some kind of burden.
"No," it said with a heavy sigh. "There has been enough death today."
She tried to raise her head and managed to only just make out the withered paws and tail of the dog-man that stood above her before she drifted off again into the world of unconsciousness.