Realm of Scamall
Evalle stood on the top of the castle and stared at the landscape Germanus had changed to multicolored hills of sand. No green grass or mountains in the distance today.
She took his desolate landscape to mirror his morose frame of mind over the past day.
She’d pissed him off by suggesting that he was being played. The kidnapper had tricked Germanus.
In his shoes, she’d be roaring mad.
Had it made a difference to Germanus? No.
He’d sent a manticore that outweighed her gryphon by five hundred pounds in to battle with her earlier. The beast had to have come from his private stock.
She was so angry, her gryphon had stomped the monstrous beast in five minutes. She shifted back and yelled at Germanus to send the other ones he kept hidden.
After watching her trash the manticore like it was nothing, the two attack gargoyles lost their usual I-can-kill-you-with-one-wing-tied-behind-my-back expressions and turned to look at their boss.
Germanus had smoldered in furious silence.
Evidently none of the handful of winged creatures kept around to intimidate her had known their boss hid more like them. The beasts listening might not shift into humans, but they understood when she yelled through busted lips, “Stop destroying these creatures, you bloodthirsty bastard. Send out your dragon!”
That had done it. Germanus leaped to his feet, yelled curses at her and stomped away.
After that, his gargoyles watched her with wary eyes, as though they suddenly realized they might not be at the top of the realm food chain.
She didn’t care. Hard to care about anything in this place when you’re doomed.
Running a hand over the sack she wore for clothing, she could feel the hideous crater in her chest. Heavily scarred skin surrounding it would never heal. Her face, arms and legs had been ripped open over and over again. Some of the wounds had managed to heal, but most left a ragged scar a half-inch thick.
Her mouth bled every time she tried to talk around the gash she’d gotten in her last battle.
The pure Noirre in her system played nice with her Medb blood to keep her alive, but whatever spell the kidnapper had used prevented her body from fully repairing itself.
She hadn’t slept soundly after those first nightmares of being with Storm. But Germanus had been so furious with her after their meeting in his treasure room that she hadn’t dared to sleep at all. She’d moved constantly, never sitting down, even putting weight on her bad leg and causing pain on purpose, just to stay awake. She was reaching the stage of seeing things she doubted were actually there, like ghosts of people she’d known.
At one point earlier today, she’d started talking to Adrianna, then stopped when the ghostly face didn’t answer.
Germanus had laughed and said, “You have to sleep sometime, Evalle.”
Not until she died.
She hoped Daegan was up to the task of killing her. She hated to put him in that position, but she’d rather die by his dragon than for Storm to spend his life trying to get her out of here. And he would.
A tear slipped out.
She swiped it away with a vicious slap of her hand.
Germanus would not see her break.
Speaking of the hemorrhoid on the ass of a demon, Germanus stepped out on the roof, accompanied by his pair of hulking gargoyles, and walked over to her.
When she ignored him, he asked, “What? No mouthy comments?”
“Nope, just another day with you, dickless.” She sent a sharp look to his groin. Yes, she was feeling mean today and what better target than Germanus? She fought his stinking battles and suffered slow recovery that would never truly heal. He didn’t dare attack her for fear of losing all evidence of manhood.
If only he would end up stuck in here for an eternity.
She’d have someone to verbally torture.
Coming up with nasty barbs would keep her busy. Wasn’t that what she heard some humans talk about? Keep your mind active as you age.
Germanus must have decided this conversation would be better without his guards. A wave of his hand apparently gave the two gargoyles leave, because they took off over the side of the castle wall. “I look forward to leaving you in this place when I escape, Evalle.”
“I have a feeling you’re going to be right here with me, oh great leader.”
“Why do you keep trying to feed me that lie?”
She finally turned, a feral smile in place. “I seem to be the only person in Scamall who can handle the truth. I’ve accepted my future. Why is it so hard for you to accept yours?”
“Perhaps I need to give you another demonstration with the other twin.”
Good one, Germanus. She’d spent the last two realm days dazed from total lack of sleep, blood loss and a corrupted mental state. She knew not to aggravate Germanus, but sometimes the words spilled out without any thought. Then he made a threat that slashed right through the pain in her chest and bludgeoned her heart.
But he would only use those threats as long as he thought they would hurt her emotionally.
Turning to him, she tried to spin the tables. “I have made friends with your beasts, Germanus. They know I’ll shield them from harm if I can. Their greatest threat is you sending them to their deaths and they’re starting to realize it. I have also realized you can’t kill a beast in this realm, not by your hand, can you?”
His surprise was all the answer she needed to continue. “If you were someone special to Abandinu, he would not have punished you by leaving you in here with no humans for company. I salute him for taking away your ability to try to rape me, key word being try. Abandinu clearly likes winged creatures, especially majikal flying ones. What’s he going to say when he realizes how many of his pets you’ve smashed?”
Germanus said nothing, but his eyes told how much he wanted to kill her.
Looked like she had found a nerve.
In that case, she would see what it would take to snap that nerve. She took a step toward him and lowered her voice. “Bring another teenager, or anyone else from my former life, to this miserable place to harm them and I will show you what happens when I turn one of your favorite beasts against you.”
“You can’t do that,” Germanus mumbled. No conviction in that statement.
