Eclipsis: Water

Chapter 28

There looked to be about 20 sirens, all circling Cetus, the ones alive were trying to work out how best to attack him. Some had been dazed, others killed - these were floating aimlessly all around him, ignored by the conscious ones. Cetus looked to be holding his ground well, but gold blood leaked out of small wounds across his stomach, made by bites and long scratches.

Upon seeing this, Alara shoved the two daggers into Kōri's hand. "Take them."

There was no time to make a sarcastic comment on his part, so he only nodded. She swung her sword at the nearest siren, embedding the blade in its ribcage. A yelp from the creature alerted the rest of them, who turned their attention towards the fairies.

"Get to Cetus," She said, conjuring a whirlpool that scattered 3 sirens like bowling pins. "We can't let them separate us. We need to stay in a group."

Kōri threw one dagger into another siren's gills, and grey blood spurted. "And how do you propose we get to him? There's loads of them."

"We'll be able to gradually. Just keep swimming forward. Stay close to me so we aren't picked off."

Alara wished she had brought more weapons with her. A bow and arrow would've worked wonders in a situation like this. Although, Kōri was managing to create sharp bits of ice to throw at the sirens, which doubled as an alternative. It was taxing, however, and Alara herself didn't know how many more times she could conjure whirlpools to give herself more time to swing her sword. They were both tired, and the remaining sirens seemed to sense this - they were attacking more frequently. They both had their fair share of scratches by the time they had reached Cetus, who was breathing heavily himself.

There's too many of them, Al. They keep calling for others. I don't know how we're going to survive this.

Alara's stomach sank at the dragon's words. "Don't say things like that. We can get out of this."

"We might need to make a run for it," Kōri voiced, kicking a nearing siren hard in its chest.  "Not 'run'. You know what I mean."

"To put some distance between us. But how do we know they won't follow?" Alara's sword-arm was aching. She switched to the other hand to swipe a gash across another's green stomach.

"We don't know. But do you see any alternative other than standing our ground?"

Tell him to get on my back. We need to be quick about this if we want a chance of escaping, Cetus said.

"Cetus said to get on his back," Alara told Kōri. "Go first, I'll try and pave a gap for us to get through," She shook her head at Kōri's attempt to argue. "Don't make this even more difficult than it is already. Just listen to me."

The ice-fairy swam his way to Cetus' spines, spearing two sirens through the eye as he passed them. "C'mon, Alara!" He shouted down at her.

The mass of sirens were beginning to close on them further, more of them taking their chances to lunge. One bit down on Alara's elbow while she had her head turned. Her gold blood tainted the water around its mouth. She shook it off angrily, lopping its head off, and it received a ice dart to the centre of its forehead not even a second later. She had no time to thank Kōri. She backed up further towards Cetus, who was shooting streams of boiling water into the ever-growing crowd.

"You ready?" She asked him.

The dragon roared in response.

Using as much energy as she could spare, she created a large whirlpool, much more expansive than the previous ones, which whisked up a good number of the sirens, pushing them further towards the depths. This had made a huge space in their numbers, but it was already starting to close again.