Chapter - 9
Back to Varka—
I heard Snezna scream.
"Varka! Some of them are near the slave carriage!"
Varka straightened, blood running freely down his body.
"I suppose we should get a move on, then, eh?"
But before the words left his lips, Snezna was already streaking through the air toward the wagons.
Always so eager to be a savior, Varka thought bitterly. Too eager. Too late.
---
He broke into a sprint, shards of glass lodged in his flesh grinding with each step. Too small to cripple him, too small to matter amidst the storm.
Must have been from the ricochet, he thought.
Something shifted in the treeline.
A nightmare lunged from the shadows.
This one was different.
Ah, an observer. While the others were busy testing my blade, this one was reading me.
It wore his face. Twisted, wrong, but recognizably his.
This will be troublesome.
The creature teleported in front of him, swinging for his head.
"Copying my moveset, huh?" Varka sneered.
He slipped the strike, but the thing was ready—its jagged glass-knife already angling for his heart.
Shadow, warped into something foul.
Varka vanished, stepping through darkness itself, reappearing at its back.
He leaned in close, lips at its ear, and whispered words Carter couldn't understand.
No—words Carter shouldn't have been able to understand.
A tongue older than men, older than gods.
The nightmare convulsed violently. Its mirrored grin cracked, split, and then it collapsed, twitching in the dirt until still.
"There's a fatal flaw in copying my existence, fool," Varka muttered, smirking as he stepped over the body.
---
When he reached the carriage, the stench was suffocating.
Blood. Jagged glass. Slave collars scattered in the mud.
But no bodies—none where they should have been.
Only scraps.
Snezna crouched in the dirt, fists hammering down again and again on something beneath him.
Each blow landed with a sickening crunch.
When Varka drew close, he saw the truth.
The abomination's face was Snezna's own.
Its skull shattered under his knuckles, its mouth still twisting into a broken parody of his smile.
"It's already too late," Varka said flatly.
Snezna whipped his head around, spitting blood.
"And where the fuck were you?!" His gaze burned, feral with rage.
"I was delayed," Varka growled. He did not mention the twisted double he'd slain.
Snezna rose shakily, arm rotting where black veins spread outward.
He spat again.
"They didn't deserve this. Not like this. Even their bodies… defiled."
"Bodies?" Varka's eyes narrowed. "I don't see any human corpses."
"Inside," Snezna grumbled.
---
Varka stared at the wagon.
The slave cage was hidden behind its wooden frame, draped in a heavy cloth.
"Stay here," he said. "And fix your arm. It's rotting."
Snezna sneered back.
"You lost your arm?"
Varka gave the barest nod, turning away without another word.
He heard Snezna curse under his breath as he left.
---
He approached the carriage.
The stench of iron and rot grew thicker with every step.
He seized the cloth and pulled it away in one fluid motion.
The sight nearly made Carter faint.
Inside was carnage.
Mangled bodies strewn in heaps, heads torn off, some chewed to ruin. Limbs twisted into grotesque shapes, glass shards embedded in pale flesh.
They had arrived only moments late, and yet the nightmares had worked with… precision.
But among the ruin, one figure sat untouched.
A small shape, crouched with her head bowed.
Unharmed. Untouched. Spared.
---
Varka stepped closer, blood squelching beneath his boots.
A child, he thought. Why?
He remembered her face from before—just another hollow-eyed slave, broken and resigned.
And yet now she sat here, clean, as if the horrors had passed her by entirely.
He reached out a hand, slowly.
And then froze.
---
A chill clawed down his spine.
Not the feeling of being watched—he had known that countless times before.
This was older. Deeper. Ancient.
Something vast and cold staring through him.
His eyes swept the cage, but there was nothing.
No gaze he could find.
Wait… is he sensing me? Carter thought.
Varka lingered in silence, staring at the child.
The moment stretched into eternity.
"How very intriguing," he whispered at last.
---