Now that is very satisfying, a voice said in my mind, and I did not know which it was, but it might have been both at once. He lost his head. Literally.
I was panting, every muscle aching after that grueling fight against multiple opponents, my only ally in the brawl a possessed dog.
You’re welcome.
My eyes flicked from enemy to enemy. The golems were frozen in place. One had his arm drawn back as if to throw a punch. The other was still on his knees, one bone arm missing. Sir Owalan was panting off to one side, bloody and bitten, looking back and forth between me and Adalbrand.
Run, run, run, little minced meat. You’re like a rat in a trap who is chewing off his own leg. It’s adorable. Perhaps you’ll be my next pet.
I needed this demon out of my head. I was starting to almost find his observations accurate. The idea of a wild-eyed Sir Owalan sitting when told and staying in place seemed fitting somehow.
A quick — and worried — glance at Brindle saw him shaking himself, blood and sweat flinging out from his coat to spray a trembling Sir Owalan. He seemed unharmed. Joyful even.
Nothing like a good scrabble to get the blood flowing. For dog and demon alike.
“You lost your construct, Poisoned Fool!” Owalan taunted. “I shall not be so easily deterred.”
He wiped a pink smear of dog spittle and blood from his cheek. Emitting a guttural sound from the back of his throat, he spun, and rushed to the empty harness Adalbrand had abandoned as if he thought one of us would try to beat him to the chance to summon a malevolent spirit.
Well, he had his priorities, I supposed, and clinging to his hope of Sainthood was one of them. It must be terrible to be the kind of person willing to grasp at a thing with no thought of the cost.
Terrible indeed. Remember how when you confessed to doubt and entered this place, it twisted you into a doubter. Forget not how when you all entered a second time, you confessed murder.
I shot a guilty glance to where Sir Coriand lay — headless.
I’d worry about how I was a murderer later.
I had learned a long time ago that the passion of battle fogs the head. I had trained myself to check for wounds the moment it was safe. Fail to do that and you could bleed out without realizing it. I gave my body a hasty check. A few knife slashes. They stung. Only one was serious and it was in the forearm of my off-hand. Adalbrand wouldn’t be able to heal it, but he would be able to help me bandage it.
My eyes were drawn to him almost without conscious thought. I found it very satisfying that he was doing the same as I had, a quick check over of his body, a shake of his head as if to clear it, and then a hand running over his face, smearing dust through the sweat there before smoothing across his shorn head. He let out a gusting breath, met my eyes, and offered a wry smile.
“Still alive?”
I nodded wearily. “You?”
His dark laugh heartened me. “For now, it seems.” His smile turned bashful. It made my heart melt a little to see such a look of boyish guilt on a face weathered by pain and shadowed by a three-day beard. “I changed the plan.”
“No longer interested in building a demon to turn against them?” I asked with a lifted eyebrow.
He shook his head, his mouth twisting into a more serious, regretful expression. When his eyes met mine again they were hollowed by sadness.
“I thought you said we would create evil to stop evil.”
He stepped over Sir Coriand’s corpse to join me. “I did say that, yes.”
His hand reached halfway toward me and then clenched into a fist, as if he were afraid to touch me, or uncertain if he’d be received. I decided for him, crossing the last space between us to press my forehead to his.
“And now?”
His voice was rough when he reached up and brushed a strand of hair from where it clung to blood on my cheek. “And now I will not bend. We will fight evil with good or not at all.”
I nodded, my forehead sliding against his with the motion. “And to think you thought your stains could not be washed away. The God reached down himself to burn away your demon.”
“To think,” he said, and there was wonder in his tone.
“To think you thought errors of youth were enough to ruin your future.”
“To think.” His laugh now was disbelieving, a man discovering suddenly he was rich only to also discover he must give all that wealth to ransom a friend.
