Page 101 of Psycho Shifters
There was a frenzy of bleating behind me, followed by loud crunching, and the hot poker sensation stopped. It sounded like Ascher had barreled into the fae with his massive horns.
“Watch and learn, little kitty,” Cobra said, and then maniacally chuckled like it was all good fun.
He needed serious psychological help. Even while numb, I noted that was ironic, coming from the person with the homicidal voice.
All of a sudden, the shadow snakes that writhed across Cobra’s skin started slithering to the ground. However, they didn’t stream forward in the hundreds like in the last battle.
Each snake seemed to lie atop another snake.
The writhing pile grew and grew as an endless stream of snakes appeared on Cobra’s pale skin and slithered down to join the…thing.
In less than thirty seconds, hundreds of separate snakes had expanded and combined.
Into a monster snake.
The creature was as tall as Cobra and as wide as my beast. It was also disturbingly long. So long that I couldn’t see where its mammoth body ended on the side of the mountain.
Shockingly, the massive snake was three-dimensional.
Before, Cobra’s snakes had been completely flat, like shadows. This creature was thick and wide, with glistening black scales darker than the onyx of Ascher’s horns.
The massive snake’s mouth opened up and showed off twin dagger-like fangs longer than my body. A forked bright-red tongue tasted the icy air.
It wasn’t the creature’s size, scales, or massive teeth that shook me the most.
It was its eyes. The huge snake had Cobra’s eyes—the same startling swirl of colors stared back at me.
When Cobra blinked, the snake blinked.
The little shadow snake on my back twirled around and sent zips of happiness and wonder across my back. It gave off a distinct impression of shock and amazement. Apparently, Cobra had not released the full creature in a very long time.
Ascher bleated in annoyance behind me, and before I could blink, a huge black body slithered over the boulders beside me.
Cobra’s hand ran along the side of the snake like he was petting a favorite dog. Not a terrifying beast.
Even as screams echoed behind me, the snake head hissing and rattling, Cobra kept his hand on the massive snake’s body.
I still couldn’t see its tail.
All at once, something banged into my back, and a spider fae jumped over the web and faced me. Before I could growl or do anything, two of its legs cut the web on either side of me and folded it inward.
I was completely ensnared.
Before Ascher or Cobra could react, it jumped ridiculously high, and I went airborne down the side of the mountain. The fae creature barely caught itself.
Bite it.
The spider fae scurried through the brutal conditions, down the side of the mountain, slipping and sliding on icy rocks. My body was wrapped up in the web, held by its giant pincers, but my head and maw were free.
Still, with how tightly it was wrapped around me, there should have been no way for me to gain purchase and bite.
If I weren’t numb, that was.
As I wrenched through the barbed web, every inch of my body screamed with agony. I shut the pain away in the deep recesses of my numb brain.
I would have passed out cold if I weren’t numb.
A copper tang filled the air as cuts skewered almost every inch of my skin. From the sticky sensation on my fur, I knew I was completely covered in my blood.