Deadly purpose drove Aven’s voidclaws towards the soldier’s throat. Not an ounce of restraint. Only the void’s single-minded urge to kill the one who had threatened Aelia.

  The spear blocked Aven’s claws.

  This legate was fast. Not as fast as a proper Swiftfoot. Perhaps not even as fast as Sergrud, much less a fourth circle like Nadyar Velian. Still too fast to take lightly.

  Aven struck again. Even through the anger and the hunger, the Battle Mind still could find space to think. His voidclaws had the range, able to extend beyond the spear’s length. He kept stabbing. Probing for openings. For weaknesses. For a single slip he could exploit.

  Nothing. Every blow Aven struck, Legatus Tovran saw coming. Exactly as Aven saw every one of the legate’s strikes.

  Aven hadn’t faced another Battle Mind since killing Father.

  Spear against claws. The legionnaire blocked every strike, each impact sending a jarring force up Aven’s arm. Even one-handed, the legate was strong. The very fact that he was still fighting even after Janaya’s hellfire had melted his arm and armor was a testament to that strength. Or a testament to the sheer strength of Hanion’s delusion.

  “Traitor to the empire!” The captain spat each word like a curse. “You poison your governor. You murder your ambassadors. You bring the void’s filth to our lands. Every drop of your black blood is a stain on Octarnis.”

  Aven ignored the words. They were as phantoms, as insubstantial as the deaths in his dream. But the spear in the captain’s hands was real. A glint of moonlight on steel promised a real death.

  A questioning touch reached his mind, a query from Esharah, asking if he needed help.

  “Stay back,” he hissed in reply. “Protect Aelia. You’d be in the way.”

  The words came out harsher than intended. Esharah still only pulsed back relief when Aven’s claws clashed again with the captain’s spear like two battling vipers. A flurry of motion that would have been a blur to mortal eyes. Aven’s attacks were fast and precise, the void claws seeking any chink in the legionnaire’s defense. Yet the captain, fueled by righteous fury and his own Battle Mind, was an immovable object, parrying every strike. For a moment, their weapons locked together, claw against spear tip, a deadlock of steel and void.

  In that lock, Aven swept his other voidarm to the side, seizing a fistful of broken stone from the road and hurling the chunk at the legate’s head. Tovran ducked to the side, but the distraction gave just enough of an opening for Aven’s claws to stab past his guard and draw a bloody line across his cheek. The skin was hard, almost as tough as Logash’s when using the mountain rune.

  Strength. Toughness. Speed. Instead of specializing in one physical domain, Legatus Tovran had them all, plus martial skill to match. And still, Aven was keeping pace with him. A true third circle legate. Even if it was an injured one, arm burnt beyond use, the thought was dizzying. Aven now fought at heights that Father had reached. A pride he couldn’t indulge while a spear still tried to find its home in his heart.

  “Did you hear me, monster?” Tovran snarled, twisting free of the lock and stabbing out his full range. Aven stepped back, Battle Mind correctly measuring the spear’s range as just a few inches from his face. “Your very life is a disgrace! If you cared an ounce for your father’s greatness, you’d have ended your own life long before you took his. You’re a rot, and a stain, the sole blemish on the legacy of a great man.”

  Aven burst out laughing, the absurdity of the legate’s words piercing even through the void’s rage and anger.

  “A great man,” Aven sneered, the words tasting foul as he spat them. “My father’s greatness was in the cruelty he inflicted on anyone weaker than himself. Maybe he was a hero once. My entire life he was nothing more a bitter, cruel man who beat his own son because there was no one else to conquer.”

  “Lies!” Legatus Tovran roared.

  “Also, he was a profligate, a ruinous gambler, and a disgusting drunkard,” Aven added. “But I can forgive the last of those; he only beat me when sober.” The void writhed inside Aven, a hot surge of memory. A familiar pain. He could feel it twisting him, trying to shape him into something monstrous. He fought it back, focusing on the battle. On the spear. On the hate-filled face of the legate.

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  “He was a paragon!” The legate lunged, a desperate thrust fueled by fury more than skill.

  Aven sidestepped, the voidclaw on his right arm slicing down in a blur. Not for the legate’s throat, or his face, or any vital organ. He aimed for the spear. Claws caught the spear right behind its head, sawing into the wood. Tovran’s reflexes pulled the spear back, letting Aven’s claws cut deeper.

  The shaft split, head flying off to clatter on the cobblestones.

  For a half second, Legatus Tovran stared at the splintered handle in his hand. Then dropped the useless shaft of wood. He charged, fists raised. Aven stabbed out with both voidarms, aiming for the gaps in the arm. One missed. The other sank through the cloth underneath into flesh.

