Chapter 45 – Dual Duels, Part 3
As Zaphyr ran through the palace, her mind raced equally quickly, planning what she would do when she caught up with the notorious hemomancer she now pursued. He’s more experienced than me, but not as powerful, Zaphyr thought, hastily reviewing what little she knew about her opponent. He has far more knowledge about the human body, and he could undoubtedly exploit his hemomancy more accurately and lethally than I could. What advantages does that leave me with? She still sought an answer to that question when the hallway she ran down abruptly ended at the bottom of a tall set of wooden spiral stairs. Skidding to a stop, she frantically searched the area to see if there was any other way he could possibly have escaped by. Seeing none, she burst into motion once more, taking multiple steps with each long stride until she reached the top floor. The door there stood slightly ajar, telling her that she was still on the right path. Feeling slightly winded from her run up the stairs, she chose to walk into the room beyond, rather than wait to regain her breath, warily keeping an eye out for another ambush from Vasil Reinhand.
The chamber proved to be a cozy affair, with two couches and a table set between them, a large tea pot on it waiting to be used. The door at the other end of the room appeared to be both closed and locked, leaving Zaphyr grimacing in confusion. She stepped forward, picking up the teapot and inspecting it. She could hear from the sloshing within that there was still some tea in it, which presumably had long gone cold. Countless possibilities ran through her mind as to where Vasil Reinhand could have disappeared to. Her question answered itself immediately when she heard the door behind her close softly with an ominous click and she felt a sharp metallic point press into her back. She cursed herself for overlooking something as obvious as checking behind the already open door.
“I must commend you on your remarkable persistence and tenacity,” Vasil said from behind her in a conversational tone. “No wonder you and your brother made it so far; you simply don’t quit. As admirable of a trait as that is, one of these days, it’s going to get you into trouble. Well, I suppose it already has. I did give you a warning, I must remind you. And yet, here we are, back with my life in your hands, for the second time. Everything that happens after this point is entirely your fault. That, I promise you. And Vasil Reinhand-”
“-always keeps his promises. Yes, I know. Are you going to kill me?” Zaphyr asked, impatience mixed with fear evident in her voice.
“Probably not, at least not at this moment,” Vasil said, smacking his lips loudly before continuing. “Your skill and good fortune in escaping my last attempt on your life has made me reconsider. I have nothing but the highest respect for you and your brother, of course: it seems a tad wasteful to me to kill such talented hemomancers before they reach their prime. Well, there is that, alongside the fact that your friends are rapidly regaining control of the surrounding building. Your survival makes you a far more useful bargaining piece.” They both heard a commotion outside, coming from the staircase, and Vasil laughed. “Speaking of which…”
He opened the door and, leading Zaphyr along by the spear point, brought her out to the top of the staircase. There, looking down, she and Vasil saw Zel, General Steroth, and several of his soldiers.
“Good evening, or perhaps morning by this point. Who can say?” Vasil called down cheerily. “In case you aren’t aware, I have your friend Zaphyr here as my prisoner, as it were. Any moves on your part that I do not approve of, and she will find out for herself what having a spear rammed through her spine feels like. I’ll have to ask her afterwards, should she still be able to tell me.”
“What do you want us to do?” General Steroth asked.
“Let me walk out of this palace, free and alive,” Reinhand said simply. “I have no personal loyalty to the Master, and with the way that it appears the battle fares, continuing to fight on would be…foolish.”
“That’s quite a different tune than the one you sang when we entered the palace. If your personal loyalty to the Master is worth so little, then why did you do all of this? Why did you teach him those techniques, help his guards?” Captain Zel asked.
“In all honesty?” Vasil responded. “After fifty years rotting in prison, it was something for me to do.”
General Steroth looked to Vyle, but neither of them saw a way out of the situation that didn’t endanger Zaphyr.
Zaphyr, shaking with fury, her face pale, reached a decision. She was tired of being used as a hostage against her friends, and she thought she had a solution, based on a trick she had seen Aldus Phlegm use. I’ve never tried this before, she thought, but I must do something. The theory itself isn’t anything Zull and I haven’t practiced before. All I need to do is apply it in a new way…
She reached out her will, freezing the blood in Vasil’s arms and legs, preventing him from moving. She felt him stiffen behind her as his muscles craped, locking him in place. Then, looking down at Zel and Steroth, she shouted, “You can come up! I’ve taken care of him.”
