A Shadow's Tale (18 page)

It seemed as if nothing was happening, and would look that way to Ahrach, but for those with a magical inclination, the static electricity feel of magic was heavy in the air. Amarath shifted a little, as if destabilised. The leaves on the trees rustled. The wind picked up its pace, but it seemed to be focusing on creating a tornado effect around Amarath. She tensed, trying to keep her feet. Without warning, she jumped into the branches of a tree to escape the winds. Another handful of heartbeats passed before Meran roared in anger. Another blast of wind knocked the demoness from the tree, but she scrambled to her feet, jamming her sword into the ground. Her hair whipped around her head in the hurricane force winds, her cloak billowing and twisting itself tightly around her. She reached up a hand to unclasp it, letting it fly away. Her eyes narrowed, doubling in number and turning red. Amarath was unleashing her demonic side. I bit my lip, hoping for her sake that she would go too far into possession that she couldn't come back. The wind stopped. Meran, taking one of his two swords blades, drove it into the ground with such force that, aided by his own magic, it created a split in the ground aimed at Amarath. She jumped out of the way, rolling as she landed. Springing back to her feet, she summoned her magic, firing bolts at the Synari. Meran deflected them with his blades, charging towards the demoness. My heart was in my mouth as they began to clash swords, Meran attacking and Amarath remaining on the defensive. Amarath parried most of the blows with her sword, taking the others on her armour protected arms. Slowly, she began to take the offensive, attempting to strike Meran where she deemed his weak spots to be. She managed to spear him through the arm. My heart clenched. He ripped the sword from her hand. She jumped out of the way. His blade caught her leg, leaving a deep gash down the thigh. Growling, she ran towards me. I froze, not knowing what to do. She yanked my sword from its sheath before running back into the fray. She attempted to cleave the Synari's head in two with my sword and
her own spare short blade, but he blocked the attack. I glanced at the people gathered round, chewing my lip. Everyone was fixated on the two combatants, following the movements. I sensed something coming from Ahrach an emotion, but I couldn't concentrate enough to interpret it.

The fight turned into a dance of death, all flashing metal and clashing swords. She kept one sword on near constant defence, horizontal across her stomach. One of Meran's blades managed to ram through Amarath's hand, forcing her to drop one sword. Magic exploded from her in her fury and pain, directed at him. The Synari managed to deflect it with his magic moments before it hit him. He lunged at Amarath with his blades, but met the demoness's shields. Dropping the barrier, Amarath made her own lunge, her one good hand still gripping a sword. She started to attack without any discernible patterns or tactics. I frowned, trying to understand what was going on. Amarath had always taught me never to do that, to always think about what I was doing. What was she trying to do? Meran blocked her attacks with apparent ease. Amarath yelled out in pain as one of his swords cut into her side. She managed to slash at his legs, drawing blood from the deep injury, but it wasn't nearly enough to incapacitate him. Sweat was starting to drip down Amarath's forehead while her opponent looked as if he could keep up the pace for days. Her injured leg was starting to tremble as exhaustion took its hold. I clenched my fists, willing Meran not to hurt her too badly. Then Amarath just stopped fighting. He slashed at her with his two blades. Amarath had a small smile on her face, seemingly relieved. Her leg gave way beneath her, and she fell onto her side, blood welling up in the two wounds to her chest and stomach. Although her eyes were half closed, as if in death, she continued to breath.

‘Amarath!' Ahrach yelled. He dashed to her side, putting a hand on her neck to check her pulse before moving on to check her wounds. Vrael's hand gripping my shoulder prevented me
from going to her aid as he stared at Arias, waiting for her verdict. I clenched my fists, desperate to go to my sister's aid rather than leave her in the hands of a stranger. I had to content myself with listening in on Ahrach's emotions so as to warn Vrael if Ahrach was going to hurt my sister. All I felt from him was a soft tenderness. A hint of love. Maybe she was in good hands with him. Closing my eyes briefly, I prayed that, if he did make a move on her, he wouldn't break her heart. If he did, I might have to hunt him down and kill him.

