6. Chapter Five
6
William
T hey couldn’t risk staying by a reeking carcass with a living beast searching for them and an injured fae. Even while Nicholas was unconscious, William’s Sight struggled against his obstructive light. The strings tethered through him burned hotter than a campfire. Catching the strings between his fingers, William retreated with a frustrated hiss. No doubt the bastard would survive without help with that kind of energy swirling inside of him, protecting itself, but they couldn’t risk waiting around.
“We can’t stay here, so we must move him.” William grasped Nicholas’ shoulders. Charmaine took the fae’s legs. Arden moved ahead without disagreement, searching for a safer place to make camp.
Once they found a thicker grove of trees, Arden searched for a water source under William’s orders. He didn’t have his satchel full of herbs and potions. He had to rely on the Sight alone, hoping Nicholas’ power would ease up so he could stitch the fae together.
“Will he live?” Charmaine asked from where they perched beneath towering pines, shielded by their shadows.
“Yes, but I am not risking pushing myself for him. We will do some of this the old-fashioned way,” he replied.
Those who didn’t have the Sight saw magic as limitless. Those with the Sight understood magic as a muscle. The muscle needed to be worked, tended to, eased into strength, and used regularly or it would lose that strength. But like any muscle, push too far and that muscle shreds. Mages have died reaching for more power than they had. That’s why many used balancing agents. Fire mages carried lighters or matches to build flames rather than create a spark from nothing. Healers used natural healing remedies to enhance their abilities.
Arden returned carrying two full buckets made of smooth stone, a conjuring of strange fae magic. Water sloshed over the sides. He dropped them at William’s feet.
“The water must be clean. Start a fire and boil it,” William ordered.
Based on his snarl, Arden didn’t take kindly to his tone, though did as instructed. Waving a hand, branches snapped from trees. Arden gathered the wood to build a fire. Charmaine snapped her fingers and fire sparked, biting at Arden’s fingers. He cursed and may have shared a tart remark if he caught her cheeky smile.
Roots sprung from the soil to link above the fire, creating a pole to hang the buckets from. Charmaine helped by encouraging the flames until the water boiled. Then she tugged the bucket over to where William situated Nicholas on his side, preventing the dirt from gathering in his wound. This wasn’t ideal, but he had to run water over the wound to remove any remaining acid. He ripped the edge of his sleeve off to use as a rag. Also not ideal. He wet the makeshift rag and dabbed at the wound, then they rotated Nicholas on his opposite side.
“What are you doing?” Arden bit when William retrieved his military knife. He held the blade to Charmaine. Fire crept over her fingers to heat the metal.
“I must cut the infested area out first. A scalpel would do better, but you fae heal quickly. I imagine a shade heals even faster.” He took the blade from Charmaine and got to cutting.
“What is the purpose of healing mages who cannot heal?”
“I will not hear of that from a fae, creatures capable of almost purely destructive magic.”
Stories said a rare few could heal among fae, typically those of such ancient lineage, all had forgotten from whence they came. The average fae naturally healed, capable of surviving deadly wounds, even regrowing limbs, so long as the injuries weren’t from iron. For whatever reason, iron burned the fae, made their skin blister and wounds fester. Fae had such unnatural dispositions, but that disposition saved Nicholas’ life. He would have died the moment the acid hit otherwise.
Arden muttered about worthless dregs, then fell silent. He should be more grateful. William did not intend to spare Nicholas. He was damn lucky Arden arrived and Charmaine made an excellent point. They needed each other out here, even if he believed the world didn’t need someone like Nicholas.
War is a product of individual choices. William believed the world would be better without certain individuals and created a list of those to be purged if the chance arose. His father, Robert, wouldn’t be proud. He believed in compromise, in avoiding hostility at all costs. William wished he still did, too, but his father wasn’t here, didn’t see what he had, didn’t live through what he had. At least that’s what he told himself in the late nights when nightmares prevented any sleep, when his father visited to curse him for his misdeeds.
You said I’d learn to survive. I have for you, for Mom, for my brothers, but you wouldn’t like what I’ve become, he thought.
“How far do you suppose we are from camp?” Charmaine gazed into the silent woods that a breeze wouldn’t dare to disturb. The limbs of the trees stretched toward them like ghostly fingers calling to their souls, beckoning them to a world of sorrow.
“Those beasts were swift. We could be miles away, but the generals will have likely sent a search party,” William replied. A party to save Nicholas more than the others.
Nicholas groaned and twitched. Charmaine held tighter, and he cut faster. A crack of thunder warned of a coming storm. The sky in the Deadlands remained solemn gray, so none could predict from which direction a storm would come, or if it would miss them entirely.
“Conjure us a shelter,” William ordered.
Arden’s mouth twisted, warning of a cutting remark.
