Chapter 53
CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE
Oslo.
—From Lyvia’s list.
We knelt in frigid, sodden hay. The dark space reeked. Bile threatened to rise in my throat as I took in the small, damp stone cell that Father Marcus had been given. His glossy eyes stared at the wall as Drystan took his frigid hands in his own, caked in blood and dirt from the day of battle.
A slice of guilt hit my chest as my mind shot to where Vienah sat six levels up, waiting to be tried.
The water witch’s cell was warm, clean, and dry, though, and the Rising soldiers stationed outside it were honorable.
I’d chosen them myself. She’d have a cot and fresh food and water.
Ronan had found and freed her family already.
I bristled at the tendril of concern squeezing my chest. Had she ever been my friend?
Drystan’s moon-like eyes were shadowed and dark, the invisible scars of battle carved into his solemn countenance. The Advetis Bone fluttered nervously on his chest as he neared Father Marcus, as if upset.
One day. It had taken one day to take the city and kill Saros. The finality of it left me drained but not lost. I was numb, but I knew where I was going, where I had to go next. But first…
“Father Marcus, can you hear me? It’s Lyvia and Drystan. We’ve come to help you,” I whispered. I wrapped a blanket around his gaunt shoulders, one of the few I’d found in the servants’ quarters that wasn’t being used for treating the wounded.
He rocked back and forth, muttering foreign words beneath his breath as his eyes darted around the wall.
I cleared my throat as Drystan ran his thumbs over the top of the priest’s bony hands.
“I found your journal,” I continued. “It helped me with the Obscura power. It was a bone. That’s what you were trying to tell me, right? A bone, not a stone.”
Dull eyes shot to mine before darting back to the wall.
“It won’t hurt you anymore,” I whispered, voice beginning to shake. “I can control it. It is mine now. No one will hurt you again.”
I scanned the dried blood on the floor of his cell and the various injuries that littered his arms and legs, rage returning to the chasm where my powers slept. Drystan’s eyes followed mine, his throat bobbing as a small pool of liquid formed in the corners.
“Come on,” I murmured, gently pulling on Father Marcus’s shoulders, doing my best to ease him to his feet. “We’re going up, away from this place.”
My voice broke as a small puddle of tears fell onto the amplifier on my chest. Father Marcus muttered under his breath, but he took my arm.
The moment his hand touched me, he screamed and jerked himself away, eyes wild. Drystan reached for his arms, pulling him back to his feet, but he convulsed, his frail body writhing out and crashing to the floor with a pained yelp.
What had they done to him? Had my power done this? A sob escaped my lips as I stepped toward him and he shuffled away, pulling the sodden hay along with him.
“Lyvia,” a voice echoed from down the hall, softer than I’d ever heard it.
Quiet, staggered steps followed, and I lifted my head to see Vulcan doing his best to hide his wince as he made his way down the aisle.
The gray fabric of his wrapped chest peeked out from beneath his shirt, and he looked pale, ragged.
He’d reluctantly stayed in the war tent after taking an arrow for me, directing our forces and adding his invaluable insight into our attack.
“You shouldn’t have come all the way down here,” I said, wiping the snot from my face and standing.
“I brought some help,” Vulcan said, jerking his head toward the stairwell without looking. My heart squeezed as Marian’s face popped in the doorway, and she hurried down the aisle. Her face was tired and anxious. She reached for my hand, squeezing it.
“You’re in Aedrialis,” I whispered.
The color drained from her face as she signed, “Let’s make this quick so I can get back.”
I nodded, motioning her to where Drystan inched toward Father Marcus as if approaching a caged animal.
“I’m not sure I’ll be able to help. He won’t—” I began as the arrival of another sounded from the stairwell.
Lord Astraeus sauntered down the aisle wearing an insufferable smirk as he spotted me.
I bristled at his appearance, barely a scratch on the man, his face free of paint and sea blue coat bright even in the dimness of the dungeon hall.
My eyes shot to Vulcan, who ignored my irritation.
Astraeus strode to the cell, smirk fading and dark eyes softening as he took in Father Marcus.
Marian knelt beside him, grasping his hand and placing a warm cup of tea against it.
Father Marcus muttered something under his breath, but his hands stopped shaking for a moment.
His eyes lifted to meet Marian’s. Her gasp was almost as shocking as the sob that followed.
Marian nearly dropped the cup of tea as tears formed in her eyes.
With help, Father Marcus brought the cup of tea to his lips and drank long and hard. Marian continued to stare at him for several long moments before Father Marcus closed his eyes and slumped back into Drystan’s chest.
I opened my mouth to ask Marian what had happened when something foreign and urgent tugged at my mind, and I went deathly still.
“What’s wrong?” Astraeus asked, the question more of a demand.
I shook my head and glowered at him. What was he doing here? Regardless of what magic he used, he’d made his thoughts about me clear enough. Alliances weren’t friendships, I reminded myself.
“Lyvia?” Vulcan asked.
