Heir of the Underground

Chapter 27: Leviathan (continued)

Leviathan abandoned his previous method of sprinting, instead stepping on slow, careful feet, listening to the sounds around him. He had no trouble remaining quiet, but Aurelia seemed to be having trouble, constantly stepping on the front of her gown.

Impatiently, Leviathan swiveled around and bent down. Grabbing a fistful of her gown, he ripped, and walked around her, peeling the bottom of the dress off, leaving it in tatters just long enough to keep her skin covered and modest.

She shot him a death look. "Thisbie let me borrow this," she grit out.

"Thisbie will get over it, believe me. This is life or death, Aurelia."

He shifted back around, focusing yet again, listening to the sounds around him. The shadows themselves seemed to whisper, to talk, but they sounded almost ethereal and inorganic, very distinct from...

Leviathan froze. He heard footsteps, not far in the distance, the sound of shoes crunching on the sand that lay on the arena floor, below the fighters' feet. He was certain of it.

He kept walking, Aurelia following close behind on much nimbler feet now that her dress was out of the way.

The sounds drew nearer, louder. And just as they did, Leviathan felt a sudden rumbling beneath him.

"Shit!" he spat. Solanine and Tierre were close, closer than he had anticipated. Not close enough for physical contact, but close enough for their long distance attacks to register.

Leviathan grabbed Aurelia's arm and hopped to the side, then again and again, until they side-stepped the giant crack that formed in the earth. Judging by the size of the gaping fissure, Solanine had been aiming to swallow his siblings whole.

But just as they seemed to be in the clear, out of the danger zone, vines came shooting at them. Not from the ground this time—no. They moved at killer speed, going straight for Leviathan's throat, Aurelia's as well.

Leviathan wrapped a hand around the vine and pressed, digging his fingers in. His strength was enough to crush the vine, leaving it limp and non-threatening. But Tierre and Solanine were playing violent.

So could Leviathan.

Searing heat oozed from his fingertips, withering the very essence of the vine. And all it took was one exhale—one exhale, and then he sent his flames forward, tracing the entire vine back to its origin point.

Just as he had hoped.

Aurelia quickly saw this and mimicked it, doing the same with her own hands.

Even better.

The vines had flown straight and hit them, not up. They hadn't come from the ground. Tierre had pulled them from the ground, held them in her hands, and used her own energy to make them grow, turning them into some kind of extension of her arms.

And now fire was quickly engulfing those arms, leading Leviathan and Aurelia right to where they needed to be.

Perhaps Solanine and Tierre had been the ones to sneak up on Leviathan and Aurelia, to launch an attack first, as Leviathan had hoped to do himself. But they certainly hadn't anticipated something like this to happen against them.

Releasing an agonizing scream, Tierre wrenched her hands away from the vines, severing the connection she had to them. They fell to the ground, still burning, beginning to shrivel and curl up slowly on themselves like a snake.

With Tierre overwhelmed by pain, Leviathan made his move. He grabbed Aurelia, tugging her forward and charged, sending a blast of fire at his step-mother. She fell back, and as hoped, it was enough to bring Solanine closer, drawing him out of the shadows where he had been hiding.