Marcus woke to the sound of rushing water, and the sight of fire-trails painting the morose skies of early morning.
He was washed up on a beach at the very tip of the southern jungle, the river Yangzhao having deposited him at the ocean that spanned the edge of Thea. He rose with a groan, feeling his back heave under the pressure from his wounds – the results of collisions with rocks and debris from the ruined bridge that had floated away with him. Even here he could see the broken beams and splintered columns that the Keth-Tari had finally brought down.
He tried reaching out with his mind, but he could hear nothing except a garbled mass of screams and wails. Such sounds could be from the animals that sniffed curiously at his waterlogged jacket and busted glasses. Or, they could be from the Pipers – whose victory or defeat was still uncertain.
This was the thought that finally brought him to his feet. Then, staggering towards the jungle foliage, he fell again.
Mari…wait…
He started to crawl with herculean effort towards the dark stalks of the trees as more voices rang out in his mindscape. He focused, trying to will his concentration to pinpoint the distince tone and timbre of any individual shout he could put a name to. He grit his teeth – his mind straining against the effort of trying to re-connect with the Pipers while his body burned under the weight of its desire to lay down and give in.
But Marcus Graham didn’t give in. Not in the dark underbelly of this war-torn world, nor on its flame-wracked surface.
“Mari…” he whispered. “I’m…I’m coming. Hold on…Hold…”
…Marc?
There it was. He’d found her. He’d finally found that which he sought after more than anything. The one piece of his former life he’d hold onto as everything else fell apart.
Mari! Mari, I’m –
A stout bludgeon to the back of his head halted all thought.
He felt his weary body being dragged back to the ocean, then being thrown against its tide as the clouds spat rain upon the battered earth. Before he could turn he then felt a claw grip his neck and force him down into the waters, holding him there while his body failed against his attacker.
“Shai-Alud,” a voice said behind him – muffled in the bubbling sheath of water he was being submerged in. “How disappointing it must be to leave this world alone.”
Marcus didn’t have time to allow himself the luxury of fear. He struggled, kicking out against the scaled body of his attacker, trying desperately to avoid taking a gulp of the ocean that was swallowing him. In vain, he struck out and met resistance, his muscles heaving with the adrenaline of a dying man while his attacker simply held him under the waves with the calmness of an infant submerging a toy in its bath. As his eyes began to glaze over, and his mouth was forced to open and gulp down liquid death, Marcus’s right hand shot out and released a burst of energy from the green scars etched upon its surface. Only then did his enemy stagger back, and he threw himself from the ocean with a heave of exhaustion.
He crawled back, gulping down as much oxygen as he could, while Prince Nagoya clutched his burning shoulder.
“You have many tricks, don’t you?” the naked Prince asked him as he clawed through his burning scale and discarded them in the sands. “It is to be expected. The lesser races often require subterfuge and dark magic to give them a chance against their betters.”
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Marcus said nothing. His mind was too focused on calling for the Pipers – for anyone nearby. His body, meanwhile, redirected its remaining strength to his right arm to launch another dart of corrupted energy at the Prince.
Nagoya anticipated the strike, this time. He rolled to avoid it and picked up a handful of his own scales, tossing them at Marcus and watching them pierce his hand.
As Marcus fell back, blood dripping from his twitching fingers, Nagoya raced towards him without another word. A quick kick sent Marcus flying back into the shallows, his back hitting against a loose rock submerged in seaweed. As the Prince rushed to finish him, another three rapid darts of energy sent him staggering back, and as he swerved to avoid the final projectile, Marcus brought a stone across the Yokun’s face, smashing into the already charred scales there and watching the Prince fall back into the ocean.
“Well!” Nagoya said as he staggered to his feet. “It seems the Shai-Alud has some fight in him, after all. Go on, human. Show me the strength of the Pale bitch’s mate.”
Marcus came at him with a scream of fury, treading the raging waters with another stone he channeled his Gloomraav through. When he smashed it into the Prince’s grasping hand he saw the scales burn away – the fingers of the Prince come apart in the face of his attack.
But then he met the eyes of the Prince themselves, and in them he saw no registration of pain, or torment.
Instead, he felt his lower body buckle as Nagoya kneed him in his chest and brought his own burning hand straight across his face. This time, the Yokun bore down on him from above, getting one arm round his throat while the other pierced his right hand and kept it under the water.
Marcus cried out in agony, his neck straining against the Prince’s grip.
“You understand, don’t you?” Nagoya whispered to him. “Your kind cannot hope to match us. None of you can.”
Marcus felt his arm tighten its hold, and his legs flap against his will as his face entered the waters of Thea again. As he charged his hand with the fires of the Unclean One, the Prince laughed – he laughed manically as his own hand crisped and broke within the waves, feeling the saltwater sting every burning groove and opened pore.
“My father always taught me and my brothers that hatred for Keji-Sai was pointless,” he laughed. “That the energy from such thoughts would be wasted on you. But perhaps he did not truly understand the depths of your heresy. And perhaps he did not understand the reasons I have hated you since my eyes first beheld you standing over the bodies of my fallen men. And the reason your Pale whore has been a special project of mine for the past year.”
Marcus tried to throw the Yokun off him. But now, every movement felt like resisting a pinnacle tied to his limbs. He felt the weight of his own body pull him down, spurred on by the Prince’s tightening hold.
“I must thank you, Shai-Alud, for you have finally helped me to understand your hubris. All this – your little campaign against our Empire – I struggled to comprehend it since the days of the first uprisings. How could you possibly believe you had a chance? Why fight a war that you would be doomed, by your very natures, to fail in? Only now do I see that the reason is more sinister than any of your puerile calls for emancipation. No, your war has nothing to do with that at all.”
Marcus’s arms stopped resisting. Now, all he had left was his failing mind.
“It’s about control,” the Prince snarled down at him. “You enjoy it, don’t you? You surround yourself with inferiors because it feels good, doesn’t it? You like the feeling of having control over them, just like your bitch mate does.”
His eyes flickered as the light of this world began to dim, and one final time he tried to kick against his opponent.
“That’s it, isn’t it?” Nagoya snarled coldly. “It is about making sure your underlings know your place – from the rats you led in the Underkingdom to the slaves you dominate with your vile magicks now. You and your mistress are more Yokun than even you know. I look in the eyes of your Pale Lady and see those of my own mother – of a woman wishing nothing more than to swallow this entire world whole. But worse than this is the thought that burns in the back of my own brain, human. A secret I could not have realized without the aid of my hatred for you and your ‘cause’. Before you expire, I shall share this secret with you.”
It was useless. Marcus knew it. Maybe the creature was right – maybe in terms of pure martial strength he couldn’t resist the Prince of a warlike empire. But his body had never been his greatest weapon…
“Your desires are what makes you and I the same, human,” Nagoya whispered.“Were you born as my brother, we would have stood together to conquer this world. But the will of Akira and of Ming’bao has decreed that your soul inhabits the body of a creature of dirt. They have made you my enemy to test my resolve. And that is why I must kill you, now."