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ROSI

“We haveto lure Yutu to the top of the resort,” I said, pacing in front of the waterfall as its white spray sloshed against the sides of the AC glass. “But how?”

“I’ll be the bait,” Ila said, spreading her arms wide.

“That’s not going to work,” I said, appreciating her bravery. “You aren’t supposed to go up there, remember? Grandfather’s warning?”

Her face fell, and she sat on a rock at the base of one of the walls. “Even if we get him to come after you, how will you get up there before he reaches you?”

I looked up and had to agree. If I climbed, it would take forever and a day. “Hover disks,” I said, spotting some lying at the base of the waterfall.

I’d nearly reached them when Ila screamed. I spun around to find her pointing at the rocks above. When I looked up, I found the atshen scaling the side of the rocks at an inhuman speed, like an arachnid with oddly bent limbs. He paused and opened his enormous mouth, revealing rows of stained teeth.

Hello, tasty morsel, he said in my mind. You will be fun to devour.

Gagging, I doubled over, holding my roiling stomach as he flashed pictures in my mind. Pictures of me screaming as he bit into my flesh. I haven’t played with my food in many years, he added, showing me a vision of him ripping my clothes off and trailing his claws down my body.

“Get out of my head!” I screamed, yanking the hover disks from the ground and activating them.

"Leave her alone!" Ila yelled at the same time, and his head swung toward her. “I am your daughter.”

He paused his descent, no more than twenty meters from the bottom, then dropped to the ground, landing on all fours before rising up onto two legs. Despite his twisted, lean body, he had to be ten feet tall. While his size astounded me, the unnatural look of him made me ill, like his existence was an affront to the rules of physics and hurt to look at.

“One of my girls had a girl,” he said in a sibilant voice. Ila braced herself as he reached forward with a clawed hand, stopping just before her face. “I remember your mother. She was gifted to me—a lovely offering. So ripe but so innocent. Yet when I accepted her, I was run from town.”

Ila spit at the floor between their feet. “You sick bastard.”

He made a sound that I assumed to be a laugh as he threw his head back. “You’re the bastard, daughter. And I am hungry—so hungry.”

“You just ate,” I said, balancing on the hover disks.

He whipped his head toward me and laughed again. “The more I eat, the hungrier I grow. That is my curse to bear. But I will take my time with you. You remind me of them, you know.”

“You should have died. Why didn’t you die?” Ila yelled, and the metal of her blade flashed in her hand as she lunged.

“Ila, no!” I screamed, but it was too late. He grabbed her wrist and twisted, forcing her to drop the weapon and fall to her knees. But he lifted her by the arm so that she dangled in the air, kicking and screaming.

“My blood runs through your veins,” he said, raking a claw down her side like a zipper. Blood sprayed out. “So I cannot ingest you. I did not die because I am immortal, and those beneath me have no consequence. Therefore, daughter, you are no more than a mistake—a parasite that grew in your mother because I should have consumed her completely and not stopped myself from reaching my full potential.”

The handle of my own dagger felt heavy and awkward as I raced toward them on the disks. I bent low to keep my balance and threw the weapon as he spoke. It hit below the arm that held up Ila, and he dropped her to the floor where she landed in a heap, a puddle of scarlet spreading out beneath her.

“You’ve cost me enough, little girl. Now you will suffer and beg for death.” He collapsed in on himself so that he was bent like an insect again. His head turned at an impossible angle, and he opened his mouth so wide, I thought he could swallow me whole.

Leaning down to grasp the bottom of the disks for added speed, I raced away from him as fast as I could. Seeing him wasn’t necessary since I heard him scrambling along the rocks to my right as I rose higher and higher, my eyes locked on the uppermost dome of the resort and the brilliant diamonds twinkling through.

I was going to make it.

Then the disk beneath my left foot snapped to a stop so abruptly that I lost my balance and fell sideways, my head down, hair falling toward the earth as I dangled impossibly in the air, still two stories short of my goal. My bag with my crystals slid from my shoulder, and I watched in horror as it plummeted to the ground below.

I rotated, coming to a stop inches from the face of my nightmares. He cocked his head to look at me and opened his jaw, revealing what would likely be my end. I had no words left, just the rapid rise and fall of my chest as he drew me closer. A long, gray tongue slithered from his mouth and dragged across my cheek, drawing a whimper from me.

“You taste like heaven,” he whispered, the scratchy surface of his tongue leaving a burning sensation on my skin.

“Please.” Apparently, I wasn’t beyond pleading. I’d cower if it meant preventing the worst kind of death I could conceive of.

“So easy to make you beg. It brings parts of me I thought long dead to life.” He hoisted me up over his shoulder and knocked the disks from my feet. I hung over his back as my only means of escape crashed to the ground below.