Chapter 26 Devourer's Prison
She didn’t know she’d passed out until the world jolted her awake again.
For a minute, Daisy drifted in the numb space between pain and nothing. The wind stung her cheeks, the grass prickled her arms, and a heavy, metallic taste filled her mouth, her blood, or maybe just the air, so thick with magic that it felt like iron filings in her teeth. She blinked, fighting through a haze of venom and exhaustion, and the stars above swam in and out of focus.
Then the ground shifted. Not a normal shift, this was the kind of movement that started with a whisper and ended with the world eating you whole.
The first hint was a cracking under her hip, like a bone breaking. Daisy had heard that sound a lot. Then a slow tilt, the grass at her fingertips sliding away, replaced by air. The next instant, she was tumbling, the earth dropping out beneath her, a black nothing where the field had been.
She hit once, hard. The impact ripped every thought from her head and replaced it with pure, raw panic. She spun, bounced, and crashed again, her leg catching on something that bent it the wrong way, then kept bending. She heard the break before she felt it: a pop, a snap, then a white-hot spear of agony through her thigh.
She bounced again, tumbled, and finally landed with a wet, heavy thud in a mess of mud and bone.
It took a minute for her eyes to catch up. When they did, Daisy saw she was at the bottom of a ravine, a dry streambed, maybe fifteen feet deep, the walls sheer on one side and jagged on the other. The mud was thick and red as old blood, the banks littered with the bones of things that had fallen, or been thrown, here before. Some were animals, some not. A skull stared up at her, jaw open in a perfect scream.
She tried to move. The attempt sent a scream up her own throat, loud enough to wake the dead. Her leg dangled uselessly, foot twisted backward. The shoulder where the Manticore’s barb had struck throbbed with every heartbeat, the pain rising in pulses, like she was hooked up to some cruel machine.
Something above her grunted.
She looked up. At the rim of the ravine, the Manticore watched, tail curled elegantly over its back. The eyes, so blue, so horribly human, met hers. The mouth stretched into a slow, deliberate smile.
Daisy scrambled backward, hands clawing at the mud. The leg didn’t cooperate. She whimpered, pressed herself against the cold stone, and looked for anything she could use as a weapon. Her satchel was gone, probably lost in the fall, and her pockets turned up nothing but a handful of broken glass and a strip of copper wire. She wrapped the wire around her fist, more as a comfort than a defense.
The Manticore didn’t hurry. It paced along the edge, tail flicking, savoring her terror. Then, with a single, impossible leap, it dropped into the ravine, landing with a squelch barely six feet from Daisy’s head.
She gagged at the smell of hot fur, rot, and wrong.
The Manticore didn’t attack. It sat, curling its tail around its paws, and regarded her with calm delight. The venom in her shoulder burned hotter, spreading to her fingers, then her chest. Her heart beat faster, the pulse so loud she could barely hear anything else.
A memory surfaced: her mother, hacking up blood in the dark; Delia, crying as she stitched up Daisy’s latest wound; the promise Daisy made to herself to never die easy, never let them take her without a fight.
She focused on the pain, on the spiral burning under her skin. Blood welled from the bite on her shoulder, bright and furious. She willed it to do something, anything, protect her, save her, explode in the monster’s face. The magic responded, but not the way she hoped.
A line of blood snaked from the wound, curled in the air, then spat itself forward, forming a brief, blurry shield between Daisy and the Manticore. The beast blinked, surprised, then lunged, shattering the barrier in a spray of red mist. It stopped inches from her face, the breath hot and reeking, the smile still there.
Daisy swung her fist, the copper wire catching the beast across the snout. It recoiled, more from shock than from pain. The tail lashed, striking the mud just beside her ear, spraying her with foul venom.
Another instinct, deeper and older, took over. Daisy reached for the blood again, this time not to shield, but to stab. She clenched her fist, felt the spiral on her wrist tighten, and watched as a lance of red shot forward, jabbing the Manticore in the eye.
The beast howled, reared up, and in that moment, Daisy dragged herself backward, using only her good leg and raw panic. She hit the wall of the ravine, nowhere left to run.
The Manticore blinked blood from its eye, the human face twisting in rage. It stalked forward, slow and careful now, the tail raised high for a killing blow.
Daisy bared her teeth and braced for the end.
The world lit up.
A roar rolled through the ravine, a sound that made the air itself vibrate. At the top of the bank, a shape darker than the night, scales catching every gleam of fire from the burning menagerie behind. The dragon.
Xeris.
The Manticore spun, eyes wide. It recognized the threat. For the first time, Daisy saw fear on its face.
Xeris didn’t speak, didn’t waste a second. He dropped from the rim, wings half-extended, smashing into the Manticore with the force of a falling mountain. The sound was meat and bone and stone breaking all at once.
The Manticore tried to fight back: fangs and claws slashing, tail stabbing at the dragon’s throat, but Xeris batted the stinger aside, jaws clamping down on the Manticore’s neck. Blood sprayed, the ravine filling with the stink of burning meat.
Daisy watched, stunned. She’d seen dogs fight, rats tear each other apart, but this was violence on a scale she couldn’t process.
The dragon pinned the Manticore, crushing it against the bank. The beast howled, the sound more human than animal. It begged, just once, a plea in a language Daisy almost understood. Xeris ignored it. He bit down, tearing flesh and fur, then shook the corpse until the spine snapped.
The fight was over in seconds.
Xeris let the body drop, then turned his gaze to Daisy.
The eyes were gold, slit-pupil, alien. But they were not unkind.
‘You survived,’ he said, the voice in her mind a rumble of heat and pride. ‘Impressive, little one.’
Daisy tried to answer, but all she managed was a whimper.
Xeris moved closer, the bulk of him filling the ravine. He sniffed at her, tongue flicking over her wounds, his breath washing away some of the pain. She felt her heart slow, the magic in her blood responding to his presence —calm, for the first time in hours.
He nudged her gently, as if urging her to rise.
“I can’t,” Daisy whispered. “My leg…”
Xeris lowered his head, eyes narrowing. Then, with exquisite care, he slipped his claw under her body and lifted her out of the mud.
She hung there, limp and broken, but alive.
Above, the world was still burning. The menagerie was ash, the city beyond already bracing for the next disaster. But in the moment, it was just her and the dragon, the ruin behind, and the unknown ahead.
Xeris unfurled his wings, and the updraft of air was enough to send Daisy’s hair streaming behind her. He clutched her to his chest, careful not to crush, and with a single, effortless leap, they rose from the ravine, higher and higher, until the world below was nothing but scarred earth and distant fire.
Daisy closed her eyes, the wind cold on her face, the pain fading into a dull, manageable ache.
She’d survived the monster.
Now she had to survive herself.