Fuck. I hated running.
I wheezed as I bent forward, placing my hands on my knees
and trying to get a deep breath in. I couldn’t function on so little oxygen.
Couldn’t think.
What could Gray have hoped to achieve by lying to me about the bones? By keeping them from me? If Susannah was telling me to run, there had to be more to it than just the simple reality of him wanting to prevent me from finding them. That fear in her voice had sunk inside my skin, slithering beneath the surface like an insidious menace.
But instead of doubting what she’d said, I was left with the growing, dawning realization that something was wrong. That I’d missed something that had been staring me in the face.
A howl cut through the woods, raising the hair on my arms. Susannah had been willing to let me flee, to let me attempt to escape the fate waiting for me in Crystal Hollow.
Because she’d known the odds of me surviving were minimal.
Creatures far worse than witches call these woods home.
I swallowed, heaving a sigh and spreading my feet shoulder width apart. Letting my magic loose was always like releasing a breath, like releasing a tiny sigh of that power into the world and molding it to my will.
I grasped my knife from the sheath, slashing it across each of my palms quickly before returning the blade slowly. My blood dripped onto the forest floor, the sound of it echoing in the silence around me. There were no
noises as the beasts hidden here stalked me, keeping quiet as I listened for them.
I inhaled, filling my lungs with air and the feeling of the woods around me. I exhaled, blowing a long, steady breath into the trees. They answered, the forest itself seeming to shift as trees swayed to the side, showing me a path through to the border where it met the outskirts of Salem.
The beasts were to my right, their footsteps thudding against the ground and vibrating against my soul where I’d connected to the trees. I took off at a run even as my calves burned, taking the path the forest had revealed and refusing to look over my shoulder to see if they would catch me.
The ground helped, rising and falling to give me momentum beneath my feet as I kept breathing. Each sigh let loose a little more of that power that I kept trapped within my skin, until the air around me seemed charged with it.
Never had I surrounded myself so thoroughly, had I released so much of it into the earth and the air. A creek bed came up before me, and there wasn’t enough time to stop—to slow myself before I would stumble into it. A tree in front of me shifted, swinging a branch toward me just in time for me to grab it.
Bark dug into my skin, drawing blood that paid the debt between us as the branch swung forward and flung me over the creek.
I flailed in mid-air, my legs continuing to run even though there was no ground beneath my feet for a few moments suspended in time. I gasped as I struck the ground, rolling myself forward and popping up onto aching legs the next moment. The howls of the beasts stalking me came even closer, and I realized it wouldn’t be enough.
Even with the forest aiding me, I would never outrun them. Not with the way they were gaining on me, and hiding wasn’t an option when they could scent the trail of blood I’d left behind. When they could feel the magic in the air and know that something that didn’t belong was here.
I kept running, pushing for the boundary. My only hope was to reach the end of the woods by some miracle.
The creature that prowled out in front of me was straight from my worst imaginings. Long, gangly limbs covered in gray, mottled skin. It walked on all fours, the head of a wolf resting atop its shoulders even though the hind legs were far more similar to a human’s than an animal.
I skidded to a stop in the dirt, looking over my shoulder as the rest of the group emerged from the trees behind me. Their chests were muscled and covered in hair, the hair on their backs so long that it disguised the curvature of their spine. The creature’s fingers were long, the black nails at the end even longer than the teeth that sparkled in the dim light of the forest as the one in front of me opened his jowls and growled as he stood up to full height.
Standing on just his hind legs, he was at least a foot taller than me. I swallowed, tugging my knife free from the sheath and keeping it at my side. I waited, sinking into the place where I felt the earth communicate with me. Where I felt each and every shift of the creatures’ feet in the dirt and
dying leaves.
The one in front of me leapt forward, landing on his front legs as he raced toward me. I spun, throwing my knife at him. I didn’t pause to listen for his whimper of pain before I ducked low and tucked myself beneath his body, vaulting to my feet on the other side as he crashed into the others.
Gathering my bleeding hands in front of my body, I watched and waited for the three still standing to move. The one with my knife in his chest lay on the ground. One of his companions sniffed the wound, then bared his teeth at me.
The next bolted forward, and I shoved my arms in front of my body. Crossing them, I muttered beneath my breath as the trees followed. A thick, sturdy branch from each side of the clearing surrounding us followed suit, crossing to wrap around one of the beast’s front legs on the opposite side.
I squeezed my hands together as the creature tripped. The branches tightened as they wound tighter around his limbs. I pinched my eyes tightly closed in regret when he came closer still, stopping just in front of me when the branches held tight.
“Lacrima,” I whispered, wrenching my arms apart.
The branches pulled quickly, uncrossing and tearing the animal’s legs from its body. Its howl of pain filled the woods.
My bottom lip trembled, hating the death and violence as the ground soaked up the monster’s blood. Taking the sacrifice I’d offered, even if it was not my blood that fed it. The next beast pounced in my moment of distraction, and I flung myself backward as fast as I could to avoid the swipe of claws.
Burning pain cut through my cheek, narrowly missing my eye as three talons tore through my flesh. My fingers worked in front of me, tying knots in the branches like a net. My back struck the earth finally, the creature’s jowl only a few breaths from my face when the branches slid between us and connected, forming a barrier as they shoved him back.
He sprang up quickly, lunging at the branches and tearing at them with teeth and claws. I turned and sprinted into the woods.
My face throbbed, and my hands began to clot. I’d given too much, and my body moved more sluggishly than it should have. That breath that had seemed so easy to exhale before was impossible to reign back in, the magic wanting the freedom it had been denied for so many years.
I gasped as I tried to pull it back as I ran, needing the extra energy within me to get my legs to move. The magic tickled my skin, a taunt and a tease as I winced back from the feeling.
Something struck my back, knocking me flat on my face in the dirt. I rolled quickly, staring up at the beast as he prowled around me and moved his body over mine.
His legs were so tall that even as he stood over me on all fours, there was no contact between us. His deep, dark eyes glared down at me, his teeth bared and dripping saliva on my face as he brought his mouth close to my face. His breath stunk of rotten meat. The stench grew stronger as he opened his jaw.
He drew his head back ever so slightly, his mouth parting. I squeezed my eyes shut and waited for the end. I dug my fingers into the earth below me, seeking reassurance in my final moments and waited for the pain of teeth sinking into my face.
Pain that never came.
The beast yelped. My eyes flew open. Hands grabbed the creature by the mouth, one holding his upper jaw and the other grasping the bottom. I stared straight into his throat. He’d come so incredibly close to biting me.
The hands holding the creature pulled, a roar filling the air as the beast’s jaw separated, snapping as it broke. The hands ripped and tore until blood burst from the creature like an explosion. It covered me, raining down on me. I blinked through it and shuddered on the ground.
I pushed up to my elbows, staring at what remained of the creature as the man holding him tore him straight down the middle, severing his body from head to groin into two halves.
He discarded the halves to the ground in a pile of mutilated flesh, those steely blue eyes rising to meet my shocked stare.
Fuck.
