Rest? At last?
I wanted to weep. Surely this must be a dream. After everything... Finally? Could it really...
"Reflecti..." I stammered. "We telep...?"
"Yes, love. And look. You've even cleared the skies for us."
Cleared the skies? My gaze floated up, compelled by a vague urge, only to confirm his nonsense claim. A great hole punched straight through the cloud cover, with tattered wisps on the very edges as if something powerful and massive had blasted its way right into outer space. The sun shone down on me in a peaceful array of summer light, making the water sparkle with every lapping wave.
"The sirens are no longer a concern," Lust continued, "and the serpent can only be—ah." He paused. "We will have to move quickly. Endure a little longer, love."
His tone was calm, but there was no misunderstanding the conspicuous about-turn. "What is it," I demanded, my own words slurring now but still saddled with all the authority I could shove into them. "Why?"
"The beast is more resilient than I expected. It's stirring. Mammon! This way!"
Stirring. My emotions were so deadened I couldn't even summon the necessary fear to react. At least my brain wasn't too paralyzed to follow instructions when Lust urged me to unclench my fist and put my hand on his shoulder for leverage. He'd taken his Shard from me already and held it horizontally between his teeth, fangs glimmering over the curved, glass-like surface. But wait! What about the...?
"On your arm, love. It's been depleted and taken on a new form. It won't leave your side in the meantime."
Once again, my sluggish attention obeyed unthinkingly, drooping to my arm. A slender braided length twined about my arm like delicate vines from my fingers to my bicep. The soft leather of it rubbed against my elbow when I twisted my forearm up for a better view. Too bad we didn't have time to gawk. Before I could get a good look, Lust pulled me up into his arms and carried me closer to shore with forceful strides through the water, straining against the resistance.
The quiet grunt of exertion when he climbed the slope into the shallows finally alerted me to the reality of his injuries. His arms—they were scorched so badly that there wasn't a speck of intact color remaining on them, but still he carried me like a knight coming to the rescue of a helpless princess. He was the one who looked like he'd crawled out of an incinerator. What was he doing! How was he going to stay standing like this!
"Lust! Let me d-down. Now!"
"Not yet, love. Mammon, this way. Quickly!"
"Don't ig-ignore me. You're... you're c-comp-completely..."
"You're the one in a dangerous state, my love. My wounds are only of the flesh. Yours run far deeper."
"'m fine!" I mumbled between gritted teeth, struggling to stand my ground. God, I was so tired... My eyes... closing. "Just let m-me down."
"No." His denial was effortless. Whatever strength I'd summoned earlier to Command him was gone now, not a trace left to bend him to my will. "Time is of the essence. Mammon!"
The serpent monster's enormous body lay coiled and tangled, half-in and half-out of the water. The white scales that had seemed almost transparent in their purity before were now blackened in great patches all over. I didn't even recognize it at first, except for the telltale wings all down its great length that dragged and floated atop the lake's surface. Little reverberations of motion made them flutter, and my heart stopped. Oh, God. Lust was right. It was still alive. Not that I'd expected to kill it—and neither did I want to, just in case... but thumping, billowing fear blew through me at the thought of it rising back up and finishing what it started. There wasn't enough room left inside my deflated brain for terror, but that much, I knew would be instant death.
No more chances. This was our last one. If we failed, there was nothing left in me to fight back with, nor in Lust—nor Mammon, either, who dragged himself around the other side of the monster's fallen body towards us.
My jaw dropped at the gruesome sight. He had been bloody and ragged before, but now entire patches of charred flesh marred his pelt. The same strange, hardened sheen that coated Lust's burns reflected the light from Mammon's mangled body, like glaze over baked clay. I swallowed hard, unable to tear my gaze away as he limped toward us on four legs then slowly rose to two. As we watched, his enormous wolf form melted away, shrinking until his human appearance replaced it completely. The burns remained, shiny patches of deep, angry red all over his body... along with grievous lacerations practically sheared right through his arms, legs, and even his jaw. He stared at us as he closed the distance, eyes burning with a fierce, wrathful light that made his injuries all the more horrifying. He couldn't even speak. When he moved his mouth, a dark essence that could only be blood—could Infernal blood look like that?—streamed out of his ruined jaw and chin. It trickled out of his eyes as well when the scorched parts of his face cracked with even that minute movement.
