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CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

I wanted to run like Rath told me to and I did—for a little way, at least. But the snow was deep and I kept tripping.

Also, I didn’t like to leave him to face the enormous thing coming through the woods alone…

even if I had no idea what I could do to help him fight it.

I turned and hid behind a tree, peering out from behind the trunk to see what was happening.

At first I thought the approaching monster was an enormous snake because it had a long, scaly neck. But then I saw its huge body coming through the woods, breaking trees like they were matchsticks as it pushed its way towards us.

Was it a dinosaur? A dragon? It had a face like a dragon, I decided, and a body like a T-Rex.

It was bizarre looking because the long, scaly neck bobbed and slithered through the air, ducking and weaving through the broken tree branches high above its enormous body as it lumbered forward, the short front arms clawing the air.

“All right, you fucker,” I heard Rath growl. “Come on—you want to dance? Let’s dance.”

The searching eyes—which were blood red, by the way—fastened on the big Orc and the thing let out a screaming roar that drilled right through my head like an ice pick.

I gasped and put my hands to my ears as the long, snaky neck dived down through the trees with its mouth open. It had curving fangs as long as my arm and I could see green venom dripping from their tips.

Rath didn’t move or try to get away. Instead, he took aim with his enormous hammer and slammed it into the side of the angry dragon head the minute it came close enough.

I saw the side of the head cave in and the light go out of the red, glowing eyes.

The neck slumped, going limp so that the ruined head dragged on the ground.

The enormous body sagged and for a moment, I thought it would topple over and that would be the end of this “challenge” as Rath had called it.

But it wasn’t even close to the end. Even as the head and neck crumbled to black ashes and blew away, something very strange happened. I saw a twitching at the base of the thing’s neck—it looked like a swelling. Almost like an enormous blister was forming where the neck and head and once been.

Then, with no warning, the blister burst and out came not one, but two fierce dragon heads attached to long snaky necks.

They shot out of the stump and grew to full size in seconds.

The huge T-Rex body righted itself and the heads began diving and hissing at Rath, who was roaring and swinging at them with his war hammer.

“Oh, no!” I breathed. I hadn’t read many fairy tales as a kid—my Mom had actively discouraged it, probably because she wanted to keep me away from the magical world in every way possible. But I had been an avid reader of mythology. So I knew what the thing that Rath was battling was.

“A Hydra!” I exclaimed, just as he bashed in another head. “Oh my God—it’s a freaking Hydra!”

Even as I spoke, the head Rath had just bashed crumbled…

and two more rose to take its place. They grew a lot faster than the first two, I noted, watching in sick fascination.

The ashes of the ruined head barely had time to blow away before two more long, snaky necks and red-eyed, fanged dragon heads took their place.

Rath was fighting a losing battle. I could see that now.

There was no way he could kill the creature completely because every time he bashed in one of its heads, two more grew.

Even as I thought this, he dealt a death blow to head number two—or was it number three?

—and immediately, two more popped up to take its place.

Now he was fighting a four headed monster that was half dragon/half dinosaur and it couldn’t die. He couldn’t go on forever—eventually there would be too many heads to fight. What was he going to do?

No, the question is, what are you going to do? whispered a little voice in my head. You have magic—you brewed that potion even though you didn’t mean to. That has to count for something—use what you’ve got!

But how?

Though I could barely stand to take my eyes off the action, I forced myself to close them as I took a deep breath.

I concentrated on what I knew—both Goody Albright and Madam Healer had said I had magic and that the spell on me was fraying around the edges.

What else frayed like that? A sweater…a sweater was made of threads.

What if I tugged at one of those threads? What if I tried to use it in some way?

Closing my eyes even tighter, I pictured myself holding a glowing golden thread—a thread made of magic. The image was so strong in my head, I could practically feel it in my hand—like a hot wire across my palms.

“Grow!” I muttered to the magic golden thread. “Expand, get longer—get thicker too! And stronger!”

And here’s the thing—I could feel it happening. I watched in my mind’s eye as the golden thread that had become a wire suddenly grew into a rope. No, not a rope—a cable—like the heavy-duty ones that hold up suspension bridges, I decided.

I heard a roar from Rath and my eyes popped open.

I saw that he was now fighting a beast with eight heads.

His hammer was moving so fast it was nothing but a blur but the heads just kept on coming!

Already I could see wounds on his back and shoulders, crimson blood was dripping from the gashes the long fangs had dug in his skin.

He was in trouble and I had to help him.

Looking down, I saw that the magic cable I had been imagining was real. It was solid in my hands—I could touch it and feel the metal fibers that had been twisted together to form it. It was just as I had envisioned it.

Great—so I had a magic rope. Now what was I going to do with it?

I thought about using it to try and lasso the heads and tie them down—to a tree trunk perhaps? But no, I didn’t think there were enough trees that were big enough and strong enough in the area to keep all those heads contained.

What I need to do is incapacitate them somehow, I thought as I watched yet another one strike at Rath. It doesn’t do any good to kill them—I have to immobilize them without actually cutting them off or killing them completely.

Rath roared again and I knew I couldn’t wait any longer. Forming the cable in my hands into a large circle, I threw it into the air, aiming for one of the heads.

“Go—encircle the neck!” I ordered it.

To my surprise, even though the head I had aimed at was ducking and dodging, the magic cable circlet dodged with it and slipped over the angry dragon head.

“Good! Now tighten!” I told it. “Cut off the air but don’t cut off the head. Just keep it from breathing.”

