Page 106 of Misfit Monsters
Another spurt of caustic energy flares in my chest, and I throw it at his hands.
His fingers spasm apart, and the flood of shadowkind flings him onward. With flashes of fangs and glints of spikes and spines, the deluge of hissing, screeching beasts in their muddle of ephemeral and physical form pummels him across the room.
“Sam!” he hollers, groping toward the dummy, apparently forgetting that his friend doesn’t have arms any more than it does ears.
The deluge of shadowy creatures heaves him again, and he topples right over the edge of the cellar door.
David Blaver tumbles through the opening headfirst. A crack reverberates from the concrete floor below, vivid enough to send an image of a skull cracked open like an eggshell flashing through my mind.
As the jumbled creatures whirl on around the room as if unsure of where to go next, I pull myself out of the shadows at the edge of the trap door. Peering down, I make out my former captor’s crumpled body.
His neck is twisted at an unnatural angle. A puddle of blood expands beneath his head like crimson yolk.
A breath rushes out of me, with a flutter of sickly relief I won’t feel guilty about.
Three figures draw up around me. Raze sets his hand on my back.
“He’s gone,” the basilisk shifter says gruffly.
The sorcerer’s commands died with him.
I grasp Raze’s arm and tuck myself into the embrace he offers.
Mirage spins around in a giddy circle. “And now everything he’s found is ours! We’ll make much better use of it. Thanks to our Periwinkle.”
The fox shifter beams at me and dips his head to give me a quick peck.
When Mirage pulls away, Hail is watching the three of us with a bemused expression.
“Thank you, Cream Puff,” he says in a mild voice that makes the phrase sound more like a fond nickname than an insult. “Come on. Let’s telloursorcerer how you saved the day.”
39
Periwinkle
Sorsha sets the last block of iron beneath the rift and steps back with her hands on her hips. “That should be enough to keep any creatures from coming through. I guess we’ll have to wait and see whether the metals lock the rift in place or if we need to scatter the protections around more widely.”
She turns toward us with a swish of her flame-red hair and an easygoing grin. One of the benefits of the phoenix shifter’s hybrid nature—born to a human father and a shadowkind mother—is that she isn’t bothered by iron and silver the way pure shadowkind are.
The men who came with her in her strange, huge vehicle can’t say the same. They’re full shadowkind, as unnerved by the protections as the rest of us, so they’ve been prowling through the forest for any sign of additional trouble while she’s worked here.
Rollick nods approvingly where he’s standing with me and my team several paces back from the rift’s current position. Here, the aura of the metal blocks stacked around the base of the portal and the thick chains hanging from the trees on either side only nip at our skin rather than searing it.
The demon was able to arrange for some human associates to drive a truck of supplies nearby and carry them most of the way over, but he didn’t want them getting too close to the rift itself. Sorsha had to take on the bulk of the final work.
“And I have a lot of reading to do,” he says. “Sorting through all the notes this addled sorcerer made and separating madness from fact. I’d thank him for leaving a few of his captives weak enough for me to catch them for further study and potential rehabilitation, but I don’t think he deserves even a fragment of good will.”
I can’t hold back a shudder. “No, he doesn’t.”
Raze’s growl echoes my reaction.
Rollick turns to look at the five of us, his cool gaze assessing.
“You’ve done an impressive job working in collaboration, even with unfortunate circumstances stirring up personal trauma.” The dip of his head acknowledges my private struggle. “I’m pleased with all of you, but I’d like to hear from your own mouths whether you think you and your teammates can safely return to your regular studies at the academy—and how you’ve addressed the problems that you’d have been banished for.”
My heart skips a beat. He’s going to trust our judgment about each other? What will the men I’ve worked with say about me?
The demon motions toward Raze first. “You were ignoring the rules about maintaining physical form and avoiding interacting with the other students rather thantrying to integrate. Can the academy’s staff expect to see that change?”
