Imaro’s sword arced with such speed the blade vanished for the fleetest of instances until it struck the creature’s twin blades.  The creature barely moved to block Imaro’s second strike.  Imaro attacked with the vigor of a lion, pounding his sword into his opponent’s guard, delivering short, precision strokes, punctuated by concise thrusts.  The creature moved to the deadly beat of the Illyassai’s music as his double blades parried saber blow after saber blow.  Imaro’s blade sang robustly, hitting a high note when its razor tip sliced across the creature’s chest.  Payment in kind.  The creature stumbled back, sparing a glimpse of his cut flesh.

            Imaro took a brief pause to appraise the blood he’d drawn.  It was green.  Unusual, yet encouraging.  The creature bled.  That meant he could be killed.  Imaro resumed his assault in a brute drive that pushed his opponent back.  The creature roared and his arm shot outward.  Imaro’s saber was stopped in mid swing by the creature’s blades.  Before Imaro could rebound his weapon, the creature twisted his wrist, catching Imaro’s sword in one of the double blades’ deep grooves.  Holding the saber in place, the creature used his free arm to deliver a smashing backhand to the side of the human’s head.

            The force of the impact twisted Imaro around before he flopped belly first on the unforgiving stone surface.  His head struck the ground, adding a second layer of fog to that which was clouding his head from the first blow.  Imaro shook his head in a vicious effort to keep from succumbing to the darkness.  He sprang to his feet, but the sudden movement put a dent in his equilibrium.  Imaro swayed off balance.  The creature was on him and for a morsel of a second, Imaro stood helpless as he tried to grab hold of his bearings.  Spurred by sheer will, linked to an ironbound refusal to abide defeat, Imaro glided beneath the creature’s long-armed reach.  Imaro’s less than graceful evasion landed him directly on the shoulder.  A riot of pain flared from his shoulder, meandering down the length of his sword arm.  That arm went numb.  Imaro shot back to his feet but could barely maneuver the limb as the creature lunged at him.  The Illyassai ducked three slashes and jerked his body back to avoid a thrust. He wasn’t quick enough.  The creature’s double blades sank into the human’s flesh, not deep enough to be fatal, but just enough to score rib bones.  Imaro stumbled backward, tripping over his ankles before again returning to the ground. 

          Imaro lost his saber.  He spotted it just within reach and grabbed it.  But his grip on the hilt was not fully consolidated when he brought the weapon around to guard his front.  The creature let loose a sweeping kick that knocked the sword out of the human’s grasp.  Imaro rolled, narrowly avoiding a downward double-bladed thrust.  Sparks erupted from the blades’ contact with the surface.  Imaro launched a leg upward driving his shin into his opponent’s face.

            The creature teetered slightly.  Emboldened, Imaro jumped to his feet and struck the creature in the same area, first with his fist then an elbow.  The blows appeared to have little effect.  Indeed, the creature’s face felt like flexed sinew to the Illyassai’s protesting shin and knuckles.  The creature released a second kick, again connecting to Imaro’s chest, propelling him a considerable distance. Imaro squirmed on the ground before his persistent will urged him back into action.  He placed a hand to his rib wound, grimaced at the fire generated by the touch, and wiped blood on his pants. 

            For several seconds human and unworldly nemesis eyed each other.  Imaro’s side burned as if   smeared with acid.  His head continued to clamor, and a darkening film settled across his vision.  Imaro blinked a number of times, forcing clarity back into his view.  He saw his sword and started to go for it.  The creature blocked Imaro’s path. 

            “What is this?” Imaro demanded.  He drew in a pained breath.  The act of talking aggravated the bite of his wound.  “You tire of this contest?  Now you seek to finish it?”

            The creature’s unsightly mouth expanded then contracted.  He clicked his fangs in what Imaro took to be a gesture of amusement.

            Imaro back tracked.  Throughout this duel he maintained an awareness of his surroundings.  The human knew he was close to the twin domed structures.  He began back tracking closer to the buildings.

            “Well come on then,” Imaro challenged, his voice gaining in volume.  “Finish me.  Kill me!”  Imaro continued taking backward steps, closer to the buildings. “Kill me!  What are you waiting for?  Kill me you vile piece of demon shit!”

            The creature bellowed and advanced rapidly toward the human.  Imaro remained in place for no more than two seconds, then turned and ran for the domed buildings.  Imaro spotted Ajil’s sword, with the dead soldier’s severed hand enfolding the grip. 

            The Illyassai picked up the sword, shedding the disembodied hand just in time to deflect a ferocious strike.  The creature’s double-blades met Imaro’s sword with a loud and echoing clang.  The muscles in Imaro’s arms, chest, down to his powerfully defined legs, rippled like restless ocean waves from the terrifying strength of the creature’s exertion.  Imaro did not tarry to trade further blows with the monster.  He resumed his flight until he came upon the narrow alleyway separating the twin buildings.  Imaro glanced behind him.  Satisfied that his opponent was striding at full burst upon his heels, the Illyassai ducked into the alley.

            The creature, though enormous in height and girth, was by no means encumbered by his unnatural size.  It was all Imaro could do, encumbered by his own injuries, to maintain a distance between him and his massive pursuer.  The human was at least fifty paces into the alley.  The light of the alley’s terminus shined up ahead like a blazing column.  Imaro cut abruptly to his left when he emerged into that light. He skidded to a stop, bent down and grabbed the length of rope he had created from Ajil’s attire.  The other end of the rope was tied to a stone stump that may have been the base of a statue.  When Imaro pulled, the rope went taut, forming a two hand span high obstacle across the alley’s exit.  The creature tripped over the rope as he flew out of the alleyway and his long body knifed groundward. 

