Kindle Edition
Amazon
Category:
Fantasy
Publisher: Amazon Kindle
ISBN-10: 1521138311
Type: Fiction
Pages: 819
Copyright: April 22, 2017
ISBN-13: 9781521138311
Price: $4.99 (eBook)
Madness and despair echo through the rusted-out layers of the Structure, a boundless labyrinth shrouded in never-ending darkness.
Follow the struggles of a few lost souls as they attempt to flee this cage of twisted steel and paranoid delusions and reach for the fabled world Above, finding their way through a web of fear, war, betrayals, political machinations, and eldritch horrors.
Pnaramakhia is a dystopian, steampunk thriller with a lovecraftian flair. Within it, I subvert and deconstruct a few common fantasy tropes while, at the same time, I explore some of the darker aspects of the human mind.
What's the story about?
This book is a monumental work, providing a multi-layered and engaging experience.
If you like dark steampunk settings, you'll find plenty of that here.
If you like accurate and deep world-building, that's also in here.
If you like cosmic horrors, ancient aliens, sorcery, claustrophobic underground ruins, you'll find them here.
If you like mystery, political intrigue, and hard moral choices, that's also part of the package.
If you like accurate historical combat, battle strategy, and world-shaking plots, I've got you covered as well.
Excerpt
Callirienne had been waiting, perched on the same old piece of machinery for nearly half a wake, regularly and carefully peeking through the mass of dusty coolant pipes that gave her a view of the lair of the monster.
At one point, she had almost fallen asleep fantasizing of a warm enlightenment at her church, but the silent, impending threat of death had put an end to it only a few seconds after she had started to doze.
One more time, she turned her neck leftward, looking at the dark corridor leading back to the kinolectric station. It was unlikely that Bast would return without her hearing him in advance—given all the steel that he was hopefully carrying back with him—but she didn’t want someone else to get a jump on her.
Having reassured herself that there was nobody lurking in the area, she turned her eyes to the slit between the pipes in order to make sure the monster hadn’t disappeared. Her motion was too fast, and the patched skin on her cheek hurt again, making her left eye squint.
She resisted the urge to scratch the bandage, knowing it would only make the wound open again. She had yet to process what that new mark meant for her, and for the time being, she preferred not to think too much about it. She decided to focus first on retaliating against the one responsible for her injury.
As the hitching lessened, Callirienne returned to her watch, directing her sight through the narrow frame given to her by the pipes to look at the illuminated platform.
No matter how monotonous the task, Callirienne felt as anxious now as she had when she started. A creature out of the darkest fairytales was within her sight, resting only a hundred yards away.
This layer of Tsamarkan was rather dark, but a few magnetic lights were still stable and bright enough to shine over the platform on which the Vrake had made its lair. A load-bearing wall extended from one side, covered in ancient hieroglyphs and control panels of forgotten times. On the opposite side, over the edge of the platform, there was the abyss from which the monster had emerged, shrouded in complete darkness. This was no ordinary chasm; it was the Shadowy Falls: a thousand mile precipice going all the way down into the Tartarian Maze.
Or at least that was what the legends told.
Callirienne had tried many times in her hours of watch to spot the Falls themselves, but her eyes could not catch even the smallest glimpse of what was sure to be a terrifying sight: an endless stream of watered down filth, dregs, and corpses pouring down from the shining city of Pnarakon, jewel of Tsama.
Unfortunately, even though she could not see them, she had no trouble smelling them. When she and Bast had reached that layer, the stench was such that both of them puked their last meal on the floor. Every room of that level reeked of death and corruption: the air was heavy with the festering stench of decomposed meat, mold and rust.
Callirienne was certain no bath would be enough to make her feel clean again. Still, in retrospect, all that time had allowed her to find a positive outlook on that ungodly smell as well as on the irregular, booming noise of the unending cascade of filth. They were probably the two main reasons she had been able to keep herself hidden for so long from the Vrake.
The monster tended to remain close to the wall, specifically near one of the less dusty control panels, but sometimes it wandered off, walking on its hind legs towards the border of the platform and raising its feathered neck as if looking for something.
It was difficult for her to describe, even after having spent so many hours with nothing else to watch and wonder about. Maybe there were animals Above that shared similarities with that creature, but Callirienne had lived inside Tsamarkan her entire life.
