Chapter Twenty Inana
Chapter Twenty
Inana
The corpse stands upright and headless for several seconds before it falls limp to the ground, blood and shadows streaming from its wound.
I don’t know when I rose to my feet. Maybe it was when Dominic did.
Maybe I’ve been standing for minutes on end.
All I know is the terror that courses through me.
The disgust. I managed to keep my composure until now, my nerves steady despite the horrifying sight the fire revealed in the clearing.
Despite the Incarnate.
Its uncanny imitation of a living being.
The unsettling wrongness in all the aspects it couldn’t mimic.
Now, as I watch the creature die, watch its skin char beneath its own shadows and melt from bone, every ounce of composure I kept fades away. My body shudders with tremors, my heart races like it will burst from my chest, and nausea churns in my—
My stomach lurches, and it takes all my restraint not to heave its contents beside the fire. If I did, I’d only make a mess of myself, masked as I am. I crouch down, no longer able to hold myself up. Sloth whines and nudges my cheek while a rough hand pulls me to my feet.
“We have to go, Inana.” I belatedly realize it’s Dominic’s voice.
It carries a note of concern, but it’s gentle too.
Shame sweeps over me. Gods, I’m pathetic to react this way.
“No,” he says, and I realize I muttered the words out loud.
He braces my shoulder with a palm, strong and firm.
“Anyone would feel the way you do after seeing an Incarnate for the first time. I know I did.”
I lift my eyes, take in Dominic’s face. It’s splattered with blood, which almost makes my stomach lurch all over again, but his dark gaze steadies me.
My mind clears slightly, and I remember I’m not the only Summoner here.
A melody weaves behind me, and I turn to find Bard, his hands shaking as he strums his mandolin.
There’s a harshness to every chord, like he too is struggling through the terror of what we just witnessed.
Or perhaps it’s due to the Shades that stalk us outside the firelight.
One paces on four limbs, its arms longer than its legs.
Others shift side to side, watching us with their hollow eyes.
Another slinks along the edge of light, pulling itself across the snow on its belly.
“We’ve provoked the Shades,” Dominic says. “They aren’t calming down enough. We need to leave.”
“What about the bodies? Shouldn’t we turn them over so their faces—”
“We don’t have time. Not while the Shades are restless. Besides, they’re only interested in the living. They will neither mimic nor consume the dead.”
I’m relieved. As much as I grieve for what happened to these people, I’d rather not look at them again, much less touch them.
Dominic must trust I’ve gathered some semblance of calm, for he releases my shoulder and takes a step back. His other hand is still gripped around the hilt of his flaming sword. “Let’s go. Slowly. Calmly.”
Another surge of fear tunnels through me at the thought of leaving the light of the campfire.
Still, my feet obey as Dominic leads the way, a step at a time, away from the fire.
Then to the edge of the firelight. Then a step outside it.
The three of us huddle close together, Bard and Dominic circling me, Bard with his song and Dominic with his sword.
I clench my jaw, hating that I feel so useless right now.
I should be helping them. I’m a fucking Summoner.
That’s my job. But no matter how many times I try to bring some calming story to my tongue, no sound emerges. Nothing.
It’s humbling, to say the least.
The farther we move from the campfire’s light, the closer the Shades get. Thankfully, Dominic’s flaming sword is just as bright as the campfire, if not brighter. Its range of light is merely smaller.
“Can’t you just…cut them down?” I ask through chattering teeth.
“We’ve already upset them with the first act of violence, and that was against an Incarnate. Shades don’t see Incarnates as one of their kind anymore, nor are they interested in them like they are in humans. If we attack one of their own, though, they will turn frenzied.”
“This isn’t a frenzy?” I ask, but I know the answer. The dragon was a frenzy. This…this is just aggressive interest.
Our progress feels painfully slow, even more so once our wagon comes into view.
Probably because my legs yearn to run but I don’t let them.
Instead, I focus on my breath, the only imitation of calm I can conjure.
Dominic hisses a sharp sound, and I fling my gaze to him.
His sword arm has faltered and his free hand fumbles at his waist. He extracts a vial from his holster, thumbs open the cap, and downs its contents in full.
His sword arm strengthens, as does the light of the flame.
Then I notice the hand that grips his hilt.
His fingers slick with blood.
The steady drip that falls from the sleeve of his jerkin.
