Page 93 of Wicked Curses
Then, like the intelligent woman she was, Sahira resisted only briefly when he turned her away from the dying immortal. They couldn’t do anything to help against so many of those things. Besides, it was already too late.
Orin led her swiftly down another alley to the end, where they stopped. To their left was nothing. Blood splattered the street to their right, and a single skull remained to mark where an immortal lost their life.
So stripped of flesh and blood, the skull looked hundreds of years old instead of an hour or two. Its jaw hung open as its eyeless sockets stared toward the end of the road and the nothingness beyond. A single hole was in the center of the skull.
That they’d left the skull and nothing else intrigued him, but he didn’t intend to learn more about these things or get close enough to examine one.
Sahira hesitated when he tried to lead her into the open street. He understood she wasn’t as comfortable moving through the shadows as him, but they didn’t have time for this.
Refusing to let her balk against it, he kept his arm firmly across her back as he guided her onward. Beetles soared above them while others skittered over the surrounding walls and buildings.
More of them scampered in and out of the homes, through the doors and windows they’d broken. As they approached the library, Sahira’s head turned toward it, but she didn’t say anything.
From the open doorway, two skulls looked out at them. Each skull had a hole in the center of it where a beetle had sucked out its brain.
A beetle skittered out the door. It ran up the side of the library while another charged across the road, coming within feet of them before taking flight.
The flutter of its wings blew back his hair and clothes. It came so close he saw blood clinging to its legs and bloated belly. He hated these things.
Determined to escape, he guided her into another small alley between some homes. They moved onward through another as they made their way down the roads until they finally emerged across the street from the pub.
It was immediately clear they weren’t getting in the way he’d exited, as scarog beetles crawled over the front of the building, scampered across the porch, and felt their way along the metal shutters.
He didn’t dare tell Sahira where they were going, as the beetles were thicker through here than they’d been throughout all the alleyways. But then, these monsters probably knew most immortals had run for the original buildings and taken refuge in them.
Orin said nothing as he guided her away from the pub entrance and toward another alley. They passed between the store containing some of the concoctions the witches could make in this place and a tailor.
Scarogs had broken into the witches’ shop. He couldn’t see inside too well, but glass fell to the ground as they bumped and fumbled through the small space.
When they made it to the end of the alley, he guided Sahira to the back wall of the tailor’s building, and they flattened themselves against it as they crept past the scarogs happily devouring what remained of a dwarf.
The back of the pub and the wall that hid the secret room came into view. Scarogs were everywhere as they sought some way into the pub and the feast beyond. The beetles crept up the wall of the pub and littered the back alley.
They had to get inside that room, and as darkness spread across the land, they had to do it soon, or they would be the next ones bloating these bugs’ bellies. Orin jerked his head to the right and released Sahira’s waist before sliding along the wall.
They scurried around a scarog sniffing the air with its antennae flicking back and forth. When one of the antennae swiveled toward him, Orin resisted the impulse to break it in half.
He’d very much like to kill every one of these things, but with only a dagger to fight them off, his chances wouldn’t be good.
Then the thing’s head swiveled toward them, and its antennae locked on him.
CHAPTERSIXTY-SEVEN
Orin didn’t knowif a shift in the wind brought their scent to it, if they made a sound only this creature could hear, or if it was because it was getting darker and the shadows were slipping, but he saw the second it registered they were there.
With an inhuman screeching sound, the scarog lunged for them. He pushed Sahira away as one of its mandibles swung toward him. The sharp appendage sliced his shirt open but didn’t touch his flesh as it arced across his middle.
Bending his knees, Orin leapt up and landed on the scarog’s head. When the creature reared, it drew the attention of its friends as Orin ran down its back and jumped on its ass.
A yellowish pus burst out as he smashed it into the ground. The scarog reeled onto its hind legs as its mandibles and pincers flailed at the air.
While the thing was in the air, Sahira ran past it and toward him as the other scarogs scampered forward in a rush of ticking feet and clacking pincers. The shadows slipped away from him as the sun vanished, and no moon rose to replace its light.
The moon would eventually rise, but not in time to provide them cover again. Orin pulled the dagger at his side free. It was practically useless against these things and would let them get far too close for his liking, but it would cut off a few legs and create some holes.
Pushing Sahira ahead of him, he spun as one of the scarogs charged him. Its large claw aimed to hammer him into the ground as it swung at his head.
He threw himself to the side and rolled away in time to avoid getting bashed into the earth. The creature expected him to try to get away and charged forward, but instead, he rolled toward the monstrosity and beneath its head.
