Chapter 37: Ambush

Adriana’s first instinct was to attack, but the moment her muscles bunched up, Synto shook his head sharply. He pulled out his club and held it at the ready. “One move and Davos dies. Test me, Adriana, I dare you.”

She froze. Hate burned her from the inside out, threatening to consume everything. He and his stupid son had made her life hell for the last three weeks, and this time he came well prepared. There were nearly a dozen armed men, a healthy distance away. They blocked off almost every entrance and exit to the empty square.

“How’d you manage to keep people away?” Lucas asked as he looked around. He wasn’t concerned, and almost looked bored. “It’s never this empty around now.”

“Don’t worry about it,” said Synto. “All you need to worry about is staying the fuck out of the way while Adriana and I talk. This doesn’t have to end in violence, girl. Give me what I want and I’ll walk away, and you’ll get another chance to find Divinity more suited to you.” He raised the club higher.

“Wait!” Adriana held a hand up. Her heart raced, and she looked around frantically. There was no good way to strike, and no matter how much she cared about power, this was Davos. He was an irritating coward sometimes, but he’d been the only one to take her seriously or give a shit about her in years.

“Wait for what?” Synto scoffed. “You have ten seconds to give me your True Divinity, or Davos dies. 10…”

Lucas nudged her in the side. “Stall,” he whispered. “Just buy us time.”

Unfortunately, Synto’s hearing was his strongest sense. “Or I could kill him right here and now.” Behind him, Mykos smirked. He looked less sickly this time, but there was something horribly wrong with how he looked under his hood. Adriana might have felt pity, if she didn’t badly want him dead.

Davos would’ve known what to do. He’d find the right thing to say and --

“What happens after you kill him?” Adriana asked.

Synto paused. “What do you mean?”

Lucas caught on and smiled grimly. “She means, if you kill him, what’s going to stop us from collapsing on you and ripping you to shreds? Right now, Davos is all the protection you have from us. You might be strong, but you’re only at the fourth ascension. I’m almost at the sixth. Adriana here was able to fight me to a draw.”

“Are you blind?” Mykos shouted. “You’re surrounded, and the moment any of you make a move, you’re dead!”

All of the eleven men were about ten feet away, a nothing distance for Heroes and Demigods to cover in an instant. They waited patiently, a myriad of weapons ready. None of them were particularly well armored, but that would stop them from blending in as well. Aside from all being big and having a brutish, animal quality to their expressions, they could’ve been any group of Mykarkians.

“Sure,” said Adriana as she caught on. “But if I do go, I’m going to take both of you with me. And then whatever slack-jawed, whoreson fuckwit you have with you can claim my Divinity. You feeling bold, Synto?”

His eyes narrowed at her. “You seem to forget that you ran away from the last few encounters. Well, there’s nowhere to go and -- “

A bolt of purple-white light hit his shoulder and discharged. Synto’s entire body locked up and the club tumbled out of his hands. It landed on Davos’ head with a thunk, but Adriana didn’t have time to worry about her friend. The second he was hit, everyone acted.

Lucas, always so slow and steady, burned with Inner Fire. In one smooth motion, he summoned his Spirit Spear and hurled it into the chest of the nearest foe. The man didn’t have time to register he was being attacked before the weapon pierced his chest and went out the other side. It disappeared and reappeared in the Demigod’s hands a second later.

“Get them!” Mykos shouted.

Adriana gathered Smoldersap on her hands and flung it at the ground in a crescent splash. It made her nearest attackers pause long enough to follow it up with a Flamespitter to make the patch of tar grow and boil. It put a half wall between her and three of her attackers, but it opened her up to an attack of her own.

She felt the attack coming before it did, and whirled around. The world seemed to slow while a man with a manic grin brought a massive sword down in a chop that even her toughened body wouldn’t be able to shrug off.

A bolt of fire hit him in the face and arrested his momentum. Adriana leapt on her opportunity and burned her Inner Fire to enhance her strength. She drove her fist into his stomach. He folded in half, and she used his momentum to pick him up and fling him into the group who went around her Smoldersap pool. It was then that she saw Eva flying overhead, carrying Tobias. The archer took aim once more. Adriana and Lucas remained surrounded, but he evened the odds.

Synto picked himself off the ground, and she saw her chance. Using her normal speed, she sprinted to him. He recovered in time, and she could see his eyes narrow in focus as he used his Warrior’s Reflexes to gauge the best way to get away from her attack. Unlike last time, Adriana saw every change in his body language, and where he would be before he got there.

She pivoted to match him, and he reversed. Alarm shone in his eyes as his best advantage failed him. She launched herself at him, fist raised and ready to come down on him like a hammer.

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Right before she connected, a creature came from the alley and intercepted her. It was a sleek, muscular wolf with yellow eyes and six legs. It slammed into her and latched his jaw onto her arm. Adriana cried out in pain as they went tumbling sideways against the nearest building. It ignored the burning from the Smoldersap and tore at her limb.

It wasn’t alone. Behind Mykos, another eight of them came out, and Adriana felt real fear. Even with a couple of the Heroes taken care of, Mykos and his monsters were enough of a threat all their own.

A bolt of lightning struck the wolf-thing. It gave Adriana the chance she needed to pull her arm back and fire a Flamespitter at point blank range. The flames spurted out over and through it. It fought to get away, but she kept the attack going as she got to her feet. Other wolf-things had come close, but she kept them at bay.

