Chapter 21
Snake, hydra, same thing, right?
Nope, not the same thing.
Not for one, fucking, second.
The coils began to move faster, undulating upward, making space for the massive triangular head to rise.
“That’s not a hydra,” Veyyr said.
“Snake!” Sorrow screeched and buried his beak and eyes in my armpit.
I shoved Sorrow back down the tunnel we’d stepped out of, wanting my hands free.
Veyyr started to move to the right, along the ledge that led down into the bottom of the pit. I moved to the left, which would put me closer to Rana.
“Python….” Veyyr held up his hands, palm out. “We are not here for you.”
Python. The Python? The one set to guard the Oracle at Delphi… “Nor are we here for the Oracle.”
The massive snake had eyes as purple as its scales, and the long-forked tongue matched as it tasted the air. But unlike Stheno, there was no response, no vocalization.
A coil flopped over, shaking the ground, and Python opened his mouth, to show off fangs that were as long as I was tall along with rows and rows of smaller teeth, set back in his mouth. Grabbing teeth, teeth that would slice you to ribbons if he bit down and you squirmed.
“Veyyr?”
“Just keep moving slowly. Don’t attack unless it does.”
In theory that was good advice. Slowing my breathing, I kept my feet moving.
The ledge led downward and each step brought me closer to a section of the nest that was littered with bones. But how to know which one was the hydra and which were leftovers from yesterday’s snake snack?
At the bottom of the pathway, Python still hadn’t moved and my heartrate had tripled despite my efforts. I looked to my right to see Veyyr in the same position. There was no doubt in my mind that the second we stepped into the nest…that was when Python would strike.
Which meant we had to move fast. “Any suggestions as to what the hydra bones look like?”
“Your guess is as good as mine.”
“Wonderful. Remind me not to quest with you again. You’re terrible at this.”
He huffed a laugh. “Duly noted. On three?”
I slowly put my falcata away, knowing that it would be of no use and just slow me down. What I needed was a little more wolf, and a lot less blade to survive this. “On three.”
“One.”
Breathe in the scent of the snake and focus on the wolf in me.
“Two.”
Breathe out and see the snake strike in your mind.
“Three.”
Leap.
My eyes flew open and I leapt not toward the nest and the bones I could see, but toward the closest coil, landing balanced on the spine. Tiny ridges acted as grips as I ran down the length of Python’s body. Drawing his eyes. “I’ll keep him busy, get the goods!”
I had to get Python to chase me, to give Veyyr time to find the hydra bones which meant I needed to piss him off. I pulled one of my small daggers as I ran, and as I jumped to another section of his body, I spun and threw the dagger at his open mouth.
The blade buried itself deep, right at the base of his left fang.
I had more than enough of his attention now. “Hurry!”
I didn’t look toward Veyyr, just ran along the body of the snake, jumping across to another coil as Python’s head struck at me, the tip of his fang cutting through the calf of my pants, skimming my skin. The heat of his mouth nearly engulfing me.
Faster.
Riftwolves. Sagryls. Bleeders. They had nothing on the speed of the massive snake. You’d think because he was so big and such a confined space, he’d be slower or more careful.
You’d be wrong.
The seconds ticked as I dodged and ducked, Python’s blood splattering me every time he got close until I was speckled in it.
“Veyyr!”
“I need him to shift away from me!”
Fuck me, of course he did. Away…away.
If I could get up to the top ledge again and draw Python’s head into a tunnel…that might work.
I slid down the backside of a coil, feet hitting the ground of the nest. A coil came at me, with enough weight and speed to crush me. I dove out of the way, hitting the bottom lip of one of the pathways.
Scrambling first on hands and knees, I was halfway up when Python struck. I had a glimpse of open mouth, fangs, and those angled teeth.
I dropped flat to my belly.
His fangs dug into the pathway, leaving a small opening out of the corner of his mouth.
Veyyr shouted something, I couldn’t make out the word and didn’t have time to sit and think on it.
Crawling as fast as I could, I made it out, with only a few more tears in the back of my shirt. Python was still stuck, his mouth solidly latched onto the stone. I ran up the last fifty feet of the ledge. “Veyyr, tell me you got it!”
“Are you bit?”
“No.”
I mean, being scratched didn’t count.
“I got it!” He bellowed.
Tracking Rana, I bolted toward her. We didn’t have a lot of time.
“I will get Rana, take Sorrow and we’ll meet you back at the shaft!” I yelled over my shoulder as Python lurched free, spitting out hunks of rock.
There was no looking back. At the edge of the tunnel was one of the torches, which I snagged in one hand. Without Veyyr’s magic I’d be running blind. I just had to get far enough in and we’d be good.
