First Soul

Chapter Eighteen

The events that followed happened very quickly although to my eyes the time slowed down so I could see every excruciating second of it. I thanked whoever it was for this, it couldn't be the puppet master as it worked in my favour, and so far, the puppet master was against us.

I knew that Phillip was free falling below me. The look on his face before falling through the hole was a combination of trust and complete shock. The trust Phillip had given me was not one I deserved but one I was so grateful for. I could hear Deyna screaming, her cries were for Phillip. I had the dog to deal with. When had the dogs grown this big? I shook my head, it was irrelevant. I ran towards the dog in an attempt to counter the attack. If you stood still, you risked taking on hundreds of pounds of weight. It would hurt, I was sure. But if you ran at the thing that was coming at you, the weight and power of the two things would clash in the middle. There was a balance.

Well, I hoped so.

Teeth snapped hungrily as I charged and cried out as we clashed. I'd managed to knock the huge dog off balance hard enough for me to gain the upper hand.

One to me.

Nil to the puppet master.

The dog flew back into its comrades, yelping in pain. I rushed towards Deyna. I didn't care about the wooden slats. We were getting off this bridge right this second.

"Run!"

I grabbed her hand and ignored her punches.

"How could you! How could you!" she repeated over and over again.

"I had to do it! It was the only thing we had time to do!"

"You killed him! You killed him!"

A piece of wood crumbled beneath Deyna's feet, and I felt the intense jerk on my arm as her legs fell through the hole. I cried out and pulled her out of the hole.

"Lester! Do it!"

A spark so bright shot out from behind us. I turned, as did Deyna, to see what Lester would do. I didn't know how Lester knew what I wanted, but I was just happy it had worked. Twice now I'd simply nodded at Lester and the man had known what to do.

Our connection was getting stronger.

We continued to run whilst looking back at the brilliance that was Lester. If anything loomed ahead of us, we were doomed as neither of us were watching where we were going. Sparks cascaded down along the bridge, a lovely, pure white firework sparkled, zooming into the air and falling like tiny stars across the bridge. Lester flew up and down and around the bridge, gaining in speed with each loop in the air. Lester continued flying around the dogs, which by the looks of things was sending them absolutely crazy. They didn't know which target to rip first. Some continued to charge at us, others were pouncing at Lester, some already hedging their bets but failing as they plummeted to the dark abyss below.

Luckily for us, the fire spread quickly and the dogs that were chasing us realised this. The fire moved quicker than a snake, the rope burning up like it had been soaked in a flammable liquid. Lester shot ahead, allowing us to finally see the end of the bridge. With a new surge of strength, I tightened my grip on Deyna's hand as I concentrated on the end and not on the fire that was licking away at the old, dry rope.

"Deyna, go!"

I pushed her ahead of me. She couldn't run quickly enough but maybe she would have a better chance of hitting the hard ground. The bridge fell from beneath our feet. The last of the wood fell away, and I took a deep breath before jumping, hands outstretched, trying to grab at the end of the cliff.