Dashyl's Journey: The Assassin

“Thank you so...whoa!”

One minute the journal was in Dashyl’s hand, the next, it was gone, snatched by a black blur of a form somersaulting through the air. A person, dressed all in black, punched Alerial in the face while in the air, deftly landed in a crouch, then spun around to face them clutching Kilkarak’s journal. The thief was a woman, masked, with just her eyes visible. Those eyes narrowed as they focused on Dashyl. She pointed at him and then jumped back into a shadow where she faded from sight.

Alerial yelled a guttural, gravelly yell after being punched and leapt toward Dashyl. The avenir waved his radia-tipped staff in a circle above him. A blue shield of radia energy emanated from the staff and enveloped Dashyl and Alerial. Dashyl turned around in time to see a dart flying through the air toward his neck, but as the dart hit the radia energy, it vaporized, releasing a bright blue flash. Dashyl averted his eyes, but heard a man cry out.

When the flash faded, Dashyl saw a man standing in front of him dressed in black robes and a red hood. The man was holding his hands over his eyes, grunting. At his feet sat a blow gun and another dart. At this moment, the woman in black leapt out of the shadows, kicking Alerial’s hands and he lost his grip on his staff. The radia shield dropped and the woman bounced from her landing right into a backflip. As she flipped in the air over Alerial, she punched him in the head and rolled through her landing, popping up near Dashyl.

Dashyl drew the knife that the venomist had given him. “This woman is as slippery as a fish,” he told himself. “Strike where she will be, not where she is.” Dashyl flung the knife through the air as the woman began her next move. As she tried to twist away, the blade caught her in the side of her torso, slashing deeply into the softer skin there. Dashyl again noticed her eyes, this time they filled with rage instead of focus. Kicking away the knife, she flew through the air in a jump kick pose towards Dashyl. Before the woman could land her kick, two bright blue flares fizzled through the air striking her in the back and head and then exploding. The force knocked her off course and she slammed into the wall behind Dashyl and did not move from where she crumpled to the floor.

“A Shadowhand Agent and a Krill Assassin!” Alerial shouted to Dashyl. “Be on your guard, they want us dead! Urk.” As he finished his sentence, a dart hit Alerial in the neck. Dashyl spun around to see the man in the red hood run to the woman and dive on the floor to retrieve the journal that she had dropped.

“Are you okay,” Dashyl asked as he went to Alerial’s side. The avenir pulled the dart out of his neck.

“Nysik. A special toxin developed by the Order of Kril. My people have been trying to come up with an antidote, but we have not succeeded.” Alerial said, looking Dashyl in the eye. Before Dashyl could even think of what to do, he heard a voice behind him.

“I have your father’s journal,” said the Krill Assassin as he walked toward Dashyl. “Your mother is dead, your father is dead, and soon you will be dead.”

Dashyl stood there, frozen with fear, thoughts buzzing through his head. “The Order of Krill and the Shadowhand Agency were part of the Legion faction. They were Sarion, just like me and my parents, why would they want us dead? Why do they want my father's journal?” These thoughts flew from his mind as he suddenly recognized the pattern on the assassin’s red hood: a skull. The skull seemed to be smiling as it hovered closer to the boy.  The man reached beneath his black robes and pulled two curved, kinked blades, one in each hand. He started whirling the blades around his body and shouted a word Dashyl did not understand.

In a frenzy, the assassin came at him, blades clashing in the air seemingly everywhere. Dashyl closed his eyes. Just as he was about to leap away, an arm hit him in the side, pushing him out of danger. Dashyl rolled and came to a stop in time to see Alerial take the brunt of the assassin’s attack. Blue blood streamed from a multitude of wounds on the healer’s body.

“Run!” Alerial screamed as he looked over at Dashyl.

Dashyl watched as Alerial pulled two more radia flares from his pockets and throw them at the assassin. A blue ball of flame engulfed the black robes and red hood for a moment and then faded. Dashyl could see his rucksack by the door. He had a clear path to grab it and run. But could he leave Alerial, the Akrasa who had saved his life? “What can I do for him now?” Dashyl asked himself.

“Run, boy!” Alerial bellowed again.

Obeying this time, Dashyl ran, grabbed his rucksack and bolted for the door. He turned before stepping outside. Alerial was holding his staff high in the air as the assassin charged at him with his blades spinning. Dashyl gasped as the assassin plunged his swords deep into Alerial’s belly. Alerial yelled one last time and smashed his staff down on the head of the assassin and both of them disappeared in an explosion of blue flame.

Dashyl had not seen the explosion. He had turned to run and was out the door a few paces when the concussive force of the blast knocked him forward into the gravel of the path. He turned back to see the remains of Alerial’s house, a ruin belching blue smoke. Scrambling to his feet, the boy grabbed his rucksack and ran away down the path, tears streaming from his eyes, with one thing repeating through his head, “Trader’s Haunt and home.”