Fate’s Pawn

Raziel drove his fist into the man’s gut. Alban rocketed back, flying through the gate. He hit the ground and rolled in an undignified pile.

Raziel charged, the distance he’d put between them melting in an instant. Alban was fast, all things considered. He came up in a crouch and thrust his hands forward. Chains shot out from his sleeves at Raziel.

Raziel had been expecting a counterattack. He pushed his magic into his hands and thrust one palm at the ground. The magic poured out in a bang, flinging Raziel up into the air. He flipped, wildly out of control, and caught a glimpse of the chains passing through the space he’d been in a moment before. His momentum slowed, and he spotted Alban looking at him with shock on his face and a bit of blood staining his teeth. Raziel put his other hand behind him and let loose another blast.

He flew at Alban like a falling hailstone, his punch catching the old man right on the chin. Raziel heard a crack and a delicious shock ran up his arm. He hit the ground hard and fell into a roll trying to stop. His feet scraped against the stones as he tried to start running again.

Alban slapped a hand down on the ground. Raziel was pulling his leg back to kick Alban in the teeth when something cold wrapped around his foot. It jerked up and spun him in a sickening loop before it let go. The world was a blur. Raziel slammed into something solid with enough force to drive the air from his lungs. He hit the ground, coughing and clutching at the cobblestones.

He looked up to see that chains had sprouted out of the ground like iron tentacles. One whipped out. The end caught him on the jaw before he could dodge. Raziel’s head struck stone, and he saw stars and tasted blood. He lay still for a moment, dazed.

“Boy!” Alban roared, and Raziel heard the rattling chains coming in to strike again. Raziel gathered his magic and slapped the ground. He popped up like a cork from a bottle and saw the chains hit the spot where he’d lay with enough force to draw sparks from the ground.

The chains came up at him, striking like snakes, but Raziel blasted himself to the side. Alban was ranting again as Raziel landed. He caught sight of something behind the wizard as the chains drew up and back, rearing to strike again. Raziel gathered his strength, bracing himself. The chains came down, and Raziel screamed as thrust his hand forwards.

The eruption of force from his hands made the air before him ripple. The chains hit that wave of force like fish trying to swim up a waterfall. They slowed, stopped, and were flung back in a flopping tangle. Alban braced himself and took the dissipating blast with his arms crossed before him. It rocked the man back a few stumbling steps but nothing more.

“You’ll have to do better than that, boy,” he grated through clenched teeth. Raziel noticed he was missing a tooth. Raziel just laughed and pointed behind him.

Alban turned and caught a faceful of Keira’s knee. Alban was flung back once again and Raziel was ready. He gathered up his fury into his hand and hurled the ball of shimmering energy at Alban’s ragdoll form. The magic burst with a bang and Alban screamed as he flew up and landed on the slanted roof of one of the nearby houses.

Raziel panted as Alban’s crumpled form bounced and rolled down the shingles and fell to the ground in a heap. He pushed himself up, slowly and carefully, as he felt a wave of weakness he’d come to anticipate.

Keira moved closer while he stood there, regrouping from the effort. He was getting better at managing the strain that using magic put on his body. He didn’t feel good by any stretch of the imagination, but he could still move.

“You alright?” Keira asked.

Raziel nodded, trying to control his breathing.

“Yeah. Thanks.”

“Sure. Soon as you’re ready we need to get to the hospital. Roland and Miles could be in trouble.”

Raziel gulped in air and nodded, putting his hands on his knees with his head down, trying to get more air into his lungs. He noticed that the chains were still there, laying still on the ground. He wondered what would happen to them. He would have thought they would have disappeared or something as soon as Alban was defeated.

Then he felt power stirring in the old man’s direction. The chain that he was looking at began to twitch and then slither its clinking way towards Alban. The other chains he’d summoned were doing the same. Raziel looked to Keira who looked just as bewildered as he felt, and Raziel pushed himself upright again. His rage at Alban was dulled by his fatigue, but there was still more than enough to continue the fight.

Two of the chains moved to Alban’s arms, wrapping around them in a spiral and tying themselves together at his shoulders. The other ends shot up and slammed through the walls of nearby buildings. The chains pulled tight and lifted Alban up, his head drooping against his chest. More chains fell from his pant legs like jangling tails, and another snaked its way around his head. It wrapped around his forehead like a circlet or a crown and jerked his face up. His eyes blazed with a fury, and his mouth was stretched into a terrible sneer over broken and bloody teeth.

He let out a wordless scream that sent blood and spittle flying from his mouth. The chains moved, shooting out to buildings behind Raziel and Keira, and hauled Alban towards them like a screaming banshee.

Raziel and Keira threw themselves in opposite directions. As he passed, the chains on Alban’s legs struck out and caught Raziel by a leg and Keira by an arm. The chains ripped them away from the ground. Raziel struggled to keep from bashing his brains out against the cobblestones as he was dragged towards Alban. They passed beneath the man, and Raziel heard gruesome popping and crackling noises as the chains forced his body to move despite the injuries he and Keira had dealt him. The chains dragged them both up into the air and smashed them together. Then they whipped them back in opposite directions and let go. Raziel sailed through the air and then crashed through a window.

