Covenant's End - Ari Marmell Page 0,36
had resumed their natural length and pulled her forward to match, rather than recoiling.
Or at least that's what Shins assumed later, when she had a moment to gather her thoughts. Now, all she saw was a sudden blur, the vicious leer, and then searing pain as Lisette slammed her forehead into Shins's face.
She'd tried to turn aside, to avoid the blow she'd somehow known was coming. All she'd accomplished was that her nose might be broken, rather than assuredly was; it was something, but between the throbbing agony and the horrid sound of something going crunch, it didn't mean much.
Olgun guiding her arm more than she herself was, Shins twisted her wrist inward and stabbed awkwardly, struggling to thrust with a rapier at a range where a far shorter blade would have proven far more effective.
Still, clumsy a strike as it was, it should have connected. Before the tip could cover those mere inches of distance, however, Lisette simultaneously dropped the rapier from her right hand and tossed the dagger from her left. Neither hand remained empty, however, as she caught the dagger in her right, and grabbed the blade of Shins's rapier in her left.
The sword just stopped; she might as well have stabbed an oak tree. That the grip was impossible, that no human hand was strong enough to arrest a thrust like that—let alone do so without slicing open her palm and fingers—wasn't remotely surprising, not anymore. In fact, Widdershins had just enough time to think a bitter Of course before Lisette plunged the dagger into her body.
Olgun did for her everything he could. Had the blade struck precisely as Lisette intended, punching into Widdershins's liver, the young thief would have died in agony, excruciatingly slowly, but not slowly enough for the tiny god to make any real attempt at healing the damage. At saving her.
Instead, with the last of the power he could muster, he deflected the steel, just the slightest angle. The result, instead, was a gut wound.
Meaning that Widdershins would still probably die in agony, excruciatingly slowly, but it might buy Olgun enough time to patch up the worst of it before that could happen.
Might. If he was even given the opportunity. If the red-haired monster didn't just finish her—finish them—outright.
Because whatever else, Olgun knew damn well that his powers were drained, that he could do only so much without Widdershins's will to channel his own. That he couldn't protect her any further.
In the deepest confines of the young woman's mind, the frightened, grieving god wept.
A piercing scream, a sob, a plea, all that and more. Shins fell back against the desk, felt the steel slithering from her flesh, then crumpled into a tiny ball on the floor, arms clutched tight to her stomach. Her sleeves were already soaked in thick, warm blood, but she didn't notice. Didn't notice she had fallen, didn't notice she still screamed and cried.
She had been stabbed before, in her life of conflict. Had strips of skin torn from her by the clinging fingers of the creature Iruoch. Had even been struck in the gut before, with a hammer wielded by a man large enough to make the Taskmaster, Remy, look like Robin.
She had never felt anything to match this.
Her world was fire, agony and nausea and terror. In that moment she would have done anything, given Lisette anything she could possibly have asked for, begged Olgun to kill her, anything to make it stop. Would have, had she possessed the presence of mind to try, but even that was denied her.
Around the edges of her awareness, she almost thought she felt the faintest tingling, a sense that Olgun was doing what he could for her injury, but it wasn't enough, not nearly enough. Her body spasmed, wrenching muscles, as though sharply tugged inward by the wound itself.
“Please…” She'd no idea what she begged for, exactly, nor to whom. Possibly to Lisette herself, and Shins couldn't even find it within her to be ashamed at the thought. “Please…”
And all the gods be praised, the pain did begin to fade! She believed, at first, it was her imagination, or perhaps her mind shutting down. A chill spread through her body, from the wound outward, and where it passed the torment eased—sort of. It didn't go away, not exactly. Rather, it felt like the seeping cold formed a wall, a barrier of ice and numbness, between the agony and Shins herself. It was still present, still raging, but somehow the worst