“Soon,” a voice called ahead. “Fucking creeps, though. Glad we’re leaving this shit hole.” Erec crouched with the rest of the group. The voices weren’t far away. A hatchet in his hand as they pushed aside books to glimpse their targets.
Not that it was hard. Seven-Snakes didn’t have the same level of caution. He couldn’t know there were people tracking him through the maze, either. They’d snatched some of the floating candles from above and used them as a source of light. But Colin’s ‘pathway’ wasn’t as accurate as they hoped.
From what Erec and the rest of the group could tell, Seven-Snakes was three rows over. Close enough to follow and hear, but until the maze intersected, if it did at all, they were out of range.
Climbing through the shelves in Armor was out of the question. And Erec doubted Boldwick wanted them to go into a battle without it against untested targets.
“Hard to tell their numbers…” Rochester mumbled, his voice loud enough for the clustered group to hear, but quiet enough for their enemies not to perceive.
It was hard to make out how many of them there were this far away. Combined with unreliable lighting and two sets of shelves blocking the line of sight…
“Enide, do the thing,” Rochester said.
“What?” Boldwick asked.
“Shhh,” Rochester waved him off.
Erec’s gaze shot over to where Enide last was; shortly behind him. The girl had been looking for different opportunities to mess with him. But she was gone. This was the moment she’d been waiting for the whole time. In an instant, he knew…
“I didn’t authorize anything,” Boldwick argued.
“Yes, yes. You’re also not the ones charged with capturing these snakes. Sir Boldwick, I mean no disrespect, as you’ve gotten us to where we need to be and I hope have made good friends. But I didn’t set out into the wasteland counting on the help of Knights. You’ll have issues with these barriers, no? We will not, and I will not risk Seven-Snakes hearing a wrong step with us tailing him forever, and then escaping us.”
“So you’re taking over?” Boldwick stared the man down, and for once, Rochester didn’t withdraw. The ink all across the Pendragon leader’s skin crawled, twisting as he met the Knight’s gaze.
A smile flashed across Rochester’s face. “I’m saying that for this, we’re fine to work the way we have for years before we’ve met your Knights, and how we shall be once we part ways. Understandable? You will stay here, and we’ll go get our bounty.”
Boldwick went silent. The Pendragons were already shoving aside books and clearing space through the shelves. Erec couldn’t spot Enide at all, which gave him a sinking feeling in his gut. Gone, like a gust of wind on the words of her leader. All of them were reacting to what Rochester told them—it shouldn’t be surprising, since the Pendragons weren’t beholden to the Knights, but the dramatic shift was unwelcome.
“Find her,” Erec whispered to VAL.
[I’ll do my best. You know, I’ve been trying to determine her exact method of doing that. Something about it rings familiar. For now, though, we’ve yet to detect her.]
It was easy when it was him giving his life to slay a horde of machines. Every time it was him on the front lines, there wasn’t a worry in him. But when he thought of Enide fighting—or even when Garin or Colin put themselves at risk, that same bit of him twisted up. If they had to fight, he wanted to be at their sides, to kill the biggest threat out there. There wasn’t any way Boldwick would let this stand. He’d tell off Rochester and get involved, Erec was sure of it.
“Very well.” Boldwick pulled back, setting his hands behind his back. “If you have need of us, we will attempt to reinforce.”
“Appreciated, friend.” With that, Rochester took a great effort to push aside a row of books. Their covers squirmed, and some pages rustled, but the book monster hidden among the rest of the texts provided little a fight. Rochester and his Pendragons soon had enough clearance to crawl through.
Erec stared at Boldwick for a full couple of seconds with the rest of the Knights left behind on this mission.
In disbelief, Erec rushed to the shelf as the leader of the Pendragons crept through—way too narrow to make work. He tested the sturdiness of the wood, pushing down on it. But it didn’t bend as solid as the steel on his back. Which meant, for as much as it was worth, this shelf was as good as iron bars. A mystery for another time, but endlessly aggravating.
Beyond the shelves, the talking continued, as did the swaying light. In the shadows, Erec barely made out the Pendragons, creeping up to the next shelf to make more gaps to sneak through, which provided a bit more vision of the battle. Yet, he still couldn’t find Enide.
“We can’t let them do this alone,” Erec argued, as Boldwick stood next to him to watch.
“They send us ahead when we’re the right tool for the job. But ultimately, we can’t do everything for these people. They love freedom; how do you think they’d react if you tried to strip them of that?” Boldwick asked, shaking his head. “We will assist with magic if things spiral out of control. Short of getting out of our Armor and joining them in this ambush, we’re not in a position to bring this fight to a close.”
“So what? We just sit back?”
“And watch, that’s exactly what we do.” Boldwick nodded, leaning down and staring through the crack in the bookshelf. “Recognizing your weaknesses is a vital part of being a Knight. As much benefit as our Armor brings, there are situations it can limit your options.”
Watching. How horrible. Erec shivered and leaned forward. His hatchet sat on the wood. As the Pendragons progressed and more gaps cleared, he got his first sight of their targets.
