Chapter 30
Ash—another Ash—kept his pistol trained on the person beside me.
His eyes might as well have been emeralds that had mysteriously gone from cut and polished to rough and raw, straight out of a mine.
His hair was mussed, streaks of dirt painted his pale face, and he had bags under his eyes I didn’t recognize from when we had entered Hell.
But he was unmistakably Ashkade. So…who was beside me?
Ash fired another shot that sent the stranger splashing into the pond with another bullet hole in his forehead. Gaunt, shadowy hands rose to grab the body, and before he was pulled under, what I once thought was Ashkade melted into a different form.
A skeletal creature, with arms and legs so long and thin it was a wonder how it even held up its body.
Like an amalgamation of a corpse and the spiders that crawled across my skin in the hold of Vaetrik’s ship.
Instead of Ash’s young, sweet face, it had a gaping hole lined with layers of sharp teeth, and a milky, unseeing eye with no lid.
Its skin was mottled and rotting, and the stench of death nearly made me gag as it disappeared into the darkness of the writhing shadows far below.
“What…was that?” I gasped.
“Something dead, I’m guessin’. You are real, right?” Ashkade asked, heaving a sigh of exhaustion as he holstered his gun. His body shuddered when I flung my arms around him, but he gave me a pitiful smile.
“I’m real. Thanks for saving me. I would’ve had no idea that thing wasn’t you.”
“This place really screws with you,” he said in a tight voice that made my heart splinter. “I saw two of those things. They looked like my ma and pa. Had to kill ‘em. I saw the front lines again…all the destruction I caused when I broke time. All the ruin I’m goin’ to cause in the future.”
Tearstains already streaked through the dirt on his face, but fresh rivers carved their way down his cheeks. Anger bubbled inside me at how Hell and its stupid tricks had somehow convinced my sweet, brave friend that he was going to be the cause of destruction. He had already been through enough.
I grabbed his shoulders and shook him hard.
“Stop. After we get out of here, you’re going to tell Rei and I every single illusion you saw, and we’re going to refute them for you, understand?
” That earned me a feeble smile, but he almost looked too fatigued to argue, not like he actually believed me.
I took his hand in mine. “Look, at least now we’re together.
All we have to do is find Reiven and everything will be fine, just like we planned. Where did you come from?”
I swiveled my head around, realizing that there were only two ways into this chamber. The tunnel I had come from, and another tunnel boring into the opposite wall.
“Same direction as you, I think. Strange I didn’t hear you or nothin’.”
“Well, I’m not surprised. This place is bizarre.
” I seized Ash by the arm and pulled him away from the dock, towards the tunnel we both came from.
He moved like a puppet, letting me pull and turn him with no resistance.
It pissed me off more than it should have as I jerked him to face me.
“Maybe we should wait here for Rei, since it seems like we came from the same way. Maybe he will too.”
“Yeah, but I think some of the others might’ve already been here. Saw at least two pairs of footprints heading to that forward tunnel. If we wait and he never comes, Shaddan or the pirate might get to the Voidtome first,” he said dully.
“He’ll be here soon.”
His lips trembled. “Hey…Zephra, if I ever became some…horrible monster that caused nothin’ but death and devastation, you know I’d want you to put me down, right?”
“Ashkade Taleus Synnex, I wouldn’t have to!
” My voice echoed across the pool of water behind us, magnified by the sheer emptiness of the stone chamber.
I softened my tone when I saw him flinch.
“Reiven and I might smack some sense into you if you ever went too far, but the only time I’ve seen you hurt somebody was when you protected me.
And you used exactly the amount of force necessary.
Whatever you think you saw—forget it, because Rei and I won’t let you turn into something you’re not. Trust that, okay?”
Ash gave me a slow nod, but his eyes clouded with anxiety, and I knew I hadn’t eased his worries much at all.
Approaching footsteps on the rock made us both jump and face the tunnel I had exited, praying it would be Reiven to complete our trio.
No. Spirits, no.
Vaetrik already had his pistol in hand as he dashed into the chamber, and I drew my rapier but could do nothing at this distance. The moment he saw me, his eyes darkened. He raised his weapon to fire.
A crack of sound split the air, and I braced for pain, for a bullet to tear through my flesh, but Vaetrik's pistol clattered to the rocky ground. He gripped his own hand to stem the slight flow of blood from where Ash had shot him.
