Promise of Wrath (The Hellequin Chronicles Book 6) by Steve McHugh Page A

once again. He stepped back, and at the last second, I removed the whip and threw a ball of flame at him. Asag raised his hand to shield his face from harm, and I darted forward, changing the whip of flame for a blade, which I brought down on his arm.
    I hadn’t really known what effect it was going to have; I was just trying anything to see what could make it through Asag’s tough skin, so I wasn’t expecting the monster to scream in pain and anger. His eyes locked with mine as the blade of flame cut through the rock and bit into whatever was beneath, and I knew he knew that I’d confirmed his weakness: magical fire. Asag swung with his good arm, but I removed the blade, darted aside, reignited it, and plunged it into his side. Asag cried out once more as several of the small monsters he controlled jumped from the battlements above me, landing with a crash.
    I twisted the blade and pushed it in further, but my attention wasn’t wholly on Asag, so I didn’t see him swipe back at me with his enormous arm. He caught me in the chest, throwing me aside as if I were nothing. The breath left my body in one go as several of my ribs broke, and my magical night vision flickered on and off for a few seconds. When my sight was steady, I used the wooden bridge beside me to get back to my feet as Asag barreled into me, driving me over the bridge and down the bank where Gilgamesh had fallen. Water and grime filled my nose, eyes, and mouth, and I rolled onto my side, blindly trying to use the reeds and plants that littered the banks to pull myself out. I was trying to get the muck out of my eyes when I was lifted from my feet and thrown aside, colliding with the side of the bank, but thankfully not rolling back into the muck at the bottom.
    My chest was on fire, and I was pretty certain I’d done more than just break a few ribs. I needed time to heal. I crawled toward the nearest tree, hoping to use it to get me back to my feet.
    “I’m going to crush you, Merlin’s little man,” Asag said, his face close to mine, his hot breath making me feel sick.
    I didn’t even see the blow to my stomach, but I doubled up and vomited onto the ground all the same. I couldn’t remember the last time something had hit me that hard. Asag picked me up, his claws raking over the flesh on my shoulder, and once more I found myself sailing through the air. I landed roughly, feeling my wrist snap, but used air magic to get the muck off my face. Unfortunately, that just let me watch as Asag walked up the bank toward me.
    I scrambled to my feet and looked around. I was outside the main gate once more, but I was not going to go down without a fight. I limped to the other end of the bridge and watched for Asag to climb the bank. His little monsters had vanished, and as he walked into view, I saw the last of them merge with him, healing him.
    “Neat trick,” I said through clenched teeth.
    “My next one is ripping your head off.”
    I placed my broken hand against my chest and felt the blood there. Power flowed through me as my blood magic ignited. Asag paused; he’d probably seen Mordred use blood magic, but while I was nowhere near as powerful as he was with it, I was no slouch.
    I flexed my fingers and my blood magic began to block out the pain of my broken ribs and other injuries. Using blood magic in such a way that you ignore your own limitations and injuries was incredibly dangerous, but so was being dead. If I didn’t do something, the latter was much more likely to happen.
    Asag, now seemingly fully healed, walked methodically toward me. “There’s nothing you can do to hurt me, little man.”
    I breathed in, ignoring the pain in my ribs, and held my breath as Asag walked closer and closer, each step reverberating over the wooden bridge. I held my place, blocking out the noise of soldiers yelling at me to run, to move aside.
    Asag stopped only a few paces away from me. “You going to use that flame blade on me again, boy?”
    I ignored him