As I watched, the glowing golden cable did as I asked.

I saw it tighten around the scaly neck and then the head it was attached to began to thrash in apparent agony.

I could see its jaws gaping wide as it gasped for breath, but the magical cable wouldn’t let it get in any air at all.

It kept on tightening until the eyes rolled up and the neck went limp as the head fainted for lack of oxygen.

That was one head down, but in the meantime, even more had grown. Hastily, I fashioned another glowing circle of magic cable and threw it at another head.

“Rath, get out of the way!” I shouted at the big Orc.

He was stumbling with weariness by this time, but still fighting.

He was trying to get in reach of the body—I could see that.

But in order to do that, he had to keep bashing heads out of the way, which only made more heads. It was, as I said, a losing battle.

But now I could help him. And the magic was flowing faster and faster—I felt like I had when my Mom first taught me how to crochet. At first I had been so hesitant, but once I got the hang of it, I could go as fast as lighting, making row after row of stitches.

Now I made circlet after magic circlet and threw them faster and faster.

I aimed with my mind and my will much more than with my hands which seemed to work fine.

Thank goodness because, as I said before, I have shitty aim—at least when only my hands are involved.

But I was telling the magic glowing circlets where to go and what to do and they were obeying me.

“Go—get that head!” I shouted, pointing at one of the Hydra’s heads, whipping around on its snaky neck, and then throwing the glowing circlet at it.

The circlet went without fail, slipping neatly over the thrashing head and then tightening until the eyes rolled up and the neck went limp and dragged on the ground.

Rath fell back to stand by me. He was breathing hard, his big body covered in wounds and blood.

“How… the fuck…are you doing that?” he panted.

“Magic, I think.” I threw another circlet and strangled another head until its neck went limp.

“Fucking amazing,” he growled. “Smart too—you don’t have to kill them—just choke them out.”

“That’s what I thought,” I said, distractedly. I only had two heads to go and I quickly took care of them.

When I was finished, the enormous T-Rex body wobbled and then fell with a resounding crash to the forest floor. It shook the ground and I stumbled and would have fallen if Rath hadn’t caught me by the arm.

“Watch out, baby,” he growled hoarsely. “Stand your ground—I’m going to finish the damn thing.”

He pulled the curving knife I had noticed on his belt earlier from its sheath and held it up. Then he said a word that hurt my ears—it was spoken in a low, guttural language I didn’t understand but somehow I felt the magic in it.

At once the knife began to glow…and then it began to grow. Its blade went from six inches long to six feet or two meters. Then it stopped growing.

Rath nodded in satisfaction.

“All right—that ought to do it,” he muttered.

“What are you going to do with that?” I asked, eyeing the knife, which had become a massive sword in his hands.

“Going to use it to stake the fucking thing in the heart,” he told me. “That’s the only way to kill it. I was trying to get to it before, but I didn’t have time to draw my sword.” He shook his head. “I thought I was going to die before you started in with your magic.”

“I’m still worried about you.” I eyed all the gashes on his green skin. “That thing bit you all over and I saw the venom dripping from its fangs!”

“I’ll be fine,” he said briefly. “Though I wouldn’t be if you hadn’t stepped in. It’s a damn good thing you didn’t run and hide like I told you to.”

“I couldn’t leave you to fight it all alone,” I objected. “Not if I could help—I’m just glad I could.”

“Not as fucking glad as I am,” he rumbled. “Hang on—this should only take a minute.”

He stomped out into the trampled snow which was black with the ashes of the beaten heads and red with his own blood.

When he got to the enormous T-Rex body, he took aim and I saw him stab it in the chest area, almost between the two grasping arms. The claw-tipped hands were waving feebly I saw, as though the beast was still alive, despite all its oxygen-starved heads.

But the minute Rath stabbed it and pierced its heart, the arms spasmed once…

twice…and then went limp. As I watched, the whole enormous creature began to turn to black ash, just as the heads Rath had bashed in had done.

In just a few seconds the whole thing had crumbled and blown away on the whipping wind, leaving only a huge black mark in the snow to show where it had been.

The Hydra was no more.

“There—that should do it.” Rath came tromping back to me, now streaked in the black ash of the defeated monster. “We met and bested all three of her challenges. Now Baba Yaga has to see us.”

“Will she—” I began.

“VERY WELL! You have proved yourselves.”

The enormous, booming voice startled me so badly that I slipped and fell to my knees in the dirty snow. Rath hooked a hand under my arm and hoisted me up again, then he pulled me against his side.

“ Baba Yaga!” he roared, making me clap my hands over my ears. “Where are you? Show yourself!”

“Not yet,” the booming voice said. “I have no taste for company tonight. You may spend the night in my hut and tomorrow I will see you.”

Suddenly, something came walking through the forest towards us. At first, I couldn’t tell what it was—I only knew it was coming through the trees from the same direction the Hydra had appeared.

I tensed and reached for my magic, holding a hot wire of it in my hands and encouraging it to grow.

“You will not need that, little witch,” the voice of Baba Yaga informed me. “You have proven yourselves—now I offer my hospitality.”

I clutched the magic wire in my hands nervously anyway, not sure if I could trust her.

But a moment later, the thing came through the trees and I saw what it was—a large wooden hut was moving towards us.

No, not moving— walking . Because under it were a pair of enormous, yellow, knobby legs and splayed, three-toed feet.

“Chicken legs,” I whispered, staring at them in disbelief. “That hut has chicken legs!”