I See Faeries

~chapter eleven~

Elodin

~

The beast lunged at me again. I suppressed a scream, and rolled to the side. Its five-inch-long claws bit into the tree trunk I'd been braced against, gouging deep furrows in the hard wood. I pointed my knife at it. The weapon seemed puny against a lucine, but it was all I had - aside from Dean. Dean was tiring, though. I was terrified that he might collapse and leave me alone against the demon.

Run, Cass! He shouted in my head. Get back in the lake! I watched the stallion throw himself against the monster, knocking it off its feet without causing any real harm. I stood, but not to run. I wasn't going to swim around while my friend risked his life.

Dean reared up, preparing to bring his hooves down on the slightly stunned beast. I watched as if through eyes that were not my own, as the demon's right foreleg tensed and rose to meet him. The claws flashed in the air, aimed directly at the stallion's belly. My pounding heart leapt into my throat as I lifted the hand that held my knife. I had only one chance. If I didn't succeed, this was it. Dean would be dead, and so would I.

Time seemed to slow as I raised my arm, adjusting my grip on the knife's handle. The blade flashed in the morning sunlight.

You can do this. You can.

I threw it. It sailed through the air like a deadly silver bird toward the two fighting beasts, falling in an arc, lower and lower. It looked like it was about to hit . . .

But it fell short, stabbing into the ground.

Dean's hooves descended. The claws were inches away from his belly, when a certain dark-haired faerie came barreling out of the woods and crashed into him. 

Dean went flying, coming down with a tremendous smack in the lake. Roman landed lightly just past the lucine, rolled, and sprang back to his feet, launching himself at the demon in the same fluid movement. The beast snarled furiously, and the pair became a terrifying blur of slashing claws and inhuman growls. I couldn't even see Roman anymore. It looked like there were two wild animals battling each other - not a faerie and a demon.

I had to do something. I looked behind me for Dean. He was painfully dragging himself from the lake, rivulets of water streaming across his back and sides as he finally stood up on the shore. He looked half dead, and I realized that there wasn't enough time to wait for him to recover. I had to help Roman myself.

I looked around frantically for a weapon, and saw a large broken stick. That'll do.

Cass, whatever you're planning on doing - don't. Dean sounded exhausted, even without speaking aloud. I ignored him, and hefted my stick.

The lucine had Roman pinned to a tree, its claws digging into his arms as it prepared to take a large bite out of his skull. I didn't have time to second-guess myself. I took a deep breath, and stepped closer. "Take this, you ugly brute!" I shouted, and threw the stick with all of my strength.

It hit the demon squarely at the base of its skull, with enough force that the creature roared angrily and immediately whipped around to face me. Roman shouted something unpleasant-sounding in a foreign language as its claws were ripped from his arms, but the pain seemed to barely slow him. He leapt onto its back with a wild yell, and wrapped both arms firmly around its throat. His muscles bulged as he squeezed as hard as humanly - or rather, inhumanly - possible, trying to cut off its airflow. It had to hurt a lot with his injuries, but I didn't know what I could do to help.

And unfortunately for me, the beast seemed more interested in me than him anyway. It tossed its head angrily and stalked toward me. I was backing away as quickly as I could without tripping, because I didn't dare turn my back on it. I knew that the lake was behind me, but I had nowhere else to go.