Page 214 of Anathema
A cold pulse of shock left me paralyzed, while I stared at her slowly lengthening teeth.
Move! Now!
I gathered my feet beneath me to dart away, but her hand shot out, gripping my arm. A wheeze of panic tore out of me, and I clawed at her fingers to loosen them. A rough jerk of my arm sent me flying face first into the snow. I scrambled onto my back, and as I kicked away from her, she scampered toward me on all fours, her mouth the only thing left visible on her face. She let out a terrifying screech that echoed through the forest and climbed over top of me, her impossible strength pinning me beneath her. A snap of her teeth nearly reached my cheek, but I shot out my right hand, grabbing her by the neck.
“Elowen! Please!”
Drool dripped from her teeth onto my chin, and I turned away, straining to hold her from my face. It was as I craned my neck that I noticed an image carved in the bark of a tree a short distance away. It reminded me of two bird’s eyes, opposite of each other and inverted like a mirrored image of one another. So wildly out of place, I couldn’t help but stare. Couldn’t look away, as some invisible force seemed to anchor my attention there. I stared at it, studying it. Time slowed. The muscles in my arms shook, threatening to give beneath her weight pressing down on them.
Heat burned across my palm, and a flash of bright light struck my eyes, nearly blinding. I blinked away the floating objects, and when I turned back to Elowen, time leapt into motion again.
A blackness crawled from my knuckles to the tips of my fingers wrapped tight at her throat. Elowen’s spine snapped straight, her head tipped back, and the pressure weighing down on me lessened. Tiny black veins pulsed beneath her pale white skin, thickening and thickening. The veins stretched and reached across her face, swallowing the alabaster white, until, at last, she crumbled to black dust that fell upon me.
Coughing, I kicked myself backward until my spine hit something hard, and I let out a scream, twisting to see a tree trunk at my back. Snapping my attention back to Elowen showed nothing but her threadbare clothes lying in a pile over scattered black dust that’d blown across the snow.
I looked down to the tips of my fingers, which remained black as onyx, and when I turned my palm up, the image I’d seen carved in the tree glowed on my right hand. A new glyph. Up close, I could see it was two vertically inverted eyes, but the ridge of each eye actually made up a scythe. Two inverted scythes.
Another glance at Elowen.
Death.
A deep growl had me glancing up again to see two pale-skinned creatures skulking toward me through the trees. I pushed to my feet and ran back toward the archway.
The trailing growls told me they chased after me, but I didn’t stop, nor turn, to see how closely. Through the snow, I booked it back toward the cottage, a suffocating fear robbing me of air as I wheezed and coughed. My boot struck a log, and I tumbled forward, the ground smashing into my chest. A quick glance showed the creatures bounding after me on all fours, and I jumped to my feet, dashing forward once more.
The archway stood just ahead of me. The air burned in my lungs, and my muscles shook as I sprinted past it to the open field, toward the cottage in the distance. The faster I raced toward it, the closer the growls seemed to chase after me.
A tearless sob tugged at my throat, but I clamped my lips to keep it in check. Zevander needed me to return. He needed me. I refused to die. I refused to leave him vulnerable and alone.
I will not die in this wretched world.
My lungs pounded at my chest for a sip of oxygen by the time I reached the porch. Weak with exhaustion, I slammed through the front door of the cottage and closed it behind me, switching the lock into place. With my back against the door, I panted, waiting for those creatures to slam through after me. Growls and snarls bled through the door. A hard thud jerked me forward. Another clanked the metal locks.
“Stop!” I screamed as they rammed into the barrier a third time.
Their growls heightened, and I slapped my hands to my ears, screwing my eyes shut. “Go away, go away, go away!”
A cold gust swirled around me, and for the briefest moment, I wondered if they’d gotten through somehow.
The beating against the door stopped, and I opened my eyes to an eerie stillness that settled through the room.
Nothing but the quiet grunts from the bedroom that told me Zevander still lay there.
Stepping cautiously over the floorboards, I padded toward the window beside the door and peered out. My heart pounded in my throat. Dozens of the creatures paced in the yard, snarling and snapping their teeth, but none of them approached the door. As if they couldn’t.
As if my presence stirred them into a frenzy, one of them rushed toward the porch. An invisible force threw it backward across the yard.
“A ward,” I whispered. It was then I remembered the symbols carved into the wood on the door.
Backing away from the window, I looked around in search of a rag and found one on a countertop. I tore it into small strips, wrapping each small section around my fingers, all the way to their blackened tips, until they were completely covered. My whole body trembled as I limped my way to the bedroom, and after sliding off the boots, I crawled into bed next to Zevander. Even unconscious, he calmed me, his massive body like an iron shield that I hid behind while the monsters paced outside the window.
If only he’d wake.
While his body continued to tremble, I buried my face in his damp skin that’d begun to heat again. “Please wake up,” I whispered. “Please don’t leave me here alone.”
CHAPTER SIXTY-ONE
ZEVANDER