They’re everywhere!
The hair atop my head shivers slightly, as something soft passes over it. I bite back a scream and remain perfectly still. Nothing happens. It passed me by.
“Don’t let them leave the square!” a towering man up near the border of the wall screams, brandishing a fierce, double-edged moon sword. It’s Otis.
Men rally around his order. Warriors try to form a blockade around the area. If I don’t hurry, I’ll be trapped inside.
The well is not hard to spot. It’s the only thing that is frozen stiff in this battlefield. A hem of blue peeks out from behind stone formation. When I circle it, my heart slows just a bit. River is curled up around the bucket, head bowed, hands trembling with fright. When I say her name she doesn’t answer me.
Leaning closer, I put a hand on her shoulder. She screams and strikes upward with a shaking palm. I manage to dodge the blow and grip her wrist. She screams again and begins to wail. I say her name again, louder, and her head snaps up. Her large eyes that I’d admired less than an hour before are now red and puffy.
No, she is not a warrior.
“Come on! Hurry!” I pull her to her feet. She’s shaking so bad I don’t know if she’ll be able to run. Her knees are trembling. “Quickly!”
A wave of pain shoots up my right arm before I’ve even turned around, and burns a line across the muscle. My scream slices through the air, and I fall backwards with the force of the unexpected blow. River screams too, and curls up against the well again, her eyes wide and hysterical.
Blood flows down my arm from the new gash in my skin. A gravelly laugh in front of me commands my attention. When I look up, it’s only with the firmest resolve that I don’t start screaming like a crazy person.
A shadow stands above me, cloaked in the darkness of a ghost-like cape, a black dagger clutched tightly in its dark hand. Every single memory from that long ago night floats in front of my eyes like I’m reliving it all over again. Except there is no Shade. No light. No one to come to my rescue. No one to block the strike.
The shadow’s black dagger rises above my head.
Roll.
And I do.
The dagger scrapes across the stone behind me. I bump into River and she jerks, closing arms over her head.
The shadow screeches in rage at my trickery, and sweeps towards me, its cape fluttering. I search the ground for a weapon. A stone. A stick. Anything to distract it. Anything to give us time to run. My fingers find the edge of the bucket.
The shadow raises the black dagger again. The bucket is heavy, and my wounded arm burns like fire, but I throw the water at the creature. The monster’s scream reaches deep down into my ears, tingling, popping, burning. I scream along with it, but grab River’s hand and pull her up. She shivers beneath my touch.
“Run!”
The shadow flails around like a dripping wet rag, and now I clearly see the outline of its body. It no longer looks like a looming monster. Instead, I see midnight black hands and a dark ebony mask that glitters beneath the hood of its cape.
River sees it too, and hesitates, staring at the shiny reflection of metal underneath the hood. The shadow starts towards her. I slam the bucket into its shoulder, toppling it to its knees – or where it should have knees – and smash the bucket, bottoms up, over its head, blinding it.
“RUN!”
This time River obeys, her skirts lifted halfway up her legs, feet flying across the dusty square. She breaks through the barricade the warriors have successfully formed, and continues running.
I attempt to follow, but I stumble. Behind me, the shadow roars in rage, its fury rising above the noise of its fellow monsters.
Run, Kyla.
But it’s too late. The shadow cuts off my path, bucket spinning through the air with such force that it shatters upon landing, sending shards of wood across the stone square.
I don’t see the movement. Only recognize the hard kick to my ribs that sends me flailing backwards.
Pain, like a hammer, batters my skull. My head is against the stone well. The village square tips back and forth unsteadily before me.
The shadow draws closer, and I try to stand. Something wet and sticky runs down the side of my face. Its stench fills my noise. Blood!
The shadow cages me against the well, its dagger gleaming.
Everything begins to shiver. The ground. The sky. The houses.
“Hellion!” the shadow mutters in a raspy voice and raises the dagger.
Get up. Get up! I try to rise. My arms shiver. My head pounds against my skull and a strange surge of energy pulses in my neck, against those hell-cursed scars won so long ago.
