Page 104 of Her Blood Revenge

Fucker.

I’m full of Pixie’s blood and in no mood to fuck about with a child-killing shit like this.

I bite his neck, taking in a mouthful of his blood.

It’s vile, and it takes all I have to swallow without gagging.

I walk his dreams. I know I need to be quick. He won’t stay down for long, and I’m vulnerable when I walk. Butthere’s no faster way to see into his mind and get the answers I need.

He’s sat at a large table. Severed limbs lie on plates as if a great banquet has been prepared. A banquet a monster like him would relish.

No. He doesn’t get to dream. He gets to scream.

The limbs roll across the table, and all join together, reforming into the infants they once were. And they swarm Sathick, bundling on top of him as they tear and rip with their teeth. I leave him to be devoured by his victims and go in search of his other dreams. Walking is a dangerous and, at times, a difficult gift. The mind is an endless vortex of hopes, wishes, fears, thoughts and dreams. But once made, every one of those things is never lost. I can navigate the mind. A skill honed over decades of practice.

I manage a couple of minutes before I know I’m no longer alone in the outside world. Something has entered the room.

Blinking, I return to the mortal world and roll out of the way of a swarm of fire pixies that fly straight at me.

Fucking pixies.

They all attack, scratching and clawing at me. They spit molten saliva, which burns through my clothes and chars my flesh. They’re small and quick, making them tricky to get a grip of and their screeches and laughing are torture, reaching a pitch so high it makes my ears bleed.

I grab one in my hand and crush it. I stomp on another close to the floor. Another prepares to throw its lava-like spit right in my face, but I dodge it and punch it so hard the thingexplodes.

Then, a hand wraps around the back of my neck, and I’m tossed clear across the room, slamming into the old fireplace. I grip the fire poker left in its holder and spin, slamming it into Sathick’s face, being sure to catch him in his grotesque mouth. Bloody teeth skitter across the floor as he roars in a fiery rage.

I can’t help but laugh as I stand and happily use the poker to take out as many fire pixie fucks as I can.

Sathick kicks me in the gut, and I crash through the same broken window Archie fled through, landing outside. I wait for the monster to follow.

But he doesn’t.

There’s an explosion, and a plume of black smoke rises into the air. The screaming starts. The coven is under attack by the fire. I have to make a choice. Stay and fight Sathick, or go and face Neve. When I hear Archie’s roar, I’m on my feet and running towards the coven.

Archie. I choose him.

I emerge through the treeline and skid to a stop in their sacred clearing. The fire is burning black and wild, and dozens of creatures are attacking the robed witches. They reach up from the ground or dive from above.

Unseelie. So so many unseelie.

A gathered force. An army.

The earth witches are slow and untrained. They’re a far cry from when these creatures last walked so freely. But the elders manage to use their magic to attack and defend.

Half of these witches have no idea how to use their gifts, and the other half are overfed politicians with a title and not much else.

Some of them have gathered together and knelt in the dirt. A small wave of mud sweeps towards the flames.

It’s a pathetic attempt, not a patch on what my Pixie did all alone.

I attack, using my sword and sleep dust. Archie is hacking and tearing his way through the unseelie. We fight. We kill.

But I don’t see Neve.

Archie stops beside me, breathing heavily and clutching his side. Ahead of us, the unseelie are gathering. At my back, the earth witches have re-grouped.

Us. Against them.

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