The Duelist 3, page 31
“Ch-ch-ch-hsssssss!”
“Oh, fuck, we got company,” I said as the sound of the junk-spiders could be heard racing through the stacks of books.
“That makes no sense,” Anwaar panted as she leaned heavily on Horus. “They should have gone dormant once we were out of the area.”
“I’ve stopped trying to make sense out of this funhouse,” I said and darted my gaze around for an exit that wasn’t either crawling in fire or back in the direction of trash-spiders. “Horus, we need an exit!”
“Booorrrrrrkkkk!” The Creature roared as it recovered from the explosive Tovish threw at it, and Roofus attacked it again with a fury I didn’t think was possible from the little beast.
“Skrrrraaaaaaaawwwww!” the gold-seeker screamed out his little battle cry and then did the most Metal thing I’d ever seen.
First, Roofus flew behind the Creature’s head and ripped the bolt straight out of its freaking eyeball with all four fuzzy moth-paws.
When the hellbeast lashed its head back with a pained wail, the crow-moth was waiting in the perfect position to drive the bolt down through its alligator-like muzzle. The bolt skewered the Creature’s mouth closed, and the shock of not being able to get it back open caused the Creature to lose its focus on its awkward flight, and it came diving toward us like the fucking Hindenburg.
“Everyone, down!” I bellowed and threw my body over Amaya’s as the hellbeast flew over our heads and smashed through the library’s wall.
“We got our exit, chief!” Horus yelled as we all picked ourselves up off the floor now covered in chunks of book and shelf alike.
“Let’s go!” I shouted and guided Amaya toward the hole that led out into the corridor with my arm over her head in case there was more falling debris.
“Roofus?” Tovish called out and scrambled across the floor to reach a tuft of yellow feathers trapped under a large tome laying open face-down.
“Kt-kt-kt,” the crow-moth clicked weakly.
“Help me!” The koala-elder struggled to lift the huge slab of book off the poor gold-seeker.
“Jenner, take Amaya!” I ordered and jumped back through the hole in the wall in order to help the old archivist.
“Ch-ch-ch-hsssssss!” The trash-spiders hissed, and the first of them made their appearance at the tops of the towering book columns.
“Come, on!” I grunted as I heaved the book off poor Roofus. The thing was similar to flipping over a tractor tire, and it was a wonder the little guy wasn’t completely pulverized.
Tovish wasted no time in bundling up the stunned crow-moth, and we both backed away when one of the junk-spiders lunged at us.
“Run, boy!” the koala-elder yelled as I sprinted past him. His poor peg-leg just couldn’t keep up, so I doubled back and snatched him up by the back of his suspenders in order to basically toss him out of the library.
“The hellbeast destroyed the stairs!” Amaya caught my hand and prevented me from taking one step too many on my way toward the lower level.
I coughed as I waved my hand to clear the cloud of smoke and let the oryx-woman lead us to the right where Horus and Anwaar were already half-running, half-limping toward the stairs to the upper floors.
“Boooorrrrrkkkk!” the hellbeast wailed as it flew straight up the conical shaft of The Aerie and directly toward the ovular skylight overhead.
“Everyone, against the wall, now!” I commanded. “Horus!”
The falcon-man copied my posture, and the two of us braced our hands on the wall and used our bodies as a shield right as the Creature busted through the glass ceiling.
Since the Aerie boasted a curved design similar to a cone or a bowl, most of the lethal shards of glass missed us and fell to the floor below.
“Hrrrrreeeeeek!” Inhuman shrieks sounded as the glass destroyed more of the junk-spiders still hounding us.
“Is it just me, or are there more of those than before?” I nearly shouted over the still raining glass.
“It would make sense if Archus left the trap enchantment over the entire Aerie instead of just the library like I first thought,” Anwaar said in a thready voice as she shuddered under her sister’s arm.
“That limits our options of getting out of here,” I said and pushed myself away from the wall when the cascade of skylight shards finally stopped.
