Janine did not turn, facing Brood Lord’s weapon with her own. Flashes of memories, so sweet and innocent, came to life. Bogdan and Ignacy were part of a medium-sized litter, eight cubs strong. Janine hugged them gently, lying on the overheated stones and feeling genuine disbelief at their survival. Eight furry nubbins, hungry and demanding, sucking milk and mewling for more and more. Her cubs. Impatient One calmly inspected the health of her new family, checking them for any defects, while Colt and young Anissa were both overjoyed, almost forcibly stuffing Janine with fresh food and milk. Her instincts were running wild back then, as instincts of any Wolfkin’s mother do, and both Colt and Anissa carried quite a number of bite marks on their bodies afterwards.
But they were happy. For months ahead, they celebrated; even Impatient One found time away from a shaman’s duties to help around the tent, trying in vain to maintain a cold posture at the sight of the young ones. Years later, only Ignacy and Bogdan stayed alive out of that litter. Bitter and merciless wars and dangerous monsters have taken the lives of others.
The mere thought of losing them hurt. She kept her focus only because she had been tempered by loss before and because a part of her soul had long since died. Death was eventuality in the Wolf Tribe. It hardly mattered what she might have tried. One way or another, her cubs will die. All Janine could do was give them a life worth living and all the love she still had in her body.
Predaig fired at Drozna’s leg, stopping her weapon the moment the bullets bounced off the bone plates covering the entire leg. Only tiny cracks were left in their wake, and Drozna smirked, pushing forward a wave of rage. The Wolfkins in his hold howled and thrashed, breaking their claws against his arm and trying to attack each other. Drozna merely raised an arm, ready to follow the order of his master.
With a simple shrug, Predaig took her weapon in both paws. If Drozna’s power affected her or if there was anything left of her soul to be reignited, Janine could not tell. That hardly mattered. Predaig was a Warlord of the first generation; she had faced foes far greater than this foolish beast could ever be.
She wielded a long, two-bladed sword cut from the wreckage of a spacecraft she had found in the desert. Its blade became blurry, coming right at the exposed Wolfkins, much to Drozna’s delight. And then he screamed, letting go of his prey, when two blood roses grew on his shoulders. Fast as lightning, Predaig had redirected her strike, slashing her foe not once but twice, cutting both the outer bones and muscles beneath all the way to the inner bone.
“Bitch!” Drozna roared, letting go of the Wolfkins. He clenched his fists, checking if he could still move his arms.
“Come closer,” Predaig sang, her voice sounding way younger than it should have been. “Come closer, morsel, and play a little. The day was long, and I am thirsting.”
“You should have thirsted for living longer rather than angering me!” Drozna roared, stopping his power. “I don’t need to hear this shit! I don’t need any fancy armor or weapon to tear you down!”
“All I hear is words, silly boy.” Predaig smiled.
“Die furred whore!”
Drozna came upon her, and a shimmering sphere made of countless blade slashes encased Predaig. Not a single movement was wasted; when his claws met steel, she would use this to turn her block into a cut, scratching his bone. A thrust was followed by a slash. A missed slash immediately turned into a block, and the dance repeated itself again. This was Predaig, fighting against Drozna like a youthful Warlord, a woman who faced a skinwalker and lived to tell the tale. Weight of years, injuries, badly healed bones, weariness—she abandoned it all, intending to face her last battle as a legend she lived. A few Wolfkins of her pack present in this battle turned on the recording of their cameras, burning through their precious energy reserves to immortalize the last glorious battle of their leader. Her final hunt.
Where Janine’s and Eled’s fighting reeked of honed skills, Predaig herself fully embraced instincts, relying on them and facing Drozna’s maddening attack with her own animalistic behavior, seeking to bleed him out before starting a feast.
And Drozna pushed through all of it. The beast barely batted an eye at his own wounds, only roaring at his missed attacks. With a persistence worthy of a Wolfkin, he has closed the distance between fighters, facing off against Predaig’s fangs with his own mouth filled with the sharpest teeth. At a close distance, they met each other with thrusts and bites, not punches or kicks. His arm swiped against Predaig’s chest plate, shattering it, and the two fighters were separated again.
