“Up,” Merik ordered. He had to check the fifth level. He had to see if there was more of the same.
There was, and Merik’s lungs fanned hotter. The fifth floor was even more crowded with supplies than the sixth, none labeled in Nubrevnan.
And all of it here, where it could do no one any good.
This food should be feeding Pin’s Keep or the homeless in the Cisterns—or, hell-waters, the people of Nihar would take it. Instead, though, it sat here and served no one. Except, perhaps, Vivia.
Enough—Merik had seen enough, and it was time to leave the way they’d come. There was no meeting here. Only a hole in the Cisterns wall that needed fixing.
Merik and Cam were halfway back to the stairwell, though, when a groan drifted toward them. “Help.”
Merik froze midstride; Cam halted beside him. The groan repeated, “Help,” and Cam clutched at her stomach.
“We need to go check, sir.”
A snap of Merik’s head. No.
“Someone’s hurt, sir.”
Another snap, harder this time. Something icy was rising in Merik’s veins. Something powerful and dark, made of Hagfishes and shadows. Leave while you still can, Merik’s instincts screamed. This place is not safe for you!
The shadow man was here.
Merik grabbed Cam’s cloak, still damp and filthy, and towed her toward the stairs. They made it three steps before they reached the source of the groans.
A man stretched across the flagstones with a sword in his belly and intestines glittering on the floor. Pain shook in his eyes, while lines as dark as the sea’s blackest depths webbed across his face.
It looked so much like a different death. A different murder—one that Merik had committed. Leave while you still can, leave while you still can.
Cam yanked herself free from Merik’s grip and dropped beside the man. “I’m here,” she crooned in an attempt to comfort. “I’m here now.”
The man’s eyes swiveled to Cam, and something almost like recognition flashed there. He tried to speak, but blood burbled from his mouth. From the hole in his stomach too.
The guard could not possibly survive this injury, yet Cam was right. Even dead men deserved compassion. So though every fiber in his body screeched at Merik to run, he made himself crouch beside the girl. That was when he saw it.
The man was missing a finger—his left pinkie, just like the assassin Garren.
It was like that night on the Jana all over again. How, though? Who was this man? It couldn’t just be random coincidence.
Before Merik could put these questions to the dying man, everything stilled in his body. Even the storeroom and the dust motes seemed to pause.
Dead. The man was dead.
Merik’s throat cleared, ready to order Cam onward. Except that at that moment, a rasp scuttled through the cellar. It crawled over Merik’s skin like a thousand sand fleas.
“Fool brother Filip led blind brother Daret
deep into the black cave.
He knew that inside it, the Queen Crab resided,
but that didn’t scare him away.”
Cam rocked back, falling onto her haunches. Merik simply gaped at the corpse. The man’s dead mouth didn’t move, and his eyes stayed stiff and glassy … Yet there was no denying the words came from his throat.
Impossible, impossible.
Cam scrabbled back on all fours, hissing, “Sir, sir,” while the corpse continued to whisper.
“Said blind brother Daret to fool brother Filip,
does Queen Crab no longer reign?
I have heard she is vicious, and likes to eat fishes.
It’s best we avoid her domain.”
“Sir, sir, sir.” Cam grabbed for Merik.
A bell began to clamor. Ear-splitting in volume and brutal in intensity, it was the palace alarm.
Merik moved. Hand in hand with Cam, he bolted for the stairs—even as the rest of the song slithered out around them.
“Answered fool Filip to his brother small,
have I not always kept you safe?
I know what I’m doing, for I’m older than you,
and I’ll never lead you astray.”
Impossible, impossible.
Guards charged downward from the surface now. Merik felt their footsteps hammering behind them on the stone steps. He sensed their breaths skating down the stairwell’s air.
He and Cam reached the lowest level and sprinted into the rows of shelves. Somehow, though, the guards still closed in from behind.
It’s the smell, Merik thought vaguely. The guards can follow the smell. Yet there was nothing to be done for it except to keep running. Shelves went hazy at the edges of his vision. His breath, and Cam’s too, came in short gasps.
