Change of Darkness Read online

  Siray gritted her teeth but didn’t hesitate a fraction longer as she threw herself forwards into a sprint, chasing after the soldiers. Once she had reached her top speed, she Changed mid-stride, something she had never done before, but which she did now without even thinking.

  Four hooves hit the sandy ground in a quick but muted beat, the sand spraying up behind her as her speed increased further still.

  Siray’s fear for her friends drove her forwards, faster and faster. It was a race now, a dash for the platforms, that she had to win. Because coming in second …

  The soldiers could hear her coming and also increased their speed, obviously under orders to give no quarter, but Siray had gained on the ones to the rear of the spread-out formation who, still being in their usual two-legged forms, were slower than the rest. Without mercy—as they surely would show none to her friends—Siray used her horns efficiently and viciously, slashing her head from side to side as she drew even with their shoulders, her horns catching and ripping through their clothing and flesh, the soldiers falling screaming to the ground or being thrown sideways by the violence of her attack.

  Oddly, the screams had no effect on Siray—she didn’t feel remorse or have any doubts about what she had to do. She felt anger, but without the drug the Faction had used on them previously, it was a cold anger, making her all the more deadly. She didn’t pause to consider the question that popped into her mind: if her lack of feeling was just the need to save her friends or if something in this place had fundamentally altered who she was. She turned that brief moment of inward focus outwards on her enemies—two down, twenty-four to go.

  Siray tracked the bodies of the advancing group of soldiers, urging her body forwards in great surges of effort, her muscles straining for each and every extra handspan she could gain.

  But the soldiers, aware of the threat behind them, had now split into smaller groups and were approaching the platforms from different angles. Siray didn’t think about it but kept on straight, aiming for the group that had decided to make straight for the platforms rather than veer off from her attack.

  It was a bad choice.

  She swept up behind them like a storm and lowered her head towards the centre of their arrangement, where three soldiers in their normal forms were running on the inside of two larger beasts, their normal legs leaving them slightly behind the rest of the group.

  The first soldier Siray hit cried out in agony as one of her sharp horns went straight through his shoulder, but barely had his screams caused the others to turn towards her when she had tossed her head, throwing the soldier off her horns and to the sand a few body lengths away.

  She didn’t still for an instant but pirouetted in a tight circle, tossing her head as she moved so that her horns slashed open the face of a female soldier on her right side just before another step and a strong upwards jerk of her head ripped open a red line on the torso of a third, blood quickly soaking his black shirt and then the sand as he fell to the ground. The female soldier also fell, but Siray couldn’t tell if she was just stunned or mortally wounded. She didn’t care, as long as the female would be no further threat.

  ‘Siray!’

  The desperate shout reached her ears, and Siray twisted, her feet churning up the sand that was turning red beneath her hooves as she identified Kovi’s voice.

  Of different heights, the high platforms were spread out so that you couldn’t walk from the top of one to another, but would have to climb down and travel across the sand before reaching the side of another and ascending again. Off to Siray’s left, she spotted Kovi on a platform, his lean form straining at his bonds, muscles standing out in his neck and arms as he desperately tried to free himself.

  But he wasn’t looking at her—instead he was staring wildly at the platform to his right, which several soldiers had started to climb after resuming their usual Kaslonian forms, and on which a restrained Genlie was becoming pale as darkly chuckling soldiers climbed towards her.

  The moment of inattention cost Siray, and a huge form collided with her at speed, throwing her into the air before she crashed down hard on her side—on the same shoulder that had been injured in the pit.

  The impact stunned her for an instant, but Siray was dimly aware that the sandy floor had also just saved her life—hitting any other harder surface might have broken her back. She blocked out the pain as best as she could and raised her head, looking around as she fought back a bout of dizziness.

  The feeling that she had been hit by a solid wall proved partially true. A number of body lengths away from her stood a six-footed rilander, its chest heaving as it pawed the ground, clearly preparing its large grey-green body for another charge.

  Siray blinked a couple of times, trying to clear the fogginess from her head, but as she tried to surge to her feet, the world spun slightly and she fell back down. Her large lungs huffed. She had to get up.

  ‘Sirraaay! Siraaaaay!’

  Kovi’s screams were louder, more desperate—urging her with every bit of breath in his lungs to hurry. Siray turned her head, the world titling at funny angles, and saw the first soldier’s head reach the top of Genlie’s platform. At the same time, from the corner of her eye, a sudden movement alerted her that the rilander had begun its second charge. Her mind evaluated every possible option so quickly that she wasn’t even aware of it—but it did produce an answer.

  She couldn’t risk revealing her sevonix form, but in her current state, she was too unsteady to remain as a yeibon.

  The rilander was just a body length away from her when she Changed to her normal form and rolled, it’s heavy front feet slamming down where her head had been an instant before.

  Clear of the rampaging beast, Siray got one foot under her and then she was away, sprinting towards Genlie’s platform on the outer edge of the arena. Although the pain in her body from being thrown by the massive animal was sharper in this form, her head was clear enough that she managed to keep a fairly straight line as she made for her friend’s platform, darting around to the opposite side from the soldiers.

