by Aaron Oster
“If you need me, just wake me up,” Lumia said, already curling up on her shoulder and closing her eyes.
The drake had done a lot of flying since they’d managed to slip the ambush and needed a few good nights of sleep before she would be back to her usual self. So, when she tried to catch a few quick naps here and there, neither of them was going to try and argue with her. Grace, because she felt bad, and Nathan, because he didn’t want to be eaten.
“Alright,” Nathan said, shrugging his shoulders in small circles. “Before we go in, we need to set some ground rules. Once we go in, you do everything I say, when I say it. No questions asked. Understood?”
Though it rankled her to do so, Grace nodded. She knew that despite Nathan’s attitude, he was experienced enough to know what he was doing.
“Good. Also, once we enter, there will be no talking. Even the smallest of sounds can alert some beasts to our presence. I’ll be dampening our footsteps to cover up any noise we might make.”
“Yeah, I’m going to have to make some noise to use my skill,” Grace said. “I’ll either need to snap my fingers or click my tongue. Will that be a problem?”
Nathan thought about that for a moment before shaking his head.
“I should be able to block out small sounds like that as well. Just stick close to me once we’re inside, and you should be fine.”
He crouched then, removing a map from his small pack and unfolding it on the ground. Moving in, Grace could see that it was a map of the city, but from before it had been destroyed.
“We’re going to have to pass through four sections and three gates to reach the palace where the scrolls are located,” Nathan said, tracing a line with his index finger. “The commoner’s section is the largest and flanks the entire city. This saw the least amount of destruction due to the way Octagon’s forces attacked the city. It’s been infested by lower ranked beasts, which should be relatively easy to get past.
“Once we get into the section housing the minor nobility, things will get a bit tougher,” he continued, moving his finger past the first gate.
“The beasts here will probably be somewhere in the low to mid-30’s, and we don’t want to bring any of them down on us. After we pass through this section, we’ll move on to the ring where the high nobility lived. It was the place where the most important would stay when visiting and housed all the most important permanent residents.
“From what little intelligence we’re managed to gather so far, we can see that the beasts here will be in the upper 30’s and low 40’s. Finally,” he said, sliding his finger through the last gate, “comes the palace itself. Here, we can expect beasts to range from the upper-40’s to the mid-50’s, and the most dangerous beast will be at the very center, in the old throne room.”
“Is it just me, or does this layout seem to mimic that of a Beast Zone?” Grace asked, noticing the pattern almost immediately.
“It does,” Nathan said with a nod. “It’s how beasts naturally congregate. The weakest are generally on the outside and serve as a buffer, while the strongest take the most secure position, protected on all sides.”
Grace nodded, filing the lesson away in the back of her mind. Just because Morgan wasn’t here didn’t mean she couldn’t learn anything. In fact, when he came back, she would have so much to tell him about.
Nathan stood, folding the map and sticking it back in his small pack. Then, he extended his hands outward and concentrated. Grace felt the air ripple and distort around them as it grew oddly heavy. It was a bit harder to breathe now, but when she took a single step, her feet didn’t make so much as a sound.
She looked up to Nathan, who gave her a single nod, then gestured toward a gap in the walls. Grace returned the nod, then headed out, taking the lead. Although they weren’t inside the city just yet, she snapped her fingers, not actually hearing the sound but still receiving the feedback as the soundwaves bounced off the walls and rubble, giving her a mental map of the surrounding fifty-yards.
She could use her Aura Sense to feel where all the beasts were, but it wouldn’t give her the lay of the land, and right now, having a good idea of which direction they should take would be the difference between a successful mission and being discovered halfway through. Grace honestly couldn’t think of anything worse than being caught in the middle of the city, surrounded by beasts with no way forward.
Sure, they could probably make it out with Lumia’s help, but this was their one and only chance at getting back to Katherine and the others. Of course, there was always the chance that they were already too late, but Grace couldn’t think like that. Everyone was still alive and well, waiting on her to return with help, so she was going to do everything in her power to make sure that this mission was a success.
She clicked her tongue lightly as they reached a breach in the wall. Her Aura Sense told her that there were several beasts ten yards to their right. But, according to her Echolocation, there was a wall between them, one that ran for several yards before turning sharply to the right. There was a large pile of rubble in their way, but they should be able to climb over it if they moved quickly enough.
Without looking back, Grace vaulted through the breach in the wall and walked quickly along the wall. It was a strange feeling, knowing that there were beasts right on the other side that she could see but that had no idea they were there. Just a few seconds later, the rubble pile came into view, and Grace clicked her tongue again.
There were no beasts on top or around the pile, and another destroyed building was on the other side. She broke into a jog, with Nathan right behind her. Scrambling up the rubble pile wasn’t easy, especially since Nathan had to work twice as hard to keep any loose debris from making any noise.
Not for the first time, she wondered just what his ability was. It wasn’t sound-related, of that much she was certain. But what else could steal sound the way his ability did? He’d refused to tell when she’d asked, and seeing as she didn’t particularly like him, she hadn’t bothered to ask again.
