The air in the pine grove turned razor-sharp.
Ten poisoned spear-tips glinted under the orange flickering firelight, closing in on the small stone ruins.
The green toxin coating the iron edges of the spears hissed softly, dripping onto the snow and burning tiny, smoking holes into the ice.
“Kill the Alpha!
Capture the magician alive!”
the leader of the Blood Guild barked, raising his skull-topped iron staff.
“The warlords will pay a fortune for a live mage!”
“Over my dead body,” Kaelen growled.
Without waiting for the masked warriors to narrow the circle, Kaelen moved.
He lunged forward with explosive Alpha speed, swinging his broadsword in a lethal horizontal arc.
The heavy iron blade whistled through the freezing air, slamming into the shafts of two incoming spears and snapping the wood like brittle twigs.
Because of the three-foot chain, Soren was dragged straight into the fray behind him.
“Kaelen, watch the left!” Soren shouted, ducking as a third spear thrust viciously toward Kaelen’s exposed flank.
Soren didn’t have spell-dust left to cast big destructive blasts, but he still had his wits and his dagger.
Sliding on his knees beneath the spear’s reach, Soren drove his silver-hilted dagger deep into the soft leather armor at the warrior’s knee joint.
The warrior let out a muffled scream behind his wooden mask, collapsing onto the snow.
Kaelen didn’t even look back.
Trusting Soren’s guard implicitly, Kaelen spun on his heel, using his elbow to smash into another attacker’s wooden face mask.
The wood shattered into splinters, and the man crumpled to the ground.
“Back to back!” Kaelen barked, his breath coming out in heavy white plumes.
They pressed their backs together in the center of the ruined camp.
The heat from Kaelen’s broad, iron-clad back seeped through Soren’s wet cloak, a solid, unyielding anchor in the middle of chaos.
The rose-colored chain between their wrists snapped taut, humming with a low, vibrant heat as their adrenaline spiked in unison.
“How many can you take?” Soren asked breathless, his grip tightening on his bloodied dagger as six remaining masked warriors encircled them again, more cautious now.
“All of them,” Kaelen replied coldly.
“Just keep your head down.”
“I am not a damsel, Commander,” Soren snapped back, a sharp, fierce grin cutting through his exhaustion.
“If you drop your guard, I’ll let them spear your rear.”
A low, dark chuckle rumbled in Kaelen’s chest.
“Noted.” This chapter is updated first at g.com.
The Guild leader snarled in frustration at their banter.
“Useless fools!
Surround them!
Use the net!”
Two of the larger warriors on the perimeter reached into their heavy leather shoulder packs and pulled out a weighted iron mesh net, spiked with jagged barbed hooks.
They swung the net between them, preparing to fling it over both Kaelen and Soren to pin them together.
Soren’s eyes widened.
If that net landed on them, the three-foot chain would make it completely impossible to wriggle free.
“The net!” Soren yelled.
“Kaelen, lift me!”
Kaelen didn’t ask questions.
He didn’t waste a second wondering what Soren planned to do.
And he immediately planted his boots into the snow, grabbed Soren firmly by the waist with his off-hand, and hoisted him upward with pure, brute strength.
Using Kaelen’s shoulder as a launching pad, Soren leaped into the air just as the heavy iron net was hurled toward them.
The spiked mesh whistled harmlessly beneath Soren’s boots, tangling uselessly around a stone pillar behind them.
While on air, Soren snatched a glass vial of simple lamp oil from his belt—not magic, just volatile, highly flammable oil he kept for lanterns.
He smashed the glass vial against the face mask of the warrior holding the net, then kicked off the man’s chest to push himself back toward Kaelen.
“Kaelen!
Fire!” Soren screamed as he landed back on his feet beside the Alpha.
Kaelen swept his massive sword through the embers of their campfire, sending a shower of burning orange sparks flying straight into the oil-drenched warrior.
WOOSH!
The oil ignited instantly.
The warrior shrieked, flailing wildly as flames engulfed his torso, stumbling backward into two of his comrades and throwing their formation into complete panic.
“Push forward!” Kaelen roared.
With the Guild’s formation broken, Kaelen moved like a tempest.
He drove his shoulder straight into the chest of the nearest guard, sending the man flying into the trunk of a pine tree.
He swung his massive sword in a brutal, sweeping strike that disarmed the next attacker, sending his poisoned spear spinning deep into the dark woods.
Within seconds, only the Guild leader remained standing, clutching his iron skull staff with trembling hands as he backed away toward the shadows of the forest.
“Monster…” the leader rasped behind his wooden mask, his voice shaking with sudden terror as he looked at the bodies of his fallen squad scattered across the snow.
you’re a High Alpha…”
Kaelen stepped forward, his broadsword dripping dark blood onto the white snow, his golden eyes glowing with a terrifying, predatory intensity in the dark.
“Leave,” Kaelen said, his voice dropping into a low, vibrating Alpha command that made the trees themselves seem to shudder.
“Tell your warlords that if anyone else in the Shadow-Ash Territory steps within three feet of us…
they won’t live to count the toll.”
The leader didn’t need to be told twice.
He turned and bolted into the thick blackness of the forest, his heavy boots crunching frantically through the snow until the sound faded into nothingness.
Silence returned to the ruined campsite.
The air smelled of copper, burnt pine, and hot lamp oil.
The small camp fire crackled softly in the center of the stone walls, casting long, dancing shadows across the snow.
Kaelen stood still for a long moment, his chest heaving as his Alpha aura slowly receded, the golden glow in his eyes fading back into a warm, dark amber.
He sheathed his heavy sword with a loud click, then turned around to face Soren.
Soren was leaning heavily against a mossy stone pillar, his hand clutching his side, his breath coming in shallow, rough gasps and now that the adrenaline of the fight was wearing off, the sheer, crushing weight of his magic exhaustion hit him like a physical blow.
His knees immersed buckled.
“Soren!”
Before Soren’s knees could hit the cold ground, Kaelen was there.
He closed the three-foot distance in a fraction of a second, catching Soren under his arms and pulling him gently against his chest.
Soren didn’t have the energy to push him away.
He let his forehead rest against the cold iron plate of Kaelen’s shoulder, his gloved fingers weakly clutching the edge of Kaelen’s leather tunic to keep himself upright.
“I told you…” Soren whispered, his voice dangerously faint, “my magic…
was empty…”
“Shh.
I know.
I’ve got you,” Kaelen murmured, his deep voice softening into that quiet, desperate warmth that made Soren’s chest ache.
Soren really said “I am not a damsel” and then immediately used Kaelen as a human trampoline (hahaha).
But can we talk about that catch at the end?!
The forced proximity/three-foot chain trope is doing overtime in this chapter.
What did you think of the fight scene?
See you in next chapter loves (^~^)