Skyreign

27: Victory or Kabaiila: Part I

Yet another time, the sun dipped below the farthest dune, barely visible past the forest of giant towers around the emergency hospital tents assembled by the Nywanese. Yet another time, the darkness of night descended upon the warring factions.

Yet another time, Saferon and Ritana made their way out into the seemingly endless war.

In the outermost, abandoned parts of the city, the only lights available to the soldiers came from their own rifles, and the only salvation available came from the same source.

Yet it was not the light, nor the salvation, the two sought that time.

Saferon had left her sword and shield behind, all tattered and bent, scorched by repeated weapons fire and altogether an attention grabber she could do without in a night mission.

"Are you certain you can still sense the presence?" Ritana whispered in hisses.

"I can gather little to nothing of the source," Saferon paused in her hustle, peeking around the corner of an abandoned warehouse, "but the source is the same as before. That much, I know for sure."

"At least draw a weapon," Ritana warned, as quietly as she could yet loudly enough to overcome the distant echoes of weapons fire.

Saferon nodded and drew a thesium pistol in the inside pocket of her long coat, as an ample response before she slinked around the corner.

Suddenly, she stopped, as if having spotted something off in the distance, her eyes transfixed on what seemed to be nothing.

"What?" Ritana poked her side.

"I can sense the presence," Saferon said with a shudder, "it lacerates my mind. It's close. I know it's close."

"Where?"

Saferon slowly scanned the darkness, lit at times by stray plasmar fire, and finally nodded to a point just across the sand-covered highway, raising her pistol, "that way."

Ritana silently followed along, cautiously looking about, placing her feet carefully and spreading her wings to lighten her treading.

As Saferon stepped around the next corner, she stopped again, her weapon pointing directly at an empty space in the shadows.

"There!" she half-shouted, "you! Come out!"

"There's nothing there," Ritana pushed the top of Saferon's gun down.

"Correct and as intended," said a slender, black-garbed female in the Behraanese tongue, as she stepped out of the shadow into the barely-brighter open before the two.

The would-be assassin held out a long-snouted pistol aimed at Ritana's chest, but the rest of her was indistinguishable, hidden under the black wrappings. Even her face was covered, save a slit for her eyes.

Ritana prepared a few of her poisonous darts, nestled in her wings and camouflaged with her black feathers.

"Identify yourself!" Saferon shouted.

"My identity matters little to the dead," the masked figure retorted, "such a shame. A talent like your own would have been useful to the Trilithe Masons of Majestia."

"Not a talent," Saferon shook her head, "a skill mastered over time. Mastered enough that I know you're not the presence I sought."

"Indeed," said the masked woman, "still a shame though."

"Enough," said a far deeper, cutting male voice, from just behind the figure.

"As you wish," the assailant withdrew her weapon, as a barely-visible cloaked figure stepped in front of her. Slowly, the cloak was lifted from his face, exposing a grey-haired, bearded man wearing circular sunguards, and a smile as crooked as sin.