Jupiter and I landed in a shadowy alley in the middle of the Buda side of Budapest. The city was divided by the Danube River and rose up into two great halves on either side. The architecture was all antiquated European with buildings on every corner that were older than the United States had been a country. Everything was gothic and beautiful, even in the darkness of night.
Lights from windows cast long, luminescent shadows onto the cobblestone walks. Laughter from nearby pubs created a rowdy soundtrack to the cool night. The speech was in a language I couldn’t understand, but, or maybe because of that, it felt musical and melodic sound.
At the same time I could feel the evil around us. Frost shone on the walls of the antique buildings and the faint scent of sulfur hung in the air.
We had landed in kind of an epicenter of Shadow activity, and we came out ready to fight. We’d followed Nate and Serena’s lights from our sky-high vantage but now, on the ground and with buildings in between, they were nowhere to be seen.
I pulled my two katanas from my crisscrossing back straps and readied myself to engage.
I had never fought in the middle of a city like this before. So far my field experience had been limited to actual fields, but I was excited to see how interesting this would get.
I followed Jupiter around a corner into a darker alley, across the road and further into the bowels of the Hungarian city. We ignored the Shadows that slithered along every surface around us. We remained intent on finding Nate and Serena; engaging the Shadows was only going to slow us down. But it just didn’t feel right, especially after today when I had been nearly choked to death by the world’s largest Shadow colony.
As we moved through the city the sound of swords crashing together could be heard clearly over the raucous city sounds. We could see an alley way that seemed to be….. glowing, of course.
We could also hear voices shouting or arguing, even laughing at times, coming from the same alley. We immediately converged. Jupiter gripped his sword tighter, the huge long sword that was honestly a struggle for me to hold.
There they were, with Shadows covering the building walls boxing them in on three sides and confining their space. Nate and Serena stood head to head with Seth, Seven and two Fallen that I didn’t recognize. The Fallen were deceptively exotic with their dark beauty and rugged features. One had chin length hair and seemed smaller than most of the other Fallen I’d seen, except for Jude. He was the skinniest man I’d ever met, yet somehow one of the most muscularly, too. One had a military style flat top that only highlighted his harsh bone structure and shining gold eyes.
They weren’t fighting now, so I didn’t know why we heard swords clanging before. But one of the henchmen did have a long gash down his exposed bicep. Now all weapons were held tensed at their sides and the only murdering happening was from the killer stares, and just figuratively doing the damage. When Jupiter talked to Serena earlier, they were heading out to investigate a threat. Apparently they found it.
Seth looked up when we entered the alleyway and our gazes clashed together and held. He became immediately on edge as soon as I walked into the alley.
But it wasn’t Seth that spoke first.
“What are you doing here?” Seven demanded. “Where’s Jude?”
I shrugged, not trusting myself enough to answer her with anything other than loud curse words and swinging swords. I rolled my wrists around my sides, moving my swords about in a smooth and relaxed way.
I remembered when these felt heavy and awkward in my hands. After countless hours of practice they were extensions of my body; they breathed with me, they bled with me, they fought with me.
“You’re not here to fight,” Seth specified coldly. It wasn’t a question, it was a bold statement.
So out of his split personalities, I was not meeting the one that wanted to make out with me. Shoot.
“I am here to fight,” I countered defiantly. Serena shot me a quick grin over her shoulder. At least she was proud of me.
“You can’t,” Seth argued. “It’s in the contract.”
That irked me more than it probably should have, but it also prompted me to say, “Sorry, I didn’t sign a contract.”
“Be that as it may,” Seven butted in, sounding more like an adult than I had ever heard her. “The contract includes you. You’re not allowed to kill any of us.” She flipped her long, golden brown hair over her shoulder with the tip of her sword, somehow managing it effortlessly without cutting even a strand of hair off.
“I didn’t sign the contract.” I took a step forward, proving I wasn’t afraid of them. “I’m not responsible to it.”
“Fine, you’re responsible to my brother, then.” Seven rolled her eyes, back to being the child.
I shrugged again.
“I would have stopped for a pint if I knew we were just going to talk all night,” Nate taunted.
“She can’t fight,” Seven glared us all down. “We’re not allowed to engage her. How is that fair?”
“Not my problem,” Serena growled. I had a sudden feeling that Serena was a huge fan of this contract. It was somewhat of an advantage.
“Alright, but what about my brother? If any of us dies at her hands, he dies at Aliah’s.” She crossed her arms, her hands still full of her two swords that were similar to mine, but more Samuri-ish.
“What about your brother?” Serena bit out. “From where I’m standing he looks every bit as Fallen as the rest of you.”
Which was very true, but I was also hoping she was bluffing some.
“I have a solution,” I gloated. Seth quirked an eyebrow at me. “We’ll play man to man tonight. Seth and I can fight each other.”