A second later, I was flipped onto my back. One of the creatures pinned my shoulders and trapped my hands between our bodies. It fit its lips over mine. They were wet and warm, too wet, too warm, and only growing more so. I heard a slurp, a pop, then felt a hard suction pry my mouth open. That funnel-like tongue I'd seen earlier lowered over my tongue and covered the back of my throat.
I gagged.
The Sybilin began sucking, sucking. Sucking. Over and over, again and again. I couldn't breath, but that didn't panic me. I'd flown so many times I was used to going without air. What bothered me was how dry my mouth suddenly felt, how slow my blood began pumping. How tight and hard my skin became.
Fight, Phoenix. Fight! I thrashed my head, jerked on its hold, trying to dislodge it. Finally I managed to work my hands free and beat against its head. Nothing budged it. Then the creature recaptured my wrists, holding them at my sides. Not once did it stop sucking from me, draining every drop of water it could. I began to grow cold. So cold, despite the heat radiating from the still-raging bonfire beside me.
That's when panic threatened to consume me. Stop. Stop! I tried to scream. Let me go! I wasn't ready to die. I'd just gotten clean. Stop!
Calm down, Phoenix, I told myself in the next instant. Calm down and think. I forced myself to be still. What should I do? How could I get the water-stealing bastard off of me? Better hurry…
Black spots winked in and out of my vision, a spiderweb that was thickening, spreading. Time was running out, I knew that much. I really would be drained soon. My fingers were already blocks of ice, my arms almost too heavy to lift. And still the creature sucked. My entire body jerked. Spasmed.
The creature's eyes pulsed that eerie red, overshadowing even the spiderweb in my mind, becoming my only focus. Becoming…lethal. Fight it. Fight this. I'm smart. I can escape. I'd been held down like this in rehab, strapped down as I fought for freedom, for drugs. I'd been overpowered, like now, yet I had managed to escape time and time again.
Now my life hung in the balance.
Drawing deep on a reservoir of strength that always managed to surprise me, I bucked upward, the action painful, almost impossible, shaking the Sybilin to the side. It released my left wrist to steady itself. With a roar, I shoved two fingers into its eyes. I cringed at the wet warmth I encountered.
It screeched an unholy sound and rolled away from me as if I were poison, rubbing at its eyes. As it flailed, I lay still for several seconds—maybe years, maybe an eternity—trying to catch my breath, find energy. My throat hurt. Badly. My skin was like a rubber band, dry, taut, ready to snap.
Come on, come on. No time to rest. I'm making my mother proud, remember?
I lumbered to my feet. The Sybilin continued to writhe. I was afraid to touch it again, afraid it would somehow be able to attach itself to me a second time, but I approached it anyway and crouched above it. I began punching. And punching. And punching. It had tried to kill me, would kill me if I let it.
I didn't stop punching, even when it tried to crawl away from me. Even when it bucked and screeched, I still punched. Punched until the murdering creature ceased all movement. None of the other Sybilins came to its rescue.
Only when I stopped did I realize that my knuckles throbbed in sync with my rage. I hurt everywhere. I couldn't stop panting.
Ryan was suddenly at my side. He grabbed my upper arm and pulled me into the very spot I'd been standing before all of this began. My knees collapsed, my adrenaline rush dissipating. I fell to my butt and leaned my head against one of the trees. In that moment, I wanted to vomit. I had nothing left inside me, however, no energy to move.
“You okay?” he asked, crouching just in front of me.
“I'm…fine…” I said as my eyelids closed of their own accord. My throat was dry, raw, each word ripped from me. I'd never felt so weak in my life.
“I'm sorry I didn't get to you sooner.” He tilted my chin and used his fingers to raise my eyelids and study my eyes. “I've never seen an untrained human successfully fight off a Sybilin who had already begun to feed.” There was disbelief in his tone, as if seeing it still hadn't convinced him. “I don't think you'll have any permanent damage. You just need water. A lot of water.”
“What about…the other monsters?” I couldn't suck air in fast enough.
“We've got them contained. Finally.” He withdrew a canteen from one of his pant pockets and held it to my lips. “Drink.”
I drank greedily, my cottony mouth absorbing every drop of moisture.
“Everything's going to be okay.”
“Who…are…you?” I panted when there was nothing left. A normal boy could not have fought like that. A normal boy did not carry an arsenal to a kegger. “Who are…you really?”
“I'm nobody.” Expression grim, he twisted and surveyed the glen.
I looked past him to do the same. Kids were strewn about, unconscious. Many of the Sybilins were still frozen in place. I gulped. “Are they dead?”
“Your friends or the Sybilins?”
“Both.”
“Some of the humans will need a few days on an IV, but survival rate should be good. The Sybilins, well, some of them are alive now but they won't be for long.” He said it with the slightest hint of glee.
“What—”
“No.” He shook his head. “No more questions.”
His sister was approaching, I noticed. She sheathed her weapons—a gun and a knife, exact replicas of Ryan's—at her waist and glanced at me. She had the same dark hair as Ryan, but her eyes were green whereas his were that freaky blue. He was tall, she was short. Where he was muscled, she looked soft.
Hard to believe the sweet-looking teenager had fought so lethally.
“What are we going to do about her?” she demanded, motioning to me with a tilt of her chin.
She was my age, seventeen, but she was trying to act older. In control. I wish I had the strength to challenge her. For the first time in years, I'd done something good. Something right. I didn't deserve condemnation. I deserved a medal. Maybe flowers. A certificate at the very least.
“Well,” Allison demanded.
“Not what you're thinking,” Ryan said firmly.
What was she thinking? I felt like I should know the answer, but my mind was foggy and I was suddenly having trouble sifting through the gloomy thickness.
“She's seen too much,” Allison said through clenched teeth.
“She also helped us. Now drop it and find out what happened to our backup. They should have been here by now.”