Lilliad chp 14

Lilli slunk behind, on high alert. She couldn’t help but feel that this had been a massive mistake.

Meanwhile, Elathor was near strutting while they muttered to themselves and made notes of things Lilli would rather not think about too much.

“Oh, interesting!” Elathor poked a protruding rib bone and wiped congealed blood onto a wall in a fluid motion. “It seems that the hatching time for this specific ktharyis was significantly lower than some of the older bodies. This man hasn’t been dead over a day and yet obviously the egg is nowhere to be seen. Fascinating.”

“Fascinating.” Igni monotoned, kicking rubble over corpses. Whether that was to prevent Elathor examining and discussing them or sheer caprice Lilli didn’t know.

‘I would personally hope Igni isn’t that callous, but they are literally a rock.’

Lilli grimaced, secure in the knowledge that neither of her companions were paying any attention to her at all.

It was almost bizarre, Lilli noted, the differences in Elathor’s level of comfort. They were incredibly nervous in social situations, but crime? No problem.

As if to demonstrate the contrast, Elathor confidently shoved a taloned hand into another corpse’s rib cage and rummaged around.

“The ktharyis really seem to like certain organs.” He commented blithely, “the kidneys are always missing in the bodies we find. Of course, this is after they’ve stolen enough nourishment from the blood to emerge.”

‘“Emerge” is certainly one way of putting it.’

Lilli tried to not look at the faces, frozen in contortions of pain and fear. It was all she could really do. It wasn’t even safe to burn or bury the bodies with a horde of ktharyis somewhere near.

‘I guess it was too much to hope that someone died peacefully in their sleep or something.’ She swallowed another bit of something that tasted like copper after she accidentally made eye contact with a disembodied head.

It was apparently mid-scream when the head was unceremoniously removed from its customary perch.

Lilli turned away.

Igni scratched at the walls they walked past.

“Sandstone? Disgusting. Who builds a wall out of sandstone.”

Lilli wasn’t sure that Igni’s face could move but she could certainly tell the tone was aghast.

Her ears quirked. Lilli tried to figure out what she had heard that had triggered the reaction.

Oh.

“Steel and bones!” She exclaimed, pointing to the sounds. “There’s fighting further in.”

As if suddenly possessed, Igni picked them both up and threw them over her rocky shoulders and ran right through the substandard wall. Their groans of mild pain did nothing to stop Igni’s momentum as she pulverized any obstacles in the way of the most direct route.

Igni had thrown her over ass-first, so all Lilli could see was the dusty trail of destruction and rubble Igni left behind.

Another crash, then another and another- some debris hit Lilli’s back and got into her hair. She couldn’t see, her eyes were stinging.  As she blinked out the dust from her eyes, she saw that Lilli had bulldozed through an entire house.

‘I wish I was surprised.’

An increasingly familiar tingle in the back of Lilli’s brain made her vomit a little down Igni’s back- it was getting stronger and stronger.

Igni roared, and Lilli was flung from her unwanted perch onto the ground. It almost instantly caved under her, and Lilli instinctively rolled away.

Now she could see.

She wished she couldn’t.

Igni had punched the ground, causing the tremor. Elathor was half over a nearly dead bush.

There was a figure behind a large and blood-smeared shield, who could only be the person they’d been trying to find.

Oh, and about 200 ktharyis, circling overhead.

“Fuck.” She and Elathor said in unison.