Nerida Quickwave's Arc

Chapter 10 of 12

Nerida turned with the trident raised. Its bone shaft felt light in her hand, the three obsidian points catching the sick yellow glow from the wreckage. She had not tested it on flesh. She had not tested it on the bond. One wrong strike and the prongs would snap, and she would be empty-handed when twelve arms reached her. The beast slid back onto the platform, the metal creature rising beside it. They stopped near a corroded skeleton of a statue half-buried in the rocks, alien symbols deep in its rusted plates. Between Nerida and the pair stretched a broken stone bridge, its pillars wrapped in pale vines. The gap was narrow. One push off the span would put her inside the beast's reach. She chose the carved octopus on the metal chest. Not the joint. The bond itself. She kicked off the bridge, drove the center prong down with both hands, and felt the obsidian bite stone-deep into the symbol. The pulse under the panels stuttered. The beast convulsed, every arm snapping outward at once. The shaft jerked in her grip — and the two outer prongs sheared clean off against the plate. She yanked the broken trident free and kicked back across the span. The beast was still twitching, its arms moving out of time with the metal thing now. The bond was wounded, not broken. And her weapon was one point of glass on a bone stick, with the pair already turning toward her together.