“Really? You sure about that? Did you not find out exactly what you were bringing into your sick little zoo when you made a deal for me? Let me clue you in just in case the kidnapper who has played you perfectly to this point failed to share everything. I have Medb and Belador blood. I’m a gryphon who shifts to human and ... wait for it ... I talk to other flying creatures mind to mind.”
Not exactly true since she hadn’t been able to communicate with the others here, but back home she could speak telepathically to other Belador gryphons and a dragon.
Germanus failed to fold and start pissing his pants, which would have confirmed a direct strike.
Damn. She’d so hoped for a loss of control on his part.
But neither did he boast that he would show her how wrong she was and bring the other twin.
For now, he seemed to at least be thinking about her words.
That wouldn’t last long.
She had been figuring out how to screw with Germanus, but it only lasted for a short time until his pea-sized brain realized she sometimes bluffed.
She wasn’t sure how she’d stop him next time her lie didn’t work and he decided to drag someone she loved in here again.
Of course, if she stayed here long enough she might find a way to communicate with the other creatures. The small group she hadn’t killed when she’d been forced to fight were wary of her, as they should be. She would have killed them, too, if she hadn’t figured out how to use her kinetics to pin them down until they quit fighting. Then she’d walk away in her gryphon form and they’d struggle back to standing.
More than once, she’d glanced back to find the creature staring at her in confusion.
The only person she wanted to maul and dismember at this point was Germanus. She’d never use her powers against a human, but he had given up that status in this place.
Inside the castle, he’d found an effective way to hold her emotions hostage.
Instead of burning the body after killing Kardos, Germanus had suspended the remains in the center of the castle. No scent of death lingered, just the balled-up, lifeless body inside an impossibly small cage. Every time she saw it, her mind replayed the vision of Kardos being killed … with sound.
For all the times she’d protected the twins, one had faced a brutal death because of her.
The first time she’d seen the macabre chandelier, she’d stopped to stare at it. She couldn’t even see his beautiful face.
The fucking gargoyle that took him away had destroyed anything recognizable.
If the day ever came for her to see Storm again, he would know the minute he opened his empathic senses that she was empty inside. Germanus had managed to annihilate her soul.
Yet again, she was glad she had not bonded to Storm.
What would he be going through right now if they had?
Both gargoyle guards that had appeared with Germanus had flown over the castle wall. Now they started making their signature loud noises below her.
She leaned over to see what was going on. They were pounding on the castle walls. What could have upset that pair?
“You will regret all you have said,” Germanus called from behind her.
When she looked around, he was grinning like he’d won the preternatural lottery. “The time has come for my escape to freedom.”
“What are you talking about?” she asked the maniac.
“We have an uninvited guest in the realm. It has to be Daegan.”
Whipping around to search the horizon, she found nothing, nothing, nothing ... wait.
There.
Giant wings flapped against the stark background.
Germanus was wrong.
That was not just Daegan and she was sick about it. “Oh, Daegan, why did you bring my gryphon pack?” she whispered.
Germanus walked up and spoke softly in her ear. “You will battle now and fight with all your might.”
“No.” She would send everyone home where they would be safe. She trusted Storm and the Beladors to protect those she loved.
This time Germanus gloated. “Look back down to the steps at the entrance.”
When she leaned over the two-foot-thick parapet again, she saw the terrified face of Kellman. His mouth had a rag tied around it. One of the gargoyles lifted a claw that was longer than her hand and held it above the twin’s chest.
She screamed, “Noooo.” As she yelled, she leaped up on the wall and jumped.
Germanus shouted, “Stop her!”
Her gryphon exploded out of her body. She was beyond feeling pain. Her wings flexed out and she banked away just before smashing into the stones below.
Turning in the air, she headed back to dive-bomb the gargoyle holding Kellman, who kicked and fought.
The second gargoyle appeared and stepped in front of his sidekick to launch himself at Evalle’s gryphon, hitting her hard and knocking her sideways.
Spinning in the air, she tucked her wings and landed in a slide. Sand blew up in a blast.
Germanus yelled down, “I give you my word he will live if you battle the dragon, Evalle.”
When the dust cleared, the gargoyles and Kellman were gone.
The seven flying creatures she’d battled were perched along the top edge of the castle staring down at her.
They all wore faces of her friends who were gryphons.
She shook her head.
The hallucination vanished, but her flying army still waited for her to lead them. Taking a running start that wobbled with her crooked leg, she pushed up, catching air as she flapped to lift off. She circled the castle and on the second time around, she swooped across the top of the parapets, screeching at the creatures.
They must have understood that as a battle cry.
Every one of them lifted off behind her.
She had no choice but to battle her dragon king.
If Daegan was with them, she had to convince him to get everyone out of here before Germanus unleashed his own dragon, which would have to be more powerful in this realm.
If Germanus had convinced her of anything, it was that he did rule this realm.
Her mind replayed what to tell Daegan and … it hit her. She could use telepathy. Not yet. She’d been able to access her kinetics more than once when she flew further from the castle. Germanus had ultimate power here, but he’d clearly never practiced enough with it to know his limitations.
But she’d never spoken to anyone telepathically here either.
Looked like a learning curve coming up for everyone.