Eyes turned to Arias. The High Priestess raised one eyebrow in distain and turned her back, gesturing to her group of soldiers and Meran to follow her. Glancing back once over her shoulder, she cast an eye over the defeated demoness.

‘If your best fighter cannot win against a simple Senator, then you are of no use to me.” She paused for a moment before adding, “Leave Amarath. She's no use if she can't win a simple fight.' Amarath turned painfully to look at Arias, her hand stretched out to the soldiers following the High Priestess.

‘Marcus…' she said hoarsely. ‘Don't leave me here, Marcus…' The captain of the group glanced at Amarath, his expression dispassionate. He vanished without saying a word. Amarath uttered a quiet, strangled cry, her hand falling back to the ground. Vrael let me go. I knelt next to Amarath, murmuring words to try to comfort her as tears started to drip down her cheeks to darken the earth below. I ran my hands gently over the wounds, trying to focus my mind enough to heal her, but my thoughts were too scattered. Vrael gently touched my shoulder.

‘Go back to the house. Tell them what has happened and assure them that everything is now under control and Amarath has returned to us. I will look after her. Worry not.'

I nodded, seeing sense in Vrael's words. If the others knew what had happened, they would be ready with back up if needed when Vrael brought Amarath home. I was of no use to anyone there. Saying my farewells, I concentrated on teleporting.

Something went wrong with the teleportation. I could feel it as soon as I had started it. Teleportation normally feels like jumping into cold water, just a little less wet. This felt like swimming through treacle, but it was too late. If I tried to reverse the magic now, I would end up falling into the void. I couldn't breathe. The magic was starting to drain me.

The teleportation ended suddenly, like a piece of elastic snapping. I gasped, drawing in the air I had been denied. My muscles ached. My head throbbed. And that wasn't the only thing wrong. Concrete walls. Concrete floor. This was definitely not the house the clan had built in the woods. The smell was familiar, but I couldn't place it. I couldn't remember where I had smelt it before. Slowly, I pushed myself to my feet, highly aware of the residual pain, putting most of my weight on the leg that didn't hurt so much.

‘Hey! We got one!' yelled a male voice seconds before I found myself rugby tackled to the ground. The assailant twisted my arm up behind my back, sending pain shooting through my damaged heart and shoulder. He clamped handcuffs around my wrists before dragging me upright by my hair. I tried to summon my magic to fight him off. Icy fear gripped my heart. I couldn't feel my magic. They must have put silver in the handcuffs! Two men in lab coats surveyed me as if I was nothing more than a lab rat while the man who had tackled me pinned me against the wall, confiscating my swords.

‘Mark it up and bring it through.' The man nodded and dragged me into a small room just off the concrete chamber. Heat suffused my body from the fire in the centre. I fought with all my strength, kicking and biting. He called for back-up. I found myself slammed to the floor, one of the men sitting on the small of my back, keeping my arms pinned to the ground. Another held my legs down. Someone ripped my shirt away from my shoulder. I tried desperately to buck my assailants off, but to no avail. Out of the corner of my eye, I watched the third man put a metal rod
into the fire. A few minutes later, he pulled it out. Taking care not to touch the white-hot end, he approached me. I couldn't struggle. I had no energy to struggle as he carefully positioned the rod. With one quick gesture, he pressed the sizzling metal onto my right shoulder blade. I yelled out as it seared my skin. I could feel the flesh blistering under the metal. He lifted the metal away, dumping a cup of icy water over the branding. For the rest of my rather short life, I would bear the numbers 004-666 on my shoulder blade.

‘Okay, take it to the doctors.'

I fought against the restraints in some sort of lab. I was strapped down on an examination table, spread-eagled. I growled at myself, banging my head on the metal slab underneath. They had taken every single piece of weaponry I carried, even the dagger I had up my sleeve. They had left me in my blood-encrusted tank top and trousers, without even my boots. Whoever these people were, they weren't taking any chances. I gritted my teeth. Somewhere to the left, a door opened, admitting the lab coated scientists I had seen before. They stood over me, just watching. I narrowed my eyes.

