Chapter 10 It Begins
It begins
Cadel jerks awake, bouncing to his feet and looking around like he’s expecting someone to appear in front of his eyes. There is a longing on his face that contrasts with the sheer aura of danger that is dripping off him.
He moved so quickly.
“Are you all right?” I murmur.
He shakes his head. “Just a dream. A bad dream. I can’t even remember now.”
I peer at him. It would be awful to have no memories, to have nothing. To not even know your own name.
“It’s okay. Don’t try to remember. It will come back or it won’t.”
He turns away from me, but there’s a tension in his shoulders that makes me think he’s going to be thinking about it for a long time.
I’ve got my own thoughts that are swamping my mind. I feel like I’ve barely had a chance to process ending up here. One minute I was so close to the answers, now I’m further away than I ever have been.
I don’t feel well. My head is burning and feels thick and heavy, and I feel like vomiting. All I want to do is curl up and pass out.
“It’s morning. We should get going,” Mordecai says.
I roll to my feet. “Give me a minute.”
I take care of business and return, waiting for the others, which only takes another moment. I’m almost scared to go out of the temple and see what horrors await us.
Still, Mordecai gives us all one heavy look and silently walks out into the dull light of the new day.
Will this be the day I die? I feel like it. I put a hand to my hot face, trying to cool off.
Walking out into the city this morning is like walking into some place new. It doesn’t look at all how it looked last night. Perhaps my perception was off, my shock and sleep deprivation turning the bleak grey buildings into a nightmarescape. The smell isn’t so offensive this morning.
In the morning light, even hidden behind clouds, the buildings are bigger than they appeared, and they seem much less intimidating.
Birds fly through the top floors, while the wind howls through them as if they are tunnels.
There is more green than I expected, but everywhere I look I see signs of the previous hunts.
A body lying in the grass; only the skeleton remains with shreds of clothing.
There’s a sword embedded in the bricks of the temple.
Someone carved ‘help’ in a sheet of plastic, an immortalised plea for help from someone who could have died hundreds of years ago. Or yesterday.
The grasses have blood-red flowers that I’ve never seen before and are tall, growing in clumps that rise to my thighs. The trees are massive, towering giants that grow around parts of buildings, letting through dappled light that still feels sinister.
If our souls stay on this plane, unhappy with our lives, are the trees fed by the spirits of the deceased? Do the people who die here come back as part of the world holding it together? Are the blood-red blooms red because of the blood that fed them?
“How far to the school that Bear was talking about?” I ask with a shudder.
I feel like we’re being watched, but there are so many places for someone to watch us from. Spirits or people, ghosts that have their bodies or ghosts about to lose them.
My morbid thoughts press on me.
I want to move.
I need to run.
“I’m not actually sure where we are,” Mordecai says. “We need to head to the center of the city.”
I curse because I’d much rather be on the outer fringes. Preferably as far from the gate as I can get.
The wind picks up, and I catch the scent of something burning. My mind fills with horrible thoughts. My skin crawls, and I turn in a circle, trying to work out where that smell is coming from.
“Wouldn’t it be bad if they just set the city on fire?” I murmur and peer up at the sky that is dove-grey. The clouds are churning.
Jarek tugs on a lock of my hair and leans in close. “No more talking for you, creepy omega.”
I splutter a laugh.
He drops an arm over my shoulders. I suck in air and stay perfectly still, watching him out of the corner of my eye. Touch is something rare in my life. In fact, since my mother died, few people have touched me and never in such a casual way.
Then again, I’ve never had an all-consuming desire to lick an alpha the way I do about this one.
“You are just a cute little bundle of happy thoughts, aren’t you? But let’s not jinx ourselves. I do not want to go out in flames.”
I smile back, despite every thought in my head trying to stop me. I can’t help it; he’s contagious.
“Are you all right, Keres? You don’t look so good.”
I don’t feel so good, but I give him a small smile and nod. “I’m fine, just shook up from all this.”
Mordecai looks around and scowls. “Let’s go that way.”
Jarek leans in close. “He’s got a very focused mind. Straight and pure. It will be fun to corrupt him.”
“You can’t,” Mordecai says easily. “I have a purpose and a mission.”
“And nothing is more important than the mission,” Jarek and Mordecai say at the same time.
