The Tyrant's Tomb

much alive. Perhaps if I managed twenty or thirty shots at that exact same
spot, I could do some real damage.
With trembling hands, I nocked another arrow. “Th-that was just a
warning!” I bluffed. “The next one will kill!”
Vulture Diaper made a gurgling noise deep in its throat. I hoped it was a
delayed death rattle. Then I realized it was only laughing. “WANT ME TO
EAT DIFFERENT FOOD FIRST? SAVE YOU FOR DESSERT?”
It uncurled its claws, gesturing toward the hearse.
I didn’t understand. I refused to understand. Did it want to eat the air
bags? The upholstery?
Meg got it before I did. She screamed in rage.
The creature was an eater of the dead. We were driving a hearse.
“NO!” Meg shouted. “Leave him alone!”
She lumbered forward, raising her swords, but she was in no shape to
face the ghoul. I shouldered her aside, putting myself between her and the
eurynomos, and fired my arrows again and again.
They sparked off the monster’s blue-black hide, leaving steaming,
annoyingly nonlethal wounds. Vulture Diaper staggered toward me, snarling
in pain, its body twitching from the impact of each hit.
It was five feet away.
Two feet away, its claws splayed to shred my face.
Somewhere behind me, a female voice shouted, “HEY!”
The sound distracted Vulture Diaper just long enough for me to fall
courageously on my butt. I scrambled away from the ghoul’s claws.
Vulture Diaper blinked, confused by its new audience. About ten feet
away, a ragtag assortment of fauns and dryads, perhaps a dozen total, were
all attempting to hide behind one gangly pink-haired young woman in
Roman legionnaire armor.
The girl fumbled with some sort of projectile weapon. Oh, dear. A
manubalista. A Roman heavy crossbow. Those things were awful. Slow.
Powerful. Notoriously unreliable. The bolt was set. She cranked the handle,
her hands shaking as badly as mine.
Meanwhile, to my left, Meg groaned in the grass, trying to get back on
her feet. “You pushed me,” she complained, by which I’m sure she meant
Thank you, Apollo, for saving my life.
The pink-haired girl raised her manubalista. With her long, wobbly legs,
she reminded me of a baby giraffe. “G-get away from them,” she ordered the