An imPerfect Fable: An imPerfect Cathar Adventure (The imPerfect Cathar) by C.N. Rowan

Author:C.N. Rowan [Rowan, C.N.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: anonymous
Published: 2024-06-18T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter six

The Forest of Camors, 16 January 1985

‘He…llo?’ The word is barely above a creak. Rasping as though through a throat packed with fresh sandpaper.

Or as if it had a blade shoved straight through it.

Shit.

‘Sorry!’ I turn back to the guy.

My first instinct is to start yanking on blades. For once, though, I ignore my first instinct, which probably saves me from slicing straight through my palm and trimming away all of my fingers at the same time.

The fact the blades are absolutely aglow with talent helps check me mid-stride. And the talent is weird. Possibly even wyrd –magic that defies even the few meagre rules and laws that normally limit power. It’s a dark green but threaded through with blue strands, which stick up off the surface off the blade in the magical glow, bristling even. In fact…

‘His magic is his blue beard! That’s where the origin of the name’s from!’ I look around triumphantly, only to realise that neither of the two people currently with me give a damn. Aicha doesn’t see magic in the same way I do, and our historian friend is probably more concerned with the various places he’s currently pinned to a stone through rather than fairy tale origins. I sigh. Isaac’s never around when you need someone to be intrigued by nerdy shit.

‘Your magic is inappropriate non sequiturs, and isn’t about to get you booked for Vegas, dickhead.’ Aicha tuts, dismissing me from her attention, and turns back towards the poor unfortunate Monsieur Denicourt.

‘Can you do anything?’ The nuances of Aicha’s question are obvious. Can I get the blades out without killing him or alerting Conomor? Both things we’d rather avoid doing.

I shrug. Say nothing. Study the blades themselves. They aren’t swords. There’re no handles to them for a start. But if you were to bang a pommel onto them, which, considering the agony it’d cause for the poor bugger they’re currently protruding out of, would be a singularly cruel and dickheadish manoeuvre, then they would be. Right now, they’re just razor sharp metal shards all the way to the end. The mystery in a film or TV show would be how anyone could possibly have embedded them through this man and into the rock itself. Except I could come up with a dozen different intricate methods off the top of my head. And Aicha would just grab them and shove them in without breaking a sweat.

Not into this suffering human though. Perhaps into whatever arsehole did this to him.

So I could remove the blades. Probably even without slicing my hands to ribbons.

But what I can’t do is keep him alive afterwards.

He should be dead. I’ve already said it, but it stands repeating. The proto-swords have punctured enough major organs, he should have croaked instantly. Not even considering the shock and the pain.

But there’s a simple reason why he’s still alive. Talent. The blades are aglow with it, the dark-green-and-blue strands wrapping around each and back again like a deadly cat’s cradle. And it’s a working I’m not capable of replicating.

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