by Jeff Gunhus
I looked to Daniel and Will. They seemed just as puzzled. Eva’s heightened vampiric senses were at work, and I realized they might be the edge we needed to be successful.
“We need to get our weapons,” Daniel hissed.
The stretch of bone-filled sand was about the length of two basketball courts. That may not seem like much, but when your vampire friend tells you there is a giant monster lying in wait under the sand to devour you, it starts to look like a long distance run.
“Eva, we can’t feel it or smell it,” I told her. “You’re our eyes and ears. Can we make it to the weapons?”
Her eyes darted back and forth, as if she was seeing something I couldn’t. Then even I spotted tiny ripples in the floor. A bulge of sand. A bone fragment twitched from something moving beneath it.
“It’s massive,” Eva whispered.
“We can’t very well just wait here for it to come get us,” Will declared. “I’ll draw it this way. You guys go for the weapons.”
“Will, no!” I cried.
But it was too late. Once a thought entered Will’s mind, it was usually only a matter of seconds before he acted on it. That impulsiveness had gotten him into a lot of trouble over the years but probably saved his life on more than one occasion. I was sure running off to attract the attention of the Boros by himself was in the trouble category.
“Hey, Boros!” Will shouted as he ran along the base of the circular wall to our left. “Over here!”
“Come on,” Daniel said. “We can’t help the crazy bugger when the Boros comes if we don’t have our weapons.”
He was right. We turned and sprinted to our right, working our way the opposite direction around the circle. A few seconds later, Eva whisked past us as if we were standing still, her vampiric powers making her two to three times faster than either Daniel or me. She reached the stack of weapons when we were still halfway around the edge. She didn’t even break stride. Running at full speed, she bent down, grabbed two swords and a shield from the pile, and continued around the outer circle. Right toward Will.
Before she could reach him, and just before we reached the weapons, the Boros attacked.
The monster burst from the ground with such fury, sand and bones exploded into the air. The force of it blew me off my feet and threw me hard against the rock wall. Daniel hit the wall next to me and crumpled to the ground with a grunt.
A high-pitched shriek filled the air, so loud that I had to cover my ears from the pain. After the first burst of sound, it changed into a lower register and became a roar like from a lion or tiger. Well, maybe from a few dozen lions or tigers. I felt the roar in my chest in a low vibration that I thought might shake the bones right out of my body. At least it wasn’t the piercing scream that felt like it would shred my eardrum.
I crawled to my knees and tried to get a look at the creature. At first, the cloud of sand and bones made it impossible to see. Dust hung in the air, a giant shadow in the center of the arena. But as this cleared, terrifying details of our adversary came into few.
The Boros was a mash-up of several creatures all in one body. It stood on thick hind legs, like a dinosaur’s, and reared back, clawing the air with smaller arms that had wicked, barbed claws on the end. An armor-plated tail with spikes on it extended behind, thumping on the sand as the Creach moved.
Dark red scales covered the heavy body, glistening in the light from dozens of torches around the arena. Two sets of leathery wings stretched out from its spine and spread in the air like an insect flaring its wings. All of that sounds like I’m describing a dragon, but trust me, this was no dragon.
First, there was the head. While everything about the body suggested some kind of serpent or dragon, the Boros’s head was a complete surprise. It looked like an enormous bull with bulging eyes, a snout with flaring nostrils hanging with long strands of thick mucus, and black, curved horns. As if that wasn’t bad enough, I realized it was just the first head.
The Boros’s second head had been hidden behind the first, and I didn’t see it until it leaned back and let out a blood-curdling howl. This head was even more bizarre. Covered with coarse black fur, it had forward-facing beady eyes that glowed yellow. It had a long, fang-filled snout that would have made it look like a wolf except for the corkscrew horns on either side of its head where the ears ought to have been. I’m not sure which head, the bull or the wolf, was crazier looking. Bottom line, this thing was one ugly looking Creach.
“Jack, catch!” Daniel called.
