Page 24

It would drive me insane before I found the damnable wizard causing havoc on my land.

Now that she was willingly mine, I felt confident in my ability to get the truth from her.

Hopefully that was before I had to go to war with a dark magic user.

War never brought glory, only horror and misery.

Besides, I always hated fighting when I was distracted.

My ear twitched before I saw it. A whoosh of air splitting under the weight of a finely sharpened blade.

Hot flecks of blood splashed across my face, and steaming chunks of viscera splattered my leather armor before rolling down my chest with a sticky squelch.

The aether mare to my right reared back, kicking and screaming.

I held my breath, watching the lower half of a demon, still spurting blood with hewn meat hanging in tatters and shattered bones jutting at wrong angles, gradually slip off the saddle and land with a sickening thud on the blood-stained soil.

Time caught up to that hideous, slow moment.

“Come out, come out, little beasties!” A grating voice boomed around us, bolstered by magical enhancements to strike fear into opponents.

Everything snapped together with a crash of armor and crunch of bone.

I jerked into action, twisting my mare toward the threat.

The troops bolted forward, meeting a moving blur.

Wizard or not, mortal men were beings of flesh and bone, not this red-hazed terror adorned in a garnet helm sporting a mockery of horns.

But he was still a man.

“Don’t falter!” I hollered. Only one scout remained, my back-up obliterated in gruesome sprays of warm ichor and lumps of meat. I growled against the hammering of my heart and propelled myself forward.

A red light blazed across the valley, carrying the heat of a thousand fires.

The blast knocked me from my mare and sent me crashing and rolling over the uneven land.

By the time I slowed, digging my claws into soft earth and stopping on all fours, my final scout lay in a lump of desiccated parts burning to ash.

His fur burned away to reveal dark skin and droplets of blood leaking from his eyes.

A wet gurgling sound bubbled from his throat before his remaining eye rolled back in his head and went dark.

“And what do we have here?” The fire hissed out, and the wizard emerged from the rising smoke. The scent of burnt flesh and acrid fumes permeated the valley, along with the tang of crackling magic. He stopped, resting his sword on his shoulder and peering down at me with black eyes.

My claws carved through the dirt in preparation to butcher flesh as I tensed every muscle in my body. Lips curled in a threat and tail flicking with rage, I snarled, “Your death.”

He threw his head back and laughed.

I lunged.

Steel carved through the air. My claws blocked, bringing me face to face with the man.

Human on the outside at first glance, but the rotten aroma of dark magic rippled off him like the sun baking a corpse in summer.

Long strands of red hair escaped his helm, as red and as bloody as his gleaming crimson armor. He grunted, arms and weapon shaking.

I snarled and summoned the strength to shove him back. He stumbled several steps away, boots squishing in smoldering demon flesh. I remained posed for his onslaught, sensing his retaliation.

“Who are you?” I demanded, slashing at the space between us.

He swiveled with a manic grin on his thin mouth. “Gustave Roan, the last mage of Earth. Perhaps you’ve heard of me?”

The human mage thrust his sword, and I leapt out of the way. He followed up with a blast of sparking red magic and I barely evaded the scalding power before it crashed into a tree. He followed me with several messy strikes, malignant glee bright in his ink-black eyes.

Rushing forward, I assaulted him with claws and fists. I landed several quick, precise attacks as I hammered his helm with a flurry of blows. He deflected with a wall of red magic that sent me out of reach.

“The Crimson Mage? The hunter?” He used my silence as his answer, rattling off more of his titles as if I might suddenly realize his worth and fall to my knees. As if I gave a fuck.

“I know exactly what you are,” I countered.

His brows arched, followed by a cocky smirk. I wanted to claw the expression off his arrogant face.

“Ah, good, I was beginning to lose hope for this realm—”

“Meat,” I said through snapping jaws.

The human mage faltered, lips falling in a mockery of disappointment.

“And I’m always so, so hungry.” My claws rained on his helm. The wizard crossed his arms, but I slashed downward and hacked through his metal armor like hot iron through butter.

