Dreams of a Dark Warrior

grow larger, his eyes wavering, but the torque stopped him from hitting his berserkrage. “Give her to me!”
    Standoff. “Not goin’ to happen.”
    “Then we fight—” Brandr went still. “Wendigos near. I smell them.”
    Red eyes appeared in the shadowed corner of the warehouse, blocking the sole exit. Dozens of the creatures scrabbled closer, their fangs dripping, the claws of their feet skittering over concrete.
    Declan clutched Regin tighter. “Fuck me.” She stirred, giving him a fitful shove against his chest, but she didn’t wake.
    Brandr mumbled, “Yeah, feck me, too.”
    “We put this aside for now,” Declan said. “If your aim is to get Regin out of here safely, then we’re in accord.”
    “Take off your glove, Blademan, and free me of this collar. Or we’ve got no shot.”
    “I can’t unlock it.”
    “And I should trust that?”
    Though the words stuck in his mouth, Declan said, “I vow it to … the Lore.”
    At that, Brandr hissed a curse. “One scratch, Chase. That’s all it takes. I will put you down if it happens.”
    Declan laid Regin against the back wall. “Same here,Brandr,” he said, turning toward the oncoming threat.
    The largest Wendigo made a guttural sound, and the pack charged them.
    Declan and Brandr fought alongside each other, their swords slashing, drawing arc after arc of the creatures’ brown blood.
    “When this is over, she goes with me,” Brandr said, decapitating one in a spray of brown ooze.
    “Over my dead body.” Declan took another’s head.
    “Not a problem. After what you did to me and to her? You want to give her more of that?”
    With each of his sword strikes, Declan felt that same déjà vu overwhelming him. Somehow, he knew when Brandr would swing, could sense when to sidestep the man’s sword. There was an ebb and flow between them, even as they continued to argue.
    “I didn’t do that to Regin—didn’t order it! I didn’t even know about it.”
Slash.
    “Bullshit!”
Sword whistling.
    “It’s true.”
    “It doesn’t matter, Blademan! It happened under your watch. You captured her. You’re responsible. Gods, man, her skin is
dim
!”
    The berserker was right.
All of this is my doing.
He had to atone. “I’m tryin’ to get her out of here alive. There’s a plane. But we’re running out of time. …”
    “That’s the least of our worries right now.”
    For every Wendigo they took down, it seemed another appeared, closing in. He and Brandr began fighting back to back with Regin in the middle.
That’s how berserkers fight. Back to back, guarding the prize.
    When the pack tightened the circle even more, and Declan barely deflected the swipe of a knifelike claw, Brandr said over his shoulder, “They’re too close. Too many. I’ll do Regin. Then you.”
    Declan swung madly. “We’re not bloody there yet!” But in his heart, he knew they were.
    Another near miss. No more room to maneuver—
    Suddenly glass shards protruded from the fronts of the Wendigos’ throats and legs. The creatures reeled, frantically clawing at the glass.
    Declan cleaved through one’s neck. “Ask questions later!”
    He and Brandr took advantage of the Wendigos’ injuries, felling one after another. Finally, no more emerged to take their places.
    When a host of convulsing, headless bodies fanned out from them, Brandr called, “Who the hell’s in here?”
    Out of the shadows, Natalya the fey sauntered, with glass shards between the knuckles of each hand and a charge thrower strapped over her shoulder.
    Brandr murmured, “Well, hellooo, trouble.”
    She nodded. “With a capital T, if you please.”
    That halfling followed her, out of breath, his eyes a touch wild, his sword coated in brown Wendigo blood. He hauled a sizable pack on his back. Containing what?
    “Did we hear something about a plane?” Natalya said.
    Ignoring her, Declan scraped his sword along the bottom of his boot, cleaning the contagious blood off his own blade. He sheathed the sword, then collected Regin against his chest.
    Still unconscious.
How injured was she?
Has tobe internal bleeding from the wall falling.
He kept reminding himself that she’d live. How many times had he cursed an immortal’s resilience?
    “Have you called for boarding yet?” the fey asked. “I’m a medallion member, and I’d prefer a vegetarian dinner.”
    Declan turned toward the exit with Regin, saying over his shoulder, “Bullshite. We’re full up.” He’d let Brandr aboard because