Chapter 19 #2
The creature below us let out a deep, rumbling growl and started sniffing around the ice. I scanned the rest of the area, noting another dead body before spotting two others closer to the bank.
“I think they’re still breathing.” My gaze narrowed on what appeared to be two young women. It was hard to tell because of all the blood.
One of the survivors whimpered, and the beast’s head snapped towards them.
Shit.
I took two steps back. “Get them out of here, Bastian.”
“Don’t you fucking dare.” Bastian lunged for me, but he was too slow.
I leapt off the ledge onto the beast’s back, rolling across it before landing on my feet on the other side, between it and the two Velesians.
“Aren’t you just the thing of nightmares?” My fingers tightened around the axe handles while I leaned forward on the balls of my feet.
Instead of immediately attacking me, the monster studied me with intelligent brown eyes as torn flesh fell from its mouth.
Great. It was smart, heavily protected, and enjoyed mauling things.
Bastian was right. Lunaria really had outdone itself.
In my peripheral vision, I saw Bastian flanking it on the right and Ryker on the left. Bastian kept going behind me, presumably to drag the Velesians farther away. It was the best we could do for them for now.
“It’s got to have a weak point somewhere,” I said in a calm, even tone. “Can you draw its attention, Ryker?”
In his wolf form, he would be faster than me and hopefully faster than whatever this thing was. Based on its size and stocky build, I guessed it was powerful but slow, which was good . . . until you got hit with one of those paws.
Ryker prowled forward on the frozen river. The beast looked away from me to take in the potential threat, moving slightly so it could watch us both, giving me a view of its side.
The triangular plate-like scales became smaller towards its belly.
It reminded me of a novemi, a medium-sized rodent that was also armor-plated.
When novemi were attacked, they’d curl up in a ball.
Their backs and sides could withstand a lot of abuse, but there was a vulnerable seam on their underbellies where the scales met. Maybe this beast was the same?
If it wasn’t, we were well and truly fucked because the other potential weakness I saw were it’s eyes, and not only were they small, but when it blinked, a thick scale covered them.
Ryker circled the beast. He didn’t make a single sound and there was something so intimidating about his single-minded focus on the creature.
The monster followed him, turning its back towards me, and a long tail extended from its body and flicked in annoyance.
It ended in a clump of scales that were raised like tiny little daggers.
I waited for an opening to go for the belly. The monster was mostly focused on Ryker, but I doubted it had forgotten about me, and I really didn’t want that tail slamming into me.
Suddenly, the monster’s right paw shot forward, fast, but not faster than Ryker, who darted underneath the outstretched claws and nipped at the underside of the monster’s leg before sliding out of range.
A pissed-off growl tore from the creature, but it didn’t go after Ryker, and when I darted forward, I immediately had to leap back to avoid the tail slashing at me. Moonsdamn it all. Why couldn’t it be big and stupid? Big and smart was just unfair.
“Girls are safe.”
I jumped two feet to the left and had my axe raised before my brain caught up to the fact that it was Bastian next to me.
“You assholes really have to stop sneaking up on me.” I glared at him, lowering my axe.
“Maybe you just need to pay more attention,” he replied evenly before turning his gaze to the beast. “Go for the belly?”
“Yep.” I eyed his daggers. They would be far better at slicing than my axes. “Actually, I’ll help Ryker distract it, you go for its underside.”
“Fine.” He pointed one of his daggers at me. “But do not take unnecessary risks. All you need to do is keep its attention.”
“Well, I was thinking about leaping into its mouth and letting it chomp on me a bit, but I guess I’ll come up with a different tactic now.” I flashed my teeth at him and darted away, moving around the beast to where Ryker was.
“Bastian is joining the fun,” I told him. “You go left, I go right?”
He let out a sharp bark in response that I took as a yes. We drifted apart a few feet, and the monster tracked our movement, opening its maw in a silent snarl.
For a moment, it was like the world paused, and I was equal parts terrified and exhilarated. This was just as much a part of who I was as the person who liked to curl up with a good book next to the fire. Whatever this thing was, it wouldn’t be killing any more of ours.
That strange feeling inside my chest thrummed, and I instinctively knew Ryker was going to move.
We leapt forward at the same time. The monster spun, swinging its tail at us like a club.
I dropped to my knees and bent all the way back until I was parallel with the ground, my momentum carrying me across the ice.
Cool air rushed over my face as the scaled tail missed me with barely an inch to spare.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Ryker jump over the tail, twisting midair so he landed facing it. His jaws snapped closed on it a second later, and the beast bellowed. Ryker dug his claws into the ice, pulling on the tail as the monster tried to yank it free.
The beast twisted, curling back on itself, jaws opening to snap at Ryker. I raced forward and slammed my axe into its face, the strike missing the eye and bouncing off scales.
Damn it.
I succeeded in getting its attention though. This time, those rows of sharp teeth were aimed at me. I spun away and ducked as it swiped even as I struck for the gap between its talons.
The monster roared, jerking its paw back as dark purple blood splattered across the ice. Not exactly a mortal wound, but it did have weak spots in that plated armor. Here was hoping Bastian could find one on its stomach.
When the monster raised its tail, Ryker let go and dropped to the lake. My heart stopped for a second when he slipped on the surface, now extra slick with blood, and barely managed to throw himself to the side as the beast slammed its tail right where he’d been standing.
A small crack in the ice formed at the impact, but the beast was already moving now that its tail was free.
So was Ryker. He’d regained his footing and raced around the creature, nipping at its face. When it lunged for him, I slammed my axe into its neck. The hit reverberated down my arm but didn’t make so much as a dent in the scales.
The monster pushed Ryker and me back towards the center of the river.
