“Not without you,” Willow snaps, urging her horse toward me.
“Yes, without me. It’s going to take all of my concentration to work the device. I can’t worry about whether I might accidentally kill you.” I look in her eyes and understand her struggle. Willow is a fighter, not a runner. “Get Nola and Jodi to safety.” I lower my voice as the Commander strides toward us, his eyes on the tech. “If he’s the only one who comes out alive, shoot him.”
Willow leans down and grabs my shoulders in a rough half embrace. “Come out alive, Logan.” Then she wheels her horse around and takes off at a gallop, Nola and Jodi on her heels, while behind me the ground erupts with a deafening roar.
It sounds like a wall collapsing. Like a thousand snarling cougars.
Like death.
Beside me, one of the tall metal poles that line the street snaps at its base and crashes down, pinning a man beneath it. He screams, but the sound is lost in the gut-churning thunder of the tanniyn that explode out of the ground in a mass of glistening black scales and puffs of smoky air.
Chunks of the road rain down on the surrounding buildings. Glass shatters. And the beasts pour out of the hole and into the street.
Everywhere I look there are huge, black, glistening creatures with milky eyes and spikes running down their backs. Streams of fire scorch the air as the creatures strafe the road. There are so many. A dozen. Maybe more. The ground trembles beneath them, and it’s hard to keep my footing.
If this is what happens when I amplify the device’s signal with two transmitters, I shudder to imagine what will happen when I attach the rest of the transmitters to Melkin’s staff and use it against the Commander.
A circle of destruction. Impossible to survive.
I back away from the road and move my fingers over the buttons to send the beasts south. They surge forward, crushing metal poles, snapping trees, and barreling through brick walls and into buildings that immediately become blazing infernos as the creatures spew fire.
Men leap from second-story windows, landing hard in a tangle of limbs. Most are quickly crushed beneath the monstrous creatures. The tanniyn are nearly the size of a small house. Twice as big as the long, rusted yellow vehicle we saw when we entered the city. In moments, the entire south side of the street is burning.
“Turn them west,” the Commander says, his eyes on the device.
“I plan to turn them in every direction,” I say. “I promised not to leave a single highwayman alive to hunt us down.”
My fingers are steady as I press the buttons to send the beasts east where warehouses and wagons line the street. The beasts roar, spitting fire at one another and anything else that moves as they twist and claw their way up the street away from us. Behind them, the buildings they plowed through sway uncertainly and then begin to crumble, raining ash and flaming debris.
“Get back!” The Commander’s hand is rough as he shoves me aside seconds before another metal pole slams into the ground where I was just standing. My back hits the wall of Rufus’s home, and the shock of the impact is nothing compared to the shock of being saved by the Commander twice in twenty-four hours.
I start moving toward the stables. In seconds, the tanniyn will have destroyed the eastern edge of the camp. I want to be near my escape plan before I have to turn them back toward us. Especially as it’s clear that while the device might be powerful enough to call over a dozen tanniyn, and its signal might be enough to drive them in the direction of my choice, the effects are short-lived. Seconds after my fingers leave the device, the beasts turn in whichever direction they please. Another sonic signal from me jerks them to the east again, but not for long. Soon, four of them plunge north into the city streets. Another two return to the wreckage in the south.
Five more turn toward us.
I swallow hard against the smoky air and accept the facts. I can call them. I just can’t truly control them.
This would’ve been good information to have before I decided to see if the transmitters would bring up more than one creature.
Before panic can strike, obliterating my ability to plan my way out of this, Rufus launches himself from the doorway of his house and slams into me, knocking us both to the ground.
“Stop!” he screams as he grabs my hands and tries to wrest the device away from me.
“Get off me.” I elbow him. “They’re coming, you idiot. Get off me before they crush us both!”
Suddenly, Rufus grunts, his eyes glazing with pain. I stare past him at the Commander, who yanks his sword out of Rufus’s back and shoves the man off me with the toe of his boot.
“Get up,” he says, reaching down to help me to my feet.
I stare at him. “You saved my life. Again.”
His scar twitches. “I saved the device and held to our mission. Now get those beasts away from us so we can leave.”
I hit the buttons to send the beasts east again and freeze as the tanniyn who were crashing through the south side of the street whip their heads toward us. Their claws dig into the rubble as they shudder, jerking their heads east and spewing billows of smoke from their nostrils.
“They aren’t moving,” the Commander says.
“I know that.”
“Send them east.”
“I’m trying. It’s like the longer they hear the signal, the better they can resist moving away from it.”
The tanniyn shake their heads and roar, a deafening rumble that nearly sends me to my knees as the ground shivers beneath me. The Commander stumbles, and I catch him before he can fall.
