Chapter Twenty-Nine
SANORA
With blind trust, I bolted out of the house through the broken doorway, half-expecting a creature to lunge at me from the dark. But the street outside was empty. Too empty and silent.
What had broken down the door then? The wind? Magic?
The rain slapped against me, stinging and soaking through my nightgown the second my socked feet hit the road.
I scanned left and right, focusing on the left path, one that led to the Crater.
At first, I couldn’t make out anything but shadows shifting.
Then, I noticed movement, and three silhouettes slid into the dim glow of a streetlamp.
My stomach dropped.
They weren’t like the messenger. These were worse. They were naked, bald, their skin a flat surface holding no features, no mouths, no eyes, and nothing to tell their gender. They looked human only in shape, as though someone had carved out a man’s outline from clay and forgotten to finish it.
My legs moved before I could think, jogging backward, then turning fully.
I ran.
They ran too, their bare feet slapping the wet asphalt as they chased me.
Rain streaked my vision, thunder shook the air, and I threw a glance over my shoulder every few seconds, praying they weren’t close enough to lunge.
Thankfully, they were slow. Still, panic drove me faster, heart hammering as the storm lashed my skin.
I didn’t know where I was going. All I could do was run and pray Thrax would find me.
Things like the messenger, the Pylath and these creatures were something I didn’t see in books. If I knew they existed in Nimorran, I would have stayed back.
Who was I kidding?
I would have wanted to come see them for myself.
But no one mentioned things like these. No one had ever documented them.
Which meant they had never seen them. Or maybe they didn’t live to tell the story?
No, there would have been suspicions or assumptions of the existence of these kinds of creatures near The Crater.
I could not be the first to be experiencing this. No.
One minute, I was feeling safe because I’d put enough distance between myself and the things, the next, I heard heavier and faster steps breaking through the rain.
My blood iced over. I twisted my head, almost tripping, to see a second pack.
They were even more unpleasant than the previous type.
I couldn’t really make out anything from the rain obscuring my view, but their short arms stood out.
They had the body shape of a human, but shorter arms, definitely elbow-length.
They outran those three, matching my speed and closing the gap slowly. They were seven.
Terror clawed my throat raw. My breaths came sharp and ragged, my chest on fire as the cold stole my strength, every stride shaking like ice ran in my veins. My phone was clutched in one fist, my knife in the other, and I ran like the night itself was trying to hunt me down.
Their screeches tore through the thunder—shrieks too shrill to be animal, and too hollow to be human.
My body weakened, legs shaking, breath hitching. They were gaining.
But I didn't stop.
The lights from most houses were off, no doubt asleep. Or pretending to. In no time, they closed up, and I searched ahead, hoping to run into Thrax, my chest beating so loud I felt like ripping it out.
I heard their sounds directly behind me, and when I glanced back, they were just as close, so close they’d grab me if they stretched their short arms enough.
Knowing I had just me to save myself, I clenched the knife tight, ready to stab through any of them. The thought made my hand shake, but I reminded myself that they were not human and they had no feelings. It was alright.
A limb clamped my shoulder.
Gritting my chattering teeth, I blindly swung my hand back mid-run, blade slicing through its chest. The creature screamed, stumbling back.
I didn’t have time to breathe before another yanked my soaked hair, dragging my head back. Pain flared down my neck as I tried not to scream, whipping the knife across its arm. The severed limb hit the wet ground with a sickening thud. I didn’t stop to look back.
The knife was so sharp I was sure I wasn’t the one who purchased it. I was bad in the kitchen and buying an extremely sharp knife was something I learned in the early stage not to do—
An arm like a vice locked around my neck and wrenched me backward, hurling me onto the gravel road. My breath left me in a violent gasp as my skin scraped the wet stone.
I lifted my head to see one light coming from a window. A man with a cup in his hand was behind it, frozen as he stared at me and the monsters trying to tear me apart.
“Help!” I screamed.
And he moved. But not toward me—no. He shut the curtains, and the light went out.
My gut sank like lead.
Fuck.
