Total pages in book: 74
Estimated words: 69923 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 350(@200wpm)___ 280(@250wpm)___ 233(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 69923 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 350(@200wpm)___ 280(@250wpm)___ 233(@300wpm)
No! I will die as myself, not a monster!
“—impressive,” the typhon crooned. “Out of respect for killing that gods’ scum, I will grant your wish.” He raised his tentacles high, leaving his serpent’s end to wrap around my torso and lift me up. “A quick death.”
As I said, I didn’t fight, or plead, or pray. I closed my eyes as growing claws shredded my boots. My change would come too late. I would die on my own terms. The first choice I ever made in what turned out to be a short, miserable life.
Maybe it’ll be better in Hades. Sacrificing myself for a world that’s done me no favors has to get me into Elysium. An afterlife in paradise sounds pretty nice to—
“Arrrgggh!”
His body constricted, choking a gasp out of me. My eyes popped open and I beheld a sight worse than the deadliest monsters of legend.
“Aim for their eyes!”
They seemed to come from everywhere. Horses burst from the trees, carrying hooded women in oiled cloth and quivers. They rained arrows on the typhons without a moment’s hesitation.
The five spectators abandoned me. They roared their rage, taking to the sky to descend on their enemy. They all did—except for the one who held me.
“Ahh,” he belted, his head thrashing and all those tentacles writhing.
Grimacing, I strained to breathe as he gripped me tighter and tighter. What was wrong with him? Why wasn’t he fighting with his brothers?
The typhon’s wings bent and crumpled unnaturally. I screamed even before it happened.
He exploded. Blood, guts, and claws showered me like poisoned rain. I collapsed in the gore, screeching my head off. “Oh my gods! What—?”
I cut off so abruptly, I choked on the words I tried to say. A figure stood a few feet from me—still as the battle raged around us. The hood of his oiled cloak pulled over his face, obscuring all but his chin in shadows. He was dressed differently than the other watchers. No quiver hung off his back, and the gold-tipped boots on his feet were not standard issue to any watcher I came across.
Slowly, he lowered his hand.
Stinging black ichor covered every inch of me. I stared through the typhon’s remains covering my eyes. Did he do this?
As if he plucked the question from my mind, the man spun on the battle and held his palm toward a vulture-headed typhon with half a dozen eyes more than two. Arrows were in a few of them, but those left gave him plenty to engage. Before my eyes, his body seized and he let out a scream that curdled my insides.
I had never seen a power like this, and I never would again.
Whipping around, I scrambled to the edge of the gorge. The typhon said the answer for getting through was simple. I had an idea. Let it work, or let the next fall snap my neck.
The goddess’s laughter rang in my ears as my talons pierced the mud, pulling me forward. My vision sharpened on my salvation—eyes changing to gift me hawklike sight. I snarled, lips peeling back over razor-sharp teeth.
“Where are you going, pet?” Amusement teased her question. “Don’t run off now that the fun has started. Stay. Kill those worthless demigod bugs.”
I willed myself on, gritting through pain as my legs bent at unnatural, inhuman angles. I had never gotten this far into the transformation before. But then, I also had never been this terrified.
The answer was simple. Designed by people who wanted fear to turn deserters around. In the end, there could only be one answer.
“Kill them!”
I reached the edge and tipped—
“Ahhh!” Screams ripped from my soul.
I was burning, burning, everything burning! My blood heated beneath my skin—scorching my veins, cooking my organs, igniting my bones—and I felt it all.
“Secure the traitor!”
Iron hands secured my ankles, yanking me back from the edge. I was helpless as bodies pinned me in the mud, binding my legs and wrists. How could I fight back? Pain was not fear, and pain was all I’d ever feel again... as a mere human.
The last thing I saw before black crowded my vision were those gold-tipped boots.
Alexander
Medora and Larisa hauled the unconscious girl to her feet— No, wait.
I squinted from beneath my hood, getting a proper look as the last of the rain washed the mud and blood off her face. Not a girl, a woman.
Good. Now no one could bleat and whine about me boiling the insides of some child. Not that it would matter to me if they did. Traitors young and old deserved what I had coming for them.
“What should we do with her?” asked Larisa. She wasn’t asking me.
The goddess Artemis had only daughters, no sons. Those daughters made up the border watchers and they’ve never taken orders from a man. They weren’t about to start now.
“She forced us to track her through typhon rain,” Medora, leader of the watchers, replied. “Most of our food is now inedible and we’re running low on water since we were forced to share with the horses. We don’t have the supplies to feed another mouth on the long journey back to the palace and her trial.” Medora turned a reptilian smile on me. She was actually a handsome woman with high cheekbones, full lips, and a head of wavy hair that glinted bronze in the sun. Anyone would call her attractive, except when she smiled. “Thankfully, we needn’t trek her all the way back to the council when we have a representative right here.”