“Down to one, precisely,” Horus said as he glanced over the banister.
When I sidled up next to him, I could see what he meant.
At first glance, it looked as if the ground floor was roiling like the ocean, but when I stared harder, I could see how it was actually writhing with thousands of junk-spiders as if the horde had multiplied somehow.
I knew it wouldn’t be long before they regrouped after the chaos and came after us.
“Up it is, now climb!” I barked when it was apparent we only had one exit.
“Up?” Jenner exclaimed as he helped Tovish and Roofus hurry along. “Where do we go once we reach the top?”
“I haven’t planned ahead that far yet,” I said as I pulled my sword free.
“Alex, try as hard as you can to make a connection with Prosper,” Amaya suggested and put her hand back in mine as we ran ever upwards.
“I haven’t tried this far away before,” I said.
“I’ll help you, just try to focus on your bond,” she said, and her hand started to glow with warmth.
Focus.
Easier said than done when I had the overwhelming sense of dread bearing down on me. The best way I could describe it was to compare it to the icy/shivery feeling I used to get whenever I had to go down in the root cellar at the farm. I was convinced that as long as I didn’t look back and ran as fast as possible up the stairs, whatever monster was breathing down my neck wouldn’t get me.
Only this time the monsters were definitely real.
But no problem.
I could do this even if I did feel like an idiot yelling Prosper’s name over and over inside my head.
“It’s not working!” I yelled as our whole party careened around another corner like something out of The Breakfast Club.
If The Breakfast Club had actually set fucking fire to their library after unleashing an Unholy Tide of hellbeasts and cursed swap-meet garbage.
“Think about the bond!” Amaya shot back.
“Hss-ss-ss-sch-rrrreeeeekkk!” The sickening chittering of the spider-horde was almost deafening, and my veins iced over.
Don’t look back, holy fuck.
“Bond, bond, think of the bond,” I chanted to myself. “Nothing’s coming to mind!”
“Think about the first time you flew together as a team,” Amaya said and swooped down to pick up a lagging Tovish around the waist without breaking a single stride.
Her strength and stamina were impressive, especially because she was still in her low-cut white Handmaid’s dress.
I realized distantly this was not the time, but like.
She was hot.
“Alex,” she said.
“Sorry!” I said as I hauled us down a corridor and over a bridge that cut across The Aerie as a whole.
A narrow bridge.
Without handrails.
Awesome.
“Asher Alex,” Tovish said from his place on Amaya’s back.
“Not now, Mr. Tovish,” I grunted as I tried to beat my brain into submission so I could walkie-talkie Prosper while simultaneously not-falling to my death.
“I know you are trying to concentrate, but I would like to point out the next bridge appears to be destroyed,” the koala-elder said in a mild-mannered way as he pointed up at said destroyed bridge.
“Fuck me,” I grumbled. “We’ll cross that bridge when we… cross that bridge.”
“Indeed,” he said in an amused tone, and I got the impression this was all novel for him like he was on an amusement park ride and not running from Satan’s Lil’ Stocking Stuffers a.k.a. demon junk-spiders.
Crazy bastard.
There was nothing for it, and after we all crossed the bridge safely, I dug my heels in and willed the canterfly to hear me with all my might, Archus be damned.
Prosper!
Is a person? My person. My Alex-person! A voice that sounded like a combination of Jar-Jar Binx and Dug from Up popped into my head, and I almost swallowed my own tongue.
Buddy? Is that you?
Is Prosper! the canterfly beamed directly into my brain as if I was picking up Prosper FM.
This was wild.
“I can hear him talk!” I gasped to the oryx-woman, and she smiled her moonlight smile.
“Of course, you can,” she said in that unassuming sage-like way. “Everything living has a voice.”
I couldn’t help but laugh a little giddily at this, and then I reached for the connection again that felt similar to Prosper’s leather reins. The bond was supple and familiar, and when I metaphorically tugged on it, I could feel an answering tug I figured meant he was listening.
