by D. D. Miers
“We’ll find it ourselves,” Fleur stated. “Come on.”
In a hurry, we continued. Unfortunately, our trail soon faded from existence. All around us lay craggy rock, pointed shrubs, and lanky trees with so few low branches that climbing them was out of the question.
I’d always assumed keeping direction would be easy when climbing over a mountain, but no one way looked more up or down than another. They all looked equally dangerous and rife with problems.
“Well, which way?” Darius asked of Fleur, who had somehow taken up post as leader and guide.
“It’s hard to tell…” The path had been cleared, if only slightly, of underbrush to follow its meandering gait. Now though, it all looked the same. We could forge on ahead, but at what cost?
“We were headed north when we started,” Fleur announced, “so that’s the way we’ll continue.”
We set off again, our visual marker left behind. Soon, only the moon lit our cautious steps. The incline became steeper and steeper, and our boots scrabbled upon loose gravel for solid ground. Several times over, my foot slipped, and the melody of the rocks tumbling downward was a long and threatening song.
“Is this a bad time to tell you I’m afraid of heights?” Ronen asked from the rear of the group. I wasn’t certain if he was merely teasing or telling the truth. The idea of plunging down a steep hillside to certain death would strike fear into anyone.
“Actually,” Fleur said as our careful steps halted, “it’s the worst time.”
Straight ahead, the world plummeted in a sharp cliff edge that took my breath away. A narrow shelf jutted along the border, giving us just enough room to shuffle along side by side.
Plastered to the jagged wall, Fleur edged along, followed close behind by Quinn, and then me. I wished my heart would stop pounding when I slid my first step out, but it thundered in my ears regardless that I bid myself not to look down.
“You’ll be fine, Sloane,” Aedan murmured quietly, as if he could read my thoughts. He slid a hand onto my hip, steading me, and a curious tingle rushed up my spine at the light touch. “One step at a time.”
Admitted or not, I was comforted by his words, and his touch, until I heard—and felt—the first loud crack of rock. We all froze, daring not even a single breath as the sound rippled down the canyon.
“Everyone all right?” Ronen called out from his place at the end of the line.
“Not hearing screams is a good sign,” I replied.
We inched farther along, slow and steady. We couldn’t hurry, but we couldn’t be sluggish either. The force could easily cause the ground beneath us to crumble.
Just as I thought the worst had passed, all hell broke loose.
The rock beneath Quinn’s feet gave way. I reached for him, trying to grab his hand or arm, but he scrambled desperately for any type of hold along the wall.
“Quinn!” Fleur’s scream pierced the air.
The tips of my fingers brushed his arm just as Aedan yanked me back from the precipice. I watched in horror, imagining Quinn was about to die before my very eyes, but Fleur grabbed his hand and nearly plunged over the edge herself.
The man slammed hard against what rock remained, precariously strung up only by Fleur’s strength. “Dammit, Fleur, you’ll kill us both! Let go!”
“I will not!” With every ounce of strength she had, she pulled his dead weight back onto the crumbling edge.
I released the breath trapped in my throat, and realized then I’d been trembling under Aedan’s sturdy hold. I could only imagine how Quinn felt.
“It’s too narrow ahead,” Fleur gasped as she looked across the gap to where the rest of us stood. “Just around this corner, the trail vanishes… We’ll never make it.”
“We’ll have to turn around,” Quinn answered solemnly.
“And what do you suppose you and I will do—jump?”
“We have no choice.”
It was a terrifying prospect, but no one could see another option. We had no equipment to rappel down, and no holds to allow us to climb up. We were trapped. Well, they were trapped. Suddenly, with a wide expanse of sky all around, I had never felt more closed in.
“Sloane.” Aedan’s muted voice dragged my eyes to where he stood terribly close to my side. “I need to trade places with you, so I can help them.”
“What?” I panicked. “There isn’t enough room to—”
“Do you trust me?”
