Marked for Death

Chapter 63

Esprл stood on the bridge of the airship and watched her stepfather battle the warforged leader. She screamed every time Bastard attacked, and she cheered each time Kandler escaped harm. When he stabbed the creature through the arm, she jumped and squealed.

The girl’s joy was cut short, though, when Bastard broke Sallah’s blade. Seeing Kandler staring at the creature through his one good eye, without a sword in his hand, Esprл knew she had to do something.

She cast her eyes about. Burch was gone and maybe dead, plowed down with the arena wall. Sallah lay leaking blood from a handful of wounds. Deothen had disappeared under the arena floor and never came back out. Brendis was just this side of the grave. Below the ship, the artificer stood over Te’oma, making sure the changeling didn’t get up and start wreaking havoc again.

“Xalt!” Esprл shouted to the warforged below, a spark of hope fanning to a flame in her heart. “You have to help Kandler!”

Xalt looked up from Te’oma and Brendis and waved at the girl. “I would like to help, Esprл,” the artificer called, “but…”

Esprл’s flame of hope began to flicker. She glanced over to see Bastard stand with a fragment of Sallah’s sword still jutting from his chest, and the fire in her nearly went out.

From below, Xalt yelled, “The ship! Use the ship!”

“Yes!” Esprл said. “Yes!” She beckoned down at the artificer. “Come up!”

Xalt looked over to where Kandler and Bastard were still circling each other. “There is no time!” he shouted. “You must do it yourself!”

The girl nodded and turned to the steering platform. The wheel stood before her, solid and unmoving, although she could almost feel the elemental beckoning to her through it. She stepped forward and wrapped her long, delicate hands around the wheel.

In the distance, Esprл could see that the warforged who had stampeded from the arena were rallying again. Several squads of warriors were marching her way from the rear of the city. Some were pointing at the ship and shouting orders. She knew she didn’t have long.

Two streets over, a lone mounted figure was leading a train of horses to the arena. Esprл squinted down at the rider and realized it was Burch, picking his way along the edge of the city on his way back toward the arena. She laughed at the sight, then a ballista bolt sailed up past her from the ground below. As she searched for the shooter, another bolt struck the ship’s hull, shaking the deck.

The attack reminded Esprл how serious her situation was. Kandler was depending on her-everyone was-and she was not going to disappoint them. She stuck out her jaw and looked for her stepfather again. As she did, the ship began to move.

On the arena floor below, Kandler saw the ballista bolt slam into the side of the airship, and dread filled his heart. “Esprл,” he said.

“Do not worry about your whelp,” Bastard said. “I won’t make her suffer long.” Then he charged.

Kandler scrambled backward from the warforged leader, turning to run, hoping he could outpace him, but he stopped in midstride. This direct threat to his daughter unleashed a thunderstorm of rage in his head. There was no way he was going to let this beast get near Esprл.

As the warforged reached for him, the justicar pivoted and slammed his fist into the side of Bastard’s jaw with everything he had. Bastard dropped to one knee, stunned by the force of the blow. Kandler shook his hand, convinced he had broken knuckles, but he followed the first punch with a flurry of blows to the warforged’s face, pounding away at the creature without pause or mercy until his fists bled freely and his arms felt like lead.

Bastard raised an arm to defend itself, and Kandler backed off from the rows of sharp spikes. The warforged used the hilt-shard of Sallah’s sword to keep the justicar at bay.

His heart beating like a war drum, Kandler wheezed and huffed as he looked down at the creature to survey the damage he’d done. He felt like he’d been the one given the beating, but the adrenaline pumping through him let him ignore the pain. Bastard’s face bore a dozen dents and scratches. One of his sapphire eyes had been knocked from its face, leaving only a dead socket behind. In his left hand, he still held the sword-shard, but his right arm ended in a ragged stump.

“Ready to give up?” Kandler said.

