Monster Girl Islands 7 Read online

  My heart sank into my stomach at the water dragon’s words.

  “Get out of there now!” I commanded my two friends.

  I had no idea what the hell was holding onto the cannon, but it must have been pretty damn strong if it could withstand the force of two water dragons pulling against it.

  Oh, goodness! George gasped. Is that a--

  The next thing I knew, I saw the sea serpent-esque figures of Nixie and George come flying out of the water with the velocity of a MLB fastball. Both of them flapped their stubby arms helplessly as they tried to right their bodies and regain some semblance of control over their trajectory, but it was no use. The two water dragons hit the water with a large splash, and then they disappeared beneath the waves.

  “Nixie!” Mira screamed as she leaned over the side of the rowboat.

  I’m alright… the warrior woman’s dragon reassured us. We’re both alright. But wow, that hurt.

  “What the fuck was that?” I demanded as my hand reached down and grabbed the hilt on my seaglass sword.

  Before either of the dragons could answer, fate decided to show me what it had in store.

  Slick red skin broke the surface of the water about one-hundred feet away and rose up to the height of a two-story house. As the hideous creature emerged and the water drained off its body, I quickly realized the shimmer on its form came not from the liquid it lived in, but the clear slime that oozed out of every pore on its body.

  The creature from the depths had a bulbus, round head with two giant black eyes and a single round circle of teeth just beneath its brow. Eight long, equally slimy arms came up beside its body, but these tentacles had one defining feature that made them different from the octopuses of my world.

  At the end of each slimy appendage sat a large, red hand, each with three fingers and an opposable thumb. Crystal-clear spikes rose from the fingertips of the octopus, and I could see even from this distance that some sort of liquid coursed through the monster’s nails.

  If it was anything like the deadlier octopuses I knew from my Coast Guard days, the oozing substance was probably some sort of venom.

  “Nooooow we’re talking.” Nadir grinned as she pulled her stone axe from its sheath. “It’s been forever since I’ve had a good fight.”

  “The battle with the orcs was only a few days ago,” Theora pointed out as she rubbed her pointed chin.

  “Exactly.” The Coonag leader smirked. “That’s a few days too long for me!”

  “Hang back for a second,” I warned the overzealous racoon woman. “We don’t know anything about this creature other than the fact it has giant hands and most likely venomous fingernails. We should figure out a plan of attack before we--”

  Unfortunately, the giant octopus wasn’t going to wait for us to formulate a battle strategy. Bits of viscous spittle sprayed through the air as it let out a gargled roar, and then the creature began to swim toward us. Its movements were graceful, so much so that it looked like its head glided along the top of the water like a sailboat in the crosswinds.

  I got him! Tirian called out from above as his mouth began to glow with orange embers.

  The silver dragon reared back his head like he was winding up a pitch and then whipped it forward atop his slender neck. When he got to the top of his momentum, Tirian unleashed a blast of white-hot flames straight down onto the charging creature, but he was still a baby, so the beam of fire was only about the size of a firehose spray to the monster.

  Still, it was enough to do some damage.

  The flames struck the octopus on the crown of the head, and it shrieked as its slimy red skin was blackened and burned. A bit of residual flames still flickered atop the creature’s dome, so it instantly ducked underneath the water to put itself out.

  However, I could still see the large, dark frame approaching from underneath the surface.

  “Nice shot, Tirian!” I called out as my heart pounded, and I drew my sword. “Next time he comes up, try and take out that ugly maw of his. Archers? Ready your bows, and aim for any soft spots you can see. I’m talking eyes, mouth, oversized pores… anything that could help bring this son of a bitch down.”

  The deer women drew their bows, placed the arrows against the strings, and pulled back at the ready. Meanwhile, the rest of us stood tensely in place as we waited for the octopus-thing to reemerge.

  We didn’t have to wait very long. A moment later, the octopus creature breached the surface like a rocket leaving the atmosphere, and then it came at us with six of its eight arms ready to attack.

  “Now!” I commanded.

