Quickly wiping my hair out of my eyes as I rolled to my feet, I glanced around, heart pounding at both the thrill of that leap and my desire to finish the damn course for the first time. This was where I normally began to lose my focus on holding our weapons in full capacity.
I could do this.
We could do this.
My body froze as a blood-curdling scream tore through the air, dragging my focus away from the course. A second later, I grunted at the impact of a part of the course swinging around to hit me square in the solar plexus, knocking me off of the platform. The ground rushed up to meet me, and I did my best to tuck and roll to absorb the impact, but I still grunted as I hit.
What the fuck was going on? My heart pounded in my chest, and the sound was so loud I was positive anyone could find me just from hearing it alone.
Where were my mates?
Ariel flew toward me, blood pouring from somewhere I couldn’t see. The trail of it following behind her caused my stomach to churn. What, or who, had been able to catch her unaware and wound her like this? Whatever it was, this wasn’t good.
“Lucien!”
“Kylo!”
“Elwin!”
I screamed for my mates as I rushed to my feet, knowing there were times that we had to separate to different areas for our individual targets. Their voices echoed back to me as they ran toward me. Relief poured through me when we put our backs to each other, looking around for the unseen threat.
A screech tore through the air, and my head snapped up as Ariel landed near us, staggering. The wing on her left side was stained crimson at the tips. The injury must be on her back. We had to get her to a healer.
“Run for cover!” she yelled at us, eyes wide with fear. “Get to the coliseum doors that lead beneath the arena!”
I struggled to understand her words as a haze of panic tried to set in, and my heart raced as I asked, “What—”
I was quickly cut off by the sound of another screech that was soon followed by dozens more. My blood ran cold at the sight of the creatures I could now see swirling in the air above us.
With the torsos and head of a woman but the talons, wings, and tail of a bird, there was no mistaking what we were about to fight. Harpies.
Holy shit. Harpies were real here. I ground my teeth together–of course they were real here.
Trepidation filled me as the haripes grouped up into a massive ball, like a flock of birds, and dove toward us. Their piercing cries made me want to cover my ears and fall on the ground until it stopped.
Ariel turned, shielding us from sight with her wings as she screamed at us, “Run! I will hold them off.”
I could now see that one of her wings was bleeding profusely from where it attached to her shoulder blade, and deep gouge marks were raked from the back of her neck down to the bottom of her left ribs. Yet she still stood firm, even with the knowledge that she would have to fight off dozens of these harpies so we could run.
I let my true power unfurl within me as the creatures got closer. I felt my hair lifting around me as goosebumps ran along my arms.
“No, we’re fighting by your side. We will not leave you.”
I didn’t have to ask my monsters if they were okay with this, because I knew this was a front we would always be unified on. We would never turn our back on an ally, no matter how dire the situation. If we did, we were no better than the evil in the world, looking out only for their own selfish intentions.
She glowered at us over her shoulder and spat, “You are being foolish! Do not sacrifice yourself here. I can’t portal you back to Zurie’s because they’ll follow our scent there.”
I averted my gaze from her, keeping an eye on the distance between us and our enemies in the air. “I’m sorry, Ariel, but when it comes to this, we will not bow to your instructions.”
Glancing at my mates, they each gave me a nod, confirming my thoughts.
“We’reallgetting out of here alive,” Kylo growled out.
Elwin began to let arrows fly at the same time that I spread out from them. I need enough space to swing my kunai to have enough speed and force to fling them into the sky at our oncoming enemies.
“Aim for the soft spot beneath their collarbone on the left side!” Ariel cried out, and I adjusted my aim. “Their skin is as hard as armor everywhere except that one spot.”
Lovely. Semi-indestructible harpies. Just what I had on my bucket list of sights to see during our trip to Divinus.
