Book 4 - Chapter 40 - The final feather (Patreon)

AN: One of two chapters for today. Schedule is still going to be strange in the coming week as we reach the ending of book 4.

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Not for the first time, my sense of planning and rationality shook hands with the petty thief inside in mutual agreement. Carrying around an orbital cannon the size of a small metal plate had a certain draw to it. Like explosions, and setting things that shouldn’t be on fire, on fire.

Unfortunately for me, the moment To’Sefit faded away, a safeguard of some kind triggered over her plates, causing the internals to melt, rendering them unusable. Including the one in hand I'd used to kill her with. 

Maybe she manually triggered it herself in whatever purgatory Feathers go to when they die, out of spite. What other reason would she have to rob me of a weapon that could obliterate anything in my way? No other reason than sheer petty hatred, and a deep desire to not share toys.

Looks like I’d need to kill To’Avalis the old fashioned way: Hitting him with another knightbreaker when he couldn’t wiggle out of the way. And since mine was spent, I’d need to get Kidra to nail him.

The occasional glances at my sister’s combat video feed during the entire debacle had shown plenty of information to use. The biggest being that I knew I had no chance in all twelve purple hells of getting To’Avalis into a checkmate like that by myself.

Kidra was one of the greatest melee fighters I knew, turning the entire thing into a calculated dance of optimal efficiency and chess. Against Avalis, she was barely holding on.

Not due to lack of skill. I could see her weaving complex attacks and feints, each perfectly suited to counter and press against his strange weapon. To’Avalis’s own motions were calm, collected and equally reactive.

The problem is that Avalis didn’t fight like a fighter. He fought like someone who would sell his own sister if it meant getting an extra five points in a match.

Kidra could pull off deadly moves time and time again, and Avalis would turn invulnerable, letting the swing float past through him, before rematerializing and delivering his own attacks. Which meant if I had to fight him, even with the occult, my own chances of winning got thrown off the speeder the moment I grew too mentally fatigued to keep the occult going.

I’d need to stack up more advantages. Two knights against one Feather and a small army of distractions was getting closer to an even fight, which wasn’t the House motto. Fortunately, I didn’t need to fight him two on one. When I’d dropped down from the ceiling, Kidra’s video feed wasn’t the only one that snapped back into view.

My boots took me directly to the whirlpool, following the flow of the water blindly in the white mist. The amount of metal sediment being churned through with the water made scanners wonky, Journey taking extra time before the wireframes appeared and more detailed topology showed up. That was to our advantage, since if our scanners couldn’t see well through the water - neither could anyone else’s.

Journey’s HUD adapted, showing a wireframe of where the ground should be.

Water flowed over the broken edge of the center, spinning wildly into a circle, the flood not quite falling down the way it should given there was nothing under but arid air all the way down to the desert strata under us. On the side of the broken ground, just before the drop, I could see the hilt of a dagger submerged underwater, tilted down from the spinning throw that had embedded it inside. Hardly noticeable, but I knew where to look.

The relic weapon had been expertly thrown, gouging a deep hole into the rock for a few seconds until the blade shut off. Normally, a straight throw to keep the blade on target was the trained method, but with enough practice, throwing it into a spin would let the occult edge gouge a full cut before the blade shut off.

And lodged right inside the cut was a familiar metal hook, trailing a taut rope, hidden under the rushing water. The line curling in an arc from the reduced gravity. Deeper in the vortex, a shadow was moving under it all, following the rope up, one arm at a time.

Captain Sagrius hadn’t let himself fall down all the way to the bottom strata. With Father’s combat engram running paired with the speed and reflex of a relic armor, even an inhumanly perfect throw with both dagger and hook could be done.

I kneeled down and grabbed the line, dragging it up, moving fast. I didn’t need to go much, my target had been steadily fighting off several hundred tons of rushing water on its own, foot by foot, over this entire time. That added up.

A helmet surfaced over the whirlpool, water parting around it, the colors and insignia of House Winterscar growing more clear as the armor’s shoulders and chest came up.

The armor watched me silently, wordlessly pulling itself forward against the churn of the water while I did the same on the other side. Including the captain, it would be two elite knights and one occult spellcaster as support against Avalis. With those odds, we could make something happen.

Unfortunately, Avalis wasn’t an idiot. 

“Behind!” Father called out from the necklace around Sagrius’s neck. He didn’t need to tell me twice, I saw the ghost outline of Avalis leaping straight for my position, sailing through the white mist. He'd disengaged from Kidra, leaving his minions to hold his spot while he ruined my plan.

I tried pulling Sagrius faster, which of course wasn’t going to be anywhere near fast enough. So I did the next best thing and let my mouth go free. Might get the Feather to start talking instead of fighting. “Avalis, we finally meet face to face you bas--”

He landed with a splash behind and immediately lifted a leg up for a savage kick. Which would toss Wrath and I straight into the vortex at this angle.

Okay, note to self, this Feather was all business. Taunting him was going to be extra difficult.

I abandoned the line and twisted around at the same moment, occult pulsing around me. My armgard shield lit up, the mirror image charging out of my position, shield raised directly where his kick would have connected - onto the occult edges glowing bright.

Avalis changed his movement instantly, turning his raised kick into a heel stomp directly through the image’s knee, right under the glowing occult edges on the armguard and breaking the image apart. From that, he followed with a full kicker’s swing, trying to punt me straight into the vortex, no questions asked. Shields flared to life over my armor right before his kick landed.

