Page 80 of An Invocation of Monsters

Somehow I had never stopped to ask if there were more sentient monsters out there, and if they were as friendly as mine.

But Toth cocked his head, still watching Kiraxis.

“With all this blood around, surely a V’uthli is coming to investigate,” he said loudly. “Possibly another Mlul’dra. Are your senses not superior?”

“Superiorrrrr,” Kiraxis breathed, groping at the pebbles on the beach.

“Then you’ll certainly hear, see, and smell it when one of them steals Elle away to be his mate.” He sniffed delicately at the air. “That might be a V’uthli I smell now.”

I glanced over my shoulder nervously, but there was no one else in sight. I still wasn’t sure I wanted to know what a V’uthli was.

“No!” Kiraxis said, aghast.

“Oh, yes,” Toth said sadly. “Here he comes. And he has a very large temple for Elle to worship him in. She might never come back.”

To my surprise, Kiraxis flipped onto his stomach and did an astonishingly rapid crawl into the lake, all four arms dragging him forward.

He bobbed in the water, flailing around and loosening the dried blood, and I looked at Toth sidelong. “There’s no V’uthli coming, is there?”

“No,” Toth said smugly, his eyes glinting with satisfaction.

“You bad, bad monster, you,” I said fondly, then patted his arm and headed down to the water.

It was not easy bathing a drunk Mlul’dra.

Toth had the wherewithal to visit Kiraxis’s cave and acquire a bar of soap for me after I’d been swamped for the tenth time, and when I finally just sat on top the monster and started scrubbing his chest free of blood, he finally gave up on fighting and purred.

“That feels very nice, Elle,” he said, beaming up at me.

“Good. Now hold still and if you roll over again, we’re gonna do this the hard way.” I had no idea what the ‘hard way’ was, considering he had several hundred pounds on me, but I was hoping his own imagination would fill in the blanks.

He did try to roll over again. Fortunately, the taste of blood and soap had called Drazan from the depths, and the Mlul’dra growled when he realized multiple tentacles were holding him in place.

I patted the tentacle curled around my ankle. “Thank you, Drazan.”

Any time you desire, Elle, the Klee said into my mind, sounding amused. It is like holding a cat underwater.

Now that he mentioned it, Kiraxis did have some rather cat-like qualities about him. I would have said his facial features were more vulpine than feline, but he seemed to avoid the water in general.

I was completely spent when the Mlul’dra and I dragged ourselves from the lake. I pretty much just collapsed face-down on the pebbles, feeling their tiny interior suns warm me.

A massive presence settled at my side, and I knew Drazan had left the lake. Toth knelt down at my head, brushing my soaked hair out of my face, and Kiraxis… well, he snuggled up next to me, his fur now clean, and began snoring.

I couldn’t help but crack a smile.

He was going to need that sleep. My healing had already worked, but his body still needed to recover from the physical trauma.

I finally managed to sit upright, practically falling onto Drazan. The Klee took my into his lap, tentacles curling around me.

“So, are we going to talk about the Hunter now?” I asked Toth. There was no point in keeping my voice down. Kiraxis’s snores could’ve started an avalanche.

Toth shook his head a little, antennae curling, but not in negation.

“There is only so much to tell you, Elle,” he said. “We simply do not know. The Hunter is yet another anomaly, one I have never seen in any other lands of the Void.”

I have never seen the Hunter, Drazan said. I felt his mental smile as he added, I am not entirely sure it knows I exist.

“I doubt it does.” Toth gave the Klee a considering look. “The Hunter moves by land, not by air nor water. The forest is its hunting grounds.”

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