Bayou Moon (The Edge #2)(30)
Author: Ilona Andrews

He tensed, in case Urow lunged at him.

The gray man grinned and took the wallet from William’s hand. "She is, isn’t she? I have the prettiest wife in the whole of the Mire."

"Maybe you should stop rubbing it in," Cerise said softly.

She must’ve seen something in his face. William pushed his regrets deeper, away from the surface.

"Do you have any family, Lord Bill?" she asked softly.

"No." He didn’t even know what his mother had looked like.

Urow’s eyebrows crept up. "All right, all right." He slid the wallet around his neck.

A bolt thrust through Urow’s shoulder. It was attached to a line.

William grabbed for Urow, but the line snapped taut and jerked the gray man off the boat.

UROW plunged into cold water. Webs snapped open between his toes, and he kicked, but the line dragged him to the surface. He skimmed the face of the river in a shower of spray. Water burned his stomach. He flipped on his side and back on his stomach again, digging deep into the waves, and thrust his hands into the current. His fingers found the line and gripped it. He searched for something to brace his legs against but met only water.

A dark form rushed at him through the waves and smashed into his gut. The last of the air burst from his mouth in a violent, silent scream. Pain bathed his left side. He clutched at the obstruction, gripping it with his limbs. Rotting bark, slick with algae, crumbled under his fingers. A log, Urow realized, and dug his claws into the soft water-soaked wood.

They shot him. The sonovabitches shot him with a harpoon and pulled him off his own boat. He’d rip out their guts and make them eat it.

The line pulled. The bolt tore at his flesh, hard, harder, ripping a growl from him. Urow clung to the tree and felt the heavy sodden mass move, compelled by the draw of the line. Pain burned him, reaching down across his chest to his ribs and his neck.

Something whistled through the air and punched the tree in twin thuds. The line snapped free, and the log rolled back under his weight. Urow submerged and surfaced. Two short black bolts punctured the wet bark of the log. Someone had shot the line, severing it.

Urow grabbed the bolt lodged in his shoulder and wrenched it free with a snarl. A piece of his bloody flesh still quivered on the barbs of the bolt’s hooked head, and he rammed it into the sodden wood. Bleeding but free, he pulled himself onto the log and crouched on it.

A small river barge crowded with people headed for his boat, drawn by three rolpies. Cerise had her sword out, and the blueblood was reloading a crossbow. So that was where the bolts had come from. He’d have to thank the guy later. Right now he had work to do.

To the far left, a second boat struggled, its towing pulley spinning wildly, the way it did when the line had snapped. Four people manned it, as its driver tried to guide their rolpie into a tight turn.

Hello, fellas. Shoot me, will you? Time to go over and say hello, in a friendly Mire way.

An ugly snarl rippled from Urow’s mouth, and he dived into the river, heading for the smaller cutter and its crew. They had no idea how fast the son of a thoas could swim.

WILLIAM reloaded. Thirty yards away a large boat sped toward them. He counted the shadowy figures on the deck. Ten. They weren’t kidding.

Magic pricked his skin with a hot needle. "The Hand."

Cerise didn’t answer. He glanced at her face and saw rage. She kicked aside a coil of docking line and stood in the center of the deck, leaning lightly forward, her sword pointing downward. A white glow rolled over her eyes.

So she could flash.

Twenty yards. Six men, three women. One undetermined in a long cloak.

They should’ve been shot at by now.

"No bows," William said. "They want you alive."

"Bad for them," Cerise whispered. "Good for me."

William raised his bow, sighted, and fired. A woman screamed and one of the figures stumbled back. The rest ducked, trying to take cover, all except the guy in the cloak, as expected. William reloaded and fired again at the man in the cloak. The bolt sprouted from his target’s neck.

The man shuddered. The cloak fell from his shoulders, revealing a naked hairless body. The man gripped the shaft of the bolt and ripped it out of his throat. An odd clicking, like the sound of nut shells crunching under someone’s foot, issued from his mouth.

One of the Hand’s freaks. William bared his teeth. He’d met this kind before. He didn’t even need the Mirror’s intel to identify it. This type was called a hunter. They specialized in tracking and apprehending. Spider really wanted Cerise.

The Hand’s agent snapped the bolt in two, tossed it overboard, and licked his fingers.

"Stay back this time," Cerise said. "It’s my fight."

"There are nine of them. Don’t be stupid."

"Stay the fuck back, William."

"Fine." He took a step back and raised his crossbow. If that’s the way she wanted it, he could always rescue her later. "Let’s see what you got."

The larger boat slammed into them, sending a quake through the hull. Two men jumped onto the deck.

Cerise struck and paused, blood running down her blade.

The first two fighters died without a scream. One moment they stood on deck, and the next the top halves of their bodies slid down into the river.

William closed his mouth with a click.

The attackers drew back.

The edge of Cerise’s sword shone once, as if a glowing silver hair were stretched along the blade. She leaped onto the larger boat.

They swarmed her. She whirled, cutting through them, slicing limbs in half, severing muscle and bone. Blood sprayed, she paused again, and the fighters around her fell without a single moan.

Four seconds and the deck was empty. Nothing moved.

She was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.

He would have to fight her before this was over, just to find out if he could beat her.

A rapid staccato of clicks came from the back of the larger boat. The hunter was still alive.

"I see I missed a spot," Cerise said.

The hunter stared at her, his eyes solid black in the moonlight. His hand jerked up . . .

William jumped, shoving her out of the way.

Pale liquid sprayed the deck in the spot where she had just stood and hissed, hardening into a corrosive paste.

The hunter creaked like he was crushing a load of beetles in his throat. "Give girl."

William snarled. "Come and take her."

The second stream of spray hit the spot where he’d just stood. Now both of the hunter’s hands were empty. No more web.

The hunter charged him, clawed hands ripping the air in a wide swing. William dropped under the thick arms and swept at the agent’s legs from a crouch. The hunter jumped, avoiding the kick, and struck, claws poised like daggers.