LOT'S MOUNTAIN

CHAPTER FORTY-TWO: Se Endefæstend

Somebody drags me out of the water and throws me on the bank. I couldn't get Jamie out of the church, but I'm holding the baby real close, to keep him as safe as I can. He's crying so hard that snot's running down his face.

Somebody's calling to me. Is that Grim?

I try to say something to him, but all of a sudden there are several loud pops that sound like guns going off. A huge clump of trees next to the Old Bone Woman explodes, sending a wave of sharp glass surging across the monsters.

Then there's another loud CRACK! and then another. And another and another.

And then a loud sizzling noise that sounds like somebody just threw water on a hot skillet.

The monsters don't have any time at all before the whole place erupts in wet popping noises. Seven more clumps of trees splinter into an ocean of glass that rakes across where Drew Sherman has the humans. They're real lucky, though. Most of the people sitting up there duck in time and just get some pieces across their arms and stuff like that.

But it's not over. The ground starts shaking, like we're in the middle of an earthquake. Before the monsters can do anything, the ground shakes and splits open. Two girls near me scream as they start to slip into the dark gully.

As quick as he can, Father Sherman jumps up and grabs the one closest to him, jerking her out of the way. The younger one ... I'm yelling out and trying to scramble to over to her, but I'm too slow. I'm still hanging onto the baby. The girl that's not with Father Sherman loses her balance and starts to fall into the darkness. Just before she's all the way swallowed by the gaping hole, Grim snags her outstretched hand and POOFS! her out of the way. They reappear right next to me.

Down by the lake, the Huntsman's shouting orders. Several curs race up to the hill toward us.

Something explodes out of the crack in the hill, flinging rocks and tufts of grass everywhere. It looks like a fat-bodied lizard with stumpy legs. What was probably once blue-green fur is now glass that juts up all around its dog-sized body. Glass horns stick up all down its back. Its thick tail tapers down like an alligator's and has clusters of long thin spears of glass at the end. Its red eyes are huge and slitted like a snake's.

The thing turns to face me, its mouth gaping open to show its too-big yellow teeth. Why the hell is it always me?

Maybe because I told the Glass Man to kiss my ass by waltzing in and screwing with his little ceremony.

Leaping over us, some curs put themselves between us and the glass thing. Their ears fold back as they snarl a warning.

It hisses something and then four more things just like it leap out of the gash in the hill. The things scramble forward. The cur's claws rake across one, shattering it and suddenly the air is full of living splinters. But the things ... damn, the splinters become like water, like round beads of liquid glass. Some slip down the cur's throat and dive into its nose. It howls and wails as it drops to the ground. One of the Diwatas, the mountain guardian things, shoves his hands into the ground just like his picking up an armload of mud and sends it hurtling at the other glass things. They try to scuttle out of the way, but three are crushed and buried.

The one that's left paces around us. Grim and me are the only two things standing between these people and this thing. I don't see any of the other humans stepping forward, but then again we are being attacked by a freaky little stegosaurus from hell.

Instead of attacking again, the thing shudders and flies apart, spraying us with glass. More out of instincts than brains, I reach out, shoving my hand into the cloud of splinters that's rocketing at us. And the glass is gone.