“Yes, without me. It’s going to take all of my concentration to work the device. I can’t worry about whether I might accidentally kill you.” I look in her eyes and understand her struggle. Willow is a fighter, not a runner. “Get Nola and Jodi to safety.” I lower my voice as the Commander strides toward us, his eyes on the tech. “If he’s the only one who comes out alive, shoot him.”
Willow leans down and grabs my shoulders in a rough half embrace. “Come out alive, Logan.” Then she wheels her horse around and takes off at a gallop, Nola and Jodi on her heels, while behind me the ground erupts with a deafening roar.
It sounds like a wall collapsing. Like a thousand snarling cougars.
Like death.
Beside me, one of the tall metal poles that line the street snaps at its base and crashes down, pinning a man beneath it. He screams, but the sound is lost in the gut-churning thunder of the tanniyn that explode out of the ground in a mass of glistening black scales and puffs of smoky air.
Chunks of the road rain down on the surrounding buildings. Glass shatters. And the beasts pour out of the hole and into the street.
Everywhere I look there are huge, black, glistening creatures with milky eyes and spikes running down their backs. Streams of fire scorch the air as the creatures strafe the road. There are so many. A dozen. Maybe more. The ground trembles beneath them, and it’s hard to keep my footing.
If this is what happens when I amplify the device’s signal with two transmitters, I shudder to imagine what will happen when I attach the rest of the transmitters to Melkin’s staff and use it against the Commander.
A circle of destruction. Impossible to survive.
I back away from the road and move my fingers over the buttons to send the beasts south. They surge forward, crushing metal poles, snapping trees, and barreling through brick walls and into buildings that immediately become blazing infernos as the creatures spew fire.
Men leap from second-story windows, landing hard in a tangle of limbs. Most are quickly crushed beneath the monstrous creatures. The tanniyn are nearly the size of a small house. Twice as big as the long, rusted yellow vehicle we saw when we entered the city. In moments, the entire south side of the street is burning.
“Turn them west,” the Commander says, his eyes on the device.
“I plan to turn them in every direction,” I say. “I promised not to leave a single highwayman alive to hunt us down.”
My fingers are steady as I press the buttons to send the beasts east where warehouses and wagons line the street. The beasts roar, spitting fire at one another and anything else that moves as they twist and claw their way up the street away from us. Behind them, the buildings they plowed through sway uncertainly and then begin to crumble, raining ash and flaming debris.
“Get back!” The Commander’s hand is rough as he shoves me aside seconds before another metal pole slams into the ground where I was just standing. My back hits the wall of Rufus’s home, and the shock of the impact is nothing compared to the shock of being saved by the Commander twice in twenty-four hours.
I start moving toward the stables. In seconds, the tanniyn will have destroyed the eastern edge of the camp. I want to be near my escape plan before I have to turn them back toward us. Especially as it’s clear that while the device might be powerful enough to call over a dozen tanniyn, and its signal might be enough to drive them in the direction of my choice, the effects are short-lived. Seconds after my fingers leave the device, the beasts turn in whichever direction they please. Another sonic signal from me jerks them to the east again, but not for long. Soon, four of them plunge north into the city streets. Another two return to the wreckage in the south.
Five more turn toward us.
I swallow hard against the smoky air and accept the facts. I can call them. I just can’t truly control them.
This would’ve been good information to have before I decided to see if the transmitters would bring up more than one creature.
Before panic can strike, obliterating my ability to plan my way out of this, Rufus launches himself from the doorway of his house and slams into me, knocking us both to the ground.
“Stop!” he screams as he grabs my hands and tries to wrest the device away from me.
“Get off me.” I elbow him. “They’re coming, you idiot. Get off me before they crush us both!”
Suddenly, Rufus grunts, his eyes glazing with pain. I stare past him at the Commander, who yanks his sword out of Rufus’s back and shoves the man off me with the toe of his boot.
“Get up,” he says, reaching down to help me to my feet.
I stare at him. “You saved my life. Again.”
His scar twitches. “I saved the device and held to our mission. Now get those beasts away from us so we can leave.”
I hit the buttons to send the beasts east again and freeze as the tanniyn who were crashing through the south side of the street whip their heads toward us. Their claws dig into the rubble as they shudder, jerking their heads east and spewing billows of smoke from their nostrils.
“They aren’t moving,” the Commander says.
“I know that.”
“Send them east.”
“I’m trying. It’s like the longer they hear the signal, the better they can resist moving away from it.”
The tanniyn shake their heads and roar, a deafening rumble that nearly sends me to my knees as the ground shivers beneath me. The Commander stumbles, and I catch him before he can fall.
