Tala almost felt bad, now that she considered things.
She stood, fully armored in ablative iron and white steel.
Flow was now in her hand in the form of a glaive. The wolf before her was larger than her by quite a bit, and she felt like the extra reach would be useful, at least at the beginning of the engagement.
A tungsten rod floated behind her neck, ready to protect that vulnerable area, while two tungsten balls hung in the air, one by each shoulder ready to deflect or redirect.
Her defensive discs floated around her in irregular patterns, orbiting her in preparation to interpose themselves between her and any attack.
Beside her, Terry stood, towering nearly double her height, eyes locked on his fellow predator.
He was massively outmatched in advancement, but he still had chosen to stand beside her in the face of this challenge, apparently claiming her as a flockmate, and demanding the right to fight by her side.
On one side, the fight seemed incredibly unfair.
She was effectively an armored juggernaut with a teleporting murder bird, coming to kill a wild dog.
Yet, despite it all, she couldn’t help but feel like the advantage wasn’t hers.
* * *
Rane looked down from the wall top, standing beside his former master.
Tala looked like a mythical goddess of war, Terry—beside her—a beast of legend.
The wolf they faced looked simple, yet the Anatalins were never as simple as they appeared.
Legend had it that the god-beast had never been inscribed, and he emphasized breadth of capacity and flexibility in tactics in those he taught directly.
This russet wolf seemed to be one such pupil.
“Can she win?” His voice was soft, but he knew that Master Grediv heard him. Master Grediv always heard him.
“I don’t know. She has powerful soulbonds and an honestly terrifying companion, but to face an Anatalin wolf and win…? We will see.”
* * *
Tala felt something echo through her very being.
It wasn’t words that she had heard—the sireling hadn’t spoken—but somehow with her threefold sight and still somewhat enhanced senses, she heard what the wolf was doing.
Ghost Steps on New-Fallen Snow.
Without any physical movement, and only the barest flicker of magic, the wolf was behind her, already biting for her neck.
An act of will caused the tungsten rod to shoot backward. It was too small to bridge the massive jaw, instead being fully engulfed before it slapped against the back of the beast’s throat, briefly arresting his attack.
At the same time, Terry flickered away, appearing on the wolf’s back to rip and tear at the fur there.
His talons couldn’t pierce the hide atop the Anatalin’s back, and he screeched in irritation at the realization.
Tala spun out of the way, whipping Flow around to cut at the wolf’s face.
Even as she spun—Void Fire Disgorgement—the wolf hacked up a glob of purple fire.
The bloodstars in her tungsten rod winked out and when the fire faded, there was no trace of the rod either.
Flow had cut the flesh, but glanced off the hardened skull of the lupine, evoking a yipping growl even as the sireling planted his front paws and lunged at her again, somehow coming in low this time despite his size.
A small amount of clearish blood spilled onto the snow, the iron claimed by Tala and pulled away.
Tala lined up her defensive discs, slapping them against the wolf’s head in sequence to nudge it to the side even as she twisted out of the way yet again, Flow licking out to leave yet more cuts through the attacker’s hide, claiming more iron and continuing the flow of clear, yellowish rivulets of blood.
Terry flickered, appearing in front of one of the sireling’s back legs, clamping down on it with his powerful beak, and tripping the wolf up momentarily.
Yet, the momentary reprieve didn’t last.
The wolf twisted nearly in half and snapped at Terry, causing the terror bird to flicker to his other side, where Terry lashed at lupine hamstrings.
A back leg jerked out of the way, before the attached paw lashed out in a horse-like back kick.
Tala came in with a lunging thrust, then, trying to land a solid hit on the incredibly slippery foe.
She thought she’d cornered the creature again, but—
Ghost Steps on New-Fallen Snow.
A dozen yards away, the sireling snapped at Terry just as the avian flickered into being, the snow at their feet exploding in violent puffs.
Terry was almost caught, but flickered once again before jaws snapped shut.
What followed was—frankly—terrifying to behold.
Terry and the wolf flickered and moved around each other, ranging across the whole of the battlefield, each unable to land telling blows against the other.
Yet, Tala was not left alone.
Every other second or so, in no discernable pattern, the sireling would appear near her, striking at her with tooth or claw.