  Strings thwipped all around me as arrows were released from their bows, and the sky was filled with the quiet woosh of the deadly projectiles as they rained down upon the octopus. They seemed to hit the beast in two separate clusters, and one cluster stabbed into his left eye, while the other hit him all around his mouth. This thing’s skin must not have been very thick, because the arrows riddled his body as if they were striking a mound of playdoh.

  As the monster reared back and roared in pain, Tirian hit him with another blast of fire breath. This time, the flames struck the octopus square in the face, and his cries of pain were quickly drowned out by the sound of his skin being turned to crispy bacon. Then the octopus’ body jerked downward, and he disappeared beneath the surface once more.

  “We got him!” Jemma exclaimed as she pumped her fist into the air.

  “Maybe he’ll stay away this time,” Theora, the beautiful deer-woman with black hair and emerald eyes, added. “I wouldn’t want to come back after getting roasted and skewered like that.”

  “That’s a huitar.” Mira shook her head and sighed. “They’re pretty docile creatures normally. Until you disturb their hiding spots. Then they become focused on one thing and one thing only: killing the source of their annoyance.”

  Well, shit.

  This time, the huitar remained under the water for an uncomfortably long period. It must have dived down deeper, because we couldn’t even see the outline of its body whatsoever.

  “Mother of fuckers,” Mira growled as she alternated peering over each side of the boat. “I can’t see anything.”

  “We’re sitting ducks right now.” I gulped as anxiety rose in the pit of my stomach. “Unless… Tirian? Can you see anything from your vantage point?”

  The dragon was still underneath the canopy of the clouds, but he was far enough up that his scope of view was way better than ours. The water wasn’t as crystal clear as it normally would have been, but it was worth a shot to see if our eagle-eyed friend could help us out.

  I see him! Tirian gasped. The ugly bugger is coming up right underneath Sela’s boat!

  “Sela!” I called over to the rowboat all the way on the other side of the fleet. “Row away as fast as you can, right now!”

  “Right away, Draco Rex!” Sela called back.

  Without a second thought, the warrior with mossy green scales plopped down in the boat, grabbed both of the paddles, and began to row with intensity. Her face was wrought with determination as she moved her boat swiftly toward the shore, but I hoped she would be quick enough to avoid the monster’s wrath.

  “Everybody else ready arrows!” I commanded the other four boats. “It’ll be breaching right over there any second now.”

  I dare him to pop back up, Tirian boasted. I’ll turn him into a piece of charcoal.

  “Don’t fire on him this time,” I ordered the dragon through our telepathic link. “I think it’s smart enough to realize the fire goes out when he’s underwater, so if you hit him with another blast of dragon breath, he’ll just go back into the depths.”

  “Then it sounds like we have to kill it the old-fashioned way.” Nadir grinned, and her striped black and white tail flicked back and forth with excitement.

  Just then, the huitar erupted out of the ocean, right in the spot where Sela’s boat had been. Though the dragonkin and her passengers were lucky enough to be out of its direct path, the rippl
ing waves flew over the side of their boat and caused it to capsize. The dragonkin women were all excellent swimmers, but the force from the wave seemed to knock them unconscious.

  “Fuck!” I yelled as the deer women unleashed a slew of arrows into the beast. “We need to get them out of the water, now.”

  We’re on it, dear one, George’s voice interjected. Just keep that hideous beast away while we get them to safety.

  George and Nixie’s scaly figures broke the surface and shot past our rowboat as they rocketed toward our endangered friends. They stayed right underneath the water, where the surface tension hugged their bodies like a second skin, and then soon found themselves at the capsized boat. They began to dart back and forth as they snatched up our unconscious friends from the ocean, but their actions seemed to attract the attention of the huitar.

  The octopus creature reached out to grab one of the water dragons, but a hailstorm of arrows stabbed into his hand and forced him to withdraw. Then the huitar’s large, dead eyes turned toward the next closest boat, and the gnashing of his teeth told me he was out for blood.

