Serpent Cursed (Lost Souls Series Book 2)

by Bree Moore

  The eyes in the circle turned on her, including the Siku-creature. Without any words, Harper somehow knew they were asking her a question. If only she could figure out what it was. She felt a tug toward them, something inside of her responding to the unvoiced question.

  Stay.

  And she found that she wanted to. These beings would accept her, take her in to be part of their pack.

  Wings flapped overhead, and the raven landed on top of one of the creatures. It didn’t acknowledge that the bird was there, staring at Harper with unblinking silver eyes.

  “Urayuli. Creatures made from the lost and unfound children. Harper, they want you to join them.”

  “I know,” Harper murmured. She stood, reaching a hesitant hand to the coat of one. Her wings shrank and a numbing sense of peace came over her. She touched the fur. It was coarser than she expected, but somehow still soothing to her soul.

  “The longer you stay here with them, the more you will become like them. You must leave quickly.”

  “But the little girl. Her family—”

  The raven shook his head firmly. “There is no reuniting them now. The Urayuli transformation is permanent.”

  Harper clenched her fist and let it fall. “Why are they drawn to me, now? I’m not lost.”

  “Aren’t you? A little girl still looking for those that she has lost, those who are lost to her?”

  Harper looked up into the looming faces. Even Siku had stretched again, her height nearly the same as the other antlered heads in the circle. She didn’t belong here. But then, she didn’t belong anywhere.

  Harper swallowed. “I need to go now.”

  The beings didn’t move.

  “I need to go. Please let me through.”

  They shifted their tall, furry bodies, but no gap in the circle opened. If she left, it would be of her own accord. They would not stop her, she thought. She grabbed the handle on the top of her pack and walked forward to the wall of bodies. She closed her eyes and pushed through between two of the Urayuli. She had to tuck her wings and force the giant creatures aside, then tugged on her pack as it caught behind her between their bodies. It came free and she nearly fell backward, clutching the pack.

  The Urayuli’s eyes turned on her, and they stretched out into a ragged line, nearly a dozen of them. More had come from somewhere. They moved toward her, making those haunted, yet somehow enticing calls. They would circle her again. She would change. Her skin prickled as if hair would start growing. Harper rubbed her arms to be sure. Nothing yet, but she had to get out of here. She flapped her wings, gathering air beneath them, and ran along the uneven ground. She lifted, then didn’t quite catch the wind and dropped back to the earth, running and flapping again. She launched herself into the hair, holding the pack tight to her chest. Behind her, those silver eyes gazed upward. The bird-wolf calls followed her, lingering in the night air.

  Harper stayed low, looking for the familiar path she had left to help Siku. She found another rock formation, different than the one she had left, but close enough to the right area that she came down near it. She had to find her people before dawn. After her brief flight through the chilly night air, she felt more awake than before, but a heaviness lingered behind her eyes. The Urayuli were close enough that she didn’t want to risk stopping for sleep only to wake and find herself made into one of them. She had to keep moving.

  The forest sounds were closer now, and louder. She ran along the path through the tall grass, eyes constantly searching for the next inuksuk. She passed another before too long, pointing along the same path, now running through a copse of trees. Harper withdrew her wings and kept her pace, dodging branches and jumping over branches and rocks, putting plenty of distance between herself and the Urayuli.

  A branch snagged her hair, short-cropped though it was.“Gah!” Harper exclaimed, reaching up to untangle the snag.

  It wasn’t a branch.

  Her fingers ran along a set of claws clamped on her hair. She looked to her left. Standing off the path was an impossibly tall woman with rams’ horns coming out of her bald head. Her too-wide mouth grinned as a second spindly arm wrapped around Harper and hauled her into the air. She made a guttural clicking sound and glided across the forest floor.

  Harper thrashed and squirmed, nearly getting free, but the ram-woman adjusted her grip, tightening Harper’s position in the pit of her arm. The smell of death mixed with the acrid notes of sweaty socks assaulted Harper’s senses so strongly she passed out for a brief moment. At least, she hoped it wasn’t longer than that.

