16. Chapter 16
The next door is framed by crystallized doves.
It leads us straight outside, where the morning sunlight pirouettes through sheets of rain along the horizon.
For a brief moment, I wonder whether this is what freedom tastes like.
Perhaps it’s as elegant as the clouds swooping over the Leviathan Sea—a sleek body of water stretching out before us like obsidian glass and nightmare-fueled dreams. Or perhaps it’s as restrictive as the ancient stone walls barricading us onto this cliffside.
No. This is not what freedom tastes like.
The jagged mosaic floor beneath my boots has been worn and aged by sunlight, sprouting little weeds that poke through the gaps in the stone, which grow wild and free around racks of weapons, wooden dummies, and bullseye targets lanced with holes.
Hundred-foot crenellated walls span the perimeter of the courtyard on each side, decorated in gargoyles with gaping maws and crooked teeth.
At the very center of it all, stands a statue as big as a battering ram, one depicting the God of War himself.
Gods, even his statue bares his permanent scowl.
“Good morrow, Shadow!” Regent says, dipping into a low bow before me. “The others are working on target practice with Master Flint,” he adds, his eager expression seeming to suggest that I should also be working on target practice with Master Flint.
I cut my gaze back to Sir Valiant to thank him for escorting me through the castle’s labyrinth of hallways, only to find him gone, replaced instead by a cool blast of arid air that makes my shoulders slump. Even the door has evaporated into dust.
Oh dear, I guess this castle is magical after all. And to think, I was so close to making a friend.
“Are you quite alright?” Regent eyes me with suspicion.
“Never better,” I sigh, maneuvering around Regent to find Lily, who’s currently flinging throwing stars at a vertical plank.
Scratch that. Lily is trying to throw stars at a vertical plank, but she’s failing miserably.
Instead, her star lodges into a decrepit wooden fence somewhere along the back wall of the courtyard, where it nearly decapitates a gargoyle.
“Goddamn piece of wrym shit!” she shouts, only to land directly on her ass with a thump as she tries to pry her weapon free.
Groaning, she dusts off her attire, which is a fitted leather corset stained a bright shade of pink, paired with high-waisted leather trousers that hug the ample curves of her body.
“Who in their right mind gave her access to weapons, do you think?” Maxine asks as she approaches me, concealing a snicker with the back of her hand.
A quick sweep of her attire suggests that she’s dressed in the same outfit as Lily, the only difference being that her jumpsuit is bronze, star-studded, and paired with a circlet headpiece.
It’s also topped off by a set of very chunky earrings that clank and clamor whenever she turns her head, a distraction from the pointy boots on her feet, I imagine.
“Probably the same person who told you it was a good idea to wear high heels in a training arena,” I retort. The smile that forms on my lips is as devious as the weapons she’s wielding.
Maxine plants her heels with a crunch on the gravel. “And here I was, hoping that you were dead, considering how long you overslept.”
“I’m sure you were crushed by the thought,” I remark, fanning my sweaty face with my hand.
“Devastated, really. Then who would watch me do this?”
In one fluid motion, Maxine flings her throwing stars at a nearby wooden target.
Impressively enough, she manages to miss her mark entirely, sending the stars sailing straight into a barrel of water instead, which splits wide open at the seams and sends water gushing all over Lily.
“Hey! You could’ve killed me!” Lily screeches in disbelief as she finally finishes prying her throwing star out of the fence.
“If I wanted to kill you, you’d already be dead.” Maxine skips away happily to collect her weapons, smiling like she did that on purpose.
“Intolerable wench!” Lily shouts at her back.
“Enough,” comes a rugged voice that cuts straight across the clearing.
We all fall silent as a man approaches.
I hadn’t noticed him before, but it’s impossible not to now.
He’s a broad brute of a specimen who seems overly concerned with pulling on those leather gloves, which work to conceal his rough, calloused hands.
His hair is peppered with gray, and his biceps look far too large to fit through a doorway.
Not that there are any doorways in the general vicinity.
I would know, considering how I’ve spent the last five minutes searching desperately for an exit, only to confirm that the door I entered through has vanished.
Which means that we’re imprisoned on this goddamned cliffside until another door decides to make an appearance when the castle shifts again.
“You’re late.” The man shoves a pair of freshly sharpened throwing stars into my hands.
