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They must be really desperate to summon this thing.
The creation bearing down on her, a monster of living wood, resulted from a hundred or so dark faerie all combining themselves into one entity. They ceased being individual faeries to embody an avatar of hate or wrath, a monstrosity intent on mindlessly destroying anything it saw that wasn’t a dark faerie.
Worse, the amount of power infused within it—bolstered by the standing stones so close by—made it nearly impossible to destroy. At least, it went beyond the scope of the magical abilities Tammy possessed. Even Queen Maple would have one hell of a time destroying it. In fact, she probably couldn’t do it alone. Undoubtedly, it would take the combined effort of multiple faeries and witches to kill it.
They didn’t necessarily need to destroy it, only make sure it didn’t hurt Maple before she could free Annie.
Tammy reached toward the ground, calling out to the earth. A stone arrowhead the size of a dinner plate formed at her command, then rocketed up at the wood giant. She aimed for one of the runes on its chest, not expecting much. It would take more power than she could summon alone to damage the runic markings, but she didn’t care. She hoped to take advantage of two things she knew about such a creature. One: they tended to be so full of rage they didn’t leave much room for intelligence. Two: its life force flowed through those runic carvings. By attacking one such carving, Tammy hoped it would understand she knew exactly how to kill it. Whether or not it could comprehend she lacked the power to do so, she couldn’t say… at least until it roared again—right at her.
“Whatever you just did, I think you pissed it off,” said Allison, taking a step back.
“Yep. My plan.” Tammy threw another stone blade at the same rune. “I want it to understand I know exactly how to kill it.”
This time, the creature got its arm in the way, deflecting the magical projectile off to the side. Tammy bolted, running away from the creature as it reared both fists into the air. The giant, seeing her run, aborted its attack and lurched into a lumbering, shamble of a run that made the ground quake.
“Crap!” yelled Allison as she dove to the side, narrowly avoiding the giant’s foot as it stomped by her.
While it appeared to be ponderous and slow, the sheer size of the behemoth’s stride allowed it to cover ground at an alarming pace. Tammy hadn’t expected it to be so difficult to outrun the thing. She poured on as much speed as she could force out of her legs, barely managing to stay on her feet as the earth buckled and trembled under the monster’s weight.
Bad idea! Bad idea!
A slim root tendril shot out of the dirt and wrapped Tammy’s left ankle. She spilled forward, crashing to the ground flat on her chest. Her life—both of them—flashed before her eyes in the span of two-tenths of a second. Rather than stomp her to death, the giant crashed on by. It evidently hadn’t been responsible for the root that tripped her.
Two dark faeries hiding in the dead grass both shouted and called it stupid, hollering at it to turn around and ‘get her.’
Tammy rolled over to sit, hastily throwing a green energy arc at the two little bastards. One screamed and just stood there, bursting apart into a blast of black smoke. The other one avoided her spell by zooming straight up.
She didn’t have time to worry about finishing the thing off as the giant wheeled around on her. Tammy grabbed the wooden cord tethering her to the ground by one ankle, but couldn’t snap it. The giant screeched a roar so loud the sound alone knocked a hundred dark faeries straight out of the sky. She looked up as a hand the size of a car came crashing down toward her.
Tammy threw herself to the side, simultaneously shapeshifting into a squirrel.
Wham!
Her little squirrel heart nearly exploded from the sound and force of the enormous wooden fingers slamming into the earth next to her. The impact rocked the ground so hard she bounced ten times her height into the air. Tail corkscrewing, she pivoted in freefall and landed, clinging to the side of the giant’s middle finger. Too freaked out to think or to have time to be scared, she scampered over the back of its hand and up its arm to the shoulder as the giant lifted its hand from the crater it made.
Seemingly confused at the lack of crushed human remains, the giant swung its massive body side to side, searching. Tammy leapt off its shoulder, shifting from squirrel to sparrow and gliding to land a reasonably safe distance away.
“There! The bird!” shouted the dark faeries overhead.
The giant turned toward her as she reverted back to her human shape.
“No!” shouted a different group of faeries. “Forget the human girl. Kill the queen faerie! She’s breaking the spell!”
Two groups of hovering dark faeries, ones rooting for the giant to smash Tammy, the others thinking Maple presented a bigger problem, got into an argument that rapidly devolved to them throwing spears at each other.
Allison screamed, “You scared the hell out of me! I thought it smashed you!”
A four-inch spear appeared stuck in Allison’s forehead.
“Ow! Little bastard.” She plucked it out and resumed firing lightning at the swarming faeries.
The giant started turning toward Maple.
Tammy looked down, dug her toes into the earth, and concentrated. Magic, regardless of type, followed certain rules. One such rule held that the more emotion a person put into a spell, the more powerful it would be. Tammy had come to think of Maple as something of a second mother—or a really cool but eccentric aunt she loved hanging out with.
Roaring in desperation to save her ‘mother’s’ life, Tammy unleashed a blast of raw natural energy at the giant, pouring so much emotion into it she wept. The bolt of green struck the giant along its lower abdomen, setting off a burst of smoldering spark embers. Orange-glowing fragments continued to spew from the wound for several seconds after the energy blast dissipated. One entire rune, a fancy design three feet tall, flickered out and went dark.
Tammy blinked.Sweet mama. I broke a rune… only twelve more to go!
