We adjusted our belongings and lowered ourselves to the ground. Frosty grass reached up to my elbows, blocking too much of my view—and not blocking enough. Though we were far back on the trail, around a bend to keep out of view, by the time we reached the center of the path, I could see the centaurs’ fires and their silhouettes as they moved about the field. There were so many. They wouldn’t have to worry about rocs swooping down on them.
The ground trembled under my palms, vibrations from all the movement to the east. Faintly, I saw startlingly graceful movements as a group of centaurs chased one another. They called out and laughed, their hooves beating the ground in rhythm.
They’d seemed awkward at first, so forward-heavy with their human halves in the front, but firelight glistened off muscular horse halves and sturdy legs. A pair of centaurs embraced. One reared up and spread his arms to the stars and moon and sky.
None of them looked like they were wearing human skin as clothing.
We’d been wrong about the sylph. Sort of. They had attacked people for thousands of years. They’d attacked me on my birthday last year, too. But there was something about them. They loved music. And now Cris was one.
What if we’d been wrong about centaurs?
Hoofbeats pounded on the ground, coming closer. Sam twisted to look back at me, and in the darkness, his eyes were wide. “Go,” he mouthed. “Fast.”
I scrambled across the path as quickly as I could, aching to get up and use my legs. But if they were coming our way, I didn’t want to be seen.
The hoofbeats thumped and a high, thin voice shrieked.
I jerked my face up to find a young centaur staring down at me, wearing a shocked expression. Another stopped next to the first. They both screamed.
I screamed.
Sam reached back and grabbed my wrist, and together we lurched for the other side of the path, but the centaurs were following—
And then the ground shuddered. Not from the herd. No, this was from the opposite direction. One solid thud followed by another.
The young centaurs stared past Sam and me, and the herd went quiet.
A hush fell over the entire area as the thuds came louder, faster. Then Sam climbed all the way to his feet—making the young centaurs jump back—and dragged me into the woods.
“Troll!”
At once, the area turned loud with centaurs shouting and metal clashing. And when I glanced over my shoulder, the young centaurs were just standing in the middle of the path, staring up with their mouths wide open as a human-shaped beast three times my size came roaring toward the field. Ice and branches flew away from the troll’s destructive passage.
“Wait!” I shook myself away from Sam and darted back to the path. The young centaurs—colts? children?—both snapped their attention to me. “Come on!” I had no idea if they understood me, but when I reached for them, one of the boys clasped his hand around my damp mitten, and we raced into the woods just as the troll thundered into the place where they’d been standing.
Sam opened his mouth, but shook his head and began running through the forest as cacophony erupted by the pond. Screams and roars spurred us through the woods. The children surged ahead, shoving branches and bushes out of the way. Sam and I hurried to keep up, but the dark forest was only brokenly lit with torches on the battlefield.
My SED buzzed in my pocket, but I couldn’t answer it. I focused on jumping over the tangle of roots the centaurs jumped over. On ducking ice-white limbs. On putting one leg in front of the other.
Shouts filled the area. Then a thundering growl. And the world thudded hard as something dropped. I stumbled, but one of the centaur children reached back and took my arm until I was balanced and running on my own again.
“Ana! Sam!” Stef’s voice came from just ahead. “There you are! I—”
Blue lights flared, targeting the young centaurs as we broke out into the open. The rest of the herd was far to our right, gathered around the fallen troll, so now it was just four humans and two scared centaur kids.
One of the boys screamed. The herd’s attention shifted.
“No, don’t!” I moved in front of the boys and held out my hands. They tried, unsuccessfully, to hide behind me. They were both much bigger than I was. “Don’t shoot. They’re just kids.”
“They’re centaurs.” Whit kept his weapon up. No one else moved, either.
Sam stayed off to the side, looking between us. “Don’t shoot Ana.”
“They’re just kids,” I said again.
The herd of centaurs rumbled closer, swords and spears lifted and glinting with blood in torchlight. Suddenly, we were surrounded. All of us humans. The young centaurs.
Stef swung her laser pistol toward the approaching army, but there was no way she’d overcome a thousand centaurs.
One targeting light still aimed at the young centaurs. I didn’t move from my position guarding them. And the other centaurs were deadly quiet as they appraised the situation.
No one moved. I could hardly breathe.