He even body-checked her once, forcing her to absorb the energy of the hit in her armor before reforming the layers.
She was holding her own—well, Terry was holding their own, and she wasn’t dying in the confusion—but she knew that the young wolf was holding back.
Every exchange between them left another minor wound on the wolf, but they were just that, minor.
He’d only shown a single magical ability, except to remove an annoyance from within his mouth.
That purple fire had been of the void, somehow, and she did not look forward to facing it directly. It also made her hesitant to use Flow in its void form as void countered void with incredible ease.
At least I have a ready defense if he tries to use it on me.
* * *
Rane watched with growing concern as Tala was put on the back foot time and time again.
Her skill and Terry’s mastery of flickering teleportation kept them relevant in the clash, but they were not in control of the fight’s momentum.
Terry seemed both more skilled in his teleportation, and could teleport more often, but the Anatalin was relentless, making efficient use of every movement.
Where Terry used his flickering to attack, defend, and maneuver, the wolf seemed to only use it to reposition himself in order to keep both of his foes properly engaged at the same time.
Rane couldn’t help but grimace when Tala took hits that he could have avoided with his own magic.
He had no delusions that he would be doing better than Tala over all, but it was still a stark reminder that he could have been doing something if he were advanced enough.
If he had made a different choice.
Now, Tala was fighting when he might have joined her, and she somehow seemed to be losing even though she hadn’t taken a single injury that Rane had seen.
He wanted to be out there, protecting her.
Then, a thought came unbidden to his mind. Just her?
That made him pause.
Did he just want to be beside Tala? Did he only want to protect her?
The thought was almost laughable, yet he knew that he’d clung to it in the past.
It wasn’t true, though.
She wasn’t actually what he desired most, even though he did want to stand by her side as an equal.
What did he want?
What was his driving goal?
He had a flashing memory of burn wolves tearing an innocent family apart while he stood helplessly by, rendered so helpless by his own choice, his own folly.
He didn’t want to advance in order to stay with Tala, to protect her.
She didn’t need his protection, and she was a protector in her own right.
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He looked down and amended. Sometimes she could use his assistance, but that wouldn’t be him protecting her. That was them working together to protect others.
That resonated somehow.
He wasn’t seeking advancement to follow a friend, to pursue something more than friendship.
He sought something more than that.
He desired something deeper.
He wanted to protect everyone.
Deep within him, it felt like his gate—his very soul—resonated with that idea, and he found himself drawn into deeper contemplation as he continued to watch the fight play out below.
* * *
Tala had always struggled when sparring against Terry.
Even the first time they’d met, when they’d truly fought, she’d done terribly. She’d likely only survived because he was a cautious fighter and was surprised by her resilience.
Despite that, the main reason she’d never seen him as a true threat was that he lacked penetrative power, and she’d believed that she could outlast him. Even so, she had found herself utterly terrified when fighting him because of his sheer seeming inevitability and relentlessness in his assaults.
This wolf wasn’t nearly as good at teleporting around as Terry was, but he hit hard.
Case in point, Tala staggered back as a paw caught her across the chest and tried to throw her to the ground.
The ablative defense cracked, splintered, and gave way, causing much less force to actually reach her, and Flow left a shallow cut on the paw in retaliation, but that was it.
The blade claimed a bit more iron for her, but not nearly enough to make a difference.
It did seem like Tala was winning the battle of attrition, as he was bleeding and she wasn’t, but she was also breathing hard.
She wasn’t used to getting winded, but after fighting at full speed for what felt like hours—but was likely closer to ten minutes—she was starting to feel just that.
It didn’t make sense.
She felt like she was being hounded by an apex predator.
Unable to get away.
Unable to fight back.
All she could do was run and wait to die.
She was so much less than—
-Think. Tala.- Alat sounded incredibly strained as she was operating on a vastly limited amount of power and mental capacity.
Tala’s eyes widened, intrinsically understanding what Alat was trying to convey, and she growled. Mental magics, too? Rust you.
Her iron exploded outward as dozens of spikes drove into the ground, and with greater aura superiority, she found the tendrils of power clinging to Flow and her white steel.
Begone. She banished the drips of power with unquestioned authority.