“What?” they said in unison, confused.
“Come up, and I will show you,” she insisted. They did as she asked, joining her at the top of the staircase and staring in amusement at the visibly frustrated Vasil standing behind her, who remained as still as a statue.
“Incredible,” Zel breathed. “What have you done to him?”
“A simple trick of hemomancy,” Zaphyr explained. “Without access to a regular flow of blood, his muscles have frozen up. Until his blood starts flowing again, he’s effectively paralyzed.”
“How long will it last?” General Steroth asked.
“Until I lose my focus,” she told them.
“Imagine, one of the most terrifying hemomancers in the empire, brought low by a such a simple trick,” General Steroth said. “How will you live with this humiliation?”
Vasil remained silent, unmoving, but his eyes followed Zaphyr as she walked aside, calculating feverishly.
“What do we do with him?” General Steroth asked.
“While I loathe saying this, he is too dangerous to imprison, or even worse, to let free. He must be executed,” Zel suggested.
Zaphyr nodded. “The only way for us to be absolutely certain is to kill him.” I cannot believe I am saying any of this, but it’s the truth. I don’t see another way.
Vasil’s eyes widened, and Zaphyr felt his struggles against her own will increase as he tried to break free of her concentration. Despite his best efforts, she was simply too strong for him. Zel stepped forward, blade drawn, when he suddenly clutched at his leg. “Ow!” he said, surprised. “It felt like something just burst…”
“What?” Zaphyr said, stepping forward and kneeling to investigate, only to realize a second later what Vasil had done; by bursting a minor vessel in Zel’s leg, he had drawn Zaphyr’s attention long enough for lose to focus. She sprung up and turned, only to see a now active Vasil pulling back his spear, preparing to hurl it at her. General Steroth, however, instantly leaped into action, running forward and intercepting Vasil before slamming into him. The collision sent the hemomancer and the general backwards, colliding with the wooden railing of the staircase, which emitted a loud cracking sound. Vasil forced General Steroth off him, his expression now returned to his former tranquility.
“I really wish you people would stop bothering me,” he said, as lightly as if they had splashed mud on his favorite set of clothes, rather than threaten to kill him. “You’re driving me to actions I would rather not take.” He stopped and seemed to consider his actions. “Let’s see. I could burst a blood vessel connected to your hearts. I could deprive your brains of blood until you passed out and died, I could…”
“I have had enough of this,” Zaphyr said. Picking the spear up from where Vasil had dropped it, she ran it along her palm, creating a narrow, diagonal cut.
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Vasil frowned. “Oh, you don’t seriously intend…”
A tiny dagger of blood emerged from the cut, hovering in the air before Zaphyr. Vasil lunged to the side at the same moment that Zaphyr hurtled the blood blot through the air. It struck him in the side of the head, the force of the collision knocking him backwards into the wooden railing. Under this second assault, it snapped entirely, the sound letting them all knew what was to come next. As the railing crumbled outwards, Vasil stumbled back, then fell through the air, remaining stoically silent the entire time, a faint smile of amusement on his face. He struck the floor at the base of the stairs with a sickening crash, his neck broken. Within seconds, he had died.
“And that is the end of Vasil Reinhand,” General Steroth said as he peered over the shattered railings. “I must say, for someone with such an infamous history, I expected more.”
“Nobody ever lives up to the legends,” Zaphyr said quietly, looking at the cut in her hand blankly.
“What you just did was very brave, Zaphyr,” Zel said comfortingly, putting a hand on her shoulder. “Killing a man like that…not everyone has the courage to do so.
Zaphyr shoved Zel’s hand off her shoulder roughly. “Don’t talk to me about bravery. It is what I had to do, nothing more. Besides, he more than deserved to die, for all his crimes.”
“That leaves only the princes to look for,” General Steroth said, choosing to deliberately ignore Zaphyr’s outburst. “So that makes our search easier at least. No other hemomancers, hiding in the palace, waiting to surprise us.”
“No,” Zaphyr said quietly. “Just me, Zull, and the Master now. That’s what it has come down to at last.”
