Still gripping her scissors, she shuffled stiffly away from the treeline. One shaking hand rested on the handle of the door. She had to say something, make some noise to alert the animal to a friendly presence.
Her throat was almost too tight to make any sound, but she forced herself to speak. “Hello?”
It came out as barely a whisper, the syllables of the word nearly swept away by the breeze curling through the bony, watchful trees, but the creature must’ve heard her. There was a pause, followed by a low, menacing rumble. It sounded like some great engine roaring to life just beyond the door. Like every souped-up, nut-dangling, chrome-finished truck she’d ever had the misfortune of laying eyes on had melted together to have a monstrous metal baby in her barn.
It couldn’t have been an animal. It just couldn’t. It was unlike anything she’d ever heard before, and soloud?—
Alashiya nearly stumbled back a step, but her fingers remained reflexively hooked around the handle, stopping herretreat. She couldn’t pry her fingers away. Her arm was locked there, like it was drawn to the door by some invisible force.
The strangest feeling hooked its claws into her. It was a pull behind her breastbone, the faintest tug as all her blood rushed away from her head at once. It was that same force that held her arm captive, and now it sought to pull the rest of her toward the door. Her senses tingled with staticky awareness.
Whatever was beyond that door knotted a thread around her beating heart andyanked.
The boards that made up the door were in fairly good shape, considering their neglect, but time and the seasons had warped them enough that there were gaps between several. She peered into the largest one, but despite the hole in the roof, there was even less light inside the barn than outside. While she stared, desperate to discover what she was dealing with, the terrible warning growl grew louder and louder.
Figuring she was already in for a pound, Alashiya stuttered, “Ca—can you speak? Are you injured?”
The growl died away. For several seconds, the world went quiet. Shaking from head to toe, she dared to lean closer to the door, her head angled to look through the widest gap.
She saw nothing but darkness. It was an all-encompassing blackness that appeared, after a moment of inspection, strange. The fine hair had just lifted off the back of her neck when a violet eye the size of a dinner plate appeared an inch from the door. It was an almost unnatural color, so vibrant that it seemed to appear from some other world. It was the most purple thing she’d ever seen. It glowed beneath a pitch black lid, and its sinister expanse was broken by an almond-shaped pupil narrowed to a quivering, hair-thin line.
Chapter Two
Alashiya didn’t scream.She didn’t have the breath for it. Air escaped her in a nearly silent, high-pitched rush as she stumbled away from the door. Her foot slid in the dusty earth, sending her crashing to the ground. The pitiful amount of protection offered by her scissors vanished when her cramped fingers lost their grip. They sailed out of her hand and into the overgrown grass.
She swore she could feel the breath of the beast as it puffed through the gaps in the door. There was an almighty crash as it burst open, its rusty hinges protesting vehemently. Alashiya scrambled backward on her hands, the grit and scraggly vegetation biting cruelly into the skin of her palms, as the beast thrust its head and upper body through the doorway.
Disbelief held her in place. Even with its coloring, she didn’t need her flashlight to see what she was dealing with. The beast came with its own light — the lick of blue flame behind its razor-sharp teeth.
The glow illuminated the massive shape of its head, crowned with four towering horns, as it advanced on her. The flicker danced over monstrous features unlike anything she’d ever seen in person.
Survival instincts finally kicked in. Alashiya twisted until she could scramble on her hands and knees. Behind her, timber crashed to the floor of the barn. That deep, thrumming growl picked up again. It was so much worse up close.
She swore she could feel its steps shaking the ground around her as she frantically searched the grass for her scissors. It was a miracle that her clumsy fingers closed around them just as a massive talon landed beside her. If she was going to die a stupid death, then she was determined to go down with her stupid weapon in hand.
She nearly made it onto her knees, but slipped again and landed hard on a stone. Pain lanced up her leg. She was forced to ignore it. A bruise wouldn’t matter if she died, and itreallywouldn’t if she somehow managed to survive.
The beast’s breath puffed against her back, each gust of air shockingly warm. It was close. So close. There would be no standing, let alone running away, with it hovering over her.
Alashiya’s mind shut down to everything except the blind need to survive. She twisted back around, using the momentum of her movement to her advantage as her arm swung in a wide arc toward the beast’s head.
There was a silver flash as the blades skimmed the flesh just above one glowing violet eye. A strange sound erupted from its throat when her scissors glanced off its leathery hide.
It reared back, its terrible mouth opened wide in offense. Alashiya took her chance. Surging to her feet, she stumbled once before she shot off toward the treeline. That tug in her chest was stronger, pulling harder in the direction of the beast, but nothing could override the will to live.
The pain in her left leg was intense, but she couldn’t afford to limp. She didn’t have a direction in mind. There was no use. She certainly couldn’t direct the beast toward the Thompsons’ farm, and there’d be no help in town even if she could get that far.
So she simply ran, the scissors somehow still in her hand, andprayed to any gods listening that the beast would be too big to make it through the narrow gaps between trees.
It was an optimistic thought.Toooptimistic.
She barely made it to the trees before she was knocked down again. The massive head struck her from the side. It sent her careening into a dense patch of wild grasses, one that disguised an old water trough she kept full in the summer for her animal visitors.
Alashiya landed hard against it. Her head glanced off the ground and the air squeezed out of her chest. Stars exploded in front of her eyes. Her lungs refused to inflate. For a moment, she was certain she would suffocate there in the grass, head split open and useless scissors in hand.
An eye swung into view again. Anger at herself, at the beast who’d invaded her sanctuary, at the gods for letting something like this happen to heragain,saw her swinging blindly once more.
Whatever advantage surprise had given her before was lost now. The beast didn’t even bother moving its head away from her slashes, but merely tilted it so the blades skimmed uselessly over its flesh. Furious tears blurred her vision, but she continued her assault until its jaws, nearly large enough to swallow her whole, lowered enough that she could see clearly into its gaping maw. Pale blue fire boiled in its gullet and danced across its huge pink tongue.
