Page 94 of The Wild Moon
“Once you’re through, I can vanish,” Vir said. “If the warriors aren’t here, they won’t track me. Once you’re safely through, I’ll go.”
“Easier said than done!” I shouted.
From the tunnel entrance came a horrifying bellow that could not have come from a human throat.
“Vir,” I said uneasily. “What was that?”
“A warrior,” he said calmly. “Go.”
I shook my head. “Vir, I’m not getting through. You have to go.”
He turned to look at me, his face clouded by blue flame, but I could still see the shock written on it.
“Go,” I said. “Before the warrior gets down here. Disappear and be safe. There’s no sense inbothof us dying.”
The golden spear continued to weave its impenetrable wall in front of Vir, even with his head turned.
“Danielle Wetter,” he ground out. “You are the first person or being to come through in millennia. I amnotgoing to just let you die without figuring out how you did that.”
I sighed. “Well, then, I guess both our stubborn asses are dying then. Good job. Unless you can poof us out of here?”
Vir shook his head. “If I do, they’ll track me.”
“It might buy us some time,” I pointed out. “Enough time to figure out how I get through.”
“It won’t matter,” Vir explained. “I can only go from here to my lair. I can’t go to another place. If they find the lair, then I am exposed and nowhere will be safe. We die there, we die here. It’s how the others fell.”
“Crap,” I muttered.
“Either you go, or we die,” he said, turning back to face the wall of shadowed darkness.
That was when the first creature slipped past, narrowly escaping the golden spear by flattening itself against the wall and pushing past as his head turned.
I shouted and, without a second thought, charged the creature as it lunged at Vir’s back. I took it to the ground before hauling back with a fist and punching its lumpy, misshapen head. It wailed at the blow, so I hit it again and again.
Claws tried to scratch my stomach, but they got tangled up in Vir’s oversized clothing, and the creature couldn’t generate any force. Eventually, my blows cracked whatever it had for a skull, and it lay still.
I got to my feet and backed away until my shoulders pressed flat against the barrier.
Farther down the tunnel, a much deeper shade of black entered the mass of shadows attacking Vir. It formed into a tall bipedal creature, though I could not see much detail beyond that. Even the creature I’d killed was hard to describe, shrouded in darkness still.
Whatwerethese things?
“I take it that’s a warrior?” I asked, trying to sound calm as the dark shape came toward us.
“Correct,” Vir said.
“Can you handle it?”
“Yes,” he said with that same calm assurance.
“Good. Hurry up and do so,” I said.
“Creatures will get through.”
“Yeah,” I said with far more confidence than I felt, shaking myself out of his clothing. “I know. Let them come.”
Okay. Time to earn your keep, I called to my wolf, lifting the mental chains her that kept her restrained within my mind.