He hit a table and a chair, sending both clattering to the ground in a broken pile of wood. Raziel came to a stop, arching his whole body in pain. He coughed and rolled to his stomach. He saw blood hit the floor and felt it oozing all over his body from cuts.

Then he heard the tinkling of broken glass and looked up to see Alban’s chains drag the man in through the window headfirst. More chains had come out from both his arms and legs. They pulled his body into the building like the legs of some hideous metallic spider. Raziel threw himself to his feet but was too slow.

A chain lashed across his temple, flinging him to the floor. He put his hands around his head and screamed as Alban’s chain tentacles slammed down on his back again and again like iron whips. The pain was incredible; Raziel felt his control of the magic that was his only armor begin to slip. Just as he thought he was going to lose all of it, the beating stopped.

But Alban wasn’t done. A chain slipped beneath his chest and flipped him over on his back and Raziel felt metal tendrils wrap themselves around his arms and legs. Then they began to pull. Raziel let out a groan that turned into a scream as burning pain lanced through his arms, shoulders, legs, and back, turning his whole body into one pulsing knot of agony.

Alban hovered over him, dangling from his chains, his face pulled into a spiteful rictus. A glob of spit mixed with blood dripped from the man’s mouth and slapped Raziel in the cheek. He was ranting something that Raziel couldn’t hear through the pain of his muscles beginning to tear and bones separating.

He tried to reach out, to find his anger and use it to give him the magic he needed to escape. His anger was gone and in its place there was a fluttering terror that this was how he was going to die. Raziel tried to use that as fuel for some kind of spell, but it was too weak and thready for him to form anything out of.

He reached out, flailing about, trying to find something, anything, to give him the power to fight back. The building they were in was a dead, broken thing with nothing left to give. The stone beneath him was cold and hard, and Raziel couldn’t muster the strength to budge its power. Alban was the only living thing within Raziel’s reach and even in his terror, Raziel’s mind rebelled against trying to draw any of Alban’s sticky, defiled energy out.

Then he felt something, small and bright and close by. He’d been reaching out as far as he could, but this was so close that he’d missed it. There was something in his pocket that was practically begging to be used. Kusa’s gem.

Raziel touched the gem with his mind and new energy flowed into him. He gritted his teeth and pulled against the chains with all his strength, but Alban’s chains were still stronger than he was. Alban laughed and pulled harder, and Raziel couldn’t do anything to resist him.

He felt his shoulders and his knees beginning to give, a burning pain that he’d never experienced before. He looked around, hoping Keira would be there, coming to save him, but she was nowhere to be seen. There was just the damaged wreck of the building.

An idea came to Raziel. A vindictive, stupid idea. But it was the only one he had.

Raziel drew as much power as he could from the gem. The gem poured its energy into him willingly. Raziel pushed the energy into his hands and into his feet.

He let loose a blast of force from each limb that ripped through the walls of the building. The chains around Alban’s head twisted so he could look at what Raziel had done. Confusion danced across his face followed quickly by realization as the roof creaked and what was left of the walls buckled.

Alban let out a wordless cry of denial and released Raziel. Raziel hit the ground and rolled onto his side, limbs still in agony and a smile on his face. He looked up to see that Alban was using his chains to try to keep the ceiling from falling. There was too much strain and his chains were too thin. Raziel pushed himself up, trying to get out himself before the house fell in on them. Each mere twitch of his muscles was a separate agony.

Keira leapt through the window, dodging a falling piece of the building as she came, and scooped Raziel up. Ignoring his screams of pain she all but hurled him through the window. Alban’s enraged shriek was wonderful to hear. Raziel would have laughed if he didn’t hurt so much. Keira threw herself through the window and was nearly out when a chain shot out and wrapped around her leg. Raziel could hear the rumbling of the house beginning to collapse as the chain began dragging her back inside. She tried to fight, but with only one leg she couldn’t find purchase.

Raziel’s body moved. His muscles burned but he got his arms beneath Keira’s shoulders, planted his feet, and pulled against the chain with all his might. His body shivered in protest, but he held on. The chain dragged them slowly closer. If she went in, Raziel was going with her.

Then, with Keira scant feet from the window, the house gave a final creaking roar and, with a dull scream from Alban, fell in. Raziel and Keira fell to the ground in a heap as the chain pulling on her finally stopping. Keira covered her head with her hands and Raziel did the same, but all that fell on them was dust.

As soon as the sounds died down, they looked and saw the chain that had been wrapped tightly around her leg was laying limp on the ground. Keira had mostly fallen on top of Raziel and once she saw that nothing was going to fall on them, she rolled off. Raziel thought about getting up and maybe helping her to her feet but found that his body only wanted to lay on the ground and maybe take a nap.

“You alright?” was all that he managed to ask.

“Yeah. You?” she asked, not moving from the ground either.

“No. That really hurt.”

“Looked like it. Sorry I couldn’t help. He caught me with one of his chains and I couldn’t get in until he let go to focus on keeping the house up.”

“It worked out.”

They lay there panting for a moment enjoying the stillness and silence. Silence that was soon broken by the sound of moving rubble.