Predaig has lost all skin on the right side of her cheek to Drozna’s bite; several of her own fangs fell to the ground. Blood poured from four deep cuts in her chest, and the claws on her left paw were missing, torn away during a fierce thrust against Drozna’s own thrust. Her opponent fared little better; a bloody cut opened his flesh beneath the ribcage, and dozens of crimson rivers flowed across his body, turning white bone plates red. Drozna chewed Predaig’s meat in his mouth, readying for another attack.
The Warlord pressed her wounded paw to her chest, gathering her own blood. Ignoring the raider’s fire, she drank it, raising her head high and unleashing a booming laugh.
Janine smiled too, feeling happy against all odds. Ignacy has helped Bogdan stand, and together with the others, they were retreating to the middle of the room. Eled turned into a whirlwind of death, beating aside the clowns’ weapons and coming for raiders. Predaig once again became her older self, no doubt guided by the ghosts of her family. What a perfect day to die!
“Why are you laughing?” Brood Lord asked, their weapons clashing against each other. Sparks from his sword illuminated his mocking face. “Is stress finally getting to you? Or is it sheer desperation? Help me here; your forces dwindle by the moment, while ours are endless. Is dying in this ditch…” He groaned in pain.
It was a well-known fact that a person could often put more strength into something when their mouth was shut and all thoughts were concentrated on the task. Janine had let her opponent run his mouth, ignoring shots landed on her armored bulk. And the moment Brood Lord got distracted enough, she put everything into a blow, pushing his blade aside and leaving a shallow wound on his chest.
“You talk too much, boy.” Janine kept smiling like an idiot, pushing him back blow by blow. “You have the privilege of seeing how Wolfkins dies. Rejoice! For your soul and blood will be my offering to all those you have killed.”
“I will see you die; this much is true. But before I take everything from you,” Brood Lord hissed, and his front leg struck, hitting Janine in the left knee with enough force to bulge metal into flesh.
Brood Lord has risen on four legs, using his weapon to keep Janine’s axe in a clench. Then he delivered a kick with his left leg against the side of her helmet, lifting the Warlord off her legs. She did not resist the impact, letting go of her weapon with her right paw and wrapping her freed arm against Brood Lord’s leg, taking him into the spin along with herself. Together, they had smashed face down into the stone.
Before lifting her snout off the floor, Janine kicked the bastard in the stomach, feeling her claws scratching against the metal and flesh, and received similar kicks in return, making her cough up blood. The force behind their joint attack has sent them across the floor, toppling fighters from both sides. Janine stood up, grabbing an unlucky raider and crushing the man’s head in her paw. Across her Brood Lord was on his legs as well, blinking away shards of the broken ocular.
“Amusing,” Brood Lord chuckled, wiping blood from his face. His voice changed again, returning to a regal and almost kind tone. “I ought to be angry, but at the same time, this is the best fun I’ve had in the past week! Thank you, Mutant Janine, truly. I am looking forward to breaking you.”
Janine stopped in her tracks. The sounds of battle, the sound of Brood Lord mocking—everything stopped. Once more, she felt herself like a little cub, frailly looking up to her mother and hearing the rejection. She was once again a terrified fool, looking down at the dead Terrific. The joy of combat, her determination, her readiness to die—everything was taken from her.
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She felt this way only once before. When she first had a talk with Ravager on that misty mountain. When she saw a person behind the Blessed Mother, and that person scared her to death. All around her, the fighters felt the same. The raiders lessened the intensity of their fire, and the Wolfkins looked around in worry. This was not an effect of power; Janine could bet her life on it. No. This feeling stemmed from being in proximity to something truly enormous.
Blessed Mother?
A crashing sound made her stop the advance, looking through the oculars of her surviving troops. The black sword came into the middle of the room, and Macarius Voidrunner followed, landing behind several warriors. With a few flicks of his wrists, he created an entire wall made of slashes before the Wolfkins, beating back the bullets and leaving four raiders headless.
