Chapter 34 Non
Non
I landed on my arse.
The floor beneath me was sodden. As I stood, dusting myself off, I saw that my boots were deep in what seemed to be brown water.
Then the smell hit my nose. I gagged as the putrid stench of stagnant water filled my lungs.
Scanning my surroundings, I saw that we’d been dropped into the heart of a marsh.
The edges of the thick water were lined with withered willows.
On one side of the water, under the cover of a tree, I could see Alaw and the other Southern Wielder she’d been nominated with.
Alaw had her sickle drawn, and the other woman had summoned a ball of gold light in her palm.
A groaning noise behind me made me turn around to find Lleucu sitting upright on a thick branch of a tree as she touched her fingertips to a bleeding gash on her temple.
The noise of steel clattering against steel echoed from deeper in the marsh; it sounded like someone had already come across the beast.
Moving in the congealed water was difficult but not impossible. I trudged ahead towards the northern edge of the pool in hopes I could pull myself out and get on more solid ground.
For a second, I expected to see rows of spectators standing on the bank, but then I remembered what Dylan had told me back at Hefina’s.
The crowds were spelled to be invisible and muted for us—something about them being a distraction.
A thick wall of fog sat beyond the trees.
I wondered if that’s what was veiling the people watching.
What if I was staring directly at Jazz? After the ordeal with the Cyhyraeth, I hoped my friend was okay.
As I moved closer to the north side of the bank, I could see that it sat much higher off the ground than the rest of the marsh. When I reached its edge, I realised it was built up nearly ten feet above my head.
Climbing out of here was not an option.
The thin layer of fog that bled out from the edges of the trees made details hard to see. But as I squinted, I was almost positive I saw jets of water running out of holes in the bank.
Pressing my palm flat to the towering wall before me, I felt rows and rows of precisely placed twigs beneath my hand.
My brain stalled trying to work out what exactly this was. Maybe it was some kind of ladder?
Regardless, getting out of the water here wasn’t happening, so I headed towards the side I’d seen Alaw on and hoped her Southern comrade wouldn’t shoot her ball of magic at me.
Then the ground began to rumble.
I turned back towards the wall of twigs to see the water in front of it bubbling like something was breathing underneath it.
Someone in the distance bellowed my name, but as I looked around the marsh, I couldn’t see a single soul.
“Up here!”
Craning my neck up, I saw boots dangling from the trees. Alaw and the other Southern Wielder were both sitting on a branch just like Lleucu had been. But they weren’t the ones screaming.
Every other person who was competing had climbed the various trees surrounding the water. Most of them sat on branches on their own, but on the far side, I could see two black habits standing side by side.
“Get out of the water!”
The command had come from Dylan, but another voice that I couldn’t identify replied, “Stop helping! Let the Afanc have her, one less for us to take out.”
Panic wrapped itself around my lungs and squeezed as I scrambled for the lower side of the bank. Something below wailed, and water began pouring down on my head.
I remember watching a horror film as children with Cat, where they kept saying don’t look behind you, and inevitably the protagonist would always turn around to see whatever dreadful ghoul followed them.
Their stupidity would drive me wild, and Cat would end up turning the film off because I’d get too angry at it.
If I ever found myself in a similar situation, I was convinced I’d never make the same mistake and look.
Turns out I was very, very wrong.
From the swampy depths rose a creature unlike anything I had ever seen. Even the Cyhyraeth that had plagued my nightmares didn’t come close to the beast before me.
Its head was similar to that of a crocodile with skin the colour of algae. As it opened its jaw, rows and rows of needle-sharp teeth could be seen, pieces of bloodied tendon belonging to its previous victim hanging from its incisors.
Its body was much more mammal-like and was covered in fur the same muddy brown as the water. From behind it, a tail whipped out that was a large, flat, leathery paddle just like a beaver’s.
Guess I figured out what that stack of twigs was. This fucker's dam.
I was so focused on its appearance that I’d failed to notice I was stood in the middle of the swamp under no cover whatsoever. The slits it had for eyes were wholly focused on me.
I began slowly backing away, but as soon as I moved, it dove back under the water. I was probably going to end up being its dinner, regardless, so I threw myself towards the bank, trudging through the sludge.
A gust of wind lifted my hair vertically as the Afanc broke the surface again. I’d made it to the bank and crawled backwards to put as much room between myself and the water as I possibly could.
I expected it to stop short when it got to land and turn its attention towards someone else that it could reach from the water. But as it rose from the sludge, I could see that it stood on four clawed feet.
As I continued to crawl backwards, I started feeling pressure against my shoulder blades. Eventually, I couldn’t move any further, and as I glanced behind me, I saw that I’d backed up against the wall of fog.
There was nowhere for me to go.
It slammed its clawed foot down on the ground and ripped the bank to shreds as it grappled over the edge and onto dry land.
It had gotten so close that I couldn’t see anything past its elongated snout, the holes it had for a nose flaring as it took a sniff of me.
My hand instinctively went for Carnwennan, but I stopped myself. What was the point of trying to land a hit on something so huge? Its skin looked impossible to penetrate, and it had come within such a short distance that I wouldn’t have been able to throw my dagger at it.
