Rise of the Death Dealer (49 page)

THE WILD PLACE

G
ath, crouching below the auction block, stared up into the sharkman’s cold
death eyes and snarled. His muscles swelled, and his burnished flesh pulled over
bone and cartilage. Every sinew and nerve told him that he finally stood at the
threshold of that world he searched for, and that Baskt held the key.

A smile gathered on his face, surfacing as naturally and inevitably as blood
rising in a new wound. It was raucous and untamed, and he realized that there
was humor lurking in this world he hungered for. But no mercy, no kindness, no
sentiment and no glory, honor or justice. Here the only redemption was the
laughter of the strong.

He laughed, low in his throat, and ground his booted feet into the soil,
holding the earth between his legs as instinctively as the wings of the hawk
hold the wind. His arms hung beside him, loose and dangerous, and his hand held
his axe with the same assurance as his arm carried the hand.

There was suddenly no hurry. They were sharing that momentary, menacing truce
that rises between beasts of prey when they confront each other.

He lowered his weight to one knee and reached back blindly for Robin, keeping
his eyes on the center of Baskt’s balance. Feeling her warm bare arm, and her
body stirring under it, he asked, “Are you hurt?”

“No,” she said breathlessly, “it’s nothing.” He felt her small hands surround
his biceps and tug on it as she pulled herself to her knees. Her breath was hot
on his naked shoulder. “Why… why is he here? How did he know?”

“I don’t know,” Gath said, still watching the sharkman. “It does not matter
now. Go to Brown John. Quickly!”

“All right,” she said. But her hands hesitated, and one touched the hair of
his unprotected head. “But…”

“Go,” he interrupted harshly. “I cannot risk wearing it.”

Her fingers trembled against his arm, telling him she knew he took the risk
for her, and he felt her lips press into his shoulder. Then they were gone, and
the sound of her bare feet danced through the silence. He rose slowly, his eyes
and senses measuring the fighting ground, the direction of the sunlight, the
bystanders.

The slavers had backed away from the auction block to avoid any bit of gore
accidentally thrown up by the impending battle, but not so far that they might
miss it. The bat soldiers had come down from their rocks and were perched on
nearby boulders with their furry heads just above the smoky drifts. Brown John
had carried the unconscious bleeding Jakar to the wagon, and Robin now joined
him there, helping the
bukko
load him aboard.

Gath sensed Cobra standing beside his stallion behind him, then he heard her.

“I’m here,” she said, a ring of desperation in her voice that was almost
childishly afraid. “I have the helmet.”

He shook his head, once, telling her he did not want it. She pleaded, “You
must.”

By way of reply, he took one stride forward and jumped onto the auction
block, landing about ten feet away from the demon spawn. The sharkman betrayed
no reaction.

Gath’s body was cocked for balance but relaxed. That primordial patience
which is the immaculate grace of the hunting animal was flowing through his
blood. But he saw no patience in Baskt’s eyes, only bravado.

The creature, with noisy growling, two-handed the hilt of his broadsword,
whipping it sideways, and the sheath flew off flamboyantly, clattering against
the side of the wagon. Before it had time to land on the auction block, he
rushed forward, delivering successive overhand blows.

Gath deftly deflected both with the blade of his axe, and his eyes turned red
with inner fire, drawing excited gasps of exclamation from the onlookers.

Gath did not hear them. He was at work, charging Baskt with his hands spread
wide at the extremities of the axe handle, holding it horizontally like a
quarterstaff. The handle took Baskt across the chest and drove him against the
side of the wagon. Both demon and wagon groaned in complaint, and the sounds
encouraged Gath. Applying pressure, he slowly forced the sharp blade of the axe
toward the sharkman’s shoulder.

Suddenly the demon spawn’s body convulsed, like a whip of solid muscle. The
spasm culminated at his chest, which acted like a hammer, and drove the axe
handle back into Gath’s throat. The impact sent the Barbarian staggering
backward, gagging for air.

Baskt followed not far behind, leading with his face in the manner of a
shark, jaws agape, and raising his sword high over his head.

