I didn’t respond, wondering if he was actually going to escape the lochness’s wrath after all. I kept looking for the creature, or at least its tentacle, but saw nothing. No tentacle, no sprays of water, nothing to indicate that the lochness was still lurking in the river below.
Grant risked a glance over his shoulder, but the bridge was empty now. He turned back around and gave me a smug look. “Looks like my men paid the toll for me. So what are you going to do now, Lila?”
My heart sank because I didn’t have an answer. This—this had been my plan. The old traditions. The customs that my mom had drilled into my head. The ones that I’d always respected and enjoyed following. But right now, it didn’t look like they were going to be enough to save us.
Devon tensed, waiting for Grant to get in range. No matter what happened, Devon was going to stand by my side and defend me to his dying breath. That meant more to me than just about anything.
But he didn’t have to.
Grant stepped off the bridge, putting one foot onto the street. Just as his second foot was about to touch down, a tentacle shot out of the shadows, slithered across the cobblestones, and wrapped itself around his ankle.
Grant fell to the ground, his sword skittering out of his hand. Slowly, the tentacle pulled him back onto the bridge. But Grant wasn’t going without a fight. He hooked his hands over a cobblestone that jutted up from the bridge’s surface. The tentacle pulled at him again, giving him an impatient yank, but Grant held on tight—so tight that his nails started to crack and bleed. But that was better than the alternative.
Grant raised his head and focused his gaze on me. My soulsight kicked in, and I felt all of his pain, fury, and disbelief at what was about to happen.
“Help me!” he screamed.
“No.”
Seeing that I wasn’t going to take pity on him, Grant turned his frantic gaze to Devon.
“Devon! Please!” he screamed. “Help me!”
Devon sighed and started forward, just as I knew he would, but I held my hand out and stopped him. I shook my head.
“No,” I repeated. “Not him. I know he’s a member of your Family, I know you thought that he was your friend, but he doesn’t deserve it. Not after what he tried to do to you. Not after what he did to Ashley and your father. Believe me. If you help him now, he’ll just try to kill us again.”
Devon stared at Grant, an unreadable expression on his face. After a moment, he gave me a sharp nod.
Grant saw his last hope fade away, and he swung his ugly, hate-filled glare to me again. “You bitch!” he snarled. “You did this to me! My blood is on your hands!”
“Yeah,” I said. “I did do it to you. But you did it to yourself, too. Good-bye, Grant.”
Grant kept clutching at the cobblestone. The tentacle wrapped tighter and tighter around his ankle, until I heard the snap-snap-snap of the bones breaking in his foot. It gave him a harder yank, then a harder one . . . then a harder one still . . .
Grant screamed and wrapped his hands around the cobblestone that much tighter.
But it wasn’t enough.
The bridge was wet, and the stones were slippery from the water the lochness had sprayed everywhere. Grant finally lost his grip. One moment, his fingers were scrabbling over the cobblestone, trying to latch on to it again. The next, the tentacle had snapped him high into the air. Grant barely had time to suck down a breath to scream before the creature slammed him down into the water.
Devon and I looked at each other; then we both hobbled to the bridge and peered over the side. The water rushed by much faster than normal, bubbling, foaming, and frothing like rapids. I thought I heard Grant let out one final waterlogged scream, and then . . .
Silence.
The river slowed back down to its normal flow, although an oily stain slicked the surface of the water—Grant’s blood.
Devon let out a low whistle and slowly backed away from the edge, but I stayed where I was, clutching the stone for support. I might have backed away, too, if I hadn’t thought that my legs would buckle, and I’d fall to the ground.
I don’t know how long we might have stood there if the black tentacle hadn’t risen up over the bridge again.
I tensed and tightened my grip on the stone, thinking that maybe the lochness was still hungry, and that Devon and I were going to be scooped up and pulled into the water like Grant and the two guards. The tentacle drew back, then snapped forward, almost like it was a baseball player hurling something in our direction. A bit of silver glittered in the air.
Clink-clink-clink.
The piece of metal hit the stone ledge, bounced off, and skittered to a stop at my feet. I looked down.
My mom’s sapphire ring gleamed in the moonlight.
I sucked in a breath. Beside me, Devon did the same.
“Why did it do that?” he rasped. “Why did it give your ring back to you?”
“I don’t know. And I’m not sure I want to.”
I leaned down and scooped up the ring. Despite the blood in the water, the sapphire star and the silver band gleamed, as though they had just been cleaned. I slid the ring onto my finger, where it belonged, then looked up. That tentacle was still undulating in the air, almost like it was waving at me.
I hesitated, then waved back, even though I had no idea if the lochness could actually see me. “Um . . . thanks.”
The tentacle slid down and disappeared below the water’s surface. A moment later, a loud sound blasted out from beneath the bridge, almost like a foghorn.
Urp.
“Was that . . . a burp?” Devon whispered.
“Do you really want to know?”
He shook his head.
“Yeah. Me neither.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
I couldn’t walk, but Devon wouldn’t leave me, so we sat on the lochness bridge. It was safer than hobbling through the streets. Despite the blood that covered us, no monsters appeared to make us their midnight snack. We seemed to be under the lochness’s protection, at least for this night.