Even in the dead of the night, I could see the deep amber of his eyes. I had no true reason to feel it, but deep within my bones, an undeniable bond and an unbreakable trust rested. I could only believe it was because of the bonding ceremony that my head nodded yes.
“Wrap your arms up around my neck and hold tight.”
His arms tugged me close to his chest, and I held him tight. Hard as I tried, I couldn’t ignore the steady thud of his heartbeat as he lifted my feet from the ground. It sent my own beating wildly, though not entirely from fear. His calm, steady pulse kept me from screaming when the fear won out over the other emotion I refused to analyze.
My eyes clenched tightly shut as he swung me around, certainly dangling me over the precipice before my feet again touched solid ground.
“You can let go now,” he whispered.
I let go so suddenly I again grasped him for support as my eyes reopened to the dark abyss below.
“Now go. Go with Ronen and Darius and get off the cliff’s face.”
I wanted to protest, but no words came to my parted lips as Darius’s hand took ahold of me. Tugged safely back along the narrow edge, I found myself far more worried over Aedan’s safety than I ever would have admitted. It felt far quicker going backward rather than forward. With haste and fear leading the way, we made it to hard, solid ground.
Just as relief washed over me, another of Fleur’s screams pierced the sky. Immediately, I darted for the path, having thrown my own safety aside entirely in my need to know they were all right…that Aedan was all right.
“Sloane, stop!” Ronen pulled hard on my arm, my shoulder aching with the sudden jerk that sent me reeling toward him. We nearly tumbled down the steep hill as I slammed into him, but he shoved me to the ground instead.
Stunned, I rubbed at my shoulder and stared at him. “What was that for?”
“Do you want Aedan to help them, or be more worried about your untrained ass?” He spat the words at me.
My lips sealed shut and my eyes focused on the space from which they’d eventually come…if they’d survived at all. I wrung my hands in my lap, my palms clammy and my mouth dry. I was a mess already, and we hadn’t even reached the City of Shadows yet.
The moment I heard footsteps, I jumped to my feet. My heart swelled as the others, including Fleur with a sizable ribbon of blood trickling down her cheek, reappeared. Even Ronen, crass as he was sometimes, breathed a hefty sigh of relief.
“You do realize how stupid that was,” Ronen scolded. “Don’t you?”
Aedan’s laugh was laced with relief and a jolt of adrenaline. “We’re all here though, aren’t we? Now, let’s see if we can find that old crone, shall we?”
Though no one voiced it, I was certain none of us thought seeking her out was the best idea. But we were quite literally put between a rock and a hard place. We had a lot to accomplish before the next blood moon.
I thought skidding back down what we’d climbed would have been easier, but I was entirely wrong. My legs ached, and my palms were scratched from grasping for handholds all the way down. We’d wasted so much time, and—
“Came back, just as I imagined.” The old woman was still seated in the same place we’d left her, as if she hadn’t moved at all. I didn’t know if such things truly existed, but I began to believe she was really a witch.
“What’s your price,” Fleur asked, “for taking us to the City of Shadows?”
The woman’s crooked teeth morphed into a mischievous grin. “All I require…it’s just a simple thing.” Her fingers drummed
together, her unkempt nails embedded with dirt and grime clicking loudly in succession.
“Okay.” Fleur huffed, clearly aggravated with the woman’s games. “What do you want?”
The woman’s deathly pallor swung toward me. “One of your daggers.”
12
One of my daggers? That was it? I began to pull one free when Fleur stepped in front of me, blocking my view of the woman entirely.
“No,” Fleur stated flatly. “If it’s a dagger you want, take one of mine.”
“Uh-huh…” The old woman’s tongue clicked. “That isn’t the deal. Her dagger, or find your own way.” Our own way had already failed us, and I imagined it was the only reason Fleur didn’t immediately launch a counterattack of words.
“It’s just a dagger,” I quietly argued, even if the idea of giving one of them up stung deep. I’d had them for years now, and they’d been given to me by Killion on my birthday. I feared I’d soon have nothing left of him, but refusing would mean letting this darkness consume everything.
