Chapter 15
KARA
For a long time, none of us move. The air inside the skull is heavy; every breath catches in my chest. I wait for the next scrape, the next hiss, the leap out of the dark.
But nothing comes.
The storm howls. Sand rattles down the walls, dancing in the air around us where it finds its way through any crack or hole. The skull groans as another gust shakes its hollow crown. My heartbeat drums loud in my ears, but the shadows don’t shift again.
Minutes stretch into forever.
“Nothing. Just bones settling. I told you,” Joran finally exhales in a sharp bark, a laugh without humor.
He doesn’t sound convinced, but the words come out too quick, too loud, as if he’s trying to make himself believe. Harlan clutches his beads tight, muttering faster. His voice shakes, but the rhythm lulls—so steady it almost sounds like he’s rocking a child to sleep.
The younger Zmaj crouches low, wings drawn tight, his glare fixed on the hollow. He doesn’t argue with Joran. He doesn’t need to. The tension in his body speaks for him.
I should be glad nothing moved again. I should unclench my hand, lay the knife down, let my shoulders ease. But the scarred warrior hasn’t relaxed.
He stands planted near the hollow, lochaber held across his chest, scars stark in the dim. His black eyes don’t waver. He’s watching. Waiting.
And that steadiness twists me up worse than fear. If he isn’t fooled, then none of us should be.
I pull the blanket tighter around me, the bandaged arm pressed close to my ribs, and curl into the curve of the skull’s jaw. My eyes sting, too dry, but exhaustion drags heavy at me.
Nothing happens. Not for a long time.
The scrape doesn’t return. The hiss doesn’t slither out of the dark. Only the storm fills the silence, a constant drumbeat that fades and swells until it’s almost a lullaby.
One by one, the others sag. Joran slumps against the bone, mutterings fading to snores. Harlan’s prayers trail into silence, lips still moving soundlessly as his eyes close. The younger Zmaj leans against the wall, tail and wings twitching in restless sleep.
I fight it. I tell myself I’ll stay awake, I’ll keep watch. But the storm’s rhythm pulls at me, steady as a heartbeat. My knife slides from my lap to the ground. My eyelids sink despite every effort to hold them open.
Sleep takes me in ragged pieces, shallow and uneasy. Shadows cling at the edges of my dreams, shapes that scrape bone and hiss low, but none leap from the dark.
When I jolt awake again, the storm’s howl is softer. Duller. Like a door has been shut between us and the desert.
For a dizzy, fragile moment, hope stirs in my chest. Maybe the worst has passed. Maybe the night is over.
But when I turn, the scarred warrior is awake. Still watching the hollow. His eyes find mine across the dim, and the flicker of hope stutters in my throat.
He doesn’t believe it’s over. And suddenly, neither do I.
The storm’s scream dulls, but the silence it leaves behind is worse. Joran stretches, groaning, his face gray with exhaustion.
“See? Told you. Nothing but wind and bones creaking. We’ll walk out of here once it clears. Back to camp. Back to real shelter.” His words stumble over themselves, too eager, like he’s convincing himself as much as us.
Harlan nods quickly, desperate. His lips twitch with prayers of thanks, though he hasn’t stopped rocking. He grips his beads so tight the cord cuts into his fingers.
The younger Zmaj doesn’t join them. He crouches by the wall, shoulders tight, wings twitching like they’re ready to snap open. His eyes flick from the hollow to the scarred warrior and back again. Not hope—never hope. He knows better.
So do I.
The air feels wrong. Sand trickles in thin streams, piling higher around our boots. My chest aches with every inhale; part of me is screaming to believe Joran, to feel the relief, but the wrongness presses harder than hunger, harder than exhaustion.
I look at him.
The scarred warrior hasn’t sat down. He hasn’t slept. He shifts his weight, broad shoulders rolling once, and lifts the lochaber across his chest. The blade catches a flicker of pale light slipping into our shelter. Not flashy, not loud—just ready. Always ready.
The sight sends a prickle through me, sharp and cold.
If he doesn’t trust this quiet, then I shouldn’t either.
I pull my blanket tighter, fingers fisting in the rough weave, and feel my stomach twist. Part of me wants to laugh at Joran, to call him blind, but another part aches to cling to the lie he’s selling. To let myself believe it’s only storm and bone, that we’ll walk free when the sand settles.
