by Travis Bughi
In front of the amazons, a huge, impassable mountain wall had narrowed around them so that the only way out was the way they’d come in. They’d run too quickly in a land they did not know in a darkness under trees that hid too much. Angor had struck them a vicious blow.
Behind them, the centaurs that had been following them were closing in. Only now, their numbers had doubled. In a heartbeat, Emily realized that the centaurs had not been chasing the amazons at all.
“They were driving us to a killing zone,” Emily spoke her thoughts aloud.
The centaurs poured in all around them, with those in the back striking up torches one by one. Smart, Emily thought. The amazons would have to look towards the light to see the centaurs, but not the other way around. More centaurs kept creeping in from the sides, and Emily watched their only path of escape become choked with them.
At least a hundred of them came forward with wicked grins and bows held casually at their sides. They stopped just out of bow range and stood rigidly, quietly, and purposefully.
“What do we do?” Hanna asked. “What do we do?”
Adelpha looked around and nocked an arrow. She turned right, left, and then back around, saying nothing. Yet, then again, there was nothing to say. Emily expected that Adelpha’s first reaction would be to release an arrow at the nearest centaur and was surprised when the amazon princess instead stepped forward.
“Lok’har!” Adelpha yelled. “The sun is set, you barbaric imbecile! You’ll kill us all!”
The insult and warning echoed in the silent night, and in response, Lok’har himself appeared from the crowd of centaurs. As he drew forward, away from his allies, he did so with a powerful aura, making sure to strike each hoof roughly into the dirt.
“Did you think I would not follow?” Lok’har asked. “Did you think that I, Lok’har, ruler of Angor, would be frightened by werewolves?”
He laughed, and his army laughed with him.
“You killed my sons!” Lok’har yelled. “I will hunt you until the end of time if that’s what it takes!”
“Or until you’re dead,” Adelpha threatened.
She demonstrated her statement by pulling, drawing, and aiming an arrow at the centaur.
“Come on,” Adelpha said. “I dare you.”
Normally, Emily felt she was the voice of reason next to Adelpha who had a temper shorter than most of the other amazons, whose tempers were short to begin with. Adelpha’s gut reaction was to hit first and hit hardest, though Emily had to admit she was clever about it. However, not every situation called for that, and Emily usually tried to find a more tactful way out of sticky situations.
This was not one of those moments. They were doomed, dead, and done for. There would be no running, there would be no hiding, and they would make their final stand now.
“Don’t be a coward, Lok’har,” Emily yelled out. “Only cowards let their men make the first kill.”
Emily then drew an arrow and nocked it. She wanted to draw two, but she needed all her shots to count. The other amazons looked at each other in shock at first, but in their own way, they each accepted their fate and stepped forward. They drew their arrows and held them up, taking aim at Lok’har.
“Are you afraid?” Iezabel yelled.
“Come meet your sons!” Hanna called out.
They cheered and yelled their insults and taunts. The amazons whistled and joked about Lok’har’s honor, about his lack of skill, and about his fancy army.
“One hundred of you for seventeen of us?” Kirke yelled.
“You can’t blame them for wanting to make the fight even,” Leda joked.
That brought a chorus of laughter, and Lok’har stomped his hooves into the ground.
“Enough!” the centaur yelled. “I’ll give you something to laugh about!”
The amazons’ laughter died down as Lok’har turned to his crowd and made a tilting motion with his head. One of the centaurs stepped forward and lifted a horn to his lips. He took a deep breath and then blew hard. The sound of the centaur horn tore open the heavens above. As one, like a river, the centaurs split down the middle and stepped back to either side. Between them, they left a wide channel, wide enough for all the remaining amazons to pass through.
Emily and the others went quiet. What was Lok’har doing? He didn’t really expect the amazons to try and escape, did he? Emily turned with a questioning glance to Adelpha and Chara, but they looked back in confusion. Then Emily heard thunder.
At least, it sounded like thunder—a repetitive, low thunder. Emily looked above, but then realized that the sound wasn’t coming from there. She looked forward, through the gap in between the centaurs, and the thunder changed from a dull noise to the definite, heavy stomping of something very large.
