I didn’t have the chance to finish my question.
“Protect the rani!” Thevan’s voice rang out.
Parushi materialized at my side in a heartbeat as Thevan charged forward on our right, weaving his horse through the woods with his sword drawn.
Beyond him, I saw what made him yell, and it took all my control not to scream. Slicing through the trees, with its silvery scales catching the light from our torches, was a Porcugi. Now that the monster realized it’d been seen, it made no attempt to be silent, and it thrashed through the woods, crushing everything in its path. It was weaponless, but that hardly seemed to matter as its horrifying smile exposed its long fangs.
“Spirits help us,” Nallini whispered.
“Damn the Spirits,” Parushi said, ignoring Nallini’s shocked gasp. “Trust our arrows.”
She unslung her bow from her back and unleashed arrow upon arrow toward the monster. One of them landed, and the Porcugi screamed. Parushi let loose a hair-raising battle cry as she charged toward the Porcugi.
“Keep her safe!” she called back to Nallini and Tara as she wove through the brush, shooting as she rode.
Tara came beside me, looking utterly ridiculous as she held a sword aloft.
“Give that to me!” I commanded.
“Your job is to hide, not to fight.” She tried to snatch my torch, but I held it beyond her reach.
“Look out!” Nallini yelled as she lunged toward Sima’s face.
Sima leaped aside, and I flung myself onto his neck, holding on for dear life with the arm that wasn’t gripping the torch as we sprinted away.
Behind me, someone screamed. I thought it was Nallini, but I couldn’t be sure. I whirled around to see another Porcugi rearing up in front of Tara, who stood above Nallini protectively. Nallini lay on the ground, curled up and unmoving.
The tip of Tara’s sword trembled as she held it aloft. She’d kept her torch in her right hand?—her dominant hand?—and her left could hardly support the long, heavy blade. The Porcugi seemed to sense her weakness. It pulled itself up and opened its mouth, letting its fangs slowly unhinge. They shone in the flickering light.
I turned Sima and encouraged him back, but there was no way we’d make it to them before the Porcugi struck. Keeping my torch aloft, I felt for my dagger, but my hand only grasped air above its sheath. It must have fallen out in the chaos, which left me with nothing.
Nothing but the torch.
Sima whinnied as he broke through to the road again, putting the Porcugi in clear sight. Distracted by the sound, the monster swiveled to face me. Sima leaped toward the Porcugi at my command, a true warhorse through and through.
The Porcugi’s eyes widened as we approached, but instead of coming to attack us, it turned back to Tara and Nallini.
“No!” I screamed.
I flung my torch toward the Porcugi with all my might. It looked like a blazing arrow of fire, and the flying light caught the monster’s attention. The Porcugi swiveled to face me just in time to be hit squarely in its chest.
It let out a scream that echoed through my bones as it fell to the ground, its arms and tail twitching as its cry bounced through the woods. It tried to lift its hooded head as I thundered to Tara’s side, but it fell back down and screamed again. The sound made my stomach clench?—their screams reminded me so much of ours.
As soon as I was close enough, Tara handed me the torch she was carrying and then lit another. “Stay back, Rani.”
She sprinted toward the fallen Porcugi with far more agility than I would have expected for a woman her age. Tara approached from the tail side of the monster and then drove the torch into the Porcugi’s preexisting wound with surgical precision. The Porcugi stopped moving, but I wasn’t going to take any chances. I slipped off Sima’s back, went to Tara’s side, and took the sword from her before she could protest.
Smoke billowed up from the wound on the Porcugi’s chest. A circle of scales had been melted off, and the spiraling smoke made the air around us taste burnt. Without hesitating, I drove my sword into the center of the wound, and the Porcugi was completely still as the blade sunk deep into its charred flesh.
“Save this one.” I handed the burning torch to Tara, and I grabbed two more from the bag that had fallen from Nallini’s horse. “We need it to light the rest. Go take care of Nallini?—she needs a healer.”
I didn’t let her argue. I lit the torches and made my way toward the other Porcugi who was still battling with Parushi and Thevan. Parushi had dismounted, and she darted from tree to tree, loosing arrows as she sprinted from one to the next. The Porcugi tried desperately to keep up with her, twisting this way and that, but it was hard for it to maneuver in such a tight space.
As I prepared to fling a torch at the Porcugi, Thevan emerged from behind a tree opposite Parushi and sneaked behind the monster, keeping silent as Parushi taunted the creature to keep its attention. He took a mighty swing at its back with his huge sword.
A clang echoed through the woods. Just as Thevan had taken his swing, the Porcugi had darted toward Parushi, so Thevan’s blade had contacted the thicker scales of its lower back and tail.
Parushi rolled out of the way, and the Porcugi twisted to see Thevan standing nearby. The monster sent Thevan flying with a flick of his tail. He landed with a crunch, and I could only hope that it was just the branches breaking beneath him. As the Porcugi turned back to Parushi, it caught sight of me, standing there like an idiot with two blazing torches held aloft.
