Slayer(47)

Leo and Artemis are here. I have help. But Cosmina needs it more than I do.

I whistle. The werewolf and the hellhound pause their fight, panting, and Cosmina looks up at me. I throw the stake to her.

The zompire lunges. Cosmina sinks the stake into its chest.

It poofs into dust like a vampire would. Which means it is a vampire. Sort of. But I don’t have time to think about it, because the hellhound and the werewolf have stopped fighting each other and noticed Cosmina instead.

Another buzz. Three more creatures drop down.

“Whoops!” the announcer says. “My hand slipped. Only fair, since someone changed the odds.”

Cosmina crouches, the stake gripped in her hand, as she waits for the next attack. But she isn’t the only human down there. The werewolves are people too. I don’t want to do this. I want to do anything but this.

But for the first time, I’m certain that this is what I need to do.

I leap the barrier, then jump out into the pit so I won’t hit the barbed wire. I land hard, right next to Cosmina. This time I nail the badass crouch. It’s short-lived as I duck the stake that comes swinging at me.

“I’m here to help!” I shout.

“Who the hell are you?” she demands. A hellhound lunges and I grab it, spinning and throwing it away from us.

“I’m a Watch—a Slayer!”

“Stay out of my way.” She shifts to engage the newest zompire. I duck a huge paw swiping at me, then twist and kick a werewolf hard in the chest. It flies across the pit, hitting the electrified wire. It howls in pain, then falls, unconscious.

The next werewolf bounds toward me. I drop onto my back, then kick out with both legs, using its own momentum to fling it, too, into the wire.

That’s two down. They’re out, but they’re not dead. My body knows exactly what to do, even when I have no clue. I scramble back onto my feet. Cosmina’s dusted the zompire, and one of the hellhounds is tangled in the wire, slowly cooking to death. My stomach turns. It’s a demon, but I don’t want to watch it suffer.

Cosmina kicks the last hellhound right into me. I catch it, holding it in place.

“Well?” she shouts.

I give her an incredulous look. “Well, what? You have the stake!”

“Great. A newborn Slayer. Just my luck.” She yanks the hellhound away from me and throws it as hard as she can straight up. It lands past the edge of the pit and scrambles away. There are shouts of fear and surprise, then several shots ring out. I assume the hellhound is dead.

“Very naughty, girls,” the announcer chides. This isn’t close to over. We’ve eliminated only two of each type. Which means there are four hellhounds, four werewolves, and four zompires left.

“This got interesting!” The announcer is more gleeful than worried. “We have two for the price of one on this Slayer deal! What do you say we even the odds?” A series of buzzers sounds, and two of each of the remaining creatures drop down into the pit.

At the same time, a sword flies in, landing on the ground next to me. I grip the hilt so tightly my hands ache.

“Do you know how to use that?” Cosmina demands.

“No!” I go back-to-back with her. She sounds like Artemis, and I’m done with it. “I’m doing okay so far!”

“No one asked you to—” She breaks off, dodging the zompire lunging for her. I have my own to deal with. It avoids my clumsy strike, hitting me hard in the side. I fly across the pit and fall just short of the electric wires and certain incapacitation—and therefore death. The monster races after me. I lift the sword and its momentum impales it.

It snarls, sliding farther down the blade toward me, fangs bared.

“Stake to the heart—a sword is useless that way!” Cosmina shouts. “Cut off the head!”

“Right!” I knew that; obviously I knew that. I brace both feet against the zompire and kick it free of the sword. Standing, I swing the sword like a baseball bat. It slices clean through the zompire’s neck.

And then something that was becomes something that isn’t, disappearing in a poof of dust. I feel a surge of adrenaline, my heart racing, blood singing in my veins. It’s gone, and I’m alive. I have never been this alive. Power and strength suffuse me. With a scream, I swing the sword at my next attacker.

It cuts deep into the arm of a werewolf.

“No!” I pull the sword free. The werewolf howls in pain. As I stumble toward it to help, something slams into my back, knocking me to the ground. The sword skitters away. I roll, but a hellhound pins my shoulders. I’m face-to-face with my doom.

It yelps, collapsing onto me. The sword sticks out of its back. I shove the hellhound off, then wrench the sword free. Cosmina’s on the other end of the pit. She must have thrown the blade. She’s got the uninjured werewolf pinned, her arm around its throat. She’s going to snap its neck the same way I snapped my first hellhound’s.

But that isn’t a hellhound. It’s a person.

“Stop!” I sprint to her, grab the werewolf, and throw it against the wire. It falls, unconscious.

“I had that one!” Cosmina snarls.

Slayers only kill demons. Not innocents. “They’re people!”

“Not tonight, they aren’t!”

The buzzer sounds once, twice, three times. They’re dumping the rest on us.