“I have Elanna,” Lyla said to Khasran and didn’t wait for the response. She grabbed two of her daggers and activated her [Shroud of Fortification] – it was like a thin shield with the added bonus of not allowing the poison on Elanna’s bladed nails to touch her. For a few blows anyway.

  Best way to win this was to not get hit.

  Lyla stepped to the side, away from Khasran, moving between the tables to draw closer to Elanna. The woman watched her all the way, arms at her side. Vixias, on the other hand, didn’t wait, charging at Khasran as soon as Lyla had moved. She heard the clang of metal as Vixias’ blade slammed down, Khasran blocking the blow with his arm bracers.

  Elanna took it as the signal to move, leaping towards Lyla like a feral cat, arms spread behind her. Lyla waited for the last possible moment, as Elanna stopped just short of her and swiped. Her right hand carved upwards, the left slashing down. Lyla squatted, parrying the blow from Elanna’s right with her daggers, before rolling underneath the slash that whispered by her head.

  She was up to her feet immediately, turning to once again parry another slash from Elanna’s right, but the woman used the momentum to twirl her whole body and roundhouse kick with her left foot. Lyla blocked it with both arms but it still knocked her back, lifting her into the air. She tucked her knees in, as Elanna leapt after her. As Lyla was falling back to the ground, she stretched her legs, planted her feet, used the ground to push off and somersault back.

  Elanna landed where Lyla had been, her left fist pounding into the floor with a boom that echoed through the hall. The room shuddered, a small crater left behind in the floor where she had punched it. Lyla took the opportunity to go on the offensive. She threw a dagger as she drew one of her other two, dug a foot into the ground, then used it to push off towards Elanna.

  The other woman swiped the thrown dagger away, but Lyla came in right behind it, thrusting the dagger in her right hand at Elanna’s stomach, then the dagger in her left at Elanna’s shoulder. Elanna blocked the blow to her body with her bladed hands and twisted her body to avoid the blow to her shoulder. She grabbed Lyla’s right wrist, turned and hurled her over her shoulder.

  Lyla slammed into the ground on her back, the tables nearby bouncing with the impact. Elanna followed up with an outstretched hand with its poisoned nails aimed right at Lyla’s face. Lyla rolled. Leapt to her feet. Elanna followed her. Another swipe, another slash. Lyla parried both but she was on the backfoot as Elanna continued her charge.

  Elanna stretched out both hands, aiming for Lyla’s stomach. Lyla [Sidestepped]. Energy coursed through the left side of her body, pushing her to the side. Elanna’s hands passed through air as Lyla stabbed at the woman’s exposed side. But Elanna was an assassin as well. She had her own bag of tricks. One moment she was there, the next a couple of metres away.

  Elanna smiled as they both drew breath.

  “You’ve improved since the last time we sparred, little one,” Elanna said. It had been a while since they had sparred. A couple of years at least, from before they were both accepted into their squads. They were relatively evenly matched. Elanna perhaps had the slight edge, being a little smaller and lithe. Lyla wondered whether to risk being hit, so she could get in close and work her daggers. She wondered how Isabel made it look so easy.

  Beyond Elanna, Vixias threw his massive blade around as Khasran evaded and looked for an opening. Tables and chairs had been smashed, splintered wood scattered across the floor.

  “We don’t have to do this, Elanna,” Lyla said. “The Empire is wrong. You could join us. Help us.”

  “Help you? You’re a traitor to the cause. To the people who gave you everything.”

  “Gave me everything? They took everything. Our parents. Our families.” Lyla paused, looked Elanna in the eyes. “They took our childhoods. We should have been children. Instead, they made us weapons.”

  “We were orphans. They gave us purpose,” Elanna said, eyes narrowed. “And they never took my family. My family threw me away. The Empire gave me a new one.”

  “These are just kids, Elanna. We can’t kill children. We shouldn’t.”

  “We shouldn’t?” Elanna’s lips curved in an unsettling way. “If you knew I would grow up to kill these children, wouldn’t it be prudent to kill me while you could?”

  “No. Children can change. They don’t need to grow up to hate. They don’t need to become like us.”

  “What if you enjoy it? What if these children you’re saving grow up and turn on you because they can? Because they became too powerful.” Elanna dropped her hands by her side, but Lyla saw the slight shift in Elanna’s feet, planting one behind the other. She was readying another attack. Lyla steadied herself. “Like those friends of yours.”

  If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

  Lyla planted a foot, felt energy pulse through her inner channels towards her calves. “I’ll deal with it then.” She thought back to Elliott’s words. How to squeeze more power. Find something to live for. For now, she knew what that was. To put an end to the child programs. On her own, if she had to.

  She pushed off the ground, her foot creating a small crack in the stone from the pressure as she sailed through the air, daggers ahead of her. Elanna stepped aside easily, slicing with her bladed fingers upwards through where she expected Lyla’s stomach to be. Lyla was ready for it. In fact, she wanted to get hit.

