Page 32 of Code Bound
I pull my own blunted dagger out, wincing at how dull it is. This isn’t going to be an easy fight, not when the two of us don’t even have good weapons. At least we have more than a rock this time, though.
The Boiúna coils around itself as it rises fully out of the water, a long slithering tongue darting out to taste the air as it looks between the two of us. The snake itself is black in color, but as it moves through the light, I can see the hidden pattern of spots along it’s back. It’s eyes flash gold, and I blink to clear a sudden fog in my head. It doesn’t help. My jaw goes slack as the snake focuses entirely on me and starts to come closer.
“Move!” Locke snarls, shoving me. The movement breaks my eye contact with the snake and my brain fog suddenly disappears.
I shake my head gently and rub at my eyes. “I think it has some sort of power. Don’t look it in the eyes.”
Locke bares his teeth at the creature and holds his blunt, rusty sword up. “Come on, motherfucker. Let’s do this.”
He focuses just above the snake’s head, avoiding direct eye contact, as he screams and rushes forward.
“Coward and idiotic,” Cipher mocks in my head. “Consider me unsurprised.”
“Watch out for—” I start, rushing forward to help. “Shit. That’s going to hurt.”
The Boiúna whips its tail around and catches Locke across the middle. He flies across the cavern and into the wall with a crack that makes me wince. He slides down the wall, out cold. The giant snake doesn’t even bother turning to check where he lands, focusing entirely on me.
“Well . . . shit,” I breathe and dive just before the thing can strike. It’s head barely misses my arm as it strikes at where I’d been standing only seconds before. I’m rolling back to my feet when it strikes again, and I’m not fast enough the second time.
Fangs sink into my bicep and clamp down. Just as quickly as it bites, it releases me, springing back to prepare itself. I scream at the burning pain in my arm and raise the dagger. This time, when it strikes again, I’m prepared. I slam the dagger down into it . . .
. . . only for it to glance off its skin harmlessly.
The Boiúna gets me right in the chest and I fly backward with the force of it. My chest burns from the fang wounds left behind, but I do my best to ignore it as I struggle back to my feet. My movements are frantic as I drag myself up and hold out my very small, very useless dagger. The snake advances on me, the hissing sound coming from its throat terrifying even if it didn’t echo around me.
“Cipher?” I rasp, my hand starting to shake. “This dagger isn’t sharp enough to do any damage.”
“Use something else,” Cipher says, and for the first time, I hear a hint of worry in his tone. “Quickly.”
I pop open my inventory and scan the full boxes, panicking as I realize I don’t have much in the way of weapons and I have too much to easily search through. Rocks, rocks, rocks, buttons, cotton fabric, fuck!
“Faster, Vespera,” Cipher pushes.
Panicking, I grab the bundle of arrows from the inventory, the only thing that counts as a sharp weapon I have. The transparent menu disappears and I come face to face with the Boiúna again as it rises up, its large head wider than my shoulders before me. Looking down, I have a split second to realize its body has circled me while I was focused on my menu before it tightens its coils and begins to squeeze.
I shout in surprise as the thick body of the snake tightens, my bones starting to ache immediately. The cold skin of the snake presses at my super-heated body, somehow comforting despite the situation I’m in.
“Locke!” I scream, struggling against the snake’s hold. The more I struggle, the tighter it becomes, so I stop, instead focusing on waking up the man still slumped in the corner. “Locke!”
The snake’s head hovers in front of me, moving back and forth as I struggle, trying to look me in the eyes. I clamp mine shut in the hopes to avoid its powers, but that only makes me more aware of just how painful the squeeze is. A breath leaves my body and the snake’s body tightens further, making my eyes pop open in pain.
Golden eyes meet mine so quickly, there’s no chance to combat it. The brain fog returns, more powerful than before, slamming into my mind so hard, I can’t even hear the words Cipher is speaking to me. My body goes slack. I stop fighting as the snake tightens its hold around me and I feel the first pop of bone. My shoulder. I can’t scream in pain, my control gone. All I can manage is a single tear that drips over my lashes and trails down my cheek.
Cipher. . . I croak inside my brain.Please . . .
I can’t speak out loud. I can’t call for help. This thing is going to crush me and swallow me whole and no one will know. That’s it. I won’t be here when Dox arrives. She won’t find any evidence of me. I failed. I knew I couldn’t do this without her.
A hollow scream echoes around the room, but I can’t turn to look. I can’t breathe. Oh Harrow, I can’t breathe. I’m going to die here. This is my grave. I survived Dross only to die being eaten by a giant fucking noodle creature.
Locke appears from my right, his blunt sword raised high. With his muscles straining, he stabs the sword down into the body of the Boiúna. His veins stand out in sharp relief as the sword hits, but doesn’t cut. As if realizing the same thing I did, that the snake’s body is too tough to cut with the blunt weapons, he switches tactics and begins bludgeoning the Boiúna across the head with the sword instead.
“Let. Her. Go!” he shouts, beating the shit out of the snake.
The Boiúna turns from me, breaking the eye contact and letting all the pain back in. I try to scream as the agony hits, my body alive now that I’m no longer locked in the snake’s mesmerizing gaze, but there’s no air in my lungs. I can’t draw in air, can’t say anything. I’m going to die anyway. A croak of a sound slips from my lips as my head falls back.
Locke moves around me, distracting the snake as much as he can. It loosens its hold as it strikes at Locke, just enough for me to take a deep, gasping breath and free one arm. The feeling of oxygen dragging into my lungs again is painful, my whole body a livewire of pain as I attempt to gather my senses. Locke can’t cut it. I’m going to have to do something, or we’re both going to die. But my body isn’t cooperating. My lungs burn worse than any Black Lung and my bones feel out of place. My left shoulder is certainly out of socket and will need to be popped back in. But I have one arm free. I can breathe a little. My head rolls forward and my eyes find my loose hand, a hand that’s still wrapped tightly around the bunch of arrows I’d pulled from my inventory. My fingers are screaming in pain where they’d been forced to hold them tighter during the worst of the squeeze, but they’re there. I hadn’t dropped them.
I have little time to think it through. I don’t believe I could think clearly anyway. The best I can do is let out a strangled scream of anger as I raise the bundle of four arrows up, the pain in the movement agonizing as I push through it. Without waiting for confirmation or a better plan, I slam the arrows down into the snake’s body, the sharp points sinking into its flesh and finally making it bleed.
