Chapter 77 Say Something Threatening

Lark cut the first taut root.

Black water spurted from the severed end. The knot beneath the surface jerked toward the thicker strand.

Kessa's second arrow pinned a thin cord against the causeway's wooden edge.

The cord stretched.

Held.

Nell wrapped her chain around the next root and drew it across the exposed stone. Pale bronze light settled beneath her heels as she took the strain.

For the first time, the black knot stopped.

Selene moved toward it.

The whole reed bed rose.

Jin saw six pale faces turn toward the causeway. Roots came out of the water in a broad, whipping sheet, not one limb after another.

Selene's barrier flared.

The first rank of roots burned against it. The second drove through the smoke, striking the white curve hard enough to bend it inward.

The rangers behind her stumbled.

She planted her sword in the stone beside her and put both hands against the light.

“Move the cart!”

They moved it.

Jin ran back to the washing stone. The skill had recovered. He selected the footing route with Impact Hitch, drove through the four strides and put the held rush through his knife's hilt against the thick root crossing the stone.

The bark split open.

He drove the blade into the split with an ordinary second thrust.

The cord snapped.

His released route vanished. The other branch still led toward the stump.

The black knot burst out of the water.

It hung inside an open cage of roots, no bigger than a helmet, turning a single glassy eye toward Selene.

“Little light,” it whispered.

Kessa's third arrow struck the dark skin beside the eye. The point skated across it and vanished into the reeds beyond.

Selene saw the shot fail.

“Keep it here,” she called. “I'll take the heart.”

She didn't ask for another arrow to be wasted against it. Lark changed his grip and went after the roots holding the cage closed.

The roots beneath the barrier plunged into the bank.

Stone shifted under Jin's feet.

Lark caught his collar and dragged him back as the causeway footing split.

Nell let her chain run before the sinking stone could take her down with it. Bronze light broke around her heels.

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The cage began to close around the heart.

Selene couldn't reach it with both hands holding the barrier.

Jin looked at the cart. Clear of the water now, one wheel trapped against a fallen root. The rangers were lifting it over.

“Three breaths!” he shouted to Selene.

She shook her head.

“Three.”

He went for the stump on ordinary feet. Too soon for another skill, and the start stone was breaking beneath the water anyway.

The nearest root face tracked him.

He took out the phone.

“You. One eye. Over here.”

The heart turned.

Jin put himself between it and the last trapped wheel, holding the camera high enough to catch his face beneath the open cage.

The eye fixed on the little dark lens.

“You're meat,” the rootwight said.

“Wonderful. Hold that expression.”

He took the picture.

Then the roots struck.

Jin threw himself behind the stump. He hit the dirt shoulder-first, keeping the phone tucked close long enough for the image to save. The ground shook beneath his ribs.

A root slid around the stump from the other side.

He saw its shadow cross his hand and flattened himself against the bank before the lash came. The first cord split its outer bark. The second caught his phone hand and drove it against the wood.

Pain burst through his fingers.

He held on.

“One!”

Kessa's fourth arrow hit the cord gripping his wrist. It loosened just enough for him to pull free.

“Two!”

The cart wheel came over the root.

Lark hit the thickest closing strand with his sword. Silver light opened it from end to end.

“Three!”

Selene let the barrier fall.

The roots rushed through empty space.

She took her sword out of the stone and stepped inside the closing cage.

White light drove upward beneath the heart.

The demon screamed.

Jin shut his eyes against the flare, opened them again and saw Selene still standing in the water, blade buried through the black knot.

She turned it once.

The roots stopped pulling.

The root cage and pale faces broke into motes. Ordinary reeds bent in the water around the fading light.

Jin sat down in the mud.

His phone was still in his hand. The case had a split corner; the screen lit when he touched it.

On it, a one-eyed demon leaned over his shoulder while he made the worst smile of his life.

Nell looked down at the image.

“You kept it.”

“I suffered for that composition.”

She started laughing, then put a hand over her face as though she'd rather he hadn't seen.

Jin spent the ten: four Strength, three Agility, three Endurance.

His grip steadied. The battered fingers still hurt when he bent them.

Selene came up the washing steps and held out a hand.

He took it.

She hauled him out of the mud, looked at the phone and went very still.

“Did you really ask it for the picture?”

Jin nodded.

For a moment she looked as if she might say something solemn.

Then she laughed so hard she had to sit down beside him.