Blade Kin by David Farland Page A

Phylomon.”
    The bird batted her wings. Her eyes fixed on the young man. She screeched and leapt into the air making gagging sounds as if she would vomit.
    “Kill it! Kill it now!” Tull shouted, and Anorath fired, catching the bird’s right wing. The bird spun to the ground, tilted her head up to see, and Tull leapt forward and slammed the kutow into her head, splitting her skull.
    Yet something swelled the dead bird’s throat, crawling up. Tull slammed his kutow into its neck.
    A terrific jolt of electricity arced up from the wound, blinding him, hurling him back. He laid on the ground, dazed, the wooden shaft of the kutow smoldering in his hand, the soles of his moccasins smoking.
    Chaa rushed forward wielding a brand from the fire, and a eel-like creature wiggled from the dead bird’s throat, ripping out her esophagus. The creature was huge, at least three feet long and nine-inches tall at the back. Its eyes were the same pale blue as its skin.
    Chaa held the flame in front of the eel’s nose, and the creature stopped, as if blinded. Chaa shouted to the boys, “You young men get back! Get Back! There is more danger here than you can imagine!”
    He eased toward the fire. The eel followed the flaming brand, sliding like a snake. It twisted its head from side to side, but its pale blue eyes seemed not to see the boys. It followed the flame.
    When Chaa reached the bonfire, he tossed the brand into its heart. The great eel rushed forward to strike.
    It wriggled into the flames and began to writhe, circling within the fire, seemingly unable to leave. A small bolt of lightning arced out of the creature, split a log by the fire, and yet the beast continued to race in circles through the flames.
    Behind Chaa, the Pwi gasped. The dying eel whipped about, the muscles in its back straining like cords, scattering coals across the ground, plunging its long rasping tongue into flaming coals at the heart of the fire.
    Tull watched that tongue, recalled how other eels in the north had attacked—flicking their tongues into the brain stems of their human victims, taking control of their bodies.
    Chaa went to Anorath, took the gun and began shooting into the great eel. Holes ripped into its side, holes large enough to put a fist through, yet the wounds healed even as they watched. He shot off all rounds, reloaded, shot, and reloaded until he ran out of bullets.
    The eel spun in a frenzy, looking for an enemy to strike, blind to anything but flames. Tull’s head cleared. Even with fifteen bullets in it, the eel did not slow.
    Chaa shouted, “Use your spear to push the logs back into a circle. Throw sticks into the fire to keep it hot—or the creature will see you! Do not let the beast touch your sticks!” The boys moved forward cautiously.
    Tull swallowed, listened to the sizzle and pop of the beast in the fire as the boys worked.
    Chaa whispered to Tull. “The eel has a skin like Phylomon the Starfarer’s. The Creators made this one especially for him. You could not have killed it. Phylomon himself would have died here.”
    Tull saw that Chaa’s hands were shaking even though his voice sounded calm.
    Fava walked up beside Tull, holding Wayan, who slept in spite of all the noise. Tull asked Chaa, “Did you know the bird would come?”
    “No. I suspected an attack, but sometimes it rains even on a Spirit Walker. I saw eels like these in my Spirit Walk, and I’ve touched their minds, for they are living creatures. Fire is their weakness. It draws them, yet blinds them.”
    Chaa supervised the boys until the blue eel finally rolled to its back and lay twitching. Then he told the Pwi about the Creators’ treachery, how they’d killed the sea serpents with their lampreys, and how they planned to do more.
    He made the Creators’ plans sound like a small thing, the schemes of children, and none of the Pwi doubted that Chaa had seen how to foil the Creators’ plot.
    Tull had already brought the sea serpents back from Craal,