Ruthless V5-Interlude-In the Frosty Air

Cara sat with her head clutched in her hands, waiting for her neck to finish reattaching.

After the fall—it was impossible to know how far it had been, because mountains were taller than they had been before the System, but one of her comrades had estimated it had been at least 15,000 feet—she would have died, if not for the fact that she was a Wendigo. Blunt force alone could not kill Cara. Not anymore.

She had shattered to pieces on the ground when she landed, but it had only been temporary inconvenience. Slowly, her consciousness had restored itself as the pieces of her body slowly gathered back together and reassembled.

It was the unchallengeable power and nigh-immortality that she had wanted—coupled with absolute security against the possibility of death—so why didn’t it feel good?

There was a crunch of footsteps on the frosted ground, and Cara’s eyes darted up to see Patrick standing over her. One of the newer Wendigos. He looked strangely uncomfortable, and not simply because he was in his human form and might be a little cold.

“What is it?” Cara asked.

“You have a leadership challenge,” he replied, avoiding her gaze.

Cara understood immediately.

“Letitia?”

He nodded.

“Tell her she’s going to die if she loses this time. I don’t have patience for people repeatedly challenging my authority.”

Malsumis might not be happy about Cara reducing the number of his creatures, but tough. Letitia was going to render them ineffective as a unit—and it wasn’t as if Malsumis had been very helpful recently anyway. Cara had walked into a trap following his directives, after all. Since then, the two had not communicated at all.

“I don’t think she’ll back down,” Patrick said. “You were out of it a bit longer than the others. She’s been badmouthing you to everyone for a while. It’s annoying, but some of them are listening.”

Cara’s face contorted in a snarl. How dare she? No, I knew Letitia lacked the instinct to survive. She never met an authority she didn’t want to challenge.

The two women were perhaps more similar than Cara would have preferred to admit, in that sense. But it also meant there was only room for one of them in the Wendigo collective.

“Give her the message anyway,” Cara said. As she spoke, the last tendon in her neck reattached. She cracked her neck absent-mindedly as she continued, “Everyone deserves a chance of survival. If she decides that she is actually no longer interested in living, I’ll meet her challenge in an hour. In the shadow of the mountain.” She pointed to the base of the massive rock formation.

“As you wish,” Patrick replied, tilting his head in a slight bow.

As he walked away, Cara allowed her mind to briefly touch on a question that his explanation had raised.

How long was I in pieces? He said I was out longer than most of the others… I didn’t miss the Victors Tournament, right?

Cara shook her head and decided that she would have noticed if that much time had passed. Or someone would have brought it to her attention. A couple of the Wendigos were strong enough that they would have been invited to the Victors Tournament—probably including Letitia, much as Cara hated to admit it.

She rose from her seated position and began stretching. Her body didn’t need it to perform at full capacity, but she wanted to get used to herself again. She was still in her fully transformed Wendigo form—inhumanly tall and tough-skinned, every inch of her skin blue-gray—and now that she knew she had to deal with Letitia, she would remain in that state until the fight was over.

Cara’s mind was on the next task already. She wanted to go after the monster that had humiliated her and placed her in this position: the Great White Hart. If not for its trick with the mountain and those ape-like creatures, Cara knew Letitia would not have dared to challenge her again. There was an element of social perception to it. Cara’s problem was partly that she looked weak.

Her ears suddenly pricked up as she heard Patrick speak up. The words were a reiteration of what Cara had told him, but he was interrupted by a harsh cackle.

“That failure has you delivering her messages now, huh?” asked Letitia’s voice. “Wouldn’t you rather follow a winner?”

Patrick’s reply would stick in Cara’s memory.

“Who is the failure and who is the winner is what you’re meant to determine, isn’t it?”

Letitia’s reply was so low as to be inaudible to Cara, but she caught the tone. It wasn’t triumphant. There was a faux-cockiness to it, but it was obviously a put-on.

She knows she’s about to die, Cara thought.

“I don’t know why we’re even having a leadership challenge,” Letitia said, finally speaking loudly enough for Cara to hear her again. “We should all just agree to depose her.”

You cowardly little bitch.

Cara stepped forward from where she had been stretching. The other Wendigos were almost all already gathered around the focal point of Letitia—except for the ones who were still repairing themselves.

There was a restless, violent energy in the air, and the others chattered. Letitia spoke over everyone else, though.

“Perhaps it’s time we did away with this custom of one on one duels to determine who should lead us. The wisest should rule—or the one who earns it by leading us to victory.”

Anarchic, Cara thought. Don’t be foolish. The leader isn’t just whoever’s standing in front of the mob at any given moment.

