The Horse reared, dumping Karigan out of the saddle.
Karigan groaned. The whole world moved and bumped in her head . . . her aching, groggy head. The greatcoat and her shirt were bunched up beneath her shoulders, and the ground scraped and dug into her bare back. There was a terrible pain in her ankle. Her arms trailed behind her in the forest litter. Trailing, moving, bumping. No, the movement wasn’t in her head at all. Her foot must be caught in a stirrup and The Horse was dragging her.
Her eyes fluttered open, and she had to crane her neck to see. A huge pincerlike claw, not a stirrup, clamped her ankle. The claw was attached to a saucer-shaped body armored by a metallic carapace supported by six jointed legs. A flat tail arched over the creature’s body, a stinger oozing with venom the size of a dagger protruding from its end. Two black orbs glinted in the moonlight, moving on the end of eyestalks. A mandible worked where its mouth was, and two slender antennae felt the path ahead as the creature ambled crablike deeper into the woods. A second claw snapped at The Horse, forcing him to keep his distance.
Karigan almost lost consciousness again, but she fought it off. Oblivion, no matter how inviting, was not going to help her. Instead, she screamed.
Then like a frightened animal snared in a trap, she squirmed and thrashed and snarled, but the claw held her fast, and in fact tightened and cut into her ankle. She moaned with the pain. She sat up even as she was being dragged, and tried to loosen the giant claw with her hands. The shell was as hard as a knight’s plate armor, and the claw wouldn’t budge. Her toes began to feel numb. She fell back, puffing from the exertion, letting her hands trail in the leaf litter. Her head throbbed so and she felt as though she might vomit. Where was the creature taking her?
Gods . . . She stifled a helpless sob, her breathing ragged. Her heart thumped against her rib cage. Calm down, calm down. Think. She forced herself to take deeper, longer breaths, to relax her muscles as much as possible, just as Arms Master Rendle had trained her. “Caving in to fear will be your death,” he once said. “There is no room for it on the battlefield. Being afraid is healthy, but fear is an enemy.” She continued with the breaths and thought about how she could help herself.
Her head bounced on a rock and sparks of light burst before her eyes. She groaned and felt the back of her skull. She winced as she touched one egg-sized bump—from when she fell off The Horse, she guessed—and a small one from the rock. Rocks and roots continued to scrape her back as she was dragged along. Would this nightmare never end? How could she help herself?
Her hand trailed along another rock and she fumbled with it, but she couldn’t get it firmly into her grasp. She searched for other rocks, but they were too small to have any effect, or too lodged in the ground, or too big for her to handle. She grappled with another that seemed right, and almost lost it when she ripped a fingernail on it. But she didn’t give up till it was firmly in her hands.
It was not easy to aim, being hauled along the ground on her back as she was. Using the strength of both arms, she heaved the rock at the creature, issuing a grunt as she released it. It glanced harmlessly off the creature’s carapace and dropped to the ground with a thud. She succeeded only in drawing the creature’s attention to her. It swiveled its disk body about to look at her directly. The eyestalks bobbed above her, then the feelers swung over and probed her midsection.
“Stop it!” Karigan cried.
The jabbing was painful, and at times, ticklish. She grabbed one of the feelers and the other whisked away. It was rough and cold in her hand, and as thick as a broom handle. The creature considered her for a moment, then shook her till she was certain her foot would be severed from her ankle. She dropped the antenna, tears of pain slipping down her cheeks.
The Horse took advantage of the diversion and met the creature head on, rearing up and pounding his hooves onto the hard shell. He moved deftly out of the way of the stinger to evade the snap of the claw. When he came too close to the creature’s eyes, it was alarmed enough to drop Karigan’s foot and pay full attention to the annoying mammal that threatened it. How astonishing, Karigan thought, that The Horse hadn’t run off, much less had stuck around to defend her.
A moment passed before she realized she was free, and that her foot was still attached to her body. She tried to stand on it, but fell back to the ground with a cry. Too much feeling flooded into her foot all at once. She stood up again, this time hopping on her left foot, and not daring to put weight on the right.
“Horse!”
The Horse was too preoccupied with fighting for his own life to help. The creature, unburdened of Karigan, moved quickly from side to side, and swiveled to stop him. The Horse’s hooves thudded the ground as he turned and swerved, bucking at the creature, then rounding on it and snapping his teeth. His efforts could have killed a man or woman, but proved futile against the armor plating of the creature. He was showing signs of exhaustion, his breathing labored, and foamy sweat dripping on the ground, and he stumbled with increasing frequency.
Karigan hopped away in an attempt to keep ahead of the two combatants. If The Horse failed, there was nothing to stop the creature from getting her.
She hopped and loped heedlessly, pushing through underbrush, and checking over her shoulder to see how The Horse fared. As the moon fell behind some clouds, an almost palpable darkness took hold of the forest and she could discern little about her. Maybe the blow to her head contributed in some way, by darkening the edges of her vision.
With her uncertain footing and dim sight, she stumbled into something sticky, like a giant cobweb. She tried to walk out of it, but it clung to her, and snapped her back, entangling both legs and most of her body. She struggled, but the stuff only stuck to her more.