“Away, filth!” Leonidas thundered, coming through the ceiling and driving Drozna away from Predaig. “Not a single one of you soldiers dies today, Warlord Janine. I swear this on my honor!”
The Sword Saint looked strikingly different from his comrades. Where they wore capes and adorned their armor with the heraldry of their household, Leonida’s own armor looked almost black. A simple suit of steel, soundless and elegant, just like the armor of his fellow, but far bulkier, with an ugly-looking backpack. In one paw, Leonidas wielded great claws. Electric discharges running down their edges made Drozna scream in pain when the Sword Saint tore a bone off his body. On another paw, Leonidas carried a great round shield.
Joining the combat, the Sword Saints turned the tide of battle, pushing the attackers back to the ruined walls with almost mad determination.
“You have none, traitor.” Janine allowed them to join the linked vision, but she herself was done showing courtesy to the Ice Fangs. Brood Lord retreated behind the ranks of his soldiers, gesturing for them to come at her. “Plenty of my soldiers had already died.”
“I will fix it!” Leonidas roared desperately. “Summerspring household will repay for every life; we will restore every broken bond and mend…” His white lenses shifted, looking at the raiders descending upon a Wolfkin warrior. The Sword Saint left footprints in the stone, battling aside foes with his shield and following with a strike of his long claws. “Not a single one of my kin will die today anymore! Not one! I will clear a path to reunification with my life if needed! Macarius, open the…”
The wall next to him broke, and a hand grabbed him by the shoulder, locking his claws. Leonidas barely had time to start lifting his shield when a halberd came down, its blade hissing with a disruption field around its edge. Janine recognized this energy; she had seen it used a few times before by the Dynast’s bodyguard. The secret behind its use was well known; this field broke the molecular bonds of everything in its path, but the sheer cost and energy consumption have limited the availability of such weapons among the ranks. Very few alloys could endure the disruption field.
Leonidas’ armor was not one of them. The glaive cleaved through his shoulder, going down all the way to his waist, and came clean, separating part of the Sword Saint’s body.
“I will not allow…” Leonidas managed to say before a gigantic steel boot hit him in the chest, pinning the Sword Saint to the ground.
All grievances abandoned, Janine, Predaig, Macarius, and Eled all charged to his aid. The one standing atop the downed Sword Saint was a giant, easily rivaling Drozna in size. His armor barely gave any creak; armor plates shifted nimbly to allow his body to move around fluidly. A cannon the size of a normie mounted on his shoulder moved, tracing the incoming danger, when a chuckle left his lips.
“Feast,” a word came from his dynamics.
Janine and the others had taken but a single step when the entire upper half of the building above them was uprooted, showing the darkening skies. Steel and stone were gone in a flash, and the floor bulged, rising up in the great stone slabs as something stood up.
Eled was the first to die. Janine knew this because her icon became dark on the HUD. But try as she might, she could not even see the blow that killed Eled. The only thing she saw was a towering figure before them, palms on the slick, curved blades in golden sheaths. In the next moment, the blades were in the figure’s hands, and Eled died. A line separated the woman’s body in two, from head to legs. Two perfectly cut halves fell on the floor, paws still clenching the sliced scythe.
Predaig died next; her head left the body before Eled’s remains could reach the ground. The cut head blinked, struggling in vain to assert control over the headless body. The lips spoke curses and demanded the body move and fight, even as light slowly left Predaig’s eyes.
Their killer stepped from the cloud of smoke, banishing it and nearby stones with a careless snap. Her hands were once again empty, the blades back in the sheath. She was dressed in royally colored purple furs, adorned with golden trimming, bone fetishes dangling on her neck as thick as the trunk of a grown-up tree. She wore no armor, the muscles the size of a human torso were visible beneath the tanned skin. Janine had seen some giants in her life, but this new breed was something else.
An air of dread visibly emanated from her, imitating a similar feeling from seeing the Blessed Mother being enraged on someone perfectly. The woman wore a thick leather cap, covering her face all the way to the nose. Pupils no larger than a grain focused on Janine were nestling amidst popped-up vessels, coloring the viscera crimson. Her mad eyes easily discerned Janine’s eyes through the lenses. From underneath the leather, across the dried-up roads, traveled two lines of blood, stopping around the jawline.