  Elanna’s claws slammed into Lyla’s midriff, the [Shroud of Fortification] stopping it from penetrating, but it changed Lyla’s trajectory exactly as she wanted it to. She tucked her head and knees in as she veered towards the ceiling, extending her legs at the last moment. Another pulse of energy blasted through her thighs, her calves and into the balls of her feet.

  Cracks ruptured through the ceiling as she shot back towards Elanna with a speed that Isabel would have been proud of. She slammed into the other woman, the stone beneath Elanna splitting and crumbling as it cratered inwards. The hall groaned, loose stone falling in a cloud of dust above their heads. Lyla straddled Elanna’s waist and thrust a dagger at her left side. Elanna scrambled to defend as Lyla slammed her other dagger towards Elanna’s neck. She blocked it with a hand, kneeing Lyla in the back, shuffling her legs to try to get out from the pinned position.

  It didn’t matter. Lyla charged her inner channels, squeezed her knees against the other woman’s sides as she went to work with her daggers. Elanna bucked and twisted beneath her, clawed fingers slashing at Lyla’s face, knees and kicks aimed towards her back. Lyla squeezed harder. This woman wasn’t going to escape.

  She stabbed at Elanna’s face, her shoulders, her thighs. Chunks of stone flew into the air, the ground cracking with each blow as the Elanna blocked and deflected. As quick as she was, Lyla was proving quicker. Energy pulsed throughout her arms and legs, helping her hold her position as she rained down with the daggers.

  She found a way through Elanna’s defences, the woman struggling to maintain her hardened skin. Lyla’s blade dug into Elanna’s thigh. She forced energy into her arms, leaned into the blade, watched the fear on Elanna’s heart shaped face. Elanna’s eyes widened, her mouth open, screaming like a feral animal caught in a bear trap.

  Lyla would kill this woman.

  She was so focused on Elanna, she wasn’t aware of Vixias until it was too late. From the corner of her eye, she saw the edge of the massive sword he carried swing at her, hitting her in the right shoulder and sending her flying across the room, smashing into a wall.

  That was harder than anything she’d been hit by before.

  Stunned, she put a hand to the wall to help her get up. She barely had the chance to see Khasran, lying on the floor in a pool of blood. Elanna was on her in a moment, swiping at her face and shoulders with her claws, slashing at her midriff, then towards her thighs. In her groggy state, Lyla did her best to deflect the blows, her [Shroud of Fortification] negating the damage from the rest but it wouldn’t last much longer.

  She was pinned against the wall as firmly as she had pinned Elanna. She managed to block several of the blows but others landed cleanly, across her face, her arms, her chest. Elanna had the upper hand, grabbing her by the arm, tossing her to the ground. More cracks split through the floor. Lyla rolled, but as she kneeled in an effort to stand, Elanna swept across the floor and kicked the side of Lyla’s head, slamming her face into the ground with a crunching thud. She rolled several times, coming to a stop by a wall.

  She used the wall to sidle up but Elanna covered the distance between them in a flash.

  “Did you really think it would be so easy?” Elanna roared at her. Lyla screamed as she felt a sharp, stinging pain on either side of her midriff. She looked to see and found Elanna’s nails tearing through her leather vest and digging into her sides, just below her ribs.

  Then Elanna removed her claws and drove them into Lyla’s chest.

  Her vision blurred, the world flickering in and out. Beyond Elanna, Lyla could make out the shadow of Vixias, standing over Khasran’s body. Vixias drew his sword overhead and carved through Khasran’s neck. As Khasran’s head rolled, Vixias kicked it towards the wall with such force, it lodged into the stone, eyes staring blankly ahead.

  “FATHER!” The scream came from the left. Lyla barely made out the figure of Aurae, standing at the entrance to a tunnel, several of the guards behind her. Father? Khasran was human, though.

  Lyla felt the poison working its way through her bloodstream, spreading from the wounds in her sides and chest towards her internal organs.

  Elanna pulled her face close to Lyla’s ear as she glanced behind her at Aurae.

  “Now, we’ll kill the rest of them. Traitor.”

  Elanna twisted her hands, before pulling them away and turning to the others.

  Lyla spat blood as she collapsed to the floor, daggers falling from her hands. She blinked, watching Elanna walk away from her towards Aurae and the rest. The poison burned through her bloodstream, her chest becoming more numb by the second, her lungs aflame as they struggled to circulate air. Her breaths became shallow, even as she did her best to stand, her fingers clawing at the cracked stone floor.

  Aurae stood in front of the guards, long silver braids tucked behind her ears, defiance written across her face even as she tried to hold the tears in. Lyla knew they weren’t strong enough to stand against both Elanna and Vixias. It wouldn’t be long before Elanna regained her full strength. And then Elanna and Vixias would kill Aurae and the guards, and the teachers. Then the kids.

  She wondered where Isabel and Elliott had disappeared to. How could they have left before saving them? Her eyes began to close as she heard Elanna’s footsteps get further away.

  Something to die for.

  Elliott’s words skittered across her mind.

  Something worth living for.

  Something worth dying for.

  Her eyes shot open.