Page 22 of The Iron Vow

Stepping back, I looked up and saw several more winged Nightmares descending in a black cloud. As they came toward me, a single crow soared above them, changed into the familiar form of a Winter fey, and dropped straight down through the mass with his ice blade drawn. Feathers and skulls flew outward as Ash cut through three Nightmares on his way down, then landed beside me in a graceful crouch.

“Ash.” Despite the situation and the swarm of approaching Nightmare birds, I gave my husband a mock frown. “I appreciate the timely and very flashy entrance, but I really didn’t need a rescue.”

“I know.” Ash offered a faint smile as he rose. “Force of habit,” he said. “It’s very difficult for me to watch you stand in front of a charging monster without wanting to jump between. Besides...” He glanced up, raising his sword as the rest of the birds came in. “We fight better together than apart. My place will always be at your side, even here in Evenfall.”

A Nightmare bird lunged at me, and Ash’s blade cut it in half before it knew it was dead. Feathers and bird skulls rained down on me, and I winced. “Not the most romantic date I’ve been on,” I said, slashing a pair of birds from the air, avoiding the talons that raked at my face.

Ash snorted. “I’ll try to add a candlelight dinner next time.”

A pair of spinning crescent blades sliced another bird into pieces, and a moment later Keirran vaulted over a crumbling wall and slammed his weapon into a Nightmare stalking in from the side. “Where is Puck?” he asked, almost shouting to be heard over the sound of beating wings. The flock of Nightmare birds was growing larger, as more dropped down from the surrounding ruins. I couldn’t see anything through the swarm of black, withered bodies and flapping wings.

With acawthat echoed even over the Nightmares, a raven swooped down in a streak of black, changed to Puck in an explosion of feathers, and crushed a Nightmare beneath him as he dropped into our midst.

“Ta-da. I’m here.” He swiped at a Nightmare with his dagger, making it recoil with a hiss, and frowned at me. “And, conversely, I am not happy that I am no longer a bird. I like being a bird, and now I can’t be a bird anymore.”

“Stop griping and start killing, Puck,” Ash snapped.

“Fine, ice-boy, but I won’t be happy about that, either.”

The swarm of Nightmares closed in. We stood our ground, guarding each other’s backs as we cut spindly bodies from the air, dodging raking claws and snapping beaks. For a few seconds, minutes, hours, it was complete chaos. I lost myself in the rhythm of battle; slash, stab, parry, dodge, feeling my friends around me do the same. The Nightmare birds were relentless, vicious, seemingly mindless opponents, not caring if their brothers were killed or if they were diving right into a sword point. They kept attacking, and we kept killing them, until the stones at our feet were covered with feathers and bird skulls.

A tremor went through the ground.

Stones rippled under my feet, pebbles bouncing away from us, bird skulls clicking against each other. For a moment, the flock of Nightmares circling us...stopped. Wings beating, they hovered, frozen as if afraid to move.

Ash set his jaw and moved closer to me, silver eyes hard. “Something big is coming,” he muttered.

The earth shuddered again, rocks bounding across the stones to fall into the hole, and with a flurry of feathers and flapping wings, the Nightmares scattered. Like a flock of startled pigeons, they swiftly flew into the air, dispersing in all directions, as something massive rose from the sinkhole. It looked like a cross between a snake and a lamprey, with pinkish-yellow skin and a circular, sucking mouth filled with jagged teeth. Long, thin tentacles covered its entire body, waving wildly around it. Looking closer, I saw hooks and fingers attached to the ends as the tentacles lashed out, snatching a pair of Nightmares from the air. The bird monsters flapped and thrashed wildly as they vanished into the gaping maw, and then the jaws closed with a horrific grinding sound.

Puck blew out a breath. “Okay, I’m kinda glad I didn’t go flying into that hole,” he muttered. “That would’ve been a nasty surprise.”

The worm swallowed, then turned its huge, bloated body toward us. Its jaws opened, showing rows of razor fangs. It let out a high-pitched scream, and then dozens of tentacles flew toward us over the ground.

“Meghan, Keirran, stay close!” Ash lunged forward, blade sweeping in front of him, cutting several grasping tendrils from the air. Keirran and I did the same, lashing out at the writhing limbs that snaked around us, slicing them in half. The ends dropped to the ground, long fingers twitching like dying birds. One of the hands flipped over and began crawling across the stones like a spider, before I stomped down hard and crushed it beneath my heel.

“No, no, no!” Puck let out a yelp, leaping back and slashing wildly with his daggers. “Bad tentacle worm, no touchie! Gah!” He jumped as Nyx appeared, slicing apart the tendrils around him in a flurry of moonlight blades. “Oh, there’s my beautiful assassin bodyguard. Did you get jealous that so many things wanted to touch me?”

Nyx was too busy cutting at tentacles to answer, but the look she gave him was scathing.

The tentacle drew back, writhing in frustration. Glaring at us from the sinkhole, the huge worm shifted its great bloated body, seeming to settle farther into the hole. The tentacles swayed around it, but the worm itself didn’t move.

“Uh, what’s it doing?” Puck muttered to no one in particular. “Whatever it is, I don’t like it.”

A rumble went through the ground directly under our feet, and before I could move, the earth crumbled beneath me. Pale hands shot into the air, latching on to my arms and clothes. I gave a yell as I was dragged under, and the earth closed over my head.

Something grabbed my wrist before it was dragged beneath the ground, yanking me to a stop. I felt myself being pulled upward, though my eyes were closed against the press of dirt against my lids.

My head broke the surface, and I gasped, opening my eyes. Ash knelt in front of me, his face tight with concentration as he pulled me from the ground. The others stood around us, torn between helping and fending off the dozens of hands rising from the ground.

Ash dropped his sword and held out his arm to me. “Give me your other hand,” he gritted out. Grimacing, I freed my arm from the dirt and gripped his wrist. The hands still clinging to me tried to drag me down, but Ash didn’t relent or let go. My arms and shoulders started to burn with pain, my muscles feeling like rubber bands on the verge of snapping.

With a rumble of breaking stone, more hands and tentacles shot into the air around us. “Ash, behind you!” I cried as a tendril with clawed fingers sank into his arm. He clenched his teeth, bracing himself as the fingers curled around him, but he couldn’t attack it without letting go of me.

“Hey! No touchie my friends!” Puck’s dagger sliced down, cutting the tendril away from Ash. “Ice-boy, if you could hurry that up, we’d all appreciate it—it’s getting a little handsy down here.”

“I’m trying,” Ash growled. “Hang on, Meghan.”

“Oh, trust me. I am.”

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