Page 19 of Immortal Longings
She’s already late to the party.
Calla’s gaze whips up. Her eyes adjust to the back of the storage space, just in time to catch a player slash his knife across the throat of another, splattering more blood everywhere. The body drops, red pooling onto the floor. In seconds, it has flowed within distance of Calla’s boots, the dimly lit passageway reeking of the metallic stink.
“Fuck.”
She presses the first button on her wristband, stopping it from trembling. If the low sound didn’t already signal her presence, her voice has certainly summoned the attention of the surviving player. He turns, tossing one of his knives into his other hand, wiping the blood from his face. There’s a drop hanging just by his lip, and when his finger reaches it, he puts it right into his mouth, licking the blood clean off.
Absolutely depraved.
Calla draws her sword. There’s not a moment to spare when she lifts it against his strike, one knife in each of his hands now, clanging down upon her. The crescent-curved blades stop inches from Calla’s face, and she stifles a wince, eyes darting to take in her opponent. Her first instinct is to wonder if this is a Crescent Society member, but she sees no markings. A coincidence that he carries their usual weapons, then.
Suddenly, the player hooks his blades down hard, and Calla almost dropsthe sword. He’s good. Too good. When he looks up, his eyes are black, and Calla blinks, certain for a moment that this is August. She lets go of her sword intentionally, taking the player by surprise when both their weapons clatter to the floor and her gloved hand whips toward him. She grabs his neck. Hooks her foot behind his knees.
There is one lightbulb in the passageway, hanging from the short ceiling. Going off her hunch, she seizes his jaw roughly as soon as they hit the floor, but when she turns his eyes toward the light, they come back flashing purple, not blue.
Not August. Someone else.
“Number Fifty-Seven,” he says suddenly. He slams an elbow to her head, and when Calla spits a curse, he’s quick to twist upright and press her into the bloody floor instead, his arm pinned upon her clavicle. In an instant, Calla turns her face away from the light, shaking her hair into her eyes. Where did his knives land? Nearby?
“How do you know who I am?” She reaches for her sword. The player stretches out to stop her. As soon as his attention snaps elsewhere, however, his hold on her eases a smidgeon, and she takes the opening to aim a hard kick to his middle and send him flying. Sword and knives alike lie scattered on the floor. The two of them pause, a standstill in the fight as they draw up their next moves.
The player smiles. The expression radiates into every line of his being, screaming with an appalling confidence, the kind that lights up a body no matter the vessel being occupied, no matter what sort of mouth is snarling its corners up.
The player lunges for his knives; Calla gets there first. By the narrowest margin, her fingers close around her sword grip, sending the blade up, which only makes the player smile harder when he swerves away. She’s almost inclined to respect his terrifying boldness. This isn’t what she expected out of the other combatants. A part of her likes it. It has gotten monotonous to be leagues aboveeveryone else. Calla Tuoleimi is positioned to win every battle—that is not up for debate—but every once in a while, a challenge does enliven her spirit.
“Of course I know who you are,” he replies, bringing his knives to his side. “It’d be very hard not to take notice.”
Calla lands a strike, cutting his arm. He hisses and surges back, but Calla follows fast and slashes with her sword again. This time, he defends himself faster, and her blade only meets the carcass hanging to his right.
She yanks the sword out of the dead cow. “You’re probably mistaken.”
“I never make mistakes,” the player replies. He hovers in his stance, watching her carefully. He’s waiting to pick out a flaw in her fight patterns, waiting to sight a weakness he can exploit.
In a smooth arc, Calla transfers her sword from right hand to left and swings. “You must be some sort of god, then.” He swerves, the blade missing his throat by the barest hairsbreadth. “What an honor it is”—she tries again, nicking his chest—“to kill a god.”
The player wipes a smear of blood from his temple. He finally cannot back away any further, coming to the wall. Beside him, the player he already killed lies unblinking. The light is strong here, coming directly from that one bulb.
And somehow, his smile is back.
“You’re beautiful.”
Calla snorts behind her mask. “You can’t see me.”
“Who says I have to?”
“Do you flirt with every person you’re trying to kill?”
“Only you, Fifty-Seven.”
Finally, when she attacks again, he lifts his knives to meet her. They move in a blur, in a brutal and coordinated dance, making a mess of the storage room around them. It is difficult to decipher whether it’s a piece of a carcass or a real limb until a beat after the strike, when congealed black blood bursts from the pig’s ribs and splatters to the floor.
She can hear him breathing heavily. So long as they keep up this dance, she will outlast his maneuvers, and at his first stumble, she can strike—
The hatch into the storage room opens. A burst of sound drops in from the market above, and the other player looks up, giving Calla the chance to plunge her sword into his chest without hesitation.
Only as soon as the hilt of her sword strikes against chest bone, there’s a blinding flash of light. Calla flinches, forcing herself not to look away. When the light clears, the body before her has murky-gray eyes, his mouth agape in surprise.
Calla tears out the sword, her teeth gritted in irritation. Without looking, she holds down the second button of her wristband, summoning emergency services. The body before her might survive if they stitch it up fast enough.
