67. Vera
Vera
She held out her hand, and Tessa and I both took it.
There was a strange tug on my elbow right as we disappeared.
Sloane’s “blinking” magic took us from the underground bunker to a dark tunnel in the blink of an eye, and I landed on the rock floor of a large cavern.
Tessa and Sloane coughed as dirt kicked up around us. But another thud made me whirl around.
“Starke!” I shouted, raising my hands in frustration. “What the—”
“Watch out!” He jumped on me, forcing me to the ground as two sharp arrows whizzed above our heads and embedded themselves in the wall behind us. “Bet you’re glad I came now, aren’t you?” he asked grimly, rolling to get off of me.
“You’re an idiot,” I hissed. “You’re going to get yourself killed.”
“This could be a good thing,” Sloane said from behind us. She and Tessa had ducked to avoid the flying arrows. “He can keep watch.”
He scowled. “Excuse me, I can do more than—”
“Because he’s smart enough to know that putting himself in harm’s way will only make things harder for us, aren’t you, Captain?” Sloane’s pointed look would’ve melted ice. “Do you want Vera to die trying to keep you safe?”
I had to admit, Sloane had a pair on her. I was starting to like her.
Starke’s eyes flicked to mine. I could tell he wanted to argue, but he gritted his teeth and pulled a sword from its sheath. “Fine. I’ll make sure nobody comes after you. Just go.”
“Where exactly are we supposed to go?” Tessa asked, looking around the cavern.
“Don’t know. I’ve never gone past the entrance.” Sloane wagged her eyebrows at us with a grin. It was a mischievous little smile that reminded me of how I often looked at Starke when I got us into bad situations. “Let’s find out, shall we?”
Without warning, several more arrows shot at us. “Praetum firma!” I cried, holding my hands out. The shield charm erupted in front of us and blocked the arrows.
“Where are they coming from?” Sloane asked.
“That way.” I pointed ahead, where shadows darkened a corner of the cave.
Keeping the shield high, I edged down the tunnel, watching out for any more arrows.
The air got colder the farther I walked.
I forced flames up my arms to light the way.
As I approached the corner, I slowly reached a hand over the edge of the bend.
When I jumped around the corner, preparing to strike our attackers, I stopped short. Nobody was there. Just another endless, rocky corridor.
“There’s nobody here,” I hissed back at Tessa and Sloane.
“Probably enchanted arrows, then,” Sloane said.
We tiptoed a few more steps before Tessa threw an arm out to stop us. “Wait.” She was so close, I saw her skin pebble as goosebumps rose to the surface. She put one hesitant foot out.
Several spikes emerged from holes in the floor.
With the nimbleness of a jaguar, Tessa leaped back, barely avoiding being impaled.
A loud crackle came from behind me, and streams of fire burst from the sidewall, nearly singing the ends of my hair.
I gasped and jumped forward, but Tessa stopped me before I ran right into the deadly spikes.
“We’re trapped,” I muttered. I summoned my Strider magic and imagined myself striding us from here to the other side of the spikes. I disappeared, but then reappeared exactly where I’d been. I tried again, and pain shot through my forehead.
“There’s some sort of spell blocking my striding magic,” I grunted, rubbing my temples. “Wonderful.”
Sloane squinted, and her body wavered in and out of focus. “Same. My powers don’t work down here.”
“I’ve got this,” Tessa said. Her limbs instantly shortened into her torso, and sleek fur grew from her skin.
Tessa had the rare Shifter ability to not only transform into an animal, but to also change her size.
Her jaguar form could be as small as a kitten or as large as a horse.
This time, she became smaller and smaller until she was a cat lithe enough to slip between the sharp edges of the spikes, winding her way across until she reached the other side.
“I didn’t know she was an animorph,” Sloane said in surprise, staring after Tessa.
“A what?” I shook my head. “Nevermind. If you liked that, you’re going to love this.
” I smirked, shifted my phoenix wings from my back, and grabbed Sloane.
She shouted in surprise. I kicked off the ground and extended my wings, flying us over the high spikes.
The ceiling was so low that my wings scraped against it.
I hit the ground in a crouch, carefully setting a wide-eyed Sloane down. “A little warning next time,” she huffed.
I chuckled, then looked around, waiting for the next threat. Tessa padded forward in her small jaguar form, nose low to the ground. Her ears went straight as her hackles rose. She sniffed the path ahead, and her black tail flicked.
My grin faded. Something felt…off. The walls on either side looked more narrow than before.