The sireling moved back, appearing a dozen yards away, watching her more warily now.
He was taking hits to lay the seeds of his magic. Now, he’s reassessing how to approach this fight.
She straightened, not even having realized that she’d been hunching until then.
With another growl, Tala cocked her arm back and threw Flow in the form of a sword. “Terry!”
The wolf scoffed, taking the sword’s hit.
The blade deflected off the thick fur and hide, even if it did leave a shallow cut in its wake.
But then, Terry was there.
He was smaller—but not shoulder small—and both of his talons wrapped around Flow’s hilt, redirecting its motion. Then, he grew massive, and drove the sword downward.
A startled yelp sounded out, the first true indication of pain from the sireling since the fight began.
Terry had driven Flow up to the hilt into the wolf’s back, between two ribs. The hit also flattened the lupine form against the ground with Terry’s brief moment of extreme size and weight.
Tala felt a large amount of iron immediately claimed, with a bit more added every moment that the sword remained.
Likely noticing something was off with the weapon, Tala felt something around the sireling flex, and Flow was pushed out.
The wolf had clearly become tired of the teleporting terror bird. “Enough!”
Void Shroud—Purple light wrapped around Terry, utterly encapsulating him for a moment.
The avian screeched in obvious pain—a bit of fear evident in the sound—even as Tala lashed out with her aura and broke the working.
Terry staggered as he landed on his feet, his feathers smoking, many seemingly having been destroyed in some manner even in that brief moment.
Tala called Flow back to her hand, using the oft-forgotten ring around its hilt—just below the guard—to whip it around for a parting slash against the wolf.
He just grunted, clearly focused on something else. Altering his magics?
“Do you have more, Terry?”
Terry flickered back to his feet, but then slumped sideways, clearly exhausted and injured.
“Go. I’ll take it from here.”
He squawked in irritation.
“You did well. I don’t think I’d still be standing without the time you gave me to figure out what was going on. I don’t want you to die.”
The wolf had returned to his feet, now bleeding a steady drip drip.
It was odd to see red begin mixing with the mostly clear, ironless blood, but that wasn’t Tala’s focus at the moment.
The wolf seemed content to wait while Tala and Terry spoke.
Finally, Terry bobbed a nod, and flickered away, appearing on Rane’s shoulder atop the wall, where Master Grediv seemed to instantly inspect him for permanent injury and the need for immediate healing.
“Your care for your Pack does you credit, human. Are you ready for the next clash?”
“Yes.”
Tala expected him to teleport again, but apparently, the wolf had adopted that tactic specifically because of Terry.
He is taking the tactic of meeting us on our own footing and winning anyway. It was a terrifying demonstration, but Tala didn’t let it shake her.
Instead, she firmed her resolve as he crouched low and lunged toward her, his quick sprint eating up the distance between them.
Tala could tell that while the sireling was still injured, he was rapidly healing.
The magics around him had not included healing before, but now, she had enough familiarity with that type of magic to pick up on the workings specifically.
He is changing his magic on the run? That was… Tala found herself in awe.
She only knew of two humans who did that, Mistress Cerna and Master Xeel, and both were among the more powerful and versatile Archons in all of humanity. They were both much, much older than this wolf was supposed to be.
He must be a dedicated student indeed.
She really didn’t have time for these musings, given that the normal level of enhancement to her mentality was absent.
If he’s better at magic than me, let’s remove that as a factor. Well, she’d do that as much as she could.
The wolf didn’t do a final lunge that she could have used to predict his attack. Instead, he just ran straight at her, crouched low.
Tala bent as if to jump left, but then moved right instead.
She used a massive amount of iron to push off from, connected to her only by a thin tendril, much as she’d done against the syphon.
The wolf was caught off guard but still reacted well.
Flow became a glaive and slammed into the lupine shoulder, driving deeply—claiming more iron—even as the wolf’s weight and momentum carried him closer to her, up the relatively short blade and handle.
A boar spear would have been a better weapon here…
His jaws twisted and bit, and Tala got a good look at his teeth for the first time.
She felt herself pale as she realized that, somehow, every tooth carried the aura and magic of a potent weapon in its own right.
The teeth bit down, barely slowed by her layered armor.