I pinched my eyes shut, something strange and foreign pressing on me.
“I don’t know,” I whispered. I blinked my eyes open and scanned the surrounding cells, searching for the source of the intrusion. A growing sense of unease snaked its way up my core, prickling the hairs on my arms as that something tried again to tap against my consciousness.
“If feels,” I murmured, exiting Father Marcus’s cell and allowing my powers to rise to the surface, “like something is here. Someone is here…”
Vulcan stepped beside me and began moving down the line of cells. I followed him, closing my eyes as that sensation struck again.
“Not here,” I murmured, “lower. We need to go lower.”
Astraeus moved to my other side. “Stay with the priest,” he said to Vulcan with a trace of authority not missed by the elf. “Bring him up. I’ll stay with Lyvia.”
“The fuck you will,” Vulcan growled, his usual sneer plastered on his face.
Tap.
I pinched my eyes shut as bickering began.
Tap.
“You’re injured.”
Tap.
“You’re untrustworthy.”
Tap.
“You swore to protect her, but you’re injured.”
Tap.
Vulcan went still. “How—”
“At all costs.”
Tap. What were they talking about?
“Today, the cost is standing aside and letting another step in.”
Tap.
My head began to ache, and the space between my eyes burned white hot.
“Lyvia—”
A hand gripped my shoulder as I swayed.
Away. I needed to get away from this feeling. It pulled me down, deep below where we stood in the stone dungeons. My feet dragged as I made my way to the staircase. My boot hit the first step leading up out of the dungeons, and the tapping turned into a vicious pounding.
“Easy,” Astraeus murmured behind me.
I took another step up, a whimper fleeing my lips.
Fuck.
Tears slipped between the cracks in my lids as I continued to squeeze them shut. I dared another step, and blazing white pain ripped through my head. The edges of consciousness blurred in my mind.
My hand gripped Astraeus’s wrist as I backed up a step, and the pounding eased to a light tap.
Down. It was forcing me down.
Another step, and that consistent tapping lightened.
We followed the damp, stone staircase down until we came to a dark hall, the last set of cells in the dungeon below Mount Telum.
Astraeus lit a torch, and we wandered through the hall, checking cells that hadn’t been used for what looked to be hundreds of years.
I ran my fingers over the bars. Old cobwebs and dust coated every inch of the place.
“Here,” Astraeus murmured. “This is the only place that’s been disturbed recently.” He motioned to a barely visible square on the wall of the far end of the hall.
The dust had been smudged there, and as I stepped forward, the tapping turned persistent.
“How do we get through?” I asked.
“Are you sure you want to?” Astraeus replied, his dark eyes wary as he frowned at various symbols along the floor.
The answer was no, but I kept that to myself as I ran my fingers over the ribbed edging on the wall. My powers bucked in response.
“It’s definitely here,” I murmured, running my fingers over the words carved into the wall.
“The weapon rests above the cage, dormant until the return of the Hidden Hero’s enemy,” I recited, brows pinching at the riddle.
I’d barely finished when Astraeus’s arm wrapped around my waist and ripped me back as rows of thick, long spikes shoved through the surface.
My voice caught in my throat as I narrowly avoided being impaled.
I shoved at the pirate’s arm, still locked around my waist, as if he were just as shocked. He released me, and we cautiously approached. As we did so, the iron spikes sucked back into the wall.
“Fuck,” I breathed, my heart stammering.
My mind reached into the chasm of power where the golden light and shadows slumbered, but they were tired.
Whatever power Astraeus had used to refuel me left me uneasy with the pirate lord.
It was intimate, somehow, as if he’d gifted a piece of himself to me.
My reluctant gratitude edged against my constant irritation with him.
That persistent tapping returned, and I gritted my teeth. Okay, so we were doing this. Whatever this was.
I stepped back, and it turned dizzying. Left, the same.
But if I stepped to the right, the tapping softened.
My hand reached for the edge of the hidden door, and the tapping blazed behind my eyes.
I snatched my hand back, instead trying for the wall, where it softened.
I continued this game of hot and cold for several minutes until my fingers at last landed on a spoked wheel, so shallowly carved into the wall it was near invisible.
My fingers traced the edge, finding letters of the common tongue alphabet topping each spoke.
“Who is the Hidden Hero’s enemy?” I whispered into the darkness. The tapping intensified, as if it could hear me.
I replayed the words of King Saros, moments before his death. They are coming…
Xenelpha had called them the ehp'uch, Rhashtai for…
My fingers found the six different letters that spelled out a word I’d heard only once. With two hands, I rotated the wheel until each letter matched up with the small divot at the top, spinning it until the combination was complete, and the wheel sank with a groan into the stone.
Embodied.
The hidden door hissed as it clicked. The thick stone inched forward at an angle, allowing the soft red glow of the hidden chamber to creep into the hall. A dome of iron rods, bent and curved in an elaborate cage, surrounded the Stone Witch.