Thief (28 page)

Karate kicks and chops disabled the first few far more effectively than he would have thought possible, and he felt their bones snap like twigs under his terrified strength. Years of martial arts training guided his hands and feet to do the most terrible damage they could and for once his conscience did not hold him back. He hated and feared these creatures as nothing else, and would have killed them all if he could.

A weight by his chest called out to him and his left hand grabbed the gun by reflex. Somehow in his rage and terror he’d forgotten it, but no longer. He fired the holy water bullets at the closest of them and more began screaming as though they were on fire. Perhaps they were.

Firing and kicking his way through them like a master warrior, he made his way through them like a force of nature gone berserk. It was close enough to the truth. Before him, before the light and the holy water they reluctantly gave way, and he made his way to freedom. But it was a two way street. For every one that he crippled, another took a chunk out of him. In short order he was bleeding from a dozen gashes, every inch of his body was puffed and swollen, and worst of all he was running out of both bullets and light. But he was getting closer.

Desperation took hold of him when he suddenly spotted the trees ahead and less than a dozen demons between him and them. Legs that had been flagging, suddenly gave one hundred and ten percent for that final burst, while his hand eye coordination went through the roof. He shot everything that lay between him and the trees in what had to be world record speed shooting time, every one a bull’s eye, and made a run for it.

Legs moving like propellers, for the longest second he thought he was going to make it. Then a hand reached for him, its talon like fingers tearing into the soft flesh of his cheek, and all his plans came to naught.

Instantly he was blind, his face was on fire, and his world was destroyed. Screams assailed him, and he knew they were his own. He didn’t try to stop them. Mikel hit out at where the hand had been and kept running, vision unimportant compared with direction and speed. The only sound he heard above that of his own laboured breathing and his screaming was that of the demons behind him.

They were close. So close that he could almost feel their foul breath on his neck, yet they didn’t touch him. How close were they? He didn’t know. All that mattered was that they were behind him, and that he kept running away from the sound.

He ran as if all the demons of hell were on his tail. They were.

Fire. His world was on fire. His hands, his feet, his body, all were one raging inferno, but the hottest of all was his face, a nuclear nightmare. He clutched at it as he ran, blindly placing one foot in front of the other since he couldn’t bear to open his eyelids. His steps were almost random and he had visions of himself running in circles, back to that dark nightmare. Yet he couldn’t open his eyes, and he couldn’t stop running.

A sudden crunch brought him to a screaming stop, and he slowly realized he’d hit something as he picked himself up off the ground. And yet he hadn’t felt it, only heard the impact and touched the ground. His tortured nerves could no more feel the impact over the fire that consumed him than could his ears hear a pin drop at a rock concert. They had no capacity left to feel such trivial things.

What had he hit? Sudden fear took hold of him as he realized he might already have returned to the lair and hit its walls, or worse still, one of them. A terrible dread took hold of him as he thought of having run into one of them. Of having run blindly straight back to his enemy. Of being caught again by what he feared most. Caught, trapped like a bug in amber, and finally devoured until not a single shred of him remained. And all the while their laughter would surround him.

Filled with panic he scrambled to his feet and ran on even faster, eyes still shut tight. Another impact and then another until his head swam, but still he didn’t stop. He couldn’t stop until there was nothing left in him to run on.

“I am a thief.” The mantra did him no good at all as he couldn’t concentrate on it, and yet still he knew it was the only thing that could help. He kept muttering the words over and over, as if hoping their magic would break him free of this inferno of pain.

Then there were voices. He heard voices, and suddenly his fear leapt to new heights. The demons. The demons had found him. He picked himself up from where he’d fallen after this latest impact and ran on blindly, frantically.

The voices followed him, sending more power to his legs, greater impact to his ever more frequent crashes.

The voices grew closer, and the last remaining shreds of his sanity began screaming at him. They told him he had no chance if he couldn’t see. The demons would catch him as easily as they would a mouse.

Knowing it was the only thing he could do to save himself he opened his eyelids with his fingers, and then tried to keep his howling down to tolerable levels. But at least he could see, sort of.

His vision was blurred at best, tears obscuring every detail, but he had enough vision and the presence of mind to see the trees. He was in the woods. He was outside. He was free. An hysterical laugh started in the back of his throat but got no further through his damaged face.

The voices echoed to him again and he ran on, finally realizing that even if he was outside that hell hole, it still wasn’t finished with him.

He ran on, long past the point of exhaustion, but too scared to stop, and all the while the voices followed him, toying with him. They were running him down like wolves did a deer. Chasing him until he dropped from exhaustion and then planning on devouring him live. Still there was no option. He ran.

A small river beckoned and without thinking he collapsed into it, hoping that the water would cool the burning. But it did no such thing. He could feel the burning still, even through the coldness of the water, and that seemed wrong, even to his tired brain. Surely it should help.

