Shiva's Bow (Livi Talbot 04) by Skyla Dawn Cameron

Author:Skyla Dawn Cameron [Cameron, Skyla Dawn]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2022-05-08T16:00:00+00:00

16

Naga

Sweat beaded down my forehead and my braid itched against my back. My feet were bleeding through the gauze on them and I sincerely hoped that was the only place blood was coming from on my person. My right hand was tense on my gun, left supported it. I had no idea where West was—he’d grown silent as had the two people still standing, and even a look under the table didn’t reveal his sleek black and white pelt.

At least I could still be a distraction; I fell onto my knees and rose to peer over the table again, fired four more rounds. The mercs were back to back, a woman and a man left, and both swung their guns my way.

The massive, thick snake body suddenly wound up the woman, squeezing flesh so her t-shirt bulged and red crept up her neck—while I stared on in horror.

Before she could twist the gun around, a huge cobra head appeared over her shoulder, jaw widening and biting down. I’d seen more gruesome things than the average person but even I was struck dumfounded, watching large fangs snap onto the woman’s throat and pierce flesh. West leapt upon the remaining guy, knocking him down into a pool of blood and gurgling cries.

Fights go a lot faster when tigers and impossibly huge snakes get involved.

Silence descended, the previous tension in the room dissipating into another kind of tight, expectant energy. Tiger paws padded in slick blood that muted his steps as he moved. The other body crumpled in a thumping heap.

I rose and rounded the table as West stood over the corpse, my gun up and at the ready. He hunched his head low between his shoulders, his bloody muzzle raised to expose his teeth as he growled. His eyes were fixed on the snake coiled atop the dead woman. It rose, thick muscled body at least six feet tall plus another few where the tail was still coiled and propping it up. Its glittering yellow eyes studied us both but settled on West, forked tongue darting out to taste the air and hood expanding. Its belly was off-white, body shades of brown—an Indian cobra. Over the pounding of my own heart and the growl of the tiger beside me came the crackle of the fallen walkie-talkie, someone shouting in Mandarin presumably for a status update that would never come.

West’s growl continued and his body tensed to leap.

“Wait!” I snapped. He didn’t look my way but I sensed he did, in fact, wait. “It’s the lodge manager. I think you can talk to him.”

The tiger crouched, gave his head a shake to flick blood off his muzzle and whiskers. His nose twitched, probably displeased with the cleaning job, and then his body shifted. Bone bent and grew, muscle bulged and moved, and skin stretched to accommodate it all. A man rose in place of the tiger, fur melding into bronze tanned skin and a head of black hair. He stood straight, no more intimidated by the snake as a man than he had as a deadly cat.

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