Broker
Chapter 291

I wonder when my teeth stopped chattering. 

It was a stray thought. An absent musing that skittered across her mind like a piece of ice on a hot skillet, dancing away before she could even grasp on to it. The cold was bone-deep. The emptiness in her chest was a cavern that could never, ever be filled. Some days were better than others. Some days she barely felt it, barely sensed the eternal torment that came with her artificially ascended ability. She could hear the voices too, the screams of the souls she had wrenched from the bodies of her enemies.

One was louder in particular. A ceaseless chorus of her own name screamed over and over and over by the pig of a man she had once called her brother. She reached up and rubbed at her throat, remembering the feeling of his fingers around it. His agony rose up again, and she savored his screams. She closed her eyes and let her head sway to the melody. The comm in her ear came to life with a hiss.

<”I have visual, Felwinter.”>

She smiled to herself and opened her eyes. "You ever watch Webclips, Your Majesty?” she asked.

<“Not much of a streaming guy,”> he said with a chuckle. <“You?”>

“I have a few favorite shows,” she said. "There’s this new one I’m really into. 'Bout a chick left behind when the world ends, some biblical rapture shit mixed up in sci-fi gamer fantasy.”

<“Oh? I do like my gamer stuff,”> he said. <”Think I should check it out?”>

“Yeah,” she said with a breath and got to her feet. “It gave me some pretty good ideas.”

<”I’m looking forward to it,”> he said. <”Go, Felwinter, and raise hell on earth.”>

She grinned as the black ice spread from her wrists. It coated her hands in clawed gauntlets, climbing to her shoulders and up her neck, then down her back. The armor took shape plate-by-plate, sliding with quiet hisses laced with the moans of the tormented. A rod of dark ice stretched down from her hand and formed a flanged mace that roiled with white, soul-touched mist. The helmet closed around her head, and she let out a blissful sigh as she looked down from the cliff on which she stood. 

A half dozen small buildings were set up around the outside of a cave. Figures milled about, but to her eyes only a handful of them were real. A dozen living things amidst a small army of corpses puppeteered by the spark of a soul. Her grin turned wild as she threw herself off the side of the cliff with the mace over her head, laughing through her descent. A clawed hand wrapped around the head of one of the zombies as she landed, white light pouring from its eyes as she dug fingers into its flesh. She pulled, ripping the bones from its body as its flesh froze and sloughed away, the pearly white material turning black as ice dripped from it.

She rose to her feet as all eyes turned on her. A thousand undead gazes.

CROOAAAAKKKKK!

They screamed and charged, weapons drawn, hands reaching for her as a wall of death bore down without mercy. The earth turned black. She raised a fist, and spears of ice formed around her, spreading like a plague as they stabbed into one body after another. Corpses converted as bones pulled their way free to turn on their former allies. Even so, there were far too many dead to put down with a wave of her hand alone. Still, I’m getting the hang of it. A city will be no problem in a year, she thought as a particularly huge zombie lunged at her.

She swung up, cracking the head of the mace against its jaw. Her hand snapped out and dug into its chest, and she felt a flicker of something escape her grip. Her smile widened even more, it was almost painful. What’s this? What’s this? She ripped its heart out and tossed it to the ground, kicking it away and into its fellows. Her skeletons spread, tackling zombies as the living residents of the campsite moved to join in on the defense. Gunfire rang out, and she raised an arm, a wall of ice blocking the bullets. The wall shattered, and she spun the shards into spears that shot out like rifle rounds.

One person screamed.

 Where are you? 

She raised her hands and let the suffering soak into her, the pain, the anguish burning into her chest and setting her frigid heart ablaze. The black ice spread further across the ground, temporary structures ripped from the earth and impaled on columns of cold. 

A footstep crunched against the gravel. 

She shouldn’t have been able to hear it amongst the din of death and battle, but it echoed as if it was the only sound in a world of silence. She lowered her arms and turned to look at the cave where a single figure stood. A man with black and white hair in the fanciest suit she’d ever seen; it looked like something out of a ren-faire. She tilted her head and turned towards him as a feeling passed through her. Otis had told her once that after a certain point those of the higher tiers developed senses. Especially the Mythics. They could feel one another.