They reached the back wall. Merik thrust Cam behind the cedar cases as light tore over him. Ten guards with torches in hand careened closer.
“The Fury!” one shouted. “Shoot him!” barked another.
Merik heaved into the Cisterns after Cam. She had waited for him—fool girl—and he gripped her once more. Held fast to her arm as they barreled down the dark tunnel.
Shadows, shouts, shit—it all bounced off the limestone walls. Then came a bark from Cam—“Crossbows!”—and a burst of wind in Merik’s chest.
No, not wind. That charge, that thunder—it was the flood.
The soldiers hollered for Merik and Cam to stop. But they didn’t. They couldn’t. That sound, that tempest approaching …
Merik and Cam had to get past Shite Street before it hit.
They reached the sewage. Cam plummeted in, and Merik fell with her, knees buckling. Hands and chest submerging. Yet the roar, the flood—it pushed Merik and Cam onto their feet once more.
They ran. A crossbow bolt sang past their heads. A second shattered the nearest lantern, swathing them in darkness and leaving only the soldiers’ approaching torches to see by.
The flood didn’t care. It still approached, so loud now it was like Lejna. Like Kullen’s cleaving death. No escape. Just the storm.
Merik kept running, his eyes blanketed by black. His hearing consumed by tides. Ahead, ahead—he just had to get ahead.
Orange light flickered. New lanterns. New tunnels. The end of Shite Street was so close now with a glistening ramp visible beyond. Merik ran harder. Four steps.
Two.
He launched onto the landing, only to lurch around and see Cam, still ten paces back and chased by a mountain of charging water.
Without thought, Merik lashed out with a whip of power. The winds snapped around Cam. Tiny but strong. Just like she was. A coil of air that carried her the final steps to safety.
The girl collapsed on the ground beside Merik, breathing heavily. Body shaking. Coated in dung and only Noden knew what else while water frothed past in a perfect, bewitched funnel.
Worried, Merik reached for her. “Are you,” he gasped, “all right?”
An exhausted nod. “Hye … sir.”
“We can’t stop.”
“Never,” she panted, and when Merik offered her his hand, she smiled wearily. Then together, they left the ferocity of Shite Street behind.
TWENTY-TWO
Aeduan stormed down the riverside path, his magic on fire. His body moving too fast to stop, too fast to fight. Straight through the Red Sails hunting the Threadwitch, he drove.
They withdrew blades in flashes of steel and bellows of ire. Yet Aeduan had no plans for combat. Not today.
One saber hissed out, setting Aeduan’s instincts alight. He ducked, rolled forward, and broke from the trees to face the Amonra.
Threadwitch, Threadwitch—where was the Threadwitch?
He spotted her. Not far ahead, on the shore. He could reach her if she would just stop running.
She didn’t stop but rather made a move of such vast stupidity that Aeduan had to wonder if she had a death wish. For he’d seen her make this move before, on a cliffside road north of Veñaza City. This time, though, Aeduan wasn’t letting h
er get away.
This time, he would follow her over the edge.
A blood-scent that stank of torture and splattered guts hit Aeduan’s nose. He twirled backward just as the man attacked. Aeduan kicked, a hammer to the side of the man’s knee.
Bone cracked. The man fell, but Aeduan was already out of the way. Already running, ready to dive into the river as planned … But he froze. A beige coat—his coat that he’d left with the Threadwitch—was now coursing down the river at a speed no man could match.
No man except Aeduan. He hurtled into the magic-powered sprint. In seconds, he caught up to the coat. It flew downstream, within reach of the shore.
Aeduan shot ahead, faster now and aiming for a riverside tree. The bank beneath it was undercut, exposing roots and offering the perfect handhold.
Soil rained as Aeduan scrambled down and hooked his arm into the roots. Water sprayed, frost to flay his cheeks.
The coat was almost to him. He stretched. He reached … He was too far. His hand gripped only icy water. So without another thought, he thrust off the bank and dove into the waves.
But no Threadwitch was waiting beneath the wool. Nothing save the cold and the sheer rage of the Amonra.
* * *
Iseult had no idea how she was still alive.