My breath catches. I remember the moment Dominic swung his sword. I’d been so focused on the spray of blood, the sight of the Incarnate’s head flying off its shoulders, that I barely gave mind to what else I saw: a spear of shadow shooting from the creature’s hand and into Dominic.
“You’re injured,” I whisper, failing to keep the panic from my voice.
“I’ll be fine,” Dominic says.
I glance back at the wagon. Gods, we’re close, but most of the Shades have followed us from the camp.
A few have drifted away, but the ones with the keenest interest don’t seem likely to let us go easily.
If anything, they’re growing more aggressive.
The one on all fours darts around us in a circle, but when Dominic holds his sword toward it, it skitters back, hissing through its featureless face.
At least there are no Shades up ahead, none eyeing the wagon or stalking the road.
“Quicken your pace,” Dominic says, “but breathe. We’re almost there.”
I do as he says, walking more swiftly now. Calvin and Harlow peer at us from the front of the wagon, eyes wide.
Calvin’s mouth forms a word I can’t hear but can fully make out. Fuck. A second later, the wagon begins to move. Panic lances through me, but he isn’t leaving us behind. He’s only getting a head start so we’ll already be in motion by the time we climb on.
“Bard to the front,” Dominic says. “Play until we’ve lost them. Tell Harlow to draw if she can stay calm. Inana, in the back. And now…run.”
We take off at a sprint, closing the short distance between us and the wagon in a matter of seconds, even with it moving. Dominic braces his free hand against my back, aiding my climb as I grab on to the back of the wagon.
Dominic steps up beside me, feet planted on the footboard, and releases me to grab hold of the canopy’s frame.
We’re picking up pace now, and I fight against the momentum to pull myself through the flap.
I’m halfway beneath the wagon’s cover when something tugs my skirt and pulls me backward.
It happens so fast, I don’t even have time to scream.
First it’s tugging my skirt. Then its phantom hand is around my calf and pulling me beneath the wagon, claws piercing my flesh. I tumble back, rushing toward the ground—
“Inana!” Dominic screams my name, and my fall is cushioned by a featherlight surface. Hands. Multiple hands.
“You’re all right, love.” Lust. That’s Lust’s voice.
“Get your fucking act together.” And that’s Pride.
A snarl sounds beneath the wagon, followed by a bark.
Then the painful touch releases my calf, and a third presence lifts me.
Shadowed hands pull me up, and I catch sight of Dominic swinging his sword, eyes dark, teeth bared in rage.
I tumble into the wagon and peek back out just in time to see a Shade cleaved in two, its body dispersing into smoke.
Five more give chase, closing in fast. Dominic disperses one, then another.
“Now is it a frenzy?” I shout over the sound of my racing heart, the wagon wheels speeding over the road.
“It’s a fucking frenzy,” he says, and cleaves through a third Shade.
The light of his sword casts his face in hard lines of fury.
Maybe it’s the near-death experience and the fact that his Shades saved me from being dashed against the road, but my heart does strange things as I stare at the tightness of his jaw, the determination in his eyes, the strands of dark hair that whip free from where he’d tied half of it back, the expert way he swings his sword despite the blood that continues to drip down his arm.
He cleaves through the fourth Shade, then finally the fifth.
My gaze leaves his face to assess the road behind us.
I expect more Shades to race after us, or perhaps creep from under the wagon like the one that grabbed me.
But after several long moments pass and there’s only the occasional Shade peering from the trees, indifferent to our passing, my heart rate slows.
Dominic too must deem the threat gone, for he swipes the blade against his thigh, just above the hilt where the etched diagram is, and the flame goes out.
His limbs look heavy, his sword arm trembling. He locks eyes with me, his widening as if he hadn’t expected me to be watching him, then heaves a sigh and sheathes his sword. I don’t miss the way his features pull into a grimace or the way his arm falls limp at his side once he releases the hilt.
I move to give him room to climb through the flap and into the wagon. “Are you all right?” I ask as he stumbles inside.
He doesn’t answer, but I can see it for myself. We left the lantern lit when we went to confront the Incarnate, and the light illuminates the blood on his face, dripping down his arm, his hand. There’s a gash in his jerkin beneath his collarbone.
He slumps to his knees, shoulders drooping.
I hold out my hands to…I don’t know. Help him? Steady him?
He falls on fucking top of me.