Page 158 of Starside

Each body that drops is soon replaced. Ancient swords shatter against my own, but the skelmires reach down and get new ones.

I turn, fighting them off, and catch a glimpse of him.

For a moment, I forget myself, I forget I’m surrounded by swamp creatures, I forget my thirst. I just stand, unable to do anything but watch as Raker’s blade carves through the air in perfect arcs, every movement precise, like he and the sword are one.

One hand holds his weapon, and the other keeps breaking into ribcages, over and over, splitting bone like snapping twigs. He takes down ten creatures in mere seconds.

A dagger glints in the side of my vision, and I barely turn in time, distracted. I cut another creature down, then steal its stone. “Is that all you have?” I growl.

As if they understand me, two of the skelmires slowly drift closer. Closer. Until they’re touching. Until the bones within them begin mingling, cracking, reforming, and they merge to create a beast double the size, with four arms. Two weapons. Two gems.

“Fuck,” I say, watching helplessly as skelmire after skelmire emerges, uniting into one monstrous beast now wielding a dozen weapons.

“Run,” I breathe. I turn and sprint, before I hear the creature following, upending the bog, a torrent forming from the force of it, nearly pulling me under.

The skelmire horde is faster. Its ribbons of skin shoot out. Sheets of flesh wrap around my arm, dragging me back.

I scream, my body roaring in pain where it’s touching me, like my bones are melting beneath my skin.

I see the flash of metal right above me, a blade coming down, and I bring my sword up at the last moment, just barely blocking it.

The weapon shatters, and I cut the flesh around my arm, but another thick ribbon of skin replaces it. Another. Until the creature is lifting me out of the water. I gasp then choke as one wraps around my neck.

A dozen faces study me, flesh pulled thin over smothered screams. My strength has nearly left me. My legs are numb. I’m tired. So tired.

But with one last flash of resolve, I cut the skin holding me up in one smooth motion.

I drop into the swamp, my head banging on the bottom, the water barely cushioning my fall. The back of my head pulses. If I’d landed on a chalice, or a weapon, I would likely be dead.

Vision spinning, I rush to my feet. When I rise, I don’t see Raker. I blink away the blurriness, searching wildly.

I’m still looking when the horde lunges forward, right at me.

I raise my sword, knowing it will do little against this thunderous beast, especially when it wields several swords, and my knees are already ready to buckle. Even so, I stay firm.

Both hands curl tightly around the hilt. I clench my teeth, waiting for the impact.

But before the horde can reach me, Raker emerges right beneath it, his sword flying out of his grip, soaring, cutting right through the creature, through every gnarled bone and sheet of flesh that lashes out, until it is halved.

For a moment, there’s just silence.

Then, a dozen gemstones fall around Raker, spilling into the water. And there are two thunderous splashes as both halves fall on either side of him. His sword is still in the air, floating, glimmering. He reaches toward it.

Right behind him, another skelmire silently rises from the depths of the pale water, ancient sword gripped high. It swings right for Raker’s head.

I throw my blade through the air with all my power, and it buries itself right through its glow, knocking the stone out of its chest. It goes still.

Raker turns to see the blade half an inch from his neck. He looks from it to me.

The skelmire collapses into a pile of bones, and we just stand there, staring at each other. Chests heaving.

Slowly, I take a step forward, and he doesn’t stop looking at me. Not as I bend into the water and retrieve my blade. Not as I sheath it. We’re both panting, wrung out, and exhausted.

“Not nothing, after all,” I say, before turning my back on him and the bog.

The bog turns into woods. The trees are hardly standing. The forest is bare, like it’s been ransacked. There are no streams. No berries. No mushrooms. Nothing.

It’s been too long without water, without food, without rest. Fighting the creatures took too much energy, which we didn’t have to spare, and something about that bog still sticks like a film to my skin.