“You know the laws,” Wolf replies dispassionately, his arm drawing back the arrow. “Nameless unchosen are considered a scourge on this land. They already carry death sentences; I’m just a law-abiding citizen.” Wolf lowers his weapon briefly, adding a second arrow. When he draws back this time, two shining metal tips gleam in the sunlight. “A child, even a nameless one, should not suffer. I will make its death quick, just to prove I am not without mercy.”
“Mercy would be to let him live,” Cyrus argues, hands raised toward his brother.
“That I cannot allow.” Wolf grins as he fires, the arrows plunging toward the child’s heart.
Cyrus strains his leg as he lunges, throwing his body in front of the boy. “For gods’ sake, get away!” Cyrus pleads as the arrows find their marks. Cyrus feels the first one burst through his chest, biting its way into his left lung. It deflates almost immediately, and Cyrus’s breathing becomes a bloody, racking cough. The second arrow slams into his right side near his collarbone. This one’s metal tip lodges deep in his bone, chewing through muscles and tendons until his arm feels numb. Yet perhaps the worst part of the pain is the burning, icy sensation of the metal in his blood. The metal’s fire scorches through his veins, scalding everything it touches. Cyrus shrieks as he attempts to pull the arrows out with his left hand, his right one unresponsive to his commands. His knees buckle and he falls, landing hard on the plank of wood in his leg. The impact only succeeds in driving it deeper.
“Fool,” Wolf sneers as he stands over Cyrus. “What good did you do? I’ll just hunt down the boy and the rest of his family later. You prolonged its life by a margin of a few hours.”
“Leave…me.” Cyrus’s voice is raspy as his eyes flutter shut. White hot agony lances through his toes. In its wake, Cyrus can feel his body dying.
“The iron is already killing you.” Wolf kneels over his brother, mercilessly ripping the first arrow out of his wounds, ignoring his brother’s groaning. A sick, sucking sound fills the air as the shaft of the arrow in Cyrus’s lungs lifts clear of the tissue. It creates a vacuum, popping audibly when the tip is pulled out. Blood gushes down his side, and Cyrus gurgles in an attempt to breathe. Wordlessly, Wolf moves up to the second arrow, tugging it sharply out of Cyrus’s shoulder. Once it is lifted clear, Wolf inspects the tip in the light. “A piece of this one is stuck in your bone. You cannot heal through another’s powers, not with the metal’s poison still raging in your blood.” Carefully wrapping his fist around the tip, Wolf sneers as he reveals his hand to be unaffected by the iron. “The aversion to metal only affects your kind, I see. Just another sign that I don’t belong with you!”
“Perfect. Let me…die.” Cyrus whimpers, blood pooling around his mouth. “Please.” His voice is hardly a whisper over the rustling air escaping from his lung.
“Fox! I need you,” Wolf demands, and within seconds, his faithful friend appears.
“Holy hell! What did you do to him?” Fox drops to his knees to examine Cyrus’s wounds as his body begins to buck. “He’s seizing! Put pressure on the shoulder. We need something to stop this blood and re-inflate the lung.”
“His shoulder will require surgery to extract the arrow’s tip,” Wolf explains grimly as he clamps a rag over the wound. By now, mercifully, Cyrus is too far gone to feel the agony.
“Wolf, this may be beyond my power to fix,” Fox informs his leader as he rummages through his medical bag. Finding a piece of hollow bamboo, he jams it into Cyrus’s lung and closes the skin around it. Almost immediately, Cyrus’s breathing slows, his body growing still.
“You’re doing all right so far,” Wolf quips as he moves out of Fox’s way. “Get the iron out of his shoulder. After a couple of hours without the metal, he’ll be able to heal with my strength.”
“If he survives a few hours, I’ll be shocked. You can’t seriously expect me to do surgery here! In the middle of the forest, on the dirt,” Fox rages as he inspects the shoulder wound. “The risks are too great! Even with your bond, he doesn’t stand a chance against an infection on top of all these injuries.” Fox raises his blood-stained hands out toward Wolf. “This is ridiculous! You need to let him go! Surely there is some shred of decency left in you—”
Wolf slams his hand hard into Fox’s mask. “I said fix him! I don’t care if he dies in the attempt, but you have to try!” Wolf lifts his hand again as Fox straightens his mask.
“Hit me again, and I’ll turn the pack against you,” Fox threatens, his voice turning as sharp and deadly as a blade. “And you know that I could. I know all your dirty secrets, Wolf, remember? Lay a hand on me, and the entire country will learn that you’re a traitor to your people.”
“They’re not my people!” Wolf growls, before his fingers ball into a fist and he recovers his control. “Apologies, old friend.” Wolf stresses the last words, forcing a smile on his face. “Do what you can to save my brother; he is still useful to me.”
“I will, as always,” Fox replies coldly. Hesitating long enough to show his own strength, Fox waits until Wolf walks away before returning to Cyrus’s wounds. Pinching the shoulder skin open, he prods the surface in an effort to find the missing shard. “It’s deep, probably stuck in the bone,” he explains to Cyrus’s unconscious body as he pulls a pair of tweezers from his kit. “I figure that since there’s already metal in you, these tweezers won’t cause any more damage. Hell, it might even kill you, and I think that you’d find death to be