The creature pounced, slamming me back onto the ground.
Its weight crushed me, rain pouring into my eyes, mixing with hot tears as I shoved away.
Then my knife found its neck, slicing clean.
I anticipated the blood that’d gurgle from him, but there was nothing.
It simply fell onto the side of the road, the cut dry as bone.
I staggered up, barely managing a step before another threw its weight onto me, sending me back to the ground.
I held it back with the fist gripping my phone while I raised the other hand, tearing my blade through its skull.
But two more followed, piling on me before I could rise.
My scream drowned under the storm, their strength overwhelming.
Rain poured into my mouth, my arms shaking and burning as I struggled to hold them back, legs kicking uselessly.
Their clawless hands reached for my face.
Tears streaked with rain as I turned my face away, pressing it into the gravel like I could sink into the ground and vanish, my body shuddering under their crushing weight.
When two more pounced on the other two I was holding up, my weak arms gave out.
I squeezed my eyes, waiting for them to tear into my face as they fell atop of me, but nothing came. They didn’t move.
Confused and panting, I forced my eyes open and shoved their bodies off me with shaking hands, chest thundering. I took a good look at them and saw their necks had split clean through, one after another.
With my heart rattling in its cage, I looked up to the side through the blur of rain. There, a dark figure stood some feet away, body bent low to pick up an object.
Thrax.
His dagger gleamed under the low light as he straightened, realisation hitting me like lightning. He had thrown it. From a distance, he had thrown his blade and cut all four bodies down, every single one of them severed with a single, perfect strike.
Relief flooded me so fast I almost sobbed.
He was here.
And I was still alive.
Thrax hurried towards me, dropping to one knee, both hands clamping over my face, tilting it side to side, searching for injury.
His breathing was ragged and heavy, chest rising and falling like he’d sprinted through hell itself.
Fear and fury tangled in his eyes, his brows drawn so tight they shadowed his expression.
His hands, calloused and warm, swept frantically over my arms, shoulders, down to my ribs, as if he had to feel me whole to believe it.
His gaze finally locked on mine, soaked hair clung to his cheekbones, rain streaking down his face. His lips parted, but no words came. Although the question he wanted to ask was loud in the way he stared already.
I nodded, shaky but firm. I’m fine.
Relief cracked through him in one visible exhale. His chest deflated, grip softening.
But only for a heartbeat.
Because the sound of wet feet slapping against the street came again as ten more raced towards us, shrieks filling the storm.
Thrax shot to his feet, dagger twirling once in his palm before locking into his grip. His whole body tightened, becoming lethal in an instant.
“Stay here,” he ordered, leaving no space for argument.
Then he moved, meeting them halfway.
In less than five heartbeats, they were sprawled in the road, their bodies twitching before falling to the ground. He waited, water dripping from his blade. Three seconds later, more emerged.
Again, he cut them down, faster than I could follow, his movements clean and ruthless. His silhouette blurred with the downpour, rain streaking like white fire around him as creatures fell the moment he reached them.
Then, with a single glance over his shoulder—so brief it stole my breath—he disappeared further, leaving me with only the sound of his blade striking body and the echo of monstrous screeches dying in the dark.
I staggered to my feet, brushing wet strands of hair off my face. My fingers clenched tight around the knife and phone, both objects feeling like dead weight. My socks squelched against the gravel, cold gnawing through my skin as I followed the trail of bodies lining the way.
For a moment, my mind fed me with the fear that they might rise again, that at any second, one would grab my ankle. My chest seized with that thought, and I quickened my pace, ignoring the ache in my lungs and the wobble in my legs.
I neared the house after a long time walking, and by then, the storm had started to ease. Finally, Thrax returned.
He crossed the distance back to me, the soft patter of the rain somehow amplifying the sight of him. His dark clothes clung to his body, dagger dripping at his side. His cold eyes raked over me in silence, lingering on my drenched socks and the nightgown plastered to my body.
The fabric was a see-through, clinging wet to my breasts, nipples peaked tight against the cold. His jaw flexed, but he said nothing.