Chapter 18
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
T wo nights camping in the desert with these brutish men had left a lot to be desired.
Drake was the only one of them who seemed to have any sense of hygiene, while the others spent far too much of their time burping, farting and spitting.
I didn’t even bother to hide my revulsion, my upper lip curling whenever they offended me with their uncouth behaviour, knowing they could do fuck all about my disgust with them as I was the map they needed to find the treasure.
I kept Azurea’s scale on me at all times, aware those arseholes kept sniffing around looking for it, knowing it would fetch a pretty price back in the city.
A scale which could summon a dragon? That held value in itself, and that was before you took into account the value of the material it was made of.
We packed up camp early and headed off before the sun had risen, getting the most out of the cooler hours of the day.
We were back to traipsing up and down the endless dunes, but luckily, we’d found a small stream back in the ravine and had managed to fill our water barrel which was strapped to one of the camels.
Drake and I had also taken the opportunity to wash while we could and I was endlessly glad of that.
We rode out into the darkness, the stars above the only source of light as we gained as much ground as we could before dawn.
We were getting close now, the cave waiting for us so near I could almost feel it with every mile we got under our belt.
But with that came trouble, because I had to find a way to escape these cutthroats after I was no longer useful to them.
And my plan at the moment was to hijack the camel who carried the water, because if I ran off without a drop of moisture with me, I was dead regardless.
As dawn arrived, the sun cresting the horizon and painting the desert gold, I reached for the vision Magdor had placed in me, finding no more directions gifted to me. It should have been here. Right here. And yet there was nothing for miles in every direction.
I drew my camel to a halt and Drake called out to slow the men as he trotted his camel to my side.
“Where next?” he demanded and I swallowed, looking around for some clue, but this was where the oasis should have been. The vision showed it to me clear as day, and yet there was nothing here in reality.
Fuck. What do I do?
“What’s going on?” Jador barked as he guided his camel towards us. “Where next, lawman?” he snarled.
I schooled my expression and pointed ahead of us. “That way.”
The others moved on immediately, but Drake caught my reins, leaning over so he could speak into my ear.
“You don’t look so sure about that, Cassius,” he hissed, and the murderous glint in his eyes made my hand rest on the hilt of my sword.
Before I could reply, a cry sliced through the air and we both turned sharply towards it, finding the men galloping out of sight over a dune on their camels, but I couldn’t see what had caused the stir.
“Maybe the treasure is beyond that dune,” I said hopefully, and Drake’s eyes sparkled like rhinestones at that possibility.
“Yah!” he cried, spurring his camel into a run and mine took off after his as we raced up the dune.
More cries carried back to us and my concern started to grow as we barrelled up the dune, because those didn’t sound like cries of joy. They sounded like ones of fear.
Drake forced his camel to a halt at the top of the dune, but the beast was moving so fast, it nearly stumbled down over the edge of it.
I caught hold of the saddle, bracing the beast and using my animal Affinity to try and send calming thoughts its way as Drake got control of it, my gaze dropping onto the men at the base of the dune and making my breath hitch in alarm.
The sand was moving, shifting like a roiling sea beneath them and a warning cry ripped from my throat on instinct, “Basilisks!” I bellowed, just as the first of the gigantic snakes exploded out of the sand beneath them.
Its scales blended perfectly with the golden sand, the creature able to camouflage itself in any surroundings.
Its head was huge and its eyes starkly white with razor sharp slits down the middle of them.
Curving fangs filled its mouth, but the four at the front were the largest of all, dripping with venom that could paralyse a horse with one drop.
One of the men fell from his camel with a scream, hitting the sand and getting a camel foot to the face as the animal fled.
Drake turned his camel back and I was about to do the same when a basilisk ripped out of the sand behind us, rising up like a cobra and lunging towards Drake.
He stabbed a knife through the air, slamming it up into the snake’s jaw, making it shriek and fall back.
But it only bought us a moment of time as two more burst from the sand, as large as three chariots stitched together.
“Go!” I barked as the men’s screams sounded behind us and they urged their camels to climb the dune in our direction.