The dagger descends.
I’m going to die.
Chapter XVI
Ignoring all the drums roaring in my ears, I shove my arms against the well. I roll sideways, arms flailing helplessly. The shadow’s black dagger cracks against the stone ledge of the well. Orange sparks fly in all directions.
I leap to my feet, knees weak and shaky. If I can run just a little ways towards the border of the square, maybe one of those warriors will rid me of this attacker. If only I had my knife. If only I . . .
I’m wasting time.
“This one’s got life.” The rough phrase sinks deep into my bones.
It spoke. The shadow spoke!
The shadow surges up around me, its black cloak spreading out wide around it, dark wisps of what I had once compared to fog, sweeping towards me. The smell that converges around me is familiar. I dash out a hand, attempting to push the fog away as it draws nearer, and watch in horror as it slowly presses over my hand with a velvety touch. It skates up my wrist and my lower arm, its wispy tongues tickling my skin, pressing against veins. Nausea curdles in my belly. I try to pull away, but the fog, now strong like iron, imprisons me. The fog draws close to my face, dancing in front of my vision. Teasing me. Playing with me. The raspy chuckle of the shadow raises the hairs on my neck.
The fog, now a thick, dark goo, glides up my arm, towards the fresh cut in my skin; the wound made by this dastardly creature’s blade. Its black, gooey edges reach the tip of the cut. The shadow hisses a delighted rumble from deep within its throat (if it has one), restoring a memory.
“Drain the girl.”
Screaming, I pull away. The shadow startles at my sudden movement, and the dark hold it retained on my limb breaks away. The goo returns to its foggy appearance and weaves through the air.
“Stay away from me!” I scream. I back up against the well, and my fingers brush a hard object resting on its ledge. It shatters upon contact with the ground into five large shards. Glass.
The shadow pauses, its black vine-like wisps jerking back into its heavy cloak.
“A Kelban,” it mutters. It’s black hand removes a different dagger from its belt. Unlike the previous weapon, its blade shimmers with the presence of an evil I can’t describe.
“Stay away from me!” I repeat, but the well prevents me from backing away any further.
“You don’t belong here anyway, Kelban. I’m doing you a favor, ungrateful bitch,” it says.
The words are familiar. I remember the raspy voice near the river telling me I didn’t belong. That I was not one of them. That I was nothing.
I was right. It had been a shadow.
I gently touch the scars on my neck. They aren’t pulsing like they usually do. Instead, they are warm and relaxed beneath my touch. They have always responded to my fear with pain – why now do they falter?
“Kelbans,” it hisses. The dagger cuts across the already opened flesh on my arm. The shimmering, unknown evil on its blade presses against my wound like a living thing, its black form clinging like a second skin. A prickling pain of warmth slides up my shoulder into my neck. “Now you’ll die.”
The black form over the wound drops off like a burnt leaf and disintegrates upon contact with the ground. Beneath the shadow’s hooded cape I hear something similar to a gasp – if it weren’t so raspy
and inhuman.
“Surprised?” I ask it.
The shadow jerks back and foggy tendrils rip from its cloak. “You understand?”
I stare at it.
“That’s impossible,” it rasps.
Moonlight – white and faded, but moonlight just the same – washes over the square. The shadow’s foggy particles disappear inside its cloak once again, but one is not fast enough. I search the ground and my fingers find one of the glass shards. It reflects the light perfectly over its gleaming surface.
“No!” the shadow gasps as I rotate the shard in its direction – catching the light with it.
“No!” it screeches as the light disintegrates its remaining foggy wisp. The black dagger drops from its hand and, the shadow slithers into the air. I rotate the glass shard again, and light bounces after it. It isn’t fast enough. The shadow disappears in the night.
The battle has ended. Shadows have disappeared – or disintegrated – in the courtyard. The square becomes a different kind of battlefield as a new enemy begins to spread its claws. Death.
