Chapter 10 #2
Air rushes around me, holding me in its terrifying embrace. My boots impact the ground and the sheer force of the landing is staggering, as my knees give out and I crumple.
Save for the throb of force pounding up my legs, there’s no pain when I take inventory of myself. I wiggle each toe then each finger. I’m sore and bruised but not broken.
The late night air greets me with a maddening silence.
Strange flowering bushes and massive black oaks rustle as I rise to my feet.
The fortress grounds incite an all-encompassing dread through me.
This place is weird, and near impossible to comprehend, but I locate the northern star and start through the gardens.
If I’ve read the old sketch correctly, Morvayne’s Well shouldn’t be far, maybe a mile or two from the fortress.
I tell myself the journey is no problem, but my ankles ache with each step.
The garden’s fountain lingers like a blurred memory, a dream resurfaced.
Its spout, as if frozen in time, trickles in a seamless arc.
I wash my hand through the falling water, half expecting the stream to be made from glass.
It scatters briefly then resumes its perfect flow.
There’s no sound, no turbulent bubbles in the pool below. What the fuck is this place?
The shudder creeping down my spine keeps my pace fast as I leave the fountain to its eerie daydream and cross a footbridge toward the tree line.
If I’ve learned anything from my time here, it’s that Shadow really loves their creepy forests.
Starlight spatters in from the gnarled canopy overhead, like little gemstones writhing across the forest floor.
Just like the haunted woods around the border, this place shakes me.
The shadows mold and sculpt into outlines of wriggling creatures.
I tell myself it’s just a trick of the light, but they stalk me like prey as I follow the cleared route through the brush.
Just ahead, there’s a crumbling stone foundation.
Maybe once a gardener’s shed or guardhouse.
My stomach flips as I realize something I’d been too distracted before to even comprehend.
Other than a cook or two, there are no staff here.
No chambermaids or hand servants. No guards or groundskeepers.
Maintaining a property of this size would require at least fifty on staff, but there’s no one.
Dread gathers tight in my chest. Where are they all?
Or, more importantly, what happened to them?
My blood chills as I approach the destroyed shed, ensnared by overgrown vines and grasses.
Rusted gardening tools and rakes lean undisturbed against the crumbling wall, exposed to the elements by a collapsed roof.
There’s a scythe with hairline fractures webbing over its blade just beneath a tangle of overgrowth.
Broken beyond use, but adequate enough for self-defense.
I pull the handle, freeing the tool from its earthly imprisonment and freeze.
It’s not the blood spatter staining its blade that causes my veins to ice over, but the broken grimy skull it’d been lodged in.
The scream builds up my throat before I can swallow it.
I’ve seen death before, experienced violence and decay, but these remains shatter me to my core.
I don’t dare look too closely, knowing I’ll find bodies littering these woods as I sprint down the trail, leaving the scythe and corpse to rot into the earth.
The path spirals through the woods like a labyrinth, and by the time I reach a clearing, the brisk light of dawn peeks from the horizon.
Sharp cliffs jut into the brightening sky on either side, and there, in the center, is a circular shrine, with a dome carved from onyx, supported by plain columns spaced equally around its base.
That has to be Morvayne’s Well. The air chills as I sneak toward the shrine steps, scanning the clearing for any sign of movement.
Hushed voices engaged in an intense conversation echo from within. I duck behind a column, pulse flaring in my ears, and scan the shrine.
“You can’t keep doing this, Jace. You’ll get yourself killed out there.” Roe’s quiet voice is stern in the rising morning air. Seated beside her, undressed to the waist, is the King of Shadow. His back is painted with open gashes all too reminiscent of claw marks.
He sighs and wades into the well—a pool filled with blood-red liquid. It’s just the mineral and sediment that taints the water red, I tell myself, but my resolve in that fact wavers.
“Who else will defend them, Roe? My people are dying…more and more by the day,” Jace says, bracing himself against the well’s edge. I don’t dare breathe. If I were to be seen—my stomach knots at the various ways either of them might kill me.
“Your people need their king to stay alive,” Roe replies, enunciating the words with her sharpened teeth.
“There won’t be anyone left to lead,” Jace says, and I swear there’s a somberness in his tone that splits my chest. Even amidst the panic of being mere breaths away from being caught, I find myself almost sympathetic.
The cold, cutthroat king who’d interrogated me is no longer present.
Only a leader desperate for his people’s survival.
But from what? There’s been no reports of invasion attempts recently across Smoke’s border.
Maybe the other factions finally came to their senses about Shadow?
Storm is a neutral party in the factions’ war games, but Sea, perhaps?
“Look at this land? These woods? They’re fucking dying, Roe.
The continent needs a guardian. The egg needs its rider.
” Jace lowers his chest into the well, wincing as each cut across his back disappears beneath the waterline.
Bathing in blood-tinted water is slightly jarring, but I steady myself against the column and lean closer.
“She’ll never admit it. You have to know that. Besides, maybe there’s another survivor out there. We don’t know it’s her,” Roe says. My scalp prickles and I turn my attention to the little she-demon seated cross-legged beside the well. Another survivor?
The continent needs a guardian.
My vision tunnels. Do they think I’m the guardian rider?
That’s not possible. Guardian riders are only born to noble houses.
My parents were lowborn, and besides…I’m from Smoke…
or so I’ve said. During the war, Sovereign’s nobility—House Ceti—must have fled.
If the dragon egg hasn’t yet stoned, then a surviving descendant is out there somewhere, and it sure as shit isn’t me.
“We just haven’t used the right tactic yet,” Jace says, before plunging under the water’s surface. My lungs risk bursting, and I’m forced to exhale. Roe’s eyes dart toward the column. Fuck. My muscles lock, my jaw clenches, and time stops. The rush of blood to my cheeks is dragonfire on my skin.
Roe’s eyes narrow as she scrutinizes the shadows. I pray to Astora, to Morvayne, to the rest of the pantheon, that she doesn’t see me.
Jace breeches the surface, pulling Roe’s attention back and I release a silent breath of relief.
“I still say torturing her is our best bet.” Roe chuckles, her canines flashing in the moonlight.
Jace tosses her a look before wading out of the well.
My gaze catches on his chest—curves of muscle with a trail of midnight hair leading to his low-rising trousers.
Gods, one glance at a beautiful body and I’ve forgotten they’re discussing the best methods to torture me with.
Jace flashes Roe a devilish grin but shakes his head. “We won’t be torturing anyone.”
Roe shrugs and rises to her feet. “Well then, what’s your plan? To hold her captive until we all die? She’s a mercenary for Morvayne’s sake. She won’t break.”
A sick little sliver of pride wells in my chest. She’s damn right I won’t spill my truths.
“I can be very persuasive.” Jace’s lip curls into a smirk as they disappear into the shadows.