The Tyranny of Ghosts_ Legacy of Dhakaan - Don Bassingthwaite [89]
“Do we follow them in?” Makka asked, eyeing the ruins under the moonlight.
Yet another wail rolled out. “I don’t think so,” Midian had said. “They’ll come out again—or they won’t.” He found a comfortable perch in a tree with a good view of the ruins and settled in to wait, with Makka crouched below.
After that, it was just a matter of patience.
Geth acted without thinking, roaring and swinging Wrath in a flashing arc. The byeshk blade jerked in his hand as it hit the black tentacle that held Tooth, but smashed through it with a crack like splitting stone.
The cut tentacle collapsed into a long line of glittering black dust.
Tooth didn’t stop screaming, though. Ekhaas’s voice joined his, shouting at him to stay still. Geth spun around. Ekhaas had the bugbear’s arm in her grasp, struggling to hold it immobile as she beat at something black and squirming on his forearm. For an instant, Geth couldn’t help but wonder how Tooth had come to have a swarm of tiny insects on his arm—then he realized what the black stuff really was. Just like the rest of the tentacle, the end that had grabbed Tooth had turned into dust.
But it hadn’t stopped moving or released the hunter. The dust curled around his hairy arm as if it were a single unit, sifting back together where Ekhaas tried to scrub it away. None of it clung to her fingers. The curling thread flowed under Tooth’s skin through a bloody hole made by the sharp tip of the tentacle.
“I can’t move my fingers! By Balinor, just kill me. Kill me!” Tooth shrieked, and Geth remembered the skeletons with bones of glittering black stone. He clenched his teeth and made a decision.
“Ekhaas, stand clear,” he said.
The duur’kala looked up. Something of what he intended must have showed in his face, because her ears flicked up, and she stepped toward Tooth’s immobile hand, gripping it hard. Maybe Tooth saw it, too, because he tugged back the other way, probably more afraid than anything else. Between them, they pulled the arm straight—or at least as straight as was possible. The elbow no longer flexed.
Geth aimed higher as he brought Wrath down through skin and flesh and bone. No longer supported, Tooth staggered and fell, his scream finally ending. Blood gushed out of the stump of the bugbear’s arm. “Ekhaas! Tenquis! Try to stop the bleeding!” Geth ordered.
Ekhaas let the severed arm drop to the ground as she went to Tooth’s side. Geth knew the sound of falling limbs. He’d attended infirmary tents in the aftermath of battle. When a ruined limb had to be amputated, it fell with a meaty thump. It did not fall with a thud as if the bones within it were suddenly far heavier than they should have been. For a moment, Geth felt an urge to check the severed end, to see if the cut bone was white or black beneath the sheen of blood.
“Geth,” said Chetiin quietly, “look.” He pointed.
The thick line of dust that had been the tentacle was flowing back into the heap of rubble. Just beneath the sounds of Ekhaas’s healing song and Tenquis’s muttered words as he applied liquids and powders, Geth could hear a low sigh like running sand.
A sigh that grew into a slow grinding. He whirled around. “Get Tooth up! We need to get away from here.”
Tenquis looked up. His brown skin was ashen; his golden eyes seemed dulled. “The wound won’t stay closed. He needs bandages—”
“We’ll stop when no more tentacles can reach us.” He sheathed Wrath, squatted down, and slid his head and shoulders under Tooth’s remaining arm. The bugbear was groaning and only barely conscious. “Tooth,” Geth said as calmly as he could manage, “can you walk?”
Tooth’s head lolled in what Geth hoped was a nod. He stood up, taking most of Tooth’s weight, and started away from the rubble of the great hall. The hunter must have been at least a little bit aware of