Jarek bursts into peels of delighted laughter and bounces away when Mordecai steps towards him, his expression furious. I exhale, relieved to have him off me so I can go back to pretending he doesn’t affect me at all.
“This way,” Cadel says.
He’s standing in hip-tall grass, and when I get close, he turns his head so I can just see the side of his face. I freeze behind him, staring as he looks back at me.
I’ve seen him before. I’ve lived this moment before.
My head explodes with pain, and I whimper and put a hand up, cradling my cheek. Cadel turns back, his eyes running over me.
What is wrong? The pain eases as quickly as it appears.
A single boom echoes through the city, birds explode into the sky, and the world gets quiet.
I turn in a circle. A pit opens up in my stomach.
BOOM.
I shudder and take a step backwards.
BOOM.
Cadel reaches out and snags my wrist. He looks into my eyes. His face is pale; his dark eyes flash red.
Red eyes?
“Run.”
I don’t have time to think about anything else. We just explode into movement. The sound of drumbeats gets closer together and louder. As if they are all around us.
Every step sends agony through my skull. My heart beats too loud, and my energy fails far too soon. I’m running on sheer willpower within minutes.
We haven’t gone far when Mordecai jumps up into a building. Disappearing into its depths. It’s a tall skeletal building with very little floor left, just a metal frame that is still defying gravity.
“Wait!” I cry out, skidding to a stop, staring up where he disappeared.
Jarek rocks on his heels and looks around. There are fewer trees here, but the buildings around us look less touched by time, so why did he choose that one?
Cadel turns around, staring off down the street, his head cocked.
“What do you hear?” I ask curiously.
“The gates are opening, the metal panels are flapping, and lots of sounds; feet marching. Animals.”
Jarek spits. “Great, the Beta’s Path is on the march to murder us. Hurry up, Mordecai!”
“Shhh!” I slap my hand over his mouth.
His eyes dance, and to my shock, he licks my palm. I snatch my hand back and stumble away from him.
He follows, his eyes half-mast. “You taste divine.”
I hiss, which is echoed by something in the shadows of the building across from us. My head turns slowly, in jerky movements.
Cadel whips around, his knees bent, gazing intently. I hadn’t thought he was paying attention to us, but his entire focus is on the dark shadows of the darkened room. The window is missing, and from deep inside comes another, more pissed off growl.
It takes me a moment, but I see the green glow of eyes, four of them. The creature leaps out, all orange and black stripes. It’s got two heads and seven tails that are held very still as it paces towards us. Teeth and claws ready to shred us into tiny bits.
Jarek grabs me around the waist and twirls me backwards. I let out a muffled grunt, but by the time I’ve turned around, Jarek’s thrown a knife to Cadel, who snatches it out of the air and collides with the cat.
They wrestle until he roars into its face.
The cat freezes, its eyes going wide. All of a sudden, it’s scrambling backwards. Cadel lets it go.
He stares after it, then turns back to us.
We’re just staring at him. I can’t look away. What is he? Who is he?
“What?”
“That cat just got terrified of you growling and ran away,” I say thickly. “You scared a giant predator.”
He shrugs. “I’m scary.”
“Uh-huh,” I nod in agreement, because what else can I say?
I turn to see what Jarek is doing and find him staring up at the building. I squint through the light and see Mordecai at the top, hanging precariously off a steel pipe.
I curse, but he just swings back in. Within minutes, he lands heavily beside us, not even out of breath.
“This way.”
He leads us through the streets, and just as suddenly as they started, the drums stop.
“Oh, that is ominous,” Jarek says darkly.
I don’t say anything; I just think of all the stories I’ve heard. I’m going to die.
I should just accept it and hand myself over to the Warden.
Mordecai leads us for a couple of hours. We move well together and in dead silence. I expected to see people or more animals, but it would appear everyone is hiding. My energy is almost gone, and the sickness has crawled up and taken over.
Half of my attention is on the world around us, but the rest is uneasily watching these alphas. My head is foggy and confused, but paranoia is slipping easily into my mind, whispering dark thoughts.
Perhaps they are going to kill me.
All the proof is there to see.
They move differently.
They make very little noise, and they flow together like they’ve known each other all their lives.
They listen to sounds but also to what they aren’t hearing. It’s like they all did training together.
The confusion grows until I can’t take it anymore. I stalk up to Mordecai, stabbing a finger into his chest.
“The least you could have done is told me you all know each other,” I snarl.