“I…” My throat dries up. “I’m sorry, are we… training for something?”
“Do you have a problem with that?” he asks, watching me carefully with eyes that shimmer like lethal shades of fractured flint.
“No, it’s just—” I weigh the throwing stars in my hands, which are heavier than anticipated. “Aren’t the gods supposed to protect us from any and all adversaries, foreign or friend?”
“The gods cannot protect you from everything,” the man grumbles darkly, inflicting me with a glare that seems to imply I’m some kind of idiot.
“Right, of course. Not sure why I assumed any differently,” I say in exasperation. “And who might you be? Someone else who is not supposed to protect us?”
“The name’s Flint. Pleased to make your acquaintance,” Flint says, not looking pleased in the slightest. In fact, he gives me a wry, unhappy smile as he pulls something from the pouch at his hip. A slim, corked vial filled with thick, yellow liquid.
“What’s that?” I ask, leaning forward to get a better look at it.
“Liquified truth.” Flint tosses the vial to Maxine.
She drops her weapons with a clatter and catches the vial instinctively, only to recoil after she smells it.
“Lesson one,” Flint says, his voice rising over the ambience of the courtyard.
“Not all weapons will bleed you out. Some will slip down your throat, forcing you to spill all of your secrets to the enemy.”
“You’re talking about poison?” I ask.
Flint gives me a single nod, and Maxine tosses the vial back to him.
He catches it effortlessly, then slips it back into his pouch for safekeeping.
“Truth Serum to be exact. Slows your heartbeat and slurs your speech. Wilts your kidneys and renders you utterly useless on the battlefield,” he says with ease.
“It’s a weapon in disguise, unless, of course, you’re using it for its anti-venom effects.
Then I suppose it comes in handy, to an extent. ”
“What’s it made of?” I ask, wrinkling my nose from the putrid smell wafting from it.
“Wyrm piss,” Flint says pointedly.
I take a faltering step back. “Gross.”
“Why in the devil’s ass-crack would we want to learn about that?” Maxine demands.
A flicker of amusement flashes across Flint’s face.
“Not all weapons are obvious, Sweetheart.” He whisks up her throwing stars and waves them around as evidence.
“Poisons can be added to your food, drink, and even coated on the tip of a blade. One little cut on the battlefield, and you’ll forget that you even exist. Think about how easy of a target you’d be then.
” He stuffs the throwing stars into Maxine’s hands, nearly sending her stumbling into a training mat from the force of his impact.
“None of your training will matter if your mind is overcome by the effects of the poisons you’ll learn about here today,” he concludes, gently patting his pouch where his poison lies concealed within.
“If you want to stand a chance against the enemy, that is.”
Bella peels herself out of the shadows and interjects, “What enemy?”
Flint goes still. For a wavering moment, he just stares at her. Then, without a word, he turns and strides toward the statue of the God of War. He removes one of his leather gloves and traces his finger along the claw-like grooves that run down the statue’s side.
“They returned across the veil,” he says ominously, stuffing his leather glove back onto his hand, only after brushing off the dust. “Winged, vengeful, and hungering for what they lost. Now they seek vengeance against those who took it from them.”
Bella’s mouth flies open.
“The dragons,” Flint adds quickly. “The very creatures who were banished on the undertow of the Curse of Love.” He turns around to face us, eyes flashing dark. “They’ve returned from Purgatory to avenge themselves.”
I recall the conversation from the ballroom between Thalmos and Rhaziel, and my pulse ticks up.
“You’re lying,” Maxine says, twirling her throwing stars around in lazy circles, as if they’re harmless trinkets and not weapons designed to embed deeply into someone’s skull.
Flint’s boots crunch across the gravel as he strides toward her, his gaze fixated on the gyrating chunks of metal in her hands.
“If I’m lying,” he says, calmly extending out a gloved hand, palm facing upwards, “then how might you explain the bounties issued over each of your heads?”
Maxine stops twirling. “Come again?”
Flint wags his fingers in a beckoning motion. With a theatrical sigh, Maxine drops her throwing stars into his awaiting grasp. Then, without a word, Flint spins on his heel and hurls both stars at the wooden post across the courtyard, slamming the X’s dead at their centers.
Maxine crosses her arms and grumbles. “Show off.”