08

Sam shut the door to her room, wincing at the loud creak. Trainees were not supposed to be out of bed at this hour. Tristan had never specified the punishment for breaking curfew, but she doubted it would be good. “Maybe we should wake Tristan,” she whispered. “He'd know what to do.”

“We don't have time to convince him the threat is real,” said Braeden.

“Why wouldn't he believe you?”

“Why should he?”

Sam had no answer to that. “Braeden--” she started. He put his finger to his lips.

Tristan wrenched his door open, wearing a dark scowl. “What do you two think you're doing?”

Braeden shot her a reproachful glance—she hadn't been that loud—and then swept a bow. “Please accept my apologies, Paladin Lyons, but you’ll have to save our dressing-down for another time.” He gripped Sam's shoulder. “Are you coming?”

Sam turned to face Tristan fully, prepared to explain herself, but her mind went blank.

“What’s with the red face, boy?” Tristan asked.

Gods, her blush must be bad if he could see it in this light. “Y-y-your clothes, Paladin,” she stammered. “You aren’t wearing any.” He'd left his room dressed only in his smallclothes.

Tristan looked down, noting the truth of Sam’s words. “Surely you’ve seen a man in his smallclothes before?”

No, she hadn't. “Y-yes, Paladin.”

“Never mind what I’m wearing or not wearing--why are you two out of bed after hours?” he demanded.

“Demons, Paladin,” said Braeden. “They’re in the keep.”

Tristan folded his arms over his chest. “Where is your proof?”

Braeden's gaze flicked to her, as if to say I-told-you-so, and then he pushed up his right sleeve, revealing a sinewy, well-muscled arm. Inked across his shoulder was the roaring head of a lion with a forked, serpentine tongue lolling out of its mouth. Its fur-and-scale mottled torso curled around Braeden’s triceps, and three thick, foxlike tails sprung from its back and wound around his forearm to his wrist. But it wasn’t the design of the fearsome tattoo that monopolized her attention.

The circulation of Braeden’s blood was a visible thing: his blue veins stood out against the thin skin of his arms, and as his blood ebbed and flowed, his skin rose and receded like the waves of the ocean. The tattoo seemed to come alive, its body riding the currents of his skin.

“Their blood calls out to mine,” said Braeden. “When they’re near, my blood responds like this.”

Tristan stared at the undulating skin. “Let’s say you’re right,” he said, with frank disbelief. “Say demons are in The Center. You thought to take them on yourselves? Two untested trainees with half a brain between them?”

Sam opened her mouth to retort, but Braeden silenced her with a slight jerk of his head. “We haven’t the time to worry about protocol or niceties. You can join us or punish us on the morrow.”

Tristan swore under his breath. “Fine,” he grumbled. “Let me get dressed, and then I will escort you to the front lobby. And when there are no demons, I will escort you back to your room, where you will remain for the rest of the night. Are we agreed?”

“Aye,” said Braeden.

“Aye, Paladin,” she echoed.

The front lobby was eerily quiet. Warped black shadows slithered across the room, and the silver light of the moon glimmered through the cut glass of the gothic windows.

“I don’t see anything,” she whispered.

“They’re here,” said Braeden.

The skepticism faded from Tristan's face. “Be on guard, lads.”

“Paladin, with your permission, I’ll draw them out of hiding,” said Braeden. Tristan nodded his assent.

Braeden ran the tip of his knife along the inside of his arm, pressing just hard enough to break the skin. Blood welled from the cut and trickled vertically to his fingers before splashing onto the pale cream of the tiled floor.

“They can’t resist the lure of blood,” Braeden explained when she and Tristan looked at him questioningly. “Not even one of their own.” He let a few more drops of blood spill from his veins, before ripping a strip of cloth from his robes, wrapping it efficiently around his wound. For a moment, nothing happened; only their uneven breaths and the slight rustle of fabric interrupted the quiet of the night.

Two scarlet spheres winked into existence at the rear of the room, backlit by an infernal glow. Sam sucked in a gulp of air.

“First demon?” Tristan asked softly.

Sam shook her head. “Second.”

“It’s just the one. I can deal with it my--” Tristan shut up as a second pair of red orbs joined the first, followed by a third. “Alright, let’s split. Sam, you take the one on the left, I’ve got the one in the middle, and Braeden, you take the right.”

Braeden held up a hand. “Wait.”

A fourth and a fifth set of eyes appeared, followed by a sixth and a seventh…Sam stopped counting as a sea of red swept across the lobby. How many were there? Certainly more than one full Paladin and two trainees were meant to handle on their own. Her heart skipped a beat.

“Sam, light the lamp to your left,” Tristan ordered, pressing flint into her hand. “Move!” Startled out of her trance, she turned her attention to the ensconced fixture on the nearest wall. Light flooded the antechamber. Sam was grateful for the reprieve from darkness...until she got a proper glimpse of their intruders.

It was as though the demons had taken the symmetric beauty of nature and turned it on its face. The head of a rabid bear, its muzzle covered with white froth, connected to the long neck of a spotted giraffe, which in turn, descended into the squat, scaled body of an alligator. A giant five-headed cobra balanced on a single coiled tail, flicking out its five tongues rhythmically.

Tristan shuddered. “I loathe snakes.” The almighty Tristan Lyons feared something? In spite of her own mounting fear, Sam smiled. Even heroes had their weaknesses.

Some of the creatures were perversions of the human race: a jackal crawled about on human hands and knees, its fur giving way to pale skin where its neck met shoulders. Others stood upright with the bodies of men, limp flesh dangling obscenely between their thighs. But atop their thin necks were the heads of animals, some as commonplace as a cat or dog, some didn't exist outside man’s imagination.

“What do we do now?” she asked, a slight quiver betraying her nervousness.

“We fight,” said Tristan grimly. “And we pray.” The demons edged closer, sniffing the air, lured into the light by the seductive smell of Braeden’s blood.

“No plan?” Sam asked.

“Don’t die,” said Tristan, and with a battle cry, sprinted into the throng of demons.

She watched with a mixture of awe and dread as Tristan carved his way through demon after demon. He was beautiful to watch, a whirlwind of man and sword, blood spraying in a never-ending spiral as he moved.