In the darkness, a bugbear roared.
The creature burst into the torchlight at full speed. It barreled down on all four gigantic paws, moving its massive weight at a terrifying speed. Behind it, the centaurs that had been herding it came to a stop and watched the creature speed through the gap made by their army. Not a single one of them moved, and instead, they cheered at the ferocious beast that they had hurled at the amazons. The sudden noise and presence of so many enemies angered the bugbear to charge faster.
It ran on a direct path towards the trapped amazons with nothing but blood-red rage in its eyes.
“Shoot!” Adelpha yelled in panic.
Arrows poured out at the charging bugbear, striking anything vulnerable that was exposed. The bugbear closed its eyes as seventeen arrows pierced its thick hide. The amazons might as well have been shooting leaves for all the good it did. The bugbear was at full charge, and the amazons wouldn’t get in more than one action before it barreled through them.
“Scatter!” Emily yelled.
The amazons dove to the side, launching themselves with their feet or otherwise rolling out of the bugbear’s charging path. Every amazon except one, that was.
Emily alone did not move. She stood perfectly still, bow raised, arrow drawn, stance taken. The other amazons recovered from their falls to see Emily still standing in the way, but there was no time for them to react. They could only watch in shock as the next few moments unfolded in front of their eyes.
Emily, standing tall and proud, bow at the ready, had a quick and sudden memory surface as she released her arrow. She thought of her mother, Mariam, just a few months earlier, standing steady and unyielding against a behemoth. Mariam had not been paralyzed by fear then, and Emily made the decision that neither would she—here and now—be stopped by this creature’s massive power.
Emily’s arrow soared through the air and struck the bugbear just below its right eye, where it hit bone and ran through thin skin. The bugbear snarled in pain and charged faster. It was almost upon her now, and Emily turned to run back towards the mountain wall. It was only just behind her, maybe twenty paces away. If she could just make five of those, just five, she thought.
She made two steps, the bugbear made eight.
She made another two steps, the bugbear made ten.
On Emily’s final step, the bugbear reached out both massive forepaws and opened its mouth for the kill it wanted so badly. It leapt into the air, seeing this little human only inches away from its hungry jaws. As it clamped shut, it drooled at the thought of tasting living flesh.
Emily dove to the ground, and the bugbear sailed over her, its teeth catching her short hair and ripping out a few strands. She rolled and felt the bugbear’s stomach fur brush against her skin as she somersaulted to her knees. She watched the bugbear’s paws smack the ground ahead of her as it tried desperately to catch its tremendous weight and turn its body. However, its momentum could not be slowed.
The bugbear hit the solid wall at full speed with a wet smack followed by a dead thud. Its head went first, and its body followed, pushing up against rock and then sliding back from the impact. The bugbear did not recover, and it collapsed to the ground motionless. The mountain did not seem
to notice.
There were five solid seconds of complete silence. The amazons and centaurs alike openly gawked.
“That’s my daughter!” Chara yelled.
The amazons yelled in pure celebration and joy. They rose from the ground and surrounded Emily, slapping her on the back, rubbing her hair, and one of them even gave her a good smack to the behind. Then they turned to Lok’har and roared their defiance.
“Was that all you had?” Adelpha yelled.
“Send another one, coward!” Iezabel laughed.
“I don’t think you brought enough centaurs, Lok’har!” Hanna said.
At first, Lok’har and his centaurs were daunted, unnerved, and shocked into silence, all at once. They were almost frightened, so quickly was their massive weapon disabled. The amazons laughed at their expressions and cheered. Then, slowly, the centaurs’ faces began to change. They morphed from confusion to surprise, then into relief, and finally to confidence. One of the centaurs started laughing, and then they all did. Lok’har himself laughed the loudest, and the centaurs grinned widely.
“What?” Adelpha muttered in puzzlement.