“We can’t move further with all our injuries and I don’t think you want Nicholas waking soaked and covered in mud because you wouldn’t set up shelter,” William added. He didn’t care if Arden enjoyed taking orders or not. If he knew what was best for him, then he would listen, and he did.
Vines breached the soil to coil around one another. By the time William finished removing Nicholas’ damaged skin, a small hut sheltered them. The vines rose in a dome shape, entangling themselves and their leaves. Charmaine lit the enclosure with a single flame flickering on the ground. The fire did little to warm them, but they couldn’t risk more out here. None knew what may await them in the forest.
William healed what he could, biting his inner lip to stifle his annoyed groans. Every string he plucked, each gentle request he gave to his magic, was met by Nicholas’ eternal fire. The tips of his fingers tingled like a sheet of paper repeatedly cut them. It was an irritating pain, but Nicholas’ skin stitched little by little, preventing further bloodshed and infection.
Afterward, William pondered how to best bandage him. None of them had provisions. Arden had the cleanest jacket. He earned a handful of dry remarks for demanding the garment and tearing the fabric to shreds. When he instructed the fae to seek herbs, too, Arden had the rage of a killer in his eyes. Though he did not take a life, merely snorted and stormed off.
“Now, let us take a look at your shoulder. At least for my sake, please,” Charmaine demanded once Nicholas had been bandaged and carefully laid on his uninjured side.
She hunkered beside William, peeling back the uniform to expose a gash from the front of his shoulder to the back. He stifled a yelp when Charmaine cleaned the wound. Now that the adrenaline died off, the pain emerged. His hand hovered over the wound. The gash stitched itself together. That’s when William felt the tug, the warning of magic telling him to stop. He rolled his aching shoulder, knowing he would need rest before he healed anything else.
“I did not want to say so earlier, but I am fairly certain Arden used me as bait,” Charmaine whispered. Her gaze shifted to the low opening of the hut. “The monster that grabbed us followed yours. When you fell, ours dropped, too. I jumped into a group of trees that softened the fall, but I didn’t see Arden anywhere, not until the beast bit me.”
Charmaine glanced at her leg, where the beast caught her in its jaws. When they met earlier, five puncture wounds ran from her ankle to her knee. William sealed the wounds, but a gruesome bruise remained.
“When I thought the beast would kill me, Arden appeared. He dealt a head injury that startled it enough to fly off. Then we heard another monster howling and Arden went running,” she finished.
“That isn’t surprising. They’re fae. We can’t trust them. We may rely on each other to get out of here, but always expect the worst.” When William said that, he didn’t expect the worst to arrive so quickly, and as a dozen spions rather than murderous fae.
First came their familiar hissing sounds and the skittering of their legs through the pines. Charmaine and William leapt out of the hut. She thrust her revolver into his grasp. The fireballs forming in her palm would do more than well against spions. William clutched the weapon. A quiver of excitement trickled through his limbs.
The spions vaulted from branches and scuffled over the forest floor. Their webs sprang forth, landing in the space he previously occupied. He pivoted, catching the attention of one six-eyed fiend. The spion reared on its hind legs, stinger oozing poison and saliva slick on its fangs. Two more spions appeared at his side. In front of him, Charmaine roasted three with a wave of fire. The survivors shrieked and climbed the evergreens.
“Keep your eyes up!” He dashed for the spion in front of him. The spion sprang, as expected. They were lethal, not smart, and this would save on bullets.
Falling to his knees, he slid across the forest floor, blade up. The knife caught the spion’s underbelly, its weakest point, and sliced clean through. The spion fell, legs still twitching. He jumped to avoid the webbing of the other two. The silk caught the tip of his boot. He wouldn’t get that free, so he yanked his foot out. A stinger jabbed the empty boot.
With two on him, he pointed the revolver in the face of one and fired at the eyes. Their armor was unnaturally thick and sometimes required an entire clip of bullets to break through. Their eyes were the safest bet for a frontal assault. One shot and the spion fell. A pincher snapped at his wrist. William spun and dropped to a knee where he jabbed the revolver against its belly and fired.
Wailing, the spion hastily retreated. Another took its place, the stinger lurching forward. William felt the air graze by his cheek, mere millimeters from the poison. He sliced at the stinger. The blade didn’t cut through armor, but the spion skipped backward from potential danger. Though Charmaine boiled a dozen, now scattered around the campsite, a dozen more sprang from the trees.
“Where are they coming from?” William shouted.
“We must be near a nest.” Charmaine cupped her hands to her mouth and released a tower of flames, cutting through six more. Sweat trickled on her brow. They were exhausted. If they didn’t end this soon, her magic would warn of catastrophe.
“Maybe that’s why the damn fae is taking so long. He got himself trapped in a web.” William would have laughed if he wasn’t busy gutting another spion.
