Chapter 26
CHAPTER 26
Rekosh was going to be torn asunder as he marched to the enemy camp behind a pair of Claws.
All his thoughts, feelings, and instincts were in conflict. Fear and fury continued warring in his core. He needed to fight for his mate, to free her, to kill everyone who was threatening her. But if he fought, they would hurt Ahmya.
They would kill her.
To act would hasten her end. To continue onward in submission would only delay the inevitable.
These vrix, still fanatically loyal to Zurvashi, would not spare Rekosh and Ahmya’s lives. Whatever choice he made, the ultimate outcome would be the same.
He could not change that…but neither could he accept it. And the last few embers of his hope were struggling to remain alight against reality’s relentless deluge.
His internal strife was clawing at his hearts when they reached their destination.
A barrier of branches and brambles ringed the encampment. Rekosh and his friends had sometimes created such barriers to protect their camps, using them to deter overly curious or hungry beasts. But he’d never beheld any quite so tall and long as this.
Standing at the center of that thorn ring was a tall tree, from which a circular platform was suspended by thick silk strands. Two Claws, with barbed spears in hand, gestured from atop the platform.
Ulkari shoved Rekosh into the Camp, hard enough to make him stumble. Heat swept across his back, radiating from the place she’d touched. It was an itch beneath his hide that could not be scratched. A churning in his gut that would not settle.
“Shall I take the lead if you wish me to stride faster?” he grumbled, exerting force on his bindings. The silk creaked and bit into his hide but didn’t give by even a threadspan.
“Close your mouth,” Ulkari growled, striking the back of his head with the blunt end of her spear.
He stumbled again, the thunk of impact echoing through his skull. But the pain, like the many others throughout his body, was distant. Dull. And he was tempted to risk inviting another blow by glancing back to steal a glimpse of Ahmya, who, with her arms tied behind her back and her legs bound together, was being carried over a Fang’s shoulder like a beast to slaughter.
Rekosh clenched his jaw and squeezed his fists against a fresh surge of anger. He couldn’t do anything with that emotion. Not yet, not until an opportunity presented itself…
Or until one was made.
So, he forced himself to study the camp. There were numerous structures within, shelters crafted of wood, silk rope and cloth, and leaves. Most looked as though they’d been exposed to the weather for at least a few eightdays.
Beneath some of those shelters were racks holding weapons—war spears and barbed spears, blackrock axes, fanged clubs, and hide shields. Though he could not count them all as he moved, there were far more weapons than vrix, even when adding the two lookouts on the platform to the party of eight that had captured him and his mate.
This encampment wasn’t merely for survival. Like Needle’s Point all those years before, this was a staging place for an attack. This was a war camp.
Yet while Needle’s Point had been days of hard striding from Kaldarak, this place was less than a single day’s journey from the thornskulls’ home.
“You have returned sooner than expected,” a female called from ahead in a deep, authoritative voice, drawing Rekosh’s attention to her.
The female wore adornments typical of Fangs under Zurvashi—a broad leather belt, a yatin hide gorget with gold bands around her neck, gold arm bands, and jewelry inlaid with sparkling gems. But those trappings were paired with long, flowing white silk wraps reminiscent of a spiritspeaker’s garb. Three lines of pale gray ash were smeared down her face, one along the center, between her eyes, the others to either side of them.
Another female, dressed similarly, stood beside and just behind her. They were flanked by a pair of males in tattered, soot-stained silk wraps.
“Prime Speaker Ogahnkai.” Ulkari slammed a leg down on Rekosh’s hindquarters, driving him down onto his leg joints. “We return bearing unexpected bounty.”
A few segments to Rekosh’s side, Nuriganas strode forward, bent down, and dropped Ahmya onto the ground. The human hit the dirt with a grunt and curled on her side. Her dark hair was tousled, and her skin was dirty, bruised, and scraped.
“Ahmya!” Rekosh threw himself toward her only to be halted by Ulkari grabbing hold of his arms and forcing more weight down onto his hindquarters. His legs dug into the ground, seeking purchase to thrust him forward, but they only slid and scratched the dirt .
Ogahnkai stepped closer to Ahmya, head tilted and red eyes ablaze.
Ulkari hooked a thick arm around Rekosh’s neck as his struggles gained new desperation.
He choked out his mate’s name, all his awareness focused on her—and the hulking female approaching her. Ahmya had never looked so small, so helpless, so fragile, not even next to Ahnset or Nalaki.
“One of Ketahn’s creatures,” Ogahnkai rumbled. She extended a huge foreleg and tentatively touched Ahmya with the tip, prompting a soft, frightened gasp from the human and a roar from Rekosh.