“I don’t like it.” Aedan’s arms slid across his chest and held tight. “Ronen?”
“It’s odd, but it’s not like she’s asking for a lock of hair or a vial of blood.”
I shivered, but pulled the dagger from the right of my ribs free.
“Sloane, don’t,” Fleur warned.
“We only have so much time, Fleur. We can’t go on the trail ahead, and we can’t easily get through Nuxvar Pass, not without a war on our hands. This is our best chance.”
“Sure, if we can trust the hag,” she grumbled beneath her breath.
Pushing past her, I flipped the blade in my hand and held it toward the woman, hilt first. “You’re taking us to the city in exchange for this blade, correct?”
“Cross my heart,” the woman seethed through a hiss of a breath that smelled rancid. I drove the hilt into her hand, and replaced the space between us, if only to give my nose respite.
“This way.” The woman smiled and tucked my dagger into the depths of her cloak before she began to waddle up the same path we’d just come from.
“That’s the way we just went,” Fleur snapped, causing the woman to cackle as she continued at a snail’s pace.
“Did you truly think there was only one path this way? Now come along, we haven’t got all night.”
Like ducklings following their mother, we scurried after her, quieted by a blanket of caution and worry. For all I knew, she could have been tricking us and would soon feed us to the wolves or send us down another deadly pass. I wondered briefly just how much she could get for us if she handed us over to those in charge of the City of Shadows.
We reached the crest of the same hill we’d climbed earlier. All it led to was the narrow cliff’s edge that had almost taken Quinn’s life. Again, Fleur was having none of it as her voice snapped across the air. “That way is suicide.”
“Are you always so easily fooled by what is right in front of you?” Grabbing hold of fallen twigs and branches laced with vines, the woman yanked it aside and revealed a cave’s mouth narrower than her hips were wide.
Ronen snorted from the back of the line. “Sneaky bitch.” Yet, he sounded almost impressed by her ingenuity. It certainly was a way to make a bit of extra coin…or goods, as it were.
I peered into the cave, but could see only a couple of feet in. A thick black encased the interior, devoid entirely of light. The thought of going inside chilled me to the bone. The woman shimmied sideways through the opening. In moments, a small brass lantern swung from her hands that lit with a small, sparking flame. It wouldn’t be enough, not with the line of shadows we’d cast on one another, but it was a start.
Fleur and Quinn dove in, their elegantly tall forms fitting with ease. I wasn’t so certain I’d slip through so easily. I stepped up and crammed myself into the narrow opening, grateful for the thick leather I wore. How on earth would Aedan manage? My pants scraped against the jagged rock, leaving me silently hoping the hole Freda had widened wouldn’t catch.
The air thickened inside the cave, moist with a dank stench that left us all breathing shallowly. We crowded into one another, meandering through the dark, narrow tunnels. Three people deep behind the lantern, I could barely see my own feet, and wondered how Ronen and Darius were managing in the back—until a flicker of firelight cast over my shoulders.
Darius held his blade high overhead, the same one that had burned with flame and taken out the mammoth spider. In awe yet again, I stared, only to have Aedan nudge me along with a gentle push.
“Oh, come on, Aedan, not going to teach her how to do it?” Darius said from the end of the line.
“You know we haven’t the time.”
“Or you haven’t the—”
“Hush,” the old woman admonished from farther up the winding tunnel. “We aren’t alone in here, and while the beasts slumber beyond the hold of mere sleep, I would rather not chance them awakening.”
It seemed none of us did either as we sealed our words into silence and continued.
The walls dripped with a damp chill that left our boots sloshing across slick stone. Several times over, I braced against the wall as my boot’s tread slipped. The last thing I wanted was to bathe in the acrid water.
Our guide stopped, bunching us together like a tight coil. I nearly collided into Quinn’s back. Standing perilously close, I strained to peer beyond him, to where the crone’s shadowed face turned back at us.