Oh, God. The whip... The Indra's Net. Finally, the gears of my cognition whined and squeaked back into motion, and with it came the belated understanding that I had caused this. That I had somehow made the sirens disappear was obvious even if it made no sense, so I had no choice but to accept it. But Lust and Mammon? Princes? With one relic I had no clue how to use, with one relic I shouldn't even be able to use, to them, I...?
A deep rumbling noise shook the air and the ground together, sending faint ripples through the water around Lust. He and Mammon both froze before turning in unison toward the great monster lying ahead of us, massive and looming. As we watched, one of its numerous drooping wings that lay partly underwater rustled and shook. Then another... and another, and another. My pulse rocketed.
"It's waking back up," I said numbly, my emotionless tone belying the panic spiking like knives in my stomach. "It's already—"
"Mammon. Now. The Shard." Lust tossed his head, gesturing for the other Prince to draw closer. "We don't have time to argue. Either cooperate or kill yourself with your own stubbornness."
Mammon growled. Probably because his mouth was unable to form words, but also probably because he had no choice but to agree. One glance at him told me enough. He had taken a beating from the monster and couldn't withstand another. Even if it meant giving up his one trump card and trusting that we wouldn't turn on him after, he had no choice but to comply.
I winced and closed my eyes when he opened his mouth. Too much. Goosebumps rolled across my body when a cringe-inducing cracking noise came from his jaw when he forced it open wider to reach down his throat. At least it was over quickly. He withdrew a familiar object, glass-smooth and gleaming. It hissed and sizzled away the light sheen of blood and saliva that coated it, and by the time Lust had his own hand wrapped around the Shard, it had regained its typical appearance, pure and untouched.
But Mammon's grip never faltered. He held on when Lust tugged on it and released another warning snarl. "I'm not letting go. Do it like this."
"We have no time for games, Mammon."
"Do I look like I'm in the mood for any?"
"Lust," I interrupted. "Just do it. Please. The—the thing, it's waking up. It's moving. Just, please."
I didn't even need to remind him. Lust's gaze had already darted to the serpent now doing more than just stirring. Was it seriously going to get up already! Oh, God. For fuck's sake! Did we not deserve one damn break!
The only upside was that it lit a fire under Mammon's ass again right when we needed it most. He stepped closer in a hurry, his attention arrested by the serpent's intensifying shifting as well. On impulse, I reached out to him and grasped his shoulder, the only unburnt part of him wide enough for me to touch without disturbing his injuries. "I'm not a psychopath," I snapped. "I lied to you before to save my skin, but we made a deal. I'm not leaving you behind just to get creamed by that thing, okay? Chill."
He narrowed his eyes but said nothing in response. Just as well, because oh, God.
The monster lifted its head at last.
Its giant scaled coils shifted and shimmered, pulling out of the lake and bunching together. Charred scales and feathers showered down like gems and stardust to float on the water, bobbing up and down with deceptively harmless charm. It was almost picturesque, a surreal vision of paradise with a mythical, mystical serpent god taking center stage with its mind-blowing majesty. But I sure as hell knew better. A lot better.
Lust grasped the Shard above Mammon's grip, both of them holding it together. I hung on with my arms around Lust's neck, clutching him so tight that if he were human, I would surely have choked him. Please, God. Not again, not again, not again, I just wanted to go home, feel safe under my own roof just one more time—
The serpent twisted its neck, and the macabre jaws opened up.
The half-man perched within them turned his face towards us.
But before it could move another muscle, a vicious lurching sensation hooked into my stomach, both familiar and foreign. He was doing it! Somehow, even with the lake surface disturbed, Lust was getting us away right when I'd thought we were done for. My gut tumbled, nausea swirling violently up my throat in a rushing storm, and the world turned inside out as reflection and reality combined, twisted, melded into one. And in one instant, we were gone, sucked into a vortex of energy that pulled us underwater.
Yet—
We were not alone.
In a great crashing cacophony, the monster lunged and shattered the boundary between us.