Free Infamous Reign by Steve McHugh Page A

knew Alan was powerful, and touched in the head, but I hadn’t thought he was powerful or crazy enough to summon one of the true giants of the ocean.
    My attention had turned away for just over a second, maybe two, but it was enough. I turned back to Mordred as he sprung to his feet and plunged a dagger of blood magic just under my ribs. I forgot how to breathe, stumbling back as pain exploded all over my body. It forced me away from Mordred and I crashed onto the pier. He smiled and showed me the blade of blood magic that he’d created in his hand. A second later the expression changed to one of shock as he coughed up blood and immediately slumped to his knees. I raised my hand to show Mordred the blade of air, covered in his blood, which stretched out from the back of my hand.
    I removed the blade and placed a hand to my ribs, igniting my fire magic, searing the flesh to stop the bleeding. I screamed out in pain.
    Mordred laughed and coughed up more blood. “You know I’ll live though, yes?”
    “Yes, but I also know it hurts like hell. I’ll take the little moments of happiness when I can get them.”
    “I really do fucking hate you, you know that.”
    “It’s come up before,” I pointed out.
    “Your summoner friend is insane for bringing a leviathan here. There aren’t many of them left. They’re as rare as dragons.”
    I couldn’t disagree with him.
    “It’s tearing that French ship apart. There are blood magic curse marks on the timber, I can feel them being torn apart.”
    “The marks or the people?”
    Mordred was silent for a second. “Both. Their blood washes over my marks.”
    I glanced over at the monster which was tearing into the ship as if it were made of nothing more than straw. It grabbed something in its massive hand, raised it to its maw and dropped it in. “Soldiers,” I said. “They shouldn’t be here in the first place.”
    “Ah, no sympathy for the enemy, is that how it is, Nathaniel?”
    “If Alan hadn’t summoned a leviathan, they would have died at your hands anyway. I assume your way would have been much less pleasant.”
    “Than being eaten alive?” Mordred looked thoughtful for a second. “Yes, my way would have hurt much more.”
    We sat in silence for a short time. Neither of us able to do anything but bleed and hurt. It was probably the first time in eight hundred years we weren’t trying to kill each other for being in such close proximity. If you didn’t count the fact that we had been at each others throats a few minutes earlier, anyway.
    “What are you going to do, Mordred?” I asked. “When those princes are safe, are you still going to try to kill them, or are you going to run away?”
    Mordred continued to watch the leviathan destroy the French ship and crew and didn’t answer. But a short time later the monster vanished back under the waves with a colossal wave that magically dissipated. A substantially smaller wave rushed over the end of the pier. When it was gone, two young boys stood, wet and scared. A smaller version of the leviathan stood behind them. It nodded to me and then dove back into the ocean. The two princes had been delivered to the pier by a young leviathan. Alan’s power astonished me, but my thoughts quickly turned to Mordred, who was watching the two princes like a wolf watches a farmer’s sheep.
    “You know what you asked me earlier?” Mordred said. “I can do both.”
    He sprang to his feet and darted forward, but I managed to get in front of him, blocking his path several feet short of the princes and driving a blade of fire into his stomach. “Now this is going to hurt,” I whispered and tore the dagger out of him, turning it into a whip of fire as it moved, almost cleaving Mordred horizontally in half.
    He dropped to his knees and tried to hold his insides in as his blood quickly drenched both himself and the pier. Blood magic glyphs lit up over his arms and while part of me wanted to finish the job, to stop whatever