Wild Hunt (The Island Book 2)

by C. M. Estopare

  Die, probably. Fall down and break my neck.

  Clinging to the slimy rock, another rain of pebbles thumped to her head, some of it taken away by the waterfall roaring over them. As the rock wall trembled, Ren hugged her body tight to the slippery rocks. Kato did the same, digging his toes between the rocks. He offered her a reassuring smile, though it didn’t find his eyes. His eyebrows rose as his eyes flashed. The rock wall groaned beneath them, shivering and moaning as the tremor evolved into a full-fledged quake.

  An earthquake. Great.

  Just my fucking luck.

  Bowing her head, she held on and grit her teeth. Please be over quick. Please be over quick.

  Nakato harrumphed in her mind. This was a stupid idea, Outsider. And the sad thing about it is that you knew it.

  “Shut up.” Ren hissed into the rock face. Water poured over her, slammed down into the crown of her head as rocks forced themselves from the wall and dropped into the abyss below. Sharp shards hit her in the face and neck on their way down. Ren concentrated on the roaring hiss of the falls, on Kato’s breath as he wheezed nearby. On her mission. On her friend.

  Mia, she had almost forgotten her. Sudden death made her think of everyone who had passed since she came to this damned island.

  Dammit. Mia. I’m so sorry. She shouldn’t have let Mia go to Morgan Black alone. Was she dead?

  It was all Ren’s fault.

  The entire earth shook, thunder booming through coarse rock and solid stone. Ren’s left hand held tight, slipped and lowered. Her right hand dug into the rock as it began to shiver and move.

  Ren snapped her eyes open.

  “Fuck.” She breathed as it shivered out of place. “Fuck, fuck, fuck!”

  Kato exhaled slowly. Heavily. He held out a hand and she grasped it with her left, right hand still wedged between the moving rock and a gritty crevice. Her left hand couldn’t feel much, but warmth rushed through it as Kato squeezed her hand tighter and tighter. A thunderous crack whipped over their heads and suddenly the waterfall wasn’t the only thing overshadowing them.

  A monstrous bolder shrieked against rock and freed itself. It fell, its shadow engulfing Ren.

  Kato sighed, his shoulders slumping. Wind whipping up around him in a funnel that exploded into a gale.

  “Don’t—don’t do that!” Ren shouted. His crystal was empty. If he pulled from the life around him, it would weaken him. It would force him to let go. “Don’t you fucking dare.”

  In that instant, he let her go.

  She dropped, gravity clinging to her like flames devouring wood.

  Her breath hitched in her throat when something light and airy slammed into her back. It cradled her, holding her still as her face burned, her eyes clouded with tears. Her mind buzzing with confusion. Anger. Regret. Fear.

  It flung her across the gorge, flinging her over the Great River like a slingshot. Her legs hit the ground first, followed by her hands. Her cheek throbbed as grass blades stabbed at her. Forcing herself up, a black silhouette, blanketed by the roar and rush of the falls, fell.

  6

  I told you that you wouldn’t forget me.

  I will haunt you until the day you die for what you did to me.

  Unfortunately, today is not that day.

  Wake up.

  Ren pressed her palms into the grass, blades bent beneath her weight. The sharp smell of grass billowed into her, cushioning her before it slapped her back to reality.

  Her heart sank before it exploded up into her throat.

  Kato.

  She crawled to the edge of the Great River. Massive waterfalls curved off of the edges, spiraling down into an abyss blanketed in white mist. Ren gazed over her shoulder, her eyes widening as she saw a stone structure on a hill. A castle? Stone walls? She wasn’t sure. It all seemed so damned foreign. The moment she got used to the Mesh, now she had to deal with this.

  Her breath caught in her throat. So they had made it? Across the gorge and back up? They had made it! Ren grinned, the smile capsizing when she realized that no one lingered nearby.

  No one.

  Where was Kato?

  You can’t be this stupid.

  Ren wished Nakato wouldn’t.