But every time I meet the warrior’s eyes, I see the truth reflected back. He knows something is coming. I see it in every inch of him, sense it in the air myself.
The hollow feels smaller by the minute.
Four of us pressed shoulder to shoulder, knees drawn tight, every breath shared. The air is hot and dry. Every shift and sigh is magnified, grating against raw nerves. Sand rasps in through the cracks, coating us in grit. It gets everywhere—under nails, between teeth—and rubs skin raw.
“Couldn’t have found a worse hole. Bones and sand. Damn lizards,” Joran mutters, shoving at the sand with his boot, muttering a curse.
The younger Zmaj’s head snaps up, wings flaring half-open in a sharp snap. His nostrils flare, his pupils narrowing to slits.
“Mind your tongue.”
“Or what?” Joran spits, too loud in the close dark. “You’ll flap at me? Scare me with your stories? You’d all be nothing without—”
“Enough.”
The scarred warrior’s voice cuts through, low and rough as stone grinding. Not the first time I’ve heard it, but rare enough that every syllable feels carved from silence. He doesn’t waste words, not when a single one carries the weight of command.
Joran shuts his mouth. His eyes still burn, but he looks down, gnawing his lip like a child caught out.
My heart stutters.
I can’t stop stealing glances. His scars look sharper in the shifting light, shadows carving hard lines across his jaw and throat. His eyes flick from Joran to the mouth of the hollow, never lingering, never soft, yet the weight of them presses against me all the same.
I pull my blanket tighter, hiding the shiver that isn’t from cold. My bandaged arm throbs, a dull ache, but it’s nothing compared to the twist in my chest.
I want him to look at me. To see me, not just as another burden to shield, but as someone worth standing at his side.
I catch myself before the thought fully blooms, clenching my teeth to bite it down. Foolish. Dangerous. He’s Zmaj, scarred and silent, carrying weight I can’t even begin to name. And I’m just… Kara.
Still, when his gaze sweeps past again, I sit straighter, trying not to flinch against the grit, trying to look like I’m not afraid. Trying to be someone he’ll remember. And inside the cramped dark, I can feel the ground shifting—not the sand beneath us, but the space between him and me.
The storm gnaws at the skull like it wants to rip us out piece by piece. Wind picks up, shrieking through the cracks, rising to a pitch that makes my teeth ache. Sand pours in steady streams, pooling at our boots, crawling higher every time I blink.
Harlan mutters a prayer under his breath, voice cracking with every word. Joran huddles deeper in his blanket, eyes darting like a trapped animal. The younger Zmaj doesn’t move, but his wings twitch with sharp, nervous jolts.
I keep my eyes on him. The scarred warrior isn’t tense or straining—just steady as a rock. Waiting. Something in that steadiness steadies me too. Then the storm’s pitch changes.
A low vibration hums through the bone at my back, faint at first, then stronger. The moan of the wind drops into something deeper, something heavier.
Not the storm. My heart slams against my ribs. The younger Zmaj stiffens, head jerking up. His eyes lock on the hollow’s mouth, black and wide.
“It’s here,” he whispers.
“What’s here?” Joran asks, his head snapping up and his voice shaking. “It’s just wind. Just bones rattling.”
The ground trembles, sand shifting in waves as though something massive moves outside. The air thickens, choking, and a shadow slides across the narrow crack of light. Not wind. Not storm. Something else.
The scarred warrior rises, smooth and certain, striding past me toward the darkness at the back of the skull. Feeling tentative but unwilling to stay back, I move to his side. My knife looks pitiful next to the long, shiny blade of his lochaber.
The ground shifts. Subtle—easy to miss with the storm outside our shelter—but it’s there. I look up at the Zmaj, and he is looking down at me. His eyes narrow, his tail twitches, tossing sand behind us. He tilts his head to one side, slightly, but the question is clear.
“I’m ready,” I say.
He nods. It’s enough. Something uncoils in my chest. It feels as if a weight lifts off my shoulders. In this moment, right before I’m probably going to die, it feels like things can change. Like I’m not fighting to be noticed, but fighting with someone who knows I am here. With him.
The hiss is soft, and the only warning we have before it blurs out of the dark.