  Unencumbered by weapons, Siray managed to climb the ladder in half the time it had taken the first soldier, yet she knew it would be close. Driving her aching body hard and fast, her hands and feet touching the rungs that kept her from falling for only the briefest of instances, she practically ran up the ladder.

  Her head came even with the top of the platform … in time for her to see the lead soldier leer at a struggling Genlie and then sink a long knife into the female’s stomach.

  A terrible drawn-out scream came from Siray’s right—Kovi.

  Everything seemed to slow down, as if the world was cruelly pausing so that the realisation of what had happened could fully hit them all.

  Siray felt her muscles automatically push her up from the ladder and onto the platform.

  Saw the lead soldier turn to glance in Kovi’s direction, a horrid smile slowly spreading across the Faction male’s face as he took in the emotional suffering of the male on the nearby platform, while behind him, more soldiers were climbing up and onto the platform, their faces turning to Siray.

  And then Siray’s whole vision was filled with Genlie—the shock on her friend’s face as the blade had driven through her training gear and deep into the flesh of her stomach, and the pain that rapidly rose to replace the shock, forcing her gentle and usually fair face to contort.

  As the lead soldier began to withdraw his knife, Siray’s eyes found that blade, Genlie’s blood glistening on it.

  And as the guard drew the weapon out of her friend, something began to rise up from deep within Siray. It was anger—but it was unlike anything she had felt before. Not the drug-fuelled battle rage she had experienced in the previous days. Not a burning need for revenge. Instead, it was a rage that seemed to feed on itself as well as the images and sounds she was taking in, going blazing hot as the sharply honed end of that dripping blade finally emerged from her friend’s body.

  And as Genlie
’s long frame went limp against her bonds, darkness staining her clothes, Kovi’s scream contorted into a thing of horror and frenzied hatred.

  The rage within Siray became an inferno. Went from hot to searing in a heartbeat, burning so hard and furiously that it became cold. Siray’s mind went white with it, like the glowing edge of a sword as it’s forged. She felt the core of power within her surging to meet the demand of her honed mind.

  And just like the sword being shaped by its creator, the wrath scorching through her mind was reshaping it, making it into a harder and more deadly weapon—with one sole purpose.

  Destroying all of them. The soldier who had hurt her friend, the others still advancing. The ones watching from around the arena. She would wipe them out.

  Yet somewhere in the background of her mind, hidden within the whiteness consuming her, she heard an agonised whisper …

  Don’t …

  But the voice was weak, its quiet plea quickly burnt from Siray’s mind.

  By the time her heart beat a third time after Genlie had been stabbed, she was upon the soldier, a large paw batting away the hand with the knife, her wickedly sharp claws splitting the flesh of that arm down to the bone in ragged strips.

  The male screamed in pain and shock, even as the weight of Siray’s heavy body bore him to the ground. Then she ripped his throat out with her teeth.

  As she stood on top of him, his body writhed once, then twice, as his nervous system kept firing. Then it stilled. Her jaws dripping blood, Siray slowly raised her head until her feline eyes were staring at the soldiers standing frozen on the platform, their faces filled with horror as they realised what stood before them.

  What they had unwittingly unleashed.

  Siray’s mind flared white again, and in complete silence, she leapt for the closest soldier. Her outstretched claws pierced his flesh, and she swiped one forepaw across his face before leaping from him to the next male.

  This one had partially managed to get over his shock and was in the act of turning away to jump from the considerable height of the platform when she landed on his back, her jaws closing instantly on the nape of his neck and her long fangs embedding themselves swiftly. He was dead before his body hit the wooden surface of the structure, blood colouring the grain.

  Siray ran swiftly to the edge of the platform. While she wanted to untie her friend and see to her injuries, she knew that more soldiers were climbing the platform.

  Kill them first, she thought viciously.

  So, without pausing, Siray simply let her feline body fall over the edge from the height.

  She fell quickly, turning lithely in the air so her feet were underneath her.

  Thus, her claws were extended and easily embedded themselves as she landed on top of the next soldier’s head and shoulders. The weight of her body wrenched his hands from the platform’s ladder, and together they dropped, him screaming and her snarling on top.

  They had tumbled halfway to the ground when the male’s body hit the fifth member of the small group of attackers—a female—who’d managed only a gasp just before the male’s body slammed into her.

  Together, the three of them plunged towards their death, but just before they hit the ground, Siray launched herself into the air, her curved talons leaving bloody gouges in the male’s flesh that caused him to scream even before he slammed into the ground on top of the female.

  Their landing was accompanied by sharp cracking sounds, something only her predator hearing could discern as she touched down softly and safely upon the sand just steps away.

  Moving swiftly back to the pair, Siray saw that they both had numerous broken bones—and the female a pierced lung, if her laboured and wet breathing was any indication.

  Two lethal slashes of Siray’s claws laid both their throats open, putting a brutal end to their service to the Faction, before she was off and running again.

  Earlier in her yeibon form, Siray’s body had clearly displayed the effort she had put into driving herself forwards as she strained to catch up to the advancing soldiers, her muscles stretching and reaching to propel her onwards.

