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Searing light bursts out of the pendant dangling on his chest, almost blinding me, imprinting the jewel’s shape onto my retinas. The sky blue gem darkens, pulsating with an erratic heartbeat as navy hues seep through the stone like swirls of inky water.
A drop of blood splatters at my feet and I look up at the king’s face, expecting that stomach churning rupture of his human skin. But he is not Serpen.
He explodes.
His entire human body disintegrates as though he swallowed a stick of dynamite, shredding his clothes and showering me, my wolf, Anguis and Serpen in bits of human flesh and blood. The chain’s ornate looping drops away under expanding stress, leaving the jewel dangling around the gigantic neck of an uncoiling nightmare. Slithering in the sunlight, the monster rises up, higher and higher, scales rocketing past my wide eyed gaze until its colossal head towers at the height of the treetops. Its rattling tail ends at four times the length of Serpen, dwarfing surrounding chalets. Silvery spikes erupt from the scales and four fangs slide from its wide open mouth, the rancid breath swirling down on my head, making me gag.
An undulating wave slowly travels up the length of its body, the metallic scales glowing scarlet as it passes. The heat emanating from its bulk causes the air to shimmer around it and I feel my skin burning in protest. I don’t want to be here when that furnace reaches the mouth.
“Run,” Anguis yells, shoving me towards Curt as his own face splits in half.
I’m already sprinting after my wolf when Anguis and Serpen uncoil their snake and serpent forms. I’ve no idea what either can do against that behemoth. Glancing back, I spot them winding themselves around its neck, heading for the throat, and a burst of hope slows my steps. A single outward strain of the horror’s spiky musculature stretches my punctured friends so thin that they pop loose, collapsing into a heaving heap of wounded snake. Curt howls at me and I run, heading for the machine, even though I know a mere rock won’t stop this enemy.
The rising heat reaches its throat and the monster regurgitates a spray of fire with the power of a flamethrower. Wolf, bear, snake and human alike, hurl themselves out of its path as it rotates, laying down a carpet of fire, igniting trees and chalets around them. Serpen coils around Anguis and slithers, dragging them both behind the mansion.
Armpit pours forth fire, engulfing the left side of the mansion, flames dancing across the roof and sending Mr G scrambling for safety. Walls burn and shutters crack, the structure partially collapsing in a smoking heap under the onslaught. The king’s tail swings in a violent arc, demolishing everything in its path and launching those caught in its way into the burning trees.
All our training counts for nothing.
The town disappears into billowing smoke and I lose track of where I am, until I run smack into the machine and land face down in the mud. I flip over, staring straight into the bloodstained face of a manic wolf, who’s doing his best to shield my body with his.
“Get off,” I yell, shoving a paw off my chest and dragging myself onto the base of the machine. I heave a rock onto the bowl and my wolf leaps at the leaver, flinging the rock straight at the monster. The missile whistles through the air and bounces harmlessly off its scales with a feeble ping, serving only to redirect his attention to the machine and its quivering operator.
A blast of fire rolls in our direction and we fling ourselves into the undergrowth. Curt lands full on my back, shoving my face in the dirt as the fire engulfs my machine. He leaps up, grabbing my collar in his teeth, dragging me clear of the flames, my flailing heels digging into the mud as I fight to help him.
Smoke swirls out of his pelt. My wolf is on fire.
Scrambling to my feet, I smother the flames with my sleeves. I don’t think he’s badly burnt, but he’s lost patches of fur. He hauls on my smouldering sleeve and we keep running towards the forest. I’m wracking my brain trying to remember the location of the pits Ursid drummed into me. It would be just my luck to end up skewered in one.
I don’t make it that far.
A pair of massive claws exit the smoke, heading straight for me. A bolas whips through the air, wrapping around the eagle’s exposed legs and he drops, already pecking at the rope. Luva dashes through the flames, swinging another bolas, but the eagle tears apart her first shot and rises up, wings outstretched, eyes locked on me. Curt snarls at the incoming eagle with more savagery than I’ve ever seen him exhibit. He’ll save me, or die trying.
“Edi,” Luva shrieks, but it’s too late.
The second eagle, Revol, soars out of the smoke, claws grabbing me from behind and I rise into the air, kicking and screaming. Curt leaps after me, snapping at the wings, but we’re already too high and he drops back with a howl of agony.
Through a break in the smoke, I peer down at what’s left of my machine, of my town, of my pack as they flee the inferno. The anger roars through me, my fingers tearing at the eagle’s claws in an impotent fit of rage.
A mighty rush of wings hurtles towards me from both sides and darkness descends. I’m smothered by feathers as Wings and Gulid sandwich Revol between them. I may not see the moment of impact, but the staggering crunch surges down my body, almost breaking my neck from the whiplash. Revol’s claw jerks, cracking my bones, before his grip loosens and I slip straight through, plummeting towards my burning town.
Arms and legs desperately flapping, I fall through the rising smoke, unable to see or breathe. I’m about to die, splattered in the mud as a blot on the landscape. Please God, don’t let me land on my mangy wolf.
One leg shoots above my head as gravity upends me and the world turns upside down. I crane my sore neck, peering up at a claw wrapped around my ankle.
“Wings,” I yell, but it’s not him. It’s Gulid up there. Old Broken Beak himself, busy saving his facial nemesis.
A concussed Revol shakes off the impact and tears at Gulid’s beak with a raised claw, making me cringe in sympathy. Gulid’s grip on me tightens as he rotates, veering away from his former friend. Wings divebombs Revol, dropping a rock on his head. The shock is enough to slow him down.
Moving faster than I would have believed possible for a monster of that size, Armpit launches up into the sky in an incredible leap and somehow stays airborne, his wide open mouth reaching for me. Gulid strains every muscle, shrieking in agony as he rises up and away from those fangs. The mutated serpent looms so close that stinking, heated slime sprays into my dangling hair as I scream in abject terror, peering straight down his pulsating throat. He drops away, plummeting back to earth.
As an exhausted Gulid angles around to land, I catch sight of the monstrous serpent, just as the blinding light from that pendant sputters and dies. He shrinks, spikes and fangs disappearing into spiralling flesh. Metallic scales dissolve into a brown sludge, leaving a slime mark on the earth, like a slug through salt. The massive chain slides down his oozing body and the faded pendant hits the deck with a tinkle.
It’s the pendant. He’s using magic to become that monster and it just ran out.
Gulid skims along the ground and opens his claw. I’m dropping again, straight into the midst of a chaotic gathering of fur and paw. My pack mates pile over my head to save me from being kidnapped again. I’m very touched and heavily trampled in the crush.
Through a sea of bony wolf legs and bear undercarriages, I spot the slug quivering and a tired, glassy eyed, naked man reappear, dropping to one knee to save himself from face planting in the mud.
“Take me,” he croaks.
Revol swoops over our heads, grasps his king in a claw and soars up and away, the second eagle on his tail.