Just as it was described in the Book, the Vrake’s form was both elegant and frightening. From tail to head, it was longer than twenty feet, although more than half of its length was made up of the long, lean, stiff tail. When he rested on four legs, its head stood as tall as at least eight feet, but the monster grew taller still when walking on the back legs. While its body was beast-like, Callirienne could not deny there was something human in the shape of its torso and forelegs, and acknowledging those similarities unsettled her for some reason.
The Vrake’s scales were of the brightest silvery hue Callirienne had ever seen, equally matched by the mane of long white feathers that covered its curved neck. For the way they caught and reflected the dim lights around the platform, Callirienne could have sworn they were made of metal. She had found herself thinking more than once that only some sorcerous quality could have kept them so shiny after climbing through the Shadowy Falls.
What disturbed her most were its eyes. They were almost disproportionately big, with a cruel and cunning spark within them; they seemed to shimmer on their own of a faint, pale green light when the creature rested in the shadows.
During her long guard, she had feared more than once that the beast had spotted her. Every time the monster turned in her direction, she felt her limbs clench and her heart stop. It was a primordial instinct, screaming for her to run away, which she had to fight against each time.
Callirienne had been lurking and fighting in the depths of Tsama alongside Bast for almost eight years now, but she had never felt that kind of fear.
We can make it, she repeated to herself as she had already done many times, trying to calm her nerves. And, after today, we will become the stuff of legends.
There were plenty of stories about vrakeslayers in Flekonos. Unfortunately, they didn’t provide much practical help as to how to accomplish the feat itself. Most tended to warn about the Vrake’s cunning nature and its impenetrable scales, but that was hazy advice at best. Were the Vrake’s scales truly invulnerable to steel, or just really hard? After having examined the monster personally, she had found the eyes to look like a considerably large target, but she didn’t remember any hero exploiting them in the old stories. Did that mean they were just as impervious to pain as the monster’s scales, or just that the legends were not accurate enough?
Callirienne was finally taken away from her thoughts as her attention was caught by a faint clanging coming from her left. She kept her eyes on the Vrake for some time still, making sure the creature had not caught the noise too, then turned around and silently slipped down from the old machine.
She kept her right hand on the sword, ready to draw it, while using the left to prevent the scabbard from making noise as she slowly walked towards the corridor. She was fairly confident that it was Bast making that noise, but didn’t want to take any risks until she had seen him. A few more steps and she spotted the shadow of a tall, armored man slowly coming towards her with his right hand raised and open in friendship. She heard some suspicious squashing sounds behind him, but there was no doubt about it: he was Bast.
Releasing some of her tension, Callirienne straightened herself and moved her hand away from the hilt. “You sure took your sweet time,” she muttered, trying to keep her voice as low as possible.
“Sorry, Liri. I was delayed.”
Bast sounded somewhat uncomfortable, but it was hard to read him with the helmet hiding his face and distorting his voice.
“A Pnark from the big city,” he quickly added, pointing with his thumb behind his back. “He’s come to watch.”
“Ugh...” Callirienne’s immediate reaction was to frown, but she quickly regretted it as she felt the fresh burns on her cheek flare in pain. “Whatever. Just…have you told him to keep quiet?”
“Yes, he’s back there with the equipment. Just go dress up; ignore him.” Bast tiptoed, trying to look behind her with a sudden sense of urgency. “Is it still there? Anybody else come in?”
“Yes, and no,” sighed Callirienne. “He’s been hanging over there for all this time. No sign of the Trawler or the Witch yet. Only weird thing I noticed is that every once in a while it started talking gibberish.”
“A spell?” Callirienne didn’t need to look at his face to understand that the last detail was causing Bast some concern.
“I don’t know.” She shrugged. “If it was, the Vrake was pretty bad at it, because nothing happened.”
“Alright, just go. We’ll talk strategy later. I’ll go guard it in the meantime.”
Getting further below through the corridor, Callirienne realized that the weird sound she had heard was the echo of the Pnarakonian guy, puking his guts out in a corner near the station.
He’s probably used to the smell flowers and honey up in the big city. She shook her head with a half-smile.
Since the Pnarakonian was too busy to even notice her, Callirienne moved directly on to the equipment. She was already wearing padding beneath her knightly uniform, so she passed directly to donning her cuirass, swiftly following with the pauldrons. She usually chided Bast for wearing so much metal, but in this particular case, she would not have minded some additional protection herself.
That thing’s beak could probably chop my arm clean off...
She was checking her close helmet when the Pnarakonian finally spoke, walking to her side.
“Uh-hm...” He gulped with a hand still covering his mouth and such a disconcerted expression that Callirienne could see it even in the dim light of the station. “I’m really sorry about that. I was…hm...”