They reached the top of the rubble pile without incident, and Grace slid down the opposite side, clicking her tongue again as they reached the bottom. Another four packs of beasts were hanging around up ahead, both to their right and their left. She dashed forward, breaking out into a full run, with Nathan hurrying to keep up.
She turned a quick corner, then dove forward, tucking into a roll and getting behind a single piece of jutting rubble. Nathan followed, stopping beside her as she remained crouched and pointed behind them.
Peering over the top, Nathan saw what she had before stopping — a group of oversized goats, all with long green beards and short, stubby horns. They might have even seemed non-threatening if not for the rows of jagged teeth lining their filthy mouths and the patches of missing hair all over their bodies.
These were Intermediate Beasts, probably somewhere around rank 20. But Grace didn’t like their chances, even if Nathan could take them.
She clicked her fingers, angling them upward and away to see if there were any other paths they could follow, and, after checking two other directions, she found one. Tapping Nathan on the shoulder to get his attention, she gestured to their right, then motioned for him to stay low. He nodded his understanding, and they took off again.
Like this, they wove their way through the rubble of the destroyed city. The level of destruction was quite severe, unlike what Nathan had led her to believe. Then again, if this was the least-destroyed part of City One, then Grace didn’t want to know how bad things would get once they got past the first gate.
They stopped for a moment as they passed a broken-down barn, Grace holding out an arm and waiting as a trundling bear lumbered past, sniffing at the air and letting out short grunts. It was a bear unlike any she’d ever seen before, with fiery red fur and a nose that seemed far too large for its face.
It turned, sniffing at the air, and Grace suddenly felt her blood run cold as she realized that they’d been spotted. Before she could do anything, Natha
n blurred from his hiding place and slammed a palm into the bear’s ear. There was a horrible crunching sound, which sounded oddly muffled, and the beast collapsed, the opposite side of its head completely blown out.
Grace jogged out quickly, already clicking her fingers and pushing her Aura Sense to the limit to see if they’d been heard. She felt her heart skip a beat as she sensed a group heading right for them, coming from their left. Left, coincidentally, was exactly the way they needed to go.
She bit her lip, and Nathan looked up with a grim expression. He held both hands to the side in a questioning gesture, and after another moment of hesitation, Grace moved away from the coming pack, already cursing their bad luck.
41
Grace and Nathan sat with their backs to a massive slab of stone studded with long metal poles. Before them lay a broken slab of stone that had conveniently collapsed on the first gate, giving them a ramp right over it. The only problem was that they faced a choice on the other side.
A pack of beasts had been hanging around that slab since they’d arrived nearly fifteen minutes ago, and after taking a detour that cost them half an hour already, she didn’t want to try and find another way in. She could avoid the pack of beasts by taking to the rooftops for a bit, but the problem was that she couldn’t see a way down from their current position. The ramp offered them a way up, one that they could take right now.
Nathan, who’d remained silent as she thought, poked her in the shoulder and made a shooing motion. It was clear that he was growing antsy and wanted them to move on, and in his defense, Grace could feel another beast heading their way. After the close call with the bear, she didn’t want to take another chance. So, she had a decision to make.
It was either take the risk for a potentially quicker route, or play it safe and try to find another way. It wasn’t a hard choice to make, and when she got back to her feet, Grace took the slab at a run. Every wasted second was one in which her friends remained trapped and in life-threatening danger. Now was not the time to play it safe.
She reached the top of the slab and leaped high in the air, using her Strength and reducing her density to cover the seven-foot gap between the ground and the first rooftop. As she passed overhead, she caught a glimpse of something gray and hairy below, but passed too quickly to make out more than that.
She landed on the rooftop, tucking into a roll and springing back to her feet. Immediately, she clicked her tongue again, getting a better sense of the lay of the land. Her Aura Sense already told her that Nathan’s initial assessment had been correct. The beasts in this area were definitely stronger than those behind the gate, which meant that they would need to be even more careful to stay quiet now.
Nathan landed beside her, using a similar roll to eat up his momentum, and came back to his feet. Grace gestured to their right, then took off at a run, leaping the gap between roofs and using the momentum to try and speed up even more. She’d found a way down, but between them and it was a fourteen-foot gap.
While she and Nathan could probably land without any trouble from their current height of around thirty feet, she doubted they could do so quietly. So, she was trying to gather all the speed she could for that massive jump. They leaped over two more smaller gaps, Grace having to weave in-between deep cracks and protrusions of stone from the partially-destroyed roofs.
The movements slowed her a bit, but not so much as to break her stride. By now, she was beginning to breathe hard, her mind going back to her time spent with Morgan. He’d been a merciless instructor, making her run until she was all but vomiting and then making her run some more. Compared to that, this was nothing.
She saw the massive gap coming up and could feel the gathered beasts between the buildings. Her body lightened as she used her Body Shift, and she leaned forward, pouring on a last-second burst of speed before committing to the jump.
For a single, breathless moment, she was airborne, nothing between her and the ground below. Then, she was falling, and far sooner than she’d wanted to. Leaping a seven-foot gap was hard, but doing double that seemed to be impossible, at least at her current level. Of course, had she been able to give herself a small boost beforehand using her Sound Burst, she probably would have made it. However, she couldn’t have, as it would have defeated the purpose of traveling without making any noise.
