Chapter 22 #2
He shook his head, confirming my suspicion.
“I don’t know. I only recall that my grandmother used to sing a nursery rhyme about one when I was a child.
It was a thing that walked like a man and a beast, a demon in disguise, and it killed everything it met: forests, cities, people.
” His voice dropped to a hushed whisper.
“I wanted no part of that, you understand?” He and I had both lived long enough to know that there was always a bit of truth in a nursery rhyme.
I nodded slowly as I contemplated this. A creature powerful enough to level cities?
There were a handful that fit that bill.
A very old and powerful vampire could, though not in the literal sense.
A dragon like Chardum? He might, but they tended not to care about such things, not even a dragon like Chardum, called the Destroyer.
Perhaps a particularly powerful warlock or witch could wield that kind of power.
I had a feeling, however, that we weren’t talking about a normal creature, but something that took great pleasure in that kind of death and destruction.
Any of the ones I knew wouldn’t do such a thing unless they had a good reason…
So the question remained: what was a Galamut?
“I’ve been trying through my contacts at Sunworld to find out more,” Kiran admitted voluntarily.
“So far, nothing. Nobody seems to know anything, just that upper management wants the creature. I’ll keep trying but…
” he did not need to finish that statement to make it clear that information on this creature was extremely hard to come by.
The silence stretched as I shared a look with Kiran, that was filled with a surprisingly mutual understanding of the danger this creature, if it existed, posed.
I opened my mouth to ask more, but something twisted sharply in my chest. It was a pull, abrupt and painful; a warning.
This was about Jade. I turned for the door in a rush, my belly coiling with pain and fear.
“I have to go,” I said, in a semblance of manners, by rote and not heartfelt.
Kiran moved fast, blocking the doorway before I could get out.
His body a living barrier I could only pass if I wanted to push him aside by force.
“Is it out?” he demanded. “Is there really one here?” I bared my fangs, he barely had time to react before I struck him aside and surged past, already running.
He’d been in in town for months, waiting and watching, and he thought now was the right time to start asking his own questions?
Inside the library, the temporary lights were on—indicating Jade had been here, working—but I saw no sign of her.
No, that wasn’t true. The box with the bracelet imbued with protection spells I’d had delivered for her was sitting on the corner of the large central table.
I snatched it up without thinking, my eyes searching between the shelves for any sign of her.
Then I saw the partially ajar bookshelf on the other side of the room.
The hidden entrance to the secret library, as ancient as Hillcrest Hollow.
Oh no, she’d gone down there, hadn’t she?
I heard the growl before I reached the door, low, furious, wrong.
It made my skin crawl and my mind fill with images of horrors: of creatures all wrong and misshapen, dark and twisted.
A Galamut, though I knew not what one looked like.
Charging down the hidden stairs, I burst into the secret library just as Belfry came flapping toward me, silk vest askew, gold chain glinting wildly.
She’s down there! he cried into my mind, twisting midair to arrow back toward a row of bookshelves.
Something shadowy snapped out, writhing from between those wooden bookcases.
Oh, Luther, it’s awful, Belfry moaned. He wheeled through the air ahead of me as I charged forward, then ducked behind me for protection.
The smell hit me first, old magic, splintered wood, rot, though that couldn’t be from the secret library itself.
It was pristine, made that way with magic.
I saw a pale hand curl from behind one shelf and rushed forward.
Jade lay sprawled between the shelves, unmoving, and for a blinding moment, I was certain she was not even breathing.
Beyond her stood a creature I’d never seen before. It was human-shaped only in mockery, with limbs too long and wrongly shaped. Blackened roots threaded through flesh, and bark split skin. Its mouth opened too wide as it howled and raked claws through a row of ancient leather-bound volumes.
Rage obliterated all thought. I roared and launched myself at it, tearing deep into its side, driving it back from Jade, holding back, only barely, from sinking my fangs into whatever corrupted blood it possessed.
We crashed through shelves in a storm of splinters and paper.
It was immensely strong, far stronger than I expected it to be, and we slammed into the stone floor.
Then Kiran hit it from the side, shifting mid-charge, a tiger’s roar echoing through the chamber.
The creature fled, shrieking into the shadows.
I did not care what happened to the tiger or the monstrous thing of bark and tree and blood.
I fell to my knees beside Jade, dread and relief tangling painfully in my chest. She was alive, barely.