Page 74 of Immortal Origins
Metal bit her thigh as a dagger sank deep into her leg. The metal mage turned his hand and the dagger twisted inside of her.
White-hot pain shot through her entire body as she tried to pry the thing out of her leg, but she couldn’t no matter how hard she tried.
Her breathing tore at her lungs as sharp as the dagger in her leg.
Fury filled her body, her veins, every corner of her mind and her channels flexed the charge she held at bay.
The metal mage sucked in a breath and she knew he could feel her magick too.
He smiled as he curled his finger and the dagger ripped itself from her flesh and flew back into his hand.
“I see I have your attention now.” His lip curled up. “We were told to be careful of you. That you might be more powerful than we think, but you don’t seem too scary to me. Let’s see why they’re so afraid of you.”
He threw two daggers at her at the same time, the sharp whistle of finely crafted blades sang through the air as she caught them both in her hands. Chest heaving, she pulled herself to her feet and this time, when his daggers returned, it was from her throwing them at his head.
He easily deflected them as they returned back to his hand like they were attached. She missed, but the message was clear.
She was also out for blood.
Her head swam, likely from how much blood she’d lost that night. She hadn’t had a moment for her body to rest and fought the nausea that came over her in waves. She smacked herself in the face a couple times and told her eyes tofocus!
She needed time to think.
Reaching her hands into the dark she called the darkness once more and coaxed it to cover her as she disappeared in the night. Shadows crawled from the forest and wrapped her in a blanket of night as she ducked behindthe nearest tree and fled behind a few more to get some distance.
With precious moments to spare, she used the cover the shadows gave her to pry a smaller branch from one of the trees that was strong but pliable. Luckily the trees offered such bendable branches because she wasn’t strong enough to rip her leathers for a tourniquet. She wrapped it around her thigh as blood seeped into the ground and tied it as tightly as she could. Biting down against the pain, she managed to get it tight enough that the bleeding almost stopped. It wasn’t perfect, but it would do.
“You can’t hide from me,” the man hissed as his footsteps approached, his shadow illuminated by bursts of dragon fire. “I know every inch of this forest better than anyone.”
Who is he?She thought furiously.
He said they’d hunted dragons before, so he must be one of the ones that hunt for dragon leather. But somehow he believed there was a bounty on her head? Had he come all the way fromNethyrto hunt her?
Whoever he was, he was incredibly dangerous.
“Who says I’m hiding?” With a small spark of Magick she carried her voice to each of the trees surrounding them so it echoed through the night. She slowly stepped between the trees letting the sound ring through the air like a bell.
“That’s a nice little trick you’ve got there.” The mage swung his arms around in a circle, daggers gleaming on his hips.
She peeked her head around the large trunk just quick enough to see him turned in the opposite direction as the rest of his men worked to fasten a chain around the subdued dragon’s mouth. The mage raised his hand and the chains wrapped themselves tightly around its jaws as it cried out in fury and pain.
“Only a coward would hide from a fight.” He spun on his heel and threw a dagger in—what he thought was—her direction a few feet to her right. “Are you a coward?”
Good. He didn’t know where she was.
Yet.
“What kind of fighter brings six men to fight his battles?” she taunted asher voice carried with the wind.
“A smart one.” He grinned and threw another dagger, this one way too far to the left.
She threw herself behind another tree, leg dragging behind her. She willed her body to do it again, circling the men the way they had tried to circle her. Using the wind to carry her sounds and confuse them.
“What kind of man hunts dragons for theirskin?” she spat with distaste.
His grin flashed his golden canine. “A rich one.”
“Or a dishonorable one,” the wind whispered to him from her lips.
