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The captain nodded.
“What happened?”
“We decided we needed help.” Anger flashed across her face. Elven pride didn’t easily allow for outside help. Things were bad.
“How many did you lose?”
“Five of my best. I was lucky to get away with a flesh wound.” She kept her gaze straight ahead. “Others weren’t so lucky.”
I swore under my breath before turning to survey our troops – a handful of elves, me and Dot. We needed more backup. A shifter and a vampire counted for a lot, but if this thing had taken out a band of elite elven warriors, then we were in trouble. And I didn’t think I could rely on the two weird men in a fight.
I sniffed the air and followed the creature’s scent to a stream that flowed around the clearing, innocently gurgling through the forest.
The manticore’s potent stench disappeared into the water. Dzrak. My gaze rested on the two strangers staring across the stream, and I strode over. Time for some answers.
The large one turned to look at me an instant before I slammed him back against a tree. The silver bracelet flew off his hand at the impact. “What the hell is this thing?”
“M…manticore,” he gasped, his throat tight under my forearm. Then he garbled some made-up words I couldn’t understand.
“Don’t mock me.”
The smaller man placed his hand on my shoulder. “Let him go.”
The compulsion made me step back before I realised what had happened. I whirled round and faced the little guy, my teeth bared and my hands shaking as I fought to control my anger and stop the shift rippling through me.
“Don’t ever use compulsion on me again.”
A crossbow clicked.
“Want me to hit them somewhere it hurts?” Dot asked in a singsong voice, as if she was chatting about the weather or her latest crochet project.
I raised an eyebrow at the two strangers. “Your move.”
The taller one swallowed hard, beads of sweat trickling down his forehead. The smaller one, John, sighed. “Enough. It is a manticore.”
I opened my mouth, but he held up a hand to stop my outburst.
“I swear it, but…it is not of your realm.”
“What the dzrak does that mean?”
Another sigh. “I cannot tell you everything.”
I stepped forward again. These secrets were going to get us killed.
“Who are you?”
“We are merely servants. All I can say is that it escaped. It is larger and stronger than the manticores you have here. We were sent here to retrieve it…” He plucked at the gold bracelet on his wrist. “You can leave if you so desire. We will handle the manticore.” John swallowed again, and James looked like he might faint.
I inhaled deeply. “Like dzrak you will. This is under my jurisdiction. People have been hurt. I’m seeing this through.”
“And I,” the captain chimed in, “I will not have you risk elven lives if you fail.”
“I’m in too,” Dot said, smiling so we could see her fangs.
“Now that that’s over with…” I stopped. A thumping sound came from the forest. I spun round, my crossbow aimed towards the noise. “We’ve got company.”
The wait felt like an eternity but was, in reality, less than a minute. All of us tensed, ready to face an otherworldly manticore.
