Elantris - Brandon Sanderson [262]
Sarene sighed as the carriage rolled down the quiet street. The weapons probably wouldn’t help much; the people of New Elantris were not soldiers. But it had been something she could do.
The carriage pulled to a sudden stop. Sarene frowned, opening her mouth to call out a question to the coachman. Then she paused. Now that the rumbling of the coach had ceased, she could hear something. Something that sounded faintly like … screams. She smelled the smoke a second later. Sarene pulled back the carriage curtain, poking her head out the window. She found a scene as if from hell itself.
The carriage stood at an intersection. Three streets were calm, but the one directly before her blazed red. Fires billowed from homes, and corpses slumped on the cobblestones. Men and women ran screaming through the streets; others simply stood in dazed shock. Among them stalked shirtless warriors, their skin glistening with sweat in the firelight.
It was a slaughter. The strange warriors killed with dispassion, cutting down man, woman, and child alike with casual swipes of their swords. Sarene watched for a stunned moment before screaming at the coachman to turn them around. The man shook himself from his stupor, whipping at the horses to turn.
Sarene’s yell died in her throat as one of the shirtless warriors noticed the carriage. The soldier dashed toward them as the carriage began to turn. Sarene yelled a warning to the coachman too late. The strange warrior leapt, sailing an incredible distance to land on the carriage horse’s back. The soldier crouched lithely upon the beast’s flesh, and for the first time Sarene could see the inhuman twisting of his body, the chilling fire in his eyes.
Another short hop took the soldier to the top of the carriage. The vehicle rocked slightly, and the coachman screamed.
Sarene threw open her door and stumbled out. She scrambled across the cobblestones, shoes thrown from her feet in haste. Just up the street, away from the fires, lay Kiin’s house. If she could only—
The coachman’s body slammed into a building beside her, then slumped to the ground. Sarene screamed, lurching back, nearly tripping. To the side, the demonic creature was a dark silhouette in the firelight as he dropped from the carriage top, prowling slowly along the street toward her. Though his motions seemed casual, he moved with a lithe alertness. Sarene could see the unnatural shadows and pockets beneath his skin, as if his skeleton had been twisted and carved.
Pushing down another scream, Sarene scrambled away, running up the hill toward her uncle’s house. Not fast enough. Catching her would barely be a game for this monster; she could hear his footsteps behind. Approaching. Faster and faster. She could see the lights up ahead, but—
Something grabbed her ankle. Sarene jerked as the creature yanked with incredible strength, twisting her leg and spinning her so she smashed to the ground on her side. Sarene rolled onto her back, gasping at the pain.
The twisted figure loomed above her. She could hear it whispering in a foreign tongue. Fjordell.
Something dark and massive slammed into the monster, throwing it backward. Two figures struggled in the darkness. The creature howled, but the newcomer bellowed louder. Dazed, Sarene pushed herself up, watching the shadowed forms. An approaching light soon unmasked them. The shirtless warrior was expected. The other was not.
“Kiin?” Sarene asked.
Her uncle held an enormous axe, large as a man’s chest. He smashed it into the creature’s back as it wiggled across the stones, reaching for its sword. The creature cursed in pain, though the axe didn’t penetrate far. Kiin wrenched the weapon free, then raised it in a mighty swing and brought it down directly into the demon’s face.
The creature grunted, but did not stop moving.