Women, shouldering bags of what I believe to be medicines, swarm towards the wounded being lined up against a wall. Some let out horrified wails as they discover a relative or friend among the bleeding warriors. The remaining warriors, the ones who haven’t even shed blood, begin to rally at the far corner of the square, whispering among themselves, pointing towards the woods. Do they think to follow the monsters? Hunt them?
The sick feeling in my stomach returns as the wounded cries fill the air. They are not of death, but of pain. Limbs crack as they are removed. The splash of blood on dirt makes bile stick to the sides of my throat. I have to get out of here. I can’t . . .
“Kyla!” Shade dashes around the corner of the well and looks down at me. “What the hell are you doing here? Get your ass back to the cellar!” He reaches down and grabs my arm, pulling me to my feet with a violent grip.
I scream. He pulls back his hand and blinks at the blood coating it. “Shit,” he mutters.
“Shade!” Axle runs up, face white. “The wounded . . . there’s a lot.”
I peer over Shade’s shoulder at Mama Opal as she enters the square, a bag slung over her plump shoulder, and a roll of white sheets bundled under her other arm. She doesn’t even see us and hurries towards the wall where the wounded are screaming.
“Axle.” The voice is so quiet – so timid – I almost don’t hear it. But he does.
River stands at the entrance to the square, gripping the stone wall of a hut for support. Her face is white and there’s blood on her feet. She must have torn them badly in her flight.
Axle hurries towards her and wraps his arms around her. She holds him tightly and begins to sob, tucking her face to his chest like a little child. She is saying something, but I can’t hear a word because of the distance.
A pang, sharp as an arrow, hits me in the chest. If Landor were here, that’s where I’d be. If Landor were here, he’d have fought with me. He’d of protected me. He’d of . . .
But he’s not here.
“Kyla!” It’s Mama Opal’s voice. She beckons me with a pudgy arm.
I approach the wounded, my insides curling as a man just opposite of Mama Opal vomits blood onto the ground. He writhes as another woman attempts to keep him lying flat.
Mama Opal ignores my horrified look and hands me a towel, white as snow. “Press this against his arm . . . right here.” She points to a bulging vein within a man – her patient’s – arm that is moving up and down beneath his skin. It’s an unnatural phenomenon. Every time the vein moves, the man groans. I press the towel over the area and immediately regret it. The vein beneath lets out a crushing sound that it shouldn’t – like a nut-shell being pulled open. The poor victim screams, his body writhing so hard that it knocks me backwards.
“Hold him!” Mama Opal shouts, desperation commanding her voice. She grabs his arm and forces it back down.
I attempt to help her, but the back of the man’s hand strikes me across the cheek. I bite my lip and try harder, muscles aching as I force his arm to the hard, wooden cot. Someone grips my shoulder and shoves me aside.
Shade presses his fingers so tightly into the man’s arm that his knuckles go white with the strain. Mama Opal grabs a tube of some green powder and pours its contents over the large gash just above the wounded man’s shoulder. The man screams again and his pupils turn dark black.
Shade’s hands begin to shake with the victim’s writhing.
The green powder turns black as all the veins around the ugly gash begin to jump up and down. I put my hands over my mouth to quell the screams that want to be released. The man begins to choke as his neck begins to shrink in on itself, his skin turning a deathly white around his face, floating down his neck, across his chest.
“No, no, no . . .” Mama Opal cries and searches desperately for another tube. I realize she’s not sure what to look for. She’s helpless.
Slowly the writhing stops. The veins don’t jump anymore. Shade hesitantly pulls back his hands.
When I look, I wish I hadn’t. The man is no longer a human. His skin is pure white and his eyes are black. His skin has welded to his bones. He stares up at the endless sky, mouth open and shrunk.
Shade turns on me. “What the hell were you doing, Kelban? Are your hands weak? Have you no strength?”
“Shade, that’s enough,” Mama Opal interjects tiredly, pulling a white sheet over the man’s face. “It’s the first time she’s probably seen anyone die so . . . gruesomely. Let her be.”
“If she held on tighter, if she’d kept the towel over the wound, he could have . . .”
