The Black Bouquet

She was passing a stand of twisted elms when something cracked like a whip. She pivoted, dropped into a fighting stance, and peered, using the periphery of her vision. At first, she saw nothing. She was an initiate of the night, yet human, and despite her training, darkness could still hinder her to a degree. Finally, though, she spotted the source of the noise. For an instant, it looked like a long strip of black cloth caught in the branches. Then, however, she realized she was looking at a living creature crouched on its perch, its wings spread and poised to flap.

The flyer's round eyes glared, and it bared its fangs. Come on, Sefris thought, either attack or clear off. You're wasting my time. Then she felt something rushing at her back.

She spun to the side, and a second creature, its foaming jaws gaping wide to bite, hurtled through the space where she'd just been standing. The tip of one furry, beating wing brushed her cowl back, half exposing the shaven scalp beneath. Seen up close, the beasts resembled the huge bats that sometimes lived in the biggest, deepest caverns, but with a hint of submerged humanity in the shape of the head and torso and the over development of its bandy legs. For one attacker to distract her while the other sneaked up at her back bespoke more than animal intelligence, and she thought she understood what ma

The chakrams she carried concealed about her person, sacred to the Lady of Loss though they were, didn't carry the same sort of sorcerous enhancement, and thus were apt to prove ineffectual against shapechangers. Such creatures possessed a degree of resistance to mundane sources of injury. But initiates of Sefris's order mastered not one lethal discipline but two, and thus she still possessed ways of attacking the werebats at range. She snatched a pinch of sand from a hidden pocket, tossed it in the air, and breathed words of power.

As sometimes happened, her magic made the darkness shift and whisper around her. The werebat that had just swooped aloft lurched in the air, then plummeted, fast asleep. It smashed into the ground with a bone-shattering crunch, and the corpse began to flow, the wings shrinking as it reverted to its alternate form.

The other shapeshifter shot out of the twisted tree. Perhaps its companion's death had enraged it, or maybe it simply wanted to deny the sorceress the opportunity to cast another spell. In any case, it plainly intended a furious assault.

Had she not schooled her features to resist such random impulses, Sefris might have smiled. She'd done her best to unlearn all emotion save for the spite and bitterness befitting a servant of her goddess, but in truth, she'd never quite managed to quash the joy she took in killing. And though striking someone dead with magic was satisfying in its own way, nothing matched the exhilaration of destroying an opponent with her hands.

The werebat swooped at her. She sidestepped the gnashing fangs and punched at the creature's chest, seeking to smash right through the ribs and into the vital organs beneath.

The blow slammed home, shattered bone, and the shapechanger shrieked, the cry pitched so high that it was more a stabbing pain in her ears than an actual sound. Its outstretched wing swatted her.

She yielded to the impact, permitting it to fling her to the ground, and instantly somersaulted to her feet. The werebat flew upward, but in a jerking, labored ma

It didn't flee. It wheeled high above, likely out of range of any of her spells, until a couple more vague black shadows joined it. Sefris couldn't tell precisely how many there were, but evidently an entire flock-if that was what one called a family of werebats-had gone hunting across the hills that night, and the wounded one had called them all in to deal with her.

Good. If she killed them all there and then, she wouldn't have to worry about another ambuscade later.

The werebats dived at her. It took long enough to give her time for another bit of sorcery. She rattled off a sibilant couplet, flung out her arm in a cabalistic gesture, and a jagged shaft of darkness leaped from her fingertips. It struck the creature in the lead. The lycanthrope's wings flailed crazily, out of time with one another, and it veered off course.

Then its fellows were right over her head, or nearly so. Fortunately, their size precluded their attacking all at exactly the same time, lest they foul each other's wings. She blocked with her forearm, bashing a set of foaming jaws out of line, then whipped the blade of her hand against the werebat's neck. She grabbed hold of its loose hide, yanked it out of the air, and smashed it down on the ground.

She nearly followed up with a stamp kick before remembering that her sandal-clad foot likely wouldn't hit hard enough to overwhelm a lycanthrope's mystical defenses. Unfortunately, she didn't have time to drop to one knee and continue bashing the brute with her hands. The next shapechanger was already hurtling at her.

She killed that one cleanly with a spear-hand strike to the chest, then leaped clear before its body could flop down on top of her. Another plummeted at her, saw that she was ready for it, and swooped high again.

Something rustled in the grass. She glanced down. Apparently when she'd hit the one werebat in the throat, she'd injured it in a way that prevented its taking to the air again. But it was still game; it was scuttling at her.

She sprang back from it and swept her hand through a mystic pass. The shadow of a nearby sapling reared from the ground and lashed itself around the lycanthrope. The creature flailed helplessly inside the inky coils.

Sefris knew that when she'd focused on the grounded brute, its fellow had surely dived, and by then was nearly in striking range. Peering upward, she whirled, and there it was, its glistening fangs mere inches from piercing her flesh. One such bite, assuming it didn't kill her outright, could change her into a creature like itself. The prospect didn't horrify her as it might have many another person, but neither was it anything to be desired. She was already the instrument the Dark Goddess intended her to be.

She grabbed the werebat by the neck to hold its teeth at bay. Her weight dragged it out of the air, and locked together, they tumbled over the grass. She kept hold of its throat and squeezed, the cesti lending the choke hold an efficacy it might otherwise have lacked.

The werebat struggled frantically, but only for a few heartbeats. Then its spine snapped.

Sefris sprang to her feet. Nothing else was wheeling against the stars or streaking down at her. If any shapechangers remained aloft, they'd evidently decided to leave their comrades unavenged and seek easier prey.

That just left the bodies on the ground, some of which had reverted almost entirely to human, and the shapeshifter still tangled in the shadow tentacle.

When it saw her looking at it, it stopped squirming and abased itself. Despite its bestial features, the enormous, pointed ears and wrinkled snout, she could tell it was begging for mercy. Perhaps offering itself as her slave if only she would spare its life.

Maybe it truly imagined that she might. Maybe it hoped she'd recognize some degree of kinship between them-both killers, both haunters of the dark.

If so, it had mistaken her nature. Sefris had never been particularly prone to sympathy, and her training had purged every trace of it from her soul. Insofar as her limited mortal mind permitted, she strove to emulate her goddess's hatred of all things, whether good or evil, fair or foul, human or monstrous. Killing gave her joy, but she labored not to seek or wallow in the pleasure, but rather to slaughter as an expression of a pure, cold will to destroy.