  “Want to see something very impressive?” Nadir giggled. “Watch this.”

  The creature extended one of its slimy appendages toward our friends’ rowboat, and everyone inside prepared for the worst.

  “I’m not sure if now is the time to extravagant flourishes, Nadir!” Malak hissed, but her leader completely ignored her pleas.

  “Ayeayeayeayeaye!” Nadir released a battle cry as she pulled her axe back with both hands over her head.

  Then the Coonag woman lunged forward and tossed her stone axe like it was an oversized hatchet. The weapon spun through the air, end-over-end, until it finally struck the limb of the huitar with pinpoint accuracy. The axe carried its momentum through the creature’s skin, until it eventually became lodged halfway through the width of the monster’s appendage.

  “Wow,” Mira muttered under her breath. “That actually was pretty impressive.”

  The beast screamed as dark blood poured out of its fresh wound, and it pivoted to see where the new assailant was located. Then its eyes locked onto Nadir, who was now doing a Coonag victory dance and completely mocking the creature.

  “Uhhh, Nadir?” I whispered to the racoon-woman. “You might want to cool it with the dance.”

  The huitar was completely still as it watched Nadir prancing around in victory, and I could see in its eyes it was trying to figure out exactly what she was doing.

  Then it hit me like a ton of bricks.

  This thing was intelligent. Really intelligent. Which meant it knew exactly what Nadir was doing, and it surely wasn’t going to appreciate it.

  Sure enough, the huitar’s eyes narrowed, and it let out a bloodcurdling roar before it began to charge in our direction.

  “Well, at least it’s leaving our friends alone,” Mira snorted.

  There wasn’t really much I could do at this point. The Huitar was four times the size of our tiny rowboat, and there was absolutely no way we stood a chance against its charge.

  If my crew wanted to survive this attack, we had to improvise.

  “Brace for impact!” I commanded as I looked to my friends in the boat. “How much do you guys trust me?”

  “Right now?” Malak gulped. “I’d trust you if you told me you had wings, if it meant we didn’t get eaten by that thing.”

  “When I say ‘now,’ we have to jump onto the huitar,” I explained as the monster drew closer.

  “What?” Theora’s emerald eyes widened.

  “I like where your head is at, Draco Rex.” Nadir smiled a toothy grin. “I wanted my axe back, anyways.”

  The huitar was approaching at lightning speed, and it was so laser-focused on our boat, it didn’t even seem to care that several arrows were stabbing into its side from other attackers as it moved.

  Nadir had insulted the beast, and it wasn’t about to forget that.

  “Steady…” I ordered as we all crouched down and prepared for impact. “Now!”

  Theora let out a fearful scream as we all jumped up into the air, and then I heard the terrible sound of the huitar smashing into our boat.

  I landed on one of the monster’s slimy red arms with a wet splat and instantly felt the front of my body become drenched in a gooey substance. It smelled putrid yet sweet, like a garbage dump that had been sprayed with too much AXE body spray, and it took everything I had not to throw up my breakfast. The liquid was thick and slimy, but it was sticky enough that I didn’t just slide right off.

  So, I quickly hopped up to my feet and surveyed my surroundings.

  Tirian must have swooped down, because Jemma was now riding him like a small, flying pony. Meanwhile, Theora and Malak were both on a nearby tentacle, and they appeared shell shocked that what they’d just done worked. Then there were Mira and Nadir, who were on separate tentacles and already headed up toward the creature’s main body.

  Gods, I loved watching these women work.

  I started to run up the tentacle like it was a tightrope, and I stabbed down into it with my sword as I went. The seaglass blade pierced the monster’s skin as if it were nothing, but the huitar wasn’t really responding to the attacks.

  Instead, he was staring at Nadir.

  Damn. He was really taking this whole “victory dance” thing to heart.

  The tentacle I was standing on lurched to the right, and I fell down onto my knees as I held on for dear life. Then I realized what exactly was going on. Every tentacle on the huitar’s body was reaching out to snatch up Nadir, and, if we didn’t do something quickly, the Coonag leader would soon be in its slimy mitts.