Props, listen, we need your help. I projected a mental picture of The Aerie and zoomed in on the upper lip of the structure carved into the jagged mountain face. Can you meet us topside? We need a hasty exit.
Can helps! Bring Victory, too! Prosper said. Hold on!
“Prosper and Victory are on their way,” I shouted ahead at Horus, who now had the ibex-woman on his back like Tovish was on Amaya’s. “We need to get to the highest point of this place so they can air-lift us out of here.”
“Can do, chief,” the falcon-man panted. “However, what are we going to do about that?”
The time had come to deal with the second bridge, and we all screeched to a halt.
“Can we jump it?” I asked, but when I got closer, I could see how impossible that was.
“Not likely,” Horus said and pulled a flagging Anwaar higher up on his back.
“Tobiiiiiaaaas!” Jenner’s voice suddenly screamed out, and all of us turned in time to see him struggle with the bundled up Roofus as Tovish sprint-hobbled toward the right.
“Kaw! Kaw! Kaw!” the crow-moth wailed and tried as hard as he could to break free and fly to his owner, who was now just a white big-eared streak bee-lining for the large column holding up the ceiling.
“What is he doing?” I gasped, but before I could go toward the koala-elder, Jenner grabbed me as he was running by.
“Hurry, back to the corridor!” he ordered. “We have to take cover!”
“Take cover from what?” I yelled and watched Tovish stop at the base of the column, shuck off his wooden leg, and then brandish the metal cuff that kept his prosthetic appendage attached.
His behavior was odd, and I stopped once more.
“Alex, we must get to the corridor!” Jenner urged me again.
“But what is he doing?” I asked.
“The old fool is planning on making a bridge by blowing up that column,” Jenner barked. “Apparently, someone learned a thing or two about explosives and magic just as much as his employer.”
“What? No way, he can’t do that!” I said and started to run toward him.
“Listen to me!” Jenner launched himself around my legs and physically prevented me from moving. “There’s no other way, lad.”
“No!” I said and tried to take a step. “There’s got to be another option. Tovish!”
The old man stopped in the middle of closing the cuff shut, smiled at me, and then thumped his right fist over his heart.
“Alex!” Jenner yanked me to the floor right as Tovish snapped the cuff shut.
The resulting explosion was incredible, and the force of it knocked both of us off our feet and caused the spider-horde to shriek and howl.
A rumbling cracking noise vibrated the ground, and Jenner and I hurried to help each other to our feet so we could move out of the way from falling debris. The giant stone structure hung in mid-air for a split second before it broke off the ceiling like a stalactite and arched forward.
The koala-man and I ran back to the others where the corridor ended and watched how the column took out the remainder of the bridge. Then the massive structure rolled slightly before it wedged itself like a toothpick caught in the gullet of The Aerie.
“What happened?” the falcon-man asked as he climbed to his feet and took stock of everyone. “Where is Tovish?”
“He just--” I clenched my jaw and then kicked a piece of rubble away from me as hard as I could. “Why did he do that, Jenner? Why did he just make that decision without even saying anything? What gave him that right?”
“He said you’d be mad,” Jenner said with a sad smile.
“Yeah, no shit,” I growled and looked around for something else to kick.
“As to the answer to your question,” he continued and stopped me from my pacing by tugging me down to his level. “Listen very carefully because these words are his last, and he used them on you.”
I blinked and cast my eyes down, but I forced them back up again.
“I’m listening,” I said.
“Tobias knew you would be angry at his decision because you are the type of person who has a hard time accepting the truth of the matter. You cannot save everyone, lad, but the simple fact you try is what makes you a Duelist actually worth his status.”
“He said that?” I huffed around the tightness in my throat. “He hates Duelists.”
“High praise indeed.” Jenner smiled and patted my cheek. “He also said you are what Ashers were always meant to be, and he told me it is up to you to save Aventoll from the Darkness.”
I swallowed hard as I looked out at the bridge my friend sacrificed himself for and then got to my feet.