  The creature muttered and cackled to herself. Around them, the forest was a flurry of distressed bird calls and darting shadows as creatures fled from the long strides of this inhuman thing. A splash resounded on the next step, and the next. Heavy droplets of water struck Harper’s legs and face. A dark wide gash in the earth rose ahead, surrounded on either side with stone walls.

  The creature hauled Harper into the cave and slammed her on the ground—no, a stone slab—near the center of the cave. Harper cried out at the impact. One of the creature’s long claws dug into the center of her chest, as if she were pressing a button to stop the sound, stop Harper’s breath, stop her heart.

  Harper gasped for air. The tight point in her chest unraveled and her wings unfurled of their own accord, scraping against the rock as they opened, flapping helplessly against the creature’s strength. The she-ram had a single finger on Harper, and yet it might as well have been a metal rod through Harper’s chest. She stopped struggling, gasping for air. Tears burned in her eyes. She couldn’t move. She could hardly breathe. She was never going to get out of here.

  The creature chanted in garbled tones, and torches on the walls lit up, giving the cave a dim, flickering light. Mad shadows danced. Harper blinked. The shadows weren’t on the walls, they were in the air, flittering creatures making yowling sounds. Shadow beings. She closed her eyes. She was going to die.

  She wouldn’t see Tyson again, and her death meant he, too, would fail. Their lives had meant nothing, her sacrifice to the Beryllium orb to free the occupants at Camp Silver Lake was a pittance in a world that would never accept her kind. And maybe they shouldn’t. Maybe, like this skeletal woman with her inhuman form and her dark magics, there were too many paranormals who wanted to harm rather than live in harmony.

  Jars clinked together. Harper squeezed her eyes shut, not wanting to see the end of her life coming. Her wings hung limp, draped over the edges of the stone table. The sensation of a rod in her chest had lessened, but only because she’d grown used to it.

  The rock beneath Harper crackled. She opened her eyes to a brighter glow than before. The yellow-orange light hovered around and over her, and heat emanated from below. Harper squirmed, still locked in place despite the fact that the ram-woman’s claws had retracted, stroking jars and bottles as she added the contents to a giant stone tub with fire licking the sides.

  It was getting uncomfortably hot. The moisture in the air dried up, and the fire at the oxygen almost before Harper could draw it in. She hyperventilated. She was going to suffocate. She turned her head from side to side, gasping for air, her vision spotting. She saw the ram-woman, the fire, the stone tub, and the blueish grey light at the entrance of the cave, ten feet away but it might as well have been miles. She couldn’t move, her arms and legs locked to her sides as if she were bound by invisible cords. She felt like a fish out of water, her wings the only part of her that could fully move, but it hurt to flap them as the bones of her wings scraped and twisted against the stone slab behind her.

  The creature heard her pathetic struggling and glided over to her with a single stride, stroking her hair and clicking, the milky white orbs of her eyes visible through her transparent, veiny eyelids when they blinked. She clicked, a guttural sound from the back of her throat, almost as if she were trying to soothe Harper.

  “Please, let me go!” Harper meant to yell, but it came out as a raspy gaspi
ng attempt to speak. The ram-woman smiled her too-wide smile, revealing pointed teeth, and stood, leaving Harper feeling as if her flesh were melting into the stone. The heat had grown to a nearly unbearable point. A point near her elbow seared, smoking slightly as the heat bit into her flesh. Harper gritted her teeth and her vision flashed, first dark, as if she’d passed out, and then bright, as if she saw into another world.

  Tyson stood in front of her and turned. Could he hear her?

  “Tyson!” she screamed. His eyes widened, and then he faded. Harper slumped onto the stone, her energy spent. The spot below her elbow throbbed. Another spot seared against the back of her ankle. Harper groaned, turning her head. Sweat trickled down her brow and sizzled on the stone. The acrid smell of burning feathers reached Harper’s nose, and in her blurred state of consciousness it took her a moment to realize her feathers were burning.

  She thrashed and screamed deep in her throat until her limbs refused to move any longer, and the heat stole the air from her lungs. The ram-woman ignored her.