Seven-Snakes led a motley crew of about twenty men and women. All of them wore various states of distressed garb and seemed rather relaxed, despite the setting. Most of them had guns, a few had makeshift melee weapons, yet none had any significant Armor. Whether that was typical for the wasteland, or they saw no point. It was impossible to say.
But soon enough, he spotted Seven-Snakes.
Not much had changed about the man since now, and the last time Erec had the displeasure of running into him. He wore the same ratty hair and had an infuriating, smug smirk on his face. Undeniably, all the thugs were deferring to him, and he appeared to be pushing along with the girl from the sewers that Erec remembered. She had her head bowed, a candle in her grip, as she led them through the dark library. She appeared to move with purpose, which was counterintuitive to the maze. Maybe, like Colin, she could see something the rest of them couldn’t.
Erec felt the embers of Fury catch at the sight. Not long ago, Seven-Snakes dragged him through the sewer and tried to bargain him away to Boldwick during a time of crisis.
It was disgraceful. He seemed so weak now, yet Erec couldn’t reach him and show him how much he’d grown. Separated by this frustrating bookshelf, and orders.
Was this how others felt around him on the battlefield?
Where the fuck was Enide?
Gunfire. The thugs began to shoot, bullets flew, and they yelled in shock and surprise. Erec’s gaze darted around, trying to find the source.
Enide twisted around in the middle of the air, jumping from one of the shelves. She levied her las-rifle and blasted it through one of the thug’s arms. Hardly a second later, someone took aim and fired, right as she got her feet on solid ground, but she didn’t wait, dashing forward along the shelf at an impossible speed. Her outline blurred and the bullet that should’ve shot through her back twisted off course.
Then she vanished again.
Only to reappear behind her would-be-shooter, blasting a hole right through his head.
The poor bastard slumped to the ground, half of his face missing, with his brain sloshed out of the hole. Enide wasn’t done with him. She grabbed the body and threw it between her and another bullet, before leaping backward; once more displacing the air and then vanishing.
It wasn’t like Soren’s, her Talent was better. Unlike a misdirection, Enide had some form of teleportation. But not how he expected. The ease with which she did so, and how she had to shift her momentum to vanish, likely meant something.
She twisted, vanished, shot, killed, and only moved faster each time.
With every ‘vanish’ she came back more precise and took more Rifts. Erec watched her leap off the shoulders of one, nick their gun, and then shoot another thug in the gut. Simultaneously, she tossed her sidearm through the air, then reappeared right before it hit the ground, rolling and shooting someone.
Were it not for Q.A.P. Erec wouldn’t have been able to track her rush through the battle as the pace only increased.
And to cope with fighting her, the entire group of thugs focused on taking her down, trying to predict her movements, but… She was only a distraction. They didn’t notice the rest of the Pendragons close in next to them, pushing free books to take aim through the shelf. It wasn’t apparent that Enide wasn’t alone until the Pendragons fired. Suddenly, not only were they dealing with a deadly girl moving too fast to counter, but they had to survive a sudden firing line.
Seven-Snakes was on the tail end of the fight. The girl he’d captured dived to the ground for cover.
Some of the wiser thugs followed suit, throwing themselves low and their weapons away. A sign of defeat as they tried to surrender what had revealed itself to be an outright slaughter of an ambush.
The Pendragons wouldn’t need help. They’d secured victory without the Knights.
But they hadn’t captured their target. Seven-Snakes took a few steps backward, his legs sinking into the ground, until he disappeared, consumed into the shadows.
Erec took off; ignoring Boldwick and asking what he was doing. Seven-Snakes would resurface. And he’d do it somewhere where he could understand the Pendragons. With each step, more of Fury poured through Erec. His instincts pulled him down the tunnel, slamming books free from the case to see.
Until he saw it. A rising body from the darkness. Seven-Snakes had reappeared down the way from the Pendragons and leveled his gun to fire.
Erec shoved more books aside, and flung his hatchet through the space in the shelves, hoping that with enough power, he might stop him from killing someone.
Enide appeared as the hatchet spun through the cases, grabbing the weapon out of the middle of the air, and giving Erec a wink. She vanished.
Seven-Snake’s finger was on the trigger. Yet as the gun discharged, the barrel flew wide. Enide’s foot collided with the weapon, having reappeared with a kick—she turned as she moved, taking Erec’s hatchet and slamming it into Seven-Snakes’ gun arm, causing him to drop the revolver and cry out in shock and pain.
Already his bottom half was merging with the shadows again. This was where he’d run for good.
Enide jerked the hatchet out and then smashed the back of the weapon into his head. With a crack, Seven-Snakes hit the ground, his eyes glazing over. Enide leaped on top of him, pulling out a pair of manacles that glowed with glyph-work and securing them on the man’s wrists.
With that, she’d ended the fight. There was still gunfire as the Pendragons took out the thugs still trying to fight back, but soon enough, they were going through the shelf to secure their targets.
It was over.
Erec let out a sigh of relief, watching Enide toy with his hatchet. She gave it a spin in her hand, tilting her head as she did so. It left Erec wondering. If the two of them were to fight, who would win? Would he even be able to hit her? Not even the Q.A.P. could predict where she appeared.