Page 24 of Vicious Is My Throne

So many years spent alone, cut off from humanity, no more of my kind in existence. But now I had Anaria. My eyes drifted to the torch Raziel held above his head, the line of people stretching between that light and myself.

We had each other. We were a family.

I smiled grimly. I’d been too young to protect my last family. Had hidden while they died around me. Had allowed a monster to take away everything I was, then served at his feet like a fucking dog. I let out a shuddering sigh.

And somewhere in the darkness behind me, the shadows sighed back.

My knives were in my hands a second later when I whirled to face whatever came charging out of that dark abyss, and for a moment, I debated shifting into my wyvern. But the tunnel was narrow and there’d be no maneuvering his bulky body in an area this tight.

“Tristan.” Anaria’s hand closed on my upper arm, her voice barely a whisper. “Did I hear what I thought I heard?”

“Stay behind me,” I warned, thighs burning as I dropped into a crouch, knees bent, ready to launch myself forward. Fabric rustled behind me as Anaria slipped off her iron bands, magic filling the air with power, my eardrums hollowing out.

“If they’re one of Corvus’s horrid creations, your knives won’t do any good. But magic will,” she said quietly. “We need light, Tristan. I don’t suppose you can manage a bit of light?”

“Only if you stay behind me,” I warned her again, praying she’d actually listen. Then I sheathed my knife and flung out my hand, casting a ball of fire down the tunnel behind us.

Shadows scattered apart, Reapers or some other fuckery, I didn’t know, but before the fire burned out, a set of eyes glowed.

A gaping mouth filled with teeth.

“Run,” I shouted, casting another fireball before I yanked out my second knife and raced behind that speeding light.

Anaria screamed my name with such terror I stumbled, then fire exploded in a shower of sparks, embers clinging to the creature, outlining its face in a corona of glowing orange.

Night Crawler.

I thrust up with both blades and they skated harmlessly off an impenetrable shell before I dodged to the side, narrowly evading two enormous, knife-like talons driving downward, sinking into the tunnel floor with an impact that sent cracks rippling up through the rock around us.

Now that the thing was stuck, armored body bashing against the sides of the tunnel as it tried to work its leg free, I used the opening to slice an arc through its throat, splattering black blood across the dusty floor.

Pincers nearly severed my nose, and behind those were rows of chattering teeth, sharp enough to shred flesh from bone.

“Not today, you walking cow pie.”

I found my footing the same time the Night Crawler did, as it scuttled from one side of the tunnel to the other, tiny beady eyes on my knife.

“Tristan. Get out of the way.”

Anaria was too close behind me, Zor and Raz shouting something I couldn’t take the time to understand as I was too busy measuring every incremental shift of the creature as I herded it back down the tunnel, one step at a time, dodging every swipe of that single talon, as sharp as any sword.

One stumble and I’d lose my head.

“Get back, Anaria. Let me deal with this thing.”

“Stop being an arse, Tristan. You can’t kill that thing with a knife.”

“Bet me,” I growled, taking another step within range of the creature, ignoring Anaria’s hissed curse. “And a knife isn’t the only weapon I have.” The fire I sent at point-blank range into the Night Crawler’s face was hot enough to melt iron.

The kind of shredding heat that only existed in the heart of mountains.

Or inside a pissed-off wyvern protecting the only thing that mattered.

Anaria gagged as the creature melted, turning into a pile of gelatinous black, legs collapsing from the weight of the shell, insides spilling out in a flood of mind-numbing foulness.

“Holy shite, you do look like a cow pie.”

A hand twisted into my cloak and yanked me backward, away from the steaming, stinking pile of…whatever the fuck that was.

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