Journey buckled against two unyielding forces. The first was his stupidly strong kick to my stomach. The second was my hasty grab for the hook embedded deep into the ground. The relic armor strained, my chest rocketing to the side as my left hand held the grip, before the force backlashed through me, slamming me back down into the ground instead of being tossed into the abyss. Bits of red splattered the interior of my HUD, and I realized that had come from me. 

To’Avalis hadn’t waited for me to get back up either. His free hand was already reaching straight for Wrath’s exposed sack, her working eye staring down the approaching hand about to tear her head off.

“No, you don't.” I snarled, spitting the rest of the blood from my split lip for Journey to handle, triggering the occult again from my prone position.

Images flashed out, three swinging for him in every direction as I rose up. This close, caught in the middle of a bad position and with little room to maneuver, I knew I had the bastard dead to rights. He hissed, snatching his hand back before my images could cut it right off. More images blurred to life from the prior ones, forcing him to leap backwards out of range. My images chased after the bastard, relentless.

He twisted under the swing of one, kicked the shin of another causing it to vanish away from the impact, and swung the chain weapon all in the same motion, catching the last one right in the ribs and scything through.

Avalis turned out to be a multi-tasker, given the chain not only ripped my last image apart, it swung directly at my position, unerringly zooming to my side just as I’d gotten back up.

I didn’t get the time to reach down a second time for the hook. I hardly had the time to curse before the mace end slammed dead-on into my hastily raised armgard.

The edge exploded in an occult blast, knocking up and off my feet. Shields triggered, dispersing most of the shock but not without rattling my insides as if I were in a full on speeder crash. Physics twirled Wrath and I around as the armor hit the ground hard, tumbling wildly out of control. Wrath’s few remaining straps had reached their limits, finally snapping clean off. She was sent rolling off away from me.

The maw of the vortex watched, hungry, as I slipped parallel to it. Pleading that I’d bounce the wrong way and fall into its gullet. 

And it's wish was granted.

My armor slammed into an upturned rock and bounced me straight to the void.

“Keith!” Kidra screamed out over comms, horrified. She was too far away, and too bogged down by Avalis’s minions.

In pure desperation, a frantic hand shot out by sheer reflex, right for the quickly approaching edge, scrambling for anything I could grip. Slick rock was the only thing under me, my hand uselessly gliding across until I crossed over the edge.

Fingers finally wrapped over something on the edge, and I squeezed. The armor instantly pitched straight down, the leftover force pushing me off mixing with the rushing weight of angry water pitted against unyielding relic armor holding onto the edge for my life.

“Close one, deary.” Cathida said, a nervous edge in her voice. “If the gravity wasn’t weakened here, that rock edge wouldn’t support your weight and inertia from that. Don’t let him get a second shot like this.”

“I don’t have jumping into an abyss on my to-do list for today, thanks for the concern.” I hissed back as I commanded Journey to pull me up. The armor complied, giving me a short jump up, landing on the walkway edge with both feet.

Avalis strolled at the edge, the chain recalled and swinging lazily around his main hand. The Captain was nearly at the edge, frantically pulling against the rope, just about to reach solid ground. Avalis didn’t even bother to look at the approaching knight fighting against the pull of the current, violet eyes fixed on me the whole time. 

The chain made a quick twist, and scythed right through the line as he passed by the hook.  

Sagrius immediately began to fall into the vortex.

Fuck.

My options came down to one possible choice. I could try to throw my own hook and rope at Sagrius and hope he’d grab hold of it. But Avalis was here, and protecting a rope against a monster like him was impossible. Distracting him by throwing random scrapshit wasn’t going to work either, and neither trying to jump after the captain. He'd just take the opportunity to murder Wrath.

Saving the captain had turned into an impossible task.

In the soul trance, I could see the falling relic armor had also come to the same conclusion, knowing there was no possible way to return this time.

But the combat engram running deep inside the armor wasn’t completely done. His right hand snapped straight for the neckpiece and cleanly ripped it off its chain. A faceless helmet locked onto mine. 

It was a perfect toss, and Journey’s gauntlet easily snatched the thrown necklace out of the air.

The falling armor finally relaxed, as if content with these last actions, letting itself be dragged off with the current, vanishing under the waves. Video feed turned into a pixelated mess before going dark, signal lost from the occlusion in the water. A moment later, he was gone from even the occult sight, falling too far out of my range.

To’Avalis watched from a distance, calculating the captain’s final choices. “A sentimental item?” He asked, fishing for information.

“As a matter of fact, it's the heart of my family.” I answered back, holding onto the little neckpiece in hand. “A sigil of the clan.”

Feathers could detect lies with enough information to work with, and Avalis wouldn’t have come here without that information. I had to lead him down the wrong conclusions.

“A weapon would have been more valuable to deliver. What could a cosmetic keepsake possibly do for you in this situation?”

I tossed the neckpiece into my shield hand, holding it tight. I took steady steps back to Wrath, drawing Atius’s machine blade with my main hand, pointing directly at him. He allowed it. 

“Think I’ll sell it for a ration bar, killing Feathers really drives up a hunger you know?”

Avalis watched intently as I took a position between him and Wrath. I could tell from his gaze that whatever mechanical version of instinct he had, it was screaming there had to be a more important reason why the captain’s dying action had been to throw that instead of anything I could ‘use.’

What Avalis couldn’t have known yet is that the captain had thrown a weapon at me.

The greatest weapon he had.

Deep in the necklace, a soul fractal remained lit within, smoldering with fury.

• Next Chapter - Combined arms