All around them, the people were thrown off their feet, unable to stand in the wake of an apocalyptic landing. The hospital shook one last time and started falling apart, burying the invaders and collapsing upon the Wolfkins. Only Janine and Macarius kept their footing, standing unharmed in the circle of safety created by this woman.
“Mad Hatter!” The raiders cheered, breaking from the rubble. The steel giant joined his voice to theirs, burying his glaive in Leonidas’ head. “Khan of Khans! Avatar of the Sky!”
Mad Hatter raised her hand, and all cheers died. She extended her hand to Janine and beckoned with two fingers.
Janine needed no other invitation. She clenched her fangs, bringing Taleteller at the towering woman in a diagonal arc. Mad Hatter had to be around six or seven meters tall; even without power armor, she easily towered above Janine, smiling with bright red lips at the advance. She could have killed the Warlord at any moment; Janine was sure of it. Size was only one of the things indicating danger, and Janine had killed bigger opponents.
No, what riled up her senses right now was the sheer pressure coming from the woman. She felt… unnatural, like some sort of abnormality falling from the sky. Janine had felt it before, during the encounter with Blood Graf. Mad Hatter was a predator, not unlike the Blessed Mother. Strength clothed in a human skin.
A finger stopped Taleteller, another finger stopped the Sword Saint’s blade. The khan pushed the weapons aside with an easy pull that nearly tore them out of the warriors’ paws. Mad Hatter looked at her fingers, nodding at the sight of two smallish cuts.
They came again, Macarius aiming his weapon at her leg and Janine aiming her blade at the woman’s chest. Only empty air met their assault, followed by an explosion of air when the immense body broke the sound barrier. Janine felt a body behind her. Her HUD shifted, showing Mad Hatter leaning against Janine’s body and holding a warrior in her hand. The hand closed, and the woman’s head popped.
“Soft,” Mad Hatter spoke, her voice rough and bored, with a hint of restrained aggression. “I’ve expected more of your chaff.”
“You…” Janine turned around, seeing how the steel giant drove back Macarius, his glaive facing against the black blade. Once more, Taleteller parted the sound boom.
“Tell me,” Mad Hatter asked from behind, looming over Janine, “have you ever seen the Sky?”
Hands grasped Janine beneath her armpits, and the world changed. The battlefield became murky, and the connection with her warriors disappeared as the armor screamed about Janine leaving the battle area. She shook her head, feeling herself floating, before realization hit her.
She was in the air! Her body slowing, Janine looked down and saw a cloud. Impossible! She thought, hastily remembering what Ignacy told her a few years ago. Clouds usually travel around five or six kilometers above the surface, and looking at the time on her HUD, Janine was on the ground, facing Mad Hatter, no longer than three seconds ago! It was impossible; she could not be thrown this high in such a meager span of time!
Pain came next, pain coming from her armpits. Mad Hatter’s grip has shattered the armor in this area, pushing a few metal shards into the skin. Janine has only now noticed it. Her body has finally slowed, and with the ancient horror woven into her very existence, Janine has understood that she is falling.
Normies liked to fly; their eyes would often burn in excitement upon a chance of getting on one of planes now circling between the Reclamation Army, Iterna, and the Oathtakers. Fools. What goes up always goes down. It didn’t matter if people liked it or not. And when you fall, all you are met with is pain.
All Wolfkins were afraid of falling. Not of heights, no. For as long as even the tip of your claw touched a mountain stone, there was little reason to fear. Even should a Wolfkin fall from a mountain, she could still grab hold of it. But a feeling of utter helplessness after being locked in the air and falling down… This was something to be afraid of.
Janine had thought that Terrific had beaten this fear out of her by throwing her and other cubs from a hill over and over, breaking their bones, checking up on their snouts, and deeply looking them in the eyes. If even a hint of fear was there, Terrific would repeat her cruel training. Turns out, it did not help, as Janine realized, flying down to earth at terminal velocity.
When she finally hit the ground, a merciful darkness swallowed her whole, devouring her fears for her pack and her sons.