Chapter 29
Islam onto a shore, and salty sand fills my mouth, burning my eyes. A roaring din fills the air. A crash of a wave.
The ocean.
Wiping my eyes, I force them open against the sting as a wave shoots up the beach, toward me.
I scramble onto all fours, but my hands sink into the sand and slow me down. My throat constricts, and my elbows buckle as sea foam teases the rubber sole of my boot.
Digging my hands down, I blindly throw myself forward and slam into a solid mass. It shifts, and my hands lose purchase, but my fingers loop around an opening, and I hold tight.
Whatever is beneath me steadies, and I rest my head.
The wave retreats with a promise to return. I blow out a long breath, and the heap beneath me does the same, with a steady thump against my ear. Cedar infiltrates my nose and calms my racing pulse.
My power sings, and I settle into this space.
Then it coughs.
I jolt up, and my burning eyes focus.
“Harriet?” she croaks.
I glance down at my fingers laced between the buttons of Kressa’s shirt, rubbing against bare skin. Yanking them free, I throw myself off of her and rise to my feet. Sand cakes my pants, weighing them down.
“Sorry, I tripped,” I stammer, holding out a hand.
I pull her up. Other competitors groan and push themselves from the sand, rubbing at their heads and shoulders. A full moon illuminates the dunes at our backs—too high to see what’s on the other side.
I brush the sand from my pants. “Where are we?”
“Impossible to know.” Kressa rolls her shoulders and rubs the base of her neck. “Sopors get their power from Serinos. They can contort reality and transport people. We could be on the other side of the continent, or still in the arena.”
“I’ve never heard of them before.”
“They were executed with the fall of the Fire Court, but it seems Caelus managed to get his hands on one.”
Just like he got the kraken. I tilt my head to the sky and point toward the dunes. “We should go that way.”
She lifts a brow. “How do you know?”
Only someone from the Earth Court wouldn’t know how to navigate. “The stars.”
I point to the brightest constellation in the sky, Aethra.
The matching one to my compass, and one that—if I had a ship—would guide me home by the tip of her arrow.
“The ocean is due west, which, if we’re still on the same shoreline as Sarenia, means the arena is that way.
” I nod northeast toward a mountain range in the distance.
But I pause, and my confidence flounders. This is too easy. I twist, and in the opposite direction, a second mountain range. I worry my lip and study Aethra. Something is off.
“Let’s not waste time then,” Kressa says, taking off toward the dunes.
If I spend too long debating which direction to go, I risk the glamour wearing off. Blowing out a breath, I jog to catch up with Kressa, and we climb the dune. At the peak, we pause—a dense forest sprawling out before us.
I swallow. “Is this—”
Kressa nods. “The Elkbane Forest.”
The green expanse stretches to the horizon, and the dense canopy shifts with a breeze. As vast and deadly as the deepest reaches of the sea.
Competitors crest the dunes on either side of us, eyeing the forest with equal hesitation. Throats bob on swallows, blood draining from their faces.
“No one is making it out alive,” Kressa whispers.
My fingers tremble, and I press them against my sides. “If the selkies don’t kill us, the forest creatures will.”
I survey the length of the beach behind us. It curves into itself on either side, cradled by the forest. We have no choice but to go through.
An unholy screech comes from the woods, rustling the canopy and sending a flock of birds into the night sky. Kressa stiffens and retreats a step. My pulse skitters, but I square my shoulders, and unsheathe the dagger at my thigh. My fingers find the familiar grooves on the hilt.
I fear nothing. In a blink, I could flood the forest and send its creatures to the depths of the ocean, the pressure killing them before lack of oxygen does.
Another shriek shakes the ground and rattles through my bones.
My grip falters, yet my resolve holds strong. “We only have an hour. We can’t waste time.”
I bound down the embankment, and sand floods my boots. Kressa curses under her breath and follows, feet pounding behind me. The forest beckons, limbs reaching out like twisted, gnarled hands.
