Airel - Aaron Patterson [37]
“You would dare kill me when you are ordered to bring me alive to your Seer?”
“He can revive you as long as you have your head intact. He can bring you back. I will kill you, bring your body to him and regain my place as captain of a hundred. Please do not tempt me.”
“As you wish.” Kreios sheathed his sword and stepped back toward the horses, in-between the attacker and his baby girl. Kreios had caught the man’s mention of having been demoted from the rank of centurion. He was amused that the man thought he could stand in battle against one of the Sons of God without his demon to give him strength.
The man started forward, turning his sword across his body. With two steps he was upon Kreios faster than he had thought possible for a human. The man’s sword slashed across and sliced deep into Kreios's chest. The man stopped and looked at him in shock when he didn’t respond to the wound.
Kreios grabbed his coat where the sword had cut through and tore it from his body. His pure white skin had a faint glow to it and a bright red slash bled from where the man had cut him.
The human stared at Kreios’s perfect skin. He took a step back as the wound healed right before his eyes. Kreios smiled and thought about how he was not even cold as he stood bare-chested in the freezing wind. He only wore human clothes to better blend in with them. A naked man with pure white skin would not go unnoticed very easily.
Kreios looked over to the wriggling saddlebags and his anger rose, boiling over. This human had dared to steal her away from him. In a flash of speed, he had grasped the muscular man by the hair and flung him into the sky, sending him high above the treetops. Jumping after him, he met the man in the air, burying a shattering fist deep into his abdomen.
The man tried to grapple with him as they began to fall back to the ground, but his will had left him, having been replaced by terror. Kreios was hurtling downward, the man in his iron grip, with all the speed he could muster, like a bolt of lightning. The ground thundered as they made impact, sending grass and chunks of hard frozen dirt into the air.
Amid the crater, Kreios stood up. He dusted himself off, wiping blood and rubble from his chest and arms. The man was dead. Every bone in his body had been shattered from the impact. Blood began to pool where he lay.
Kreios found his torn coat and, taking the baby in his arms, he wrapped her tightly in it. Like a shooting star, Kreios sped through the night sky. The dark firmament held many shooting stars but on this night it played host for an ominous observer. The hollow glistening eyes of the Seer looked on as Kreios raced across the sky.
It was time.
Chapter XX
Kreios touched down in the woods just outside Gratzipt. The smoke from the huts hung low to the ground like a blanket. Kreios ran the rest of the way into town and down the main road to the humble house where his brother had hid his little family. It was just before dawn, the moon long ago set. A crackle of firelight on the eastern horizon prophesied the coming day. Not one townsman had awakened from his deep sleep, though death and evil surrounded them.
Zedkiel opened the door . Hugging his daughter, Kreios said, “She is safe, but we cannot stay any longer.”
Zedkiel waved him in. “We have packed and are ready to leave. We must go now if we are to survive the day.” He had a large makeshift pack filled with the essentials on the ground next to the door. Blankets, dried barley bread, a knife, wood and bone utensils, and a few things for cooking. They did not need much food, only enough to keep Maria nourished. The rest they could hunt and cook over an open fire.
“They are camped a few miles from the gorge with an army. The Seer is with them…they are planning something,” Kreios said. He stuffed a bundle of rope and more dried food in his pack as he spoke. “I killed two of them. The Sword has restored me faster than I have ever experienced. I actually healed