I’d broken her. Not her body, though I’d definitely punished her on that end. But even without the screaming madness I could tell that I’d broken the assassin’s mind. Her eyes shone with the dull uncomprehending chaos that only accompanied a loss of lucidity.

This fight was over.

I swept her half-hearted lunge aside with an almost gentle swipe of my warscythe’s haft and let the liquid fire dissolve off my carapace. There was no reason to be a savage brute about this, not anymore. I’d come to the Finger of God thinking myself a hunter. But I could see in those maddened eyes that I’d never be more that a nightmare to this woman. There would be no honor in testing ourselves against one another. There was no more cat and mouse games to be had. There was only bloodshed, madness, and hate.

“What a letdown,” I muttered and reached out to grab the woman by the front of her jerkin. There was nothing left for me here and no joy in cutting down a raving lunatic so my intent was to simply pitch her backwards over the rail to spiral her way down into the inferno raging below. Her weight was nothing to me, but as soon as I tried to lift her there was a jolt of pain from my shoulder which cut through the blank numbness that covered my limb down to the elbow. My grip slipped lifelessly from the assassin. I blinked, uncomprehending, and looked down at the arm swaying loosely at my side.