The tree line swallows us, and moonlight speckles across the forest floor, spearing through small, insect-eaten holes in the leaves. The canopy hides the stars, and my stomach hollows. My only navigation.
I point my boots in the direction of the northeast mountain range. “We have to keep in a straight line. If we get turned around, one of us will have to climb a tree. And that will slow us down.”
“Noted.”
She follows close behind, and I keep my hand steady on my dagger, scanning the twisted tree trunks for glowing eyes or bared teeth. Protruding roots slow us down, some higher than my chest.
A scream echoes through the forest and silences the birds in the trees. I halt, and my blood drains to my feet.
“That wasn’t a selkie,” Kressa whispers, the whites of her eyes visible in the dark.
No. It was a man. A competitor. “We need to run. Now.”
I take off without bothering to check if she follows, but her footsteps pound in sync with mine, and her breath fogs in front of her. Tree limbs reach out, whipping me in the face as I leap over roots and weave around dense bushes.
The canopy thickens and blots out the light from the moon. I slow my steps.
“Can you see anything?” I whisper.
“No—”
The breeze dissipates, and the temperature plummets. The forest quiets—stills as if holding its breath. A clearing opens and I freeze, throwing my arm in front of Kressa.
“Get down, and don’t make a sound.”
Moonlight filters into the clearing like a spotlight and illuminates a competitor, frozen to the spot.
A woman steps out. Glittering scales protrude from her chest and cascade down her waist and across her hips. Shiny black hair falls past the tips of her ribs, and her lush lips tilt into a smile.
She stops before the man and runs a finger down his arm. “Are you Anson?” Her voice comes out as a purr, and her eyes settle on his face.
“I can be whoever you want me to be.”
“Where is it?” she whispers, toying with the collar of his shirt.
“Where’s what?”
My fingers dig into the earth as she blinks, and the whites of her eyes disappear, replaced with a shade of black darker than the surrounding forest. Darker than the water kissing the seafloor.
Her face contorts, her luscious smile widening until the edges of her mouth meet the hinge of her jaw.
White teeth morph into a row of fangs sharp enough to shred flesh.
The man lurches back, but her razor-tipped nails dig into the skin around his neck and pin him in place.
“My tail!” she screams.
The man grips her hands and tries to pry them from his neck, but it’s no use. “I—I don’t know. I don’t have your tail.”
“Liar!” She leaps onto him and clamps her teeth around his throat, tearing it out before another word leaves his lips. She spits it out and returns to his body in a frenzy, shredding his skin into ribbons. She bellows, her bloody face tipped to the sky.
I inch up from my knees, fingers trembling around the dagger. “Run. Now.”
We burst from the forest floor and sprint along the edges of the clearing, the selkie too busy feasting to notice us.
“That’s a selkie?” Kressa says between pants.
“One on the brink of losing her ability to live in the ocean.” A pang spears my chest. Unable to roam the open ocean, selkies’ hearts wither, and they die within days.
My lungs ache, and frigid air bites the lining of my throat. But I can’t stop. We have to get to the other side of the forest and reach the mountains, or break through the mental barrier the Sopor threw over us.
The trees thin out, and my breath hitches. We’re almost there. Forcing my legs faster, I pump my arms and push against the fog clouding my vision.
I trip and careen forward, slamming my face into a gnarled root. Rolling to my back, I press a hand to my throbbing temple and groan. Something shines behind my closed eyelids and I blink them open to the bright moon overhead. My muscles relax. We made it.
“Harriet,” Kressa whispers, voice shaky. She taps at me with her boot. “Harriet, get the fuck up.”
The hair along my neck rises. I push my elbow against the ground—no, against sand. I raise my head, coming face to face with the back of a dune, and my breath hitches. It’s the beach we left nearly an hour ago.
“You must be Kressa,” a female voice croons.
“And Harriet,” another intones, sweet and silky.