A Wolf at the Door

If the woman knew we were there, watching her, she never once looked down the hill at us. Instead, she stood on one of the wider tree stumps, doing what looked like warm-up stretches. Still being as stiff and sore as I was after my injuries, I kind of envied her flexibility. Her stretching done, she bounced on her toes a little, rolling her head on her shoulders. Obviously, she was waiting for something, and it wasn’t us.

“What exactly are we looking for, here?”

“Quiet. It is to be starting now.”

Okay, I don’t like being shushed like a hyper kid, but before I could object, something stirred on that hillside. I squinted through the binoculars, trying to make out just what was going on.

For a moment, I thought that some small animals had come scampering out of the decimated tree stumps, capering across the ground around the woman’s feet. But it must not have been cute little bunny rabbits and squirrels, because she stepped back up on the tree stump, keeping her boots clear of the darting shadows. They weren’t very big, maybe the size of a football at the most, but she definitely didn’t want them touching her.

In no time at all, there were dozens of them, probably more, just little balls of shadow flitting and flickering over the ground. I lost sight for just a moment when a full body shudder caught me out of nowhere, and I realized how really freakin’ cold I’d become. Beneath the warmest clothes I had, my skin was crawling with goose bumps, and my stomach cramped painfully.

Putting the glasses back up to my eyes, I saw that the little shadows had gained some purpose, clambering over each other, stacking like interlocking blocks. Taller and taller it built, until it loomed over the woman like a thin, teetering tower. Each little segment had a pair of legs now, jointed insectile legs, and they waved and flexed, looking for purchase.

“A centipede…” Crap, that’s what it looked like. A humongous centipede, scuttling over the ground as it came together piece by piece. And it wasn’t finished by any means. The darting shadows kept appearing, kept adding on, and the bug-thing kept getting longer, stretching out along the ground to support the length it had raised up in the air. We still hadn’t got to the head yet, and I was suddenly very certain that I didn’t want to see what that would look like. “We have to help her.”

“No.” Ivan’s voice was quiet, calm. “To aid her will to be forfeiting the contract. She must do this alone.”

“What is that thing?”

“A demon. Lesser in strength than some, greater than others. She should to be having no problems.”

It didn’t look like either of the demons I’d fought. The most recent, the one that nearly made my entrails into my ex-trails, had been a monstrous white-furred beast, with ram horns and gleaming silver claws. That one I called the Yeti. The other one, my first one, had been furry too, sort of, but much smaller, lower to the ground. Something between a cheetah and a Komodo dragon, maybe. It had died much easier than the Yeti.

“She’s one of your champions, then?” Of course she was. Ivan was trying to convince me that this was my life’s calling, right? Of course he’d bring me to see one of his best and brightest at work. Standard recruiting tactic.

He made one of those generic man-noises, and I got the idea that my question-and-answer period was over. I focused through the binoculars again, dreading what I’d see, but afraid not to watch.

The centipede-demon was almost fully formed, a few stray segments scuttling their way to latch on to what I assumed was the hind end. It had to be nearly twenty feet long, and the half that was raised into the air was nearly twice as tall as the woman it was menacing.

I had to give her credit. If she was scared, I couldn’t tell it from where I was standing. Her stance was loose, relaxed, and her hand rested on the hilt of her sword lightly. I think she was speaking to the thing, and I saw two sets of mandibles in its…well, we’ll call it a face for ease of reference…face waggle about with sharp snaps. The terms must have been agreeable, because she drew her weapon—a shashka, Ivan had called it—and sketched a very faint bow.

The demon wasn’t one to stand on formality. It struck almost faster than I could see, and my entire body jerked with the impulse to go tearing up that hill. I didn’t need to worry. The woman, Svetlana, had been ready.

Almost casually, she rolled out of the path of the striking head, coming to her feet and slashing in one fluid movement. I could tell even then that she was good. Damn good.

The sword connected with the demon’s—we’ll call it his back—back, and there was a bright flash of light, dazzling in the night vision lenses. I almost dropped the binoculars, blinking spots from my eyes. “What the hell was that?”

“Hm.” Ivan frowned thoughtfully behind his own binoculars. “Blessed silver in the blade.”