“Not his gold haired mate, but this one still bears a vrix mating scent…” Ogahnkai flicked her gaze to Rekosh, mandibles twitching closer together. “Your mother fought for Takarahl with honor, weaver, and yet you have betrayed all we are to be lured into this thing’s trap!”
Do not touch her.
She is mine.
Do not touch!
However much he might’ve wanted to, he could not get those words out through Ulkari’s crushing hold on his neck. All that emerged were furious, raged snarls and growls.
Reaching down, Ogahnkai grasped the front of Ahmya’s dress and lifted her off the ground. The vrix leaned down, shoulders rising and falling with heavy breaths. Those mandible fangs were much, much too close to Ahmya’s head.
Hands clenched behind her back with knuckles gone pale, Ahmya met Ogahnkai’s withering gaze and held it.
Rekosh’s rear legs sank into the ground. He shoved hard on them, dragging Ulkari forward.
With a bone-shaking growl, Ulkari fell partly atop Rekosh before catching herself. The fanged club at her hip swung down, the sharp shards and teeth biting at his hide. He hissed at the pain.
One of those shards snagged on the rope around his wrists.
Movement to either side marked Ulkari’s companions rushing over to help restrain him.
He ensured the rope was hooked firmly as the males grabbed hold of him. It dragged across the shard, and he felt the faint vibrations as threads frayed.
Immediately, he tested the damage, pushing out on his arms, twisting his wrists, putting whatever strain he could on the frayed rope. But it wasn’t enough. Not yet.
Ogahnkai chittered and smoothed a palm over Ahmya’s hair. “Such spirit. In the weaver’s struggles, and in this creature’s eyes. Our queen will surely be pleased.”
“Your queen is dead,” Rekosh growled.
Ulkari caught his hair at the back of his head and shoved the side of his face into the dirt.
Glaring at Rekosh, the Prime Speaker released Ahmya, letting her fall to the ground, and rose slowly, menacingly. “Death holds no sway over one such as our queen. Our queen of ash and bone, god of the Tangle and all within it!”
She spun around and bowed reverently; the three vrix accompanying her did the same, and all repeated those words in a devoted murmur.
Our queen of ash and bone.
Only then did Rekosh see what had been behind the four of them all along.
A towering figure clad in polished gold adornments and vibrant purple silk—a skeletal female vrix. Her arms were outstretched, clawed fingers spread menacingly, and her jaw hung agape, revealing her sharp teeth. The black of her empty eye sockets was impossibly deep, brimming with hunger and malice.
The embodiment of death .
“Oh my God,” Ahmya rasped.
Terror’s cold hands closed around Rekosh’s hearts and squeezed, sinking their claws in to sap all the heat and strength from his body.
Zurvashi.
She was here. Somehow, she was here, and…
He drew in a burning breath as his hearts jolted into a rapid, punishing rhythm.
No, it wasn’t Zurvashi. It was Zurvashi’s remains. He could see the dark silk string neatly wound around the blackened bones, attaching them to each other and to a framework of sticks and posts rising from the large, flat stones stacked beneath the skeleton.
“She is more now,” Ogahnkai declared. “Our queen. The Queen. Greater than the Eight, she is the ruler of all vrix, and our paltry offering shall hasten her return to this world of hide and blood.”
Ahmya turned her head to meet Rekosh’s gaze. Her eyes expressed so much in that fleeting moment. Her fear and uncertainty, yes, but also her love.
That look shattered his hearts and bolstered them at once because it also conveyed a simple but profound understanding.
Rekosh and Ahmya were the offerings.
No.
He could not fail to protect her again, no matter how impossible the situation seemed. He could not fail .
As Ogahnkai and her cloth-clad companions straightened, Ulkari pushed herself upright, crushing Rekosh beneath her weight. No sooner was she off him than he was hauled up off the ground by the Claws who’d come to her aid.
He bent his wrists sharply, seeking the damaged rope with his long claws, oblivious to the pain of the angle.
With his head up, he could now see what lay before the skeletal shrine. A square pit, three segments across and two deep, filled with branches and twigs. Beneath the fresh wood was a layer of gray soot, ashen lumber, and charred bones he could only hope had belonged to animals.
The clothed males strode away from the pit to retrieve a large basket filled with dried leaves, grass, and fronds.
“Today, my queen, your will is done,” Ogahnkai called, spreading her arms wide. “Two of your enemies face your justice.”
Moving in unison, the males threw handfuls of kindling into the pit. Dry as it appeared, it was likely to light quickly.
“Do not do this,” Rekosh said, voice steady despite his breaths coming increasingly quick and shallow. “You will regret it.”
One of his claws caught the rope and dragged across it.
With a quiet sound of discomfort, Ahmya rolled and rose onto her knees.
“You are in no place to make threats,” Ulkari grated from beside Rekosh.
“It is no threat. Only truth.”
