Page 95 of Dark Gambit Reliance

He veered to the right and swung his sword with incredible force toward her neck. Anticipating the move, she swiveled away while swiping the sword at his calf, but he jumped out of the way, and the cut she inflicted was only superficial.

Baring his fangs, he growled and pressed on, with a dagger appearing in his left hand. When she parried his sword's swing, he brought his knife in an uppercut motion in an attempt to gut her.

Jade somersaulted backward, landing on her feet long before he closed the distance between them, and threw her dagger at him. He shifted, and it was embedded in his shoulder instead of hitting him in his heart.

His fangs bared, and his eyes fully red, he yanked the dagger out of his shoulder and threw it at her.

His aim was messy, probably because of the wound to his shoulder, and it barely grazed her arm, cutting through her shirt and scraping her skin.

With the dagger lost in the dirt she was left with the sword only, but that was enough to finish him.

Vombad was bleeding from his calf and shoulder, while she had only suffered a scratch.

Advancing in a flurry of blade motion in order to draw his attention to the sword, she got in range and kicked his injured calf with the force of her momentum.

As his leg buckled, he instinctively reached with one hand to break his fall and lifted his sword to protect his head.

She moved sideways, and rather than going for the obvious, she sliced down at the hand holding the sword.

He lost his hold, falling on his ass.

It should have been easy for her to finish him right then, but he wasn't as easily defeated as she'd hoped.

Moving faster than a viper, he twisted and caught his sword with the other hand, immediately shooting forward and thrusting it where she'd been just a split second ago, but she was right behind him.

Again, it would have been easy to thrust her sword into his back, but then she wouldn't see his eyes as she delivered the death blow, and that wouldn't be satisfying enough.

She'd waited a very long time for this moment and wasn't willing to compromise.

Instead, she delivered a roundhouse kick to the back of his head.

Vombad was built like a brick wall, but the loss of blood and the mighty kick to the head were clearly taking a toll, and he fell to his knees.

He tried to push back up, but his legs refused to accept the load. He leveled his eyes at her. A look of pure hate and evil.

She knew that he was still dangerous, even on his knees, and it would have been foolish of her to underestimate him.

But he'd already lost, and he knew it.

Jade smiled. Bless the Mother for the strength she'd gifted her with.

Vombad parried her swings, and for a few brief moments, Jade toyed with him, letting him believe that he was holding her back. But when the glimmer of hope appeared in his eyes, she delivered a hard blow to his sword hand, forcing him to let go.

Standing tall in front of the murderer of her people, she waited for him to do the honorable thing and offer her his throat, but in his heart Vombad was a coward, and he instinctively lifted his hands to defend his head and his neck.

"You were always a worthless coward, Vombad." She swatted away his defending hand with her sword and delivered the killing blow.

67

KIAN

Kian had watched the mission unfold through the video feed from the drones, but once the drones were no longer needed and the battle continued on the ground, he had to rely on listening to the com.

Next to him, Onegus was talking to Yamanu, getting an update.

"When all was said and done, there was really no fighting to speak of," Yamanu said. "The tranquilizer darts did what they were supposed to, but some of the Kra-ell could fight off the effects for longer than we'd expected, so we had to knock them over the head. After that we bound them with the titanium cuffs and brought them down to the basement of the office building. The guys were squeamish about doing that to the females, but we had no choice. They fight as viciously as the males. I'm proud to report that we managed not to kill anyone, not even those we had to fight after we dispatched the first wave of defenders. The only casualties the Kra-ell suffered were the work of Jade and Kagra. They dispatched six of Igor's inner circle males."

"What about Valstar?" Onegus asked.