Skidding into the tunnel where Rana slept, I stopped only long enough to scoop her up, grabbing her by the hands and flinging her over my shoulder, grabbing the lantern and then taking off again.
Once I was forty or fifty feet in I slowed and turned, holding the torch up to look back. Python stared at me with one eye, turned his head and flicked his tongue down the tunnel.
“Sorry man, you can’t win them all.”
Python hissed, spit and blood flecking the walls. My dagger was still stuck deep above his fang—there was no way I was getting that back. A loss but acceptable.
I took a step back and shook my head. “Time to go.”
An unexpected wash of dizzy hit me, starting at my knees and working its way up. I wobbled and leaned against the wall. Was I that worn out? No, I didn’t think so. The line along the back of my calf burned and throbbed now that I wasn’t running for my life. Numbness followed the heat.
“Damn it.”
Python shouldn’t have fit inside the tunnel. It wasn’t twenty feet across.
But he also wasn’t exactly your average snake you find out in a swamp.
The big fucker shrunk just enough to fit in behind me.
Torch in one hand, Rana a lumpy sack of potatoes hanging over my other shoulder, I ran, limping through the tunnel. Whatever was going on with my leg, and the ‘not bite’ there was nothing I could do about it.
As I got close to the base of the shaft, the blue of Veyyr’s lanterns drew me on, and I threw the lantern behind me in a desperate attempt to slow Python. “He’s in the tunnel behind me!”
The open space below the mineshaft was right there…right there and I could taste the fresh downdraft of air that said we were so close to being out of here.
Behind me the steady thump of Python’s body pushing off the edges of the tunnel drew closer. Each step as I ran only seemed to slow me down.
Rana stirred on my shoulder.
I couldn’t save us both.
Heaving her with all I had, I threw her toward the shaft as Python slammed into me. “Go!”
The last thing I saw as Python’s mouth closed around me was Rana flying through the air toward Veyyr’s arms, Sorrow on his shoulder. Funny to think that it gave me a sense of peace—Sorrow would be okay, Rana would snap out of it, Veyyr would have to survive his quest now.
The blue of Veyyr’s light extinguished and I was quite literally inside the maw of a beast. I could stand up, one hand braced against the roof of Python’s mouth, away from the angled teeth.
The smell of whatever he had been eating was mixed with the musk of snake and it filled my nose and made my eyes burn.
But I wasn’t dead. “Well, that’s unexpected.” My voice echoed in the darkness as I balanced on the bottom of his mouth, the tongue flicking around me, whacking my legs.
Python was moving, slithering backward was my best guess. His throat and neck muscles convulsed as if he could throw me back but with his head in the tunnel, he couldn’t.
“Listen big boy, I’m still alive. And you need to be worried about that.
” I pulled my falcata free, making sure the edge of the blade hissed across the sheath.
Python slowed. “I know and you know that even this blade might not touch your scales. But in here,” I pressed my hand harder into the top palate of his mouth, bits of moisture dripping down my arm.
“Lots of tender bits to cut. I bet I could cut your neck right in half, through bone and flesh, all the way to your scales. That’s going to hurt like a bitch. ”
He stopped moving, and I waited. “So, we can call this a truce, and you can let me out. Or I can start cutting. Your choice. I’ll even pull that pesky dagger out.”
The hiss started at the back of his throat and pushed forward as his mouth opened and I was shoved out, stumbling backward. Python’s eyes glowed as he opened his mouth and angled his head, baring his fang that I’d buried the dagger in.
I didn’t hesitate, didn’t let myself think about the damage he could do if he wasn’t a snake of his word. Not that he’d said anything.
I yanked my dagger free and stepped away from him. “If Thorn put you up to this, pass on a message for me.”
The snake’s eyes narrowed and just his tongue flicked out. I smiled. “Tell her that if she wants to kill a Tracker, then she’s going to need to try a little harder.”
Python’s eyes widened and then his lips peeled back and he…laughed. His head and body shaking as he began to slide backward, and I lost what little light there was in his purple eyes.
I took a step back, then another and another and then just went to my knees, my own words circling around my head. “That was a stupid thing to say.” I touched the edge of the tunnel and after another minute, pushed back to my feet.
There was shouting and then the blue light that belonged to Veyyr was there and he had me in his arms. “I thought…”
“Nah,” I leaned on him as we headed back to the mineshaft. “Going to take more than a big snake to stop me.”
I needed to stop saying shit like that. Really, the universe loved to test me. Or maybe it was the throw down I’d given Thorn?
Yeah, that was more likely the cause of all that came next, but give me a minute, we have a calm before the storm like any good quest. It can’t be all fighting and overcoming, right?