  Still Tovran charged, heedless of the pain. Thrusting the pain aside, just as Aven could. He threw a punch, a powerful haymaker that would have crushed a mortal’s skull. Aven dodged, the legate’s knuckles scraping across the void-blackened skin of his cheek.

  Tovran’s shoulder slammed into Aven’s chest, and the legate grappled him, trying to wrap his good arm around Aven’s neck. They were close. Too close.

  Void spikes erupted out of Aven’s body, stabbing into the legate. Most met only metal. Some found glancing scratches on his skin.

  The Battle Mind didn’t find a way out. Not before Tovran lifted Aven completely off his feet with his one good arm and slammed him into the street. And again. Cobblestones cracked from the impact. Aven felt his bones crack too, in some distant part of the Battle Mind tracking his injuries. Not even the void’s fury could hold back the agony that shot through him with each slam.

  When Tovran lifted him up for another slam, Aven seized another fistful of broken road stone, and his claw smashed the cluster of rock into the side of Tovran’s head. The legate stumbled, dropping Aven. Not enough to stop him, but enough to create distance.

  Blood trickled from the side of Tovran’s head. But he didn’t even notice. Only a snarl, and then a headlong charge again. This time, Aven’s Battle Mind saw the mistake. An opening too great for Tovran’s own Battle Mind to correct in time.

  When Tovran closed the distance, Aven dropped, getting an angle lower. This time, both void-formed spears struck true, driving into Tovran’s flesh. Tovran strained, pushing himself further onto the spikes, the illusion of purpose driving him past all pain. A second too late, he realized his mistake.

  The void spears vanished. Leaving the two holes in Tovran’s gut open. Blood poured out.

  For a half second, Tovran still stood. Then the focus faltered. Pain, and shock, and surprise, all flooded into the legate’s face. Too much for split pieces of a mind to contain. He fell to his knees. One hand went to the ruin of his stomach. The other hung limp.

  Aven’s voidclaw sharpened to a curved blade like an executioner’s axe. He raised it, ready to end the threat to Aelia. To sate the void’s hunger for more killing.

  “Aven, wait!” Esharah’s shout cut through the haze in his mind.

  He stopped. Hand still raised. He looked over to see Esharah, her arm hanging limp and blood soaking her shirt.

  Suddenly, sounds reached his ears too. Sounds that fury had suppressed. Aelia’s shout. “No! Don’t kill him!”

  Aven looked into the eyes of his beloved. Aelia’s eyes were wide with fear. “Please,” she whispered.

  Aven looked back at the soldier on his knees before him. Now there was only a beaten man. Horribly wounded.

  “Hanion’s control over him is broken,” Esharah confirmed.

  “The...the ambassador,” Legate Tovran’s voice sounded uncertain. “I...I saw...”

  Esharah linked Aven’s mind with Tovran’s. Aven saw her draw the true memory forth. Legatus Tovran watched as Ambassador Trellian Rosval plunged a dagger into his own chest. The memory twisted, and a phantom wearing Aven’s face stood over the corpse. A different sort of illusion from those Hanion used on the servants. Instead of just twisting perception, this created a parallel memory. One that replaced the truth entirely. Until now.

  The legate’s mind shrank back in shock. Confusion. Then horror. And then shame, deep and profound.

  “You were deceived, Legatus Tovran,” Esharah’s truth echoed in both Aven and Tovran’s minds.

  Legatus Tovran looked at Aven, then back to Aelia. The man had been ready to kill an executor of a province over a lie. His head hung, shock and pain destroying any fight in the man.

  This fight was over. Even as the void screamed to kill, to sate its hunger.

  The void was just another name for Aven’s own feelings. Just his own rage and hunger reflected. This wasn’t another force possessing Aven. The void was a part of him. A choice. Just as the void in Hanion’s illusions was only the echoes of Aven’s own pain.

  Even so, it was almost too powerful to control. Esharah’s mind joined his, not forcing the void back but gently guiding it down. A calm port in the storm. Her presence was the only thing that let Aven push back the monstrous, bloodthirsty part of himself and let the rage recede. Aelia was watching. Esharah was with him.

  Aven lowered his hands. Started to withdraw his claws.

  A sudden burst of pain exploded through Aven’s chest. He felt himself lift off the ground. The Battle Mind recognized the impact to his chest.

  But where-

  How-

  A figure stood where Aven had a second before. Just in front of the beaten Tovran. A man with golden hair burning like the sun.

  Esharah’s thought flashed through Aven’s mind quicker than any words could, “Aurelio?”

  “Who?” Aven thought.

  All that registered in the fraction of a second as Aven flew through the air. The Battle Mind gave Aven just enough time to wonder before he collided with the stone walls of the nearest house.

  The Battle Mind couldn’t tell him whether it was stone or bone breaking.

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