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He spotted the skull first, a shriveled thing covered in ash and smudges of what looked like dried blood. Then the darkness locked him in a chokehold before the shadow rushed toward them, leaping with so much hostility that it would have knocked Moon to the ground. He yanked the teenage boy behind him to counter the weight, then blinked when the shadow crashed into an invisible force and bounced back.
“Brace yourselves,” Brian commanded, arms raised and fingers glowing.
Moon was the first to heed, protecting the warlock’s side. Maddox and Ruby fell into formation as they covered all of the warlock’s corners. They watched the shadow fall away and the creature stand up, twice their size and riddled with scales and scars. Black eyes watched them in turn like bottomless pits. Its forelimbs were shorter than its back ones, the clickity-clack sounds signaling that it was no longer trying to sneak up on them.
It leaped a second time, collided, and fell. It repeated the action a few more times until it was tired, stumbling in a drunken stupor. The clickity-clack sounds grew until they rang incessantly in his ears and his hair stood on end.
“It's calling for reinforcements,” Maddox hissed. “We have to go.”
They attempted to move while the creature trailed after them. They stopped when more clickity-clack sounds filled the air, and shadows emerged from all directions until they were surrounded. The same hostility radiated from them as the creatures charged toward the sheen, too, one by one, then stopping and becoming eerily quiet. The ticking bomb in his senses stopped—and the creatures jumped the sheen at the same time.
A loud booming sound ensued as the creatures were thrown back, but so was Brian. Moon caught the warlock, whose body was shaking even while he tried to maintain his outstretched arms.
“Ruby, I need backup.”
But Ruby remained frozen, fear in her eyes and dread all over her face.
“I can’t,” she whispered.
“What do you mean you can’t—”
“I don’t have magic,” she blurted out in an agonized voice. “I lost it at some point, I don’t know when. But it’s not in me. I can’t back you up.”
Brian and Moon gawked at her in disbelief, but the next puzzle clicked into place for Maddox as he recalled her avoidance, her lack of answers, her rising frustration…the frequent break-in to James’s office, and her reaction to his meddling.
“You willed the portal to take us to a place with an energy source,” he deduced.
For communicating with your brother,was what he didn’t voice out.
Brown eyes met his, her shame visible. “Yes. I was expecting Fae territory. Not this.”
“Fae territory would have been worse,” Brian said.
But Maddox shook his head. “I’m not so sure about that.”
He kept his gaze on Ruby, trying to communicate that they would talk about this later. He felt Brian’s hard gaze on him, openly trying to figure out his relationship with her. Then the creatures snatched his attention, drawing closer like an unstoppable force. He looked up, an idea forming.
“Can you make an opening above?”
Brian nodded. “Yes.”
“No.” Ruby took his wrist, squeezing it in a plea. “Don’t.”
“I have to. Run as soon as I draw them away. Open it…now.”
The man waved a hand, and a small hole parted. Moon crouched, allowing Maddox to climb up and haul himself toward the hole and reach for the closest branch. He swung himself upwards, swung from branch to branch, and cupped his hands over his mouth. A ringing cry spilled from his lungs, jarring their clickity-clacks. He kept it up until all heads turned in his direction.
The first creature leaped up while he moved to a higher branch and waited. Stupefaction filled him when the creature tried to grab the branch but couldn’t, its limbs not having enough fingers to grip and heave itself up. The others tried, too, then lost interest and returned to the more feasible option: the three stuck in Brian’s thinning protection.
“They can’t climb,” Maddox deduced slowly, watching as two creatures tried to climb up his tree trunk and failed. “You can’t stay down there. Moon?”
Moon was quick to pick up on the hint, boosting himself up as soon as Brian opened another hole. Maddox gestured him closer.
“You have one task. Distract.”
The howl that came from Moon was from the soul, tugging a shudder off Maddox as he swung back on top of the sheen. He waited until the creatures shifted their attention to Moon, who was swinging across the trees and taking his arrested watchers on a dance.
“He is a wolf shifter?” Brian asked sharply.
