Descend, Crimson Flame
A shiver raced over every inch of her. Nina lurched upright in bed, and pain stabbed through her ankle so sharply that tears sprang to her eyes.
“What? What’s wrong?”
Nina answered Kirill at once.
“I have a feeling something terrible is about to happen. Something enormous. Where’s my uniform?”
“Burned it. Spare clothes are under the bed.”
Nina dragged a basket out from beneath the bed. The garments were far too large and hung loose on her, but this was no time to care.
Kirill sighed as she watched Nina fling off the patient’s gown and change into the uniform.
“Give it up. You only just woke out of the poison. Your body’s a wreck, and if a fight starts like that, you’ll be the first one dead.”
“I’d do exactly that if I could. This is far too serious.”
She threw the black long coat over her shoulders and buckled her sword to her belt. One foot in a boot, the other still wrapped in bandages, she made for the door as she spoke.
“Kirill, if anyone comes, run. All the way to the main castle. Don’t wait for me. Not for anything.”
The wrongness in her voice made Kirill narrow her eyes.
“What? Why are you like this?”
“Just run, no matter what!”
Nina flung the words behind her and broke into a sprint.
“Of all the times to get hurt. This hurts so much I could die. Seriously!”
She yelped and snarled, but she did not slow. If anything, her pace only climbed.
Boom!
In the next instant a roar shook the earth, and a violet flash flooded her sight. At the same time a wind steeped in miasma slammed into her.
Did the barrier break?!
With a sharp crackle, blue fire leapt across her coat and began to burn straight through it. Even the uniform, specially treated to resist Bellac corruption, could not endure a miasma this fierce.
The wind hurled her backward. She caught a branch, spun once around it, and flung the coat aside, then drove herself forward again.
Damn it. Damn it. Damn it.
She spat the curses under her breath and drew her sword.
By the time she plunged into the heart of the blast, the battle was already raging.
Have they lost their minds?
The Bellac looked as if they had gathered for a party, and only the high-grade ones at that. A swift glance over the living sent despair sinking through her. The ordinary knights had been wiped out. Of the Elite, a mere two remained: Jin, and Vice-Captain Louis.
Adrian?
She saw him collapsed behind Jin and Louis. The shout tore out of her before she knew it.
“Adrian!”
Jin answered in his place.
“He’s alive! That lunatic priest bastard blew the thing up, and he got caught in it—”
“He is still breathing.”
Louis went on.
Only because the two of them had been holding the assault at bay had Adrian survived at all. Anyone near the barrier, near the blast, had been torn to pieces and flung away. One face of the cubic building had been blown off entirely, and something like a thick, sticky fluid was spilling from the breach. Bellac kept crawling out of it. Worst of all, a thing like an enormous pincer was forcing itself through the narrow hole in the barrier, and the rest of the ward looked ready to come down.
“Nina! Look out!”
Jin shouted.
What came down on her was a Bellac like a gigantic squid. Its countless limbs were terribly long, each one sheathed in scales as hard as steel. Whenever her sword met them, steel rang and sparks flew.
“I am one blessed by North Wind and Frost.”
“O blade of the howling wind, O keen edge of the cool frost!”
Beneath the sleeve she had shoved up, her Spirit Crest blazed as if it had caught fire. The blade froze a stark white and sheared through one massive limb in a single stroke, as easily as cutting soft butter. The severed face froze white at once, and Nina slipped swiftly in between Jin and Louis.
They had matched their rhythm dozens of times, hundreds; the link came easily. The fighting grew smoother. Any chance of winning did not. Nina set her jaw.
We can’t beat this.
Even this one colossal squid was more than they could handle, and the other Bellac were swarming in as well. For now only a single face of the barrier had broken. But if every face gave way? A deep violet mist was creeping along the ground, spreading farther and farther. One look was enough to know no human could endure that.
And I’m wounded on top of it. Damn it all to hell.
“North Wind and Frost, my old comrades.”
“Steadfast shield that permits no spring, stillness that swallows all things—”
“Shield of perfect winter!”
She raised her sword and cried out, and a round shield formed as if ice itself were freezing into place.
“Young Master!”
She drove the sword into the ground and dropped to one knee beside him. Even inside the shield Jin never took his eyes off the enemy, while Louis came close and examined the wound. Thick blood was sliding from Adrian’s head. As they peeled away his contaminated coat, he came to. His eyes opened, unfocused. He tried to surge upright and swayed.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
At the rapid hammering against the shield, Nina spoke quickly.
“Leave this place to me. The two of you take the Young Master and withdraw.”
Brief and plain as it was, no one accepted it.
“Don’t be ridiculous.”
That was Jin’s answer. Adrian’s eyes narrowed.
Nina looked at the shield as it began to crack and spoke again, fast.
“I’m the only one who can seal that hole and finish the monster. The only Spirit Users here are the Young Master and me, and we can’t leave this to him, can we?”
“Why not.”
Adrian reached out and seized her arm.
“I’ll do it.”
“No. Not with your body like that. And you are the Young Master. I’m the only one who can.”
Nina flashed a crooked little grin, brushed herself off, and stood.
“Jin. Vice-Captain. I’m leaving him to you.”
Jin’s face was tight with unease.
“What are you planning to do?”
He thought he already knew. He still wanted to hear it. Otherwise, how was he supposed to stop her?
Nina shrugged.
“I’m going to make a contract with a new spirit.”
Jin reset his grip on his sword.
“If you die, I die with you. I’m not running off and leaving you alone.”
“I’m not telling you to run. I’m telling you to protect the Young Master.”
“I don’t need that.”
Adrian’s voice came out rough. He struggled to rise, but dizziness would not let him stand straight. His vision swam. Louis caught him as he staggered.
“I won’t leave you behind. If someone has to stay, I will.”
Gasping, he wiped clumsily at the streaming blood and forced the words out. Nina puffed out her cheeks.
“You really won’t listen. Even so, you have to go. Someone has to carry word of this. If you die, Young Master, what becomes of the knights who abandoned their captain and ran?”
At that, Adrian’s head dropped.
Nina gave his chest a light push.
“Then do your duty.”
To live was a responsibility. To survive was a duty as well.
Adrian ground his teeth. He did not want to take a single step from this place. One lapse in judgment, and he had lost everything.
And yet. And yet—
You, too?
Even you?
No. I don’t want this.
I absolutely refuse.
If you aren’t here, then I—
The words climbed all the way to his throat.
No one gives a damn about a life like mine. So here. With you.
“Captain.”
Louis called to him.
Adrian turned a contorted face toward him.
“Let us go.”
In that instant the shield shattered. Nina kicked off the ground.
A squid limb came after her. Dodging the strike, she began a long incantation.
“You who are searing flame, heat that burns and bursts through anything, fire that wells up without end—”
“To you I offer my flesh, I offer my blood, I offer my bone…”
“Nina!”
Adrian shouted.
Nina clenched her teeth. Her strength began to tear out of her at a frightful speed. She could feel the merest fringe of a presence so vast it raised the hair on her skin.
“Upon your altar, burning without end, I offer my soul.”
The air shuddered with a low thrum. Nina gripped her sword tight.