The beast had grown still larger. It filled the tower room entire now, and was crushing him against the walls with its bulk. As it waved its arms around, it smashed the stones to powder—its arms were as thick around as tree trunks now. Would it keep growing, would it grow so large it burst the walls of the tower? Would that be enough to kill it, when the upper stories of the tower collapsed upon it?

Malden doubted it. But he was certain of one thing—he, himself, would never survive such a collapse.

There was no more time for thinking. He reached around the tentacle at his waist and grabbed the flask of wine. It was leather sewn together with gut, the seams worked with wax to make them waterproof. It sloshed as he lifted it up to see it. When he bought the thing, he’d chosen shrewdly, picking a vessel that wouldn’t leak, that would stand up to rough treatment. Now he cursed himself that he hadn’t just bought some cheap skin he could burst with one hand. The damned flask was too sturdy. He brought his bodkin around and stabbed it. Wine squirted out of the hole he’d made and red drops ran down the back of his hand.

One drop fell onto the beast’s skin. The arm that held him pulsed wildly and he was thrown hither and yon, but the grip around his waist eased a trifle. Yes! The wine had some effect on the thing. He held the flask toward the tentacle and squeezed it as hard as he could, spraying wine all over its pulpy flesh.

Suddenly, blood rushed down into his legs and they burned with new sensation. His guts relaxed inside his abdomen and he belched as his stomach nearly loosed its contents. He squeezed the flask again and he was free, flying through the air as if the demon had thrown him like a ball.

The wall of the tower came toward him very fast, and he nearly crashed into it head first. He threw his arms up in front of him and managed to catch the wall with his sore fingers and then cling there like a spider before he fell back into the demon’s arms.

Below him the beast thrashed like a mad thing, bashing against the walls convulsively. Stone crumbled and shattered and pulverized. A wide crack opened in the wall and then a whole section of the tower’s stonework fell away, letting in a rush of cold night air.