Page 66 of Red Demon (Oria #1)

Strike Cold

M y world shrank to the flickering tablet screen when I could bring myself to look again, to keep swiping and looking for something that wouldn’t wreck me.

Images blurred by: an empty cell, death, a grimy kitchen, more dead.

A hallway patrolled by armed guards in Mahakal’s black and red, sprinting down the corridor.

The prison’s exterior, snow distorting the feed. Asri cloaks, blue-lit hands. At first I was too afraid to hope. But there they were. Telesilla had found us.

The rebels moved in a unified line, their engraved staffs glowing, the snow pulsing with the light of Oria under their feet. Magic, unblocked and unrepentant. The screen lit up with the flash of an aerial assault, the ground of my cell shaking. Mahakal must have launched artillery at them.

I braced myself before I looked at the video again. The rebels stood tall, standing in a ring of undisturbed ground when the dust on the screen settled.

Mahakal’s soldiers came at a run, no doubt with fresh magic blockers among their gear.

Yet I watched as the empire soldiers stumbled, clutching their heads as their faces contorted in pain.

An unseen force, no more than a ripple of light, as the first wave of soldiers fell. The rebels pressed their attack.

Hope unfurled in my chest. Asher had done it.

He’d reversed that magic blocker to break the other machines, allowing our allies to squeeze Mahakal with their full power.

My eyes scanned the battlefield, flicking the exterior cameras, searching for Asher, the familiar glow of Istaran.

He had to be here. He must have used Istaran to track Far.

There! Istaran flashed and cleaved through a line of twitching soldiers, the blade humming with power. A ragged sound escaped me—Asher, blade flying as he took to the front, his face determined and fearless.

And then, Faruhar.

She assessed from the edge of the fray. Soren gestured to her.

She picked up a weapon from a fallen soldier, Chaeten tech—blade dull like the kind Mahakal had gifted Ash.

Her eyes burned with fury, alert and devoid of recognition as she struck down a robed Asri rebel with brute force to the head.

My throat opened, tasting the rank air of the cell.

She picked up his staff next as its glow faded.

I didn’t understand. I couldn’t.

She lunged down the line as the rebels raised their blue hands in her direction, as the ground underneath swelled with light.

Another black-robed rebel fell to the ground, silent on the video feed, but I felt the thud all the same.

She found Soren with a swiped dagger, using her body to sweep him to the ground as she sliced his belly open.

He did not rise.

Faruhar turned, steel eyed, seeking her next victim.

I could see mute screaming on the feed as the rebels charged in unison, meeting her with everything they had.

Each encounter ended the same: a flurry of motion, stained snow.

Another rebel down, and another, holding their line, their hands outstretched in denial of the fact that while Mahakal’s forces fell like harvested straw at their magic, she marched on, unaffected.

Horror stole my breath. Telesilla, her white braid flying, met Faruhar with furious grace, but not enough.

Telesilla died with her mouth so wide on the silent video my mind filled in the sound.

After piercing her chest with the dagger, Faruhar picked up Telesilla’s Oria-threaded blade, dark in her hand, and hacked off Telesilla’s head.

Then Asher.

Asher stood his ground, his sword low as she turned to meet him at a run, sword ready. I clamped my eyes so tight I saw red bursts of blood but I could not unsee Faruhar, my Far, painted with the blood of her allies as she ran for him. Ash. Not Ash.

I opened my eyes too late. Faruhar stood alone on the screen.

Mom taught me there will always be someone else to hold on to when a pillar of our life falls down, and she taught me to be that pillar in turn. The last pillar of my life was dead, and Far…

The world exploded into chaos as the door to my cell clattered open. Mahakal rushed in, snatching the tablet from the table.

With a snarl, he slammed the tablet onto the cold stone floor, crunching it under his boot. The screen flickered with mute colors before shuttering out on the next frenzied stomp. Then Mahakal’s fist slammed into my jaw, pain throbbing through my skull.

“Traitor! Wild dog!” he spat, raining blows down on me. “I protected you! Shielded you! Do you think the queen would have let you live?”

He punched my back, and I retreated into myself as the blows rained down on me.

“I saved this world for survivors like you. Millions died for your betrayal—” I lost the words, the sense if there was any, focusing on the manic glint in his eyes between blows.