“It gets worse on the other side,” she warned with a sprinkle of amusement in her voice. She couldn’t tell if it was his pale, clean-shaven face, the short hair, or his confused expression, making him look so out of place there, like a little prince cast out of his palace. “We’re right next to the biggest dump in all of Tsama.” She brushed back her hair, knotted it behind her neck, and put the arming cap on.
“What...” The Pnarakonian took a few seconds to realize what she meant, looking at her with a face halfway between disgusted and confused. “The Shadowy Falls?”
God, he looks young. She gave him a side-glance, adjusting her helmet. She tried to fit it as gently as possible, but it still brushed her bandages, making her shudder.
Just suck it up! she chided herself. Only one more thing to do, then we’ll have all the time to rest. She needed to be sharp and dependable in the fight; it was too dangerous. If she faltered and Bast died because of it, she would never forgive herself.
“I see...” continued the Pnarakonian, almost talking to himself. “So, the Vrahekiron might have come from below? Climbing?”
Callirienne shrugged, quickly charging her spring-gun and then taking a second one.
“Keep it down, Pnark,” she uttered. “You can think without speaking.”
Callirienne tested her vision, tilting her head inside the helmet and turning towards the station first and then towards the tunnel leading to the platform. She was nearly blind in that spot, but the platform should have enough magnetic lights to see even through the helmet.
Luckily the devil is as bright as it can be. Not much chance of it blending in the shadows.
The helmet wasn’t made for the dark layers of Tsamarkan; the knights of Queol wore them while riding under the sun. Callirienne could only imagine how different it must have felt, how easier it must have been.
They probably don’t even have to decide whether using it or not; they just keep it on all the time.
She realized only then that the Pnarakonian had started murmuring to himself again, yet this time she decided to ignore him. She put the second gun in its holster, took the spear and the long rifle, and finally hurried herself back up to Bast.
“What’s the plan, Bast?” she whispered as quietly as she could, crouching at Sebastophian’s side.
Bast had climbed to her former post, where he could discreetly look at the monster through the forest of pipes. He gave himself some time to think before answering, and Callirienne could feel that he was as uncertain about their chances as she was.
They had already considered a few ideas before he had left for the monastery, but everything depended on what weapons he could find or if the monks could spare any guards at all to help them. With even just another couple of spearmen, they might have managed to surround the beast and push it back into the abyss, but that didn’t seem like an option anymore. Bast had returned with some heavy weaponry, but no reinforcements. Callirienne knew that the only alternative was to kill the Vrake directly in some way. She couldn’t deny that one part of her relished the idea of the two of them killing the fiend by themselves, carrying back the head as a trophy to the Abbey, and then being celebrated by their brothers-in-arms like the heroes of old. The problem was that the rest of her mind was absolutely gripped with terror at the idea of attacking the monster without an army backing them up. She was ashamed of her fear of dying, but she worried even more about causing the death of Sebastophian.
“I’m still for flanking.” Bast’s voice shook her out of her contemplation. “I can sneak on the other side, you set yourself up here.” He shifted his weight on his left leg, careful not to make noise with the armor.
Callirienne wasn’t too sure about that idea; she still had a lot less steel on her, and less weapons too. In order to get to the other side of the platform, Bast would have to circle the area by sneaking along the border edging the abyss. If he clanged at the wrong time, when the noise from the Shadowy Falls was too little, or if the monster could see well enough in the dark and turned too early, Sebastophian would be doomed.
She had already voiced her opinion before he left for the monastery, but he refused to listen to her.
“At this point, it might be better to kill it while it’s alone,” he then added after a moment of pause. “We can set another trap for the others later, if they come at all. You can shoot through the pipes with the rifle from here while I do the same from the other direction.”
“Right.” Callirienne cleared her throat and gave a quick glance at the monster, making sure it hadn’t spotted them. “The eyes, right?”
“Yes. The ideal thing would be to wait until it’s sideways and blind it completely with a coordinated shot before it has a chance to attack. If we do that, we can have enough time to recharge and keep shooting until we hit a soft spot. Hell, if the scales really are impenetrable, we should still be able to push it off the Falls with the spears if it cannot see us.”
Callirienne looked at her side, hearing the Pnarakonian coming from the tunnel. He was being quiet, finally, but she felt uneasy with a stranger around, especially during such a delicate mission.
And a heathen to boot.
Seeing him flinch and tilt his head with a frowned face, Callirienne thought he was just eavesdropping on their conversation, but then realized that he was really trying to see beyond them, through the pipes, looking for the creature.