  Delusions took over Harper’s mind. Her throat was parched, she couldn’t speak, but she whispered.

  “Quinn,”

  The ram-woman ran a finger along Harper’s forehead, then brought the finger to her mouth and licked it. Harper shuddered, feeling feverish. The stone table branded a spot near her shoulder blade, below her wing. A trail of smoke went up into the air above Harper’s head, and her ears filled with the sound of feathers rustling.

  “You nearly took too long. You have the ingredients?” The low-pitched voice came from the ram-woman. Harper didn’t know if she was hallucinating again or if the woman had been able to speak this entire time, but had chosen not to.

  “It’s overcooked,” the light, airy female voice said with disdain. Harper’s head rolled to one side. Her eyelids slitted open and she saw white figures like angels, snowy wings spread, noses pointed like beaks, hands and feet black and scaled with talons instead of fingers. The four of them stared at Harper.

  “Black sister,” one of them murmured. A third figure handed a bundle to the ram-woman.

  “You serve me,” the ram-woman hissed, stretching to her full height. Her head scraped the ceiling, and her white eyes flashed blue. The four angelic bird-women huddled together and hooted anxiously. The ram-woman snatched the bundle and tore it open, dumping the contents into the stone tub. Harper heard liquid bubbling, and the slick sound of a knife on stone being sharpened. Her stomach clenched and heaved.

  The ram-woman raised the knife, admiring the edge. She aimed it at Harper’s mid-section, and a pointed tongue slithered along her lips.

  Harper felt the Song build before it released. She opened her mouth and launched the notes into the air, but her voice was merely a hoarse keening, nothing like the vibrant melody she’d woven before.

  A screech interrupted her attempt, like an owl’s, and two of the white bird-women launched themselves at the ram-woman. Their talons gouged at her milk-white eyes. Harper’s shut her eyes. Talons scraped her sides, and one plunged into her chest at her sternum. She gasped, eyes shooting open, and she bolted upright, grasping at the blood that flooded from her torso. Claws gripped her shoulders and lifted her, pushing her to the floor. She lay there, sprawled helplessly, her skin burning against the cooler stone. Her hands pressed against the floor, but her muscles gave out under the slightest amount of effort.

  Talons on her shoulders again, and another pair scraped her low back as they dug into the waistband of her jeans. Wingbeats accompanied the shrieks from the ram-woman, blood-curdling yells and curses spilling into the cave. Harper lifted into the air, her wings fluttering uselessly as they dragged in the dirt.

  The bird-women soared with her into the cold Alaskan night. Harper shivered and trembled so much she thought the women might drop her. They flew and flew, the trees and ground a blur below. Harper passed out and woke to the ground drawing nearer and nearer, and then the women did drop her, and the skin on her face felt as if it peeled off as she skidded to a stop.

  A figure in white crouched beside her. “We will tend your wounds, but then we must leave you. We have broken our contract with the sorceress and she will hunt us. We have sent a signal to the Raven, he knows of your survival.”

  Harper groaned in response. Gentle hands removed her clothes, rubbed a substance on her burns and scrapes, coating her face. Every touch made Harper want to scream. She withdrew deep inside her mind, to a place where she went when she dreamed. It only masked the pain.

  Leaves pressed into her wounds, wrapped deftly by experienced hands. Four kisses marked Harper’s brow, and murmured apologies, before the sound of beating wings filled the air, and then silence. Crickets chirped, and beneath their melody the land thrummed.

  Drums?

  Harper drifted into sleep, her pain momentarily soothed. She thought she heard wings again, and a croaking, low voice inquiring, but she couldn’t muster the energy to understand the words, much less respond.

  When she woke, the ground still throbbed with a far-off rhythm. Her limbs felt stiff, her skin stretched sharply, as if it were splitting. Gasping, Harper paused. She drew her wings in, then rolled over with a sudden motion, her yell startling birds from their nighttime roost. Her eyes took in the barely visible stars. The sky was brightening to a washed-out navy blue, almost grey, with pink tinging the edges. Dawn was coming. She would fail in her task.

