Chapter 16 #2
Sunshine felt that and whirled with a bone-jarring screech.
The stinger began spewing a distressingly thick fluid like pus as it flailed.
Sunshine reached for Cha with three pincers, having the acuity to fend Dy off from immediately jumping to Cha’s side with the other three.
The fae feinted at her head, which Cha deflected neatly before diving for that vulnerable stinger again.
She managed to cleave off one of the bundle of wormlike things at the tip, which oddly flew up into the tree, and draped over a branch, continuing to wiggle on its own, dripping the fluid that hissed and turned the daffodil grass black where it landed.
Note to self: don’t let that stuff touch you.
Then her ankle jerked and her short-lived journey of being actually on her feet ended abruptly when she was upended, suspended by that ankle from one viselike pincer, dangling well above the ground.
She tried swinging her sword at the limb that had captured her, but her leverage was all wrong.
She did, however, gain an excellent vantage of Dy’s continuing sorcerous battle with the fae.
Dy had switched tactics and seemed to be destabilizing the ground beneath the big bug. Sunshine sank, scrambling up with multiple floppy feet, only to sink again—and lurching to the side suddenly enough to drop Cha on her head.
Ow.
She’d spent more than enough time already being helplessly dizzy and entirely useless, though, so Cha forced herself to her feet—walk it off, she sternly instructed herself, her mother’s caustic voice useful for once—and determinedly attacked the vulnerable stinger.
It took dodging flung droplets of the burning venom, along with ducking the pincers darting her way—fortunately without much focused intention, so distracted was Sunshine by Dy’s magical attacks—but Cha managed to cleave away a few more squiggly worms. Then, via great good luck, just as Dy rained what looked like crimson pellets on the fae, pushing Sunshine back into the hole, and as she flailed for purchase on the crumbling rim, the long column of the stinger-tipped tail flopped out flat for a moment.
Cha, always a fan of seizing the opportunities luck threw her way, pounced on the stinger, straddling it and wielding her sword in overhead blows like an axe.
The position gave her a bit more effective purchase on the deceptive exoskeleton—or whatever the hell it was—and allowed her to use her weight to pin down the business end of the stinger.
It surged beneath her, but she clamped on with her knees and rode it like a green colt feeling its oats.
The back of her neck tingled with apprehension at the thought of those snakey bits reaching her and delivering a dose of no-doubt painfully lethal venom, but as long as it was only imaginary tickles and not caustically burning drops, she figured she was good.
Or, if not exactly good, at least not dead.
Her determined hacking at the same spot finally yielded results.
The mushy yellow carapace cracked, then gave way entirely, the stinger snapping in half.
Sunshine screamed in a woman’s voice, and Cha leapt away—checking first to see where the squiggly tip of doom had landed.
It flip-flopped like a beached squid, tentacles waving frantically.
Some even acted like fingers, digging into the pretty, daffodil lawn and trying to crawl toward her.
Cha took several stumbling steps back—not at all steady on her feet yet—putting significant distance between herself and it.
“Bandit!”
That woman’s voice wasn’t Dy. Cha spun to see Sunshine as the fae woman she’d been at first, but now crumpled dramatically on the lawn, one leg missing and bleeding copiously. She wept, beautifully, and reached a delicate hand toward Cha.
“Please don’t hurt me, Bandit,” she pleaded. “I wanted to love you. I didn’t mean to make your lover jealous. Help me, please, my beauty.”
Dy, on the other side of the prone figure, tossed back her long curls and raised her brows. “They say the fae can’t lie,” she said to Cha. “Guess it was love at first sight. Shall I bow out and leave the field to your new blonde?”
“Ha ha.” Cha shook her head at the fae. “Cut out the dramatics, Sunshine. My jealous lover will let you live if you’ll take us to the palace.
” As extortion, that might be a stretch, as fae tended to be very long-lived, if not immortal.
Still, if you chopped them up into small enough pieces, they didn’t enjoy life very much.
Sunshine narrowed her eyes. “So you did come here for a reason. You lied to me.” She sounded so aghast and astonished that Cha had to laugh.
“Well, I do like speed,” she explained, taking the moment to fill in Dy on the cover story she’d offered. “And I think the palace is pretty and I want to see more. But my partner and I also have a little bit of a trade to offer.”
Sunshine sat up, all vestige of weakness and injury gone. The glamour even filled in the missing leg between one blink and the next. Yeah, anything less than chopping into tiny pieces left the fae just fine and dandy.
“A trade?” she asked, a crafty gleam to her lovely eyes. Sunshine batted her lashes at Cha. “I want a cut, in exchange for introductions.”
The fae looked so lovely, a flower spun of golden sunshine amidst a sea of complimentary shades. Cha smiled at her. Took a step to take her still-outstretched hand and—
“Stop that,” Dy said sharply to the fae.
The fae pouted, but suddenly Cha came to her senses. She shook her head. “I am a fucking idiot,” she complained.
“Well, yes,” Dy answered. “But you’re my fucking idiot, so I’ll protect you.”
“Where is my cat?” Cha demanded of the fae.
She thrust out her bottom lip further, but waved a hand. Katu jumped down from an overhanging tree limb, blinking sleepily. “He’s unhurt,” the fae said sullenly. “I only sent him for a nap. Now, about my cut.”
Cha reassured herself of Katu’s wellbeing, checking him over thoroughly, while Dy negotiated with the fae.
Normally Cha handled the deals, having a better head for numbers and coin, but not so much at the moment.
Not with her skull throbbing with headache and her embarrassment so fresh and keen.
She really hated that she’d lost her senses to such an extent.
“I’m sorry, baby cat.”
Katu purred and Cha blessed the infinite forgiveness of animals. And, hopefully, of sorceress-partners.