“Poison,” Ashure muttered, nodding to a torn bright-blue mushroom lying in the man’s curled, stiff fingers.
Asahi squatted next to the man. He used the tip of the dagger and gently touched a black smudge on the man’s bottom lip. He jerked back when the smudge shrieked and writhed at the touch of the dagger’s point. The magic in the dagger turned it a brilliant white, which then faded. The residue left by the alien turned to ash.
“I guess we now have a definitive answer on what killed them,” Ashure murmured.
Asahi heard a faint flutter of wings, and stood up, facing the back door. He held out the dagger, hilt pointing up, for the lion to land on. Mr. Gryphon shook his body from head-to-toe and wingtip-to-wingtip before folding his wings against his body and sitting down.
“Did you find the missing man?” Asahi inquired.
Mr. Gryphon shook his head. “No, but I found footprints leading into the woods. I followed it as far as I could. I’m tethered to the magic in the dagger, so unfortunately, it wasn’t very far,” he added with an indignant sniff.
Asahi looked through the doorway. Nali was landing just outside. She strode across the yard and into the kitchen.
“Did you discover anything?” Ashure asked.
She shook her head. “Nothing significant. Pai is still searching,” she replied.
“We know for certain it was the alien. There was black residue on one victim’s lip,” Asahi said with a nod toward the body.
“I found footprints leading into the woods,” Mr. Gryphon stated.
“I’ll—” Nali began before they heard their transport’s engine start up.
“By a Sea Monkey’s tit,” Ashure cursed.
Asahi was already speeding through the other rooms, heading for the front door. He pulled it open in time to see the back of the transport fishtailing as the missing Daktyloi stole their mode of transportation. Nali pushed past him, lifting off as she ran. He started after her, but Ashure reached out and gripped his arm.
“Ashure,” he growled, trying to pull his arm free.
“Something is not right, my friend. Besides, you couldn’t catch up with either of them on foot,” Ashure muttered with growing unease.
Asahi pulled his arm free and looked around. There was a strange chill in the air.
“Step back inside,” Ashure murmured.
Asahi slowly moved back into the longhouse. Ashure followed him, shutting the door and sliding the thick iron bar across to secure it. Ashure signaled him to close the window to the left while he took care of the one on the right.
“We need to secure the rest of the house,” Ashure said.
“I’ll take the front. You take care of the back. Make sure you start in the kitchen. The door was still open,” Asahi grimly agreed.
They split up. Ashure disappeared through the doorway leading to the back of the dwelling. Asahi secured the living room area before retracing his steps through the front room to the library. Upon entering the room, he hastened to the windows, closed the heavy iron shutters, and locked them.
The Daktyloi had cleverly engineered slats with tracks at the top and bottom. Polished wooden shutters folded away into the window frame when they were not in use and were easy to close when needed. On the right side was a recessed set of vertical slats which slid across the windows while the left portion threaded a set of horizontal slats through grooves in the first set. This unique crisscross pattern locked the iron shutters and eliminated any weak areas in the event of an attack.
Asahi stepped into the room where he had found the dead woman. He glanced at her before he focused on sealing the windows. He was almost finished pulling the vertical blinds closed when a swarm of bright red beetles hit the window, cracking the thick pane of glass.
To his horror, more beetles appeared. They slammed into the glass, uncaring that the impact cracked their hard bodies and exposed their vulnerable internal organs. He understood why when a stream of black matter oozed from each dead beetle and was eagerly absorbed by another.
Asahi yanked the shutter closed and secured it. Sconces around the room, fueled by magic, illuminated the darkness. He backed away from the window.
“Ashure!” he yelled.
“I saw them,” Ashure grimly replied behind him.
“I suggest that we pick a room and barricade ourselves in,” Asahi asserted.
Ashure nodded before he stiffened and paled. Asahi turned to see what Ashure was staring at and stumbled back into the pirate in horror.
Standing in the doorway was the dead body of one of the male Daktyloi. Asahi’s mind flashed to the zombie movies and television programs he had avoided as a child. He had an intense dislike of horror films.
It took him a split second to realize that the blackness in its eyes was the reason it was moving. He muttered a curse. They should have inspected all the bodies for residual alien matter. They were trapped inside the house with zombies, and the longhouse was under siege by the alien-possessed beetles.
“I hope Nali and Pai are safer than we are,” he breathed.
“Dead Daktyloi to the left,” Ashure grimly answered.
“Do you have your alien killer handy?” Asahi wryly asked.
Ashure uttered a sardonic laugh and pulled his sword out. “I never leave home without it,” he replied with a malevolent smile.
“You take the one on the left, I’ll take the one on the right,” Asahi muttered, surging forward with the gryphon dagger in one hand and his pistol in the other.
Chapter 13
Nali swerved to miss a tree branch when the electric transport disappeared into a tunnel of trees. Her eyes narrowed in determination. She wouldn’t let the Daktyloi driver get away that easily.
Pai noticed what was happening and flew ahead to block the driver’s exit. Nali frowned when she noticed the vehicle was swerving left and right, possibly trying