  Blank shadowy faces surrounded her. Long, transparent fingers trailed on her face and arms, and murmurs filled the air. Shadow people. Friends or foes?

  A red gash opened in the face of the one near her head, and a half-dozen rows of teeth gleamed at her. It chittered loudly and leaned in toward Harper.

  Near-death or not, her survival instinct was intact. Her body screamed for her to run. She managed to bolt upright, scattering the short shadow men. The nearest shadow bit her arm and she yelled, beating the creature against the ground until it let go, her blood coating its rows of teeth. She released her wings against the pain, though it was much less than before. Something the owl-women had done to her had accelerated the healing of her wounds. Most of them. Some of her feathers had melted together, others fell out and drifted to the ground as she flapped her wings. Could she fly? There was only one way to find out.

  The shadow men had scattered when her wings flared out, but now they crept forward. Harper ran at them, yelling and beating her wings. They fled back a few feet and she leapt, her wings catching the air. One side dipped dangerously. She fought to stay upright and failed, crashing to the ground in a gasping heap. She pushed to her feet again. Hands tugged on the edges of her wings, dragging her back down. She knelt, head lowered as she breathed.

  What was the point of this whole supposed quest if she was going to die now? One of the men approached her, the one with blood still staining its teeth, the only feature visible on its dark, oblong face. It stroked her face, her nose, her brow, and then it transformed before her eyes.

  Its shadow skin paled, became fleshy, grew in a blobby, disproportionate way until the features rearranged into something Harper recognized.

  Her own face.

  The body changed too, mimicking her crouch, getting every detail accurate down to the wound marks and scars and the fact that she wore no clothes. Brown eyes stared into hers. It reached a hand up, touched her forehead, and then phased through her skull. Harper’s eyes rolled back. She felt the shadow creature sifting through her memories until it found what it wanted, memories of her parents she barely remembered herself. The mentions of the tribe she sought in order to be reunited with her people.

  The shadow-Harper removed its hand. Harper’s vision returned to normal, watching the other version of herself grin and launch itself into the air while its companions swarmed her. Where was it going? Did it know where the tribe was? Would it reach them before her? Harper dug her hands into the ground, small rocks and dirt tumbling between her fingers. She clenched her teeth, and as th
e shadow form of herself flew away, becoming no more than a dark speck against the brightening sky, she faced the demons that surrounded her with the determination that she would either defeat them and follow the one that had stolen her image, or she would die here, in the land of her ancestors.

  ⇺ ⇻

  Chapter Fourteen

  Quinn

  Harper looked as if she’d been through hell and come back again. She smiled inspidly. “Don’t worry. I’m fine.”

  “But your clothes.” Quinn rushed to her side. “And how did you—”

  “Shhh…” Harper put a finger to his lips.

  Quinn blinked rapidly. She wasn’t acting like herself, but then, he didn’t know what she had been through the past few days. Hell, the past few years. Maybe this was a coping mechanism, or maybe he didn’t know her as well as he thought.

  “Welcome, granddaughter.” Chief Aguta stood and raised his arms. “You must be hungry.”

  “Famished.” Harper beamed. She sat on the right side of the chief. Food and water were brought to her. The rest of the tribe returned to music and dancing while she ate, still wrapped in that ridiculous blanket. Quinn kept peering around his grandfather, averting his eyes when the blanket flashed open. None of the tribal peoples seemed embarrassed by her sudden undressed appearance, but it wasn’t like Harper to be so unreserved, he knew that much.

  Quinn picked at a bowl of berries, listening to Chief Aguta tell her many of the same things he told Quinn. Harper nodded and smiled at the right places, but none of her strong opinions surfaced, and she never mentioned Tyson once. Had the man been killed or had they separated? How had she found the tribe?

  “I have a gift for both of you.” Chief Aguta stood and kissed his wife on the cheek when she brought him the wooden box Quinn had seen him with earlier. He opened the lid, then gestured for Quinn and Harper to stand. They obeyed, Quinn glancing at Harper from the corner of his eyes. Something about the way she stepped out of the firelight and into the chief’s shadow unnerved him.