The Blacksmith Queen (The Scarred Earth Saga, #1) - G.A Aiken Page 0,94
her wrapped in its tail. With her arms pinned at her side, Keeley couldn’t reach her weapon or even use her hands to defend herself.
Still running, Gemma curved away from the exit and back toward the thing that held her sister. It made its claw into a fist and tried its best to slam her into the ground. She zigged and zagged to avoid that rampaging fist, finally reaching the part of the thing’s tail that rested against the ground. She climbed onto it, glancing at her sister. Keeley was still alive but her face was starting to turn blue. It was crushing her with that blasted tail.
Once on top of the tail, Gemma started to run up its back. The beast started to move around, trying to reach one forearm behind it. That’s when the wolves attacked, barking and leaping up to bite its underbelly. The thing stood and started to use its back claws to stomp on the wolves. She heard the unmistakable sound of wounded canine but she had to ignore it and keep running.
She reached the back of its neck and pulled both her swords. She went up a little farther until she began to slide back down. That’s when she raised her weapons and, with a scream, brought them both down in the middle of its neck.
Rising up on its hind legs, the monster threw its head back and roared. The sound shook the chamber and rocks began to fall from the ceiling.
Yanking out the blades from the thing’s back, Gemma raised her arms to protect herself but she lost her balance and tumbled back along the beast’s spine until she hit the ground hard, knocking herself out.
When Gemma opened her eyes again, the tail had unwrapped from around Keeley and her sister was lying on the ground, out cold. The beast, however, was stumbling around. Gemma, at first, didn’t know why. Then she realized blood poured from a gaping wound on its forehead.
Assuming one of the rocks had hit it, Gemma forced herself up and ran to her sister. She re-sheathed her weapons and grabbed her, trying to drag Keeley over to a safe corner. But as she moved, she felt her strength waning.
Then the wolves were there and they grabbed Keeley on different parts of her armor. Together, they dragged her through the beast’s twisting legs. They’d just gotten her outside the cavern when it finally dropped to the ground with an impact that shook everything around them.
Gemma fell beside her sister. She panted and rubbed the back of her head where she’d taken the brunt of her fall.
The wolves were panting next to them, a few either bleeding from rips in their flesh left by the thing’s talons or nursing broken bones from getting hit with its fist.
“Thank you,” she said to them. “For helping me.”
Keeley gasped awake, arms swinging, eyes wide and panicked.
“You’re okay,” Gemma said, patting her shoulder. “You’re okay.”
“What . . . what happened?”
“It’s dead, I think. I don’t hear it breathing anymore. But we shouldn’t wait to be sure.”
Keeley sat up and nodded. “Yes. You’re right.”
But the lead wolf ran up and barked at the thing.
“If you wake that fucking thing up . . .” Gemma warned.
But apparently that wasn’t its purpose. Because her sister was suddenly crawling over to the wolf.
“Keeley Smythe, I swear to all the gods!”
“Give me a minute!”
Keeley went over to the thing’s side and ran her hands over the scales, stopping where the wolf’s nose briefly rested.
“Holy shit.”
“What?”
Keeley glanced at her, grinning. Then she pulled one of her knives out of its sheath and began cutting away at the thing’s scales. It took a few minutes but finally Keeley faced Gemma and held open her blood-covered hand.
Gemma leaned in and took a look. “That can’t be all of it,” Gemma complained in disbelief about the flat, circular disk of gold in her sister’s palm. “Tell me I didn’t risk my life for that?”
“Tell me,” Keeley shot back, “that a sister of mine doesn’t remember how Sichar’s gold works.” Gemma’s head hurt and she could feel that bits of her were becoming decidedly sore. So she wasn’t really in the mood for any of this. When she didn’t answer, her sister said, “With this amount of Sichar’s gold, a true blacksmith can outfit an entire army from helmet to boots and all the armor and weapons in between. This is a fortune in Sichar’s gold.”