Page 17 of The Only Way Out Is Up

Not my main concern right now. My knife suddenly looks puny. The curved sword jabs at my face, and I jerk backward. My opponent kicks me in the wrist, sending my own blade spinning away, then plants a foot on my chest and shoves. The bed takes me out at the knees and I sprawl backward. The silver sword point hovers between my eyes, too close to focus on, like a fly trying to land on my nose.

“If you tell me who you work for, I might let you off with a few scars,” a young woman’s voice says. “Is it Gestian? The du Freis? It can’t be Dreikin, they’d never have sent an assassin so incompetent.”

“What?” I struggle to raise my head and see her, but that brings the sword point even closer. “I’m not— I didn’t even know you were here!”

“Bullshit.” She gestures with the sword, point whipping past my eyes, and I hastily lie flat again. “Don’t lie to me. You fuckers haven’t done enough to my family already?”

“I swear to the stars!” I manage to scoot back a little and push myself up on my elbows. “I was just—”

“I am going to cut your fingers off one by one until you tell me what I want to know,” she says, punctuating each word with a flick of the sword. “Then your toes. Then your cock, if you still won’t talk. And then I’ll figure out something even worse.”

“Worse than cutting my cock off?”

“I am very inventive,” she growls. Unfortunately she gestures again as she does this, and I feel a sudden stinging pain. We both stare as a shallow line of red appears on my bicep, a drop of blood growing at one end. She seems momentarily as startled as I am, but she rallies first.

“And that is just a taste—” she begins, then whips around at the sound of scuttling feet. Her sword cuts through the air in an arc that would have severely inconvenienced anyone trying to come up from behind, but unfortunately (for her) Star is only about a half meter high, and her blade zips right over him. He scrambles up her leg and onto her back, and she gives a yelp and reaches for him with her free hand.

Then she stops, eyes very wide, because Star has one of his manipulator arms out with the sharp side pressed to her throat. Those blades aren’t big, but they’re wickedly sharp. I can see a tiny line of blood form on her skin as she swallows.

Don’t hurt her. The last thing I need is to leave bodies behind me. The Arbiters wouldn’t let that lie.

[Agreement: unless she moves.]

“Fuck,” she whispers. “Fuck fuck fuck.”

“Drop the sword, please,” I say, sitting up and rubbing my arm. The cut isn’t bad, but it stings.

“No.”

“Sorry?” Looking at her big, scared eyes, I find making threats a little awkward. But she was threatening to chop bits off me a minute ago. “Do you want your throat slit?”

“Maybe I fucking do,” she says, voice rising. “Do it. Kill me. It’s what you came for, isn’t it?”

“It’s not—”

“Kill me. Kill me.” She’s practically screaming now. “Just fucking do it, I can’t stand waiting anymore—”

“I’m not going to kill you,” I shout back, temper rising. I clamber up from the bed. “Look, I don’t know who the fuck you are or what you’re so worried about, but I’m not it, okay? I don’t go around killing people!”

We stare at each other from a few centimeters apart, both panting, tears smudging her cheeks and sweat prickling on my forehead. It occurs to me, belatedly, that she could stab me quite easily from this position if she really doesn’t mind getting her throat slit afterward.

She blinks. Her eyes are very blue, so dark they’re nearly black.

“You mean it,” she says.

“Of course I mean it,” I snap. “If I was here to kill you I would have done it already, wouldn’t I?”

She cocks her head, considering this. “Probably.”

“So…” I let out a breath. “Now what?”

Her lips purse. “If I put down my sword, will you tell your runic to let go?”

“That seems like a good start.”

She bends her knees, very carefully, and lays her sigwork sword on the floor, then looks up at me.

[Query: is this wise?]