She tilted her head forward and smiled as a zombie lunged at her from the side. A spike of black ice shot up from the ground and impaled it through the jaw and skull. "Found you.”

The man leaned on a cane for a moment before standing up straight, twirling it once between his fingers and grabbing onto the skull on one end. 

With a tug he pulled a blade from it and pointed it in her direction as fire spread down the length of the weapon. His red eyes glowed bright behind it as dozens more opened in the shadows of the cave. On her side, black skeletons wreathed in the souls of the damned moved to stand with her. She barked out a laugh. "This is fun.”

“Agreed,” the villain said, his voice deep and luxurious in a way that matched his look and casual smile. "May I have your name, hero?”

“Felwinter,” she said, “And yours?”

“Charon.”

“Shall we?”

“Let’s.”

Flesh and bones collided as she closed the distance between them, swinging down as he cut across her field of view. Her mace clipped away, and his free hand snapped out, the gloved fingers growing a bit larger as he reached for her. She snickered, and a black spike raced towards his palm while she brought her arm back towards him, the mace screaming for his head. His body went limp, collapsing to the ground like a ragdoll before she could land a hit. She blinked as a terrible force crashed into her side. She didn’t even know what hit her as she hurtled across the ground and skipped a few times before crashing into the outer wall of the cave while the skeletons and zombies continued to fight it out.

She blinked a few times, a bit of blood dripping from her lip as she ripped her arm free of the stone she’d been embedded in. Ahead of her, a zombie in a martial arts gi stood with its fists raised. Its eyes were glowing that same red. She grinned as the body that had collapsed rose to its feet again.

“You’re out of your league, Felwinter,” Charon hissed, his voice coming from both bodies. 

She sneered and hopped back onto the ground. "So you’re what I felt in those zombies. They're a part of your soul. You can keep bouncing around and avoiding me while you wear me down, hm? Is that your plan?”

Charon’s true body - she assumed so anyway - tilted his chin up and smirked. She waited for him to say something, and instead a bullet nearly hit her between the eyes, cracking against the icy helmet and pinging off. She rolled out of the way as a hail of gunfire from armed zombies chased her around the length of the battlefield.

“Were you hoping for monologuing, Felwinter?” his voice carried through every zombie present, like a cacophonic stereo. “Looking for me to wait for you to make a move? I’m afraid that’s the domain of bit villains and stage plays. This is the big leagues!”

She slid and threw up another wall of ice that was riddled to pieces by whatever ammunition they had switched to. Whatever they were packing, it was the good stuff. Her nose wrinkled, and she whipped her hand towards the line of gunmen only for them to collapse as blades of ice punctured their bodies. More zombies moved in without hesitation and picked up their weapons to resume the assault. Then a chorus of roars filled the air with a sound that sent her back all the way to camp.

She looked up to the sky. Mottled gray-green dragons, six of them, flapped their wings as they rose over the fighting. Her eyes went wide.

“You like them?” Charon laughed before his voice turned to a cold, gravely rumble. "I know you, by the way! A graduate of the camp I got these from. How interesting! Tell me, how did you do on your final exam, little hero?”

More monsters - zombified beasts from dungeons - charged into the ranks of the skeletons, crushing several even as the skeletons put in their own damage. It was a war of attrition on both sides. The zombies were stronger than her skeletons, but the skeletons were absorbing the zombies into their number, spreading like a plague. There was no way of telling which side would be left standing if the commanders didn’t intervene.

She looked back at the dragons as their throats began to glow and took a single step back.

<”Don’t back down. My Heralds don’t lose to odds like this.”>

“Sire.”

<”Prove to me that the monstrosity I gave you isn’t just a pretty fake. "> he snapped. <”Wound the Underworld’s King of the Dead or don’t come back to my side.”>

She panted, looking back towards Charon, who sneered at her from his position far in the back as a cascade of green fire blasted down towards her. Her world seemed to slow down, her mind reeling from the moment, the screams in her head egging her on to just die already and get it over with. Phillip's voice, wailing and begging her to suffer as he was, eternally as his soul was flayed over and over across the ice she kept him in. She wanted to silence him, consume him, take him in. He wailed back, begging for her to do it, to make the pain stop.

