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He’d hunted them like they’d hunted his Kind for thousands of years. He was indiscriminate in who he attacked and killed, though he stayed away from villages. It wasn’t so much that he made a conscious decision to spare the less martial Dark Ones. It was more that a giant liger could hardly blend in with the human cattle, Pure slaves and their Dark masters, given that he refused to take two-legged form.
Members of the pride he left behind came across his path at times. They tried to follow him or convince him to hide in the jungles, mountains and forests like the others.
It was too dangerous, what he was doing, they told him. He would make things a thousand times worse when the Dark Ones took their retribution. Ashlu wasn’t as bad as her bitch mother, they said. The annual hunts were less brutal; the kills less numbered. But there was no telling what the new Queen would do if he kept inciting her with his blatant kills and rebellion.
He wondered when the Beasts’ stones had turned into wool balls. The sniveling cowards.
So, he ignored them. And before long, each and every one of his old comrades went on their way, leaving him alone once more.
Good riddance.
He didn’t need them. He didn’t need or want anyone.
He lived only to hunt down his enemies and make thempay.
He kept pacing around the base of the pit, going in one direction, then doubling back. As he paced, he growled low and deep, the rage and bloodlust uncontainable within the walls of his body.
Soon, he estimated, the guards would come to take him for the spectacle that occurred every few days.
How the new Queen loved to make an example of him in front of all those feckless, gutless sheep she ruled.
He had failed to escape the last few times, but he’d managed to kill several guards in the process before he was “contained” again.
This time, he was determined not to fail. Either he would fight his way through, or he’d die trying.
~ * ~* ~ *~ * ~* ~ *~ * ~
It was a near thing.
Ben almost couldn’t bring his opponent down.
He harnessed everything Cloud and the other Immortal warriors taught him, every form of martial arts beat into his body through a decade’s worth of grueling training—Kung Fu, Brazilian Jujitsu, Karate, and just plain dirty no-holds-barred street fighting.
But his Dark opponent was taller, broader, faster, had probably close to a hundred pounds of solid muscle on him, and ten times as strong. Good thing Ben trained not only with regular humans, even the deadliest ones like the Chevaliers who worked with Pure Ones, but also with Immortals on a regular basis. He had a few tricks up his metaphorical sleeves.
In the end, he played dirty.
He feinted a high full-bodied tackle but switched to low at the last possible second. As he slid between Zai’s legs through the dirt in a slide-for-home-base kind of move, he punched up directly into the male’s crotch.
And in the split second that his opponent froze with debilitating pain (but didn’t completely fold like any normal male would do, damn his balls of steel!), Ben spun his legs in a scissors sweep, catching Zai behind his knees. Then, he twisted his own legs tighter around Zai’s like a wrench and brought him crashing face first into the ground.
He didn’t keep the upper hand for long, for the male immediately used his superior strength to keep Ben trapped, flipping their position so that he was on top, his full weight bearing down on Ben like a mountain, their legs still twisted together.
Zai’s forearm pressed forcefully into Ben’s jugular and held there.
“You’re dead,” the enormous male growled.
Mute as he was from lack of air and unable to use his throat, Ben tapped Zai’s side with one hand, hoping he’d interpret it right.
You win, the gesture conveyed.I yield.
For many seconds, Zai didn’t move, simply staring implacably down at him until Ben’s vision began to black out.
At last, he relented, pulling off of Ben in one smooth motion and standing over him as Ben coughed for air and took a lot longer to find the strength to get up.
“Weak,” the Dark One muttered with massive arms folded across his chest, glaring blackly at Ben.
“Yeah,” Ben admitted in a whispery croak, rubbing his sore throat, “but I knocked you down, didn’t I?”
