Now Kovos was fighting the last man, the one that had beaten Keither, the one that had killed Moleth. Kovos brought the sword down, knocking the soldier’s sword out of his hand, but instead of killing him Kovos threw down his own sword and shoved the man against a tree, holding him by his throat. There was a wild, hateful look in his eyes. He reached down to the soldier’s belt, pulled out his dagger and raised it to his neck. He slashed down, cutting veins and arteries. Then he cut the other side of the neck. He continued to do this again and again until the man’s gurgled scream stopped and he slipped from Kovos’ blood-soaked hands. Kovos turned, letting the lifeless body hit the ground. He looked at Arkin dead in the eyes. The surprise was instantaneous, but was quickly replaced with a wide smile, like nothing had happened.
“What took you?” he said.
Arkin weighed his options. Kovos may have snapped and become unstable, but it appeared as though the killing rage had run its course, at least for now. He was as close to normal as possible,
“Laundry.”
Kovos nodded his head. Arkin spoke. “Are you ok?”
“Other than watching my brother get beaten to a pulp, Sasha almost getting raped, and killing three men, I’m doing great!” He smiled sarcastically at the end. Arkin could tell Kovos wasn’t actually smiling and the gallows humor was a good thing. Kovos was still with it.
“Ok. How did it feel?” he asked.
Kovos’ face darkened as he thought. “Not good. But not bad either. They deserved it. I don’t know how I should feel.”
“That’s a good sign, then. Go clean up Keither. He should be waking up soon.”
He turned and saw Legon with Sasha. Her eyes looked blank and out of focus. She was probably in shock. Legon was next to her with his arms around her, talking into her ear. She was rocking back and forth slightly. Her clothes were still covered in blood, but it looked like Legon had wiped it from her face. She had been through a lot, and Arkin hoped that she could keep it together for just a few more days, and then she would be fine. He knelt down and wiped his blades off on one of the dead men’s pants. He reached back and re-sheathed them as he walked back to the tree he’d been in to get his bow.
Legon looked up at him. “Thank you for coming when you did. I know it wasn’t the most opportune time.”
Arkin walked to Sasha and bent over, placing his hand on her cheek. “Are you ok?” he asked in a warm voice.
“I will be. I’m just shaken is all, I’ll be fine.”
“Good. You just sit here for awhile, ok?”
She looked up and wrapped her arms around her knees. There was a small groan and Arkin turned to look at the man Kovos had paralyzed. “Sasha dear, on second thought, Keither is getting up now. Will you take him to go get cleaned up? There’s a small stream on the other side of the road.”
She got up without question and walked to Keither, helping him out of the camp and out of ear shot. Arkin stood and beckoned Legon and Kovos over as he walked to the man on the ground. It appeared that he could still use his arms, which was good. He looked scared, which was also good. As Arkin walked up to him he pulled a small knife out of the sheath on his belt. He knelt down next to the man, Kovos and Legon on either side of him.
Sasha was helping Keither along, or was he helping her? He didn’t know what was going on. He was covered in blood and there had been bodies in camp. Also, why was Arkin here? His head was pounding and fuzzy. The last thing he remembered was getting beaten.
They were crossing the road. There was the sound of water running. Sasha’s lip was bleeding and she was shaking. He remembered what the man had done when he tied her and he knew what happened. All of a sudden the pain in his body didn’t seem to matter, and he was suddenly thankful he was unconscious when they… when they… He wasn’t going to think it. He saw the stream, moving fast in the mountain pass, the light playing on it, illuminating the trees. He knelt down with her. She scooped up water, splashed it over her face and then started wiping his. He needed to say something to her, something supportive, but what? He had never been able to talk to people, never. But Sasha, she was different. She was nice to everyone, and everyone disliked her for something that he knew wasn’t her fault.
Anger, sadness and hate coursed through him, but also love. Love for someone that was kind to him, love for someone good. That someone could do that to her, could hurt her…But maybe they hadn’t. Maybe that’s what the fight was.
He placed his hand on her wrist. “They didn’t…?”
“No. Arkin came right before they were able to.” She looked down. Shame and humiliation filled her expression and voice.
He breathed a sigh of relief. She was standing now and he stood shaky on his feet. She steadied him. She was helping him, after what had just happened to her, after what she’d just seen, she was helping the guy who was out for the whole thing. Who would do that?
“Sasha.” She paused. “You’re a good person, the best person. I don’t care what people say, you’re not a demon, you’re an angel. You deserve better than how people treat you. I just thought you should know.” That came out bad and awkward. She probably thought he was crazy or something. Why had he talked?
He looked down at his feet. This was why he didn’t talk to people. She placed both her soft hands under his chin, raising it. Tears were forming in her eyes and her voice shook. “Thank you.” The tears started rolling down her cheeks and he knew she meant it. He wondered how many people had ever told her that.
Arkin knelt down next to the paralyzed soldier and spoke in a soft voice. “We require information from you, information that we will get, and after that, we will kill you.”
The man’s eyes bulged and he stuttered, “Why…why should I talk then, if you’re going to kill me either way?”
Arkin didn’t like doing this, but the bastard had it coming.
“I’m glad you asked that. Because it is going to be up to you how long it takes me to kill you. One way is fast and relatively painless. The other is… hmmm, well, messy.” The man looked at Arkin intently for a minute.
“What do you want to know?” the man asked.
He wasn’t surprised to hear this. Of course he would crack. This pathetic animal didn’t have any training, any backbone. He was a blunt instrument, nothing more.
“What was your mission? And what did you know about it?”
“That’s all you want to know?” the soldier groaned. He was clearly in pain.
“That’s it. Now talk,” Arkin said, and gave the man a slight shake. These royal guards were the easiest to interrogate. No discipline, no honor.
Breathing hard from the pain of having his spine broken, the man began. “Ok. We’re here looking for a man that’s a smuggler. We didn’t know where he lived, just that it was in the Salez territory and that he was around eighteen with a tattoo on his back. We were told that he would be armed and dangerous. After we caught him we were to take him back to the capital for interrogation.”
“You needed ten armored men for a smuggler?”
“No. We went in two groups of five. This was just the last town on the way.”
“So why did you set a trap?”
“We knew that whoever we were looking for must be here, and the commander said that it would be good training for us. Also, ten of us in a town would draw too much attention.”
“Very well. I believe you.” Arkin knew that these people just took orders. They didn’t think. He reached down, and before the man could say anything, he broke the soldier’s neck.
The sound of shuffling feet told him that Sasha and Keither were returning. It was a good thing the soldier had talked so quickly. He didn’t want either of them to have to see more violence today.
As he got up, Legon looked him in the eyes. “I appreciate what you have done, but we need answers, and…”
“You will get them, but first we need to move away from here. Go and cut all the men’s purses. Take anything of value.”
“You want us to rob them? We need to get out of here before more men come! We need to run! We need to
