“Help me..” A familiar voice whispered.

Light from her torch fell on a human-sized cocoon.

“Emily? Oh no. Emily!” Dread sank her heart. Her friend was trapped in a white silken cocoon. Emily's face was as pale as death itself. A spider-like beast with the torso of a human emerged from the shadows and gripped the cocoon with its hands. Its fangs pierced into Emily's neck.

“So what have we here?” An eerie voice hissed into Ava's ear.

Spinning around she saw her personal nightmare. Waist down was a spider with eight legs. Waist up was a man with the face of a spider. Ava screamed.

The creature stalked up to her. Its arms wrapped themselves around her waist, pulling her towards its chitin body.

Ava jabbed her elbow into its abdomen.

A spray of white fluid answered her, gagging her. She could barely breathe as the creature spun silken threads over the rest of her body.

**

A branch snapped. Danielle jumped. Maybe exploring this haunted trail wasn't such a good idea after all.

“You girls scare so easily,” said the bespectacled geek beside her that was her brother.

“Speak for yourself. You're the one who didn't want to come.” Daneille prodded Sammy's chest with her finger.

Robert brushed away the moss on a wooden trap door. “Hey guys, look! Weird inscriptions here.” In a flash, Sammy and Danielle were by his side.

Sammy's brows knotted together. “I've seen these symbols in some old books about ancient warriors. Legends say that a long time ago, this world was overrun with half-human, half serpent creatures. The Ven'eelgs, I think. There were also other monsters in that legends. Probably came from the story teller's nightmares.”

“Let's see what's inside.”

Robert, commonly known as The Bouncer, threw his weight against the door, breaking it.

“YIIIIII....”

THUD!

Danielle peered into the pitch black hole. “Hope he's still alive.”

“Oooff...” Robert's voice drifted to their ears, followed by a barrage of curses that would make a sailor blush.

“Yup. He's alive. We'll take the steps.” Sammy lit the way with his pocket torchlight.

The steps were slippery, covered with green slime. Danielle choked as she tried to breathe the pungent air. “Smells awful.”

“Yeah. Like the entire Society Of Onion Eaters farted in here before sealing up this chamber.”

“Do you have to be so gross?” Danielle missed a step, catching Sammy's arm to break her fall.

“Careful little sister, I don't want to have to rescue you too.”

“You? Rescue me? Ha!”

The lights went on.

Danielle's heart stopped. “Snakes. I hate snakes.”

Glass panels on both sides of the staircase were all that separated the pair from twin mountains of snakes.

Sammy shrugged. “Chill out Dan, they can't reach you through the glass.”

As if on cue, the glass shattered. Serpents tumbled over the pair, burying them alive.

**

Robert brushed away the dried herbs that clung to his skin. He wasn't hurt. That herb hill broke his fall, but boy did he itch. And he stank too. That stuff smelled like hay mixed with cow dung.

Fumbling through his pockets, he pulled out a mini-torch. His eyes popped out of their sockets when he surveyed his surroundings. White marble walls, a marble floor and ceiling surrounded him. The lights went on. His gaze fell on the stairs by the wall several feet away. Snakes slithered down the steps towards him. “Shit.”

An open door at the opposite end of the chamber beckoned. He leaped to his feet and dashed through the exit, to a corridor.

“Another sssspecimen.” Someone, or something in a white lab coat, with a serpent's tail instead of legs, and a snake's head instead of a human face, welcomed him.

His hair bristled. Few men made Robert feel small, but this was no man. The Ven'eelg towered over his six foot frame.

The beast grabbed his arm with its green reptilian hands. Its strength was phenomenal. Robert's training kicked in. Using the creature's strength against itself, he flipped the monster over and dashed past him into the first room he could find and shut the door behind him.

Turning around, he saw men and women, each suspended in some kind of liquid within a glass capsule. Their eyes were open, but unseeing. Tubes connected their arms, their nostrils and their mouths to the metal roof of their glass prisons.

His eyes landed on a struggling woman who pounded on the glass wall with her fist. “Danielle!”

“Ready to join your friendssss?” Two Ven'eelgs from behind a black screen slithered towards him. He stepped backwards, into the welcoming arms of his captor.

**

Ava's eyelids felt like lead as she forced them open. Flames from the torches that lined the walls lit the chamber. As her eyes wandered around the room, her breath caught in her throat. Cocoons like the one that imprisoned her lined the room.

What was supposed to be a Halloween game for the five friends had gone terribly wrong. Ava shrugged, or at least tried to shrug. The cocoon rendered her body immobile.