Tobias dropped out of the sky behind her. “You okay?” he asked.

“For now. Kill the greasy, bearded one!” she shouted.

Tobias grinned and took aim at Synto. The bastard feinted and then went the opposite way as the archer loosed his attack. It went wide, and Synto scooped up his club and approached at an angle.

Meanwhile, Lucas roared and fended off four Heroes by himself. Adriana saw him catch a sword in his hand and twist. The sword snapped in half, and the big Demigod took his piece and stabbed the man with it. Blood dripped from his hands, but he never stopped moving. Slow and steady, until he burned with power for a split second to jam his spear into another man’s guts.

The wolves fanned out, until her Flamespitter couldn’t come close to hitting them all, but if she dropped it they’d swarm her. Behind them, Mykos glowered, and slashed the air with his hand. The creatures went through the flames and overran her. Tobias had no choice but to Lighten himself and scale the building.

The flames cut out as they attacked her, and the thought went through her head that she was probably going to die, and to Mykos. This made twice he’d gotten the better of her. Adriana screamed in pain and rage. Then a figure came down like a fiery comet and landed in the middle of the monsters.

Eva didn’t have her spear this time. She didn’t need it. Adriana gathered she had two real powers, and she made use of both constantly. The petite blond radiated fire around her, getting hotter and hotter by the second. She made eye contact with Adriana, gritting her teeth as the flames grew and licked at the houses next to them.

The nearest wolves held on as long as they could, but a sharp yelp later and they released Adriana. One tried to run away, but it made it three wobbly steps before collapsing from the heat. Even she wasn’t immune to the heat, so much higher and drier than she was used to with her resistance. As the flames swept over her, the rest of the wolves managed to fall.

“You okay?” Eva asked, though she looked disgusted at helping.

“Fine,” Adriana gasped. “Get Davos and get him to the ship!”

Eva’s eyes narrowed, as if she was about to argue, but she flew up and over Synto again.

The bastard looked between Eva and Adriana, deciding between protecting his hostage and focusing on his prize. In the end he moved away from Davos and bowed mockingly. Eva scooped him up and flew off unharmed.

“Not looking so good, girl,” he said, sauntering forward. “That looks like it hurts, and I see you don’t have fast healing yet.”

Adriana wasn’t out of the fight yet, but she panted with exhaustion and pain. Her entire body was littered with bleeding bite wounds, and it was only a matter of time before they caught up with her and brought her down. She gathered Smoldersap and bared her teeth at him. “You ready to die, Synto?”

“Are you?”

They rushed each other at the same time. Adriana swung at him, but his Warrior’s Reflexes were even better up close, where his instincts and heightened sense of time won out over her ability to predict his movements. He twisted his entire body out of the way and continued the momentum to slam his club into her side.

A rib cracked and all her breath escaped her. She kept moving, but the pain shrieked until it was all she could focus on. Instinct guided her as she tackled Synto to the ground. Pain whited out her world, but she held on and focused on cooking her Smoldersap. He managed to grab her by her arms and held her hands away from his him.

“What’s…wrong…Synto?” Adriana gasped. She put everything into trying to grab his face with blackened hands. “Too hot?” Smoldersap dripped onto his cheeks.

He hissed in pain, eventually crying out when another few drops landed on his chin and set his beard on fire. Synto flailed wildly until he threw Adriana off.

Adriana landed hard. The pain slowed her as she fought to her feet. Synto patted his cheeks down. His hand burned as he scraped the worst of the Smoldersap away and threw it on the ground. Time froze, then they both attacked.

She burned her Inner Fire at the last second. Even Synto’s borderline prescient reflexes couldn’t keep up with the sudden burst of speed. Her first connected with the burning half of his face. He flew backwards and smashed through the building behind him.

Every desperate heave of breath stabbed her in the side, but Adriana was standing, and Synto wasn’t. She laughed in pain and excitement, before movement out of the corner of her eye made her turn.

Mykos came at her with his knives. She couldn’t move in time. Preparing for the worst, she was pleasantly surprised when a bolt of lightning hit him. He fell twitching to the ground, knives clattering after him.

Lucas grabbed her arm. On reflex she pulled away before she saw who it was. “We need to leave,” he said insistently. Over where he’d been fighting, all of the hired warriors were on the ground, some of them groaning, others obviously dead. Lucas himself was none the worse for wear. Just a few cuts and blood trailing from a broken nose.

“Not until I kill Synto,” she said before taking a halting step forward.

“No. Now, Adriana!” Before she could protest, Lucas threw her over his shoulder. It made her ribs hurt worse, but she didn’t have a chance to complain. The Demigod burst into motion, each long step fueled by spurts of his Inner Fire. It was less rocky than it could’ve been, and it gave her a chance to see Tobias and Iris running past the action behind them.

The city melted away as Lucas took them to the harbor, where their ship, the Duskbreaker, waited. It was a standard trireme with both sails and three rows of oars, though they weren’t out at the moment. They went up the gangway, and he deposited her on the deck next to Cora and a still bound Davos.

Adriana groaned and reached for him. Weakness caught up to her, but they’d survived for now. Cora caught her hand.

“Hey, you look rough, but I got you, okay? Davos is safe, and now it’s time to focus on you. Where does it hurt?”

Adriana let out a wordless, exhausted groan.