Page 107 of Eldritch
A scream of wild terror echoed through the room, her eyes wide with the kind of unbridled fear he’d never seen before. “A blade to my throat!” she screamed. “I want to die with a blade!”
Whatever dwelled in that pit was apparently worse than death.
“You don’t get to choose.” Loyce gave one hard shove from behind, and Vaelora let out a gut-wrenching scream as she fell forward.
Madness seized Zevander’s muscles, and in one quick strike, he spun around, jabbing his fingers into the soft flesh that covered the orgoth’s vitaelis vein. He gripped hard and tore away the throbbing vein, so that blood spouted down his hands.
Once free, Zevander darted for the pit and jumped in feet-first.
He hadn’t even measured the depth, so he came crashing down onto the gravely floor with a hard thud that buckled his knees. From what must’ve been twelve meters overhead, faces peered in on him, Theron among them.
Pain throbbed in Zevander’s legs as he pushed to his feet.
Whimpers reached his ears, and he turned to find Vaelora in a defensive stance, holding a rock in one hand. Beyond her, stood three wide caves, their gaping entrances surrounded by thick roots, and nothing but darkness within.
A long pole slipped down from above, its tip attached to a flaming bundle of kindling. The pole handler lit one of the stone sconces on the wall, illuminating the dim cavern.
Zevander darted forward for the pole, just missing it before the handler raised it back toward the surface. He quietly growled and twisted around to see Vaelora’s panicked expression.
“This is where she keeps her pets,” she whispered.
Enormous squiggly lines smudged into the cave sand, the width of each half his height, gave some indication of their size.
Small enough to be contained within the cavern, but large enough for Zevander to be concerned.
“I watched them once. Dragged another slave off. I don’t know what they did with her?—”
“It used her,” Loyce interrupted from above. “Charnelyths are very practical creatures. They don’t just kill for the sake of killing, or for food. No, they’re far more resourceful.” She hiked her boot up onto the edge of the pit and sipped her wine. “When they clamp their teeth into your flesh, they release a venom, so that by the time they drag you back to their nests, you’re completely paralyzed. At that point, the female will deposit her eggs inside of you. The male, of course, will fertilize them, as they do. And like good parents, the two will keep you well fed on whatever they manage to scrounge up. Decayed human meat. Rats. Insects. And when the babies are finally ready to hatch, they will claw their way out of the eggs and tear through your body, consuming your flesh as their first meal.”
A deep, guttural growl reverberated off the cave walls, and Vaelora choked on a sob. Her hands shook as she clutched the rock.
“As for you, Zevander, they’ll wrangle you to the ground and decapitate you. Your body will feed their colony, but they’ll keep your head as a sort of trophy.”
Another growl, that one pitching to a roar, alerted that the beast was closer.
Zevander glanced around for a weapon, but all he could find was a rock, slightly smaller than the one Vaelora clutched. Wrists still shackled together, he tore his mask and horns away, and focused his attention on the three caverns. As he waited for the beasts to emerge, he couldn’t help but be grateful for whatever Theron may have done to restore his senses, despite wanting to rip the betraying bastard’s throat out.
“Promise me something …” Vaelora spoke low, her voice quivering like a candle in a drafty corridor. “Should you ever leave this place and cross paths with my brother…tell him I love him.”
“Enough of that. You’re getting out of here.”
At first, the only sound was their panting breaths, but then a loud, gratingscrape and thunk,scrape and thunksent him searching for the source. Could’ve come from any one of the caves.
Or all of them.
He tugged on Vaelora’s shoulder, and she flinched. “Get behind me.”
She scampered around to his back, her nails digging into his side as she clutched him.
The first charnelyth slid forward and the crowd overhead erupted into gasps and cheers. The creature had the body of a snake, with thorns and thick scales, but its head was like that of a dragon, broad and angular, with deep ridges over its serpentine eyes that gave a menacing glare. The flicker of its tongue reminded him of the vicious cobras he’d learned of, that dwelled in the Eremician deserts.
Adrenaline surging, Zevander searched the beast’s form for any sign of a weakness, but every inch of it was scaled with what he imagined to be thick, rough skin.
Impenetrable.
From its top lip protruded two long tusks instead of fangs, their tips sharp and pointed for piercing. If he could tear one away, he might be able to stab it, just as he had with the orgoth. Yes, he was certain that would be the way to defeat it.
The creature let out another roar and slithered toward him. It drew back for a strike, and Zevander pushed Vaelora to the ground then dove to the side, narrowly missing those long, serrated tusks that jabbed into the dirt. A plume of dust exploded into the air, and Vaelora let out shriek, kicking away from the narrow escape.