“Don’t leave me!” the man on the ground wailed and one glance back showed me his end as one of the snakes swallowed him whole, his screams still echoing out from within its body for several agonising seconds.
Drake had circled the dunes and made it beyond the snakes which slithered back beneath the sand below us, and I tore after him, drawing my sword and swinging it as I readied to fight for my life.
Ahead of us, the horizon glistened, a wave of heat rippling on the edge of forever and my gaze snagged on it as it glimmered then changed, the sand seeming to shift as a rainbow of colours fanned across the dunes.
A snake burst from the ground ahead of my camel, making it honk in surprise, the words “Evil sand worm!” flaring in my head as my gifts picked up the animal’s fear.
I swiped the scimitar through the air in a deadly blow, the Forken sword like a dream to work with as it cut through skin and bone, beheading the basilisk in one clean strike.
The camel leapt clumsily over its body, honking again in panic as we took chase after Drake who was slashing his knife at any monster which struck at him or his steed.
A prickle of magic washed over me and an oasis appeared before us, stretching out ahead of us in place of the endless desert.
Two lush green mountains which shouldn't have existed in the Lyrian sat right at the heart of it, the rush of a stream and the call of birdsong sent my heart pattering and my lips parted in awe at this incredible defiance of nature.
“Into the oasis!” I roared, though it was unnecessary as everyone was clearly heading there as fast as their camels would carry them anyway.
I turned to the gang to find them smiling wickedly at the sight before us, proving that this was no illusion.
The snakes didn’t seem able to cross into it, slithering back into the sand as they got close and Drake whooped as he made it to safety.
The sand turned to grass beneath us and a cheer left my own throat as I pulled up alongside the thief, his wide smile bringing one to my own lips.
“Fuck me, that was fun,” Drake said and I sheathed my sword, unable to deny those words as the rest of the men made it to us.
I was kind of disappointed there were still six of them standing, because the odds of me making it out of here alive were heavily stacked against me.
It was also clearer than ever that Drake hadn’t been joking when he’d told me he cared not for any member of his gang – there wasn’t so much as a mention of the dead man as we turned to move further into the oasis and it was clear not one of the men surrounding me mourned him.
We delved into a deep forest of palm trees where the air was thick with moisture and laughter spilled from my lips at the relief of falling into the shade of this hidden paradise. I sighed under the shelter of the trees, the cooler air a blessing after days of baking in the sun.
A chorus of tropical birds sounded all around us and the gurgling of a river called us on.
It wasn’t long before we found it and we hurried forward, letting the camels take an eager drink.
Drake drew his animal up alongside mine as the gang dropped down and ran into the river to quench their thirst.
Drake tugged his cloak off and stripped his tunic too, tipping his head back and closing his eyes as he smiled up at the canopy of leaves overhead.
I eyed the tattoos on his skin once more, itching with questions over them as I took in their foreign shapes and intricate details.
There was something powerful about them, each of them so similar and yet somehow endlessly different all at once.
No piece was too close to another, the bare skin between them like a network of empty chasms which ran across his muscular body.
“Come on, Cassius, drink,” he commanded before dropping from the back of his own beast and moving to the stream to quench his own thirst.
I followed him to the soft ground, dunking my head beneath the cool water and relishing the feeling of the droplets running down my spine as I surfaced again. I drank long and deep, satisfying the burning desire in my body for moisture and sating my parched mouth.
But I didn’t linger any longer than it took to fulfil my most pressing needs.
I was anxious to get moving, wanting to get my hands on that coin in case Magdor had already found someone else to bribe into coming here.
A triumphant smile pulled at my lips. That coin was going to kiss the edge of my new sword and whatever foul intention she had for it would be vanquished as surely as I could manage.
I reached for the hilt of my blade, but found it missing, my heart lurching in surprise as I whirled around in search of it.
A glint of sunlight caught my eye and I turned to find Drake flipping the scimitar over in his grip casual as fuck, having unsheathed the blade after he'd stolen it. Again.