“I suppose I should thank you for bringing the child right to me.”
“Fuck you,” Kinzer said, struggling against Craetis's grip. Craetis squeezed Kinzer’s biceps. The grip burned against his muscles. Kinzer took it as a warning not to try it again.
“Don't be upset,” Veylo said. “We were bound to find you sooner or later.” He turned to Deter. “Did you bring their swords with you, like I asked?”
Deter motioned to two swords, laying on the ground behind him.
“What are you up to?” Kinzer asked. “Why don't you just kill us?”
“Oh, I will,” Veylo assured him. “But you know me. I'm all about theatrics. Which is why I'd rather not blow my wad. You see, I've been working on a little project that I'd like you to test out for me. It's a very special project that I'm hoping you and Dedrus will be able to appreciate.”
He reached into his pocket and pulled out a long, aluminum cylinder. He pressed his lips against the end of it and blew.
A high-pitched sound stung at Kinzer’s ears. Dedrus groaned.
What is Veylo up to?Kinzer thought.
There was a sadistic gleam in Veylo’s eyes.
STOMP! STOMP!
Tremors ravaged the concrete floor, shaking the support beams.
A ripping sound came from the side of the garage.
A green tentacle punctured through the wall. Another punctured just a few feet from it. And then another.
“No fucking way,” Dedrus said.
Kinzer gasped.
The tentacles flailed about, tearing through the wall, creating a dust-filled cloud.
A chunk of the wall pushed forward, breaking open like a baby chick pushing its way through its shell.
SMASH!
Chunks of wall collapsed onto the floor, and an orb slid through the fresh hole.
It was a Morarke. There was nothing else it could have been.
As its tentacles squirmed across the garage floor, as if feeling before it, a giant, rhinoceros-sized foot slipped through the hole. Another foot was right behind it.
Its flesh was green, laced with gray from the wall debris. Its dome-shaped head had two holes. Its mouth was a gaping crater filled with swirling, razor wire teeth. Just a few feet above that was a slit of an eye. Halfway down its bulky body, eight tentacles swung every which way, feeling before it, as if trying to make sense of its surroundings.
“Fuck!” Dedrus exclaimed.
The floor cracked into webs as the Morarke’s mammoth feet stepped toward Veylo’s assembled meeting.
“Isn’t it beautiful?” Veylo asked.
“If the Almighty or the Leader find out that you have that—” Dedrus began.
“And how will they find out when you’re both dead? Besides, I have this one perfectly under control. Trained him myself. I call him Hoddy. Quite spectacular, isn’t he?”
The Morarke growled. It stopped until it was a few feet before them, its tentacles relaxing, caressing rather than flailing.
Craetis’s fingers shook against Kinzer’s arms. Kinzer knew it was because he was scared as shit. As he should have been.
