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“I surrender,” Dessin taunts. He’s six feet, four inches of deception. A god standing among insects, unafraid of their mortal weapons.
Movement everywhere. Men in white and forest green, camouflaged into our surroundings. Swords. Daggers. Crossbows.
I am a newborn bird, left in the nest, sitting without fight in the rise of a battle.
They move closer, shuffling their boots in the snow, trapping him in a death circle.
The man who seems to be leading the ambush is tall, freakishly tall, like a circus act on stilts. His dark goatee flutters in the winter breeze. He wears a black top hat with a red symbol embroidered on it. A red X and other indistinguishable markings.
Dessin studies the men. This look of his, so certain, it makes my muscles relax. “It’s been a while since I’ve stopped a heart. And there are thirty-seven of those here. I think I’ll end with yours.” He nods at the man with the top hat.
They continue their slow steps, crossbows aimed at his head, closing in on him like a wild animal that has escaped its cage.
“I’d say we can discuss this like men, but tell me, would men hang babies by their toes?”
The men charge him.
Dessin pulls a metal ring out from under his shirt, a double-edged blade, allowing it to twirl fluidly around his index finger. The first two shots from the crossbows are dodged with precise side steps. But the next two, Dessin is waiting for. He uses the circular blade to swing, twist, and maneuver, swiftly slicing through the middle of the arrows like the snapping of a twig.
And as the men close in, Dessin unfurls his wings of power, releasing the dragon waiting to scorch them with fire.
He takes off in a sprint, slashing throats with this strange circular knife. Blood sprays over his face and chest, bursting from carotid arteries. With one hand, he snatches a flying arrow through the air and punctures it through the skull of another man to his left.
The rest happens in a blur. I see entrails spilling onto the snow, I see Dessin decapitating the men holding guns with the spinning knife, and I see the martial arts breathe life into his body, revealing the deadliest dancer alive.
About fifteen men remain, all trying to charge him at once. The sight of it gives me pause. Makes my stomach twist with worry. With that many swords being swung, with that many archers firing their shots, he’s bound to be cut down. It was as if the first twenty-one men he annihilated were the front lines. Only present to wear him down.
The arrows are all shot at once and he deflects, using a bloody sword to knock them from his line of sight. Except one. One sneaky arrow soars passed his defense, slicing over his arm with a wet ripping sound. It doesn’t strike true. It’s merely a flesh wound.
Dessin grunts at the impact. I wince as I remember his arms are already carved up from the cage he was trapped in earlier.
They take his moment of weakness and prey on it. They attack simultaneously now. Overpowering his weak arm with the crashing of swords and daggers.
It’s too much, he can’t—
But as fast as a meteor plummeting to the earth, a vision of black death thunders through the air, DaiSzek reigns over all. His roar shudders the trees, cracks the ice, and ends the fighting.
He towers on a hill, overlooking the violence, baring his teeth to show off his weapon of choice. I nearly fall over in my hiding spot. The mere majestic sight of him causing a rush of euphoria to pump through my veins.
His growl is the trumpet of death, a mix of a lion and a dragon. And in the same breath, he leaps from the hill, tackling six men into the snow. The sight is ferocious. His teeth sink into flesh, shredding different body parts into ribbons and fountains of blood, and doing it all with the sound of hell booming from his chest. I’m mortified at the massacre and yet I want to shriek in victory.
Dessin leaps over DaiSzek and the pile of bodies he devours, and with the speed of a horse he races to the freakishly tall man.
While he exacts his promise, my attention is snagged on a faint motion from behind a tree only a few yards away from me. A man crouched low into the snow, taking his aim with a crossbow. I know Dessin or DaiSzek do not see him because he hasn’t moved an inch.
He’ll hit one of them.
The shot could be fatal.
I stand to my feet, throw myself through the trees, and desperately race to the hidden soldier. He has a steady eye on one of them. His finger starts to tighten on the trigger.
No! But the cry for help doesn’t rise from my panic. Words stay clogged in my throat. There’s only a single action. A motion of my arm. A target I must strike.
But I stop, like my hand is attached to a puppet string, unable to protect, unable to kill. And before I can witness the murder of one of my friends, the sharp end of a wide sword tears through a thick layer of skin before it crashes into his spinal cord. I immediately drop the knife and fall backward onto my butt. The rich blood pours from his neck onto the snow. A ruby-red river melts the ice, steaming in the winter air.
I’m panting. Can’t look away. Can’t rip my gawking stare from the man choking, bleeding out, writhing in a puddle of himself.
But the arrow in his crossbow is gone. Did he shoot? Was I too late?