Looking up, I saw my sword flying through the air toward me. I snatched it by the well-worn hit and sprang to my feet.
I didn’t need to say anything to Daniel because he was already charging at the Boros with all his might.
As I ran toward it, the ground beneath my feet crunched from all of the bones brought up from the depths. I wondered how the beast was able to burrow through the earth, but I didn’t have much time to think about it before the Creach tried to burrow one of the spikes on its tail through my chest.
I jumped just in time to avoid the worst of the tail, but I couldn’t get high enough to clear it completely. It nicked my lower legs and spun me in the air. I landed headfirst, missing the scattered bones and falling on a clear patch of sand.
Daniel brought his sword down on the tail with a battle cry, but his weapon clanged off the armor and rebounded.
The bull-head spun around, eyes blazing. I heard a strange clicking noise as the Creach drew in a lungful of air, and I smelled charcoal in the air. It was a sound and smell I remembered well from the dragons.
“Daniel! Move!” I yelled.
We’d been in enough battles together that he didn’t hesitate. He sprang forward, diving back over the tail just as a stream of fiery liquid burst from the bull’s mouth. It splattered like gobs of mucus except that they were on fire.
The stuff covered the ground where Daniel had been standing, charring the bones in the sand. The wolf-head spun around to see what his partner in crime was up to. I hoped that would give Eva and Will a chance to break free.
But nothing moved on the opposite side of the Creach.
“Eva! Will!” I bellowed, fearing the worst had already happened. The Oracle’s words came rushing back to me, the warning that all of us might die and the promise that no matter what, at least one of us would.
Finally, Eva and Will appeared on the far side of the Boros. The distraction had been enough to break them free. I saw that Will limped on one leg and Eva had to help him along. We already had one injury.
“You take the bull and I’ll take the wolf head,” Daniel shouted.
We charged forward, jumping over globs of burning goo, swords swinging. The Boros swiveled its enormous body toward us, both heads screaming at us. It came down hard on its arms so that it faced us on all fours, the heads now at our level instead of towering over us.
I swung my sword at the bull-head, aiming for one of its massive eyes. It dodged easily, much quicker than I expected for a monster this size. I ducked a swipe it made with its right arm and felt the air whoosh over the top of my head.
Next to me, Daniel made contact with the wolf-head, sinking his blade into a spot next to the Creach’s nose. That head reared back, roaring. Not in any pain, but definitely angry.
“Watch out!” I cried. The Boros had arched its spiked tail over its own head like a scorpion. From his angle, Daniel couldn’t see it, and he was about to get skewered.
In a blur of motion, Eva rushed up from behind us and pushed Daniel out of the way.
But she wasn’t fast enough herself. The heavy tail smashed into her, knocking her head over heels across the arena. She smacked into the rock wall and sagged to the ground.
Even over the roaring Boros, I heard a cheer from the werewolf crowd gathered above us.
Both monster heads turned toward me. Stepping backward, I tried to draw the Creach away from my friends. I fended off a series of violent attacks, including another spray of fiery mucus.
/> I chanced a quick look over at Eva. She was moving, struggling to get back to her feet. The blow she took would have killed Daniel or me, but not her. I imagined her vampire blood rebuilding the tears in her skin and reforming her broken bones. It was happening slowly, so the damage must have been bad. I just hoped it didn’t take too long because I didn’t know how much longer I could hold off the Boros on my own.
I felt the cold steel of the gate where we had entered the arena against my back. The wolf-head howled, and the bull grunted in a slobber of molten fire. They had me and they knew it. With nowhere to run and no space to maneuver, there was no escape.
Then, just as the Boros reared back for its final, fatal strike, the craziest, most unexpected thing happened.
Chapter 29
The gate behind me slid open and I fell backward in a heap.
The Boros screamed in frustration as the gate closed, taking a full blast of the bull-head’s fire. Then something smashed into the door, hard enough to dent it inward. A second blow added another dent, but the door held.