“Then we’d better do Old Tovish right by getting out of here so we can fight another day,” I said, and the words weighed almost as much as my heart. “Let’s go.”
“Are you alright, chief?” the falcon-man asked.
“Yeah,” I sighed and marched forward with determination. “We have to keep going.”
Alex-person? Prosper tugged on the reins of our bond as we all raced across the makeshift bridge. Alright?
Hey, buddy. I’m fine.
But… sad? the canterfly ventured.
I’ll be okay. We’re almost there, are you ready?
Is! my noble steed confirmed. Also bring Gelf.
Gelf?
There was no answer to my last mental question, and I figured I would just have to find out who or what this mysterious “Gelf” was at a later time as the remaining five of us crossed the bridge Tovish made.
“We’re almost there,” Horus said as he adjusted his grip on the ibex-woman now cradled in his arms.
It was worrying how now she seemed on the verge of completely passing out, and I forced myself to push harder so we could widen the gap between us and the spider-horde before it had a chance to reassemble.
When we all finally made it outside of The Aerie, the silhouettes of Prosper and Victory came with a sense of relief-tinged bittersweet with the loss of Tovish.
Shortly after we took off, it was by the unanimous and unspoken decision that we landed on a small plateau for a moment of silence.
I dismounted and walked toward the plateau with my arms crossed over my chest, and the distant screams of the spider-horde ricocheted off the sheer jagged cliffs as the mindless trash-monsters threw themselves off The Aerie.
I didn’t know if it was poetic or not, only that I felt a little empty inside.
“Most of us don’t choose when or how we die.” The oryx-woman came up behind me and pressed her forehead into my back right between my shoulders. “But Tovish did. He chose when to meet the Goddess, and he has met Her in the most Noblest of Halls.”
“Somehow, that’s comforting,” I said after I mulled over that odd wisdom of hers. “In an existential way. I think. Or like in ‘there’s hope left in Pandora’s Box’ sort of way…”
“Alex,” she stopped me before I could get all Existential.
“Hm?” I said and tried to pull together my scattered thoughts.
“What I mean to say is… I’m so sorry about your friend,” she said with a small sob in the back of her throat, and I whipped around right as she threw herself into my arms.
“Amaya…” I breathed and cupped the back of her head as she nudged her forehead into mine.
I closed my eyes when her hand came to cup my cheek, and I sighed when I sensed the distinct mingling of our spirits if that’s what it was.
That weird to Know and be Known thing that surrounded me like a warm blanket straight from the dryer.
That scattering of breadcrumbs in the sunlight.
“You must forgive me,” the enigmatic oryx-woman whispered and reverently stroked my cheekbone with her thumb. “I can’t help myself.”
“Nothing to forgive,” I said and took her hand in mine so I could place a kiss on the back of her hand. “How is your sister?”
“She needs rest, but she should be okay,” she said, and we both turned toward the rest of our crew and quietly observed them.
They were all taking this much-needed breather either apart or together to reflect in their own way.
Anwaar was sitting on a mossy log while Horus pretended he wasn’t hovering when he totally was.
It was kind of a cute sight.
For one, he had draped his own travel cloak around her shoulders and stood off to the side ostensibly as a lookout, but from here it was transparently obvious the only person he was looking out for was the ibex-woman.
And then there was Jenner, who was sitting rigidly on the extended saddle seat and absently petting the battered gold-seeker as he gazed out at the valley without really seeing.
“We should go,” I said with a pang in my heart, and I turned back to the oryx-woman where I felt soothed and held by her calm gray-morning gaze. She had a long black feather twisted around one of her flaxen curls, and I gently pulled it free with a grin that was a Solid Besotted on a scale between Smitten and Totally Gonzo.
Amaya blushed and then took the feather from me and twirled it between her fingers.
“Ah!” she abruptly gasped and dropped the feather.
“What is it?” I asked as I watched the feather float innocently to the ground. “What’s wrong?”