We kept the pressure on, alternating who rushed in for a hit and trying to distract the beast if one of us slipped.
Bastian was trying to dart underneath the creature, but the damn thing was aware of him and used its tail to take swings at him.
Finally, he succeeded, and it let out a pissed-off snarl before rising up on its hind legs. One of Bastian’s daggers was buried between its scales.
“Shit.” There was a seam where the scales met, but they were so tightly packed that Bastian’s damn blade was pinched between them. My hopes of being able to disembowel the monster vanished. “Get out of there, Bastian!”
With a pissed-off snarl of his own, Bastian rolled across the ice just as the beast stomped down with both paws. Bastian sprung to his feet and sprinted towards us, sliding to a stop next to me.
“Any other ideas?” he panted.
I wracked my brain as the monster stalked towards us. It was barely wounded. Meanwhile, all three of us were bleeding heavily. Both Ryker and I had been caught by its claws, and Bastian had been too slow on one of his dodges and the barbed tail had stabbed him in the side.
If we ran, it was unlikely to chase us for long, but it would almost certainly go back to the two wounded Velesians. We’d be leaving them to die.
But we couldn’t just keep hacking away at it.
That clearly wasn’t going well for us. We were barely holding our own at three-to-one odds.
Sooner or later, one of us was going to go down and not get back up.
The other problem was that sunset was less than an hour away, and this much blood would attract even more predators.
A coldness passed over me that had nothing to do with the temperature. I wouldn’t let Bastian or Ryker die, and I sure as fuck didn’t want to die either. Pushing aside the dread, my mind rapidly went through options before finally settling on one that seemed the most likely to succeed.
“Buy me a minute,” I yelled before turning and sprinting back to where we’d first fought the beast. Behind me, it let out a low growl that changed to an outraged snarl midway through.
A quick glance over my shoulder told me Bastian had gotten close to hitting its eye, and the monster was very much not happy about that.
I flew across the ice before skidding on my knees to where the small crack had formed after the monster’s tail had collided with it.
This time of year, the ice wouldn’t be that thick, not this far south.
I sprung back up to my feet and raised my axe before slamming it down.
The crack barely widened. I raised the axe again.
Slam. Crack. Slam. Crack. Slam. Crack.
Now for the fun part. Dismissing my axes, I raced back to where Bastian and Ryker were tag-teaming the monster, and my breath caught at the blood coating Ryker’s side and the way he was ever so slightly favoring his right hind leg.
“Bas!” I screamed. Bastian’s head snapped towards me. “Give me a boost!”
Bastian crouched and interlocked his fingers. I didn’t miss a beat, slowing just enough to jump and land my foot in his hands. Bastian straightened, launching me into the air just as Ryker leapt forward, snapping at the monster’s nose and drawing its attention.
I landed on the monster’s back, my feet immediately slipping on the smooth scales. I let myself fall onto my knees and scrambled up to its neck. The monster roared and tried to shake me off, but I hugged its neck as best I could and held on.
Bastian and Ryker dove forward, forcing the monster to pay attention to them.
My knees dug into its sides, and I sat up, releasing my hold on its neck and summoning my axes again before bringing them down hard on two small holes on either side of the beast’s head.
It had no visible ears, so I assumed these were them, or at least something that wouldn’t respond well to being hit directly.
Based on the high-pitched roar the monster let out, my assumption had been correct.
I dismissed the axes again and scrambled off its back, bending my knees as I hit the ice and tucking my body into a roll before springing to my feet a second later.
The beast growled, and I didn’t have to look to know it was chasing me.
I slid to a stop just before the cracked ice and stared down the monster thundering towards me.
“Come on!” I screamed and called my axes back. Adrenaline coursed through my system as I leaned forward on the balls of my feet. The monster’s claws dug into the ice as it slowed, jaws wide open. I darted to the side and slammed my axe into its face, forcing its head to snap away.
Another pissed-off snarl rolled across the ice before the monster rose onto its hind legs.
I held my ground as the monster towered over me.
“Move, Rynn!” Bastian screamed. Both he and Ryker sprinted towards me, the silver wolf pulling ahead.
The monster let out another ground-shaking roar, but I didn’t move until it started to stomp down with its giant paws. I darted left. Not fast enough. The downward strike clipped my shoulder, and I spun before being slammed to the earth, one paw pinning me to the ice.
Both axes slid away from me at the impact, and it felt like time slowed. All I saw was the monster’s wide open maw dripping in blood as it came for my head.
Then I heard a crack so loud, I thought it was thunder reverberating through my mind, and the next second, air was being sucked from my lungs as freezing cold water enveloped me.
Claws raked my side, yanking me farther down into the water as the monster frantically tried to swim up, but all those plated scales came at a price: it was too heavy to swim.
Another paw hit me, this one sending me spinning away from it as it sank lower in the cold, dark water. I kicked, trying to swim, even as my lungs screamed for air. Falling into the water hadn’t been part of my plan, but at least I’d taken the monster out.
My vision started to dim and my kicks lost their strength.
I could barely make out the light of the surface as I feebly swam towards it before the world went black, and for a few blissful seconds, I felt nothing at all.
Then pain.
A fiery pain erupted in my heart, snapping my eyes back open.
With renewed vigor, I started swimming, but the freezing water was sapping my energy too fast, and after only a few kicks, I felt myself waning again.
I wasn’t going to make it.
A hand plunged into the water, gripping my wrist and yanking me out. I was vaguely aware of Ryker’s teeth grabbing my shirt and hauling me farther back as large blocks of ice teetered in the water.
What felt like an eternity later, Ryker flopped down next to me on solid ice and Bastian collapsed on my other side.
“So. Much. Punishment,” he rasped.