Dread spread through his body. His concern for Tressa had him so distracted he hadn’t even realized someone, or something, had been deceiving him. Bastian scrambled back to the tree. He reached up, grasping for a branch. His fingertips scratched bare on the hard bark. Finding purchase, Bastian hoisted himself back into the tree.
A scratching noise behind him was followed by a low growl.
Bastian held on to the tree trunk, balancing precariously on a branch that might be too weak to hold him. It bent toward the ground, threatening to dump him at the slightest wrong move.
He stretched his arm out above him, scrambling to find another branch that could carry him even higher.
The wet chortling wafted toward him. A scratching noise tore at the bark on the tree.
Bastian finally felt a branch. He wrapped his hand around it, tugging hard. It didn’t budge. With a heave, he pulled himself up, desperate to get higher before the thing below could catch him.
The noise got farther away as Bastian climbed higher. He let out a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding. He shivered and hugged the tree, his muscles screaming for a break. Safety couldn’t be far away.
A sharp tip came shooting through the air, piercing Bastian’s leg and yanking him back toward the very thing he was desperate to escape.
Chapter Thirty
Bastian reached up, grabbing the hilt of his sword with his right hand before he fell to the ground, landing with a hard thud on his back. The spike stuck in his leg retracted. His leg throbbed, but he didn’t feel any blood. Yet. Quick thinking had kept him alive until now. He wouldn’t let a spike stop him.
The fog swirled, blinding Bastian before he could determine where the beast hid. Instead of attacking, he held still on the ground, his sword in front of him at the ready. If his hunch was right, the beast couldn’t see him either. If it could, it would have attacked already. It would have gotten them the first time through the forest. Based on Connor’s wounds and his mother’s scars, Bastian guessed this was what attacked them. He refused to be its next victim.
“Bastian,” it said in Tressa’s voice again. Honey dripped from its voice, but it was no longer tempting. Was it so foolish to think he’d answer the call?
“Bastian!”
He sat up. That wasn’t Tressa. It was Vinya, his wife. The voice came from behind him and sounded very far away.
“Dada!”
His stomach dropped. Farah, his daughter.
A scratching noise on the forest floor jolted Bastian to his feet.
“Shit,” Bastian mumbled under his breath. He ran in the direction the voices came from. At least in the direction he best guessed. The screams for him continued.
“Be quiet!” He yelled back. “Don’t say another word!”
“Vinya.” It wasn’t Bastian. Damn it. The beast was playing its game on them too.
“Over here, asshole.” Bastian yelled so loud his throat felt it was ripping to shreds.
“Vinya,” it said again, ignoring him. Its voice sounded exactly like him.
Bastian’s sweaty hands gripped the hilt of his sword. He could follow the voice just as easily as Vinya. Faster, even, because he didn’t have a kid to slow him down.
A few moments of silence passed. Good. She’d stayed quiet like he ordered. He could only hope she’d stayed where she was too.
A whimper punctuated the air. “Mama! Where are you?”
Bastian paused. He couldn’t find them and he knew what was coming next. He waited for the inevitable.
“Farah,” the thing called out to his daughter, using its sweetest imitation of Vinya.
Bastian turned, his sword outstretched and swung it through the air. It planted firmly in something fleshy. A smile crept across his face as the thing in front of him snarled.
He pulled back hard on the sword and made another hacking blow, meeting again with resistance. A gurgling noise sputtered in the air and something wet landed on Bastian’s cheek. He wiped it off with his finger, then brought it to his nose. Blood.
Lust raced through his veins. Another hack. Then another and another. More blood spurted on him, driving him into a frenzy.
Something sharp whizzed through the air, landing on his arm. Intense pain surged through Bastian’s body. Using the pain, he hit harder and faster, blindly whacking at the beast hidden from him in the mist. Whimpers replaced the snarls. Then silence.
Bastian struck out again, but his sword caught nothing but air. He pointed the tip down and poked. It met with resistance.
Finally. It was dead.
“Vinya,” Bastian called out into the gray darkness. “It’s me.”
Silence.
“Vinya, it’s okay now. I killed it. Call out and let me know where you are.”