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“Don’t hurt him Michael, he’s protecting us from you,” Theo says.
“Don’t hurt him, he’s our friend,” Joe says, grabbing the arm of the green one.
12
Guard
Iglance at the hand around my arm, ready to shrug it off, but I don’t. They are friends with that big beast?
If I fight him, I will die like the other guard. That wouldn’t have mattered yesterday. Today I have tasted something other than blood and death. “If I let them go, the queen will kill me.”
Julie appears at the bars. “Only if you stay here. We’re climbing the spire and going home.”
I glance at her. “This is home.”
“This isn’t home,” she says. “You were human once. Every monster was.”
I shake my head, even as the memory of screaming metal and hot blood swells to consume me. Light flash red and blue, blurring my vision. And I see them. Humans, my friends, dead. “No.”
The human man tightens his grip on my arm. “I was a monster until recently. I still have a small tail and fangs. It’s possible to revert. To escape.”
The big thing that they call Michael swings his horns as if to rip me apart.
“I need to protect you.” I fold over as though already speared on his horns. The pain spreads over my skin and the memory takes over, consuming me. I see humans and the wheel. The world spins and glass shatters around me.
I didn’t protect them. I killed them.
The metal is cut open around me.
The hand on my arm hurts, his claws are digging into me. I can’t breathe. The beast charges and I expect the worst, but I lift my hands anyway. They are soft and useless.
His horns go through the bone bars over my head, and he twists, sending shards of bones flying. They scatter around me like the glass in my memory. I never understood what it was, what it meant. Now I know.
I was like Julie once.
Fragile and human.
She throws her arms around the beast’s neck. “Michael! I didn’t think I’d ever see you again.”
I’m lying on the ground near the ruined bars, staring up at them. I’m alive. And they are free. The queen will either devour me or send me up the spire to climb until I fall and die.
Wait…they said they were going to climb. They want to climb and go home.
The gray monster with the oversized claws steps out of the cell. He uses the back of his hand to touch the beast. “You have changed so much.”
“I had to fight my way here.”
“But you are here,” he smiles.
The man holding my arm lets me go. I am pathetic. Why didn’t I fight? Then the man steps out. He stands over me and I half expect him to kill me. Instead, he offers me his hand.
I stare at his claw tipped fingers and notice the thin tail that hangs down between his legs. Like a monster, he has no clothes.
“Are you able to get up?” he asks like he cares.
“What does it matter?”
“You tried to help us when you thought we were in danger.” He keeps his hand out.