But the energy of the small crowd made her just slightly anxious. Cara wasn’t sure if Letitia was actually landing persuasive lines with them or if they were just antsy, bored, and ready to entertain any ideas, listen to any idiocy.

The other Wendigos could, if they wished, tear Cara to pieces. There was no chance she could survive that. She thought she was still the strongest—but that was speaking individually, not relating to her ability to fight off dozens at once.

Cara accelerated her movement toward the gathering as Letitia continued speaking.

“She was meant to bring us victory. Instead, she has delivered us hunger and defeat!”

“Treachery and mutiny!” Cara roared loudly.

The crowd reacted instantly, parting to let her through and allow the two women to face each other. Cara saw the flash of nerves on Letitia’s face before her expression became impassive again.

“We’re discussing some new ideas for how we should be governed,” Letitia began, a sneering smile plastered on her face.

“If you’re too weak and cowardly to face me, just say so, and we can try running a wimpy democratic system instead.” The words dripped with sarcastic mockery so that no one present could have thought Cara meant it as a serious proposal.

The crowd stilled in a second. The accusation of cowardice was a deadly challenge.

“All right, then, we’ll fight—to the death, like you wanted,” Letitia said after a moment.

“Let’s do it now,” Cara replied. “Right here is as good a spot as any for you to die.”

“You’re eager,” Letitia said. “I guess you got tired of being the boss. The burdens of—”

“Shut up and put up your hands,” Cara said.

The crowd stepped back to form a perimeter and began whispering words at both women.

“Kill her, Cara!”

“Take the lead, Letitia!”

“You’re the strongest now!”

To Cara’s annoyance, she thought almost half of those present were cheering on Letitia.

But she knew they would forget about that and cheer just as enthusiastically for Letitia’s death.

These are my people, Cara thought. Then she put away the idea, to be examined, perhaps, later.

Letitia had stepped forward, extending her claws so that they extended six inches each. A frosty aura surrounded her, as if she thought that ice powers would harm Cara.

The two Wendigos squared off, and the dance began.

Letitia made the first move—a betrayal of her lack of confidence, perhaps, but an effective start. With her long claws, she struck at Cara’s shoulder. Cara responded with a defensive swipe at Letitia’s legs. Both women landed, scoring blows that produced long scratches across each other’s bodies that grudgingly leaked thin streams of thick blue-gray blood.

Cara initiated the next exchange, a heavy kick into Letitia’s abdomen that should have sent the other woman flying. Instead, Letitia grabbed hold of Cara’s foot and arrested her own momentum, then yanked on Cara’s ankle, lifting her off her feet and bringing the leg to her jaw with its big, jagged teeth.

Before Letitia could bite into her flesh, Cara twisted in the other Wendigo’s grip, grabbed hold of Cara’s left arm and used it as leverage to try and pull her leg free.

Letitia’s grip was incredibly strong, however, and after a moment, Cara felt bone break and crack—and only then did her foot slip free from the other Wendigo’s grip.

Cara frowned and stumbled backward. The pain was bearable for her, but it was a surprise that Letitia was strong enough to break bone. This required a slight recalibration of strategy.

Letitia did not give her that time. She charged after Cara, Water Mana gathering around Letitia’s body, and Cara could tell from the way the temperature in the air suddenly dropped exactly what Letitia was planning to do.

Cara hurled herself to the side as a small wave of water swept the ground that had been at her feet a moment before. Still in midair, she saw the water freeze into a small, thin wall of ice at the periphery of the circle that surrounded them.

So that’s her game…

Letitia wanted to immobilize her limbs and restrict her movements.

As Cara dropped through the air, she sensed Letitia lunging at her before Cara saw her. The motion was a little too slow, but Cara let Letitia catch her.

Letitia drew a long raking wound down Cara’s right side, and the crowd seemed to go feral as they saw what was happening.

“Give us some blood, Letty!”

“Kill her!”

Cara winced—not at the pain, which was really very minor, but at the reaction from those around her. No one was on her side. They just wanted to see some carnage. She formulated her new plan partly influenced by that.

Mana condensed around Cara’s body and rapidly swelled to a crescendo as Letitia pressed her apparent advantage, throwing more slashes—and doing more meaningful damage. Cara simply folded her arms defensively, protecting her center of mass from any harm.

Letitia managed to slash through the muscles of Cara’s right arm using the claws on both hands. Next, she eagerly grabbed hold of the floppy, helpless limb, and she wrenched it free. Letitia threw the arm off to the side, her expression giddy, and she stabbed forward with her left claw, throwing caution to the wind and going for Cara’s throat.

