The Sweetbriar Slayer

Chapter Nineteen: Deal with a Devil

There is the sound of a door creaking open, and Aurelia scrambles to her bare feet, adrenaline surging through her veins, her heart pounding painfully against her ribs. She stills the urge to pull her hairstick from her hair, not wanting to alert Aron to the weapon she hides in plain sight.

When she sees the tunic of mercenary's black and guild gold, she freezes.

She had been a fool to trust Mikael.

"Hey! It's after hours. How did you get in here?" the mercenary demands.

Aurelia glances at the exit behind her, calculating whether or not she will be able to out-run the mercenary standing on the opposite side of the pool.

He swings his flashlight so that the beam blinds her, and catches her panicked glance.

"Stay right there," he orders, and Aurelia transitions her weight to the balls of her feet, softens her knees, and readies herself to flee.

He takes a step closer, and his face changes.

"You- you're that girl. You're the girl who killed the Helborus heir," the merc exclaims. He drops the flashlight, the beam skittering over the water of the pool and across the room, as he reaches for the dagger at his belt. 

Aurelia stands her ground as the large man runs at her, the wicked edge of his knife glinting dangerously in the low light of the glow globes. She sinks into a crouch as he approaches, rips her weapon from the hidden holster on her thigh, scrabbles across the ground with her own knife in her hand.

He swipes at her, catches the fleshy part of her upper right arm as she skitters past him. In retaliation, she swipes behind her with her dagger, cutting across the back of his ankle in a quick, deep, lucky strike.

The man cries out, staggers, falls heavily to the ground. He tries to push himself to his feet, but as soon as weight rests on his injured leg, he wobbles and crumples to the floor again.

The Achilles tendon.

Aurelia's smile is feral.

She could flee, now that he is immobile.

But she does not.

Her blood sings the sweet siren song that her body has learned to crave. She feared it, once. Had run from it, crying and vomiting like a child. She feels no compulsion to ignore its clarion call now.

She stalks closer to him, slowly, like a jungle cat, as he whimpers and groans and slashes in her direction with his knife.  His eyes are glassy and fear-filled when he stares up at her. The expression makes Aurelia's blood thrum.

"Who told you I was here?" she asks, her voice at once saccharinely sweet and husky- the voice of a stranger to her own ears.

"I didn't know it was you," the man growls back, his dagger pointed in her direction as he pulls the dead weight of his leg away.

It is a pointless exercise and they both know it.

"What brought you here, then?" she probes.

"A woman. A woman told me that she saw someone break in after hours," he divulges, and Aurelia smiles.

"Good boy. What woman?"

He curses at her, swings his knife when she gets closer. It cuts through the fabric of her skirt, but does not cut her leg. As he does, she jumps back, picks up one of the side tables sitting around the pool. She throws it at him, and he drops the dagger when he raises his hands to protect his head.

While he is distracted, she steps on his wounded leg, grinning at his responding cry of pain. Before he can catch his breath, she has lurched forward, pilfered his dagger from its spot on the ground.