But before she could fully comprehend the awful sight before her, the angry Kriver reared up on its hind legs. Its swirling tentacles were still screaming and writhing—they flung droplets of the trainer’s blood and gobbets of his flesh into the crowd. The gore even reached the Empress’s table—Kaitlyn felt something warm and slimy splash against her chest and run down between her breasts.
Looking down, she saw with horror that it was a piece of bloody blue flesh, leaving a slippery trail over her skin.
“Ugh!” she gasped. Reaching into her cleavage, she snagged the piece of flesh with her fingernails and flung it away. But she was so distracted by the gory task that she didn’t realize what was happening.
The lights had stopped flashing, but the Kriver was still enraged. She bounded away from the bloody jumble of bones that was all that remained of her trainer and headed right for the dais where the Empress’s table sat.
The Kriver bounded once, twice—covering the distance between the blood-soaked stage and the dais in terrifying, ground-shaking leaps. Its single amber eye was fixed, not on the Empress, but on the source of the sudden movement—on Kaitlyn, flinging the bit of flesh from her chest.
At last Kaitlyn looked up and her stomach seized into a fist-sized piece of ice. Cold clarity sliced through the last of the cinnamon wine haze.
Me—it’s coming for me!
Screams erupted from the tables below as a wave of panicked women in silken gowns and elaborate headdresses hastened to disengage themselves from their husbands and scrambled back from the huge, U-shaped table configuration. Chairs overturned, plates shattered and wine spilled everywhere.
But on the dais, there was a frozen, horrified silence.
The Empress stared, her mouth a perfect ‘O’ of outrage. Aria had somehow managed to twist all the way around in her husband’s lap and had buried her face in Dinky’s neck, squealing. The guards at the periphery stood like ornate statues, staring stupidly at the Kriver, their ceremonial spears useless in their stunned hands.
Kaitlyn wanted to do something—anything—but her brain seemed to have short-circuited, getting stuck somewhere between run and freeze. She felt as trapped as the insects in the vast amber doors as the Kriver raced towards her.
The beast landed at the base of the dais with a thud that vibrated up through the stone and right into her bones. It reared again, towering over them, blotting out the light.
Up close, it was worse than she could have imagined. She could smell its breath—hot and rancid—like spoiled meat and rotting garbage. She could see the individual rotating teeth in each snapping beak-mouth, all flecked with blue gore. The muscular tentacles whipped forward, aiming right at her.
Abruptly, Braze erupted into motion beneath her.
A hard shove between her shoulder blades sent her pitching sideways off the big Kindred’s lap. She hit the cold stone floor of the dais shoulder-first, a jolt of pain shooting down her arm. The breath left her lungs in a startled “Oof!”
She rolled onto her back, dazed, just in time to see Braze go into action.
He didn’t just get up—her Protector uncoiled. One second he was a tense, seated statue—the next he was a blur of tan skin and corded muscle launching himself from the chair. But he didn’t go toward the beast—he went along the dais, running full-tilt toward the petrified guard standing at the far end.
The Kriver saw the movement and screamed—a sound that felt like needles in Kaitlyn’s ears. One tentacle, faster than a striking snake, lashed out at Braze’s retreating back. It missed by inches, the beak snapping shut on empty air with a sound like cracking bone.
Braze reached the guard, but he didn’t yell or gesture. Instead, his hand shot out, grabbed the shaft of the man’s ornate spear, and yanked it free. The guard stumbled backward, finally waking up, his face as pale as milk.
Time—which had been dragging for Kaitlyn as she watched the big Beast Kindred in motion—suddenly snapped into hyper-speed.
Braze raced back, planting his feet wide on the edge of the dais, putting himself between the beast and Kaitlyn. He held the spear low and ready—not like a parade-ground soldier—but like a hunter who knew how to kill.
It flashed through Kaitlyn’s mind that he was from Rageron—a planet with a vast jungle filled with monstrous beasts. This was Braze in his element—rugged and deadly. He had the polished metal point of the spear aimed straight at the Kriver’s massive, glowing eye and looked ready to use it.
“Come on, you fucker!” she heard him growl. “No one threatens my Mistress!”
The beast charged. It wasn’t a bound—it was a full, murderous gallop straight up the shallow steps of the dais. It screamed as it came—all of the hungry mouths at the ends of its tentacles screeching in unearthly discord at the same time.
Kaitlyn scrambled backward on her hands and heels, her dress tearing on the rough stone. Her heart was pounding and part of her wanted to hide her eyes, the way Aria was doing, pressing her face to Dinky’s neck. But she couldn’t look away.
The Kriver reared up, blotting out everything. Then its tentacles rained down. One whistled toward Braze’s head. He ducked, and Kaitlyn heard the snap of the beak right where his ear had been.
Another shot for his legs. He sidestepped—the movement so fluid it was like watching water flow around a rock.
Then he struck.
He didn’t throw the spear. He braced it and shoved as the Kriver’s own weight came crashing down against him.
The point hit the shimmering black fur just below the nest of tentacles around the single Cyclopean eye. There was a horrible, wet thunk—a sound like punching through leather and meat—and the Kriver’s shriek of rage turned into a gurgling scream of agony. Dark, purplish blood jetted from the wound, spraying across the stone and across Braze’s chest and face.