As if summoned, Arden sprinted into the campsite. A murderous wrath of vines and roots flared from his form, lashing out at nearby spions and slicing them to ribbons. His obstinate grin spoke of destruction. William ordered Charmaine to duck in time for Arden to spin the roots into a thin line, sharp as a blade, and sent them forward. The makeshift sickle sliced through most of the beasts. Two spions sprinted toward the forest. Lurching to her feet, Charmaine summoned a massive fire and swept the flames along. The fire hit their marks, cooking the spions instantaneously.
Charmaine spun on Arden, a fire encased hand pointing accusingly at him. “You could have killed us!”
“But I didn’t.” Arden spun daintily on his heel. “In fact, I saved us all. You’re welcome.”
“Where have you been?” William asked, gesturing for Charmaine to burn the silk from his stuck boot.
“Collecting herbs, as you wanted.” Arden shoved a hand into his pocket to reveal a small collection of sage. “I couldn’t find food, although we have enough of that now.”
And none were happier for it, even Arden grimaced. Spion legs could be cooked, though they chewed like melted wax and tasted bitter no matter what one added to them. With their injuries, and not knowing how far to travel, awful food was better than no food.
“Then I heard the buggers,” Arden continued. “First one or two, then more. I wasn’t certain they were heading this way, but I turned back, heard gunfire, and here we are.”
“You didn’t come across a nest?” asked Charmaine. William held himself steady on her arm as he slipped his freezing foot back into its boot.
“No, not any sign of one either. No webbing or animal carcasses,” Arden replied.
“Then what are they all doing here? I don’t believe in coincidences, so they didn’t happen upon us,” William said, gazing about the forest. With the shade of the evergreens and oncoming night, shadows suffocated the woods and the threats waiting among them.
None truly knew what awaited them here. Once, the Deadlands had been farming villages known for their abundance of wool and grain. Then Fearworn had been chased out of Faerie and found his home here. The villagers weren’t prepared. They had no idea what was happening until Fearworn raised the mountains and called forth storms to make a once fertile land desolate. So few escaped and their accounts varied that no information on the Deadlands was considered accurate.
“They could have heard that ruckus earlier with the beast.” Arden waved a dismissive hand. “What does it matter? You said we can’t risk moving. We’ll cook these legs up. The fire mage and I can maintain a flame. One of us will always keep watch. That’s the most we can do.”
That was all well and good except another attack came by the following afternoon; two debraks rushed through the forest directly for them. William did not miss the horror in Arden’s voice when one beast slammed their fist through the hut. Nicholas laid beneath the rubble, dirty and suffering from a fever, but unharmed.
By evening on the second day, fifty ratwings descended from the sky. The bastards reminded William of the monsters that carried them from the encampment, the leathered wings and long muzzles. Although, ratwings were about the size of a house cat with the body of a rat and the teeth of a shark. One took a nasty chunk out of Arden’s arm. Another ripped the tip of Charmaine’s ear off, and William damn near lost two fingers.
“We can’t risk staying here any longer. These beasts keep coming. I’ve used all the sage on Nicholas and it isn’t safe for us to search for more. We must be near one of Fearworn’s cursed Shimmers or you aren’t telling us something.” William pointed an accusing finger at Arden.
The fae pressed a hand to his chest, feigning offense. “I beg your pardon, but I have been of tremendous help, and you refuse to treat me with an ounce of kindness. Besides, moving Nicholas would be a poor decision with his fever.”
“The fever broke this morning,” William argued and took another gander at the sleeping fae.
Their healing capabilities were beyond his comprehension. Two days ago, Nicholas was on the brink of death. Any mortal would have died instantly. Now, he had little more than a bruise along his torso. The shade would have woken already, if not for the unusual fever.
William often dabbed the sweat from his skin, hating how, like this, Nicholas was more than tolerable. Fae were blessed with far too much. Wickedly handsome, a set of crimson lips that feigned sweetness, Nicholas Darkmoon had an aura of otherworldly beauty, ethereal enough to make one question if he were real. Of course, the fae always ruined his dastardly handsome face by opening his cursed mouth. Perhaps a shit personality was the price one paid for beauty.
“And yet he continues to sleep. Perhaps I should be suspicious of you.” Arden’s eyes flashed a more brilliant red. “Has the human taken this chance to seek revenge? Have you done something to keep him sleeping?”
“Don’t be ridiculous. I wouldn’t kill him with witnesses around.”
Charmaine guffawed, and the flame in the hut flickered. “Can the two of you go one day without arguing? I beg of you. You’re getting on my last nerve.”
“And what will you do then?” asked Arden. “Throw a fireball at me?”
Charmaine took a loud crunching bite of a spion leg that made Arden grimace. He flinched with every loud crunch of her teeth and gagged when she started chewing with her mouth open purely to annoy him.
