The ward flashed again and I gripped my handgun. No one came through. Nothing changed. Weird. I wondered if the ward was set to flash periodically.
To my side, Tex blinked. The skinned vamp took a breath. Let it out. That was too much movement for my peace of mind, what with the Flayer here. I managed to get across the cave, where I staked him low in the belly. He dropped like a marionette in inept hands. My friend was still alive-ish but paralyzed, and I’d not have to kill him true-dead. Hopefully he was also out of pain. I staked the female vamp too, giving me a safety net of time. Shoulda done that right away.
Okay. That was an improvement in the no-plan problem. I was getting there.
I walked to the witch and knelt in front of her. She was young, too young. Maybe fifteen. There were clasps on the silver cuffs and headband, and when I touched the handcuffs, a shaft of pain cut through me. I jerked back. Null cuffs. Great. This was gonna hurt. Steeling myself, I unclasped the headband and the cuffs. Tucked them into my gobag. Slowly she took a breath and her eyes fluttered open. She focused on me. She flinched.
“I’m Jane Yellowrock.” I paused, and added, wryly, “The Dark Queen of the vampires. My friends are the Everhart witch clan. Do you understand me?”
She gave an abbreviated nod and shuddered.
“Who are you?”
“Stacey Shooker,” she whispered.
Shooker. Of the Asheville Shooker Witch Clan.Crap.So much for their reassurances that everything was okay with them. They had lied in the hope that their teenaged witchling might survive contact with the Flayer of Mithrans. Someone needed an education in when to tell the truth and ask for help.
Stacey licked her cracked lips and looked around, her eyes darting. “Where is he?”
“Dismembered. Part of him is out in the gorge. The rest is a mess in the back. I suggest you don’t look.”
“Oh god. Oh god oh god oh god.” A tortured laughter rose in her throat and then choked off. Her breath made little flapping sounds. “Don’t look? I’ve seen shit this week. I don’t think you can shock me.”
“I get that. Still.” I handed her a stick of jerky. “I don’t have any water.”
“Better than nothing. Thanks.” Stacey looked around the cave again as she tore open the jerky, staring at the broken walls and the circle on the floor. “You got the kid out of the circle. Good. But how are we all getting out of here?”
Annnnd we were back to the no-plan part. “Working on that. Besides you, how many witches does he have?”
“Just me.”
The ward flashed again, and this time something bright, like glowing charcoal, shifted across the back of the cave. I had seen that before, or something like it. “Has the ward been flashing?”
“No. I never saw it do that.”
I made it to my feet and went to the back of the cave, to the Flayer. His exoskeleton was solid, smooth, as if I had never busted it open. And... it had arms, which I had tossed out of the cave. That meant that the flashes were to a purpose, likely the result of the arms getting back inside. But how? Unless the horror movies had it right all along and they crawled back without a brain and nerves and muscles being attached to one another.
Huffing through the pain, I picked up a pointed, sharp-edged boulder and brought it down with all mymight onto the chest exoskeleton. The rock punctured through and I left it in the hole. I pulled the vamp-killer and brought it down on the Flayer’s fingers, separating them and carrying them to the fire. I tossed them in and watched them burn, a sizzling fast smell of scorched... scorched something. Not really meat. I had no idea what scorched insect smelled like. The scent made me want to hurl. I tossed the arm back out of the cave.
“We have to go,” I said to the girl. She was short and not in shape. I’d be lucky if she could keep up, even with a sick me carrying EJ. Who took after his dad. Not a tiny four-year-old-ish kid. “Can you drop the cave shield?”
“It’s mine, so, yeah.”
I looked back at Shimon’s body. A stub was growing at the neck stump and the rock was being pushed out of the torso from the inside. Something dark gray flew across the back cave wall. “Get to it. And hurry. I got a bad feeling.”
I made it to EJ and fell to my knees, the pain growing, and I nearly passed out as I tied the velvet cape around him to keep him warm and struggled to get him over my shoulder. I didn’t make it and he lay on my lap, limbs splayed.
“Shield’s down. And no offense, but you look like shit. Like you’re gonna die any second,” Stacey said, from my side.
“Pretty much,” I huffed, breathless from even that much exertion. “Cancer. Can you carry him?”
“Yeah.” Stacey got EJ up and over her shoulder, grunting with the effort. She clearly wasn’t accustomed to being hungry, thirsty, or carrying a stout, heavy kid.
At the entrance, we looked down a good fifteen feet to the floor of the crevice. It was covered with shattered rock and debris that had fallen from the cave and from overhead. I had no rope. No way could I get down and then catch either of my charges.Beast. You gotta give me half-form.I looked back over my shoulder. The head of the Flayer of Mithrans was no longer where I had placed it. The charcoal shadow moved across the back wall.Fast.Red eyes caught the firelight.
“Holy crap,” I whispered, understanding at last. Kicking off my shoes, I demanded to Beast, “Shift!”
“What?” Stacey said.