Bastard’s jaw dropped. The hinge came down askew to the sound of metal scraping metal. Bastard looked at the justicar through his remaining eye and laughed loud and long.

Kandler turned and ran. While his arms felt like they might fall off, his legs still had some life in them. As he raced across the arena floor, he heard the steady tread of the tireless warforged close behind him. He dared not look back for fear he might stumble, but the footfalls seemed to grow nearer with every second.

Something jabbed into the back of Kandler’s thigh, and he tumbled to the ground, clutching his leg. He somersaulted forward several times before he came to a rest. He slammed to a stop on his back and saw that he had the hilt from Sallah’s sword in his leg.

Kandler hurled himself to the side, and Bastard’s spiked foot came down where he had just been. The warforged leader stomped down again, and once more Kandler rolled out of the way just in time.

Bastard kicked out at the justicar again. Kandler squirmed out of the path of the warforged’s foot, grabbed the hilt of Sallah’s sword as he came to a stop, and pulled it free. He screamed at the pain and rolled again, just in time. Bastard raised his foot again, Kandler rolled, the foot came down, and Kandler jammed the shard of Sallah’s sword straight down through the warforged’s foot and into the floor below.

Bastard roared in pain and lashed out with its other foot. His spiked toes caught Kandler in the shoulder and stabbed through to his bone. The justicar spun away, holding his wound and trailing blood as he went. He struggled to his knees and scrambled away as fast as he could.

“You think this toothpick will stop me?” Bastard roared. The justicar hoped so, but he didn’t say a word. He kept moving at a shuffle and didn’t look back. He could feel his boot filling with blood.

The warforged tried to raise his foot but failed. He snarled down at the hilt stuck through his armored toes. “This ends now!”

The area around Kandler grew dark. For a moment, he wondered if the vision in his unbruised eye was starting to fade too, then the world started to grow light again-lighter than even before, but red and angry. A crackling sound filled the justicar’s ears, erupting to a roar. It confused him for a moment until he identified it as the noise of a bonfire roaring straight at him.

Kandler braved a look back and saw Bastard pull the hilt of Sallah’s sword from his damaged foot. What was plummeting down on top of the creature caused the justicar to leap to his feet and put every last bit of energy he had into racing away.

The airship slammed down on top of Bastard and smashed the warforged leader flat. The ship bounced, and the ring of fire caught Bastard like a moth in a flame.

Kandler missed sharing Bastard’s fate by a matter of yards. As the ship hit the ground, the arena floor buckled and hurled him forward. He landed on his injured shoulder and had to fight to keep from blacking out at the pain. He rolled several times and ended up on his stomach.

Before he could turn his head, the airship took off again. This time, she shot forward, heading for the far arena wall through which the titan had plowed. The ring of fire brushed past Kandler so close that it singed the hair on the back of his head. Once it passed, Kandler worked his way to his knees and from there to his feet. As he stood, he watched the ship sail just clear the shattered wall. She came close enough to set some of the wreckage ablaze, but the gust of wind in her wake snuffed the flames out.

The ship passed over the wall, and no sooner had it passed than a horse leaped over the lowest part. The rider galloped up to the justicar, leading three more horses behind him.

“How are things, boss?” Burch said as he rode up to where the justicar stood.

Ignoring him, Kandler stared after the airship. “Come on. Turn it around. Turn the ship around.”

The ship kept sailing on in a straight line for the horizon.

Covered with blood from his shoulder, leg, and hands, the justicar stood there staring after the ship, willing her to turn around, turn around, please turn around. She didn’t even slow.

Burch leaped down from his saddle to put a shoulder under Kandler’s arm. He took in all of Kandler’s wounds and said, “I’d hate to see the other guy.”

Kandler jerked his head over to the pile of charred fibers and blackened metal that was all that was left of Bastard. He never took his eyes off the airship.

Burch let out a low whistle. “Who’s on the ship?” the shifter asked.

Kandler’s face contorted into a mask of frustration. “Esprл,” he whispered.