He was right. It did have that swishing wing sound. Only these had to be huge wings to make the noise she heard.
This wasn't good.
Dev ground his teeth as he looked for the next threat that was coming for them. His entire body was aching all the way to the marrow of his bones. All he wanted was to find the damn girdle and get out of here before one of them was killed. Most of all, he wanted to go back to when it'd been just him and Sam in her house. To that moment of perfect bliss when there had been no danger. No goal. And they'd been naked in each other's arms.
Weird how he didn't want to leave anymore and start over. He was perfectly content to stay, so long as she was with him.
But then life was insidiously evil in that it seemed to always be a study in how hard it could kick you down. Like the king Tantalus that Ethon had mentioned earlier. Life dropped you neck-deep into the water you craved most, then the minute you stooped to drink, it evaporated. It let you starve while succulent grapes hung over your head, so close your fingertips could brush them, then the instant you reached out for one, a phantom breeze would blow them right out of your grasp. All the while you could see your desires so clearly, you could reach out and almost touch them, but you could never have them.
That was what he hated most about it. Life was anti-happy.
He glanced to Sam. Right now, he couldn't even touch her. She was completely intangible and yet there she shimmered in all her beauty. Calling out to him when he knew he couldn't have her, couldn't touch her. And right now, her features were pinched and strained with worry. Of everyone here, he knew exactly how much torture it was for her to not be able to really help them, and all he wanted to do was make it better.
"Mommy? Mommy? Where are you?"
Dev felt sick as he heard the voice of a little girl and saw the devastation on Sam's face.
"Mommy? I'm so scared. Why did you leave me?"
She started forward.
"Sam!" he snapped at her. "It's a trick. You know it is."
Sam wanted to believe it, but the voice...
It was Agaria. She would know that sweet, precious voice anywhere.
"Sam? Is that you? See, Ree, I told you Mommy hadn't forgotten us. I told you she'd be back."
Dev's heart clenched, especially when he saw the pain etched on Ethon's features. "Damn you, bastards!" Dev roared. "Stop with the cruelty."
"Devereaux? Is that you, brother?"
Pain lacerated Dev as he heard Bastien's voice in the strange shadows around him. Before he could stop himself, he'd taken a step toward it.
"Fang? Is that you?"
Fang swallowed hard. "Anya?"
Dev cursed at the name of Fang's sister who'd been killed by Daimons....
Ethon was the first to come to his senses and completely reject the voices. "It's the manticore, guys." He moved to stand in front of them so that they couldn't head toward the voices. "People, wake up! Listen to me. You're under a spell. It's the--"
His words died under an assault of arrows.
Dev hissed as one grazed his arm and laid open his biceps. "Take cover!"
Unfortunately, there wasn't much cover to be had. One arrow landed deep in his shoulder.
Sam cursed as she saw Dev go down. Her powers dipped, but before they vanished completely, she raised the stones from the ground, giving her friends a modicum of shelter as the arrows rained down on them with such ferocity, she understood how King Leonidas had felt against the Persians. She controlled her rising panic as she heard the manticores drawing closer. They were growling like lions now as they continued to shoot arrows at them from their tails. It was the wickedest of weapons and one that was long range. Damn the gods for that.
And while the manticores had the bodies of lions, they all had the head of a human, which made them some of the deadliest of Greek monsters because they weren't mindless animals. They could think and deceive and use their voices to mimic others.
Most of all, they could kill up to five hundred feet away. It was why so few people ever saw them. By the time you looked one eye to eye, death was already rattling in your chest.
True to his Spartan nature, Ethon laughed. "We should feel flattered that the gods sent these after us."
Dev passed him a sneer that said he thought Ethon had been inhaling fumes. "Flattered?"
"Yeah. It means we're bad ass even to the gods." He pulled out a handful of shurikens. "C'mon, you bastards! Let's dance." He dodged out from behind the rocks to throw them.
Sam ignored him while she studied the arrow in Dev's shoulder.
"I've got it," Scorpio said, coming to tend the wound.
Dev hissed as Scorpio touched the arrow that was buried deep while Ethon fell back against a rock that shielded him, laughing in triumph.
Dev looked from Ethon to Sam. "Please tell me his brother had better sense."
"Not really." She laughed. "He just wasn't as enthusiastic about his stupidity."
Ethon tsked. "Ah, Sam, that hurt my feelings."
She gave him a droll stare. "What are you talking about, E? You don't have any feelings."