Raziel and Keira looked at each other and then sat up. The chain that had been wrapped around Keira’s leg was sliding into the collapsed house like a snake trying to hide. Parts of the collapsed house were shifting and sliding as something moved like a mole beneath it.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Keira said.

Raziel groaned. He grabbed the gem from his pocket. If there was more fighting to be done, that was the only source of energy he had left. He and Keira got to their feet and cautiously made their way around the collapsed house.

Alban was in no shape to do any more fighting. His clothes were torn, and he was covered in his own blood. It was only the chains wrapped around his body that let him keep moving. Raziel was confused at what he was doing. Alban was letting the chains move him, but it seemed to be in strange, unintentional twitches dragging his blood stained limbs over the cobblestones.

Raziel and Keira looked at each other, unsure of what to do. It wasn’t until Alban whipped a hand around what he’d been drawing that Raziel realized what he’d been doing. He tried to lurch forward and stop Alban, but it was too late. Two chains lifted up and met at a point in the air and sank into it. They pulled apart and the air separated, creating a window to somewhere else.

Raziel heard a surprised utterance come from the other side. He didn’t hear the exact words, but he recognized the voice. Mask stepped through the window, and Raziel felt weariness wash over him.

His mask still was the worse for Keira’s punch, but if anything there seemed to be a new spring in his step as he stepped jauntily over to Alban’s ruined form. Kusa had sacrificed itself for nothing.

“Oh Alban. You look terrible. What happened?” Mask said. His tone was, on the surface, deeply concerned, but there was no sincerity in it. If anything there was an undercurrent of wry amusement that matched the smile painted on his mask.

Alban tried to speak but all that came out were pitiful pained grunts along with a burbling of bloody bubbles. Alban gave up and looked pointedly in Raziel and Keira’s direction. Mask turned to look at them and put a hand to his painted smile.

“They did this to you? Well, that won’t do at all. Tell me, what would you like me to do about it?”

Alban, pitiful as he was, dragged himself up. He wasn’t standing. It was amazing he was even alive. But, prideful as he was, it was clear he would not beg on his knees. Not even now.

“Help me…. Kill them,” he said finally, forcing out the words.

Mask let out a genuine belly laugh. He even threw back his head and held his stomach. Raziel saw impotent rage spark in Alban’s eyes.

“You can’t even kill kids on your own? And now you want even more of my help? After all I’ve done for you?” Mask seemed to be nearly crying with laughter as he spoke. One of Alban’s chains rose up like a clenched fist for a moment, but it drooped down almost instantly as Mask’s laughter began to subside. “Fine, fine. I’ll deal with the mess you’ve gotten yourself into this last time.”

Mask turned casually back to Raziel and Keira and brought up a hand flexing his fingers menacingly. Beside him Alban gathered himself, getting ready to back Mask up it seemed. Raziel and Keira prepared themselves for Mask’s rush as best they could.

Mask took a single step forward, planting his foot delicately. Then he turned on his heel and plunged his hand into Alban’s stomach, driving it up behind the man’s ribcage. Alban let out a shocked grunt but did not scream. His expression was not pained but utter, near comical, shock.

“What was it you said about your son the other night?” Mask asked, his hand still deep in Alban’s chest. “‘A tool that breaks after one job is worthless.’ Well, that’s true. But you’re even worse. You haven’t succeeded at a single task I’ve given you. Your son has some potential, but you, you aren’t a tool—”

Mask’s arm twisted and came wrenching out of Alban with a wet pop holding something red and pulsing in his fist. A gush of blood followed, and Alban’s chains trembled as they lowered the man to the ground. His eyes were locked on Mask the whole way down.

“You’re just trash,” Mask said, throwing Alban’s heart in the dead man’s face. Mask looked at his hand for a moment before shaking it, throwing droplets of blood on the ground.

“And now there’s you two to deal with,” he said turning back to Raziel and Keira with a considering look. “Are you sure you won’t consider joining me?”

“Are you serious?” The words popped out of Raziel mouth with utter disgust.

“I’m very serious. You’ve both handled yourselves excellently. You have quite a bit of potential that I would hate to see go to waste. I know this looks bad,” he said with an offhand gesture at Alban, “but the man really was an awful business partner.”

“No,” Raziel said.

“Absolutely not,” Keira said at the same time.

“That’s a pity,” Mask said, with what seemed genuine disappointment. “Well, you’ve both demonstrated the danger in underestimating you. Two on one is hardly a fair fight.”

Mask reached out to the spot where the window that Alban had created had been. He peeled the air apart once again, though Raziel could not see into it from where he stood. Mask gestured for something to come out.

Raziel expected the man shaped shadow to step out. Instead, what stepped out was small, not much larger than a child. It had sickly yellow-brown skin the color of rotting apple flesh except for a ragged hole in its chest where green blood oozed. There was a mask on its face. Unlike the one Mask wore, this one was brown, made of wood and more or less square shaped and dry yellow grass hair stuck up from behind it. The expression on it was not a smile. It had no mouth. Only large, staring eyes.

“I’ll take the girl. Kusa, kill the boy.”