Page 16 of Heart’s Rescue

Something hits me in the leg. I blink, and it hits again, harder. She’s kicking me. Rather ineffectually, but still, at least there’s a little fight in this one. I turn to smile at her as Phaedron’s sword cuts the air between us, and then I squeeze her wrist even harder.

She gasps. Her grip on the dagger tightens. I twist her hand toward me, feeling the delicate little bones inside her wrist grind against each other.

She cries out, and I’m so close to her that I can feel the warmth of her breath on my cheek. I can smell her, soft and delicate, like green, growing things. I dig my fingers into her skin until her hand relaxes, and I hear the soft thud of her dagger hitting the snow at my feet. Then I rock back, raising Phaedron’s sword. The monster yanks her arm out of my grip and pulls free.

She turns and runs, dark hair and sapphire dress streaming out behind her. She’s not even wearing a cloak. No wonder the stupid thing is shivering. I watch her for a minute, then pull my magic back to me. My eyes burn as the ink-black tentacles of my magic boil around the monster’s feet.

She manages to break free of the first one, but my second attempt snags her ankle, and she goes down hard on the snow. I let my magic go, bleeding back into the ground beneath the snow. Color returns to the world as the blue flames die and my vision goes back to normal. I slowly walk toward the fallen monster as sharp flecks of ice start to fall from the ceiling of the world.

She’s back on her feet by the time I reach her, swaying and unsteady but still glancing at the woods as if she’s thinking of running again. There’s a bluish tinge to her full, dark lips that makes me think I’d better hurry this along if I’m going to finish her off before the cold does.

I swing Phaedron’s sword in a nice, wide arc between us, making sure she takes in the full length of this sweet, ridiculous piece of steel. The monster’s eyes follow me, narrow and calculating. Her body is shivering so violently it’s a wonder she’s even able to stand upright.

“Going somewhere?” I ask.

The monster glares at me like she wants to rip my throat out. Her dark eyes jump from Skyfire’s blade to the woods and then back to the sword. Then, suddenly, something shifts in her expression. What had been rage and fear and panic turns strange, replaced by something that looks almost like cold calculation, as if the monster has just weighed her options and decided how she wants to die. And then she just looks sad.

The monster falls onto her knees, spreads her arms wide, and looks up at me with big, dark eyes. Ice pelts the snow between us.

“M-M-Mercy,” she whispers through those blue lips.

I take a step back, dimly aware that I’m letting the point of Phaedron’s sword drag in the snow.

“What?” I say.