“Liri?” Bast’s annoyed tone stung her, making her aware that she had stopped listening to him.
“Sorry,” she answered, giving him a guilty look through her visor. “I zoned out. I got the first part, though. What I’m worrying about is if we don’t get to blind it. I mean, we can’t really synchronize the shot or we risk alerting it before springing the trap.”
“We wait until the beast is turned at the right angle and shoot immediately after. We should be able to poke at least one eye out. When the monster charges one of us, the other should have enough time to recharge and shoot out the other one. God willing, the first shot might even get to its brain and kill it immediately.”
She chuckled. “Yeah, we should be that lucky. But wait. If it charges one of us, then it will be giving the back to the other. There won’t be a clean shot to any of the eyes.”
“In that case, if let’s say, it charges me, you just leave the rifle and rush it with one of the pistols. In any case, if the monster comes this way, I think it’ll take some time to break the pipes before it reaches you, so you might even get a second shot with the rifle charged.”
“Yeah, but if it charges you...”
“Then you’d better run fast, Liri.”
Callirienne nodded, letting out a sigh.
That’s why I’m the one remaining at this post.
She felt her face blush with shame. In the last few years she had finally started to feel as if Bast had started to treat her as a fellow knight rather than someone he had to protect, but perhaps her accident with the Witch had eroded his confidence in her.
I’m overthinking this. He’s still relying on me to do my part, otherwise he would have sent me away the moment I got burnt.
“The priority,” said Bast, “if we don’t blind it, is to cripple it first. We just harass it with the spears, test how tough the scales really are. Then, if we can’t manage to wound it that way, I’ll try to take a shot with the hammer. If we can break one of its hind legs, we can just fall back and shoot it from afar until it—”
“Who’s that?” the Pnarakonian interrupted, clinging to the side of the old machinery. Callirienne felt the instinctive need to shush him, while Sebastophian turned to look at the platform.
“Liri.” New tension was suddenly palpable in his voice. “The Trawler’s here.”
“Alone?” Even as she asked the question, Callirienne turned to the already overcrowded peeping slit to see for herself.
The man was there on the platform, meekly walking towards the monster with shoulders curved and hands clasped on his chest. He still wore the shabby surcoat Callirienne had seen him in during their last encounter, the lower rim gnawed and blackened by the fire, and a tightly knotted and powdered peruke to cover his short hair. At one time, that wig might have been as white as the Vrake’s scales, but years of sweat, smoke, and filth had turned it into a greyish, slimy mass hanging over the Trawler’s pale and wrinkled face.
“Who’s the Trawler?” asked the Pnarakonian.
“Not now!” uttered Bast, quickly getting back on his feet.
“How the hell did he manage to get there without passing through the rail?” asked Callirienne.
“It’s worrying, you see,” commented the Pnarakonian. “I could swear I’ve s—”
“I said not now,” restated Bast. “I’ll go into position. We’d better act while they’re both distracted. Pnark, can you shoot?”
“Well, I’m not really—”
“Then just keep quiet and don’t get in her way.” Bast gave a last fleeting check to his own equipment and pulled down his visor. He then placed a hand on Callirienne’s shoulder. “Good luck, Liri.”
Both of their faces were hidden. She could neither see him nor feel the touch of his gauntlet over her pauldron, but the gesture was still enough to give her a small dose of relief and new determination to push away the fear of the monster.
“You too, Bast,” she whispered. “God be with you.”
“Remember,” he warned, “shoot the first time it turns sideways.”
Callirienne gave him one last look as he was embraced by the shadows then she knelt down on the machinery and propped up the long exalist, placing it between two of the pipes, all the while keeping her eyes glued to the platform.
The Vrake had moved closer to the center and had started talking to the Trawler. This time it was speaking in proper Pnarian, but the rumbling of the water covered most of its words, preventing her to make any sense of what it was saying. Even though the Trawler looked far from comfortable, recoiling two steps away from the Vrake for every one that the monster took in his direction, it didn’t really seem as if the creature had any hostile intentions.
Would it be too much to ask for them to fight each other? Callirienne thought. Not that the Trawler would stand a chance, but at least it’d be a nice distraction. Speaking of which...
The Pnarakonian was busy fiddling and fretting next to her, making it more and more difficult for her to ignore him. As suspicious as those noises were, Callirienne couldn’t turn to him under any circumstance. She had to keep her eyes on Bast in order to see when he had reached his position on the other side of the platform. The Shadowy Falls’ border had so little light that she was certain that, if she had moved her eyes away even for a second, she would lose his sight entirely.
