Light of Epertase 01: Legends Reborn by Douglas R. Brown Page A

serenity won the battle with Alina’s eyelids and she acquiesced to dreamland.

    A lina startled herself awake with a terrible realization. “By the gods,” she shouted and jumped to her feet. Blair didn’t stir so she shook him violently. “Blair, wake up.”
    The sky glowed a muted orange, marking the setting of the suns. She knew as all Epertasians did that predators filled the forest at night. Her heart quickened.
    Blair stretched and groaned before he too realized the lateness and bounced to his feet. “Stay calm,” he yelled over the beating rapids. “We’ll be fine. We just need to keep close to each other and keep our eyes open.” He tied his sword back around his waist.
    Alina snuggled to him. He put his scrawny arm around her.
    “What about our stuff?” she asked as she tugged at the blanket.
    “Leave it,” he shouted and yanked her away.
    He pretended to be calm but his face betrayed him. He led her through the passage and into the forest.
    A shadow bounced off the trees in front of them. A wolf howled in the distance.
    “Allusia,” Alina whispered loudly. “Allusia!”
    She feared their horses were lost. Blair tried to assure her that horses could find their way home if they’d been spooked. He wasn’t a good liar.
    She huddled to him. “Where are all the animals?” she asked. “We should’ve seen a bird or a mouse by now, shouldn’t we?”
    “Just keep moving,” he said.
    Alina tugged on his arm to slow him as he dragged her along. She worried the cracking of sticks beneath their feet would draw out whatever had the forest animals so quiet and scarce.
    He grabbed her shoulders and faced her. “We are being stalked,” he whispered without trying to soften the effects of his words. “We need to hurry.”
    She knew well that it was a half-day’s travel by foot and he knew it too. “We’re not going to make it,” she whispered.
    Blair ignored her.
    A tree limb snapped behind them. Blair sucked in a startled breath and sped to a jog. Alina held his hand tightly, trailing behind. The forest was almost black as they entered the time between the setting of the suns and the lifting of the moon. Soon, their vision reached less than a few twisted, prickly trees ahead.
    A staccato growl broke the silence. Alina flinched and stiffened her grip. Blair shook her hand loose and drew his sword.
    “Run,” he whispered while nudging her again with his free arm. His sword shook in his hand. The monster before them resembled a scorpion from the Wastelands except it was as large as a horse. The animal’s tail curled above its body like a candy cane. It crouched, poised to attack.
    Alina recognized the creature from old fables she’d heard as a child. Their hunter was an ochrid, a creature as dangerous as any in the known world. The stories told that no man had ever survived an encounter with the beast.
    She stuttered back a step.
    “Ruuuuunn,” Blair screamed.
    Please, Blair, don’t.
    Her husband-to-be leaped into the air like the warrior she knew he wasn’t. The eight-legged creature snarled, showing its razor-sharp, pointed teeth. As Blair neared, the creature hissed. Blair thrust his steel forward. The ochrid’s tail sprang forward, striking Blair’s chest true.
    He screamed the most awful sounds Alina had ever heard.
    He pleaded one last time. “Alina, ruuuuun!” Then his shriek turned to drowning gurgles.
    The creature ripped its tail free of her lover’s chest and cocked it back again. Alina turned to run. A cold, slimy slab of meat slapped against the back of her arm. She swatted at it as she ran but the slug slithered into her blouse and down her back. Scorching pain erupted from between her shoulder blades.
    She felt faint, slowing her run to a stagger. She imagined she had been poisoned. The echoes of Blair’s screams were more than she could stand so she jammed her hands against her ears.
    She stumbled like a drunkard. The few trees that she could see in the dark wobbled and