Chapter Thirty-Seven Blood Song #2
Thance tried to wrap the cloak around Omira’s shoulders, but his sister yanked the cloth back and did it herself. The normalcy of that small action had both Reya and Thance relaxing. That and the sadistic gleam in Omira’s eyes as she took the short sword and dagger Reya offered her.
“Sorry I couldn’t find you a spear,” Reya said.
Omira’s reply was a dry rasp. “I’ll make it work.”
They were silent and quick as they searched the rest of the chambers in the hall.
Each time they reached a turn, Reya would put up her hand, a signal for them all to halt while she peeked around the corner.
Where they found guards, Reya brought them down swiftly and quietly.
Hall after hall, they searched. But in each room, just tools and bloodstains remained.
Only in one room did they find a body. A Sage—still, cold, and pale with blood loss.
There was no sign of Caelan.
“We need to split up,” Reya said, frustration and hopelessness threatening to overwhelm her. “It’s only a matter of time until they find one of the bodies we’ve left behind—if they haven’t already—and this place goes on lockdown.”
“What do you suggest we do?” Omira snapped.
Reya ran a hand through her hair. “The exit. Is it in the armory?”
Thance nodded. She’d been right.
“You said you knew the layout of the prison. Can you find it from here?” Another nod.
“If this is going to work, I need you both to listen to me.” Reya offered Thance the ring of keys.
“By the look of them, I think the key for each cell block also fits each cell in that block, which makes things easier. The rest of the keys you should be able to get off the guards at the sector entrances. Open every cell door. Kill every guard and priest you see. Set free every magic-born. Do it as quietly as you can for as long as you can. We all leave here together, or none of us do.”
Reya would not leave behind the child with hope in his eyes. Would not shut her own a moment longer to the horror of what was being done here, and not just to the Sages.
The King of Rhiterra had stolen what was hers, had stolen Caelan. And no one stole from her and walked away. For that alone Reya was going to end this place. She would take as many people with her as she could, and when she was finished, Rothmire would rue the day he’d dared send men into her home.
“Reya,” Thance cautioned, “corralling that many people may hurt our chances of getting out at all—”
“If the exit has in fact been sealed,” she said, cutting him off, “we will need strength in numbers to fight our way out. And the fight does not belong only to the Sages. It belongs to everyone in here.” Reya was no longer able to contain her anger, to bury it beneath the calm she’d spent her life practicing on jobs like this one where her and the Bluehoods’ lives were on the line.
“There are children in this prison. And I will not leave them to be”—she gestured at the chambers, voice shaking—“blood-let and experimented on. You tried to take the prison once before and you failed because you stood alone. If you do not learn from that, if you continue in the belief that some lives are more valuable than others, then you are no better than the Fae or the King of Rhiterra.”
Thance flinched. Omira looked murderous, but the familiar expression was edged in surprise, and then it turned contemplative.
“What are you going to do?” Thance asked.
“I’m going to find Caelan.”
“And if something goes wrong? If you both get trapped here?” Omira asked.
Reya met Omira’s sharp gaze. “I need you to trust me.”
They considered her in silence. Then they both nodded. “We’re with you,” Thance said, before concisely explaining how to get to the armory.
“As soon as you start opening cells, they will likely light the signal fires, if they haven’t already,” Reya said. “You know what will happen then. Arm every prisoner who can hold a blade. I’ll meet you there.” She turned to go, but then halted. “Oh, and Thance? There’s something else.”
She’d checked every door. Still no sign of Caelan.
There had to be something she was overlooking.
Reya sprinted back down the hall, double-checking every room and running her hand along the shadowed stone, feeling for hidden paths.
She almost missed it.
The door was tall and thin, barely big enough for a single person to fit through and old enough that she could smell the rotted wood. It could have been a closet. But a two-finned tail had been carved into its center.
It was unlocked, which was the first bad sign.
A moldy draft wafted up from the abyss as she pushed the door wide.
Darkness greeted her, so black she feared even an immortal’s sight would do nothing to assist her.
She summoned her Ire and pulled one of the torches from the wall, revealing a narrow, winding staircase.
“All right, let’s see where you lead.”
Down and down she went, the thin torch held out before her to help light the steps that grew slicker and narrower the farther she descended.
As she counted the stairs, the walls began to change.
The stone turned rugged and dark, and small weeds appeared in the cracks along the walls.
Reya knew she was no longer in the fortress.
She was beneath it. Far beneath.
Reya forced a yawn to ease the painful pressure in her ears. A sound like rushing water greeted her, growing louder and louder as she continued down the steps. She paused to listen.
Singing. She was sure of it.
It was haunting and beautiful, a symphony of crashing surf and wistful keens.
Reya took the rest of the steps two at a time, giving up her efforts to count—she was deep enough that it hardly mattered now—and bracing herself on the walls as she spiraled down, down.
The music swelled as the floor leveled and a small, ancient iron door appeared. No keyhole.
Metal whined as she pushed against it, but the frame didn’t budge.
Reya stepped back as far as she could, angling her body to one side, and rammed her shoulder into the unforgiving metal.
Her bones cried out at the contact, but she ignored the pain.
Again. The rusted hinges screeched. Again.
With a grunt, she went flying into a cold, wet room.
Or rather, a cavern that smelled of mold and the ocean.
And there in the hollowed heart of the mountain—hanging by his ankles above a black lake teeming with flesh-eating Sirens—was Caelan.