Ishkah shrieked, and spat a mouthful of venom. The bilious green fluid spattered over Furian’s breastplate, up his unprotected throat, the man screaming as it began to burn. He fell backward, clawing at his neck, rolling in the sand as the crowd bellowed. Ishkah scrambled to her feet with a gargling growl, snatching up her blades and raising them above her head to end him.
Mia’s sword flashed, striking Ishkah’s blow aside. Ishkah struck back, cracking Mia’s sword at the hilt and lashing out at her head. The girl pulled back, crying out as the blow sliced down through her brow, opened up her cheek, blood in her eyes. Staggering backward, she fell to one knee, and Ishkah kicked her savagely in the chest again, the fire in Mia’s broken ribs burning white. Winded, she tumbled backward along the dirt, barely stopping herself from plummeting off the platform’s edge.
With a shapeless cry, Bladesinger whipped her neck, her long saltlocks scything through the air. The razored blades she’d woven at the ends of her braids tore into Ishkah’s face, her forearms. Bladesinger charged, a sword in each hand, clashing toe to toe with the towering silkling over Furian’s prone body. Her blades cut the air, whistling, whirling, singing, shattering one of Ishkah’s weapons and plunging deep into the silkling’s side. Bladesinger twisted her wrist, shattering the obsidian sword inside the wound, green blood spraying. Ishkah screeched, stabbing back, opening up Bladesinger’s forearm to the bone as she tried to ward off the blow. An empty fist pummeled the woman’s face, a blade scythed at her throat, and as Bladesinger ducked, the silkling brought her knee up into her foe’s face.
Bone crunched, Bladesinger’s spine arching as she flew back, helm flying from her head, nose pulped. Holding her sundered guts in with one hand, Ishkah followed through, driving a brutal kick into the woman’s solar plexus and sending her rolling back across the platform. Mia rose to her feet, blood drooling from her split cheek, gasping as she realized Bladesinger was about to tumble over the edge.
“… MIA, NO…!”
It was foolish. Idiotic, really. Victory was her goal here, not heroics, and Bladesinger was not her friend. But with a desperate cry, Mia hurled herself across the platform, plunged her remaining sword deep into the sand and seized hold of Bladesinger’s wrist. Bladesinger cried out as she went over the edge, dragging Mia with her. The girl screamed as she arrested their fall, holding tight to Bladesinger with one hand, the sword hilt with the other, the fire of her broken ribs blooming inside her chest. The crowd roared in amazement, Mia’s bleeding face twisted in agony. Her ribs were pressed against the side of the platform, the colossal gears churning ten feet below as it continued its revolution around the arena’s heart. Her grip was slippery with blood, her body drenched in sweat.
“Hold on!” she cried.
Bladesinger gasped in agony, her face a bloody pulp. She glanced down to the shifting mekwerk below, up to Mia, shaking her head.
“Let me go!”
“Are you mad? Climb!”
“I’m too heavy, you skinny little shit! Let me go!”
“Stand together or fall alone!”
Ishkah was on her knees, two hands pressed to the terrible wound Bladesinger had carved in her side, green ichor dribbling from her shattered eye, her slashed face. Features twisted, she scrabbled in the dust, took hold of a fallen sword. And with the strength of a mountain, crowd murmuring in awe, she rose.
“Kill!” the crowd roared. “Kill!”
“O, shit…,” Mia breathed. “Bladesinger, climb!”
Ishkah began stalking toward her, sunslight gleaming on her sword. Mia winced, trying to keep her grip as Bladesinger pulled herself up. Her ribs were screaming, face throbbing, teeth gritted at the pain. Her hands were full, she couldn’t clutch the shadows, couldn’t reach out to the dark as she’d done so many times before …
“… mia, look…!”
Beyond the silkling, stalking closer, Furian was stirring. Sloughing off his helmet, the flesh of his chin and jaw and throat a bubbling, weeping ruin, breath rattling in his chest. The crowd’s cries became a chant, a rhythm, pulsing with every beat of her heart.
“Kill! Kill! Kill!”
“Furian!” Mia screamed.
The Unfallen looked up, saw Bladesinger trying to drag herself up Mia’s shoulder, the girl’s face smeared in blood, the silkling a few steps away from ending them both.
“Furian!” Mia roared. “The dark!”
Ishkah snarled, needle teeth bared as she stepped closer.
“Kill! Kill! Kill!”
“Do it!” Mia screamed.
Bladesinger dragged herself up over the edge, reached out to Mia. Ishkah raised her blade, only two steps away. And fingers curled, teeth bared, the Unfallen reached out to the shadow beneath her, and tangled up the silkling’s feet.
Ishkah stumbled, hissing in confusion. The crowd ceased their chanting, held their breath. Mia dragged herself up over the platform’s edge, face twisted in agony. Furian gasped, collapsing onto his belly as he lost his grip on the darkness, Ishkah stepping up and slashing Bladesinger across her back, splitting the leather, blood spraying. Bladesinger collapsed with a cry, and with a desperate gasp, Mia dragged her obsidian sword from the earth, twisted away from Ishkah’s sword, and hacked the silkling’s arm off at the elbow.
Ishkah screamed, green blood fountaining. The crowd were alight, howling their fury. Mia twisted, dropping low and hewing at the silkling’s leg, bringing her to her knees. The arena erupted, the noise deafening, seventy thousand voices rising in crescendo, “Kill! Kill! Kill!,” the suns burning overhead, blood thrumming in her veins, heart thundering in her chest as Mia screamed and swung her sword double-handed, all her strength, all her fury, all her pain, taking Ishkah’s head clean off her shoulders.
Blood sprayed, spattering Mia with warm, sticky green. Ishkah’s body trembled, six arms twitching as she toppled off the platform’s edge and down into the grinding gears below. Mia winced at the bubbling crunch, averted her eyes, bloody obsidian still clutched in her hand.
But still …
… I did it.
Trumpets blared, silver and bright, the platforms ground to a shuddering halt. The editorii’s voice rose over the blood-mad roar of the crowd, bouncing off the arena walls.
“Citizens of Itreya! Your victors! The Falcons of Remus!”
The crowd went wild, the applause deafening. Bladesinger staggered to her feet, face alight with pain and triumph, blood streaming from her wounds. But still, she grinned, throwing her good arm around Mia’s shoulder and kissing her bloody cheek.
We did it …
Turning, Bladesinger grasped Mia’s hand in her own, raised it high into the sky, bellowing at the crowd.
“What is her name?”
“Crow!” they roared.
“What is her name?”
Feet stamping, hands clapping, the word reverberating across the sands.
“Crow! Crow! Crow! Crow!”