He didn’t even try to roar again; waste of breath. He just charged, leaping forward at the group of demons and Pavuleans. He thudded into the approaching mill demon while surprise was still registering on its face and it was just starting to raise its trunks to fend him off. He half-headed it, half-shouldered it out of the way, sending it crashing to the floor.
It was all happening very slowly. He wondered if this really was the speed that such moments of action seemed to happen at for predators in the Real – one reason they were so good at bringing down their prey, perhaps – or if this was an extra effect introduced just for the demons in Hell, to allow them an even greater advantage over their victims, or just to let them savour the moment all the more fully.
The four demons from the flier were all facing him now. The two holding Pavuleans did not worry him so much, he realised – he was thinking like a predator, like one of these bastards! – because they didn’t want to let go of their charges, at least not yet. By the time they thought the better of this, he knew, it would all be over one way or the other.
One of the remaining demons was faster to react than the other, opening its mouth into a snarl and starting to rise up on its hind legs while it brought its forelegs up towards him.
He was aware of being slightly encumbered by the small, hard weight he was carrying against his great furred chest. Chay. Could he just throw her through the doorway from here? Probably not. He’d have to stop, take aim, lob her. It would take too long and the way the angles worked one of the demons would only need to raise one forelimb to catch her or knock her off course. By the time that happened he’d have lost all his temporary power and be no more strong than she was now; no match at all for even a single demon.
He could use his slight lopsidedness to his advantage, he realised, as he took his next swinging, galloping step. The demon facing him, ready to tackle him, was allowing for how he was moving off-kilter, unconsciously preparing to intercept Prin a couple of metres ahead according to the already set rhythm evident in the way he was moving.
Prin threw Chay from one forelimb to the other and pressed her hard into the other side of his chest. The gesture cost him a small amount of momentum, but gave him the greater advantage of throwing off the reckoning of the demon preparing to bring him down.
Prin opened his jaws as the third barb made itself felt in his neck. One pulse left. The fourth barb would signal his instant return to the small, broken body he’d been trapped within for the last few months.
The demon didn’t even have time to look surprised. Prin crunched his jaws closed on the smaller demon. He felt his fangs penetrate furred skin, flesh, sinew and tendon and then bite into the giving hardness of bone. He was already turning his head, an instinctive reaction giving his jaws time to fully close. The demon was starting to turn too now, pulled round by his attacker’s greater weight. Prin went with the motion, keeping his jaws tight, feeling bone snap and crumple inside his mouth. He pivoted with the demon, using their combined mass to swivel even as he kept on charging forward, bringing the body of the bitten demon swinging round, legs flailing, to connect with the body of the second pouncing demon, knocking it aside in a snarling ball. Prin let his jaws open; the first demon was flung from them and went slithering along the floor, already bleeding, narrowly missing the legs of one of the other two demons still holding the Pavuleans.
He was almost at the start of the slope to the blue glowing door. He made one last bound, launching himself through the air.
As he did so, he knew he had made it, that they would get through the doorway. It floated up towards him as he rose in the air, still propelled by the last great thrust of his hind legs.
One, he thought.
The way the mill demon had said “One,” after the last two Pavuleans had gone through.
And, just as he’d burst into the mill, a voice – the same voice, he realised now – had said “Three.”
Three: then the two little Pavuleans had gone skittering through the blue glowing gate. One.
He’d been counting down.
Of course; the gate could count. The gate, or people operating it at this side – or more likely the other side, in the Real – knew how many to expect, how many they were allowed to let through.
Just one more person would be allowed to make the transition from the Hell to the Real.
He reached the top of his last, pouncing leap. The doorway spread before him, a glowing bank of blue mist filled with shadows. He wondered if the fact that he and Chay were so close together would allow them both to make it through, if the gateway would be somehow fooled by this. Or perhaps the fact she was catatonic, semi-conscious at best, would mean that she could make it through as well as him.