  Closing her eyes, she forced her eyebrows together. There had been an earthquake. Kato had caught her hand and looked at her…sadly. A shadow hovered over her head and suddenly she was flying. She soared across the gorge and landed right here. In this spot, right on the opposite side.

  Ren looked up. There was nothing over there. The Mesh had vacated. To her right, the sun hung over the horizon. Cracks of rust spiked through the blue and white of the sky. Ren dug her fingers into the dirt, soil crusting under her fingernails. It was cool to the touch, like the waterfalls. Like the mist.

  A black figure had fallen through the falls. She had blacked out.

  And woke up here.

  Where is Kato?

  A mottled growl echoed in her head. Renata.

  “Kato?” Ren called, turning her head from side to side. Scanning the mist, the plains to the left and right of her. “Kato!” she cupped her hands near her lips. She waited, kneeling. A mist laden breeze picked up her hair and brushed through the frizz, caressing her as easily as Kato’s pocket of air had.

  That idiot pulled power from the earth. Ren shook her head and clenched her teeth. He threw me across the entire damned river. He…

  And then he fell. Probably broke his neck.

  Dammit. Her eyes were misting again and she blinked her tears away. Balling her right hand into a weak fist, she stood. Her left knee buckled. She went down, then caught herself. Her stomach lurching as she forced herself to stand again. She took another look down, staring at the misty abyss with flaring nostrils.

  How could he do this to me?

  Nakato coughed. Wow.

  How could she think that? Dammit. Dammit! Kato—her last good friend—sacrificed himself to get her across. If only she had followed Lindiwe’s advice and walked along the Great River to find another bridge. If only she hadn’t allowed him to climb down with her. Then she’d be the one down there in the abyss, not him.

  Why would he do this?

  Why?

  A low sigh stole Ren’s attention. That one, Nakato breathed, has always had something to prove to us. To me.

  Ren shut her eyes and blocked the voice out. Ever since Nakato’s voice started babbling in her head, Ren wished she knew a way to shut the dead woman up. Now she knew. All she had to do was ignore the bitch.

  Her left eye twinged at the word as a spark of pain jetted through her forehead.

  Ren opened her eyes. Breathed in the cold air.

  He’s not dead.

  He can’t be. Kato is un-fucking-killable. He’s down there somewhere and I’m not gonna leave him hanging.

  “Moira,” Ren called to the sky, face wet, “if you’re looking to help me, now would be a good time to start.”

  The falls roared. Overhead, gigantic birds spread their black and gold wings.

  A black speck hung in the left corner of her eye. She turned.

  The black cross-hatching of a cage caught her, made her breath unevenly. The cage—a tower—descended deep into the abyss and vanished, the mist closing in on it.

  She began walking toward it before her mind could even register what it was.

  Black steel closed the distance. A cage-like tower glinted in the morning light.

  7

  A lift.

  A band tightened around Ren’s stomach. Though it was all in her head, her stomach cramped as she lurched forward toward the cage-tower sprouting up out of the mist below. To her right sat a shiny black podium that spearheaded its way through the swaying grass blades. Two buttons sat on top, one red, the other green. Ren blinked her gaze away from the podium and pressed her forearms against the lift’s sliding door.

  Nothing happened. It groaned under her weight. Shifted uncomfortably in a slight morning breeze. For a long moment, the entire tower
shook as a sudden spray of water soaked its midsection.

  “Open,” Ren begged, “Please.”

  Pathetic, hissed Nakato’s voice. Climb down if you must, but—for the love of me—don’t you dare cry again.

  Too bad her eyes were misting again.

  Pushing away from the cage, she flattened her palms against the nearby podium and stared, wide-eyed, at the buttons. Between the buttons curved a divot in the black steel that she slid her fingertip across. Pinpricks of ice raked across her skin, she yanked her fingertip back.

  Ren tried the bottoms, slamming her fist against the red one. Nothing. She huffed, hammered her fist into the green one.

  A clicking sound shook the cage. The sliding door clamped open for a millisecond and snapped closed.

