Discordant Note | TBATE

Chapter 36: Incentive

Toren Daen

The thug reeled to the side, a streak of crimson blood spraying out from where Wade had clocked him. The knife he held toward me slipped from his suddenly weak fingers, falling in slow motion to the snow below.

Before it could even hit the ground, I slammed the full force of my telekinesis into the earth behind me. I rocketed forward in a flare of white, the power of my push blowing a curtain of snow in my wake.

I reached out with my hand, latching onto the collar of the thug's grimy tunic before he could even blink. He flailed in confusion, his head wound disorienting his balance.

I wasn't about to make that any easier. I turned, using the momentum from my forward rush and a twist of my shoulder to slam the man into the ground hard. He bounced off the stone, the sickening crack of something breaking from the impact echoing into the quiet night. My firm grip on his throat shoved him back into the indent he'd made in the snow.

I drew my dagger with my wounded left hand, wincing at the pain of clenching my fist around its hilt. I knelt over the downed man, one hand on his throat and another with a dagger poised over his eye. My knee locked his chest and arm firmly in place, and with my enhanced strength I knew he wasn't going anywhere.

The thug gasped for breath, a wheezing, rickety sound, then groaned in pain. A speck of blood spattered from his mouth as he coughed, hacking for air.

I might've damaged one of his lungs with how hard I threw this druggie into the dirt. I could've broken his spine.

I didn't care.

I spared a quick glance at my surroundings, unwilling to let myself be caught off guard again. Wade was ferrying the young boy over to his mother, who was completely focused on her child. Naereni was still tending to Greahd. Whatever the other thug had done had clearly hurt the woman somehow.

That only stoked my anger higher, matching the heat of the cookfires around me.

"How did you find me so fast?" I hissed to the man I had pinned.

The man's vision cleared for a moment, but he looked at my poised dagger with a terrified expression. He whimpered underneath me, wriggling slightly before I pressed my knee harder onto his chest.

Considering what I felt give way under the pressure, I knew I had broken a few of his ribs. He wailed in pain, and I immediately let off.

"Look," I whispered lowly. "I don't need to kill you. You don't need to be in pain for too long. But you are going to tell me how you found me."

I had only been visible for less than half an hour. The fact that this man attacked me so quickly told me that Blood Joan had a better network in East Fiachra than I was led to believe.

"Don't kill me, man! It wasn't personal! I know what I said, but I take it back! Please!"

I grit my teeth, my patience wearing thin quickly. I hissed, snapping the next words. "Tell me!"

My blade, hovering just over his eye, began to drip with blood. The wound on my hand was still leaking, and the stream had slowly meandered down my glittering steel. My blood slowly fell from the tip of my blade, dripping just under the thug's eye.

"I just saw you dancing around!" He whimpered between gasps of pain. I could distinctly smell the stench of urine from the man, whatever motley courage he'd plucked up gone with the wind. "It was an accident! They promised me!"

Drip, drip, drip. The blood ran down my knife, my grip quivering as I held it over his face. Does your hand shake from the pain, or making the threat? A voice inside me asked. I forcefully suppressed it, knowing I couldn't afford introspection right now The man kept saying they'd 'promised him.' What was he talking about?