Chapter Four #2
A glancing blow caught the side of her shoulder and she stumbled, searing her wrist on the green flames. The pain made her instantly queasy, her vision blurry.
If there was somewhere to run or hide, she might have had a chance. But there was only the damp stones, the green fire, the vicious, violent screaming all around her. Another glancing blow that she managed to escape, but only by landing hard on her knees. The shock of it traveled up to her jaw.
A bird she could not see sent her an image, a flash of her hitting the ground, flattening herself down. Fast. Now.
She sprawled, her cheek pressed to the stones, gasping.
A giant storm-gray wolf soared over the green flames and landed inside the ring.
He snarled, and it shivered through the sudden hiccup of stunned silence.
Sorcha peeked up, could only see thick fur, muscles rippling beneath, and thick claws just by the side of her head.
He snarled again, fur bristling. She caught a glimpse of sharp teeth.
And then he was soaring again, green flames reflected in his golden eyes as he attacked. She had a very brief moment to wonder why those eyes looked familiar.
The ogre outweighed him by several stone, but he was faster and smarter.
He went high, then low, clamping his jaws around the back of the ogre’s heel.
Blood stained his muzzle and Sorcha could hear the crunching sound even over the general din.
The ogre howled. He struggled to stand, swinging his fists.
The wolf stayed between him and Sorcha, turning his head only to snap at her when she moved.
Another vicious bite, a swipe of those powerful claws, and the ogre went down again and this time stayed down, groaning. The green flames flickered, lowering.
The wolf leapt, landing crouched over Sorcha, snarling at the faces that came into view when the fires dwindled further.
Magic rippled through him, like wind through the long grass of his fur. His lips lifted off his teeth, still smeared with blood.
As the audience went wild and the guards hesitated for a moment, Sorcha heard a crow, this time through the rotted rafters overhead.
She used every bit of her power to push out images of crows flying, black feathers, the flickering torches inside the tower.
The chorus of their cawing turning the ruined tower into a church of vengeance.
The first crow arrived a moment later.
And then another.
And another.
They dove in between the rafters, through the open archways, a blur of sharp beaks and curled claws.
They attacked everyone and everything, causing instant chaos.
There were shrieks as witches covered their heads, ducking low, shoving each other to get outside, where they choked on the waiting smoke, momentarily disoriented.
Blood spattered on the ground with stained muslins and silks and diamond cravat pins.
The crows did not let up.
Sorcha stumbled toward the archway, the huge wolf at her back, his nose nudging her spine to get her moving.
She stumbled, noticing a woman pressed to the wall, terrified.
She was waiflike, with long blonde curls and round, stunned eyes.
She did not look as if she belonged. Sorcha wondered if she had been dragged here by a family member or was a captive.
There were tear tracks on the apples of her cheeks.
“Come with me,” Sorcha said loudly.
The woman only stared at her. She was a bit older than Sorcha, but she was shaking like a debutante before her first curtsy to the queen.
“I won’t hurt you,” Sorcha said. “But you can’t stay here.”
The woman finally nodded tremulously. Sorcha grabbed her, leading her outside, where the chaotic din was certainly no less chaotic.
Smoke choked the courtyard and the flames flickered high, already eating through what was left of the stable roof.
Magical familiars streaked through the air like a star shower.
A glowing deer made of light bounded past her.
“We have to run,” Sorcha told the woman.
The guards would start turning on the crowd soon enough.
They were drawing too much attention, even so far out in the hills.
The light would be visible from the towers of Hallow.
The Order of the Iron Nail might even come, with so many witches in peril. “Can you run?”
They pushed through the melee, making it out onto the grassy field. The stars were choked with the shadows of crows. Sorcha sent them her thanks. They accepted but were disinclined to stop harassing the witches below. It was too much fun.
Sorcha left them to it as a woman with striking cheekbones hurried toward them. “There you are! I told you your brother was an idiot for bringing us here.” The waif fell into her arms. The other woman turned to Sorcha. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome,” she said. “Can you get home?”
“I’ve got her.” They turned and disappeared into the darkness without another word.
Sorcha decided they had the right idea. She needed to get home, where an ogre was unlikely to put her in a stew.
The wolf clearly agreed, as he nudged her again until she was stumbling into a run. Hot breath ruffled her hair.
She pushed on until her lungs burned. So did the muscles in her calves. But again, she had not been made into ogre stew, so she counted the night a success. And there was a bear shifter, several Lycan, a Pegasus, and a hippogriff now free of the pits.
The wolf paused when she did but did not follow when she started to walk again. Did it need encouragement? What did wolves eat in their wolf shape? Meat? Cake? There was blood around its muzzle. People?
“You’re not coming?” she asked.
He snorted once and did not stir.
“Guess not.” She tilted her head as the clouds parted enough that the moon shone on golden eyes, sharp teeth. Storm-gray fur. “Thank you,” she said. She did not know how to say thank you in wolf.
He watched her all the way up the path, turning to bound away only after she took the fork that led into Hallow. Even as she walked home, she thought she saw his shadow.
She decided she deserved a pot of chocolate. Or a bottle of wine. Both.
One day…one day she would burn the pits to the ground entirely, not just its stables.
But not tonight. Tonight she limped home, with a sore shoulder and a wrenched knee, stinking of smoke.
And it was worth it.
It wasn’t until she reached Nettlestone that she realized there was blood dripping down her fingers from a deep scratch on her arm. It immediately began to sting when she noticed it.
“You smell…unpleasant,” Hecuba informed her as she detached from the shadows.
She was medium height, medium build, medium everything.
The camouflage of a truly ancient predator.
She might have been quite forgettable if it weren’t for the gleam of lavender eyes, the ostentatious embroidery of her dress, all magenta lilies and leaping white deer. The tumble of pale, pale hair.
Oh, and the fact that she was a vampire.
“Thanks very much.” Sorcha made a face. Hecuba had moved into the house last year when Sorcha found her hiding under a dolmen, nearly skeletal with hunger.
She had never said what or who had driven her there.
When she’d tried to glamour Sorcha into offering her neck, Sorcha sent a hawk diving at her eyeballs. And thus a friendship was born.
“Where have you been?” Hecuba demanded, fangs flashing. She had never fully regained the reliable use of her knee, and there were still scars across her collarbones. Scarring a vampire was a very difficult thing to do.
“Dancing a quadrille,” Sorcha replied drily.
“In a gutter?”
“Something like that.”
Hecuba lifted a lace handkerchief to her nose. She was the most fastidious vampire Sorcha had ever met. “Well, you’re safe from me. Even the smell of your blood is not enough to tempt me through the mud and sweat and wet dog? And…is that fish scales?”
Sorcha shrugged wearily. “Very possibly.”
Hecuba gagged dramatically. “Have someone clean you up properly, crumpet. I’ll never get to sleep with that odor wafting through the manor.”
“You once drank from Jenny Greenteeth.” Jenny Greenteeth was a swamp spirit who smelled exactly as one would imagine a swamp spirit to smell. Which was: not good.
“She was perfectly willing.” Hecuba shuddered. “But now you truly understand how noxious you smell.”
“I thought you were a fine lady,” Aesop chided softly as he met them in the hall. There was a kitten curled up asleep on one massive shoulder. He was carrying a bowl of warm water and clean cloths. Clearly he had smelled Sorcha’s approach as well.
Hecuba snorted, unrepentant. “Yes, but I am a fine lady who also happens to possess a functional nose.”