Pulling back her arm—the skin no longer pale and flaccid but strong, powerful, and filled with well-trained muscles—she threw the sword she had in her hand. A Minotaur’s blade, much longer and wider than any human sword, and Annwyl handled it like it was a small eating dagger.
The weapon flew across the tunnel and slammed into the Minotaur female, forcing her back several steps.
The priestess stared down at it, but she didn’t die.
She raised her arms and shouted, “Kill—”
But Annwyl’s hysterical scream drowned her out, and then the Blood Queen was charging the Minotaur female, slamming into her, knocking her into the ground. She yanked the blade from the female’s chest and raised it. Still screaming, she slammed it into her. The priestess’s howl of pain filled the tunnel, but it still couldn’t block out Annwyl’s scream. It went beyond a battle cry. It went beyond anything.
And while she screamed, over and over again, Annwyl yanked the weapon out, and slammed it back in.
Unable to turn away, they all watched her, even Dagmar. The Minotaur males didn’t move. Their commander was dead and their priestess was being murdered right before them.
And it was murder. A brutal, vicious murder. Blood and gore flew everywhere, even striking Dagmar and the babes, but Annwyl kept going until the tip of the blade slammed into the ground beneath them. That’s when she released it and tore at the priestess’s chest using only her bare hands. She tore the ribs apart and began to slam her fist inside the open chest cavity again and again.
By now the female Minotaur had long died, but apparently Annwyl’s rage was still going strong.
Dagmar lost count of how many times Annwyl struck at the open chest in front of her. How many times she yanked organs out and tossed them over her shoulder. For the first time in her life, Dagmar was mesmerized, unable to think or reason or do much of anything but stare.
It took them long minutes before the Minotaurs finally snapped out of their own state of shock, and one of them, a giant with an absolutely enormous head, moved toward her. He slowly raised his sword and Dagmar went to warn Annwyl, but a blade held against her throat cut off the sound.
The Minotaur now stood behind Annwyl, the sword held in both hands over her naked back. Without a sound, he brought it down. But as the tip of the blade neared her spine, Annwyl moved. She simply lifted her right arm and reared to her left side. The blade slammed into the Minotaur female’s empty chest. The male stared dumbly at what he’d done, and then his gaze turned to Annwyl. Her smile was mad, one corner of her mouth lifting, her green eyes rising up to look at him through the wild tumble of hair in her face.
“Missed,” she hissed, and the Minotaur stumbled back. He was terrified. He couldn’t hide it, not from his comrades, not from himself. For the first time in his life, Dagmar was sure, an Ice Lander was terrified and everyone knew it—because they were all terrified as well.
Terrified as they watched Annwyl grab the hilt of the Minotaur’s blade still sticking up from the female’s chest. Terrified as the much smaller human and naked female got to her feet. Annwyl panted, not from exertion … but from lust. From desire. The desire for the kill. Dagmar had never seen it like this before. Not like this. Not as if the warrior would climax at any moment merely from the threat she presented.
The queen’s crazed gaze shifted to Dagmar and the Minotaur behind her lowered his blade and moved away. He held his hands up, the palms coated with a lighter, paler fur than the brown and white on top.
As one, the Minotaurs all moved back, watching her closely, so closely.
Annwyl wet her lips, her panting getting heavier, her body more aroused by the second. Then she screamed; she screamed and the Minotaurs ran. Down the tunnel they’d built and out into the sunlight they rarely saw.
And Annwyl? She was right behind them.
Fearghus stopped short and Gwenvael almost ran into the back of him. His brother turned, his eyes wild as he searched the area. Annwyl’s horse reared up and held its ground.
“What? What is it?”
“Listen!”
Gwenvael heard it then. Something he thought never to hear again. The battle cry of the Blood Queen.
“There! She’s there!”
And Annwyl was there, tearing out of a hole dug into the base of a small hill. She wasn’t running away, though; she was running after. Running after the Minotaurs she’d chased off. At least nine feet tall and outweighing her by more than twenty stone, the Minotaurs ran. But she caught up with them. As he, Fearghus, Briec, and Bercelak all landed nearly a hundred feet away, Annwyl caught up with the first one. She slashed the back of his ankles and he tumbled forward. As he rolled onto his back, she cut his throat and kept moving, slashing at another. The Minotaurs had hoped to outrun her, but now there were dragons in their way, cutting them off.
Briec took in a breath, ready to douse them all in flame, but Fearghus shook his head. “No. Leave it.”
“But Annwyl will be safe.” A gift from their mother protected Annwyl from a dragon’s flame. It had helped her more than once during a messy battle.
“Leave it,” Fearghus said again.
They did, and the Minotaurs, realizing they couldn’t escape, spun around to face Annwyl. They attacked as one fighting unit, nearly twelve of them remaining from what Dagmar had assured Fearghus would be a force of at least fifty. But the blade Annwyl carried—a short sword for a Minotaur, but nearly double the length of Annwyl’s own broad sword—flashed in the sun as she went to work.