I flung myself forward, kicking his pistol into the pool behind me. I stood right before him with the tip of my rapier at his neck before he could recover to draw his own sword.
He glared and grimaced at the wound in his hand, though it looked like Ash had merely nicked the side of his palm. A trickle of blood slipped down his wrist. “Oh, come now. What are you going to do, pet, kill me? You don't have it in you.”
“Say the word, Zephra,” Ash said from behind me, keeping his gun trained on Vaetrik.
Unlike him, my hands trembled as I tightened my grip on the hilt of my sword, trying to imagine impaling the pirate who ruined my life in the neck. I flinched when he took a step closer, as if he didn't care about the sharp point of my blade pressing against his throat. His smile widened.
Ash said my name again, more urgently. It dawned on me that Vaetrik might have moved this close to ensure Ash wouldn't have a clear shot on him.
I forced myself to swallow my fear. “I already told you, I'm not your damn pet. Vaetrik Tynedall, you were cruel to me, for no reason other than I was the first person you could treat as less than. And I hate you, more than I've ever hated anyone in my life. Not because you’re a Human…because of the things you did to me.”
Even so, there was room in my heart to forgive him.
“I cared for you, Vaetrik. I truly believe we could have been wonderful friends if things had gone differently. But as things are now, you need to understand that I won’t tolerate any more of your cruelty.”
An inclination to show him mercy echoed inside me no matter how I tried to shove it off, yet it was fragile, like a string that frayed second by second.
It stayed my hand for too long.
“I did what I had to do to make a name for myself, you know that,” Vaetrik said. “And I think now I'll be even more renowned as the Eventide Brigade captain who killed a Mourner prince and the Timebreaker himself. I want you to watch me do it before I kill you too, pet.”
Ashkade fired, but it went wide and zinged into the rocks—a warning, since Vaetrik was still too close to me for him to have a clear shot.
“I almost feel bad for you,” Vaetrik hissed, eyes alight with malice. “Your prince is bleeding out as we speak, back there in that tunnel. I ran into some strange creatures that looked like the two of you, and he found me standing over the bodies.”
I searched for the lie in his expression, but he was skilled at hiding things, just like I was. All I could see was venom. But no, there couldn't possibly be any truth to it. Reiven was perfectly fine, and he'd join us soon.
“I left him alive, you know.”
“Where?” Ash demanded, taking a few steps closer.
“He’s lying!” I snapped.
Kill him. Kill him!
That feral chant resounded in my head. Vaetrik needed to die now. My bones and blood knew it.
But Ash wasn't primed to distrust him in the same way I was. “B-but what if he's not? What if Rei is hurt and we could save him? We have to at least try!”
“Lower your weapon, Timebreaker,” Vaetrik said with a coaxing smile, “and I'll take you to him.”
I screamed at Ash not to listen, bared my fangs, and wrenched my sword arm back to deal the killing blow. The sound of Ash taking his finger off the trigger of his pistol made me freeze, especially as Vaetrik sneered.
“Zephra, don’t,” Ash said in a small voice. “It'll be…fine.”
Vaetrik moved as quickly as a darting eel, seizing my wrist to render my rapier useless.
He still had his cutlass, I remembered with a start, as he hurled me backwards so I crashed into my young friend.
Somehow, Ash managed to catch me under my arms, though he had to drop his crutch with a clatter on the rocks to do so.
Maybe in that moment, the god of time intervened.
I was painfully aware of every second that ticked by, and my body dragged like a corpse being pulled through muck.
I was off balance, but I was still between Ash and Vaetrik as he charged, cutlass drawn and madness in his ice-blue eyes.
All I had to do was steady my boots on the stone, brace for impact, and block.
That was what I was supposed to do. That was what should have happened.
But instead, Ash shoved me to the ground behind him, and I slammed into the gravel on my back. The impact made my ears ring and my vision blur, but not enough to blind me to what happened next.
Ash had hardly raised his pistol before a quiet, frightened gasp escaped his lips as Vaetrik thrust his cutlass through his chest with a snarl of rage and effort.
I heard another, quieter whimper before Vaetrik withdrew his sword, only to stab my dearest Human friend twice more in the stomach before kicking him to the ground. The sound of flesh ripping made sickening warmth rise from my stomach up my throat.
Vaetrik chuckled. He chuckled.
All the breath and life left my body in one scream that could have torn my vocal cords to shreds.