I didn’t mind them, after a while. His fists hurt less than Ash and Far, and soon nothing would hurt me anymore.

The beatings stopped. Mahakal stood before me, catching his breath, a vial glinting in his hand.

“This,” he said, ripping off the top with his teeth.

“Is the death you deserve.” He took a sip, laughing.

“You don’t deserve a quick death, you deserve one that is certain, with more pain than my fists can give you. ”

He yanked my head back, the metallic scent of blood filling my nostrils. He tipped the poisoned vial into my mouth, sweet and green and lethal.

This was it. I wondered how long it would take until the end, already starting to detach from the pain of my body. He reached out his hand to force my mouth shut, shattering the empty vial on the cold stone.

I saw my opening. I lunged my neck forward, my teeth snapping shut on his outstretched finger.

A bone-splitting crunch, followed by Mahakal’s roar of pain.

He pried the mangled bit of flesh loose, spurting blood, but not before his blood dripped in my mouth along with any remnants of the poison I couldn’t spit out.

Disgusted, I sucked in what blood I could and spit the bloody finger out, my throat on fire.

Mahakal screamed at me with venomous hatred from the other side of the room, his face contorted in pain and fury.

I gasped for breath, falling to the ground. I saw the triumph in him as my body began shaking. The poison, working too fast. Pain I didn’t know was possible, wracking me to a silent scream.

He spat at me, the wet saliva landing in my hair as he touched his comm with a scowl.

Taking his weapon with him, he opened the door and left me in the dark.

I hovered in and out of a pain so intense it consumed me—sliding into black waters to a place where there was nothing, where my fears melted and my senses loosened their grip to the Nara, falling up, up into the bright acceptance of death.

I’d done my best. I’d failed. There was nothing left.

I don’t know how much time passed until the door burst open again, the sounds muffled, and I focused my dull eyes.

It wasn’t Mahakal. Kane, his face pale and bloody, stumbled into the cell, his hand clutching a nasty gash across his chest. I looked up, too dizzy and weak to rise from my crouch on the ground.

Beside him, Faruhar. She gutted Kane with her borrowed blade, and his bowels fell across the cell as he crumpled. She sliced his head next, smashing through his skull to spill his bleeding brains across the cold floor.

Each breath ached—my chest too hollow for fear, but I couldn’t close my eyes. She turned to me, covered in blood, her eyes wide and alert.

“Far,” I choked out.

She cocked her head, a bird of prey.

My mind raced, searching for the familiar script, the words I used to anchor her, to remind her of who she was. “Faruhar, you’re s—” I started, but I wouldn’t lie. No one was safe: not her, not Telesilla, not Asher. She’d shatter me too. She already had.

I met her blinding gaze. Tears streamed down my face, a silent plea to see any trace left of the woman I said I’d love forever. But I didn’t.

“Kill me,” I whispered, lost.

She blinked, taking a knee beside me, her sword below my chin. “Why am I your death wish?” Her whisper echoed in the small room.

Tears streamed down as I struggled for breath, tasting my blood, or Mahakal’s. I wasn’t sure.

She knelt beside me, her eyes scanning with sharp movements. “Who are you to me?” she rasped.

A new sob escaped my lips. “It’s me, J–” I slumped under the weight of my wounds, the poison, my despair, but I formed the words clearly, certain. “Kill me.”

She shivered, dropping the weapon. A single tear bled down her stained cheek. “I remember the people I trust.” Her voice strengthened, gaining defiance through the cracks in her voice. “The people I love.”

That was the first time she said it, but I couldn’t smile. I didn’t even look up.

She reached out, a tentative touch against my cheek. The warmth of her fingertips chilled me.

“Tell me your name, please.” Her voice trembled.

I shook my head. My throat tightened, but I answered. “Jesse.”

Her lips quivered into a smile. I thought I saw fragile recognition, at risk of shattering.

Words failed me as I looked into her yellow-green eyes. Intense, familiar. Beautiful. “You killed them—innocent women. Our allies. And Asher—”

I watched all the joy in her flicker out.

“My brother Asher,” I said, forcing the words out. “You killed him.”

A tremor ran through her body, her hand on my face shaking. “I thought—” She turned away from me, breathing fast. When she looked at me again, tears blurring her vision, she drew her borrowed sword, pointing it at me.