They’d sent me a shield.
The beam hit the shield and reflected off of it, striking the lone remaining post from the building Vin had been thrown through earlier. The wood turned to stone and the Basilisk smashed it with its tail before launching the appendage at me.
“SWORD!” The rough feminine voice was vaguely familiar, but I couldn’t remember where I’d heard it.
I grabbed the sword out of the orange light. After the tail slapped against my shield and pushed me against the building I slashed at it with the silver blade.
The edge cut through the scales like they were made out of paper.
The basilisk roared as it slithered away from me. Bolstered by the confidence in my new weapon, I charged, trying to give it a more serious wound.
The serpent was smart enough to recognize that I was holding something that could hurt it if I got close, so it switched from offensive to defensive, curling back into itself, then trying to slither away.
Vin staggered out of the building that the basilisk was heading towards. I couldn’t outrun it, even if it seemed like it was slowing down. There was something else I could do though.
“Vin!” I pulled back my arm and threw the sword at him. “It can hurt it!”
My brother blinked a few times, but even in his dazed state he was able to pluck the sword out of the air. His arm swung to cut into the monster and if it could do as much damage in my brother’s hands as it did in mine, it’d cut a big gash in the middle of it.
My brother’s empty hand punched the serpent.
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The sword had vanished almost as soon as Vin had touched it. My tired brain was trying to wrap my head around what was happening when the owner of the rough feminine voice walked around the building to my right that was still standing.
“You gave a Cam a magic weapon!” Velt Soberthinker’s voice dripped with rage. “I thought you were smart!”
“I didn’t realize…” I noticed her right arm had turned fully to stone.
The Dwarf stablemaster could still move her shoulder but from halfway to her elbow to the tip of her fingers, her arm was nothing but stone.
“Cursed thing got me while I was trying to get people out the south gate.” She waved her hand and summoned another sword in front of me. “Try not to break this one. I ain’t got much left.”
We’d come in through the western gate and if she’d been wounded by the southern gate, that meant that most of the south west side of the city had probably been either petrified or destroyed. The monster was moving east, which meant it was going towards people that hadn’t been attacked yet.
“Can you do anything else?” I tried to stifle a shiver. I could see my breath, Starna had dropped the temperature in the area so low. Her comment earlier made sense now. Freezing the entire area would slow the cold-blooded monster down, giving us a little more of an edge.
“I might be able to make a dagger.” Velt shook her head. Her red braids had come undone, spilling hair over her shoulders in a tangled mess. “I’m spent. I might be a mage, but I’m nowhere close to what people think a Soberthinker is.”
Vin had caught the basilisk by the tail and was trying to drag it back up the street.
“You’ve done a bunch!” I waved as I forced my muscles to move. “Try to rest up while you can. We might still need you!”
Velt nodded and sat down on the ground, propping up against the building that she’d been hiding behind.
I turned to the fight and watched Vin drop the tail so that he could avoid the rest of the body coiling around him. Even with his tough skin, I had my doubts that he’d last long if the basilisk was able to wrap him up and squeeze him.
There wasn’t a lot of time left in this fight. One side was going to win soon because we were both worn out. I just hoped the edge that Velt had given me would be enough to tip the balance firmly in our favor.
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