Kell's Legend

down, saw Barras standing close to her, not looking at her, but watching the spectacle with Kat.
    “Let us go,” she said.
    “Why? We’re going to have a pretty fun with you two for, oh, I’d say the next month. You can get a lot of use out of a young woman like yourself; you have so much stamina, so much passion, so much anger. But, finally, when we’ve fucked you, and beaten you, and broken your spirit worse than any high-bred stallion, when you no longer scream during orgasm, when you no longer scratch at faces and pull at hair…when your spirit is gone, me sweet little doll, then, and only then, do we slit your throats.”
    Nienna stared down at the man, tasting vomit, and wondering how she could kill him. His words frightened her more than anything she had had ever heard, or ever seen; worse than the albino army, worse than any canker. For here, and now, this was personal, not just an invasion, and this man was evil, a total corruption of the human shell. She was still stunned that she had not been able to see it. To smell it. It was a sobering life experience.
    “How could you do that to us?” she asked, in a small voice.
    Barras glanced up, then reached out, his hand creeping up the inside of her trouser leg. His fingers were rough on her skin. She squirmed, but he was stronger than he looked; he grinned as his fingers groped her inner thigh, her soft flesh, her young flesh, and his eyes were old and dark and deeply malevolent.
    “Not everybody in this world has the same morals as you, little honey. You little rich girls; well, you deserve every fucking you get.”
    The men, laughing, got the stick from Kat and bore her to the ground. One kissed her, and when she bit his tongue in a spurt of bright blood he slapped her hard, across the face, then again with the back of his hand. Blood trickled from her nose and she lay, stunned, fingers clenching and unclenching. The man pulled free her vest revealing small, firm, breasts. He squeezed them, one in each hand, to the cackling of his companions…
    “Call them off,” said Nienna, voice so dry she could hardly speak.
    “Why, me sweets?”
    “You saw the axe,” said Nienna, voice turning hard. “It’s Ilanna.”
    Barras narrowed his eyes then, scowling at her. “Where did you hear such a name?”
    “It’s true,” she hissed. “It’s my grandfather’s axe. He’s coming. Soon. He will kill you all.”
    “What’s his name?”
    “You know his name, you heap of horse-shit.”
    “Speak his name !” snarled the woodsman.
    “He is Kell, and he will eat your heart,” said Nienna.
    This impelled Barras to move, and cursing (cursing himself, he knew he had seen the axe before), he stepped forward to talk to the woodsmen; but something happened, a blur of action so fast he blinked, and only as a splatter of blood slapped across his face and dirt-streaked stubble did he leap into action…
    The creature slammed across the clearing from the darkness of the trees in an instant, picking one man up in huge jaws, lifting the man high at the waist and crunching through him through his muscle and bonesand spinal column and he screamed, gods he screamed so hard, so bad, as the canker shook him and gears spun and wheels clicked and turned and gears made tiny click click tick tock noises, and it threw him away like a bone into the forest.
    Barras ran forward, screaming, his sword raised…
    The canker whipped around, a blur, and leapt, biting off the woodsman’s head in a single giant snap.
    His body stood for a moment, still holding a tarnished sword, an arc of blood painting a streak across the forest in a gradually decreasing spiral. Then a knee buckled; the fountain of blood soaked the pine needle carpet, and the body crumpled like a deflated balloon.
    Nienna struggled against her ropes, and she could see Kat crying, pulling on her vest and trews.
    “Kat! Over here! Get the axe!”
    The remaining four woodsmen had grouped together, pooling weapons. With a scream, and as a unit that displayed previous military experience, they charged across the fire at the canker which growled, hunkering down, crimson eyes watching the charge with interest, as a cat watches a disembowelled mouse squirm.
    Kat grabbed the axe and, still sobbing, half crawled, half ran towards Nienna. She swung at the rope, missed, then swung again and the sharp blades of Ilanna sliced through with consummate ease. Nienna hit the ground, and Kat helped her get the ropes from her wrists