We were halfway back up the stairs before things started jumping out of the water like catfish on a summer’s day. I remembered the tentacles of the pool monster at Tarleton. Our flashlights barely cut the gloom, but I got enough of a look to know I did not want a close-up. Black, wriggling things leapt into the air, trying to reach the stairway and us. Slimy and bulbous, they reminded me of individual octopus tentacles or impossibly large slugs, except for their gaping mouths.
One of the things landed on the open metal stairway ahead of me and I blasted it with a shot from the walking stick. It writhed as it shriveled and bits of it flew off, landing in the water with a muted plop. In the next instant, the dark water roiled as the creature’s companions fought over who got to eat the leftovers. My stomach lurched.
More of the things heaved themselves up onto the steps. They looked like snakes without heads. Open, lamprey-like maws were all I could see, no eyes or ears, no skull. Eating machines, hungry for fresh meat.
“What are they?” I asked, sickened and horrified.
“Leeches,” Sorren replied. “Only they’ve been exposed to very powerful magic.”
“Leeches?” My voice rose a note. I’d had an unpleasant, unforgettable encounter with leeches when I was a kid, swimming at my grandma’s pond. These were super-sized. We were going to have to fight our way back up the steps.
Teag hit one of the thrashing monsters with his staff, knocking it back into the water. I had to be careful with the walking stick, because I didn’t want to hit anyone with fire, and I wasn’t sure whether or not any of the equipment around us might be flammable.
One of the monster leeches hurled itself into the air and lay wriggling at my feet, its open maw flexing as it sought flesh. I leveled my athame and a brilliant, white light flared as my power sent it flailing through the air. Leeches don’t fly well, thank all the gods and spirits.
The leeches must have smelled blood, because the water boiled with them. They crawled over one another in their frenzy to reach us, and more than once, we saw one of the uber-leeches reach escape velocity only to be grabbed and pulled back into the stagnant depths by a hungry fellow bloodsucker.
I would have loved to have just torched the lot of them, but I had no way of knowing what else lurked in the shadowed recesses. If there were left-over cans of gasoline or other flammables somewhere above water level, I could set up a fatal fireball that would wipe us out along with the leeches.
Sorren slashed at the leeches with his swords, sending bloody geysers into the air as he cut them in half. The leeches writhed and wriggled, blood spurting everywhere, until they rolled into the depths of the filthy, stinking water to be consumed by their fellow monsters.
I promised myself time to throw up if we survived the encounter.
Caliel let out a yelp, and scrambled back as a leech thrashed toward him, intent on the fresh, hot blood it sensed. Sorren grappled with one of the leeches that had managed to get a grip on his leg, and I watched, sickened, as he yanked it free, its maw red with blood.
“Get up the stairs!” I yelled. “I’ll blast them once we’re clear.”
No one needed to be told twice. We all scrambled up the metal stairs, and I turned and loosed a blast of cold magical force from my athame. The brilliant white light hit the writhing leeches, hurling them free of the steps, throwing them back into the fetid water and tearing some of them into little bits for good measure. Their bloody remnants served to distract the rest of the monsters from following us, as they fought over the spoils.
I was shaking as we reached the relative safety of the second floor. “Keep moving,” Sorren urged. “I think we’ve gotten the wrong kind of attention.”
We had awakened the spirits tied to this place. Whatever bound their restless shades to this godforsaken ruin had shaken them from their restless sleep, and now they were looking to take their annoyance out on those who had interrupted their eternal slumber.
The night outside was still and hot. Yet here in the power plant, it had grown so cold I expected to see my breath. Shadows and half-seen images darted around the edges of my sight, and the sense