The wind-stirred bushes behind them exploded.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
13 Vult
Geth ripped Wrath from his scabbard, but their attackers were already on them. They moved fast. Very fast. He caught only a brief glimpse of hairy brown limbs before the first of the varags was on him. He barely got his gauntlet up in time to block the creature’s strike. A heavy grinder like Tooth’s but much older, the blade worn to a curve by long sharpening, went scraping across the black metal. Geth struck back, but the varag slid aside with frightening speed. His blow found only air.
Then it was past him and whirling to attack again. Geth turned, keeping it in his sight, and finally got a good look at the creature. The varag’s face resembled a hobgoblin’s, with flat nose and thin lips, but stretched out and thrust forward almost like a muzzle, its teeth sharp and prominent. Flat, heavy horns grew across its brow almost like armor. Its long, powerful legs had the backward bend of an animal’s. Its arms were almost as long as its legs and when the varag turned, it hunched forward to pivot around one clawed hand. Rough leathers wrapped a body that was as tall as a bugbear but much leaner, like a hungry wolf.
The varag howled as it lunged a second time-a battle cry, Geth realized as Wrath translated words barely recognizable as thick, guttural Goblin. “Blood and meat! Blood and meat!”
The ancient grinder battered Geth’s gauntlet again, but this time Geth twisted his hand and grabbed the varag’s arm as the blade skittered away. He stepped into the varag’s charge, ducked, and heaved. The shrieking creature-no matter that it spoke, used a weapon, and wore clothes, Geth couldn’t think of it as anything other than a beast-hurtled over his shoulder and crashed hard into the ancient stones of the road. Its words cut off with a clashing of teeth. The impact would only stun it for a moment. Geth moved in, Wrath raised and ready to chop down.
Long feet with claws even heavier than those on the varag’s fingers raked at him. Geth jumped back, but the claws still caught him a blow across the belly, shredding his shirt and tearing into his skin. The wounds were shallow-deeper and it would have been his guts instead of shreds of cloth sagging to the ground.
Geth wanted to look and see how the others were doing. He could hear the sounds of their fighting, but he didn’t dare take his eyes off his attacker. The varag was too fast. As it twisted to its feet and grabbed for its grinder, Geth reached into himself-and shifted.
Some shifters manifested claws or fangs or a burst of speed when they drew on the power of their lycanthrope ancestors. Geth’s gift was sheer toughness. He felt the sense of invulnerability that shifting brought burning in his blood, toughening his skin, making his already thick, coarse hair even thicker. The gashes across his belly closed themselves into angry scars. He sank back into a crouch, sword and gauntlet raised.
The varag hesitated, as if it could sense the change in him. As if it knew that he had become a little more like it. The creature paced back and forth, hunched over on three limbs, its nostrils flaring as it breathed in his scent. Geth peeled back his lips and snarled at it. The varag growled in return and came at him.
Geth leaped to meet it. They came together hard, but this time Geth caught the grinder on the back of Wrath. He twisted the twilight blade, and the deep teeth on the sword’s back caught the grinder, locking it in place. The varag howled and raked at him with the claws of its other hand, but all they did was add to the shreds that hung from Geth’s shirt and vest. Geth drew back his right arm, curled his gauntleted hand into a fist, and drove it hard into the varag’s face.
Bones crunched and the varag staggered back, blood welling up from the imprint of Geth’s knuckles. Geth didn’t let up. He stayed on top of the varag, holding the lock on its grinder, pounding away with his metal-encased fist. The thing’s howl of anger turned to one of pain and confusion. It let go of the grinder and turned to run.
Geth lunged and slashed with Wrath. The edge of the sword sliced into the meat of the varag’s leg. It folded instantly. The varag pitched forward, arms flailing. Geth didn’t give it a chance to recover. He struck hard and fast. Wrath bit deep into its shoulder and halfway through its neck.
A savage growl and a terrible, short scream brought him around, fear for his friends rising in him. The growl was Marrow, though, and the scream a varag-she had it on the ground, her massive jaws around its throat. As he watched, she twisted her head and ripped. The varag’s throat tore out in a spray of gore. Marrow threw her bloody muzzle back and howled her triumph.
Geth raised Wrath to the sky and howled with her.
Around Ekhaas and the others, the last two varags hesitated in their whirling, blurring attacks. One was already bleeding from a deep wound; the other bore the smoking scars of acidic fumes-one of Tenquis’s spells. Geth caught the glance that passed between them.
They were going to break, he realized, and if they ran, there would be no catching up to them. They would escape, and all the varags in the area would know there was two-legged prey to be had-if they didn’t already.
“Stop them!” he spat, but Tooth was already moving. With a stationary target, he swung his grinders as easily as if he were chopping jungle growth. The wounded varag was caught off guard. One arm came off at the elbow and went flying into the undergrowth. The other came off at the shoulder and hit the ground with a meaty thump. A third stroke of Tooth’s grinders took off the creature’s head.
The final varag turned and ran. Tenquis flicked his wand at it with one hand, hurling a small metal sphere with the other-in the same moment that Ekhaas’s voice rose in song.
The sphere burst against the varag’s back. Thin yellow-green vapors, churned by the dissonance of Ekhaas’s song, billowed up around the fleeing creature. The varag wailed, clapping hands to its ears while squeezing its eyes shut, but it was too late. It stumbled away from the vapors and crashed to its knees, then slumped over. Its hair was already curled and black from the acid, the skin underneath already burned raw. Blood trickled between the fingers that still clutched its ears.
“Four of them,” said Chetiin. “Four of them against six of us. They don’t hold back.”
“I told you they’re not afraid of anything,” Tooth said hoarsely. “We were lucky it was only four. Maabet, we’re in trouble. Other varags will find the corpses. They’ll track us. If we can get out of their territory, we might be safe.”
Geth grabbed his arm. “We can’t turn back now.”
“You saw how fast varags move. Once they start tracking you, there’s no outrunning them. Even leaving their territory may not stop them, but it gives us a chance. We can let them quiet down, then come back.”
“Then Suud Anshaar is safer,” said Ekhaas. “You said varags don’t go near it.”
“That only makes it safe from varags,” Tooth growled. He pulled free from Geth and pointed up the old Dhakaani road. “That will take you right to the Wailing Hill. Or at least it’s supposed to. We’ve got a deal. I’ll wait for you at the other end of the road at noon, when the varags are mostly asleep, for three days. If you don’t come back, I’m heading back to Arthuun.”
“You’ll be on your own,” Geth said.
“Might be better.” Tooth turned and started trotting down the road, moving with surprising silence for someone as big as he.
The sudden shrieks of varags from that direction-not close but not so distant either, and not hunting calls, but more like a pack skirmish-made him pause. Marrow growled something.
“She says,” called Chetiin, “that if she was hunting, she’d follow prey on its own before she followed prey in a group.”
Tooth looked down the road, then back up at them. “Blood,” he grumbled-then came back to them. “But I’m not going into the ruins, just waiting for you outside them.”
Geth could have smiled at that, but the knot of fear that the howls produced in his own belly wouldn’t let him. “Done,” he said and started along the old road again.
The others fell in alongside him. Tooth looked at Ekhaas and Tenquis. “Any magic you have that might slow them down would be helpful.”
The duur’kala and the artificer glanced at each other, then Ekhaas shook her head. “No,” she said, “but I can help us move faster.”
She started to sing again, the song low but rhythmic. The magic caught at Geth’s feet, strengthened his legs,
