Adept (The Essence Gate War, Book 1) - By Michael Arnquist Page 0,103

interest in the cave for some reason.

She ground her teeth. Every step she allowed now would lengthen her shot. Now was the time, and if his back was turned such that he never had an opportunity to evade the lethal strike, so much the better.

Gliding from the cave, she drew back on the bow until her fingers brushed her cheek. She sighted down the arrow shaft and past the curved blades of the head, shifting from one moving figure to another as she sought her target. Several things dawned upon her in an instant: her target was nowhere on the trail below, and the creatures now whirling to face her were not the men with whom he traveled.

Moreover, the creatures were not even human.

There were six of them arrayed on the crumbling path, the nearest less than ten yards from her. They were clad entirely in tattered strips of cloth, and their black flesh shimmered dully in the meager starlight like unpolished obsidian. Bulging eyes and gaping mouths worked in soundless ferocity as the creatures gazed up at her.

Without hesitation they burst into frenzied motion, bounding and clawing their way up the trail. By reflex, she aimed at the one in the lead before she caught herself; she still had one of her three black arrows nocked, and they were far too valuable to waste on random assailants such as these. Cursing the lost seconds, she returned the deadly projectile to the quiver across her back, and, selecting another, she drew and fired.

The shaft slammed into the creature’s chest, staggering it back a step from the sheer force of the blow. To her astonishment, however, it uttered no cry of pain, and instead surged forward with undiminished vigor. In a blur of motion, she sent three more arrows hissing through the air to find their marks. The head of the nearest creature snapped back at an angle no mortal man could survive, and when it hunched forward again a shaft had sprouted from its forehead to match the one in its chest. Its unblinking eyes found her again, and it lurched after her with arms outstretched. The one behind it pawed to get past its cohort on the narrow trail, feathered shafts projecting from both of its legs. The foul thing seemed unaffected, its wounded legs bearing its weight without slowing its progress in the least.

The huntress gave a sharp whistle back into the cave, and then stepped forward to the top of the trail. She set her jaw and took a tight, two-handed grip on the lower limb of her bow. As the first creature reached the crest, she swung the weapon in a vicious arc, hammering it from the path to tumble down the hillside, rolling and clawing for purchase.

She struck at the next figure in line, but it caught at the bow and she was forced to release it. It cast the bow aside and came for her again, and she whipped out her long hunting knife to hack aside its grasping arms. Unflinching beneath the razor-edged blade, the creature grabbed at her first, its crooked black fingers catching at her clothing as she danced back to remain out of reach. She licked out with the blade, and it fumbled for that as well, seeking to grasp the weapon with its bare hands and wrest it from her.

Two more reached the top of the trail and flung themselves at her with the same heedless abandon, and she was forced to leap back into the cave or be surrounded. Yet more of the black things crested the trail, and they closed in, relentless.

So intent were they upon their prey that even the thunder of hooves from within the cave did not distract them until the horse was upon them. Shien slammed into the gathered throng, sending several of the creatures sprawling. The mare lashed out with iron-shod hooves, and another assailant reeled back under the force of the blows. The huntress leapt to the saddle and dug her heels in. Together she and the mare plunged through the press of bodies. At speed, in the dark, the treacherous path might well be the death of them, but they would have to risk it to escape the clutches of these unnatural, undying black monstrosities.

They hit the loose gravel of the trail and began a stomach-lurching slide. Shien dropped her hindquarters and braced all four hooves as the huntress tried in vain to discern the ephemeral ribbon of the path