The amazon princess was at the front of the group and slowly turned to see if any of the other amazons knew why the centaurs were laughing. However, the moment she turned around and looked past the women, her face filled with dread. That’s when Emily heard breathing. She followed Adelpha’s eyes to see the bugbear taking slow, purposeful breaths.
It was still alive, and terribly angry.
The bugbear stood itself up slowly, taking huge breaths and snorting through a broken nose. Blood seeped out from every orifice on its face, dribbling down its chin and painting its brown fur red. It stood up to full height on two legs, towering over the amazons at almost the same height as a treant—its massive body a shadowy, monstrous terror in the moonlight.
Behind them, the centaurs laughed, and Lok’har led them in a cheer.
“Can you get lucky twice, amazons?” he asked.
The bugbear snarled, its lips curling back in an expression of bestial wrath. It raised its paws up into the air and roared.
“Shoot it!” Adelpha yelled.
The amazons snapped from their trance and reached for arrows from their quivers. The bugbear swung its paws with powerful arms, each one bigger across than the largest of the humans. Before an arrow could be fired, the second amazon that night was lost.
The bugbear’s paw caught Kirke square across the chest. She had pushed Leda down and out of the way, but there was no time for Kirke herself. She was lifted up into the air on the massive paw and thrown clear across the forest. She landed on a jutting rock, snapping her back across the stone before sliding to the ground with eyes wide open.
She didn’t get back up. She never made a sound.
“NOOOO!” Leda and Hanna yelled. “Kirke!”
The bugbear swung its paws again, scattering amazons in all directions. Arrows poured in all around the bugbear, turning the creature into a pincushion. Blood ran from every hole, but the bugbear didn’t stop. It lashed out at another amazon next and crashed down on her.
“Its head,” Emily yelled. “Its head!”
The amazons shot desperately, getting in every arrow they could. Some tried to back away from the beast, but its reach was long and there was nowhere to go. Backs hit stone walls, making it impossible to shoot.
One arrow, shot by Iezabel, struck one of the bugbear’s eyes but didn’t penetrate its skull. The beast roared in pain and covered its face with one paw, still using the other to swing widely. With its eyes impaired, the bugbear’s targets dodged easily, and it searched for a slower target. Emily watched in horror as it settled its remaining eye on Chara.
The bugbear charged and roared at Emily’s grandmother. Chara, already exhausted from the run, could not move fast enough and stared wide-eyed into the slavering jaws of her own death.
“Mother!” Emily yelled.
Emily dropped her bow and leapt at her grandmother.
They crashed to the ground as the bugbear’s paw swept over them, tearing Emily’s quiver of arrows open and scattering them wide. The two women hit the dirt prone and glanced up at the death they’d just missed.
But the bugbear had neither tripped, nor fallen, nor lost its concentration. After its paw swept past them, the bugbear had used the momentum to spread the paw open above them, preparing to slam it down to the ground. Emily knew there was nowhere to run. She and Chara were going to die now, together, here in Angor.
Emily wasn’t sure she was ready for that. She cringed as the claws of death came streaming down towards them.
Then the bugbear’s paw stopped in mid-air.
The bugbear—for all its rage, anger, roars and snarls—froze in place just moments from crushing the two amazons. Its eyes glazed over, as if listening.
The amazons held bows and arrows at the ready, teeth gritted, but eyes open in shock. They risked split-second glances at each other, searching for an explanation, before turning full attention back to the bugbear. The beast remained still, only its ears twitching back and forth.
And then Emily heard a howl. Unlike a bugbear’s roar, it was smooth, graceful almost, but absolutely feral.
“Oh no,” Chara whispered.
The bugbear, without a moment’s pause, turned and charged off towards the centaurs. The centaurs scattered out of the way in a hurry as the bugbear barreled past them at full speed. It neither stopped nor hesitated as it disappeared into the darkness.
“It doesn’t want to be trapped in a corner,” Adelpha said.
Emily’s heart pulsed in her chest. Had that been a werewolf howl? Were werewolves truly so terrible they made bugbears run in fear?
“Take positions!” Lok’har yelled. “Close up the gap!”
