Outlanders 24 equinox ze.., p.25
Outlanders 24 Equinox Zero, page 25
Sif stepped to the edge of the dais and gestured contemptuously toward Brigid, then the others. Stridently she shouted, "Grigori Zakat has mighty plans for a mighty people! If the outer world is overrun by barbarians, he will aid us in bringing the lesser breeds to such a pass that their only hope for survival lies in surrender to Thulian domination!"
Brigid started to speak again, but Wothenjaz cut her off with a raised hand. His attitude was one of weariness, of having heard it all before. "Enough," he proclaimed. "Debate is not our way. Thule has existed for countless centuries bound by our customs and traditions. One of those traditions is that anyone who wishes to wear the helmet of kingship must fight for it, or have his champion do so. Zakat's champion is Sif, and I cannot fight her. I have no champion to fight in my stead."
Brigid inhaled a deep breath. "I think you do."
She glanced questioningly toward Kane, still caught fast in the grip of the Thulians. He nodded curtly.
Chapter 25
Gundrun snapped the manacle around Kane's left wrist and gave the slender chain an experimental tug. She said something and Brigid translated. "Don't be fooled—this chain is as strong as the one that bound Fenris.' "
"Whatever the hell that means," Kane muttered.
Gundrun fed the other end of the chain through an eyelet in the pipe. A Valkyrie on the far side connected the end link to an identical manacle and snapped it around Sirs wrist. She stared at Kane expressionlessly across the fire pit. The venting pipe had been lowered from the ceiling and it was positioned four feet above the cover disk.
Zakat spoke earnestly to Sif, who listened intently, a look of serene detachment on her face. Her long flaxen hair was tied in a single thick braid that hung down her back. She was stripped of her armor, her Valkyrie's finery and wore a dark, close-fitting leather tunic, cinched at the waist by a length of knotted rawhide.
Kane was dressed similarly. The Thulians had insisted on it. He wasn't sure if the mode of garb was traditional for single combat, or because the warriors became suspicious when they couldn't gut him during the melee.
Grant muttered, "Even if you win, it may not change anything. Zakat has a lot of support here."
Kane shrugged. "At the very least we'll delay Zakat dumping all those chemicals down the gullet of the volcano."
"I've been thinking about that," Philboyd announced. "I doubt he'll get the result he's hoping for. More than likely, he'll set off underground explosions that will blow vents in the sides of the cone below the water level. They'll get one hell of a steam bath and probably parboil all of Ultima Thule in the process."
"That's nice to know," Kane drawled. "But we'll still be here and get boiled right along with them."
Philboyd swallowed. "I guess you're right," he replied inanely.
Brigid glanced into Kane's face. Her eyes were ego worried, her expression pinched. "I wish I could be sure what the outcome of this contest will be. If you kill Sif, Wothenjaz is liable to kill you right along with Zakat."
Kane smiled thinly "That possibility occurred to me, but I think he's a man of honor."
Grant pursed his lips, as if he tasted something exceptionally sour. "Wouldn't that be a nice change?"
Wothenjaz lifted his voice above the murmuring throng, shouting, "Kampfen!"
A male warrior and a Valkyrie removed the two sections of the fire-pit cover. Kane felt the intense heat rising out of the well in an almost solid column, like a physical assault.
A man handed Sif a short-handled axe. A Valkyrie pressed a twin to it into Kane's hand. He hefted it, checking its balance. Then Sif gave the chain a terrific yank and Kane catapulted off the floor. He managed to keep his footing, but he staggered on the lip of the pit. He teetered, arms windmilling, squinting away from the orange-and-red glow from below. It was like looking down the throat of Hell.
Sif sprang in, chopping at Kane's head, but it was a feint. The Valkyrie meant to make a swift and shifty fight of it. Kane returned the blow with a cut at Sif’s legs. The woman bounded high, clearing the blade easily and in midair hacked down at Kane's head, meaning to separate it from his shoulders.
He hurled himself to one side and the ax blade chopped into the collar of tiles, slicing one in two. Kane didn't hesitate—he shot out his left leg in a sweeping kick that caught the backs of Sif’s ankles and dumped her over on her back amid a heavy thud and a bellow of outraged surprise.
They struggled to their knees on the rim of the fire pit. The wavering heat waves drew sweat out of both of them. Kane almost felt as if his skin were shriveling under its blast.
