Repeal

Chapter 30

The guard turns to face her, grinding loudly as he moves.

Shocked frozen, she watches the mace slowly drag across the ground and lift in the guard’s hands. The spikes glitter in the darkness.

The curse words run through her mind so fast they don’t make sense.

A booming crunch makes her head snap to the side. The other soldier has crashed through a wall with his sword. Kadar pants heavily a few meters away, getting ready to move as the soldier twists for action again.

Neither guard seems fast, but they are incredibly strong, with sleek armour that she doubts she can even scratch.

For a split second she considers charging into the other room in search for the Alcrest’s bodies and ignoring them all together...

Suddenly she knows how to do it.

The mace falls heavily behind her as she bolts forward. She pauses just out of the reach of the next swing as the soldier stands. Then, deliberately she makes a show of moving out of the maces reach. The guard follows on loud, heavy feet.

For a moment, she doubts this will work. I can die! Kiera reminds herself. But the truth is, she can die weather or not she tries this. The mace is pulled back. She crouches low, unable to breath.  She suddenly feels like she’s standing in front of a spreading truck with an avalanche of boulders bouncing around behind her. She doesn’t know which will be worse.

Kadar is barking. The guards are grinding and creaking. Weapons shimmer with fire. She’s petrified.

The guard swings the mace in slow motion.

Only when the mace is so close she can almost feel the impact of air pushing against her, does she jump. Adrenaline spikes through her blood, and it’s like the jump is impossibly high and suddenly it seems like a miracle. To jump high in a wolf fight would mean certain death; but right now it’s all she can think of. 

The Mace slides a under her in slow motion although her heart thumps a million miles an hour. The spikes glisten and the patterns of red are in sharp focus.

Her paws slap the ground hard and a faint pain laces up one leg harshly.

Behind her there’s a crunch. No screams. Metal shatters and when she finally wobbles around to look, the red mace is compacting itself. For a moment it seems like that’s all that’s happened until the blue soldiers leg suddenly blows out, metal and steel flying out as the mace swings through like a suddenly deflated ball.

Still no solider makes a sound besides the grinding. The blue soldier tips forward, sword narrowly missing a stunned Kadar.

Kiera pounces aside as the steel contraption topples. The stone floor cracks as the guard falls. The sword skids from the soldiers hands, and even without a hand guiding it, stabs into a wall shallowly.