“What are you doing?” she finally burst out, trying to rein in her voice almost immediately after the first word.
“That…Trawler guy...” said the Pnarakonian, still making some squeaking and creaking noises with his tools. “It cannot be, but…it almost looks like...”
Bast had finally reached his position; Callirienne saw his shadow duck and become completely invisible from her point of view, which meant that in only a few seconds, he would be ready to shoot. She turned her eyes back to the Vrake and the Trawler; they had both moved closer to the bearing wall, and the old man had started fiddling with one of the control panels.
This isn’t good, she thought. If the Vrake keeps standing that way, neither of us has a shot to his eyes! Come on! Turn!
“Tsol!” abruptly exclaimed the Pnarakonian at her side. “It is an Hoplyos!”
The hell is he talking about? Despite not having the least idea of what he was saying, the anxious tone of his voice was enough to unsettle Callirienne, making it even harder for her to keep focused.
Why is he suddenly so upset?
The Vrake was still giving both of them his back, his snout firmly turned towards the wall, craning over the Trawler’s shoulder to look at whatever its accomplice was doing. Its claws impatiently tapped on the floor with a metallic cling.
“The other person!” the Pnarakonian frantically tried to explain. “That’s how he came in through the wall!”
“He did what?”
“You have to stop him! He’s trying…just stop him! Shoot him or something!”
“The hell I will!” She had the urge to give the Pnarakonian a jab in order to make him calm down, but at the same time, she didn’t want to accidentally shift her aim and lose the shot. She had to remain focused. The Vrake might turn at any second.
“You can’t let him finish!” desperately complained the Pnarakonian. “He might blow up the entire layer!”
Callirienne had yet to understand what he was talking about, but his sudden, hysterical tone was starting to really worry her.
“Keep quiet!” she scolded him. “You’ll blow our trap! First I shoot the Vrake, then I’ll shoot the Trawler. If you’re so concerned, then shoot him yourself.”
“Me? I can’t do that!” The young man sounded appalled at her suggestion. “But he must be stopped immediately,” he kept complaining. “I don’t think he knows what he’s doing. Maybe if I warn him...”
Hearing him moving away, Callirienne was forced to free one arm from the rifle to grab the Pnarakonian from his coat and drag him back to her side.
“You’re going nowhere and doing squat,” she hissed, holding him against the machine with her forearm while still trying to keep her eyes on the platform. A quick glance at him made her realize that he was wearing a strange set of goggles with multiple lenses and held a strange contraption in his hand.
What if there really is something wrong? she found herself thinking. He was an emissary of Pnarakon after all, and the Zakhai knew more about Tsamarkan than any other living person.
But if he’s wrong, I could ruin the trap! Bast could die!
She could feel the heart of the Pnarakonian thumping madly over her forearm.
“Just…give me a second,” she finally told him. “And be quiet.”
She had no way of warning Bast from where she was—not without alerting the Vrake and the Trawler as well. And the Vrake was not turning; whatever the Trawler was doing, it had the monster’s complete attention.
If he does not turn until the Trawler has done whatever he’s doing...But what is he doing?
She suddenly felt like there was no time to lose anymore; she had to make up her mind and act immediately.
Keeping one hand firmly on the rifle’s trigger and her eyes on the monster, Callirienne carefully moved her left hand to her belt, taking one of her pistols and balancing it over the barrel of the larger weapon.
Alright she reasoned to herself, I shoot the Trawler with the pistol. That will make the damned thing turn for sure, even if I miss. At that point, no matter what, I use the big exalist for the Vrake.
She took another few seconds to better aim with the pistol, targeting the man’s back, and considered her decision one last time, praying it to be the right choice.
Callirienne pressed the trigger. The pistol’s spring went off with a loud click, followed swiftly by the hissing of the bolt.
Callirienne saw the Trawler shudder and groan.
The Vrake turned its head almost immediately towards the origin of the noise. In that split second, she saw the green eyes of the beast looking straight into her own, and she felt her heart stop as primordial fear gripped her soul once more.
She hastily threw the pistol aside to better hold the rifle, but during her motion, the stress made her right hand clench too soon. A second, louder click followed the first; the projectile flew into the monster’s face, but missed the eye, bouncing over the Vrake’s beak without even leaving a mark.
She saw the monster’s legs contracting, ready to charge forward, but a third shot stopped its attack on start, reaching the creature from the opposite side of the platform. The Vrake twisted its neck and let out an incoherent screech that sent a cold shiver down Callirienne’s spine.