Sif swung her ax again in a whistling curve, and Kane's flashed up to meet it. Steel rang together with a painful clash and both blades shattered, flying fragments nicking their flesh and drawing blood.
The Valkyrie gaped at the wooden haft in her hand, then dropped it and reached for Kane's throat. But her arm was numbed by the force of the blow and Kane easily slapped it aside. A fierce jab opened a gash above Sif's eyebrow. Scarlet oozed into her eye, blinding her.
With a screech of fury, Sif tried to exchange punches with Kane, but her flailing fists missed their weaving target or rebounded from his forearms. She hurled herself forward, fingers bent into claws.
Kane caught her wrists, noting fearfully it was like grabbing two bars of tempered steel. They tumbled over the floor, locked in each other's arms. Sif's fingers slipped on Kane's sweat-slick arms, and her grasp was so powerful his skin peeled away in strips as if it were scalded.
Sif drove a fist against his chin, jarring his teeth together. He clutched the braid in her hair and jerked. She shrieked and struck at him again. Unwilling to release his hold on her hair, Kane slid to one side, feeling Sif's fist skim along the side of his face, tearing at his ear. Kane raised his knee, driving it into Sif's belly.
Sif swung again, howling with rage. The mallet-like blow caught Kane on top of the shoulder, briefly numbing his arm. Sif looped the slack of the chain and dropped it over Kane's head, tightening it around his neck. She struggled to rise behind him. Kane knew she intended to garrote him to death, so he heaved back and forth, twisting within the noose of the chain and scraping his flesh raw. He struggled to get to his feet, and for an instant he was nose to nose with the Valkyrie. Only cold, naked fury showed in Sif's eyes. Kane thrust the crown of his head at the woman's face, but she turned her head and caught the blow on the side of her jaw.
Still, Sif bent over backward, over the lip of the pit. Kane was forced to throw himself in the opposite direction to pull her away so she wouldn't drag him down, as well. She fell inside Kane's reach. He threw his left arm out, locking it around and behind Sif s right arm, trapping it.
Sif struggled to get free of the hammerlock, and Kane slid his right arm around her neck. He forced her down on the tiled collar encircling the rim of the fire pit. They had already absorbed the terrific volcanic heat and when her cheek touched a tile, he heard a faint sizzle as of meat tossed on a griddle and she howled in pained agony.
Kane lifted her clear of the tiles. Sif gagged, clutching at the Kane's arm. She inserted her fingers into the crook of his elbow and to his astonishment she actually began prying it away. Kane increased the pressure, bearing down. Zakat shrieked something, and Kane glanced up to see him nearly dancing in mad frustration, crimson-flecked spittle flying from his lips.
Brigid's sharp voice cut through the murmur of the onlookers like a knife "Zakat is telling her not to yield! He wants you to kill her!"
Kane could only guess at the reason, but he figured the death of Sif at the hands of an outlander might sway both the Valkyries and Wothenjaz to his side.
Sif hissed a stream of words in Thulian, and although he couldn't understand them, he gleaned their meaning. She told him she would never yield, never surrender.
Despite her tone of defiance, Sif's respiration was strained and panicked. Kane reached a swift conclusion, with only the vaguest concept of how his decision might turn out.
He released Sif, pushing away from her and standing. As he backed out of range of her arms and legs, he shouted over his shoulder, "Baptiste! What are the Thulian words for 'I give you back your life'?"
Sif slowly climbed to her feet, regarding Kane with a glare of pure venom. She touched the reddened welt on her cheek where the tile had burned it.
"Baptiste!" Kane yelled again, not daring to take his eyes off the Valkyrie as she advanced on him, gathering the slack of the chain in a loop in one hand and slapping it against the other.
Suddenly Brigid shouted out a string of confusing consonants. At the top of his voice, he repeated the words as best he could. He bellowed it twice, still trying to back away from Sif.
Wothenjaz suddenly rose from his chair, assuming his full, formidable height. He spoke, and his roar of a voice was like thunder. He lifted his great broadsword over his head. Sif instantly jolted to a halt. Her blond head swiveled toward her husband, her eyes wide with shock.
Brigid came quickly to Kane's side. In a voice quivering with relief, she said, "It worked, Kane. You worked it out when I couldn't. Wothenjaz was hoping you'd do what you did."
Grant and Philboyd bracketed them. "Just what did you do?" Grant demanded. "What's going on?"
