The ghouls had gone completely silent, their eyes like dozens of tiny shiny moons all focused on me. Just a few more seconds . . .
“Kill her,” another ghoul chimed in. “We have to hurry.”
“Kill her. He’s waiting,” a third voice chimed in.
“Kill her. Kill her.”
They seemed awfully desperate. Something weird was going on.
“Who is waiting?” I asked.
“Shut up!” the leading ghoul snarled.
I leaned forward and gave the leader ghoul my hard stare. “You look plump. You’ve been raiding the countryside and growing fat from gorging yourself on the people you’ve murdered. I gave you a chance to leave. Now it’s too late. Pay attention to this moment. Look at the stars. Breathe in the cold air. This is your last night. These are the last breaths you will take. I will kill every one of you.”
The leader ghoul snarled, dropping all pretense. “You and what army?”
I began pulling magic to me. This would hurt. This always hurt. “That’s the great thing about werelions. You don’t need an army. You just need one.”
The ghoul twisted his face. “You’re not a werelion, meat.”
“I’m not.” I nodded behind them. “He is.”
The leader ghoul spun around.
Two gold eyes stared at him from the darkness. The enormous lionlike beast opened his mouth and roared. Until I met him, I had never heard an actual lion roar. It sounded like thunder. Deafening, ravenous heart-dropping thunder that severed some vital link between logic and control of your body deep inside your brain. It was a blast of sound so powerful, I had seen hundreds of shapeshifters cringe when they heard it. A wolf howl heard in the middle of the night raised the hair on the back of your neck, but a lion’s roar punched through all of your training and reason straight to the secret place hidden deep inside that screamed at you to freeze.
The ghouls stopped, motionless.
I opened my mouth and spat a power word. “Osanda.” Kneel.
Power words came from a long-forgotten age, so ancient that they commanded raw magic. Few people knew about them and even fewer could use them, because to learn a power word, you had to own it. You made it yours or it killed you. I knew a handful of power words, far more than anyone else I’d met, but using even one came with a heavy price tag. For my father, the power words were a language, one he spoke fluidly and without repercussions. They didn’t hurt him, but I always paid a price.
The magic ripped out of me. I braced for the familiar twist of agony. The backlash bit at me, tearing through my insides, but this time something must’ve blunted its teeth, because it didn’t hurt nearly as much as I remembered.
The magic smashed into the petrified ghouls. Their knees and elbows crunched in unison and they crashed to the asphalt. It would buy me at least ten seconds. If the magic wave had been stronger, I would’ve broken their bones.
I swung my sword. Sarrat met a ghoul’s bony neck and sliced through cartilage and thick hide like butter. Before its dead body fell to the ground, I thrust my blade into the chest of the second ghoul and felt Sarrat’s tip pierce the tight ball of its heart.
The lion’s body roiled, snapping upright. Bones thrust upward; powerful muscle spiraled up the new skeleton. A blink and a new monster lunged forward, a nightmarish mix of man and lion, seven and a half feet tall, with steel-hard muscle sheathed in gray fur and curved, terrible claws. A ghoul leaped at him. He grabbed the creature by its throat and shook it, as if he were snapping a wet towel. A sickening snap echoed through the night and the ghoul went limp.
I carved the third ghoul into two separate pieces and sliced the fourth one’s throat.
The ghouls woke up. They swarmed us. The leonine beast swung his claws and disemboweled a ghoul with a precise swipe. Intestines rained onto the road. The bitter stench of ghoul blood mixed with the unmistakable sour reek of a gut wound singed my nostrils.
Claws ripped through my clothes, drawing agonizing scalding-hot lines across my back. You want to play? Fine. I needed a workout anyway.
My saber became a razor-sharp wall. It cut, sliced, and pierced, ripping flesh and hissing as the ghoul blood that bathed it boiled from its magic. I moved fast, sidestepping claws and blocking teeth. Another fiery gash stung my back. A ghoul clamped onto my boot and I ripped my leg free and stomped his skull into the pavement. A welcome heat spread through me, turning my muscles flexible and pliant. The world turned crystal clear. Time stretched, helping me. The ghouls lunged, but I was faster. They raked at me with their claws, but my blade found them first. I savored it all, every second of the fight, every drop of blood flying past me, every moment of resistance when Sarrat caught my target on its edge.