Page 37 of The Curse of Ophelia

I reached Sapphire as the predator released a roar that rolled along my bones, closer this time.

Jezebel threw me my pack and weapons as I pulled our horses’ tethers loose and swung myself onto Sapphire’s back. She didn’t need my hurried instructions to take off down the wide path between the trees, away from the approaching beast. I’d never seen my horse scared until now.

Four sets of hooves followed, but they were quickly drowned out by the thundering steps of our attacker barreling through branches.

“What is it?” I called over my shoulder, my hair whipping my face.

“I don’t know,” Cypherion answered, picking up speed. His wide eyes caught the slivers of moonlight that poked through the branches, and there was true fear there.

Another roar pierced the night, and Sapphire sped up. It was cutting a path through the trees, parallel to the trail, gaining on us quickly. Too quickly.

Patches of moonlight reflected off a body that was scaled in places and fur-covered in others.

My stomach clenched.

A slitted yellow eye met mine as it turned toward us, charging through the trees. My fingers itched to grab my sword. Why were we fleeing when we could be fighting?

“Are those—” Tolek began, but his words were drowned out when the beast cut into our path.

It flared its gigantic set of wings. Covered in scales as dark as a moonless night and as sharp as knives, they blocked the entire path. With a hide of the deepest black and a mane of thin silver hair that glowed against the night, its body looked almost horse-like. But the armor of scales protecting its legs—legs that ended in claws, not hooves—and the spiked tail thrashing about behind it were of some other origin.

It towered over our mares on four legs, but it was breathtakingly large when it reared up on its hind legs. Wings flapping, it swiped out a claw. Sapphire pivoted, barely avoiding it, but a scream behind me chilled my blood.

Jezebel.

I yanked on Sapphire’s reins to turn her and pulled my sword from its sheath. The creature was towering over my sister, her form so small on the leaf-strewn floor. Elektra danced on the outskirts of our circle, throwing her head back with a desperate whinny as she fought to rescue her rider.

With a bloody gash streaming from her shoulder, Jezebel raised a dagger and stabbed at the beast’s leg, rolling away as it swung out. Its claws scraped her chest. When she pushed herself to a crouch, I saw the anger twisting her face.

The beast swung one wing across the space, knocking my sister to the ground again, and I screamed. It turned that slitted yellow eye back to Sapphire and me, and I swore it sparked with familiarity.

Without hesitation, we charged at each other. Warrior and horse against unknown beast. It was a clash of metal against scales as I fought to land a blow with Starfire. The way the creature moved—with cunning and fluidity—spoke of a power so old I didn’t recognize it, but my bones and blood could feel it.

In my periphery, I could see Cypherion and Tolek trying to strike the beast’s defenseless sides, but the spikes in its tail swung lethal blows between them.

It snapped its jaws at me. I twisted, narrowly avoiding teeth as sharp as daggers. Its putrid breath skimmed across my face, hot and musty, like it had been sleeping for centuries. It was practically on top of us, raising a leg, claws shining in the moonlight.

I needed to get off of Sapphire. To send her running.

With a quick blow, I swiped Starfire between us, forcing the creature back a step. I jumped, landing in a crouch, and was raising my sword when the beast released an agonized howl. I chanced a look at its backside to see Jezebel had risen and brought her sword through the end of that spiked tail, severing the tip.

As I was about to take my chance, drive my sword into the beast that had tried to kill my sister with every ounce of weakened power I had in me, it flapped its wings. I staggered back from the wind it created.

Then, it took off through the trees with one last glance back at Jezebel. She narrowed her gaze at it, and it did the same, but there was no threat in the stare.

As it rounded the bend in the path back toward our initial camp, Jezebel collapsed.

“Jezzie!” I screamed, running to her side, but Santorina was already there, assessing her wounds and pulling water from her pack.

“She’s okay,” Rina assured me. “Look, the bleeding has already stopped. I think she just needs this.” She removed a vial of salts from her bag, unstopped it, and waved it beneath my sister’s nose.

My heart pounded in my ears until Jezebel’s eyes slowly opened.

“Thank the fucking Angels,” I breathed, crushing her to me, then pulling back to inspect her face. She blinked rapidly, scanning our surroundings.

“Let me clean your wound,” Santorina muttered, and I let my sister go, not taking my eyes from her.

I was grateful for the instruction of Santorina’s mother, who spent time studying in a Bodymelders encampment before her marriage, learning their medicinal practice and training with their healers. I thanked her Spirit for teaching her daughter how to care for wounds.

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