Gath dropped to a knee, wheezing and clinging to his axe, and saw armored
legs driving for him. Staying low, he instinctively shortened his grip on the
axe and dove forward, turning sideways in mid-air. His hip took out one leg, his
elbow the other. Baskt flew forward over the Barbarian’s body. Gath’s hip hit
the stone block, and he thrust his axe up at the demon’s descending belly.

Baskt twisted fluidly in mid-air, like a fish in water, writhing away from
the blow. The axe sliced across his belly armor, removed several plates, leaving
smears of blood across his chest, and continued harmlessly into the air.

When Gath rolled upright, Baskt was on his feet facing him. His heaving belly
had already stopped bleeding, and the bluish-white sheen of new growth was
rising where the armor plates had been, replacing them.

There were hoots of approval and grim laughter among the slavers, and groans
came from Gath’s comrades.

Gath considered briefly the fact that the demon’s armor replaced itself,
giving it the respect it deserved, then began a search for the Lord of
Destruction’s weakness. He worked the sharkman around until a shaft of sunlight
penetrating the gathering clouds was in his eyes, and tinted membrane descended
from the demon spawn’s lids, to cut the glare. No advantage there. Gath then
retreated until Baskt was working with the side of the wagon on his right. It
should have cramped his right-handed swing. But Baskt took no notice of the
wagon’s presence, his sword cutting through the wood as if it were butter. He
tried other tactics, but the sharkman was oblivious to all of them, and Gath
went on the defensive.

As he blocked and dodged and ducked, his blood began to boil in his veins,
and the red glow in his eyes grew brighter and brighter. Pain began to burn his
flesh inside out. It ate into his brain, but brought no new tactic to mind, only
rage and more pain.

They continued to work.

Sparks showered their bodies as axe and sword met solidly. High-pitched
tearing howls rent the desert when they sheared across flesh. Gath became
drenched in sweat, and it formed puddles in the depressions of the hard stone
auction block. Baskt began to fume at knee joints and elbows, and an oily slime
surfaced on his fleshlike armor. Its putrid stench of dead fish mixed with the
drifting smoke hanging over the camp, and stung Gath’s nostrils and eyes.

They worked some more, until Gath’s head hung low over his swarthy body. His
pride was squirming and swelling in his gut. Then it spilled out, like a
contagion. It spread into muscle and bone and to the very ends of his skin and
hair, affecting how he stood and moved. It did not straighten him, as normal
pride would. It bent him low, like the proud panther. It seared through nerve
and brain and blood, and keyed itself to the same guttural pitch of the howl
that ripped out of his mouth.

He charged inside the swing of Baskt’s sword, and again caught him across the
chest, holding his axe handle like a quarterstaff, and drove him back against
the side of the wagon. The demon crashed into the splintered wood, and his upper
body crushed through it into the interior of the wagon. Then his fluid body once
more convulsed like a whip.

Gath anticipated the serpentine blow. He let go of the axe handle just as the
demon’s chest was about to hammer him, and grabbed Baskt’s throat, driving the
fingers of both hands under the living neck guard of his helmet. When the blow
came, Gath grunted painfully and flew backward, his arms extending. But his
fingers, half buried in the sharkman’s meat, hung on, and Baskt came flying
after him.

Gath hit the stone block with his naked back. The blade of the axe, which had
dropped between them, turned on impact and caught against a ridge, momentarily
standing upright with the cutting edge exposed. It sheared through Baskt’s
shoulder armor and penetrated the socket before being wrenched free. The demon
dropped his sword, but Gath saw no reaction in his death eyes. This Lord of
Destruction felt no pain.

Baskt lay on top of Gath. His upper jaw was raised and protruding, as if it
were not attached to his skull. Gath held it off with both hands squeezing
Baskt’s throat, and the jaws snapped in front of the Barbarian’s eyes. Two rows
of saw-toothed teeth stood upright in the lower jaw as it swept up to meet the
upper. They collided with enough force to remove a forty-pound bite of castle
wall, but only fed on strands of stray black hair.

Gath, still holding on with both hands, rolled across the stone block, trying
to kick the demon off. But Baskt liked it where he was, and stayed. Still
rolling, one of Gath’s hands dove for his knife. Its fingers closed on the hilt,
and Baskt changed tactics. He wrapped his arms around Gath, pinning the hand
between their bodies, and began to convulse, shaking and snapping.