‘When you pervs are done watching me, could you let me go?' I said. I thought I might as well try. You never know. They didn't answer me to begin with. They just scribbled a few notes on clipboards before talking as if I wasn't even there.

‘It's not an ideal model, I'm afraid, some damage has been done to this specimen. There's a puncture wound to the left hand side of the chest.'

‘It shouldn't impact the studies though. It'll also give us a chance to observe the healing process for more natural wounds.' This put me on edge. More natural wounds? More natural compared to what? I growled again, trying to pull out the straps on my arms. The physical effort sent pain lancing through my chest, but I didn't care. I just wanted out of here. They watched with the same fascination of a five year old watching an anthill.

‘From what we already know, this isn't a particularly weak specimen. That means that the silver does indeed have an effect on this species of demon. We can conclude that not only does it prohibit the use of magic, but also limits physical strength. I believe additional testing is needed to prove this, but I'm guessing that the silver actually brings their strength down to the average of an ordinary human child.'

‘Useful for the ground teams to know.' Oh goddess. Now it all made sense. Amarath had told me about these people, after I had a run in with them once before, of which I remember nothing. The Milita. Oh goddess, it was the Milita.! I was in even more trouble than I had realised. The more they learned from me, the easier it was for them to take down the rest of the clan. I couldn't let that happen.

I kicked out at the door of the cell, grinding my teeth. I rubbed my arm, where they had tested the effects of water, holy water and silver solution. Needless to say, I had two large burn sores on my arm. I sighed heavily. The cell wasn't big, two metres by two metres with a glass front. A concrete ledge that served as a bed took up half of the space. I sat down, putting my head in my hands. Just how had I landed myself here? By not concentrating enough to see the trap, of course, a stupid, stupid mistake. Now what was I going to do when Karthragan turned up? There was no way I could fight him on this ground. I lay back with a grimace. The Milita had only just begun with me. X-rays, scans, lots of poking and prodding had already gone on to give them an idea of how a part demon worked. I scratched at my wrists, where metal cuffs inlaid with silver had been fitted. No magic for me. I had less than a month before Karthragan would find me. I already knew that he was tracking me, keeping an eye on my every move so that when the time came, he knew exactly where I was. Not that he'd help me get out of here. The weaker I was, the easier it was for him to defeat me.
Stupid prophecy
, I thought as I curled up in a corner.
Stupid, stupid prophecy
.

* * *

I screamed as electricity spiked through my body. The scientists scribbled a few more notes down on their clipboards. Three days to go before the prophecy, and I was still in the Milita's lab, and nowhere close to being able to escape it. Don't get me wrong, I had tried. I had tried everything I could think of, and nothing had worked. If anything, it had only made things worse. I now had two guards armed with silver bullets posted outside my cell at all times. I spent most of the time outside of the lab drugged up to my eyeballs in sedatives. Inside the lab, they ran experiments on me, determining my weaknesses. My arms were already covered in sores from silver and holy water. They had even tried putting ice against my skin, which had burned without leaving a mark. Fire had invigorated me, to the point where I had almost managed to break free, but I hadn't been able to get further than the door out of the lab. Now they were trying electricity, having hooked me up to all sorts of vital sign monitors. As glad as I was to see that my primary heart was starting to function again, this was not the way I would have wanted to find out. I arched my back, trying to muffle my scream as another, stronger bolt of electricity spiked.

‘That charge would have been lethal to humans.'

‘I think we can count that although electricity can serve to slow a demon down, in the long run all you will do is anger it.'

‘So the ground teams shouldn't rely on their tasers.'

‘No, not if they want to make it out alive. We already know that it is nigh on impossible to contain an angered demon.' A needle slid into the skin of the crook of my elbow, releasing a sedative serum into my bloodstream. Waves of tiredness and nausea slid over my mind. Two guards unhooked me from the machines and dragged me back to my cell.

I lay on my side on the concrete bed, closing my eyes. Tears
threatened to spill over. I reached a hand over my shoulder to touch the branding, still heavily scabbed over. I had seen the reflection in the glass front of the cell. The fourth demon they had managed to capture, six black numbers against pale skin. My hand flopped back down onto the concrete, my muscles too tired and heavy to use.