Almost blind with pain, I grabbed a torn root in my hand and whipped it
at him. Kahanov’s laugh was cut short as the whip wrapped around his leg. I
pulled, and his body flew from the wall, crashing to the jagged stone of the
cavern floor beside me.
I was on him in a second, ramming my claws into his body.
Warm blood splattered across my face.
He screamed, and a billowing cloud of fire burst around me. The blast
sent me flying back, and I tumbled across the jagged floor of the cavern.
Growling, I rose in time to see the sorcerer stagger to the base of a tree. I
lunged, but the roots swallowed him whole.
Suddenly, I was alone. Savannah was gone. And Kahanov was gone.
The shock of it drove the breath from my lungs.
Panicking, I tried to find a way through the cluster where he’d
disappeared, but there was only dirt behind the immobile wall of roots.
I tilted my head back and howled with rage.
As the reverberations died through the chamber, Savannah’s words
echoed in my mind: I’m buying you time to save your pack.
I looked to the faces of those I’d failed.
My heart clenched. The roots were moving and winding around their
necks. Horror filled me, and the weight of what the sorcerer had said sank in:
I don’t need you or these people anymore.
I leapt for the nearest body and tore the roots from the man’s throat as I
shouted for Neve and Sam.
Savannah had bought my pack time. But time was running out.
46
Savannah
The writhing roots dragged my body downward through a long, snaking
tunnel. I screamed as rocks ripped into my skin and tore my clothes.
Suddenly, I was falling, and then agony shot up my spine as my body
slammed into the ground.