Thin straight hair like stretched glass, droopy eyes, powdered lips, and an air of icy queen. Bo Barri stood head tall upon a flowering ice spire. His shawl fluttered in the cold wind as his blouse opened up to his naked knees. Sucking in, four claps, and a kiss, birthed nine ice serpents. Flinging down from above. Exploding ice shards sunk into shallow pits, merely nicking Akli and Valory.

  I would have liked them dead by now, but perhaps I’ll hold off. They’re more resilient than I thought. The girl predicts my attacks well. However…the boy, he’s…bizarre. It’s like he knows he’ll be fine, so he puts little effort into dodging. It’s… Bo’s stomach began to turn with unease. A foreboding presence sinking into the back of his subconscious.

  Skidding behind steel fencing of a water logged shack, Valory began to tend to Akli’s wounds. “Enough,” he said. “We don’t have time for this…we need to get to the princess and Ben. They’re in the most danger.”

  “Agreed, and I think I know how,” Valory replied.

  “…” She’s figured it out? Of course she did…

  “Before they fire they hold their breath and the number of claps changes the formation of the ice and how it’s shaped.”

  “You noticed that…?”

  “I have good eyes, don’t you recall?”

  “I suppose you do,” Akli smiled as he rolled up his sleeves. “I’ll give you an opening, so make it count.”

  “Aye.”

  Akli dashed through broken frames, tumbling back into the fray of frost. Bo made a snappy rhythm, exploding the air in a cloud of icy dust. Mist? Akli thought. Needles sunk into his arms before turning to water. A rock rattled Bo’s brain as his ice collapsed. Damn…I let my guard down.

  I have to hit him hard right at the moment they clap, if I mess up the timing they can freeze me. Valory thought as she bolted towards the falling Bo Barri.

  “You take me for a fool, girl…” Taking in the largest breath he could hold, nine symbols formed from his interlocking fingers. With a swift clap that knocked away all the sediment in the air, three large penguins appeared; their eyes a radiant silver that matched their cute beaks. Tooting along, their gaseous farts let them slide along the road until they burst forth at the speed of rockets. Knocking the wind out Valory, her conscious fading. Bouncing with the penguins’ giggles shook her senses. What was up? What was down? Everything spun around her.

  “Valory!” Akli closed in, his fists whiffing wildly. Shit! I followed the arrows, but I still can’t hit ‘em. “Fucker! Stay still!”

  “I’d rather not. You scare me the most…who are you?” Bo asked as he leaped back a few meters. “Answer, and I may spare your life.”

  “I’m Akli Graham, now who the fuck are you?”

  “Bo Barri, a simple bounty hunter. It’s rare to find fellows who can touch a pillar. Rarer the more south you move. Yet, here I am sensing comradery with that girl, and an unnerving essence oozing off you. So I ask this, Akli Graham, who are you?”

  Akli charged with his shoulder, plunging it into Bo’s stomach as he lifted him high above. Every muscle tightened into the swing that plummeted Bo’s head into the cracking soil below. “I didn’t understand any of the shit you said.” Sucking from his sinuses, Akli released a large wad of mucus and blood.

  Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

  “Hahaha! Lucky boy, you are born lucky. You’ll have a shitty death, lad,” Bo said with a cackle that pulled Akli’s fist back. The same uncanny feeling he had when he first met Haza-Ra. Shivers scattered down his spine, his knees buckling under. Sweat pooled his face as his breath dragged, scratching the inside of his throat.

  Bo sat up, whistling to the wind created a storm of ice, birthing a sea of farting penguins eager to release as much of their gas until they broke. Sinking into the abyssal white, Akli turned purple, his skin blooming blue, the frost striking at his pumping heart. Bo strolled out of the haze to find Valory standing in a pit of broken penguins. “You survived,” Bo said.

  “You may not be able to answer, but tell me, is this how it’s done,” Valory sucked in, clapped her hands together, and in an instant, a compressed line of water that moved at the speed of sound shook open her fingers. The force too much for her to hold, a splatter of water that attributed nothing. Blood trickling down her palms along her arms, dripping down from her elbows.

  “It was a good effort, a lovely attempt even. However, unless you possess a class that attributes a strong physique, there is no possible way for you to unleash such a technique. Your build doesn’t say strong, so my advice would be to try something else. Well, that’s if you had the opportunity to live…”

  “I see, thank you very much…you’ve taught me a lot in such short a time.”

  “Hmm, girl, you must be mist—” Blood ran down the side of Bo’s face, merging with his pale make-up. He felt a tickle by his ankle, and so with a stray eye he looked down. His ear, still warm, dying his garments with red, lay by the side of his skin upon the frozen ground.

  The idea is simple in nature, but difficult in practice. Absolute control has its limits. So within the time I have to hold my breath I must come up with a method to attack that is both swift and effective. Ice takes too long to form, compression is too powerful for my body to utilize, so what can I do? If range isn’t a concern, then I can manipulate the water in the air, and then freeze it in an instant. It will turn back into water once I let go, but I can do small damage if I play it smart. Valory kept pushing her brain, trying to solve problems that may, or may not occur. Trying to find the most efficient application of this technique she arranged in the midst of a dire situation.

  “Perhaps you are more talented than I initially sold. Indeed to venture into two stages is credible. Most who reach stage two were simply born with it, but you unlocked it with intellect; at such a young age as well. Truly praise worthy. I was one who was merely born, and yet I still dream to enter the next stage. Destiny is a fickle thing, I suppose I’ll never reach it; at least not in this lifetime.” A sickle and chain made of frozen crystal coiled behind Bo and into his hands. “I’ll show you my life’s work…” Nine dancing dragons swirled. Mere mirages, yet their intensity felt all too real.

  The sickle flew overhead, diving such as a sea-bird would. Its fang digging into Valory’s shoulder. A crown of ice formed in a second, knocking the sickle away. Nine claps forming nine dragons, emerging, vanishing, flying in and out of reality. Disoriented, Bo knew not where an attack could appear. When blocking from the front, he would be hit from behind. When aimed from the sides, he would jump to be struck from above. Puffs of ice shifting and changing on the fly. Before Bo could think up a solution, he had been striking air whilst being struck.

  Dancing to the feeble tune of his cracking chain, Bo Barri dropped to his last breath. Valory staggered, hyperventilation taking hold of her woozy head. Clearing the sea of white ice opened to a patchy bed under a shed filled with hot coals.

  “Akli…?”

  “Good…work,” Akli said with chattering teeth. “You did it…”

  “I…did…I did it…” Valory wept. Akli took her into his arms, the two warming up by the coals. Clouds curled together into neat bundles of darkness. Less than a moment: rain began to pour down near the outskirts of town. With a short caravan driving through the shallow chaos, unsure if they should care or not about the obtuse circumstances.

  Following the skip, past the town square, through the field of succulents, ran Ben with Haza in his arms. Leaping over thorns and sand, sliding down hills and rushing in and out of abandoned buildings, led them to the dark overhang where they could hear the clicking of hooves underneath the roof of drizzle.

  I think we lost him… Ben thought as he was about to put Haza down.

  “Keep running!” Haza yelped, for the shadow of the clouds could not darken them any more than the wave of stone, as if a mesa grew legs. Ba Barri’s head pounded and pumped, thumping a beat that made him fade in and out. Blood leaked down from his nostrils, but the frantic grin that batted no eye kept up. His cackle roared high above the sky blocking mass that he steered.