"By sparing Sif's life," Brigid explained, "when Kane could have taken it, she can no longer champion the cause of Zakat."
Kane gulped in oxygen and rubbed his neck, glad to be away from the scorching air around the fire pit. As he socked the manacle around his wrist, he said, "That's what I figured he was up to when he agreed to a trial by combat, even though I wasn't a Thulian. Zakat outsmarted himself by having Sif as his champion, whom Wothenjaz wouldn't fight."
Grigori Zakat stared in openmouthed terror as Wothenjaz majestically descended from the pla platform, the broadsword in his hand gleaming like quicksilver. The milling throng parted for him. The man was at least seven feet tall, and he looked almost as broad. He was a living juggernaut, a figure not just of legend but vengeance, justice and death.
Zakat screamed at Sif, rushing to her, clutching frantically at her arms. She shook him off, not looking at him, as if his touch tainted her. Zakat turned his gaze toward Kane, his lips working, mouthing words no one could hear. He glanced into the implacable faces of Valkyrie and warrior alike, but none of them acknowledged his presence. Even if any one of the were inclined to interfere, they were forbidden by ancient ritual, custom and law.
Zakat split toward Wothenjaz, who strode toward
him with the confident swagger of a tiger approaching its prey, his blue cloak belling out behind him If he so coveted the rulers of Ultima Thule, Zakat knew he would have to duel Wothenjaz for the crown—and even Sif knew he couldn't possibly emerge victorious.
Nostrils flaring, Zakat stared wide and wild-eyed toward Kane. His face contorted. He began to tremble violently, his eyelids flickering, spittle collecting at the corners of his mouth.
Kane met his gaze and snarled out a mocking laugh. "Why don't you tell him about the time you were the King of-Fear, Grigori? That might make change his mind about chopping you into about a hundred pieces and feeding you your peenee."
Zakat's left hand clutched at his amulet. His body quaked, a thousand changing sparks of light dancing in his eyes. Then he threw back his head and screamed, a howl of terror, of fury torn from the roots of his soul.
He bounded toward Kane, hands raised, fingers curved like talons. Grant made a motion to intercept him, but Kane elbowed him back. He whiplashed the chain across the floor separating him from the onrushing Russian. The manacle struck Zakat's temple with a loud crack of bone, spinning him and sending him staggering to the edge of the fire pit.
His feet scrabbled for purchase on the gilded tiles, then he slipped over the rim. The fingers of his left hand hooked onto the edge and he hung there, over the terrible heat. Kane sauntered over to the pit and gazed down at Zakat, his face twisted in exertion.
"We've been in this situation before, Kane," the Russian gasped.
Kane nodded. "I remember." He bent over, extending a hand. "This time I won't let you fall."
Zakat's eyes widened in surprise—then the looming figure of Wothenjaz cast a shadow over his face as he stood shoulder to shoulder with Kane.
"I understand why," he said hoarsely, great globes of perspiration forming on his forehead. "You prefer to see me humiliated before you see me dead."
"Actually," Kane replied smoothly, "I don't care what order they're in." He reached down. "Make up your mind."
Grigori Zakat's lips writhed over his teeth in either a grin or a grimace when he released his grip. Kane caught only a glimpse of him as he plummeted down the volcano's conduit and into the inferno of its belly. He didn't see or hear his body plunge into the magma, but the unmistakable stench of seared human flesh and scorched hair wafted up in a noxious cloud.
Wothenjaz nodded brusquely as if deeply satisfied with the way everything turned out, as though it had all gone according to an intricate plan. He regarded Kane solemnly for a long, silent moment, then his lips quirked in a smile beneath his beard.
With a flourish of his cloak, Wothenjaz pivoted on his heel and marched over to Sif. She dropped to her knees before him, head bowed, eyes downcast.
Grant whispered to Kane, "Think he'll kill her?"
Kane shook his head. "Not after all of this."
Philboyd stepped up close and asked, "Will he take her back?"
Kane pondered the query for a moment, but before he could answer it, Brigid said quietly, "There's an old Latin saying, Victoria et pro victoria vita—victory, and for victory, life. Wothenjaz won a great victory for himself and for us. No one could wish for anything better. He'll take her back."
Then the assembled Thulians shook spears and swords and axes over their head and began singing about the glorious days to come.
Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 9
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 9
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
James Axler, Outlanders 24 Equinox Zero