Hoping that Sebastophian’s shot had done more damage than hers, she left her post, already reaching for the second pistol, and recovered her spear left near the machinery.
Fear and anxiety did not allow her to form coherent thoughts; she heard the Pnarakonian screaming something at her side, but she was too agitated to understand his words. She only knew that she had to go on the platform and help Bast flank the monster.
She almost stumbled on one of the pipes on her way there and cursed herself for her clumsiness.
Callirienne reached the platform and passed by the Trawler’s body, who had crumbled over the control panel on the wall. The Vrake had already moved away; she could see its shadow closer to the hedge of the abyss. It was so fast that it was a blur. The monster kept hunched over itself, rapidly slashing with its long, straight foreclaws in quick, violent bursts. Callirienne could only imagine what it would feel like to be on the receiving end of the assault.
Sebastophian had to use his spear with both hands to deflect the incoming attacks, and even then, Callirienne could see that he was being forced into a desperate defense.
Her vision was limited. She still couldn’t see how much damage Bast’s first attack had caused, but she knew it had been done to the creature’s left eye. She needed to place herself on the Vrake’s right flank and try to unload her second pistol at point blank on its right eye.
The Vrake suddenly leaped forward, forcing Bast to throw himself to the side.
Knowing Sebastophian would need a few precious seconds to get back up, Callirienne charged the creature from her position, pinning her spear in the joint of its back leg.
Her bones ached on impact; she felt the spear bend and vibrate in her hand while the monster did not flinch. When she retracted the weapon, she could see a smudge of dark blood on its tip—a meager reward for her effort.
It barely even scratched it, she thought, a new surge of hopelessness gripping her mind.
The Vrake started to turn towards her, and Callirienne quickly stretched her other arm to aim at its face with the exalist.
The Vrake reacted faster; its claws rasped over the armor’s flutings in a spray of sparkles accompanied by an ear-piercing screech, then they cut through her right arm’s flesh, tossing her away.
Callirienne lost hold of her spear and let out a muffled scream as she rolled on the ground. For a few moments she was overcome by pain, her mind blurring and her limbs refusing to answer. She was terrified more than she had ever been during any other hunt. Desperately, she tried not to lose consciousness, praying for the Vrake not to come upon her to finish her off while she was lying there, completely defenseless.
When she finally managed to flinch and roll on her side to take a breath, the Pnarakonian’s voice reached her. The young man was still screaming for some reason.
“I can’t fix it!” he was shouting, standing next to the control panel where the Trawler had been only a few minutes before.
“We need to leave now!”
Callirienne barely had time to ask herself what the boy was doing up there in the open when the Vrake came upon her with a cold swish. She instinctively curled on herself, covering her head, but the monster was not after her. It leaped over her body, running towards the wall and the Pnarakonian.
Callirienne forced herself up and jumped behind the creature; she had still her last exalist and her sword, but she doubted she could do much damage with the blade.
It’s so fast, she thought, unable to keep up with the monster’s charge. The Pnarakonian let out a scream, trying to get away from the Vrake and stumbling on the Trawler’s corpse.
With little time to think, Callirienne reached the Vrake as it was turning around; she quickly lowered herself to avoid being wiped away by the monster’s tail. She stuck the exalist in its thigh, as close as possible to the scratch already made with the spear, and pulled the trigger shortly after.
The monster’s pained growl gave her only fleeting solace; the Vrake’s paw closed around her chest and over her arms, lifting her from the ground. Callirienne struggled, letting out a moan when the monster’s fingers pressed harder around the recent wound on her arm.
She saw the hateful, large eyes of the Vrake looking down on her through the slit of her helmet. One of them was half-closed and bleeding; its green iris still glimmered in the dark, piercing through the coat of black blood.
The monster brought the other paw up and moved it closer to wrap around her head.
Callirienne was completely terrified, paralyzed by fear and pain, unable to either think or move.
She heard somebody screaming, but the voice was distorted by the roaring of the monster and she couldn’t understand who it was or what was being said. The realization of being about to die completely overwhelmed her. She didn’t know if it was the Vrake’s magic sapping her resolve, or if maybe she’d never truly considered herself in mortal danger before.
It doesn’t matter anymore.
She closed her eyes. The pressure around her chest increased, followed by a surge of cold. The monster was still roaring; even as her senses grew dim, Callirienne could hear the overwhelming, thundering rumble echoing in her head.
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