  So, I turned around and tried to keep my balance on the moving tentacle as I made my way back to the creature’s wrist.

  Mira must have had the same idea, because I saw her dashing up the appendage in the same direction as me. The others seemed to be more focused on the creature itself, and Theora and Jemma launched arrow after arrow into the creature’s body, but it didn’t seem to care.

  At the same time, Malak was down on her knees tearing into the beast’s flesh with her bare teeth. The Coonag woman’s plump ass was held up high in the air as she ripped out chunks of huitar skin with her mouth, and for a second I forgot we were in the middle of a battle. My thoughts began to wonder about what else the sexy Coonag woman could do with her mouth…

  I was snapped back into reality when my foot snagged on one of the creature’s suction cups, and I fell down with a sickly plop and stabbed my sword down into the beast’s skin to keep myself steady. This time, the blade went as deep as the hilt, and the huitar seemed to notice.

  The creature’s tentacle froze, and I instantly sprang back to my feet. I didn’t even turn around to see my opponent’s response, mainly because I could already feel the huitar’s eyes glaring into my back.

  Instead, I hastened my pace and pushed myself further toward the monster’s hands. I didn’t know if cutting off these meaty claws would actually do much damage, but it would sure as hell make our lives a lot easier. So, I pushed forward, and when I was only a few paces away from my target, I readied my sword and prepared to attack.

  That’s when the huitar made his move. The creature raised its tentacle upward, and I slowly began to slide back toward his body.

  Then the lightbulb went on in my head.

  I wasn’t going to do the damage to this bastard. I would just let gravity do the work for me.

  So, I waited another second or two, until the tentacle was practically vertical, and then I used all my might to jump toward it. Next, I stabbed my sword into the creature’s arm as deep as it would go, kicked off, and let gravity take its course.

  My blade was lodged deep into the huitar’s tentacle, and the weight of my body pulled it downward like the world’s most macabre zipper. As I moved down, the creature’s skin split open on both sides, and gallons of dark red blood erupted from the wound. The viscous liquid poured over me like a waterfall, and I was soon
completely soaked in huitar blood.

  The monster let out a shriek of agony as he whipped its wounded tentacle forward, and I was suddenly launched through the air. The blood was completely obscuring my vision, but I knew there was nothing around us for several miles. Even though the water was going to break my fall, I was high up enough that I knew it would hurt like a bitch when I slammed into the surface.

  So, I closed my eyes and tensed up my body as I prepared for impact.

  We have you, Ben! Jemma’s voice reassured me.

  Suddenly, I heard the sound of beating wings, and I felt something grab onto the back of my shirt. Then two soft arms reached under my armpits and secured me in place.

  Blech, Tirian grumbled. And I thought orcs tasted bad. It’s like I’m chewing on a piece of raw iron.

  “We figured you needed a lift,” Jemma purred into my ear as we flew through the sky.

  “Thanks,” I announced as I tried to wipe the huitar blood from my eyes. “But we’re not done yet. Not until that fucking thing is in a deep watery grave… Take me back down!”

  Sure thing, Ben! Tirian chirped as he turned his body and banked in the direction of the huitar.

  From up here, I could see the four women who were on the beast were still battling for their lives. They were darting up and down tentacles, leaping back and forth between the different appendages, and attacking the monster in bite-sized chunks, all while it was trying to snatch them up with its large hands.

  Blood was still spurting out of the huitar’s wounded tentacle, too, and I could see his movements were getting more and more sluggish by the moment. I must have hit a vein, because the monster was losing blood by the gallon, and I was sure he would bleed out sooner rather than later.

  That wasn’t quick enough for me.

  Even if it took him ten minutes to completely bleed out, that still gave him ten minutes to try and hurt my women.

  And I wasn’t about to let that happen.

  “What’s the plan, Ben?” Jemma asked as Tirian took us in closer to the beast.

  “I’m glad you asked,” I shot back playfully. “Hand me your bow.”