Page 70 of The Iron Raven

“Nothing to say, Goodfellow?”

I blinked and glanced at Ash, walking beside me with his sword at his side. He shot me a look, then turned his attention back to the Monster prowling ever closer. “This is the quietest I’ve ever heard you before a fight. You’re usually taunting our opponent or making ridiculous comments by now. Don’t tell me you’re scared.”

I sneered at him. “Me? Scared? Who do you think you’re talking to, ice-boy? Is this the face of someone who’s afraid of the big bad monster?”

He shot me another glance, his brow furrowed. And I knew I couldn’t hide it. Not from him. I was afraid. My hands were shaking, and the phantom wound I had taken before was throbbing, an icy cold pulse right below my ribs. But I was also furious, shaking with anger and hate for this Monster. This thing that dared make me, Puck, feel real terror for the first time in eons, who had twisted my world around and turned me into something I loathed. The Robin Goodfellow everyone had despised for his cruelty and vicious pranks. Who held grudges, played with human emotions, and crafted elaborate schemes of revenge. The faery who was contemplating becoming an enemy to his best friend once more.

So, yeah, I wasn’t feeling very jolly at the moment. I felt less like making jokes and more like carving this bastard’s ugly head from its neck. Though I knew it wasn’t going to be easy, even with the Ice Prince and the Iron Queen at my side.

“What is this thing?” Meghan whispered, as the silhouette of the creature grew even larger, huge antlers framing the moon. “The amount of negative glamour it’s putting out...is frightening.”

“Yeah,” I growled. “Whatever you do, don’t let those tentacles touch you. It’s not fun, and you might end up...a little different than before. I found that out the hard way.” I spared a glance at the direction Nyx and Coaleater had fled but couldn’t see either of them among the forest of statues.

Ash raised his sword, letting the icy blue light wash over us all. For just a moment, in the chilly glow of the blade, the prince’s face was pale. “Then let’s kill it quickly, before it does any more damage,” he said, and plunged the blade down, sinking it into the earth.

With a rush of glamour, ice spread out from the tip of the sword, coating the ground in a frigid wave. It covered the stones, the walls, the twisted statues scattered throughout the courtyard. The writhing carpet of tentacles froze as they were encased in ice, then shattered into thousands of tiny shards, creating a crystalline blizzard in their wake.

That was our cue. I sprang forward with a snarl, daggers in both hands, racing across the frozen ground toward the Monster. Ash was right beside me, throwing out a flurry of frozen knives that spun through the air right at the creature’s ugly face.

The Monster lowered its head, and the dozens of tendrils on its back and shoulders flailed, striking the darts from the air. By that time, though, Ash and I were right beneath it, darting to the left and right as it lashed out, curved talons slamming into the flagstones and shattering them with a roar.

Fear suffocated me. This close to the Monster, it was hard to breathe without gasping in terror. I shoved down the dread and latched on to the rage that came bubbling to the surface, anger toward the Monster, toward Ash, toward Oberon, Titania, and the entire Nevernever. I channeled that rage into a knifepoint and with a snarl of my own, slammed my daggers deep into the Monster’s side. At the same time, I felt the chill from Ash’s sword as the ice blade came slashing down, hitting the creature from the other side and probably severing something vital.

Beneath my dagger hilts, the creature’s dark, leathery hide rippled like shadow, almost insubstantial. The Monster itself barely made a sound. No howl of pain, no roars of anger or agony; my blow didn’t even seem to register. I yanked my blades free, and a spray of darkness followed, writhing and thrashing as it solidified into a long black tendril, grabbing at me as I danced away.

Despair and anger rose up, even as I shoved them back. Same thing as before; I couldn’t hurt the bastard, and even worse, my strikes seemed to be making it stronger. On the Monster’s other side, I saw Ash dodge a vicious swipe and lash out with his blade, cutting deep into the hairy arm. It should’ve severed the limb completely, or at the very least opened a huge gash in the flesh. I’d seen him do it before, on things that were just as big. But there was nothing. No blood, no reaction from the creature; only those wisps of darkness that turned into more of those damned tentacles.

The Monster lashed out with its other arm, and Ash rolled away, just barely avoiding the claws that raked deep gouges in the stone. I darted in while it was distracted with Ash, leaped off a thigh, and drove my weapons into the base of its spine as hard as I could, putting all my anger and hate for this thing into the blow.

It jerked up with a snarl, blank white eyes rolling back to glare at me, giving Ash just enough time to slide beneath it and jam the full length of his sword into its chest, far enough that the very tip erupted through the skin of its back.

Panting, we circled around to its front, watching as it spun to follow us with that horrible, surprising grace. Its movements were slow and smooth, not hampered in the slightest. Though three feet of superchilled metal right through their rib cage would’ve killed most monsters, all we had done to this one was annoy it.

Ash shook his head with a frustrated noise. “This isn’t working, Goodfellow.”

“Oh, you think, ice-boy?” I curled a lip at him. “What was your first inkling?”

He glanced at me, and his eyes narrowed, anger sparking to life within. My gut twisted as I recognized that glare. The same look I’d faced when Ash had been out to kill me.

And then, the skies flashed, and a bolt of lightning streaked down to hit the Monster in the skull. It roared, the first sound of pain I’d heard from it tonight, and it staggered back, baleful white eyes snapping to the figure behind us.

Meghan stood a few paces away, sword drawn and shining beside her, one arm outstretched toward the Monster. She blazed with power, her blue eyes hard as she stared at the creature, and for just a moment, my heart swelled with hope.

Then the Monster threw back its head and roared, and the ground at our feet erupted. I scrambled back as dark tendrils rose into the air, writhing and lashing out at everything. They spread over the whole courtyard, until no part of the ground was left uncovered.

I dodged a pair of tentacles, leaped through another, then felt one snake around my waist, burning with cold as it pulled me down. Images flooded my head again, unwanted and unwelcome, and rage flared. Snarling, I freed my arm and sliced through the coils around my waist, seeing Meghan and Ash also entangled in the darkness. The ones surrounding Ash had frozen solid, but more were rising to take their place, and a couple had managed to coil around the prince’s legs and sword arm. With a flash of glamour, they stiffened and iced over, and the prince tore himself free with sharp crinkling sounds.

Just as a massive claw snatched him up, lifted him into the air, and slammed him into the stones with a sickening crack.

My heart stopped beating. The Monster gave a howl of fury and triumph as it pounded Ash into the ground again, then lifted him up with a roar, jaws gaping to bite off the prince’s head.

“NO!”Meghan raised her hand, and a pulse of electricity rippled through the ground, centered on her.

The writhing carpet of tentacles jerked, snapping wildly, then vanished into coils of darkness on the wind. With a yell, the queen flung out her other arm, lightning streaking from her fingers to slam into the Monster’s chest. The creature snarled, dropped a bloody Ash to the stones, and went stumbling back a few steps, shielding its face.

With lightning sizzling around her, the queen strode forward, grabbing Ash as he struggled to his feet. The Ice Prince’s long coat was tattered, blood streaming down one side of his face, but he still turned and gestured weakly at the Monster, and ice spears sprang up from the ground, surrounding them both in a protective ring of frozen crystal.

“Ash.” Meghan’s voice was breathless, her normal calm shattered. She sounded terrified now, kneeling on the flagstones with her Ice Prince, clutching his shoulders. Her fear echoed over the wind, carried on the wisps of darkness till fading around us. “Talk to me. We have to get you out of here.”

---