Another Sharlak thrust his spear at the lone Dark Elf, but Shade deflected the attack. He dragged his dagger across the shark-man’s right cheek. He was surprised when the Sharlak went down coughing and choking on its own blood, but then the assassin realized he had slit it across the gills.
The other Sharlak howled in rage, each dreadful creature flexing its own powerful jaws. Two Sharlak charged him on either side waving their claws madly, their gaping jaws dripping wet with saliva. The assassin back-flipped across the canal and landed on the opposite walkway. The maneuver took the Sharlak momentarily by surprise who glared at him from the across the waterway.
Shade allowed a cocky grin to spread across his lips. A bone spear caught him in the shoulder and sent him crashing into the back wall. The assassin’s heart skipped a beat. He was pinned in a sitting position against the wall. He feared that spear had driven in deep just below his shoulder blade. His hands felt around madly until he gripped the spear. He exhaled in relief. The spear had only grazed him. It had penetrated the seam of his leather jerkin and gotten lodged in the wall. He struggled to free himself, but he could not dislodge the spear. He was trapped!
Several more Sharlak emerged from the waters as the others across the walkway dove in. The Sharlak reappeared and soon seven hungry shark-men dashed across the pavement claws outstretched and horrid jaws agape.
Shade struggled and slipped suddenly into unseen form.
The Sharlak stopped in their tracks momentarily stunned at their meal’s unexplained disappearance. The assassin remained perfectly still against the wall. He watched as the Sharlak sniffed the air and stalked steadily closer to him. He silently retrieved his dagger, sliced through the top seam of his armor and freed himself. He crouched low his daggers ready in his hot clammy hands. The grin returned to his invisible lips as the hunted was once again reborn the hunter.
Shade waited for the perfect moment.
Two Sharlak caught his sent. They stretched out their necks and their jaws widened into terrifying maws. They roared as if to drive fear into his heart when he suddenly struck. He opened up their windpipes. The pair collapsed dead. The other Sharlak roared in outrage, but he sprung forward.
The assassin cut three more at the gills and they too went down shrieking. He rolled across the pavement. He whirled around and dropped out of unseen form. The pack-leader and a Sharlak spearman growled at him, but hesitated after seeing the short work he had made of their kinsmen.
“Come on you two, fight me,” he grinned in challenge.
The pack-leader shook his shark-toothed sword at the spearman and motioned at Shade. The spearman’s hand trembled slightly. He wound the rope tighter around his arm and raised his spear. Shade flashed the creature a glare and he hesitated yet again. The pack-leader snarled at its cowardly minion, spit at its webbed feet and charged.
Shade parried blow after blow as the pack-leader rained down a surprisingly complex combination. The assassin remained in intense concentration as he worked off his staggered shock in facing a skilled swordsman.
Shade blocked blow after blow, knocking shark teeth off, but he could not turn the duel to his advantage. One misplaced step would be his last. He barely caught the spearman’s spear throw out of the corner of his eye. He ducked just long enough for the spear to whisk past him, but the pack-leader seized the assassin by the neck and pinned him up against the wall. The Sharlak lifted him. The spearman dragged his spear across the ground as he reeled it in for another go.
The Dark Elf heard the cartilage flex in the pack-leader’s jaws. It blasted a hot breath reeking of brine and death in his face. He felt the Sharlak’s long slobbering tongue taste him. It licked him slowly up the cheek.
The assassin seethed through his teeth. He ran his dagger across the Sharlak’s right shoulder. He slipped out from under the pack-leader’s grip. He slid under the shark-man’s legs and rolled to a stop.
The spearman threw the spear again, but this time Shade not only dodged the throw, but cut the rope as it whisked past him through the air.
The assassin spun around. He unleashed his own deadly combination bearing down hard and fast with his two daggers. The pack-leader clumsily parried the blows, but he was no match. Shade cut the Sharlak pack-leader first at the arms, then at the knees and finally just above the heart slicing cleanly through the aorta.
The pack-leader blinked. Death froze over his face. He toppled into the water and disappeared with a bloody splash.
Shade grinned devilishly at the only remaining Sharlak. He brandished his daggers dangerously. His glowing yellow eyes burned in challenge begging his opponent to be foolish enough to attack.
The spearman looked down at its severed rope and then at its spear which lay far beyond its reach. The shark-man took one last look at the deadly Dark Elven assassin and plunged back into the filthy seawater. It disappeared with barely a ripple and swam away.
Shade waited, blades ready for a time, but the Sharlak never resurfaced again. He tucked his blades away and spat with a disdainful sneer, “Coward.”
Suddenly, the assassin felt a pair of strong scaled arms wrap around him. He was ripped violently off the ground and whisked through the air. He struggled in vain, realizing to his horror he had forgotten. The other hunter had come….
Chapter Twelve:
Lewd’s Hand
Shade was momentarily stunned as his attacker whisked him through the air. He struggled against his assailant’s hold, but could not escape. The tunnel rushed past them in staggered gray blurs. He could not move his arms, but his fingers felt horns protruding from long oily black hair. He grabbed onto a horn. His foe drove him headlong through the air, a pair of massive leathery wings flapping through the obscurity. What was this foul demon?
The assassin extended his thumb and jabbed at his attacker’s right eye. He felt his foe shake his head and knew he must have hit his mark. They dropped altitude and veered sideways, but Shade hit a brick wall hard. The impact knocked the wind out of him. He collapsed on a hard unforgiving stone walkway.
He coughed and gasped for breath. He rubbed his spinning head and pushed himself quickly to his feet. He staggered momentarily. He knew taking too much time to recover could prove fatal. He pulled out his daggers, his eyes still scrambling to refocus. He heard the loud rush of a waterfall.
Three tall winged figures stood watching him in cold brooding impatience. He concentrated and the three figures merged into one. The figure was tall and lean but heavily muscled, clad in iron-studded leather with spiked shoulder plates black as night. A dragonish face sneered at him, his teeth looked like pointed human canines. It was Lewd’s Hand. The Hand waited patiently, forgoing the opportunity to seize on the opening. They had hit the ground at the edge of a drain. A waterfall foamed as the sewage emptied into a lower sewer. He thought he saw the white forms of more Sharlak in the waters, but he could not take his eye off his foe.
Shade sneered back, his hands finding their way to his daggers. Lewd’s Hand already brandished his jagged black sword. The two assassins locked eyes and for a moment all that could be heard was the loud trickling of sewer water.
“I should have known it was you,” the Dark Elf said, “you shall regret this small mercy. How could you allow your only chance to slay me to slip so easily from your grasp?”
“Enough words,” the Hand growled back, “you and I are above the toilsome waggle of tongues. Now we shall find out once and for all who is top blade.”