Hands grabbed at me and I struggled against them. I’d dropped my sword, so I went for the dagger at my waist.
“Jack, wait. It’s just us.”
I froze, and my eyes adjusted to the darkness in the tunnel. I’d never seen a more beautiful sight as the two guys standing there.
T-Rex and Xavier.
“What… how did you…?” I stopped myself. They could have ridden in on the backs of a pack of mugwumps for all I cared. They were there and Xavier had his bag of tricks with him.
“We’ve got to get back in there,” I shouted.
T-Rex looked scared to death, but he nodded. “Do you think we can beat that thing?” he asked.
I looked down and saw that he carried a mean-looking crossbow with one of Xavier’s canisters screwed into the top of the bolt where the arrowhead would normally be. He shoved it into my hands.
“How powerful is the explosive on that bolt?” I asked.
Xavier shrugged. “I haven’t had time to properly test –”
“Is it a big or a small explosion?” I shouted.
“Big,” he replied. “Pretty big, I think.”
Xavier dove into his backpack again, rummaged through it, and came up with new items. He held three small bags in his hand and gave me another arrow with a canister on top. He shook his head. “But I don’t think the arrows will be powerful enough. Its armor looks too thick.”
“We’ve got to try,” I said. “Open the door, T-Rex. Let’s get into the fight.”
T-Rex yanked on a pulley next to the door, and the mechanism cranked the door open, revealing the Boros in the center of the arena. Will attacked one side and Daniel the other. I spotted Eva stumbling toward the fight, not quite recovered.
T-Rex, Xavier, and I ran into the pit, yelling at the top of our lungs.
Xavier threw three bags at the Boros. When they burst open, clouds of smoke filled the air, giving us the extra cover we needed.
The Boros turned to face this new threat, both heads screeching angrily at sight of the prey that had gotten away.
Will and Daniel used the opportunity to press their attack, getting dangerously close.
Soon, we had the thing encircled, the six of us united again, ducking in and out of the cover provided by Xavier’s smoke bombs.
The Boros lunged at whichever one of us was closer, the two heads sometimes going in opposite directions, yanking them both back with a snap.
We had it confused. It started to make bad decisions out of frustration, lunging too far forward and leaving itself open for a cut here, another blow there. I decided to go for broke.
“Heads up!” I yelled. “Everyone get back!”
Everyone turned and ran toward the outer walls. The Boros froze, then slowly turned toward me, realizing it was caught in a trap.
“Sorry, big guy,” I said. “But this is what you get for messing with the Black Watch.”
I took aim with the crossbow and let the bolt fly. It arced perfectly through the air and hit dead center in the massive Creach’s chest.
The explosive detonated in a gigantic ball of flame. A wave of heat blasted over me, and I dropped to the ground with my arms up to cover my face. It was way more powerful than I’d expected. Xavier was likely grinning from ear to ear.
I looked up, expecting to see the gruesome wreckage of the monster littering the arena. Instead, all I could see was the white smoke from Xavier’s smoke bombs mixing and swirling with the black smoke from the explosion.
It all hung low in the arena like a fog over a swamp.
Everything was silent. Even the werewolf spectators stood hushed. I glanced up at the rock promontory where Kaeden remained motionless, his face caught in a wince of pain.
My confidence surged. Surely, Kaeden could see into the smoke from where he stood better than I could. I read the look of pain on his face as a sign that he’d been beaten. That he knew I was going to ask for the Jerusalem Stone as my one wish he was in a position to grant me.
But as I watched him, the wince disappeared and slowly but surely turned into a wicked grin.
With a roar, the Boros burst out from the smoke, beating its massive wings so the smoke blew out of the pit, up toward the roof of the cavern where it swirled among the giant stalactites. The werewolves howled in approval as the Boros rose to its full height and stretched our every claw and spike in a display of force.
It was completely unharmed.
My heart sank. If an explosion that size couldn’t hurt this thing, then what good were our puny swords and spears?