Arden ignored her and asked, “If you haven’t poisoned him, why hasn’t Nicholas awoken yet?”
“With that tone, I’d dare to say you care for him,” William replied mockingly.
“Care is not a word within my vernacular. Nicholas must survive and thrive because he is one of the few who can defeat Fearworn.”
“I will defeat him,” a groggy voice spoke. Nicholas’ eyes fluttered open. The once vibrant rose color dulled to an ashy pink hue, and his skin had a sickly sheen.
Arden assisted Nicholas into a seated position. He leaned against the wall of the hut, pinched eyes peering about.
“What happened?” he asked.
Arden knocked one of the water buckets against Nicholas’ thigh. He dunked a cupped hand in to drink.
“You almost died against one of Fearworn’s beasts,” Arden explained.
“You likely would have died had Albie and I not tended to your wounds,” William added. “And we’ve been under constant attack from monsters who seem exceptionally keen on killing you.”
Nicholas cleared his throat. His voice held a deep huskiness from his sleep. “Of course, Fearworn wishes me dead.”
“Yes, but only grumps have intelligence. The others are controlled by a shadowed disciple’s will, so spions, debraks, and ratwings continuously falling upon us? That isn’t a coincidence. They know we’re here, somehow, so I suggest we move on.”
“Moving on won’t do much good.”
“What do you mean by that?” Charmaine asked.
Arden leaned against Nicholas to whisper in his ear, a desperate hand clutching his bicep. If the bastard thought anything of Arden’s warnings, he revealed nothing. The shade kept his gaze on William, lips parted to show the pointed canines behind.
“Answer my riddle correctly and I’ll tell you why the monsters are appearing.” Nicholas smirked. Even the previously miffed Arden got a sparkle in his eye from the mention of a riddle.
“Now is not the time for games,” William argued.
“This is no game. It is a riddle. What learns but cannot read, is moved but also confined, and all of us hide?” The gaze Nicholas shared belonged to that of a child discovering starlight for the first time. The excitement grew every second that passed without an answer, with the possibility of having stumped William.
“The mind,” he replied, rolling his eyes when Nicholas clapped.
“Oh, delightful. That was easy, here’s another—”
“You said you would tell us about the monsters if I answered correctly.”
Nicholas’ shoulders deflated and lips pursed into a pout that William looked away from unless he admitted something regretful.
“You spoil my fun, but fine, attacking Lockehold wasn’t merely about taking the stronghold. My kin have always kept watch over the Deadlands. They heard of a shadowed disciple among Fearworn’s ranks called The Creator. Fearworn supposedly conjured ideas of monsters and this Creator assisted in stitching them together. That same Creator traveled to another Scar outside of the Deadlands and was returning, thus passing through Lockehold. None of us wanted to miss the opportunity, so we laid siege and I burned that Creator to ash. Now,” Nicholas plucked a leather-bound book from the interior of the jacket Charmaine gave him during his fever. She and William shared confused looks about how the book got there. Damn fae tricks.
“I have Fearworn’s book of monsters that has a mighty aura. Not one a human would notice, but shadowed disciples and monsters might,” Nicholas declared.
“Book of monsters.” Charmaine pressed a hand to her bruised leg. “So those beasts that grabbed us from camp?”
“Likely written about in these pages, although I’ve barely begun the translations. From what I’ve read, Fearworn has summoned new beasts from the Scars, but nothing of the magnitude that we saw. He’s creating a fucked up puzzle constructed of monster parts and testing their capabilities” Nicholas had such an intense intrigue in his eyes that one could drown. “How thrilling.”
“This is far from thrilling,” William snarled. “If he succeeds in creating an army of new beasts, we’ll lose so much of what we’ve achieved. This war may continue another decade and there is no telling who the winner will be.”
“Exactly. Thrilling.” Pressing a hand to the wall, Nicholas rose on unsteady feet. “Though it burns me to admit, I owe you a life debt, William Vandervult.”
“I want nothing from you.”
“Regardless, you are owed.” Nicholas caught William’s gaze. He believed, for a moment, that Nicholas would divulge how he would have taken his life had Arden not arrived. Instead, the fae continued, “I will repay my debt when the time arises. Now, where is the monster’s corpse? I must examine it.”
“Have you gone truly mad?” William barked, incapable of comprehending the fae’s stupidity. “We are under constant attack because of that book. The other beast is out there, and you want to return to the rotting corpse?”
“Yes. It’s invaluable. The beast had to be of Fearworn’s creation. It may help me understand more of the journal and what both our armies may be up against in the future. This is worth the risk.” Nicholas tossed Charmaine’s jacket onto her lap. He exited the hut with remnants of his shirt clinging to his wide shoulders and Arden in tow.
“This is an utterly poor decision,” Charmaine muttered.
“Fae are known for them,” said William, as they begrudgingly followed anyway.