By all logic and physics, she should not be. The Amonra was indomitable. It spat her up and then kicked her down. Light, gasps. Darkness, death. No sound, no sight, no breath, no life. For a century—or perhaps only moments—the current possessed every piece of Iseult’s being.
She hit boulders, she hit substrate, she hit waves so hard they felt solid. Her ankles snagged on rocks, on branches. A thousand unseen claws in the riverbed. Each time the foamy rapids spat her out so she could gulp in air, they instantly sucked her down again.
Until Iseult hit something that hit back. The world punched from her mind. Then her body snapped around backward. All wrong, yet held fast by something.
Iseult snapped open her eyes, fighting the river’s pound against her face. She saw nothing, but she felt hands. Arms.
Him. It had to be. No one else was Threadless.
No one else was this strong.
The Amonra was stronger yet. Always stronger. It yanked the Bloodwitch—and Iseult with him—onward. Lifted them to the surface … and smashed them back down.
Air, Iseult thought. It was the only thought she could manage. Stars flashed, stars burst. A booming to fill her skull.
But something else was wriggling into her pinpointed awareness. Something rumbling, something violent.
Something she and the Bloodwitch absolutely could not survive: the Amonra Falls.
When her numbed toes hit gravel sediment, Iseult dug in. The river heaved at her, but she pressed deeper. Behind her the Bloodwitch realized what she did and imitated, heels shoveling down.
He blocked her from the current’s teeth, and Iseult reached with ice-block hands for anything to grab on to. Frantic now. Air, air. Her knuckles grazed stone. Distantly, she felt the skin tear open—and she also felt the Bloodwitch lose his grip. The river would reclaim them soon.
Air, air.
Whatever had cut her knuckles was a protrusion on a tall column of stone. She grabbed hold with frozen fingers. Just in time. Aeduan’s hold on the sediment gave way; the river snapped him onward.
He held tight to Iseult, though, and Iseult held tight to the rock. Her muscles screamed, her sockets popped.
Aeduan clambered around Iseult. One hand, large and rough, closed over hers—locking her grip in place, and anchoring him too, as he grabbed at the same stone.
Air, air.
He found another handhold. He pulled; Iseult pushed; and up they moved, inch by inch. Iseult anchoring. Aeduan grappling. The river towing.
Until at last the Amonra released them both. Until at last they broke the surface, and air, air, air coursed over them.
Iseult had just enough time to glance around—craggy outcropping, waterfall below, coughing Bloodwitch beside her—before she collapsed to the wet granite and the world went blessedly quiet.
* * *
For what had felt like hours, Aeduan simply lay on the granite, breathing, while the river churned past and the Amonra’s icy bite faded from his bones. The Amonra’s roar, however, never died.
Eventually, the Threadwitch sat up, so Aeduan sat up too. The Red Sails who’d hunted them were gone. No scents lurked nearby—theirs or anyone else’s.
“Wait here,” Aeduan said, his voice waterlogged. “I’ll be back soon.”
At the girl’s silent nod, Aeduan stretched his magic to its maximum reach, and then he scouted the area for a safe place to hide. For a spot where no human blood hit his nose, where no man had walked for ages.
What he found were ancient ruins. Built into the cliffside, more forest than fortress, whoever had left these granite walls and columns, they were lost to time now. Old carvings had eroded to inscrutable grooves. Floors and roofs had been replaced by roots and branches, tiles and mosaics had been replaced by lichen and fungus.
But it was defensible, hugging the cliff as it did, and it was hidden. A thorough sniff around the place yielded nothing but animal scents. The rook had passed this way, but not men. Not slavers.
When Aeduan returned to the slick granite, he uttered only the words, “This way,” but she understood. She followed. Away from the waterfall, away from the river, away from any blood-scent belonging to men.
Descending the steep hillside was slow. A constant back-and-forth in the only way the terrain would allow. Finally, the first monoliths crooked up from the earth, and the ground flattened into narrow, overgrown steppes. Here, men had carved the cliff to their liking. Here, enormous cypresses had taken root unimpeded.
