Page 10 of The Teras Trials

Something isn’t right. I feel it, feel the wrongness of it knot in my stomach. That haunting drone of a howl couldn’t have come from this creature. A cerastes couldn’t have torn apart Thad’s party.

Something else is hunting it.

The thought crystallises just as another creature bellows overhead. I drop to my knees, hands over my head. The creature screams, a satisfied, excited sound, and when it lands the ground shakes.

An odd ticking sound fills the air. Peering through my fingers, I watch as the cerastes reels out of the ground to face its enemy. But there won’t be a fight. The cerastes doesn’t stand a chance.

The ticking noise sounds again; I see a scorpion tail whip over the new teras’ body and impale the cerastes in one smooth motion. The cerastes throws its head back and screams loudly, a high-pitched squeal that fetters out to a soft, squelchy squeak.

I start to shake. Its killer is a giant. We’re both dead. Thaddeus stares up at it and the fear drains from his face. He is resigned. That expression is so much worse.

The teras’ head sits high—two or three tall men stacked upon one another—and its body is sturdy and wide. It walks forward and easily crashes through the trees. Great feathered wings are folded neatly against its muscled flank, flaring only slightly when it jumps. It has the hulking body of a lion. Massive paws pelt the ground. The scorpion tail ticks back into place as it walks.

And in the growing light, I see the sunlit edge of a human nose and lips and it turns to inspect my brother, its prey.

Manticore.

I hold my breath. The manticore opens its mouth. Its face is oddly generic, its skin a pale brown. This androgynous mix feels familiar, as if the creature is the cousin of every living human. As it opens its mouth, its jaw unhinges unnaturally wide, revealing three rows crammed with sharp teeth. First, it scoops the dead cerastes into its mouth and cranes its head back to gulp down the snake-like creature whole.

But the cerastes is tiny. It won’t satisfy the manticore for long.

I reach for my gun. I don’t know what the point is. I can see the thick hide from here. Will a bullet even make it through?

Thaddeus shoots first. He stares it down and pulls the trigger: one, two, three, click, click, click. Silence. He throws the pistol aside as the manticore howls in anger. A tiny trickle of blood leaks from a wound in its shoulder. That is all.

Thaddeus is going to die, and then it’s going to be me.

I see him sitting there resigned to it and I want to scream. If dying here is what fate has in store for me, then the Greeks have been right all along. Sophocles said fate has a terrible power.

And with my father’s voice, I hear the quote. “You cannot escape it by wealth or war. No fort will keep it out, no ships outrun it.”

With Fate hanging over me like a guillotine waiting to drop, I run. As I run, I scream.

I sprint out of the bushes onto the road, running towards Southend, further away from the safety of London’s wards. Coattails flap madly around my legs, the wind screams in my ears. My brother is shouting furiously. I think I hear him cry. No, he says. Cass, no. But I scream and wave and hope the manticore loves the chase more than prey that’s prone.

I don’t look back. Not when I hear the growl. Not when I feel the vibrations of something heavy chasing me. My throat burns. My mind runs black. The only thing moving me is the thrum of adrenaline, some embedded desire to live that is knitted into my very core. It is a drumbeat sound in my head.

Run. Run. Run.

The trees fall away again and leave me exposed. Behind me, the manticore bellows. The deep bass sound rumbles in my belly and I dash forward with renewed speed. Then my foot jams against something. All at once I’m tumbling through the air. I land badly. The air is knocked out of me. Pain throbs up my spine, the back of my head. I give a pathetic, wheezing cry—I am ashamed. I can’t even do this for him. I can’t even die far enough away to give him a chance. I look up in time to watch the manticore dive over me. The warmth from the underside of its belly spreads over my face and I stare at the white ribbed belly, the wingspan as it flares and blocks out the moonlight, the massive paws outstretched as it leaps. It lands beyond me with a crash, skidding to a stop and turning to face me.

I lay splayed in the snow, too terrified to move. If I run, it will eat me. If I stay, it will eat me. Slowly, I drag myself to my knees.

I hear another voice somewhere. It’s not Thad’s. But I can’t pay attention to it.

The manticore growls and steps closer. It takes up my entire vision. No pinch of hope can save me now. That ticking sounds again. I’m dizzy, scared. I barely see the shape of the creature’s scorpion tail being raised slowly over its impassive human face. The strange human eyes stare at me. Pre-emptively, the manticore begins to open its jaw. I stare into black void behind the rows of teeth.

Tick, tick — it is getting ready to strike. I pull my gaze to the edge of the tail.

It whips forward. I dive to the side, and then roll again as the sharp tip comes striking down towards my new position. I scrabble to standing and throw myself aside. The scorpion tail crashes into the trunk of a tree behind me. Decimated pieces of bark explode through the air. I flinch to the side immediately and use the momentum to keep running. The manticore makes an odd noise of annoyance and lunges after me.

You can’t outrun him, my brain tells me, but my legs ignore that and keep me sprinting at full speed. A bellow. That ticking sound again. My head snaps around and I watch the sharp point hurtle towards my eyes. Panicked, I drop to the ground and roll on to my back. The tail retracts and the manticore is standing over me. I watch in horror as it quivers, readying itself for the final strike. The jaw opens once more.

Something whizzes through the air.

The manticore screams; not the happy hunting sounds it had been making, but a terrible, outraged cry of pain. It rears onto its back legs. A glint of sunlight illuminates its flank, now slick with blood. Two feathered arrows jut out of its sternum. The manticore lands heavily and barrels forward. I barely roll in time to avoid being crushed.

The trees obscure it, but both parties are vocal. I imagine the strikes; the intermittent ticks of the scorpion’s tail thudding into snow, into trees, into something that might have been flesh. I hear a gurgled grunt, a scream of outrage — both terrifyingly human. And then the manticore howls. Great heavy footfalls rush away.

---