But least ways, as he lay in that river and floated he could recover some breath and maybe float past his torturers. Besides if they were hunting like wolves, with their noses, the water should mask his scent. He tried not to laugh out loud at the stupidity of the thought.

Suddenly the voices were louder, much louder, and he could see indistinct shapes among the trees as he floated past. They knew he was in the river. He panicked and started trying to swim for the other side, but his arms, his entire body was too tired to make more than a feeble splash. But worse, even that feeble noise was enough to let them spot him.

He heard splashing, several splashes, and knew the demons were coming for him even in the river. Was there no way to stop them?

“Sherial.” He called her name out loud knowing she was his only chance now, and that she couldn’t come this close to the nightmare of the demons’ lair. But there was no other hope in the world.

Almost instantly he felt her response, a wonderful warmth that ran through him, a wordless statement of love and passion, and for a single instant he knew peace again. But then everything was blown away as another nuclear explosion of pain tore him apart. The touch of the demons waging unrelenting war upon the angels.

He would have screamed but his vocal cords were simply too inadequate to express his pain. Instead he fainted.

**********

“By Myrran’s light, look at him!”

Voices again called him to life, and this time they were close, standing right beside him. Closer. One was touching him, holding something to his face. And yet, they weren’t demon’s voices. Even as he heard them he knew that much and knew relief. Infinite relief. They were human, and the one who had spoken was a woman.

“He looks like he’s been fighting Lea’s entire pack with his bare hands.” Light shone in his eyes even through his closed eyelids, and despite the pain he welcomed it too him. Any light was better than darkness.

“Look at the marks. The brand covers half his face.” There was a sense of horror in her words and yet he didn’t understand it. He understood very little at that stage. He heard the words but their meaning didn’t really register. The pain had subsided to mere agony, but exhaustion and confusion ruled in its place.

“But look at his back.” Another voice, this one male perhaps that of a mere teenager, speaking in as much awe as the previous one had horror. “The angel’s mark runs all the way from his shoulder to his tail. A perfect V.”

Mikel did nothing, since he could no longer do anything anyway.

“He’ll need stitches, and soon. Lots of stitches. He’s in shock, exhausted and hypothermic. He’s lost so much blood he may die anyway.” A man’s voice, possibly the one holding the cloth to his face. Calmer and more in control of the situation. This one wasn’t swayed by what the others saw. Was he more controlled, or simply colder?

“No. Iss strong. Not die easily. Not die at all.” Another man, but this time one with a voice so impossibly deep and an accent so strong he could just as easily have been a Kodiac bear. But above all there was a feeling of hope in his nasal tones.

“Hass fought well, fight tough. Iss why he so hurt. Never gave up. Fight even to death.”

“He’s also awake.” A soft man’s voice, but for all that, one that spoke with a certain surety; he knew something. “Listening to our every word. He’s in pain, he’s cold, tired and confused but still listening to every single word we say. As Abrax says, he’s tough.” Another man, this one also cool and controlled, yet not uncaring.

“Yet with all his strength, with an angel’s mark the size of an ox, he still got branded, and worse than the rest of us put together. He can’t be that great.” It was the woman again, her sarcasm and bitterness clear, but really only serving to cover her own deeper pain. The silence that followed her words was one of disappointment as they accepted her truth. One of more pain as Mikel realised they knew his failure. As he too remembered it.

“Lets get him back to the village.” Her sense of horror had clearly passed, to be replaced by resignation. This woman Mikel realized, had seen too much, been through too much. Nothing could rattle her for long.

He felt a sudden rolling sensation and then arms were under his back and legs. Two arms. In one fluid movement he was lifted as easily as a man lifts a child, and carried like a bag of groceries. That much at least penetrated his mental fog. What sort of man could lift a two hundred pound man and carry him effortlessly?

Against his better judgement he tried opening his eyes again, and wished he hadn’t. More agony, more fire, more pain filled him. And then there was the sight that greeted him. A face, really a grizzled mat of black hair and ragged flesh on top of shoulders larger and more muscled than any action hero he’d ever heard of. A man chiselled out of a mountain and covered with black hair. He smiled at Mikel, leaving him with an impression of yellow teeth, fangs and bad breath.

Around him the others walked, a man who looked more vampire than flesh and blood, tall thin and bloodlessly pale. Another a boy scarcely out of his teens, scared and hurting. A tiny woman, thin and spry with a nervous energy and a rage that barely stayed under control. She was carrying a walking stick larger than her, a twisted mass of vine and wood with spirals enough to make his head spin. Another man, average in height with a ponytail and silver circlet around his forehead. He had an expression of total defeat on his face.

The last, another shape he couldn’t see clearly but walking on all fours. A dog, he wondered, but only briefly. Not when it came closer and he saw it, as it saw him. No dog by any stretch of the imagination. Not even a wolf, unless it be Fenris himself. For it was the size of a pony, covered in fur tangled and matted like a jungle, and it had a look about it that suggested it thought everyone there was little more than a tasty appetizer.

Mikel let the darkness take him again.