The Threadwitch never spoke on the hike. Her breath came in curt gulps. She clearly needed rest; she clearly needed food. So though Aeduan’s muscles sang with the urge to move faster, he kept his pace slow. Manageable.
Until they finally reached the heart of the ruins. It was the only space with four walls still standing. Admittedly, vines and mushrooms had laid claim to the granite and there was no roof to top it off, but walls were walls. Most people liked them.
Then again, the Threadwitch wasn’t most people.
She sank to the stone and mud-earth and hugged her knees to her chest. Despite the heat sweltering here, she shivered.
“Why does he hunt you?” Aeduan’s hoarse words split the living silence of the place.
“Who?” the Threadwitch asked, her voice haggard and muffled by her knees. She lifted her head. There was a cut on her brow that Aeduan hadn’t seen before.
“The Purist priest,” Aeduan answered. “Corlant.”
To his surprise, her breath hitched. She clutched at her right biceps, and something like fear flashed across her face.
It was the most expressive he’d ever seen the Threadwitch. A sign her careful control had crumbled beneath exhaustion. Aeduan hadn’t known it was possible.
This girl had fought Aeduan—tricked him and broken his spine. She had battled city guards and faced cleaved Poisonwitches head-on, yet never had Aeduan seen her show fear.
“You know him, then,” Aeduan said.
“How,” she clearly had to concentrate to get that word out, “do you know him?”
Aeduan hesitated. For several moments, there was no sound beyond the distant waterfall. No movement beyond the breeze towing at the branches overhead.
Aeduan hovered under Lady Fate’s knife. The question was, which side of the blade would hurt less? To tell Iseult the truth about Corlant and the arrowhead would mean that any betrayal Aeduan might have had planned would be impossible.
Yet to keep the arrowhead a secret would guarantee that more men like the Red Sails would follow. Aeduan couldn’t spend every moment by Iseult’s side, and if one of Corlant’s other dogs caught up again—if he lost her to the Red Sails … to that Firewitch—then he would lose his silver too.
H
e pulled the arrowhead from his pocket. “Corlant hired me,” he explained brusquely, “before I encountered you. He wanted me to find you and bring you to him. Alive.” Cautiously, Aeduan inched toward the Threadwitch, expecting her to cower.
She didn’t. Of course she didn’t. She merely rubbed her biceps, and once Aeduan was close enough, she plucked the arrowhead from his waiting hand.
“Why are you telling me this?” she asked.
“Because my silver talers are worth more to me than what the priest is offering. And because I am not the only person Corlant has hired to find you. Those men work for him, and I assume there will be more.”
Iseult stared at Aeduan, posture swaying. Face crumpling. Then she began to laugh.
It was unlike any sound Aeduan had ever heard. Not a pretty twinkle like the wealthy wives in Veñaza City, who kept amusement contained and wielded it like a weapon. Nor a raucous guffaw from someone who laughed freely, openly, often.
This was a shrill, breathy sound, part warbling trill and part frantic gasp. It was not a pleasant sound; it did not invite others to join.
“Dumb luck,” she choked out. “That’s what keeps saving me, Bloodwitch. Pure. Dumb. Luck.” For the first time since partnering with her, the Threadwitch slipped into Dalmotti. “Goddess above, it’s right there in the phrase, isn’t it? ‘Dumb luck.’ Choose the stupidest option, and Lady Fate will reward you.
“I should be dead, Bloodwitch. I should be shredded upon the stones or pummeled beneath the waterfall. But I’m not. And Corlant? H-he tried to kill me before. With this arrow.” She held it up, eyes fixed on it. “And he cursed it too. So if the wound didn’t kill me, the c-c-curse would. Yet somehow, I survived.”
Iseult’s laughter weakened. Then rattled off completely. “You’ve been there all along, Bloodwitch. Somewhere, l-lurking. You are the reason I had to go to my tribe—which means you are the reason Corlant c-c-could attack. So if I had never met you, then would I even be here right now?”
Aeduan’s eyes thinned—not because of what she said but rather how she chose to say it. She was blaming him for the Purist priest Corlant. Blaming him for everything, yet it wasn’t as if he had asked for this either.
Windwitch Page 20
