throat.
Four more Kulks remained standing. Two rushed at me while the other two lunged for Merr-anda. But my mate wasn’t helpless. I’d fashioned her a knife, and she brandished it now, slamming it to the hilt into one of the Kulk’s armor seams. He screamed and fell to one knee. I made a run for the other one, but a blow to the back of my head took me off my feet. I hit the ground face first, eating a mouthful of dirt before rolling onto my back and narrowly dodging a spiked ball on a chain as it slammed into the ground where my head had just been. Somewhere nearby, Merr-anda screamed. A body lay near me, the solar gun still clutched in his lifeless fingers. I grabbed it and lurched to my feet.
Two Kulks had a hold of my mate while another one swung the spiked ball over his head as a low growl rumbled from his chest place.
“Drak!” Merr-anda cried as she flailed in the Kulk’s grip. “Yore bleeden. Oh Gawd, yore hed!” Her pupils were blown, the whites of her eyes showing. “U mawtherfukerss,” she snarled at the Kulks. “Led meh goa!” One slammed his fist into her gut and then as she doubled over, he backhanded her to the face. The smack reverberated around the space and sent a bolt of adrenaline down my spine. Merr-anda coughed and spat a dark blob on the ground.
I didn’t feel pain. Liquid trickled down my back, but I ignored it. I lifted the gun and shot two laser bullets right into the eye-slits of the Kulks holding her. They dropped like stone. I turned on the last Kulk and swayed back just in time to avoid the spiked ball slamming into my face.
Somewhere in the distance, an orange fireball lit up the sky. Heat slammed into me. The remaining Kulk sneered. “There’s more of us coming. You’re already injured. Give up the human now and I’ll give you a quick death.”
Kulks traveled in units of twelve. I’d known from the beginning there’d be more to fight. I’d take them on too. I’d take on hundreds to protect Merr-anda.
I raised the solar gun and pressed the trigger. The gun clicked ineffectually. The Kulk laughed, a husky eerie sound as he advanced on me. “Stupid Drixonian.”
The word sliced into my skull, ripping through brain matter like a sharpened blade. I gasped as the night spun. The ground and sky and fire mixing into a frenzy of blurred images. Seething with anger and confusion, I tossed the gun to the side and dove at the Kulk in front of me. A painful blow slammed into my shoulder, but I didn’t stop as I slashed at the figure in front of me with both forearms, hacking away until I fell to the ground on top of a lifeless body. Only when I felt small hands tugging on biceps did I stop.
The Kulk lay below me, his armor bent and broken and his soft body inside sliced into ribbons. I fell back, panting, my vision coming into focus as I peered up into my mate’s bruised and bloody face.
That Kulk’s word had sent an arrow right through the wall of my mental protection and pierced at the bullseye of the truth. Some of it. I grasped for Merr-anda, who clung to me as her eyes leaked and that low cry fluttered from her swollen lips. Who I was sat in the back of my throat like a burr, and I longed to spit it out and hear that verbal truth spin in the air around me.
The crackling of fire drew my immediate attention. Merr-anda and I stumbled toward the hut, and as we drew closer, the reality of what I feared proved right. The Kulks had found my sanctuary, and they’d set fire to it. Merr-anda gasped when she saw the flames leap into the air. I could do nothing but watch helplessly as smoke poured from the home I’d made for myself when the last one had been purged from my mind.
Because I remembered now. I was a Drixonian. A legendary warrior. And my home was with the Night Kings. I wasn’t welcome there. I couldn’t remember why, but I knew with certainty that they wouldn’t allow me inside. However, they would help Merr-anda though. This I knew. The male I’d seen in the forest those many rotations ago had been a Night King, and he’d had a human female with him.