Primeval Fire (Scarlet Odyssey) by C. T. Rwizi

Author:C. T. Rwizi [Rwizi, C. T.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: 47North
Published: 2022-07-25T16:00:00+00:00

18: Kamali

The Crimson Woodlands

Kamali has always thought himself levelheaded and rational, not given to pride or the aggressive masculinity that rules other men. A patient sort of fellow.

But after days of Taji Msani transposing him repeatedly across the joyless Void alongside Neema and Daudi—two other Jasiri with taciturn, solemn temperaments—Kamali’s patience has stretched to a razor-thin wire on the verge of snapping.

They’ve had to follow Meddur’s trail all the way across Umadiland, interrogating people in towns along the Artery, threatening, hypnotizing, mind reading, and sometimes beating them for answers. They’ve had to fend off multiple warlord disciples far from pleased to see Jasiri operating on their soil. They’ve had to double back from wrong turns and search every byroad south of the Umadi border until finally tracking their quarry down to these accursed woods.

And now Kamali must fight and possibly kill a puffed-up Yerezi ranger too foolish to realize when he’s outmatched.

They meet in a clash of metal along the roadway, aerosteel against its more mysterious red variant, one a prize of the Yontai, the other a Yerezi secret. With his mask on Kamali relies on cosmic sight, which gives him a more detailed picture of his surroundings, if muted in color. The boy’s spearhead still glows like molten rock, and it streaks in a scorching ribbon toward Kamali much faster than he expects. No sooner has he turned away a thrust than the next one comes, seeking his masked face, swiping for his neck, keeping him weaving through one parry to another.

They circle each other like feuding cats, looking for openings in each other’s defenses. Kamali finds one and lunges, at last outflanking the moving spear, but the boy pivots and spins away, following through with a sweeping cut that blurs toward Kamali’s face. He recoils just in time to feel it hiss past the surface of his mask, but the Ajaha whips the spear upward not a split second later, and Kamali moves too late, taking it on his chest. The spearpoint screeches and scrapes against his breastplate, leaving a thin scar across the moongold redhawk etched onto its surface.

Shocked, Kamali looks down at his chest. He thought the rangers of the Ajaha were little more than common men with a morsel of enhanced strength from having their bones enchanted. Evidently he needs to make a reassessment.

Birds caw somewhere in the woods. Members of the Faraswa caravan have disembarked their wagons to watch, huddled behind the mounted rangers. The ranger in front of Kamali licks his lips, eyes alert, spear steady in his hands. No armor or clothing protects his upper body besides a crisscrossing leather harness and an ornate pauldron cast into the snarling head of a Yerezi leopard. Prideful, certainly, but he seems the earnest sort, Kamali would say, if a little naive.

You should have never challenged me. Kamali draws essence from the vertebra of enchanted moongold at the base of his spine—the Jasiri’s second heart. He metabolizes the essence as strength, lets it course through his veins, and then unleashes it, darting forward with an unnatural burst of speed.

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