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“Fire!” the charr centurion roared.

The axe-rifles boomed and vomited smoke and lead. But the shots struck the ethereal membrane and sank into it and were eaten away. Bullets showered rust to the ground.

The leader of the charr stared, his jaw dropping. “You’re full of surprises!”

“I’m Logan Thackeray. I protect those who are mine.”

“I’m Rytlock Brimstone,” the charr shot back. “I kill those who aren’t.”

“I recognize your blade. Did you say Rurik Brimstone?”

“Rytlock,” the charr snarled.

Logan shrugged. “I just figured since you stole Prince Rurik’s sword, you probably also stole his name.”

Rytlock lashed the air with the burning blade. “The sword’s mine now.”

“After this fight,” Logan said, whirling his war hammer in a figure eight, “Sohothin will once again be in the hands of a human.”

“During this fight,” Rytlock spat, “Sohothin will once again be in the guts of a human.” He looked back at the charr around him. “Turn those damned rifles around and chop them to pieces!”

Rytlock charged, ramming his sword toward Logan’s stomach.

The man spun aside, his war hammer pounding the fiery blade. Sparks flew, and the sword clanged down to one side. Logan stepped in to kick his opponent’s leg, and Rytlock staggered back in surprise and pain. The man meanwhile advanced, swinging his war hammer in a thundering arc overhead.

This time, Rytlock deflected the blow, leaned in, and planted a massive fist in the man’s stomach. Logan flew back and crashed to the ground. He staggered up to one knee.

“You fight like a charr”—Rytlock laughed blackly—“though you fly like a grawl.”

“Grawl don’t fly.”

“They do when you punch them!” Rytlock stomped toward the man and swung another massive blow.

Logan tried to dodge, but the flaming sword followed him. Growling, he jabbed his hammer out desperately. Sohothin engulfed the weapon, fire mantling the hammerhead.

Logan ripped his hammer free, but it sloughed a skin of red-hot metal.

The charr cackled. “Nice sword, eh?”

“Legendary.”

“And you’ll never wield it.”

Again the roaring attack, again the argument of metal and fire, and again Logan stepped back, his hammer smoldering and his chest heaving.

Rytlock was a cat playing with prey. “At least you’re doing better than your friends.”

Logan glanced to one side where Wescott, Perkins, and Fielding fought back-to-back, surrounded by four charr. On the other side, Everlee, Dawson, Tippett, and Castor fought a similarly desperate battle against five charr.

“Is that how you fight?” Logan growled at the legionnaire. “Four on three? Five on four?”

Rytlock shrugged. “We fight to win. Foreign concept to you humans, I know.”

Fury flooded through Logan, and he spun. His war hammer vaulted overhead and moaned down toward Rytlock’s head. The charr rolled aside, the hammer cracking across his claws. He clambered to his feet and charged, Sohothin’s fires roaring. The flaming blade struck a blue aura that Logan had painted in the air to cover his retreat.

Rytlock ripped his sword free of the barrier and said, “You’re so good at retreating.”

Despite his words, Logan took another step back, staring in horror—not at the sword, but at what it showed lurking behind the charr.

Two monstrous faces loomed out of the night. Their eyes were the size of fists; their mouths were gathered like sacks; their armored figures towered like cliff faces.

“Ogres,” Logan stammered as he staggered back.

“What?” Rytlock roared, turning.

“Ogres!” Logan shouted.

A massive boot pounded the ground behind Rytlock, who whirled aside just before a spiked club crashed down beside him. The spikes impaled another charr and rooted him to the ground. The ogre flexed its sinewy arm, trying to yank the club free.

Recovering from shock, Logan charged the ogre, running up its huge club and arm and onto its shoulder. With a mighty swing, he buried his hammer in the brow of the beast. Moaning, the ogre dropped to its knees and rolled ponderously forward. Logan leaped to the ground.

“How about