            Imaro leapt from his position and pounced, plunging his sword deep into the creature’s exposed back.  The demon bucked like an enraged bull, knocking the Illyassai off his back.  But Imaro regained his footing and stabbed his opponent in the armpit as the latter twisted around.

            The creature howled in rage and agony.  He swung his blade arm with wild desperation.  Imaro evaded the uncoordinated attacks with ease and slipped in close to stab the creature in the chest.  He chopped at the creature’s neck, but his opponent was flailing so, Imaro could only manage to embed his sword in the collar bone…if this cursed monster had a collar bone to sever.  Imaro stabbed and slashed with repeated effort until the creature’s upper body was an eerie green smear of perforated flesh.

            Weakened by his mortal injuries, the creature dropped to his knees.  Whatever baleful light blazed from this demon’s eyes lessened to an ashen gaze of defeat.  Imaro had seen that look in many a foe he had dispatched. 

            He took a step toward his downed opponent, his sword raised, preparing to end this contest once and for all.  Instead, he paused and lowered the weapon as curiosity seized him. 

            “What in the name of the Cloud Striders are you?”

            The creature lifted his head, meeting the human’s gaze.  Then he dropped his head and brought up the gauntlet that held his twin blades.  The creature tapped a stud at the bottom of the gauntlet and a section of material retracted to reveal a glowing, rectangular pad. 

            Imaro stared in some wonderment as the creature used a clawed finger to tap a pattern inside the rectangle.  With each tap, a musical note sounded and Imaro’s kufahuma whispered a warning.  Imaro questioned that internal prodding.  After all, here resided his enemy before him, defeated and dying…and yet something remained amiss.

            When the creature completed whatever task he was performing, a keening noise emanated from the gauntlet.  Imaro saw slashes of light pulsing across the face of the gauntlet’s rectangle.

            Imaro heard something else…words coming from the creature…but words of an odd non-caporeal quality…as if they were not being spoken directly by the demon… What are you waiting for…kill me you vile piece of demon shit…

            The creature’s body quivered with a laughter that was more haunting than the distorted regurgitation of Imaro’s words.  As the creature laughed the noise from the gauntlet increased in pitch.

            “Enough!” Imaro yelled.  The Illyassai drove his sword into the demon’s neck, ending the mad cackling, but not the gauntlet’s elevating screech.

            The creature fell forward, dead.

            Run!  The voice in Imaro’s head screamed.

            This time, Imaro listened.  He took to flight, dashing back through the alley, across empty streets, weaving through a jumble of ruins.  He ran, even as his lungs burned and his legs began to feel like slabs of stone.

            A fan of sun bright radiance blossomed from the spot where the creature perished.  The light, intensely hot and ravenous pushed outward, obliterating the domed structures, expanding to consume every other structure in its unidirectional path.  An ever widening radius of annihilation converted objects to burnt embers and the very ground liquefied to a molten glaze that would soon solidify to glass.

            Imaro kept running as the ground quailed beneath his feet.  He dove into a deep depression just as a blast wave swept over him with all the unimpeded wrath of a vengeful god… 

            Rashad Ebn Asola emerged from his hideaway.  He knew he should have stayed hidden as Imaro insisted.  But that horrible blast of thunder that rent the sky, followed by the ground quake and heavy winds, drove him into the open.  When he looked to the source of the disturbance he beheld with paralyzing fear a shroud of smoke ascending skyward, taking on the shape of an enormous mushroom.  Rashad wrapped his scarf tightly around his face and held a hand up to shield his eyes from the stinging sand whipping around him.  His first inclination had been to flee toward the open desert.  After all, whatever it was that had wrought so much destruction must surely have slain the demon as well.  Then he thought of Imaro.  Rashad, against his better judgement, proceeded toward the city center, toward more possible danger.  The deeper into the city he ventured the poorer his visibility as the ashy mist thickened around him.

            He squinted in the distance as something took shape in the fog up ahead.  Rashad’s heart hammered and his blood went cold in spite of the oppressive desert heat.  Then relief settled over him when he recognized the outline of a man.  There was no mistaking the size and muscularity of the figure.

            “Imaro!”  Rashad’s joyful smile dimmed slightly.  The warrior was covered in a gray coating of sand and ash, making him virtually unrecognizable.  The look on Imaro’s face, dispassionate in the best of times, was utterly, inhumanly void of expression.  His dark eyes glimmered like moonlit opals.  In one hand, Imaro held a sword, in the other a worn leathery sack.

            “Imaro, I am overjoyed to see you.  The demon…is dead?”

            Imaro’s face softened. A shadow of smile cracked through the stone cast of his expression.  “The demon is dead.”  He handed Rashad the leather sack.

            Rashad took the sack, looked inside and yelped with delight.  He pulled out two thin tablets covered with the engravings of a dead language.  The third item he removed was a scintillating jewel-encrusted dagger with a golden blade of untarnished luster.  Rashad appraised the breath taking dagger before recovering his tongue.  “Imaro, I don’t know how to thank you…”

            “The credit is not mine,” Imaro interrupted.  “Thank our demon friend.  The blast he caused uncovered that treasure. At least we’re not leaving empty handed.”  The Illyassai moved past the scholar clearly bent on vacating this gods forsaken city and never looking back.

            Rashad scrambled to put the artifacts back into the sack and rushed to Imaro’s side.  In spite of all that happened Rashad could not erase the grin brought on by the moment.  “I’m going to be rich and the women will love me!”

            Imaro quickened his pace.  This was going to be a long trip back.