He heard the clinking of gold as Ulkari shifted, and he braced himself for another blow.
But Ogahnkai twisted to look back at him, making a sharp gesture with one hand. “Allow him to speak. For one who has woven so many words, it is only fitting that his last will be spoken before our queen.”
Ulkari growled. No blow came.
Pushing outward to keep the rope taut, Rekosh managed to scrape his claw across it again. A few more threads gave. It seemed so small a thing, but he knew that sometimes all it took was a single thread. A single thread could change everything.
Ahmya sank onto her haunches, placing her hands just above the rope wound tightly around her booted ankles. Her slender little fingers sought the knot.
She couldn’t possibly outrun a vrix, but it meant she wasn’t defeated yet. She hadn’t resigned herself to the fate these vrix had chosen for her.
Swallowing his rage, he said in English, “These will not be my last words, my wife.”
His mate looked at him, but he only briefly met her gaze. She took a deep breath, squared her shoulders, and nodded. “These will not be our last moments, my husband.”
“You have family in Takarahl, Ulkari,” Rekosh continued in vrix even as he carefully worked at the rope with his claw, ignoring the ache in his wrists. “A sister. Urshar. Do you not wish to see her again?”
Ulkari’s body bristled with tension and radiated fury. “So now you threaten my?—”
“No,” Rekosh replied with a snap of his mandible fangs. “Ahnset is queen in Takarahl, and?—”
“A false queen,” one of the nearby males declared.
Ahmya’s littlest finger hooked the knot, which she delicately drew toward her other fingers.
Rekosh made sure not to look at her directly. Right now, the other vrix thought her beneath their notice, and that was the only advantage she had.
“Regardless,” he said, “Ahnset controls Takarahl. And your sister thrives there.” With no small effort, he swept his gaze across the other vrix. “All of you have family in Takarahl. Brood siblings, mothers and sires, broodlings of your own. They all dwell in peace now. But what you seek to do here will threaten that peace.
“You are warriors.” Cowards. “I am but a weaver, yet I can see that your battle need not continue. The cloth of Takarahl has been frayed and torn, but it may well be woven anew. It may be made stronger than ever. Lay down this cause and return to Takarahl, to your families, to peace.”
Sizzling heat coursed through his veins, flooding his limbs and making his hide crawl with the need to take action. And thread by thread, he kept up his silent assault on his bindings.
I will kill you all with my bare claws and fangs. I will paint my hide with your blood for harming my mate, for threatening her, for frightening her.
You will pay with your lives.
“But I promise you,” he continued, “there will be no peace for any of you should you proceed. You will call the wrath of Takarahl and Kaldarak alike upon you. That need not be. Together, we can make our home whole.”
Ulkari snarled, clamping a hand on his shoulder in a crushing grip, but Ogahnkai chittered. The sound was unsettlingly light, airy, and uncaring.
Ahmya tugged on a loop. The knot loosened.
Ogahnkai stared at Rekosh as the silk-clad males returned the basket to its place.
Out of time. We are almost out of time.
“Weakness,” Ogahnkai said. “That is all such words have ever been, all they could ever be.” She brought her upper fists together with her elbows out, creating a triangle, and mirrored the gesture with her lower arms. The result wasn’t the sign of the Eight, but a closed shape with four sides and four points.
Her booming voice echoed over the camp. “Hear me, for I am her Prime Speaker, and I speak with her voice.”
No. No, no…
Rekosh dug his legs into the ground, struggling against the holds of Ulkari and the males, his hearts thundering just as loud as the Prime Speaker’s voice. The rope around his wrists still held.
The clothed males returned, each carrying a crude clay bowl from which blue-green flames flickered.
By their eightfold eyes, no!
Ulkari grunted as Rekosh advanced by a handspan. The males behind him wrenched back on his arms, throwing their weight against his.
“The only true strength lies in action!” Ogahnkai shouted. “In nourishing the jungle’s roots with blood. The only true might is wielded by conquerors. And the greatest of conquerors is Zurvashi, the one true queen! Our queen of ash and bone, who will rise and conquer these lands once more!”
Another piece of Ahmya’s knot loosened, and her ankles separated by a finger’s width.
Ogahnkai lunged at the human.
“No!” Everything within Rekosh tightened with cold, devastating pressure.
Ogahnkai’s hand closed on Ahmya’s dress. She yanked the human off the ground and flung her into the pit.
Ahmya screamed.
Rekosh roared and surged forward, dragging his captors with him. He felt the sound in his chest, in his throat, shredding and clawing, but he could not hear anything over the echoing scream of his heartsthread.
He had to get to his mate. Had to tear through these vrix, no matter how many there were, no matter how much blood he had to spill.
At the edge of the pit, the two males poured their bowls of flaming spinewood sap onto the kindling.