Jenna Helland - The Fanged Crown

“You have to do something, Verran,” she said in a calm voice. “You have to do something now.”

“What’s he supposed to do?” Boult said.

“I can’t!” Verran cried.

“Can you see it?” Majida said. “In your mind, Verran? Can you see what you’re supposed to do?”

“It’ll just make it worse!”

On the ground, Harp scooped the sword out of a pile of rancid blubber and charged at the beast’s core. He jammed the weapon through the bone into an empty cavity where it lodged in place. Ducking as one of the bony appendages swung above his head, Harp tried in vain to pull the sword back out.

“My spells can’t hurt it like that,” Majida said urgently to Verran. “You have to make it alive!”

“What!” Boult said in disbelief. “He has to what?”

Verran shook his head desperately.

“Make it live. Do it, Verran!”

“You want to bring that thing to life?” Boult shouted. “Majida! That’s insane!”

“Sit on the ledge,” Majida said. “Don’t think about the creature—I’ll protect you. Think about what you need to do.” Kitto finally managed to loose himself from the grasp of the tentacle. But just as he freed himself, it swung wildly, flinging the boy into the air. Tumbling to the ground, Kitto smacked against the rocks before landing with a dull thud. Harp left the sword stuck in the beast and sprinted to Kitto, who was just getting up off the ground. As Harp helped him to the edge of the pit, he saw Verran looking terrified on the ledge above him. The boy’s lips moved silently, and his face seemed swollen and bruised as a dark blue tinge crept around his eyes.

With a sucking noise, the carrion that was spread out across the bottom of the pit oozed across the ground to the beast. It slid along its tentacles and up the bony core to the top of the shattered skull, until every inch of the monstrosity was covered in a gray, fleshy coating. Reddish-blue veins branched across the outside of the new skin, lacing the hunks of meat onto the skeletal frame. For a moment, the creature froze. From his position on the floor of the pit, Harp gawked at the creature above him, a monster that now resembled a marine animal, landlocked in a lake of decay.

In the moment of silence, Harp heard a low thud and then another. Kitto turned to him wide-eyed as the noise increased into a constant rhythm. Harp could feel each stroke pulse through the ground into the soles of his feet.

“What is that?” he asked breathlessly.

“The beating of its heart,” Kitto said awestruck.

“Oh, Verran, what have you done?” Harp whispered. The creature shuddered as it took its first breath and expanded until it almost filled the pit. Looming above them, it cast Harp and Kitto into darkness. As it rose higher into the air, its four tentacles towered above Verran, Boult, and Majida, who were still on the ledge.

“Get out of there,” Majida yelled down to Harp and Kitto, who were huddled in a corner of the pit. But the smooth walls of the chasm offered no handholds. The two men skirted the edge of pit until they were directly below the others on the ledge, but the creature’s ever-expanding bulk threatened to crush them against the rock.

The meaty tentacles flailed in the air uncontrollably, and one of the appendages crashed down on the ledge between Boult and Majida. Boult kept his footing, but Majida was knocked off balance. She lunged across to the slope below Zo, but slid down the gravel and almost fell into the pit. Digging her fingers into the soil with her legs dangling off the edge, she managed to hold on until Zo climbed down and hauled her up to higher ground.

Using his crossbow as a club, Zo swung at any tentacle that came near them while Majida pressed her palms into the ground and recited an incantation. As her lips formed the ancient words, a snarl of shiny black thorns sprang out of the ground at the bottom of the pit. As long as arrows and as wide around as a man’s wrist, the hooked thorns radiated like a starburst in the dirt surrounding the monster.

“Those are Banethorns,” Zo warned the others. “They’re poisonous.”

“We’ve got to get them out of there!” Boult shouted, stepping quickly along the ledge to Zo and Majida. “Get me rope!”

Zo threw his pack on the ground, and Boult rummaged through it. When a tentacle flailed dangerously close to the dwarves, Zo slammed the wooden crossbow against it and deflected the blow. The tentacle retreated momentarily and crashed down again.

“Where’s your damn rope?” Boult demanded, turning the pack upside down and dumping the contents onto the gravel.

Zo didn’t have time to answer as he batted another assault away from Majida, who was still kneeling on the ground. Below them in the pit, spiky green leaves and mace-headed brambles rose out of the soil, twisting into thick, knotted vines that looped around the fleshy creature like chains. The hooked tips of the thorns dug into its skin while the poisoned sap seeped into its exposed veins. The creature struggled against the vines and thorns, and hunks of its flesh ripped away as it was pinned down under the clawing plants.

“Get off the ledge!” Harp called up to Verran. Verran didn’t move. Muttering to himself, he leaned down and touched the wall above Harp’s head. Under Verran’s fingers, strands of the emerald vines flowed from brambles surrounding the monster and up the cliff to the ledge. Instead of black thorns, they were adorned with delicate yellow flowers.

“Climb!” Verran urged them.

Harp and Kitto scrambled up the vines, reaching the ledge just as the pit below was overtaken by the poisonous plants. The brambles engulfed the creature, and the men joined the dwarves on the other side of the chasm. With all four tentacles grasping the edge of the pit, the creature made one last effort to pull itself free from the twisting brambles. But it couldn’t free itself from Majida’s thicket, and the poison from the thorns pulsed through its veins until it reached the beast’s core and its beating heart was stilled.

When the chasm was filled to the brim with twisted black vines, and there was nothing but silence in the air, Harp checked to make sure everyone was still standing. Kitto was bruised and a little bloody, but he assured Harp that he was fine.

“What just happened?” Boult demanded. “Who should I thank, and who should I punch?”

“Thank Verran and Majida,” Harp said. “They saved us.”

But Boult wasn’t in a thankful mood. “Did you know something lived down there?”

“Nothing lived down there!” Zo said indignantly. “Majida! Do you know where that came from?”

Majida looked at Verran. “No,” she said finally. “I don’t know. But we should get below ground as soon as possible.”

Majida and Zo turned and walked into a narrow channel in the rock behind them. With smooth walls streaked with glossy bands of red and pink, the channel was an old riverbed that twisted through the rock. Above them, the storm clouds had blown away, and the sky was blue and clear.

“Did something happen, Verran?” Harp asked quietly as they followed the others through the channel.

“I didn’t do anything!” Verran said defensively. “If she says I did, she’s lying!”

“Easy,” Harp said.

“I hate Chult,” Verran said angrily. “And I hate her.”

“You saved me and Harp,” Kitto reminded him, but Verran strode away from them. Harp thought about calling him back, but decided against it. As Verran stalked away, Harp saw a large circle of blood staining the back of his shirt, just below the base of his neck.

“Was he injured?” Harp asked, but neither Kitto nor Boult had an answer. Verran had been on the cliff through the battle, and Harp couldn’t imagine what blow would form such a perfectly round wound on the boy’s back. With Verran in such a state, he couldn’t imagine getting answers out of him either.