  “Dammit—just work you stupid thing!” Ren slammed both fists into both buttons, pounding away at the podium, her Scion crystal jingling against her chest. Nothing was going right. Nothing would ever go right. Why did she even try the stupid fucking idea of climbing down that long, long, drop? She couldn’t do it. Even if the stupid quake hadn’t happened, she would have given up. She would have slipped and broken her neck. Kato would have saved her from something—something she brought on herself—and he’d be gone. Sacrificed himself to the misty abyss.

  He’s alive.

  “I know!” Wait. Was that Nakato? No—that had to have been her own voice.

  He’s probably dead, stupid Outsider. You’re wasting your time and mine.

  There. That was Nakato. Should Ren be worried that it was getting harder and harder to unravel her thoughts from Nakato’s?

  Ren shook her head, shoulders slumping, as she splayed her hands against both buttons. Her petrified hand weighed the red button down easily, while she had to apply pressure to her good hand. Nothing. Nothing happened. Nothing opened.

  Was the damned thing broken?

  It looked usable enough. Why would it be here if it weren’t working? It wouldn’t be here if the people in that castle-looking-place up on the hill didn’t use it to get to the bottom of the Great River from time to time…right?

  Damn. She sounded stupid even to herself.

  Ren’s eyes alighted on the divot. It was there for a reason, right? She pressed her fingertip into it again, arms going taut as the ice-cold teeth raked at her again. Was it looking for something? Trying to pull something from her? Her eyes ventured to the empty Scion crystal resting on her chest. The two shapes were almost identical. Maybe if she…

  Leaning forward, she placed the crystal into the divot. The two clicked almost instantly, like matching puzzle pieces. The whirring screech of metal scraping against metal made her turn her head as a wheeze wafted up from the bottom of the tower. The ice cold feeling crept its way into her crystal, conjuring little flakes of snow inside the clear vial. The door to the lift opened.

  It fucking opened!

  But the lift inside dropped. It plummeted like a raindrop escaping from the clouds, plunging beneath the mist blanketing the bottom of the gorge. The chain attached to the center of the lift sang a screeching metallic melody until there was no more slack to give and it jolted.

  The door closed, the divot rejected her crystal with a shock of electricity that spiraled up her necklace.

  Ren backstepped, windmilling her arms in a bumbling attempt to keep her balance.

  Dammit.

  It was a long way down. She couldn’t just jump. She couldn’t even climb now. And with the lift gone, she had no way of calling it back up. She still attempted. Placing her crystal in the divot once more, it zapped her like a fork in a socket. It wanted nothing from her. It gave nothing.

  She couldn’t just leave Kato down there wreathing in pain. Probably cursing her stupid idea and even dumber plan.

  Fucking Moira.

  If Moira wanted her damned job done so bad, why couldn’t she just do it herself? Why couldn’t she go into this damned city and find the people she needed? She was a goddess, after all. Ren brought her gaze to the castle-like city on the hill.

  Moira told Ren to find her twelve. Kato is one of those twelve—the Air Scion. Among them, there would be four others hiding out in the city. But before setting her sights on them, she had to find Kato. She had to save her friend.

  All of this other nonsense could wait.

  8

  The castle-city curled like a massive stone dragon, its stone bleached by sun and rain and wind. People began crowding the dirt trail she followed before the colossal stone walls began towering over her, a thin gray shadow washing over her like a linen sheet. Wandering closer to the white stone walls, she began to hear inklings of conversation. White noise. Hawking island speak, less sing-songy than the Mesh’s version, crashed over the dizzyingly high walls and spread through the opened gates of the front entrance.

  Ren wouldn’t be entering through the front.

  At least we know you aren’t that stupid.

  Ren seriously wished Nakato wouldn’t.

