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I am something different.
I think perhaps I have my child to thank for that.
The Other lunges, but I am, somehow, ready. I bolt to the side, toward the nursery door. I’ve almost made it when I hear a clamor on the other side.
I step out of the way just in time as a line of guards comes rushing in, responding to my call for help.
Unfortunately, they have no idea what they’re up against, or that the Other has just lunged for me again.
It gets two guards between its jaws, the sound of their bones cracking. That normally would make me sick, except my body seems to know that it doesn’t have the option to be sick, not if I’m going to get my daughter out of this.
Instead, I retreat, hopping not-so-nimbly over the Other’s swooshing tail as it focuses on the guards.
I think to hide in the closet, but then the Other opens its jaws, dropping two corpses to the floor. It hisses, spraying a silvery liquid at the remaining guards.
This time, the sound does make my stomach lurch.
Several of the guards scream, cries of pain I’d yet to hear the likes of. As I reach the closet, I chance a look over my shoulder.
I regret doing so.
The silvery spray coats the soldiers’ armor, which is smoking, sizzling as the creature’s spit burns holes in it, ripping through the helmets and breastplates. It doesn’t slow as it reaches their skin, burning, burning, burning, until I glimpse muscle and bone and…
I look away, hearing the thud of bodies as they slump to the floor.
The creature sniffs around at their corpses, then there’s the familiar crunching sound as the creature feasts.
No. No, no, no.
No, it won’t get me. And it certainly won’t get my baby.
Distracted. I have to get out of here while the thing is distracted, but it’s blocking the doorway to the nursery with its massive body, and the only other way out of the room is the window.
That isn’t going to work.
We’re at least six stories up.
I could climb down, I figure. The outside of the palace is intricately designed enough that I could probably find enough footholds and handholds, if not to scale down, then to at least hide out until the Other is gone or someone can come rescue me.
I tuck Cecilia into my chest, slipping across the floor and over the Other’s happily swooshing tail. There are still shards of glass left in the window, but I manage to poke my head out and get a good look.
I instantly wish I hadn’t, the ground appearing so much further away than it usually does. Several gargoyles line the walls, and a few ledges too. But if I’m going to reach any of them, I’ll have to jump.
The calmness I was afforded moments ago seems to vanish as reality sets in.
There’s no way out of this room. Not with Cecilia in my arms.
I can’t catch myself and hold on to her, too.
No. No, I won’t accept that. There has to be another way. I will make there be another way.
Please, I pray to the Fates. You already saved her once. Please just save her again. You don’t have to worry about me.
I blink away the tears threatening to blur my vision, swallow the fear intent on paralyzing me, then search the room again.
A sling. I have to have one around here somewhere. I used one when I took the baby on walks, but it was usually Imogen who brought it to me, and in truth, I’ve never paid the slightest attention to where she keeps it. In fact, I pay little attention to much of how Imogen does anything she does; I’ve been so exhausted.
Since when did I let myself become so helpless?
