across Danica's prone form, smashing the head with a two-handed overhead chop. The head recoiled, and Cadderly pursued, smacking it repeatedly.
The second head rushed in at Cadderly's back, but Dan-ica threw her legs up and then down, snapping her back in a quick arch and hurling herself to her feet A single stride brought her alongside the chasing head and she dipped low, drawing a dagger from her boot, then shot back up, driving the knife up to its silver dragon-sculpted hilt into the bottom jaw.
Cadderly's arms pumped relentlessly, beating the already disfigured head into a bloody pulp.
The remaining head soared up high, but Danica locked her arm over the neck and went along for the ride, holding fast to her stuck dagger. She curled up around the neck, bringing her boot to her free hand and managing to extract her second dagger.
Then she held on, stubbornly, as the monster bucked and whipped. When its frenzy finally abated, Danica plunged her second knife into its eye, pulled it back, and drove it home a second time.
Again came the monstrous frenzy. Cadderly, trying to get to Danica, got clipped on one rushing pass and was hurled ten feet down the corridor.
But Danica held on, kept both her daggers buried, working them back and forth, turning their handles around in her palms. She fell hard to her back, smacking against the stone, the monstrous neck dropping over her.
Stunned, the monk could not find her breath, could not focus her gaze, and was hardly conscious of her grip on her knives. Her instincts screamed out at her to react, to wriggle away. Her instincts screamed out at her that she was vulnerable, that the hydra head could easily shake free and snap her in half.
But the hydra was no longer moving, and a moment later, Cadderly was standing above Danica, pulling her arms free,
shifting the bulky serpentine neck off her.
Shayleigh heard a murmuring up ahead, the drone of many muffled voices. She started to call out a warning to the Bouldershoulder brothers, but the dwarves had apparently heard the sound as well, for they lowered their heads and picked up the pace, Pikel's sandals slapping and Ivan's boots thumping.
Shayleigh slipped along silently right behind them, her bow ready. Around a bend in the corridor they saw a straight run past two intersections and ending at a set of double doors.
Too many!" the elf maiden whispered harshly, slowing her pace. Too many!"
Double doors blocked their way, then double doors hung awkwardly on broken hinges. Ivan and Pikel burst in, weapons high.
"Uh-oh," muttered the green-bearded dwarf, echoing his brother's sentiments exactly, for they had come into a huge hall, a dining area, now apparently doubling as a command post, lined with dozens of tables and more than a few enemies. Shayleigh sighed helplessly and rushed to catch up with the furious dwarves, who, in their momentum, had already charged past the first empty tables.
A group of ores sitting closest to the door barely had the time to look up from their bowls before the dwarves fell over them, hacking and kicking, Ivan butting with his deer-antlered helmet, and Pikel a flurry of flying knees and elbows, butting forehead, and tree-trunk club.
Only one of the six ores even managed to get out of its chair, but before the startled creature took two steps away, an arrow sliced through the side of its head, dropping it dead to the floor.
On ran the dwarves and on chased Shayleigh. Their only hope was in movement, the elf maiden knew, in rushing through too quickly for the multitude of enemies in this hall to organize against them. In full flight, she put an arrow to the side, catching a man in the shoulder as he tried to raise a bow of his own.
Tables overturned, chairs skidded aside, as the men and monsters scrambled to get out of harm's way. One unfortunate goblin got tangled up in its companion's chair. When the dwarves had passed, both the goblin and that chair lay flattened on the floor. One ogre did not run, but crossed its huge arms over its chest and stood with legs firmly planted, thinking itself an imposing barrier.
It got wounded in more than its pride when Ivan rushed right through those widespread legs, the dwarf's axe up high over his head. The ogre lurched, grabbing at its torn loins, and Pikel ran beside it, caving in the side of its knee. The ogre hadn't even hit the floor yet