This was the wizard, the human, that had been slipping into Infernus and destroying my lands, mutilating my people. He decimated every village he swept across and left destruction in his wake. I wanted to rip him apart and break him, slowly, painfully .

Violence wasn’t new to me. It was ingrained into my baser instincts.

Necessary in a world of violence and constant struggles for power.

My father taught me violence and aggression, and I bore witness to hellish savagery a thousand times over.

It was vile, that need for blood to gush on my tongue and meat to render under my fangs, but I would carry that burdensome hunger with me for an eternity.

It was an unholy inheritance from my demonic ancestors.

My father’s monstrous hunger ground down the softness of my mother’s humanity long ago.

Fire summoned from beyond erupted from the ground and blasted me.

I covered my face to avoid the heat and nearly missed his sword arcing for my neck.

Molten rage poured into my stomach and cascaded into my limbs.

I used that anger and hatred to fuel my strength and harden myself into the trained weapon my father beat into me ages ago.

I roared, and the sound echoed over the valley with the force of avenging thunder.

“You’re not like the others,” he remarked between a volley of blows and counters. A demented laugh frothed at his mouth. The wizard lunged with magic and deflected with steel. We balanced in a dance of precision and barbarity, neither quite gaining ground over the other.

“Don’t tell me you’re impressed,” I teased. My tail whipped out and snapped at his wrist. His sword spun away, landing blade down in blood-soaked dirt .

Chest heaving, he stopped. The madness in his eyes when he straightened up to appraise me made my spine crawl.

Magic zapped through his fingers, red-hot and virulent.

He gazed at me not like I was an unfamiliar beast in a new world trying to kill him, but like a…

specimen begging to be placed on display.

“I admit I very nearly am.” The magic at his fingers hummed. The sword wobbled where it protruded from the ground. The blade sang as it jerked from the dirt and spiraled into his awaiting palm. “Almost impressive enough to add you to my legacy.”

He barked out a chilling half-laugh before charging.

“Legacy?” The word leapt from my tongue without permission.

Bloodthirst and hunger aroused a frenzy difficult to control.

My precise attacks gave way to chaotic strikes, and my mouth watered to clamp down onto the wizard’s throat and feel the bones snapping in his neck.

I wanted to relish the spurt of his blood in the back of my throat and his dying twitch between my jaws.

An inferno rose to a dangerous pitch within me as I launched myself at him again and again.

“Oh, yes.” He cackled, dancing out of reach of my claws before hammering me with a storm of bleeding red power. “Why else would I come to this backwoods plane? There’s nothing here but the one prize I seek. I lost her once, but I’m close. I’m so close. I’ll have her soon.”

My stomach sank and clenched. I threw him off me. We circled one another, stepping over the remains of my comrades. My fingers twitched, claws sharp and ready to rip him apart. Sweat dripped down his temple, making his hair look like rivulets of blood streaming down his face.

“If you find this prize, you’ll leave?” I asked.

The mage straightened up, eyes flaring as if seeing me for the first time. Perhaps he saw a leader willing to do almost anything to relieve his people from the scourge on their homes and lives. A bargain instead of a battle to the death.

“It’s hard to say.” He circled me, drawing out his words as if considering my offer. But I think I’d known from the start he was a conqueror. He wouldn’t leave Infernus alone once he found the prize he was here hunting. It was an untapped world of potential, a treasure to a wizard of his caliber.

“What do you seek?” Whatever it was, I had to keep it away from him.

His gauntlets creaked when he adjusted the grip on his sword.

His black eyes flashed from black to red, a flare of light and my only warning.

“I seek the wind elemental, beast. The last of her kind, and I’ll stop at nothing until her death is rightfully added to the legacy of my haul. Her extermination will be sweet.”

With enough time, I might have put the pieces together. I didn’t have the chance when his magic sent his sword through my flesh and muscle and the ground rushed up to greet me.