She reached out desperately as she fell, and her fingertips just managed to snag the edge of the roof. Her momentum carried her forward, and she slammed face-first into the wall, sending a shower of pebbles clattering to the ground below.
Something seized her arm then, and a moment later, she was flying through the air, landing a second after with an explosive whoosh as the air left her lungs.
Grace gasped for air. Rolling onto her back, she saw Nathan pressed to the surface of the roof next to her and pressing a finger to his lips. Trying not to groan, she used Echolocation to see how the beasts were reacting to the noise they’d created.
The soundwaves came back, showing her that all of them were looking up to the roof, and one was starting to climb up toward them. It was a large, shaggy beast, with hooked claws that punched easily into the stone. It would be reaching the position within a matter of seconds, and Grace knew that if they were still there when it arrived, the others would quickly follow.
She quickly got to her feet, head swimming, and pointed frantically to the other end of the roof, where it had partially caved in, leaving a steep ramp back to the ground.
Thankfully, Nathan didn’t argue and followed, the two of them moving quickly to get out of sight before the beast reached the rooftop. Grace slipped as she tried to run down the steep decline, bruising her hip, but managing to turn it into a slide rather than a tumble.
She hit the ground and sprang to her feet, making a dash for a pile of nearby rubble and sliding behind it. Nathan appeared a moment later, and she motioned him to remain still. Clicking her tongue, she checked for the position of the beast that had been climbing and found it staring out on the edge of the roof.
Her muscles locked up, her blood freezing in her veins as she waited for the beast to come after them, to let out a warning cry to the rest of its kind, and for them to be swarmed. But, after sniffing the air a few times, the beast simply turned around, heading back to the rest of its pack.
Grace slumped, letting out a silent sigh of relief, and gave Nathan the thumbs-up to let him know they were in the clear. They still waited another couple of minutes just in case, in which time Grace began to feel the discomfort of the ordeal she’d just been through.
Her nose had hit the wall quite hard, and although it wasn’t broken, it hurt to the touch. Likewise, her hip felt quite tender, and she knew it would be bruising. It seemed that even at her current rank, she could still cause herself injury through mundane means. She would have to find out why, because something like a small fall shouldn’t have hurt her at her current rank.
Maybe Morgan will know, she found herself thinking.
The pain she felt suddenly wasn’t caused by any physical discomfort. It was strange, as she found herself believing he was alive, yet also not alive, all at once. How could someone believe such contradictory information and still feel that both were true?
She snapped her fingers, trying to distract herself from the morose thoughts, and found that their position was about to be compromised. Cursing silently to herself, she sprang back to her feet and ran to her left, skirting the pile of rubble and coming around a corner before slowing.
A long sinuous tail flicked not five feet away – the back end of the beast coming around the rubble-pile. It was terrifying, seeing something so large in person and knowing that if it saw them, they would have no choice but to run. The tail moved forward, and so did she, her back pressed to the pile of stone as she slid along silently.
There was an escape route just a few feet ahead, but she needed the beast to keep moving if they were going to make it through. Of course, that was when the beast stopped and started to turn,
and, in a panic, Grace went the only direction she could — up. Her hands dug into jagged pieces of stone as she hauled herself upward, her feet scrabbling for purchase as she tried desperately to get above the beast’s line of sight before it completed its turn.
She froze when she was about ten feet up, watching several small pebbles fall toward the ground, but when they hit, they made no sound at all. Looking over, she could see Nathan staring down as well, an intense look of concentration on his face. Grace wanted to breathe a sigh of relief but knew that doing so would give their position away. Right now, they had to be absolutely still.
The beast turned, slinking back their way, and Grace got a good look at it for the first time. Muddy brown scales covered its body, and a row of gleaming, metallic spines flowed across its back. Small tufts of feathers protruded from the beast’s joints and gathered in a crest above its eyes.
It was clearly a lizard of some type, as a forked tongue flickered out, tasting the air. Grace could feel her heart hammering in her chest as the beast stopped, its head only four feet from where her boots stood, lodged in a small crevice for balance. All it would have to do was look up, and it would see her. If that happened, their mission would be all but over.
A beast like this would take more than a single blow to kill, and there were too many other beasts in the area for an attack to go unnoticed. She held her breath, biting her lip and trying to keep herself from trembling as the beast’s tongue flickered out again. It let out a low hiss, turning its head from side to side, its tongue flickering out over and over.
She could see it turning, its head slowly swiveling upward, and resigned herself to being caught.
A loud clattering of stone about twenty yards away almost made her jump. Thankfully, she managed to remain still as the lizard let out a loud hiss and flashed off to discover what had made the noise. Looking over to her right, she saw Nathan staring down, another stone clutched in his hand.
She was glad for his quick thinking, but her Aura Sense told her that the noise had attracted a lot of attention. Beasts were swarming in from all over and converging on their position. They needed to get out of here quickly if they wanted to remain hidden. She turned to begin her slide down when she spotted something in the distance.
