Rise of the Warrior of Everfen

Chapter 71: The Two Beasts

Erinne hitched up her skirts and stooped, removing the knife from her boot and looked through the hallway. Her breath rattled out of her and the baby in her stomach had gone strangely still in the wake of her fear.

How did it get inside? The guards were still scrambling to lock up the entire castle. Had it already been inside? Had it somehow broken down a yoked door? She worked to calm her mind, calm her racing heart, when she heard a woman start screaming somewhere inside the castle.

No...Erinne shook her head, it's a man.

His scream was pure, high pitched terror. The kind of scream that drove people to the brink. Her ears buzzed as it fell quiet in the castle again. Andol clung to her as tears rolled down his face, instinctively understanding that they were in danger but he stayed quiet. The same could not be said of a child in the other room.

A pit sank into her gut as they all started crying out at once, "Mommy?! I want my Mommy!"

"What was that?"

"I'm scared!"

Andol shoved his hands over his ears and more fear crept into his small frame as he started shaking. She could hear a servant trying to get the children to be silent but she was failing. They were sitting ducks, waiting to be killed, drawing in the monster with their wails of terror. She looked down at Andol. She should move him now. She should take him down the hall and lock them both in a room. It just wasn't in her to abandon innocent children. She couldn't leave babies to be slaughtered.

Erinne rose from her crouched position and grabbed Andol around the wrist, "Come on, baby, we have to help them!" She dragged him along behind her as she bolted back towards the room she'd just left behind. As she ran inside, she shouted, "Quiet! Everyone quiet!"

The older children were startled into silence while several caretakers still struggled with some of the smaller ones. "She won't stop!" The wet nurse cried out.

"Make her stop!" Erinne hissed. If she didn't, they'd all die. The woman looked terrified and uncertain, but another took the baby from her and pressed her hand over her mouth, quieting her cries.

"Shhh, shhh, baby." She rocked her, eyes wide and panicked but the infant started to settle.

"Move to that closet, quickly!" She urged them and turned back towards the door, motioning to Andol. "Baby, see that wooden plank? That yoke?"

Snarling filled the hallway outside, she could hear farther, distant shouts as guards scampered around the castle, searching for the animalistic beast. Erinne's heart ran cold as she saw out through the open doorway, her hand resting on the wooden door. She could see it.

Her hand trembled as she closed the door with agonizing slowness so she wouldn't draw it's attention while the women and children shuffled towards the closet. They didn't move fast enough. They should have been running.

She finished closing the door as gently as she could and twisted her head. Andol was frozen just feet from her, staring at the door that now blocked his view, but it was clear by the terror on his face that he'd seen it. He'd seen the monster out there. Still trembling, she kept her hand pressed against the door and pointed at the yoke again, "Andol," her voice was low, "come my little warrior, be strong, get the yoke for me."

She heard him gulp and the color had drained from his face, but somehow he turned and walked towards it, lifting it with more strength than any human child his age could. When he brought it closer, she took it from his hands and hoisted it upwards to lay it across the door when something slammed into it.

A short gasp escaped her lips as the wooden door was flung back against her, the wood breaking and shattering. It rained down around her head as a chunk of it collapsed onto her and knocked her backwards. She felt her back collide with the wall next to the door, somehow keeping her balance but the dagger slipped from her hands.