Page 17 of The Iron Vow

Bony claws crushed the ground beneath it as the Nightmare regained its balance, rising up once more. It was now nothing more than a bulging sack with limbs and a tail, but the front of the sack turned toward us, severed spine poking through the top, and lunged.

“Okay, so strike ‘remove head from body’ off the list,” Puck yelped as we scattered. The Nightmare followed us, slashing and raking wildly with its claws, seemingly enraged now that its head was gone. Puck danced around it, just barely avoiding the talons slashing inches from his head and face. “And I don’t see anything that looks like a heart on the outside. I guess we’re going to have to cut this thing open and see what the squishy inside is made of.”

Keirran grimaced. “I don’t think it’s going to be anything pleasant.”

He and Puck darted toward its middle, but the Nightmare leaped back, twisting its body out of reach. “Oh ho, I don’t think the kitty wants us to pat its tummy.” Puck grinned evilly as he circled around. “What’s the matter, cat? Is the kitty ticklish?”

The Nightmare backed up, the front of the bag swinging from side to side, as if trying to keep an eye on all of us at once. Ash lunged forward, and the Nightmare spun toward him, lashing out with both claws. The talons screeched off the raised ice blade, and Ash drew back from the assault. But the Nightmare’s right flank was fully exposed now, giving Puck the chance to dart forward and bring his daggers slicing across the bulging, wriggling sack.

A spray of clear liquid burst from the gash, arcing into the air, and Puck leaped back with a yell. Clapping a hand to his arm, he staggered away, jaw clenched in pain, making my stomach drop.

“Puck!”

We rushed to his side. The Nightmare was backing away, shaking and swinging its “head” wildly. Spatters of that clear liquid hit the ground, and where they did, the mud instantly bubbled and steamed. Puck slumped against a tree, gritting his teeth, one hand still cradling his arm. Steam writhed between his fingers, and the air around him smelled of decay and rot.

“Son of a bitch,” he gritted out, and carefully pulled his hand away. The sleeve of his hoodie had been seared away, the edges blackened as if burned, or melted, and the skin beneath was a stark, angry red. “That kitty has some really nasty acid reflux.”

Ash handed him the dagger he’d dropped. “Can you still fight?”

Puck winced. “Yep,” he wheezed. “Though I’m not looking forward to slicing that thing open again. Really missing those daggers you can throw around, ice-boy.”

Ash’s face tightened, and he gazed at the Nightmare, still raging at the edge of the lake. “I don’t have much glamour left,” he muttered, raising his arm. “But I’ll try.”

“Ash, no.” I pulled his arm down. “Conserve what you have,” I told him. “You might need it later to heal. Or to save your life.” His gaze was solemn as it met mine, but he dropped his arm and nodded. I took a breath and looked at the Nightmare. “We have to cut it open,” I said, feeling the others’ eyes on me as I raised my sword. “We’ll just have to be really careful.”

The Nightmare turned toward us. Bile or acid or whatever it was dripped from the gash in its side and ran from the front of the bag, making the ground steam below it. The sack was writhing feverishly, as if the cut to the fabric had incensed or made frantic whatever was inside. It stalked forward, and we tensed as it loomed closer, the smell of death and rot nearly choking us.

The monster gathered itself to lunge, and a pair of spinning crescents made of moonlight flashed through the air like shooting stars. They struck the Nightmare in the side, tearing through the thick canvas and continuing out the other side in a spray of clear fluid. The monster staggered, making heaving motions as if it was about to vomit, and the gash in the fabric widened.

Nyx dropped into view, seeming to appear from nowhere and making Puck start. “There you are,” he breathed as she strode to his side, her golden eyes shadowed with concern. “Perfect timing as usual. What would it take for me to have my daggers just poof into my hands whenever I need them?”

The assassin’s slender fingers gently touched his arm, her gaze probing. “Join the Order and spend the next two hundred years learning lunar magic,” she replied absently. “And then survive initiation where your entire Order hunts you down through the night. If you live through that, you’ll receive your bond blades. If not, you weren’t skilled enough to join the Order in the first place.”

“Oh,” Puck said, and from his tone, he obviously hadn’t expected an answer. “Is that all?”

“Everyone.” Keirran’s voice was a warning. He was staring at the still-heaving Nightmare, watching the tear in the side get wider and wider. The smell of death, decay and rotting flesh intensified, making my stomach churn. “I think it’s about to get worse.”

With a tearing, ripping sound, the burlap bag split open, andthingsspilled forth into the mud and grass. Cats. Dozens of them, maybe hundreds, the bodies making wet splats as they slid onto the ground like fish. Their fur was drenched and slick, plastered to their bodies, their eyes bulging and white.

“Oh,” Puck said, sounding sick and breathless at the same time. “Drowned cats. Lots of drowned cats, and they’re looking at us. You were right, princeling. This is far, far worse than the Nightmare.”

The growing pile of wet, squirming cats broke apart. Staggering and clawing themselves to their feet, they gazed at us with frenzied eyes, then rushed forward with eerie screams and yowls. The wave of reeking bodies leaped up and crashed down on us, their shrieks ringing in our ears.

I slashed several from the air, seeing everyone else do the same, and dead cats rained down around us. But there were hundreds of them, coming from every direction. Furry bodies landed on me, wet and disgusting, sinking sharp claws and teeth into my skin. Being bitten by a cat is not fun; being bitten by a half dozen reeking of wet fur and decay was nightmare-inducing. Claws raked at me, and my eyes stung from the stench. It was hard to breathe through the noxious cloud surrounding us.

Around me, I saw the others striking down cats by the handful, Ash wading to my side so that we stood together against the throng. But there were always more. Dozens of dead cats flinging themselves at us, screaming and wailing. If we’d been in the Nevernever, a few pulses of lightning, ice, and Summer glamour from the four of us would’ve cleared out the horde in seconds. But there was no magic to draw on in Evenfall, and our reserves were very low. The last time we had been in Faery, we had stood against a literal army of enemies, and I had used the last of my magic to seal the way to Evenfall so the Nightmares could not pour through into the Nevernever. We had already been exhausted, our glamour nearly drained, before we had even set foot in this nightmare realm.

“Ugh, they just keep coming,” Puck said, smacking a cat out of the air with the back of his arm. A mangy yellow creature landed on his back, half its fur fallen out, and sank its teeth into his neck, making him yelp. “Ow! No, bad kitty!” he yelled, wrenching the cat away by the scruff and flinging it back into the horde. “No touchie!”

“What is controlling them?” Ash wondered, blocking a cat leaping at my face with his sword. The feline slid down the blade and latched onto his wrist, biting and clawing, and he flung it away. “This was one creature. Usually there’s a single power that controls them all like Meghan said. The heart or brain or core of everything.”

“Unless Evenfall Nightmares don’t play by the same rules,” Puck added. “If they don’t, I’m going to be annoyed. No one likes cheaters, especially unstoppable undead ones.”

The cats were getting more numerous and more aggressive, clawing each other out of the way to get to us. Their screams and wails rang in my ears, and both dead and undead felines piled up near our feet. Blood from numerous gashes and puncture wounds ran down my skin, seeping into my clothes.

And then, through the swarm of shrieking, raging cats, I saw a lone feline sitting where the giant skull had fallen. It was shaggy and gray, with a raggedly bushy tail and a single golden eye, staring at us balefully. For one horrific, sickening moment, I thought it was Grimalkin. That somehow, something had finally gotten to our disappearing furry guide, and he had become part of this Nightmare.

No. That can’t be Grim. I won’t believe it.

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