“He would have died!” Mama Opal’s eyes flash fire. She slaps a hand on top of the sheet – on top of the body. “They all die! We have no cure. No cure, you understand, Shade?” Tears pour out of her eyes. “We . . . are . . . powerless.”
“What cure?” I ask. “Why did he need a cure? He only got wounded. He . . .”
“It was a shadow blade,” Shade interrupts. “Shadow blades are a unique specimen. Where we possess these . . .” He points to the swords crossed on his back. “Shadows possess a murderous weapon of their own. A blade that works with the effect of poison in one’s bloodstream. Once you are cut with it, you die within minutes, veins popping and turning black, skin turning white, eyes dilating.”
He steps closer to me, until he’s towering over me. I have to lift my chin and look at him. The underside of his jaw is coated in blood where he wiped his hand. “Understand this, girl. There are many strange things you have yet to see. This place you call ‘the Wilds’. . .” he leans close, until his breath skates over my neck, “. . . is a frightening place.”
I pull away from him, heart pumping madly. I’d seen nightmares too horrifying to describe and never had I seen anything like that man’s death. It couldn’t be real. But I stare at the hand still protruding from beneath the sheet. White. Dead. Black veins. It is real. It is all very, very real.
Mama Opal notices my gaze and pulls the sheet over the man’s hand. She gently wraps her arms around my shoulders. “Don’t look, honey. It won’t do you any good.”
How could I not look?
Shade grabs my elbow. “Come here.” He shoves me against the table and wildly searches through Mama Opal’s medicine bag. He pulls a vial from its folds. A white powder is inside. He takes my arm and opens the vial, pouring the contents over the gash. The powder seeps into the wound. Blood bubbles out of the gash in thick gooey formation. I gag at the sight. Shade pays it no mind and wipes it away with the edge of a towel from Mama Opal’s collection.
“Did it ever bother you?” I ask. “The sight of blood?”
He rips the towel into shreds. “No.” He begins to bind my wound tightly.
“What about pain? Does it bother you?” I search his face earnestly.
His jaw tightens. “No.”
I let the matter rest. For now.
“What does a shadow blade look
like?”
I think he won’t answer me for a moment, so intent is he on tying an intricate – but stable – knot on my bandage. “It’s black, but sometimes gray. It has a sleek blade that could cut glass. It’s edges are as thin as paper and it sings like hell’s opening gates when it slices through the air. When you look at it closely, it seems to possess life of its own when it shines. Very few shadows seem to use them, preferring their simpler swords, as if they know the danger of the weapon they carry.” His eyes have taken on a faraway look. It makes me tremble. There’s something about him – I can’t put my finger on it – but he knows a lot more than he’s telling.
I try to restore an image of the black dagger the shadow unsheathed. It had gleamed. There had been a glossy, iridescent appearance to it that I cannot explain. As if it was – alive?
“I think . . . it was a shadow blade.”
Shade’s chin snaps up. “How long ago where you cut?”
“Half an hour ago . . .”
“Then it wasn’t a shadow blade,” he interrupts and starts to leave.
I grab his arm, hands closing around sleek muscle. Shade glares at me, the look sending chills up my spine, but I don’t let go. Instead, I step closer to him, until I can look him straight in the eye.
“It had to be. It moved like nothing I had ever seen. It . . .” He tosses my hand off his arm and steps back.
“First of all, Kelban, don’t ever touch me again with your filthy hands. Second, it wasn’t a shadow blade. Or . . .” He takes a threatening step in my direction, forcing me to back up against the well. “You’d be dead.” He backs off and wipes at his arm where I touched him with a disgusted frown.
All around the square, the sound of weeping replaces the screams of death. The wounded are carted off on strong arms for their beds. The dead are lined up against the wall nearest the gate. Six feet of dirt will be their blanket. I count four sheet-covered figures.
A cry of rage turns me around. Dirk breaks out of a group of common village men and heads straight for me. His fists are balled at his sides and shaking dangerously. Keegan makes a grab for his father and misses.
Ostracized (The Ostracized Saga Book 1) Page 25