  Now, she was a black-and-silver streak, her speed effortless as she glided over the sand, the layers upon layers of muscle in her sevonix body powering her onwards. Head down, tail slightly curved in the air behind her for balance, she streaked towards the next platform.

  There were still sixteen soldiers left, yet a number of them had frozen in the process of climbing up Zale’s and Baindan’s platforms after witnessing Siray’s attack on the other unit.

  Two of them were between her and Kovi’s platform and, seeing her approach, they dropped their spears and turned to flee.

  One of them whirled to run towards the main group, obviously realising that only the advantage of numbers might save him. Yet he hadn’t managed more than a couple of steps when Siray leapt from several body lengths away, her powerful jaws wrapping around the soft spot on the back of the neck and slicing through flesh, cartilage, and bone in one strong bite. She dropped away from the now lifeless male and continued her run to the next platform, her large paws making no sound against the sand.

  The other soldier, a female, was clearly fit, evident by the simple fact that she had managed to reach the side of Kovi’s platform and had already scaled a substantial height by the time Siray focused on her.

  The terrified female shrieked as she saw Siray reaching the bottom of the platform, and the soldier began climbing faster still.

  The inferno in Siray’s mind was still blocking out everything else but this hunt, yet she didn’t need to think about what to do next—her body already knew. Once she was at the bottom of the ladder, looking upwards at the scrambling Faction female, Siray’s rear legs came in close to her front paws, her entire body coiling itself up. Then she sprang—a great explosion of power from her hind legs that propelled her a quarter of the way up the platform. Her extended claws sunk into the wood of the structure’s wall as she landed, giving her enough of a hold that her rear legs were able to land underneath them. The claws of her hind legs now securely in place, she leapt upwards again and slightly to the left … onto the back of the climbing female.

  The female screamed in agony as the claws of all four of Siray’s feet sunk deep into her flesh. Unlike her other kills, Siray didn’t go straight for the female’s neck but opted instead to climb up the female, her large hooked claws leaving horrific gashes as she used the Faction soldier as a living ladder.

  Amazingly, the female somehow managed to maintain her hold on the wooden rungs of the ladder while Siray climbed, but her tenacity was of no help when Siray made another leap from the female’s body towards the top of the platform, purposefully kicking out and backwards with her rear legs.

  As living softness gave way under her ripping claws, the female let out a final cry of anguish before she tumbled from the side of the structure.

  Siray didn’t look back as she hooked her front paws over the edge of the top of the platform, a final leap landing her standing safely on its upper surface, while a muted thump from behind told her the Faction female had hit the sands below.

  Moving swiftly to the large wooden pole to which Kovi was tied, his madly staring eyes didn’t seem to see Siray at all as she began applying her fangs to the ropes binding his torso, arms, and legs.

  Thick and strong as the cords were, they were no match for the pressure of her bite.

  Although he still didn’t turn or look at her, Kovi seemed to sense the instant he was free and made quickly for the side of the platform.

  Siray, likewise, didn’t pause but turned in the direction of her next friend.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  THE NEXT PLATFORM across was Zale’s, and the soldiers scaling its sides had renewed their climb with haste. Several body lengths away from Kovi’s platform, the other structure was too far away for any Kaslonian to jump onto.

  But not for a sevonix.

  Once again, Siray’s feline form demonstrated the
incredible power it contained as she sprinted for the edge of Kovi’s platform and vaulted into the air, her body arcing through the space between the structures, her front legs and shoulders stretched forwards.

  She landed safely just beyond the edge of Zale’s platform, her front claws digging into the wood as her back legs joined them neatly and she slowed herself to a stop, pivoting with the intention to release the ropes binding Zale.

  But as she stalked towards Zale’s pole, someone spoke again in her mind.

  Behind you …

  The voice was still weak, but its warning made Siray’s instincts flare up, and she whirled around, teeth bared, just as Zale shouted his own warning.

  ‘Look out!’

  A small blade flashed towards Siray, and she darted sideways, her speed saving her life as she felt the blade penetrate the flesh of her previously uninjured shoulder. Bending her neck, she wrapped her jaws around the hilt of the blade and pulled it out with her teeth, flinging it sideways.

  As the weapon sailed through the air and over the edge of the platform, Siray turned her glaring blue eyes upon the male now standing weaponless before her, and she drew her lips farther back from her teeth in a savage snarl.

  Realising his foolishness, the soldier tried to take a speedy step back, but Siray sprang at him, her claws out as she grabbed for his shoulders, dragging him down to crash against the surface of the wooden platform. Rolling him over onto his back with one paw, as if his weight were nothing, she watched his eyes widen in fear as she pinned him, his arms raised to protect his face.

  As if that would save him.

  The smell of urine pervaded Siray’s senses as she casually bounced the top half of her body up and then let one paw take most of her descending mass.

  Onto the soldier’s windpipe.

  The crunch beneath that paw was tremendously satisfying, and Siray sprang off the body, zipping around to the rear of Zale’s pole.