Slumping back against the warded fog, I accepted my fate. I’d barely survived the Cyhyraeth, so I certainly wasn’t going to survive something that made those monsters look like common fruit bats.
A boom echoed through the marsh, and the Afanc’s attention left me as it let out another wail. From one of the lower hanging branches, Guto and his brother Osian both fired balls of golden light at the beast.
The Afanc moved with the nimbleness of a serpent as it slithered towards the twins. Grateful it had turned its attention elsewhere, I pushed to my feet, but in the next moment, I had the wind knocked out of me.
Its long, paddle-shaped tail that I hadn’t seen coming caught me as I stood, catapulting me across the marsh. With a thud, I landed face down in the mud.
The sounds of power hitting the Afanc’s skin could be heard in the distance.
I rolled onto my back and wiped the sludge off my face in enough time to see the creature use its tail to propel itself out of the water.
Osian managed to throw himself from the branch and caught himself on another one nearby.
But Guto didn’t budge as he kept firing his power into its ascending mouth.
The Afanc closed its lethal jaw and dropped back down to the water, taking Guto and the whole branch with it.
Only his legs had been caught in its needle-like teeth, and Guto’s torso dangled like a rag doll as the beast shook its head from side to side.
Its shaking was so vigorous that eventually, the twin’s torso detached from his lower half altogether and landed on the ground. Guto’s organs were splayed across the bank as he let out a scream of pain.
He wasn’t dead.
I had no idea how. Maybe it had something to do with our power blessing us with longer lives and faster healing. But for Guto, this was a living hell.
“My legs….my legs!” he sobbed as he reached for his intestines and gathered them up in his arms. Clutching them to his chest, he rocked back and forth.
Then the whistling of steel flying through the air could be heard, and Caledfwlch buried itself deep in the tree next to Guto.
The whole marsh seemed to stand still as everyone waited for what would happen next.
Slowly, Guto’s head toppled off his shoulders and landed on the ground with a thud.
His body fell to the floor, but his arms never stopped clutching his insides.
Caledfwlch dislodged from the tree and disappeared back into the fog.
Dylan had put him out of his misery.
Lleucu dropped from her branch and launched her shield at the Afanc. Its jagged edge hit one of its spikes along its back, but dinged straight off and landed in the water.
The beast, having gotten bored now that Guto had stopped bothering it, dived back into the water. Only its ridged spine protruded out of the waves as it glided with ease.
With a decent amount of space between myself and the Afanc, I had a good chance at getting a few hits in with my daggers. I patted my sides but came up empty.
Where the fuck had Carnwennan and Cynddaredd gone?
The spine of the Afanc drew closer and closer, but I couldn’t focus on my connection with either weapon as panic seized me.
I ran my hands through the muddy shore I’d landed on, but I couldn’t see a damned thing.
A droplet of bloodied water ran down my nose, and I looked above me to see the underside of the Afanc.
Hoping it hadn’t seen me underneath it, I carried on desperately pushing through the mud, looking for my weapons.
I cursed my injuries from the night of the attack for stopping me from being able to train with my power.
It could have saved my arse right now if it wasn’t completely silent in my chest.
In a moment of pause while I tried to find the connection to the daggers again, I felt a sharp pain shoot up my leg.
Reaching into the inner pocket of my habit, I pulled out one of the cinnamon sticks Hefina had given me for pain.
Although after being soaked by the marsh, it was now a gooey brown paste.
Pinching my nostrils, I forced the paste down my throat and hoped it would give my leg some reprieve.
Hot breath from behind blew my hair into my face. The Afanc had noticed me.
I managed to turn myself around to face it just in time as it pinned me to the ground with its clawed foot. Despite the sedative I’d just taken, pain lanced through my body, likely undoing all the hard work Hefina had done to heal me.
Although I’d been standing on a muddy patch of ground, the sheer weight of the beast pushing me down meant my body began sinking into the mud. Water rushed over me, and in seconds, I was completely submerged and pinned to the bed of the marsh.
My arms flailed at my sides in desperation, trying to feel for anything I could use to stab its foot, but I felt nothing.
Screaming caused me to swallow mouthfuls of stagnant water, and I was drowning more quickly than I would have if I’d kept my mouth closed.
Speeding up the inevitable, though, I supposed.
With one final burst of energy, I flapped my hands at my sides like I was making a mud angel, and the Afanc pressed its foot down harder to try and still me.
Then something sliced my right palm, and I closed my hand around the blade of a weapon. I had no idea if what I felt was even one of my daggers, but I pulled it towards me with all my might. It felt like its tip was lodged in the bed of the marsh as it dragged along the floor slowly.
Above me, the end of the Afanc’s snout broke the surface of the water and snapped at my neck. I gave the weapon digging into my palm one final pull to yank it free.
A light flared from underneath the silt that made up the marsh floor, outlining the shape of a rift in the ground. It slowly parted, and familiar shimmering black shadows rose from it, engulfing me. Then I was free-falling into nothingness.