“What are you going to do, Zaphyr?” Zel asked curiously.
She clenched her fist, and the wound in her hand stopped bleeding for the moment, scabbing over as she willed it. “I am going to find Zull, and then together, he and I are going to hunt the Master down and destroy him.”
“That’s ambitious,” Zel commented. “Are you sure that you both are up to the task?”
“It is what we have come all this way to do, whether or not we realized it,” Zaphyr said. “Yes, we are ready.”
“After what I’ve seen, I trust the lass,” General Steroth said, bowing slightly as he did so. “Lead the way, Zaphyr Tyrill.”
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“You seem to think it is your destiny to live forever, Sangue,” Sir Kyr said. He and Sangue were walking in a circle, perfectly in step with each other, eyes locked. “I agree, destiny has played a role in this. But it hasn’t gone quite as you thought it would. Since we first met, my fate has been bound to yours. I have survived everything: my slavery to you and your father, my battles against countless hemomancers, alone or alongside the Tyrell twins. I even survived after my confrontation with you, in Ar Goll Forest. I have lived so I can fulfill my purpose: to destroy you and your father. Every time our fates intersect, I have emerged triumphant. I ruined your father’s plan to conquer Wyllshire. I hunted you both down, and with the help of my companions, slayed your father. I only have a few hours of life left in me, and yet, here I am, face to face with you, to finish my fate. How poetic.”
“You think too highly of yourself for a dog. I won’t let myself be killed by a mangy, half-dead cur like yourself,” Sangue hissed. “I will live forever. The Master has promised me this.”
“Look at yourself, Sangue!” Sir Kyr barked, his tone enough to make her flinch back. “For once in your arrogant life, think! At what point do you twist yourself so thoroughly in the pursuit of life that it isn’t even worth living anymore? You’re not even human. You’re a cobbled together corpse, a nightmare thing, powered by your own hatred and fear of death.”
“You’re one to talk, dog,” she snapped back, but he could tell from the troubled look in her enormous, bloodshot eyes that what he said had seriously shaken her.
“It’s finished, Sangue,” Sir Kyr told her. By now, he had shifted his position so that he stood by where his sword had landed after he had thrown it to close the portcullis. “Even if you were to kill me and escape, the twins will defeat the Master. You should know by now not to underestimate them. Once the Master falls, you will be in the same situation as before, your bindings broken and decaying, death’s shadow creeping ever closer. But this time, there won’t be anyone for you to crawl to and beg to extend your miserable existence for just a few more days. I have accepted my end; I face it with honor and peace. Can you say the same?”
Sangue, who had been keeping in step with Sir Kyr, suddenly stopped and ran towards him, his own sword outstretched in her hand. She slashed at him, but he snatched up his fallen blade and effortlessly parried her clumsy blow with his own weapon, knocking her to the side. Snarling, Sangue turned even as she charged past him and tried to hit him from behind with one of her outstretched talons, but Sir Kyr ducked just in time, watching with widened eyes as her talons swung past his face. Sir Kyr kicked her in the leg, making her buckle and fall to one knee, glaring up at him with undisguised hatred. He swung his sword again, trying to decapitate her with a single swift blow, but she lunged forward and bit him on the wrist, holding him fast with her toothed beak.
Sir Kyr, wincing with pain, tried to wrench his hand free, but to no avail. Sangue, glaring at him evilly from her bloodshot eyes, bit down even further. Blood spurted from between her lips, and Sir Kyr howled in pain. She bit down for a final time, and with a horrible snapping sound her beak pierced through Sir Kyr’s hand, severing it from his arm. His sword fell to the ground with a clatter as his still twitching hand released it.
Sir Kyr, narrowly avoiding Sangue’s talons as she swiped at him once more, picked up the blade with his remaining hand and stared at her grimly, every fiber of his attention focused on her to predict her next move. Sangue darted forward to try and grab his other hand, but Sir Kyr struck with an expertly delivered blow, slicing at the side of her face and splitting up one of the stitches which held it in place. As incomprehensible sounds of rage and pain bubbled from her inhuman lips and she clutched a talon to the side of her face, Sangue stumbled backwards, glaring with utter and total loathing at Sir Kyr.