Ava shut her eyes and concentrated, focusing Clayton's face the way he had taught her. Dating a warrior had its benefits. He'd taught her how to contact him mentally.

Ava? What are you doing?

Getting ready to become some monster's supper. What do you think? Ava cringed as Clayton's probes pierced into her mind.

The scent of man and cinnamon engulfed her. Ava's cheeks were on fire. Clayton's arms rippled as he tore apart the cocoon that imprisoned her.

“Emily?” Her voice caught in her throat.

Clayton looked away. “Too late. Once the Spidr'acs feed, the victim dies.”

Tears stung her eyes as she fell into his arms.

**

Sammy felt like a plucked chicken about to be roasted. He was barely conscious when they fished him out of his watery prison. With his glasses missing, he could barely make out the faces around him. A hideous scream made him jump out of his shrivelled skin.

A needle plunged into a middle aged man in the Ven'eelg's thrall. Thick hair sprouted from the man's skin while his expression morphed into a wolfish grin. Before his eyes, the man turned into a werewolf.

“Like what you ssssee?” said his captor. “You're next.”

Sammy shuddered. His free hand reached for a test tube that contained what looked like liquid fire. In a swift move, he threw the liquid onto his captor's face.

The Ven'eelg screamed as its face caught fire. As the creature grasped at its burning form, Sammy fled.

**

Danielle could barely make out the newcomer in the dark. A glimmer of light fell on him. Her heart leaped when she saw her geeky brother wielding an Axe, squinting at her.

Sammy pressed his finger to his lip, signalling her to stay quiet. Then he swung the axe at her prison, freeing her. The crashing glass and torrent of water that swept her out of her capsule could have woken up the dead.

“I thought you said keep quiet,” groaned Danielle.

“Shush. We've got to free Robert,” he whispered. Then he swung the axe at Robert's capsule.

“Ssstupid humanssss!!!” A pair of Ven'eelgs slithered into the room.

“I told you to be quiet,” whispered Sammy.

A serpent's tail slithered around Danielle coiling around her arms as its fangs, dripping with poison hovered inches from her face.

A burst of fire hit the serpent, causing it to release the young woman. Though unscathed, Danielle's mind reeled. “I don't believe this.” At the doorway stood Clayton, Ava's boyfriend. The easy going hunk looked ferocious. Golden flames danced on his skin. Ava stared at him like a lovesick puppy, confirming his identity.

Another fire ball flew from Clayton's fiery hand, burning the remaining Ven'eelg to the ground.

Sammy ran his fingers through his hair. “Thanks, man.”

Clayton seemed not to hear him. Instead, he gathered the bundles lying on the table. Each bundle was the size of a man's forearm. Golden flames danced within the blue light that enclosed each bundle. “Let's go.” He motioned towards the exit. “I've cleared the way out.”

Robert grabbed Danielle's hand and ran with her out of the door, with Sammy close to their heels.

Fresh air welcomed them as dashed towards the light, into a meadow. “I never thought I'd be so happy to see the grasslands again,” sighed Ava. The sky darkened. Above them was an ominous shadow so huge she couldn't make out where it began or where it ended. A dragon.

“Not this,” muttered Clayton as he hugged the glowing bundles. “Go!” he yelled as he waved his free hand at Ava and her friends. A blinding light engulfed them.

Instantly, Danielle, Rob, Ava and Sammy found themselves in Ava's home.

Danielle blinked. “What happened?”

Ava shrugged. “Clayton sent us here where it's safe.”

If it weren't a fact that all four of them had gone through this crazy adventure together, Danielle would have sworn it was a dream. “Where's Emily?”

“He was too late. They killed her.”

• The End -

Lost In Another Realm

by SFX Fantasy

ISBN-10: 1847283004

ISBN-13: 978-1847283009

Available at Amazon.com and Barnes and Noble

Read the full story at Warrior Girl, Lost In Another Realm and The Dark Warriors

Book 3 : Dark Warriors

Divide and conquer. The enemy's strategy appears to work when the four most powerful elite warriors are trapped separately in different worlds, each oblivious to his or her past. Sarah alone, being the newest and presumably weakest of the elites was ignored by the dark warriors.

The Academy, barely having recovered from the recent massacre is forced to fend off an invasion without their elite warriors. Evan is forced to make a decision that would change his life forever.

A final confrontation between the warriors and the mastermind behind the dark beasts. The final book in the trilogy.

This third book contains a bonus chapter (9 years later) not found in the original A Warrior's Death Trilogy

Buy The Dark Warriors at Amazon.

Cover art for all these books was done by Laura Diehl