That’s the weakness of this type of armor. It’s for distributing incoming force, not taking direct, sustained pressure.
It was a fleeting thought as she enacted her plan.
The iron spikes that she’d driven into the ground around them whipped back inward, held together and empowered by her aura which reigned uncontested around them.
More than forty iron spikes buried themselves into the still closing wounds of the sireling, claiming more iron and burrowing still deeper.
Those that tried to pierce fur and hide failed, only serving to spread iron across the wolf’s outsides, which was helpful in its own way.
The wolf clearly did not like this turn of events. It growled even as it stumbled, dragging Tala along with him due to Flow still impaling him through his shoulder.
He shook his head with a vicious jerk, ripping off her left arm with a sickening, ripping pop.
Tala screamed despite herself, letting go of Flow with her one remaining arm to drive her fist into the beast’s eye, forming white steel claws on instinct even as she struck.
The jaws released her arm, and he pulled backward, trying to get away from her clawing hand.
She unbalanced due to the missing arm even as the wolf surged forward once more, snapping toward her again.
She tried to jump away, but that just meant he latched onto her hip instead of her head or chest.
With another vicious jerk, her left leg was torn free.
RUST! She began building power within her lungs. If he wanted a close in fight, she’d make him pay for it.
Flow snicked back into her hand, and flipped to its void sword form, Tala acting on pure instinct.
As she brought it down, a field of void popped up in the way, and Tala cursed herself a fool.
She’d already seen him use void twice. It was clearly something he was very familiar with. Void countered void almost perfectly, because two voids simply couldn’t clash, it was against their nature to do so.
She let Flow fall back into its standard sword form, and that was able to land cutting blows once again.
The wolf’s paw came up, raking at her with claws even as his jaws continued to snap and bite and tear.
They were both making relatively simple back and forth lunges, Tala far more awkwardly due to missing basically half of her body.
The wolf was still struggling as she claimed more and more of his blood-iron in a slowly building cascade.
It wouldn't be fast enough, though.
Tala saw red even as her vision began to darken.
She was going to die.
The wolf was on his last legs too, but she was going to die.
She didn’t have her magics, not really.
Even so, she took the power that had been building in her lungs and exhaled it out across the wolf’s head, even as he struck.
His hair puffed away and his skin cracked and peeled, but she simply didn’t have the potency to make the attack any more useful.
She was going to die, alone yet again. Alone, when friends were so near at hand.
Her healing was so slow that it was barely preventing her from bleeding out at this point.
Flow fell again and again as she screamed in impotent rage, the sound amplified by her own magic and raw emotion.
The sireling flinched slightly but didn’t relent. Even that wasn’t enough to save her.
She was going to die, and she wasn’t ready.
The wolf seemed to stumble, then somehow surged forward with a burst of strength, a fire in the creature’s one remaining eye, almost a desperation mirroring her own.
Tala made a mistake in her jerking—half-body—attempt to avoid the attack, and the jaws closed around most of her remaining torso. The teeth spent most of their force penetrating her armor as they came to rest against her skin.
Together, the combatants fell to the ground, Tala unable to keep the teeth at bay.
She looked toward the wall, seeing the bastion of humanity so close.
Tala saw Terry looking back at her with clear rage and fear on his avian face.
She saw Rane, halfway over the wall, held back by a Refined on each arm. She almost laughed at how staged it looked.
It was like she was seeing the end of a story.
The end of her story, those on the wall were witnessing that end.
She looked back, seeing what she could have had.
Tala closed her eyes, waiting for the end.
But… the sireling hadn’t bit down yet.
She wasn’t dead.
Was he giving her a chance to surrender?
It seemed that he had actually been true to his word. He was going to let her surrender.
“I…” She tried to force out the words. I surrender.
They wouldn’t come.
What a stupid reason to die. She had pushed so hard she couldn’t even voice her own surrender.
Then, she noticed something, her mind clearing just a bit of the fog that had settled over her.
The wolf wasn’t moving at all, and all of the iron within it was hers.
He was dead.
She began to shudder, blood burbling up between her lips as she began laughing, not out of mirth, but out of pure exhausted relief.
She was alive, and she had won.
The restriction on her inscriptions lifted and power burst through her.
She had won, even if she still felt as if she’d lost.