She reached past him with a cruel smile and grabbed hold of the other souls she had taken since his death. Thirty-five lives at her hands and the hundreds of broken malformed spiritual remnants inside the skeletons around her. She drank them all, leaving only him to rage and shriek and beg for him to be one of them. No, never you. You’ll stay with me forever, big brother. 

Her soul felt full.

BOOOOM!

In an instant the black ice spread across everything. Buildings, zombies, rocks, and walls - everything was consumed as the world around her was turned into a living hell. Even the flames froze in midair and dissolved. The dragons' wings locked, and the creatures fell from the sky, their bodies shattering against the earth like ice sculptures. The ice became like fluid beneath her feet as she strode forward, ripples forming amidst the frozen, apocalyptic field. Bodies reached for the sky, seeking escape. The only thing moving besides herself was Charon, who had wreathed himself in flames.

She launched herself at him. “LOOK, KING OF THE RIVER STYX!” she screamed. “THE LAKES OF COCYTUS WEEP FOR YOU!”

He barked out a laugh and met her blow for blow, his weapon bouncing off of hers as she swung and swung. She finally had enough strength to rival him, however temporary it was. She would have to restock on souls after this, but that was fine; there were plenty of them on Earth for her to collect. His blade cut through her armor when he managed a hit, his body flexing and twisting like rubber every time she got close. It was like he was built just to survive anything someone threw at him.

She snarled and ducked beneath a vicious swing at her throat. He snapped his flaming hand out, and she drove her shoulder up and into it, letting the fire burn through her armor as a single shard of black ice formed in her free hand. She drove it up, and they stopped. 

Charon coughed.

She tore off her cracked and worn helmet to look him in the eyes. "Got you.”

He smiled as the red light faded from his eyes. "Maybe next time.”

Charon exploded, and Felwinter wrapped herself in ice, flying back and crashing into the stone of the cave as the zombies around her detonated as well. Buildings burned and crumbled as she got back to her feet. She frowned at the devastation. Looks like he had a failsafe. No surprise from the big boss of the underworld. 

She sensed a new presence approach and looked up to see a person hurtling towards her. She narrowed her eyes as the man landed.

“I’m Guildmaster Olsten of Perth!” he shouted. "Who are you? What happened here?” he demanded.

“This-” The black ice burst through his chest as she started to restock with a smile.

–

Charon awoke in his lounge, his usual fallback body lying in a comfortable silk robe on the couch. He shot up and let out a pained cough, gripping at his chest as an icy sear worked its way through everything that he was. It was an agony unlike anything he’d ever experienced before, and he’d cut off his own limbs to graft new ones on. It was like the chill was etching at his soul. A pain that went beyond the possible eternity he saw for himself.

That could have killed me, he thought, panting as the chill finally subsided and his soul started to recover. It’s a good thing I just need time to heal from something like that. 

He spat on the ground and tied his robe before reaching for his phone.

“Felwinter, huh? Alright,” he said with a grin. "It seems I’ve found myself a nemesis. How novel. I’m coming for you, bitch .” 

He dialed out and waited for the other end to pick up. When it did, he didn’t mince words.

“Boss, we’ve got an issue in Perth.”

–

Sonya hung up the phone and stared at it while she walked. So you’ve finally homebrewed a Herald worthy of the name, Otis.I didn’t think you’d be able to do something like that on your own. Watching you isn’t enough, clearly. 

She smiled. Fine. What’s another obstacle? Mimir has made his own little move as well, but I’m still the one pulling the strings.If the game has gotten harder, then I’ll just have to turn up the heat even more. 

“Is he alright?” Marta asked.

“He’s fine,” Sonya said with a nod.

“Good,” Marta said. "What now?”

“Now?”

Sonya asked as she stopped at the railing and looked down at the small army of heroes waiting to charge into Dharan.

“Now the gloves come off.”