“The beasts ahead lay dormant, but I would not wish to see what would happen should you tempt fate.” She glared at Darius and his brazen blade. “Leave them be and you shall live.”
We moved on, the narrow tunnel widening into a vast cavern. The faintest press of a boot beneath our weight echoed across the space. Before long, the flickering light of our flames wouldn’t reach the far walls. The space was too large. Too dark.
“More spiders,” Fleur hissed beneath her breath.
I wanted to believe she meant the small kind, but I knew better. At the far end of the cavern lay a spider’s nest unlike any I’d seen before. Each beast was larger than the last, and taller than any one of us. Their sheer size made the one from earlier appear a mere toy.
Covered in thick hair, their legs curled against their bodies. They slept in arbitrary slings of web, their menacing eyes staring off in whatever distance lay ahead. The entire cavern seemed to be draped in the same thick web. I didn’t want to imagine what lay encased in the mummy-like drops hanging from the ceiling.
We tiptoed through. I imagined the silent crone ahead had died and we’d soon be dinner for some patient arachnids. They slumbered directly above our exit, and I was sure to hold my breath as we ducked through.
Webs clung to my face, leaving me sputtering as my body itched all over. I felt almost certain smaller spiders—more naturally sized spiders—had landed on me, but my frantic pat down revealed none. I smelled a gust of fresh air and could have cried with relief.
We paused again as the old woman moved aside another barrier that hid the mouth of her seemingly secret cave. Desperate to be free, we spilled out into a rocky forest, much like the one we’d begun in. The old woman covered the exit back up and continued to hobble on.
It was amazing she made it at all on the treacherous hike that remained. Every step rife with jagged rocks that could trip or twist any ankle, but she somehow sailed ahead with ease. There was something about her. Something quite odd that left me uneasy as we finally pulled to a stop at the edge of a clearing.
“There you are,” she cooed, drawing our attention forward.
Sure enough, we could see the walls of a great city, the stacked stone reaching high above whatever lay protected within. Yet it was what lay between us and that wall that turned my stomach and put worry on everyone’s faces.
It was an encampment, much larger than the one I’d been a part of in the Outlands, and of a far different atmosphere. The tents that dotted the landscape were nothing to be concerned about, save that t
hey surrounded the city gate we’d need to get through. Several fires stood tall and proud, casting a glow upon those who danced around in some type of ritualistic regard.
“What are they doing?” I whispered when a wretched scream echoed from the midst of the camp. It was a woman’s cry, and among those who danced, she was tossed like a ragdoll thrown to a vicious dog. She seemed not to be the only one having fallen to their savage ways. I spotted other bodies, lifeless and some incomplete of limbs, strung across spikes like macabre decorations.
I had never been more horrified or ill within the pits of my stomach before.
“Now what?” Fleur asked.
“Now, now.” The crone’s tongue clicked again. “I said I would get you to the city, not get you through. You’re on your own.”
“What?” I spun immediately on my heel, my teeth grinding at her deceit. She’d taken my dagger for this, and now left us on the precipice of certain death. Her eyes fell on me, devilry dancing in their depths as she stepped back, farther into the trees. I followed her, but she’d simply vanished into the wind.
13
“She’s…gone.”
I’d seen her vanish with my own eyes, but I couldn’t believe it. I darted in and out of the trees, if only to prove to myself the woman hadn’t merely hid among them.
She hadn’t.
“What do you mean, she’s gone?” Quinn’s eyes narrowed dangerously as I motioned to the forest.
“Just like it sounds. She’s gone. She just melted into the darkness.”
“Great,” he grumbled. “Well, hopefully, she wasn’t considering us as sacrifices to give to them.”
My stomach upended again as I looked back to the sadistic encampment. It was a sickening scene that had me questioning whether the damp earth beneath their feet was due to spilled water—or rivers of blood.
“Do you think they are Dark Fae? Or something else?” I stepped forward, just to the edge of the tree cover. Words lay unbidden upon my tongue, silenced by a sight that left me blinking in complete shock.