The spiky protuberances on the sharkman’s armor, like hundreds of small
teeth, raked the Barbarian’s arms, chest and legs. Pain seared into flesh and
spine. He began to roll in his own blood, and the moisture sloshed over his
pinned arm, making it slippery. He pulled hard on the knife, and the blade came
out of its sheath. Gath turned it as they rolled, and used the sharkman’s
convulsing body to help him drive the blade deep into the living belly armor.

Feeling no pain, the demon spawn continued to spasm, and the blade drove in
repeatedly. Blood drained from the wounds, then suddenly erupted in fountains,
and they rolled in that. Locked together. Howling.

The onlookers stared open-mouthed, stunned.

It was at that moment that Gath felt a surge of satisfaction shoot through
him, a sense of fulfillment that spilled over him, coming from all directions.
He was immersed in battle; at the core of the chaos and pain and blood and
howling, and he felt a kinship with this territory as he had felt with no other.
Not in the lair of the wolf, not in the rain forest at the dark of midnight, not
marching at the head of a tramping army. Here death was the only escape, and the
only release. He had found the world he searched for. It was that wild place at
the center of a battle to the death, and he was home.

Thunder rolled in the sky above. The ground below shook. Darkness blotted out
the sky. The sounds of scurrying men and snorting frightened camels and horses
erupted nearby, and a whimpering cry of dread fear. Cobra’s. Then cold wetness
pummeled Gath’s struggling back and legs. Rain. A sudden desert torrent was
descending from dark clouds overhead, and its heavy drops filled the air,
blurring all vision.

Baskt, growling with cold satisfaction, and seeming to take strength from the
downpour, shook with renewed effort, stronger and stronger. The pain of the
hundreds of biting teeth numbed Gath’s mind. His grip weakened, and his knife
was bludgeoned from his hand by the Lord of Destruction’s twisting hip. It
tumbled across the stone and splashed in a puddle of diluted blood.

Baskt glanced at it triumphantly, and their bodies slipped slightly apart.
Gath thrashed for release, tearing at the sharkman’s arm, and it came out of the
shoulder socket. Gath discarded the lifeless arm unconsciously, kicked free and
rolled across the stone, jumping to his feet. Rain pelted his bloody hide and
washed him clean in seconds. But fresh blood came as soon as the old was washed
away, and he teetered weakly in place, his strength ebbing.

Through the sheet of rain, Gath could barely make out Baskt kneeling about
five feet away. His guts were streaming from his stomach, and he was
matter-of-factly stuffing them back inside. The fact that he now had only one
arm and hand made the work slow.

Gath started for him bare-handed. His knee gave way, and he dropped onto all
fours. He pushed up, then staggered backward. He kept at it, fell off the
auction block and splashed in a puddle at its base. He flung himself over onto
his knees, head low and wary. Exhausted. Gasping. The blinding rain obliterated
everything beyond three feet. Its roaring splatter covered all sound.

A softness pressed into his back. The body of a woman. It contrasted so
sharply with the world he now inhabited that the pleasure was sublime,
enervating. He dizzied at it. Then he heard a grunt of hard effort, as if
someone were lifting a weighty object, and Cobra’s arms and upper body fell
heavily against his back. He knew her curves and scent. She was heaving
something toward his head. He reached up, felt the rim of the homed helmet just
as it touched his hair, and stopped it there.

“You must,” she begged. “He’s too strong. He’s getting back up.”

Her voice was frantic, suddenly so void of her normal cunning and subterfuge,
that it confused him, and he thought for a moment it was Robin behind him
instead of Cobra. In that moment he relaxed slightly, and the helmet slid down
over his head, imprisoning him.

He rose instantly, sensing the rush of approaching danger, and darkness and
blood hunger boiled through his body. Here within the confines of the helmet was
a world beyond the wild place. Here battle held no laughter. The last tie with
civilization was broken, and he hungered for the taste of frothing blood on his
lips.

His head snapped up, and directly above him he saw a massive convulsing
darkness dropping out of the rain-filled sky. Baskt.

Gath thrust up with his head through the driving rain, and the horns of the
helmet speared up into the descending belly. The force was such that both horns
and helmet impaled it, the metal sinking into demon flesh until the flaming eyes
of the Death Dealer were washed in blood.