Page 77 of House of Kallan
I’d like to say I moved to the front line, but I didn’t think there was much of a difference. We didn’t have a second line or third. It was just us. This row of earth monsters and the handful of us who joined. As I got closer, I found there were moremonsters from Bael’s party who had joined us. A basilisk was unwinding as I stared, winding up and up and turning his death gaze to the hybrids.
I watched as it caught one of the kids and they went down, limp.
My stomach churned. Oh, fuck. I didn’t know if I could fight a kid. This wasn’t their fault. They didn’t choose this. It wasn’t their fault.
These thoughts were running rampant in my mind when I came face to face with a little girl. We stared at each other. There was nothing but fear in her eyes.
“You don’t have to do this,” I said, holding my hands up as you might when you were trying to show that you weren’t armed.I mean no harm.She was maybe seven. Could be younger. Her eyes were wide with terror as a swirl of fire moved around her, her hands up in a fighting pose. Absently, I wondered what they did to make kids this young understand how to fight like that. “We won’t hurt you, I promise. I can bring you somewhere safe where no one will ever hurt you again. I swear.”
She swallowed and dropped her hands.
The mistake wasn’t on anything either of us did. It was that someone else didn’t trust her, or perhaps didn’t hear our conversation. Maybe I was too trusting. As soon as her fire fell away, someone I didn’t recognize enough to put a name to scooped her up into a bear hug.
She screamed, panic taking over.
I watched as the life in the man’s eyes fell away. He dropped the girl, who stumbled and fell to her knees. He hovered for a second, and then fell to his knees too. His eyes absent and lifeless.
“No,” I screamed, rushing forward to catch him as he somehow defied physics and gravity to stay upright. He was a wolf. A wolf with deep piercing puncture wounds in a line down his front, beginning at his heart and ending at his stomach. “No,no, no.” He finally fell forward toward the ground just as I grabbed him.
“I’m sorry,” the girl screamed. “I’m sorry. Please don’t hurt me.”
I didn’t have time to calm her right now. This wolf was already dead, so I only had a minute to react. Less.
Looking at the girl, I said, “Bring me one of the assholes you came with. Not another child. An adult. Alive. Now. I need them immediately.”
She nodded and spun around. I was on the verge of screaming for Tyrus when she returned, pulling along a hybrid beast as if they were a rag doll. She pushed him to my feet, and I quickly grabbed hold.
A molten white light blazed to life. Somewhere close by, I heard the girl scream again. Before my eyes, the wolf’s body stitched itself closed as color came back to his face. Meanwhile, the hybrid in my other hand began simultaneously tearing open violently.
When the wolf coughed, I let the transfer die down. It was complete anyway, but I just hadn’t wanted to take a chance. Helping him sit up, I shoved his shirt out of the way and sighed in relief. He was going to have scars, but he’d be fine.
“Thanks,” he said, wrapping me in his arms. I thought it was probably gratefulness that made him do it as much as him trying to regain his bearings. Then his eyes turned to the girl.
“I’m sorry,” she said quickly, taking a step back.
“It’s okay,” I said, offering her my hand. She hesitated, but came closer. I could now see the deadly spines protruding from her back. “I need you to sit somewhere safe, all right? Just stay out of the fight.”
“Or,” the wolf said, “maybe convince some of your friends to back away. I cannot tell you the conflict we’re facing right now as we try not to hurt you kids.”
The girl nodded.
“What’s your name?” I asked her.
“Nine,” she said.
I sighed. Of course, it was a number. “Okay, Nine. I’m Tatum.”
“Kormak,” the wolf said.
“See if you can convince your friends to back away, okay?”
“They’re not my friends, but I’ll try.”
“Just the children,” Kormak said. He looked at me. “While I understand you’d like everyone to just stand down, you need to know that the hybrids are being controlled remotely by a chip in their brains.”
“I know. My husbands told me,” I said.
Kormak smiled. “Husbands. Good.” He looked at Nine. “You okay now?”