The rockface pressed closer together as we moved deeper down the tunnel.
I summoned fire to my hand, and its blaze flickered off the stone.
After several yards, the corridor abruptly widened into a circular chamber.
The ground was carved into dozens of square tiles, each about two feet wide.
Faint runes were etched on top. Some glowed red, but others were dark.
“Nobody move,” I said. “Everything here is trying to kill us.”
Tessa shifted back into her human form beside me, her brows knitting. “Glowing rocks? What’s this for?”
Sloane crouched at the edge of the chamber and brushed dust off one of the runes. The symbol flared brighter at her touch—three lines with a diagonal sword through them.
“Never know until we try,” she said with a shrug. Before I could stop her, she pressed down on the tile and immediately jumped back to us.
More arrows shot across the chamber, right where she’d been standing. These were charged with lightning magic and left smoke in their wake.
“Okay,” Sloane said slowly. “Any other ideas?”
“Why don’t I just fly again?” I spread my wings and lifted into the air, but the runes weren’t only on the floor.
As soon as I gained height, the ceiling flashed in warning, red symbols lighting up among the stalactites.
Blades burst from slits in the ceiling, slicing through the air in intersecting arcs.
Steel flashed inches from the tips of my flaming feathers before retracting again.
I crashed back to the ground with a grunt.
“Well,” Tessa said, staring upward and clicking her tongue, “that answers that.”
“Wait, do that again,” Sloane exclaimed. Her gaze was fixed on the tile nearest me. “Flash your wings.”
I did as the rebel requested. I lifted my wing over the row of tiles closest to us, and flames danced across my feathers. One of the tiles directly beneath it flared gold.
Sloane grinned. “I think it likes you, Lightbringer.”
I extended my wings as far as they would go without me stepping on a tile, and several more turned gold in response.
“I wonder…” Summoning more phoenix fire, I shot a stream of bright orange and red flames over the entire chamber.
In return, tile upon tile lit gold, creating a path in the floor that led from where we stood to the opposite side of the room.
“It’s the heat,” I said.
“No,” Sloane countered. “It’s the light. Your light.” She looked at me. “The Elders may be soulless murderers, but they were right about one thing.”
“What’s that?”
“You really are our only hope.”
I diverted my gaze back to the pattern before us. “Let’s just get this over with.” Keeping my fire outstretched ahead of us, I carefully stepped on the first golden tile and held my breath.
Nothing happened.
“Promising start,” Tessa said.
When no magical arrows shot at me, I moved to the next one. Tessa followed, with Sloane close on her heels, making sure they only touched the tiles I did. The chamber filled with the sounds of crackling fire, boots scraping stone, and our heavy breaths.
Halfway across, my fire flickered. I furrowed my brow, forcing more power into the blaze, but it was as if something was snuffing it out. A chill spread across the chamber. With no warning, my fire sputtered out completely.
Darkness fell over us. The golden runes disappeared, leaving us stranded.
“Why’d you stop?” Tessa asked.
“I didn’t. It just went out.” I wracked my brain, trying to remember the pattern. There had been one just to the left, and then straight ahead, and then to the right…
I jumped to the left. The air was silent. But when I stepped forward to the next one, the rune flashed bright red, then went dark.
“That doesn’t seem good,” Sloane muttered.
I forced both their heads down as a lightning arrow whipped above us, but the motion caused us to stumble onto several other tiles.
A rumble shook the cavern. The ceiling shifted and glowed, bringing down more blades that sliced right above our heads.
The runes on the floor flashed wildly, red then gold then orange.
Tiles behind us dropped away to reveal a black pit below.
“Run!” Tessa screamed.
I lunged forward, barely clearing the edge before the row behind me disappeared. We were only a few rows from the end. Sloane struggled beside me, so I grabbed her elbow and pushed her forward, and we both stumbled over the last row.
An earsplitting scream sounded behind us. I whipped around to see Tessa dangling over the abyss, clawing at the last row of tiles. “Tessa!” I shrieked. I dove to my stomach to grab her arm, but it was too late.
The final tiles crumbled and fell away. Tessa’s head disappeared, along with her strangled cry.
“No!” All the air left my lungs as I screamed. I summoned my wings to plunge after her. My feet were almost off the ledge when I saw it.
Tessa swung a few feet below, held by nothing but bronze fingertips buried in the side wall.
My shoulders slumped in relief. I quickly hauled her up and, without thinking, crushed her in my arms.