His centaurs, upon seeing the bugbear charge them, had split open from the back. Lok’har was yelling at them to come back in and close up tight. They started to re-form, but it was far too late.
A centaur in the back, furthest from the group, was the first to scream as a black mess of fur and fangs pounced on him from the shadows. His legs kicked up, and he cried out as his flesh was torn in vicious shreds and thrown into the air.
“Werewolves!” several centaurs shouted. “They’re here! They’re here!”
“Shoot! Shoot!” Lok’har yelled.
The centaurs rained down arrows on the first werewolf and then shot blindly into the darkness. Lok’har pushed his way through his own.
“Form around me!” he yelled. “Protect me!”
Howls and snarls filled the forest around them, and the centaurs shot in all directions. Black shapes leapt quickly out of the forest, snatching up unwary centaurs and dragging them off into the shadows, where their screams were cut short. Even under the full moon’s light, the werewolves seemed to come out of nowhere, attacking from every direction at once. Whenever a centaur looked down to nock an arrow or towards another direction, a werewolf would pounce down from the trees, from behind a trunk, or through a bush and drag the screaming centaur off into the woods.
“Get ready, ladies!” Adelpha said.
No sooner did she say that than a werewolf jumped off the side of the mountain to land on all fours in front of the amazons. Emily was shocked at its sudden appearance. She hadn’t even seen it approaching. It rose to its hind legs and howled.
As big as an ogre, maybe six hands taller than Emily, the werewolf was completely covered in black, thick, mangy fur. Its eyes were dark grey, its ears pointy, and its body sleek and strong. Short yet thick claws protruded from every finger on its hand-like paws. It finished its howl, and Emily was shocked to see a long tongue hanging out from its snout-like mouth.
The werewolf swept razor claws at the nearest amazon, but she was already falling back, and they only just scraped the skin, drawing little blood. Amazon arrows punched into the beast, and although it was bigger than a human, it was no bugbear. The werewolf stumbled with each strike and then dropped to t
he ground dead. Emily looked at the odd creature and couldn’t tell if it was human first and beast second, or the other way around.
“Close in!” Adelpha yelled.
The amazons stepped together, back to back, and Emily realized her mother’s bow was still on the ground. She reached out to grab it, and as her hand clasped around the wood, she heard a snarl in the darkness. Emily gasped and a hand from behind grabbed her skirt and yanked her back towards the group. A werewolf paw, followed by the werewolf himself, pounced from the shadows to grab where her head had just been.
Amazon arrows struck the beast in each eye, and it yelped as it slumped dead. Emily turned to see that Adelpha had grabbed her.
“Next time, leave it,” the princess scolded.
The centaurs were screaming in throngs now. The werewolves had broken the group apart, and there were open spaces all around. Lok’har was yelling for them to close in, but the werewolves were attacking en masse now, and centaurs cried out as black figures took them out from the darkness. They shot back, but for every werewolf they killed, two centaurs were dragged off or injured.
“We have to go,” Chara said, “or we’ll be next.”
“Now’s our only chance,” Emily added.
“Let’s move,” Adelpha commanded. “Stay together, everyone.”
As one, back to back so that every amazon was touching another, they started slipping away in the shadows. They stalked out from the ravine, coming ever closer to the centaur massacre. Emily quickly reached a hand up to her quiver and was relieved to find she still had arrows there. The bugbear’s paw had ripped a wide gash and spilled most of her ammunition, but she still had enough for the moment.
An amazon turned to look at the centaur battle for a moment, just a moment, and a werewolf snatched her leg and dragged her off under a bush. Her closest friends turned and reached out for her, but the amazon had disappeared for good. They were about to dash off into the dark forest, but others stopped them.
“Don’t,” one whispered. “Stop,” said the other.
“Stay together,” Adelpha snarled. “And don’t look away.”
Emily kept her eyes forward and her back to the group. They edged slowly around the mountain wall, coming far too close to the dying centaurs. As the humans edged past them, Lok’har noticed their retreat.