  A thriving line of Vost men and women, all dressed in pastel colored harem pants or loose, drifting, tunics reaching their knees; ambled outside of the gates. Some pushed and shoved in a chaotic line of people. Others set up lackadaisical camps and meandered around fires dug into stone pits. The tantalizing smell of bacon grease played with Ren’s nostrils and her stomach groaned, hating her for not feeding it. She ignored the sensation and pain as she swerved through thrown-together campsites and angled around resting people. She followed the towering white wall, hand grazing along the rough stone before she moved farther away from it. Scanning for any way in that didn’t involve waiting in a long line just to be told by some stuck-up guard-guy that she didn’t belong here.

  Whatever. She’d find a way in. A faster one.

  The ground trembled, grass blades dancing erratically, as a massive creature touched down from the sky and began stalking along the edge of the campsites. The hissing caw Ren heard told her that it was another one of those ugly-ass monster birds—a cockatrice. And it was probably following her because—hey—that’s just her luck.

  She chanced a look over her shoulder as the campsites along the wall ended and nothing but grass splayed out before her. Coming closer to the wall, her fingers registered a crack in the rough rock face as she searched for the cockatrice. Following the crack with her shoulders up to her ears, she spotted the monstrous black bird from the corner of her eye and decided to start walking a little faster. Because the thing was definitely following her. It wasn’t a matter of why, just why not.

  Because fuck me that’s why.

  Pebbles shivered between vibrating grass blades as Ren double-timed it, running alongside the wall with her fingers still stuck in the growing lines of cracks. Her eyes scanned faster, following the long black lines until her eyes fell to a splintered hole in the wall large enough for her to get in. But, high enough for her to worry if she could actually make it. Unfortunately, Moira only gave her the gift of fire, not flight.

  She’d find a way in somehow.

  The cockatrice followed, shrieking an ear-splintering song. Ren resisted the urge to clap her hands to her ears, her left hand would probably knock her out. Pumping her legs now, she forced herself to control her breathing as she sprinted toward the hole and made it. Reaching for the edge of the broken stone.

  A form materialized before her. All black and gold feathers and beady eyes of steel. A rider sat atop the bird, peering down at her like a half-brained cockatrice hatch-ling. The man cocked his head of hay-colored hair and pursed lips that were barely there.

  He opened his mouth, scanned her body and hesitated. Opening his hand, he wiggled his fingers quickly. Spoke in that guttural form of island speak Ren would have to get used to hearing.

  Just when she was only beginning to understand the Mesh’s language, now here come the Vost.

  The rider was pointing and jabbing, crooking his fingers like he was asking for something. “I don’t know.” Ren threw up her hands, her eyes barely looking
at the cockatrice and rider as she calculated how much time she’d have to slide around the two before the cockatrice petrified her entire body.

  Not long. Probably…

  The hole was literally right there. She could run three steps and make it. But the cockatrice barred her way, looking down at her quizzically.

  Would have been to have some help right now.

  For once, Nakato was silent. Though this prayer had been to Moira.

  Ren sighed dejectedly. The cockatrice stomped forward, lowering its face to be level with hers. The rider belted out one word, “Identification,” he strained, veins popping in his neck, “Please.” He enunciated each vowel, almost as if it pained him to actually speak English.

  For some reason, Ren’s face lit up. “I don’t know.” She tried again, shrugging with a pained look on her face. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  The guard harrumphed, then pointed at her chest. Ren realized he was pointing at the crystal. “You want?” she asked—hoping she had got the message.

  The man shook his head, jowls shivering with each shake.

  Ren shrugged again, opening her hands. “Then, what?”

  “Why…is it…,” the cockatrice took another step forward, almost pressing its forehead into Ren’s, “empty?”

  It took a couple seconds for Ren to catch it. There on his neck swayed a crystal just like hers. Blue and shining and brilliant.

  What the f—

  The cockatrice reared back and screeched. The sulfuric stench of stone-breath exploded from its nostrils and Ren took this as a cue to run. She sprinted forward, eyes on the hole, as the cockatrice screamed, stone-breath blasting from its nostrils and beak. Ren propelled herself into the air, arms outstretched. Her fingers grasping the hole before taking hold of its protruding lip in a death grip. Her knuckles went white as she pulled herself up, her shoulder buckling and straining.