“We can continue to do this forever, Sangue,” Sir Kyr said. “Dealing blow for blow, injury for injury, until eventually we both collapse. Neither of us is going to leave here alive. I’ve made sure of that.”
Sangue hurled the sword she had taken from Sir Kyr at the side of his head. Bringing his own sword up to block, the weapon bounced off in a shower of sparks, skittering across the ground to rest at the opposite end of the courtyard. Sangue rushed forward, talons outstretched as she scraped and raked at every inch of flesh she could reach. Sir Kyr expertly deflected every blow he could, but their situations had reversed; now Sangue who moved with such superhuman grace and agility that it proved impossible to block every move. Sir Kyr, hoping to catch her off guard, swung his sword around to strike her in the side, but Sangue had anticipated that. She moved towards him until they nearly touched, too close for him to wield his sword effectively, and grabbed his remaining wrist with her talons. Rather than risk losing that hand as well, Sir Kyr let go of his sword and pulled free of Sangue’s grasp. She reached down and picked up the sword he had just dropped and held it unsteadily. Sir Kyr, backed up against the tree in the center of the courtyard, watched her, eyes wide, gasping heavily.
Though her beak prevented her from expressing herself as a normal human would, Sir Kyr could almost swear that, in that moment, Sangue smiled triumphantly down at him. “It’s over, Sir Kyr,” she said, the first she had spoken since they had recommenced their battle. “I have won. I am undefeatable.”
Sir Kyr, hunched against the wall, bowed his head, as if acknowledging his defeat. Sangue lunged forward, blade outstretched. Rather than defend himself, however, Sir Kyr simply stood there calmly, letting her strike him and bury his own blade up to the hilt in his chest, until the tip of the blade touched the bark of the tree behind him. She looked up at him triumphantly, before her fear returned, instantly realizing by seeing his own composed expression that she had done exactly as he had wanted her to do. Before she could pull away, Sir Kyr reached out and bit her on the neck, clamping down with all his remaining strength. Though it cost him nearly half of his fangs, he yanked his head back, tearing a large chunk of her neck free. A fountain of blood spurted from where half of her neck had just been, and a gasping and gagging Sangue clutched both hands to her throat, trying to staunch the flow of blood. She slowly sank to her knees, eyes lolling back into her head.
“I told you, Sangue,” Sir Kyr said, speaking through mangled flesh and broken fangs. “It was my destiny to kill you.”
She opened her mouth to try and reply, but instead of words, blood and tar mixed flowed forth as she thrashed back and forth on the ground in a pool of her own sickly smelling blood. Gradually, her movements grew weaker and weaker, and at last she lay still. Sir Kyr walked over and knelt beside her, checking to make sure that she was well and truly dead. A quick inspection showed that she was, and that her body had already begun to decay at an accelerated rate. Within a day, nothing more than a skeleton would remain. Sir Kyr smiled slightly at that, and gently closed her unseeing eyes, which looked up at the sky above.
Sir Kyr then looked at the sword, still buried in his abdomen. He knew that only a short time remained for him as well, and that removing the sword would only make the wound bleed more. Instead, Sir Kyr sat down besides the tree, patting the side of it with his hand. “Well, Steroth, Vyle, Zaphyr, Zull, and all the others, you won’t have any further need for me,” he said aloud, though no one could hear him except the tree. “My quest is finished. It is truly over.” As he said that, he smiled at the finality of the statement. Sitting beneath the tree cross-legged, he breathed inwards and outwards, slowly, in rhythm, eyes closed, as he awaited the end.
He did not have long to wait. Even as he sat there, he felt the last remainders of his strength slowly ebb away, a little bit at a time. Soon his arms and legs were too heavy for him to properly lift, and his head drooped forward. More than anything else, he felt very tired. His remaining hand curled into a fist, falling numb. There was no pain, something that Sir Kyr was grateful for. Instead, he was washed in a strong sense of peace as he waited. His eyelids fell shut on their own, and his breaths came slower and slower. The last motes of consciousness fled from him one by one, and, after giving a final, relaxed sigh, he slumped forward, his sword still buried in his chest.
And thus did Sir Kyr, last of Aldus Phlegm’s abominations and the greatest knight to ever hail from Wyllshire, die.