Page 56 of Cherry Moon

Bollocks. I slid back across the ground until my spine bumped the upper garden’s wall. Hands shaking, I touched the handle.

Nope. Too painful to pull.

With gritted teeth, my brain worked overtime to figure out the next move. If I pulled it, I might bleed out. Tenshi only knew what arteries and stuff it’d hit.

Screw Bony Hag and her reflexes.

The ground quaked, the vicious fucker moving closer. Every shake magnified the pain, a load of it migrating into my skull.

“Enough of this.”

She flung out her skeletal hand in Zach’s direction. Bone shards shot from her fingertips, cleaving through the air.

I glanced back as they hit him in the palm of each hand and lifted him off his feet, then pinned him to the ground, his arms outstretched.

The katana hit the grass with a heavy thud.

“And so we begin again,” Bony Hag declared.

She was on me in seconds, taking me by the flesh arm, pulling me up to her face level.

My shoulder socket throbbed, gravity and my weight battling her. I kicked out, cursing, struggling to the max.

“What if I begin by taking this arm?” she asked, her face flickering between this one and Mama Rita’s. “A full circle moment indeed.”

Her laughter was a wicked wind in my face, stinging my eyes.

“Then I will pluck out your ribs, one by one.”

“Not if…” Man, the pain rioting in my body wouldn’t let up. “Not if I get yours first.”

More laughter. “Mine? Do not be so absurd, Taker. This is⁠—”

“My end?” I scoffed, delivering a cackle of my own. “Do you know how many times I’ve heard this shit?”

That got no answer, her eyes flashing with menace.

“There is still time, Akira,” the voice spoke. “Take the blade. Call to it as you did in days of old.”

Days of old being the critical word here.

“I don’t want it,” I grumbled.

Because what if me taking it killed G anyway? And what about the window now being closed? What was this, extra time?

Guilt gnawed at me. The world needed me to fight for it again, especially with this latest development.

But I wasn’t sacrificing my man.

“Call to it, Akira. Save yourself. Save your loved ones.”

Bony Hag made a sound, a kind of hacking, gross noise. I half-expected her to spit in my face.

“Time to feed,” she declared. “First your arm, then your ribs, and then your love.”

Her other hand curled around my body, giving herself leverage to pull me like chewing gum.

Oh. Shit.