I woke up from my little pity party at the sound of Eva’s battle cry ringing in my ears.
She was charging the Boros single-handed as the rest of us stood open mouthed. And she was right. What else was there to do, even in the face of impossible odds? Give up? Not likely.
That was our creed after all. Do your duty, come what may.
In this case, the come what may was a two-headed monster who could breathe fire and barely flinch when what amounted to a bomb exploded in its chest.
But the duty part hadn’t changed. And if this was where we were all meant to face our end, then we would do it with honor.
I ran toward the Boros, crossbow tucked under my arm with the extra explosive arrow in my hand. Ridiculously, I pulled out my dagger while I ran, as if I was going to slay this beast with a blade hardly the length of my forearm. The explosive wasn’t going to work either; I’d just seen that with my own eyes, so the dagger was no more ridiculous than any other weapon any of us were using. Besides, it felt fitting to go out with a blade in my hand.
Eva engaged the bull-head, dodging jets of fiery goo, getting in small cuts and stabs on the soft tissue around the mouth, but not really doing anything to hurt it.
Instead of taking positions about the monster like we had before, we clustered together this time. It was as if we all subconsciously wanted to be together in the end, fighting shoulder to shoulder like we had so many times before.
I managed to slide the bolt into the crossbow and used the hand crank to arm it. I thought maybe if the Boros gave me a shot with its mouth open, then maybe that would be a way out for us. Even then, I was sure the other head would finish us off.
“Keep it up,” Daniel yelled. “Fight to the end.”
We all surged forward, giving everything we had. Eva moved like a blur. Xavier clumsily wielded a spear but did his best with it. T-Rex and Will stood so close together they looked like they had one body with two heads, just like the Boros.
“Watch it,” I yelled as a jet of fire streaked their direction. At the last second, Will saw it and pushed T-Rex out of the way before jumping clear himself.
The image stuck with me, and a thought stirred deep in my mind. The way they were so close together. How the fire almost took them out at the same time. There was something there, I was sure of it. Only I couldn’t….
As if in answer to me trying to think of a
way out, the heads of the Boros screamed louder than anything I’d heard yet. I held my hands to my ears and the others did the same. A second too late, I realized it was a trap.
The Boros crouched low and spun in a circle faster than I thought possible given its size. Its armor-plated tail whipped along the sand covered floor and took all of us out in one mighty swipe.
Fortunately, none of us was hit square on like Eva had been. All of us dodged just enough to avoid serious damage, but each one of us fell, sending our weapons scattering. Every weapon, that is, except the crossbow, and that had nothing to do with me holding it.
In fact, it was tangled in my shirt and just came along for the ride. I landed with it painfully jutting into my ribcage. It hurt, but that was a far cry better than the explosive tip going off, which it could very easily have done if I’d landed in a slightly different angle.
I rolled over onto my back, my ears still ringing from the Boros’s roar. Looked to my left and right, I saw all my friends sprawled out on the ground around me, groaning. The Boros rose up on its rear legs in a triumphant pose.
The werewolf audience ate it up, howling and snarling with delight. The anticipated boring slaughter had ended up given them more fun and interest than they’d expected. Now it was time for the show to end.
The Boros looked to Kaeden, just like a gladiator in ancient Rome looking to Caesar, asking whether to give mercy to the opponent.
The werewolves fell silent, and I heard nothing but my ragged breathing and the thumping of my own heart in my ears. There was a long pause, and I felt a surge of hope that Kaeden would spare our lives.
“Would you like to know why the Boros serves me so faithfully?” he called. He must’ve wanted to stay in the spotlight a while longer.
“Sure,” I croaked, aching all over. It couldn’t hurt to get on his good side.
Kaeden nodded. “Long ago, the Teutonic Knights captured the Boros using the Templar Ring. And with it, they created a pit so deep and slippery, the Boros couldn’t crawl out, so narrow, it couldn’t fly out, and so hard that nothing could escape. Not even a creature used to tunneling through solid rock.”
