Return of the Crimson Guard

the risk.’

‘Finished,’ Ereko called. Kyle and Stalker, on one side, began edging backwards.

‘You risk far more than you comprehend,’ Traveller said, sounding almost regretful.

‘It would not be a risk otherwise.’

Beneath Kyle's sandals the beach shook, churning. A hissing flow of sands sank his feet to the calves. He jumped, staggering, to keep his footing. A shocked yell from Ereko snapped his head around. Traveller was gone. Kyle gaped at Ereko who stared at the empty sand.

‘No,’ the giant mouthed, appalled.

‘You fools!’ the giant roared at Jhest. ‘You have no idea who — what — you are interfering with!’

‘What may, or may not, happen far away in another land is of no interest to us,’ said the mage and he gestured. As one, weapons slid from the soldiers’ wooden and leather sheaths. Ereko sank to his knees, pressed his hands to the sands.

‘Get him on board,’ Stalker snarled, drawing his curved blade. Kyle grasped an arm, but he might as well have been pulling at a tree trunk. The giant dug at the yielding sand, yanking free of Kyle's grip.

‘You really did not think we would be so foolish as to cross swords with him, did you?’ Jhest said — his voice still as flat as when they exchanged pleasantries last night.

‘Oh, just kill the bastard, will you?’ Stalker said over his shoulder. Kyle ignored him, a hand at Ereko's arm.

‘We must go — please!’

The soldiers advanced, swinging, and the Lost cousins parried once, twice, holding their ground, ripostes gouging scatterings of the small stones to the sands.

Jhest's bland smile drew down and his smooth brow furrowed. ‘What is this?’ he murmured.

Ereko raised his head and Kyle was shocked by the rage roiling in his molten eyes. ‘You and your cabal have erred, Jhest. You should not have chosen D'riss. Any Warren but that. For you seem to have forgotten who, in truth, / am.’

‘You are Thel Akai, yes. An ancient race of this land — a useless remnant of a sad past.’

‘And who were we before we named ourselves, before any other sentient kind arose? Our forebears were the children of the earth!’

‘Kyle!’ A yell from Stalker. One of the soldiers had caught Badlands in a bearhug. The man stitched the armoured giant in thrusts of his long-knives but to no visible effect. Kyle darted forward, drawing. He swung at a shoulder and the tulwar slid through the stones with a grating screech. The arm hung half-dismembered, accompanied by a gout of black blood as thick as tar. Badlands fell to the sand and lay stunned. Kyle stared. He was so amazed that a ponderous attack from another of the armoured giants almost decapitated him. He ducked, swung two-handed at the leading leg and severed it at the knee. The soldier collapsed to lie flailing in the sands like an upturned beetle.

‘What? How is this?’ Jhest gaped his disbelief.

Kyle leapt to one of three soldiers Stalker had kept at bay, severing an arm at the elbow and crippling a leg on the backswing.

‘No!’ Jhest bellowed. ‘You are not of the Isture!’

Unhesitating, Kyle continued hacking the lumbering giants — none of whom uttered a sound or even flinched from their attack though it was obvious they were doomed. Once down, the brothers finished them off.

After the last, Kyle spun on Jhest. He was exhausted, his arms numb and tingling from the jarring impacts of swings that he'd had to give every ounce of his strength. The Jacuruku mage eyed him in turn. ‘You should not have been able to do that,’ he said flatly. ‘It is therefore the blade. Allow me to examine it.’

‘Allow me to kill him,’ Stalker said to Kyle, panting his own weariness.

‘Not yet.’ He crouched beside Ereko who still knelt on his hands and knees, his arms sunk to his elbows. ‘What should we do?’ he asked, pleading.

Ereko did not answer. His eyes were screwed shut, his teeth clenched, lips drawn back in a rictus of effort. ‘Almost,’ he hissed on a breath. ‘Almost…’

Jhest clapped his hands, barking an order. Stalker raised his sword. ‘Wait!’ Kyle yelled.

‘Why is this shit still alive?’ Stalker demanded.

‘Damn right,’ Badlands added.

‘Because we may need him.’

‘For what?’

‘To retrieve Traveller.’

Hesitating, Stalker slammed home his blade. ‘Damn the Dark Hunter!’

Jhest, however, appeared utterly unconcerned. His gaze was directed far off to the jungle-line beyond. A one-sided smile crooked up his thick lips. Kyle, a cold presentiment shivering his flesh, slowly turned following the mage's gaze.

‘Trouble,’ Coots said laconically, spitting.

Movement shivered the treeline all up and down the beachfront for as far as Kyle could see in either direction. Armoured soldiers identical to those dismembered around them stepped forth. Tens, hundreds. ‘Ereko!’

But still enmeshed in his efforts the giant did not answer.

‘You have no choice but to abandon him,’ Jhest observed blandly.

Snarling, Stalker drew and thrust in one movement. The mage did not flinch. Instead, he looked down calmly at the sword impaling his abdomen and cocked one brow. ‘You will find me a great deal more difficult to kill than my servants.’

Stalker stepped back. His blade sucked free, glistening with a clear, thick ichor. ‘Kyle…’

‘Wait!’

Ereko, grunting his effort, was withdrawing his arms from the sands. His hands came free, clasped in a shared wristlock with another's arm — Traveller's. Up and down the shore, the beach shuddered, rippling beneath everyone. Even the mage, Jhest, was rocked. ‘No!’ he bellowed. ‘Impossible!’

Beneath Ereko was revealed a gap, a wound into darkness. Sands disappeared, sucked in a growing vortex that appeared to lead to… dark nothingness. Kyle leaned forward to lend a hand.

‘No!’ Ereko gasped. ‘It will take you.’

Traveller's other hand appeared, pushed down against the surface. Gasping, Ereko straightened his legs, drawing the man free. The gaping void disappeared with an explosion like the burst of a Moranth munition. The report of its closure echoed from the tree-line. Traveller lay supine while Ereko straightened, drawing in great bellowing breaths.

‘They're still comin’,’ Coots drawled into the silence.

The swordsman pushed himself to his feet. Jhest watched, his face eager, almost avid, lustful. ‘You live,’ he breathed, awed.

Traveller rolled his shoulders, wincing. ‘My life is now my own, magus. It can no longer be taken by anyone.’

The statement seemed to transport the mage. His eyes lit up and open glee twisted his mouth into a frog-like leer. ‘Then it is true! It can be done!’

Traveller seemed merely to gesture and the mage's head flew from his shoulders to roll to the sands. ‘Not by you.’ He sheathed his sword.

‘Time to run away,’ Coots suggested.

Blinking, Kyle stared at the headless torso of the mage that remained standing, immobile. He had the unnerving impression that should he touch it a hand would leap up to grab him. Glancing away he saw the army of armoured soldiers almost within reach. ‘Run!’ They leaned their shoulders to the Kite, pushed it out into the surf. The Lost brothers pulled themselves in. Ereko, Kyle saw, glanced back and cursed, slogging away. Traveller had remained on the shore.

Cursing as well, Kyle threw himself back into the surf. When he arrived Ereko was pleading with the