Stupid bitch, Cara thought. You didn’t even eat the arm and force me to regenerate it. You’re just going for the quick, easy blood. Ridiculous that you even thought you could fight me.

And now Letitia had overextended herself.

Cara slipped to the side, moving with greater speed and grace than she had allowed herself to display through much of the fight.

Letitia tried to turn and face her, but two shadowy hands sprouted from the ground and grabbed her feet. She began to fall forward, but she would not make it to the ground.

It was Cara’s moment to lunge, and she jabbed with her remaining claw into the big opening that Letitia had left. As Letitia’s arms spiraled, instinctively trying to recover her balance, Cara struck like a fencer, her bladed nails hitting Letitia just below her left breast.

As the tips of her claws made contact, Cara extended them an extra inch to more easily pierce through the other Wendigo’s chest. The points went in like a knife going back into the block. Seemingly almost no resistance.

Letitia’s eyes widened as she recognized what Cara was doing. Letitia tried to pull back, but she could not match the speed of Cara’s lunge, not when she was already off-balance, her momentum against her. Cara’s claws made their way through a gap in Letitia’s rib cage until they struck the hard, stony surface of Letitia’s Heart of Ice. The claws started to glide off of the stiff material, but more of Cara’s shadows wrapped themselves around her arms, gripped the tips of her claws, and adjusted their momentum, guiding them up and around the gem-like organ.

In an instant, Cara had a grip on the Heart of Ice.

Letitia’s eyes widened in an unmistakable expression of fear. Her cold dead lips, inches from Cara’s face, mouthed words of apology, already beginning to beg for her life.

But it was too late now.

Cara yanked hard on the roots of the organ and plucked it out with a single vicious tearing motion.

Letitia stumbled backward, clutching at her chest.

Cara held out the crystalline structure of the Heart of Ice in her claws as if offering it back to Letitia.

The other Wendigo enjoyed a momentary flash of hope. Then Cara betrayed the truth with a sadistic smirk.

You’re not getting this back.

Letitia lunged, claws extending, trying to grab for her only truly vital organ—and Cara crushed it in between her claws. Then Cara pressed the heart to her own lips and began to eat. It tasted like a snow cone flavored with human bone, but Cara could also feel the power in the ice.

It set off an unexpected hunger in her, and some pieces fell to the ground as she clumsily ate what remained in her hand.

Letitia let loose with a horrendous scream as she threw herself to the ground, grabbed for the few remaining pieces of her shattered heart, and tried in vain to push them back together again and then to shove them back into her chest.

But all the king’s horses and all the king’s men can’t save you now, Cara thought, suppressing a cruel laugh. The destruction of the Heart of Ice was the one truly lethal danger to a Wendigo. With Cara having eaten most of it, Letitia’s fate was undeniably sealed.

After a few seconds of desperate last efforts to survive, Letitia finally slumped to the ground and stopped moving.

A shadowy hand tossed Cara’s severed arm back to her, and she simply pressed it back into place to reattach it.

There was an eerie silence for a few seconds.

Then a single Wendigo began applauding. Cara was pretty certain it was Patrick. The rest of the Wendigos followed suit, with varying degrees of enthusiasm. There would be no further challenges for a while. Cara had cemented her dominance once again.

It was all so tiresome.

I told myself that Wendigos were just as bad as humans before we went up that mountain, Cara thought. That might not have been fair to humans. I’m starting to think my new kind are worse. Strong against the weak and submissive to the strong. Isn’t that worse than some humans?

Her mind returned for a moment to Mina from Orientation. That woman had tried to stand up to Cara even when she knew she could not possibly defeat the Wendigo. That, and other similar acts of absurd courage under fire, even while heavily pregnant, had won Cara’s undying respect. Perhaps Mina’s strength of will and bravery had grown in Cara’s recollection, but she didn’t think so.

If more humans were like that… Cara did not allow herself to complete the thought. Not because it was sacrilegious against the god she had chosen to serve. But because it was pointless now. She had already chosen her path.

“Come,” Cara said in a loud, harsh voice. “We are going after that bloody buck again.”

She turned away from the corpse of Letitia—let the others eat what was left of her body if they wanted to—and walked through the circle of Wendigos. Those individuals at the edge parted to give her a wide berth. No one wanted to get in her way just then. She felt that the others in the circle were moving, too, but she didn’t bother checking if they were following after her.

It didn’t matter anymore.

Even if the Wendigos all scattered rather than joining her, Cara was committed to her next task.

The Great White Hart would fall at her hands before the Victors Tournament—and grant Cara the powers of a Ruler. Even if it risked becoming her white whale, she would kill it or die in the attempt.