It was moot, since they were both moving too quickly for him to risk intervening.
As she threw herself to the side yet again, she thrust her arm out. Magic stirred the air as she incanted, raising the hairs on the back of his neck.
Vines burst from the stony ground. Thick green-brown tendrils snaked up Coll’s legs. Writhing and twisting, they held him fast within moments. Coll hardly seemed to notice, still fixed on his target; when he did realize, he brought his arm back as if to throw the hammer in Lila’s direction, but the vines reached for his arms too, freezing him in that pose, wrapping his fists so tightly Benin doubted he could release the hammer even to drop it.
He hadn’t known Lila had levels in druid as well. Just when he’d thought nothing else could surprise him this day.
Surprise quickly turned to alarm when more vines erupted from the path, this time crawling up his own body. He tried to wriggle away, but they held him firmly. Smaller ones even sprouted from the larger to ensnare his fingers and prevent him from casting. A snarl and a yelp behind him confirmed that Pyra was similarly restrained.
He stared around at the barren rocky ground of the trail, a fragment of professional curiosity making him ask, “How did you manage to summon vines here?”
“Nature always finds a way.” Lila straightened her cloak, still breathing heavily.
“There’s nothing natural about any of this.” His eyes narrowed. Saying the words out loud made something click into place. The strange behavior of the badgers, and of those monstrous fish that attacked during the river crossing... “Come to think of it, there’s been plenty of unnatural stuff happening these past few weeks.”
“I assume you’re referring to my dire creatures,” she said conversationally.
“Your dire creatures?”
Her smile this time was genuine, full of pride. “Nature always finds a way,” she said again, “but sometimes it needs a helping hand. That’s what the Beast Cores were meant to be. A helping hand, to encourage struggling species to flourish once more.”
“Yet you threw them at us like they were no more than cannon fodder,” he retorted. “That doesn’t sound like you’re ‘helping’ them.”
Regret darkened her expression, and her smile this time was sad. “No, but it was necessary. And once this task is done, I’ll finally be able to develop and use them for their original purpose. He promised.”
The fanatical expression was back. It sickened and terrified Benin in equal measure to see such an expression on the face of someone he’d only ever known to be logical and intelligent. Whoever this Lord of Light was, he had a lot to answer for. And just what in the hells was a Beast Core?
Full darkness fell, the last vestiges of sunset dropping beneath the horizon on the mountain’s far side. After checking he and Coll were held firmly by the vines, Lila closed her eyes in concentration.
“I saved the most special Beast Core till last,” she said, tilting her face toward the summit. “Wait quietly while we do our work. Don’t interfere, and maybe we’ll spare the gnomes. Though I’m afraid I can’t guarantee the same for you.”
Sixty-Two
Trogloraptor
Corey
At first all I could see above us were the supporting ribs of the shattered dome.
But as the last traces of orange sunset disappeared, Ris’kin’s eye picked out movement. Something was rising from the dome’s remains, as though it had been sprawled on top. Some of what I’d taken for arching metal supports now shifted, revealing themselves to be multi-jointed legs, yellow-brown and hairy.
Dire Trogloraptor Queen
Arthropod
Sensitive to light and heat, the trogloraptor usually avoids the surface, preferring to remain underground. It enters a dormant state during the daytime, relying entirely on its infrared heat-sensing vision at night.
The trogloraptor does not build webs; instead, it waits patiently for prey to pass nearby, its translucent hairs allowing it to blend into its surroundings so long as it remains completely still. Its tendency to appear near tombs, as well as its behavior of digging up and carrying away buried corpses, has earned it the common nickname “grave-robber spider.”
It had been lying up there this entire time, dormant, unnoticed. Now, hooked toes gripped the edges of the circular walls as it raised itself up to tower above my denizens, an eight-legged void blocking out the stars. I couldn’t help but stare in awe.
Unlike most spiders, I saw, this one had a mere six eyes rather than eight. They were blackish-green, tinged with a film of red. And they were focused entirely on Gneil and the acolytes below it.
Slowly, carefully, Ris’kin reached back to unsheathe the twin half-spears from the harness on her back. Adrenaline was surging through her limbs, pushing her to leap immediately upon this new threat in a whirl of snarling and stabbing. Only my will kept her from doing so; the trogloraptor hadn’t yet acted with aggression, and I was unwilling to provoke it just yet.
It just woke up to find us in its territory, I told my avatar. It’s going to want to defend itself. But it’s more afraid of us than we are of it.
I eyed its green-red orbs, its spreading palps, and above all its enormous height.
Probably, I amended.
If we could keep it calm, maybe Gneil could work his weird animal magic on the creature. Or, failing that, we just needed to drive it far enough away from the altar for me to end the exodus in safety.
Then the implications of the creature’s name hit
