Brothers: Legacy of the Twice-Dead God by Scott Duff Read Free Book Online

never occurred to him that he could miss. Technically, I
guess he didn’t. Kieran caught the bolt with his bare hand, inches
from his chest, and tossed it to the ground, still laughing. The
swordsmen started running then. They had another fifteen feet or so
to go. I jumped forward, wanting to help him and not knowing how,
but I-not-I held his arm out against my chest, saying calmly, “He
can do this.”
    Mister Crossbow was a blur of motion after
the shock of Kieran catching his first bolt, firing and reloading
from the quiver on his back. I’d see movies that weren’t this hard
to believe as Kieran danced around the flying bolts and directed
them down into the asphalt. A tiny forest of short dark green bolts
erupted at his feet as he moved in impossible ways with
unimaginable quickness. The rain stopped but Kieran continued
bending backward to avoid a perfectly timed sweep by the swordsmen
intent on scissoring him in half while his attention was elsewhere.
He was upright again before either elf had time to adjust for the
unexpected follow through. He grabbed the left elf’s sword hilt,
the gold sword, with one hand and with the other, struck the elf in
the jaw with the heel of his open palm. The burgundy energy that
got the troll engulfed the elf, too, but ate him much faster. I
guess size does matter. The scabbard clattered to the ground.
Kieran dropped the sword and turned to the other elf.
    I thought the elf took an odd stance, his
sword too low to the ground. It seemed to me that he would have to
go upward to do damage, making a more difficult swing. But what did
I know. I could see Kieran’s face from this position—he was
grinning. He was in a fight for his life and he was having fun. I
was too scared for him and for me to think about that, though. I’d
read about adrenaline rushes and endorphin releases so I suppose
this was what was going on here. Otherwise I had a nut-job for a
brother. Would be just my luck this week.
    The elf grinned, too, and dropped the sword
point to the ground. Green and red sparks shot out from the sword
and arcs of power in red, like lightning, flew out around the
garage. It hit everything within fifty feet, except a six-foot
circle around I-not-I, for which I was thankful since I stood in
that circle. I didn’t want to know what the energy felt like.
Kieran didn’t seem to notice it at all. Apparently, whatever the
elf was doing took concentration because he didn’t notice Kieran
step within reach. When the elf raised the sword and looked up,
Kieran grasped the naked blade between thumb and forefinger and
backhanded the elf. The sword stayed with Kieran but the elf flew.
And flew until he hit the back concrete wall, sliding down the
wall, leaving a long, bloody smear.
    Mister Crossbow snarled, jerking our
attention back to him. He’d dropped the bow and was standing twenty
feet off in front of Kieran with his hands out in front of him, one
on top of the other with palms facing about a foot apart. A dark
green ball of energy was forming between his hands. With hate in
his eyes, the elf spoke a word and the ball exploded from his hands
and shot towards Kieran.
    Then it turned. Halfway to Kieran, it turned
and headed straight at me. I saw the shock in the elf’s eyes before
it registered in me that this big piece of honking deadly magic was
heading my way. I heard Kieran shout, “No!” and saw I-not-I step
directly in the path of the growing green ball of fire,
intercepting it. He just stepped right in front of it. With my
newly installed sight, I saw the magic eat him, or rather try to
eat him. It was more like he ate it. When I looked back to Kieran,
he was looking back at us, smiling. The forest of bolts had moved
up the roadway a little and packed more densely. In the shape of
the elf, actually.
    I’d just watched four people killed, I
realized. I ran for a corner and puked, grateful that breakfast was
long ago. The dry heaves weren’t pleasant either, though. My