Page 30 of A Blade of Blood and Shadow (The Ravaged Kingdom #1)

Chapter

Twenty-One

W ith every step, the pull of that familiar magic grew stronger and stronger until I could feel it vibrating in my very bones. It led me off the main chamber to another set of stone stairs.

After our fight with the Vikkarni, my whole body ached, and I wondered if the Watchman was leading us on some wild goose chase with the sole aim of exhausting us.

As we climbed, my focus drifted from the tug of that strange magic to the sound of Kaden’s ragged breathing. He seemed to be moving more slowly than usual, and I knew the venom must be working its way through his system.

We needed to find that book — and fast.

The stairs came to an abrupt halt in front of an ornate iron gate. There was no lock — no mechanism for Kaden to unravel with his magic — but somehow I knew that I was the key. Or at least my magic was.

As I drew closer, the gate swung open with a loud screech, and I stepped into a small alcove that led out onto a ledge. Below was an enormous natural cavern. The stench of moss and decay nearly bowled me over as I approached the edge and stared out over the murky black water.

I sucked in a breath. The magic was even stronger here. It buzzed against my lips and hummed in my chest, and I sensed a little flare of excitement that hadn’t come from me.

My gaze drifted across the cavern to another ledge. It was the twin to the one on which I now stood, and I could just make out what looked like a box resting on a dainty pedestal inside the alcove.

“Is that it?” Kaden asked, his normally golden face ashen as he stared out across the gaping pit.

I nodded.

Every few yards, a stone column rose from the foul-smelling water — a tiny island just large enough to stand on.

Gauging the distance, I was fairly certain that I could jump from one column to the next to reach the opposite ledge. But after our experience with the Vikkarni, I knew the risk of falling to my death couldn’t be the only danger. The Watchman was too malicious for that.

As I stared into the fetid water, my gaze snagged on a dark shape moving beneath the water’s surface.

I shuddered. Something told me that whatever dwelled in that water was even worse than the Vikkarni.

As if the thing had read my thoughts, something broke the water’s surface. Not a fin or a snout or jaws, but what looked like a human head.

Horror clanged through me as water sluiced over the creature’s hair and down its naked body. A woman. Only there was something . . . wrong about the way she bobbed there, as though it took no effort to tread water.

Straw-colored hair clung to her face and back in sodden ropes, and her flesh was as gray as a waterlogged corpse. The woman’s arms and torso were horribly emaciated, and I could see ribs protruding from beneath her breasts.

Neither Kaden nor I said a word as she scented the air, her hair falling back off her face as she turned to look at us.

Everything inside me recoiled at her unholy gaze, and I staggered back from the edge. Where her eyes should have been were two sunken pits. The flesh of her nose had rotted away entirely, leaving only a gaping hole in her skull.

Despite the female’s apparent blindness, she leered up at us with rotten teeth. The sight was unsettling, almost as if she were anticipating her next meal.

Just then, more heads broke the water’s surface — males and females who looked just as dead.

No, not dead , I realized. They were undead — merpeople starved for living flesh.

“Shall we?” Kaden asked. His tone bordered on his usual cockiness, though he couldn’t mask the trepidation in his voice.

I drew in a shaky breath and nodded. After our last encounter, every fiber of my being itched to sink my blade into those merpeople.

A heartbeat later, Kaden summoned his wings, and my heart leapt at the sight.

I’d all but forgotten about his wings. We wouldn’t have to jump after all. He could fly us over that ghastly pit.

But as soon as the thought flashed through my mind, the merpeople began to screech. It was a horrible, alien sound that rattled my skull and made me want to cover my ears.

The shrieks they exchanged told me they were doing more than expressing their displeasure. I couldn’t understand them, but the meaning was clear by the rage that contorted their faces — rage at the possibility that they might be denied their next meal.

A few dove back beneath the water’s surface, and Kaden and I exchanged an uneasy glance. Filthy water splashed as the merpeople began to reemerge, clutching primitive crossbows and bolts.

“Get down!” Kaden yelled a split second before the first one loosed an arrow.

My knees hit the ground, and my skin hummed with familiar magic as Kaden threw his body down over mine. That magic fizzed and stuttered around us, and Kaden’s low hiss tickled the back of my neck.

“ Shit .”

His low oath sent a jolt of fear through me, and I scrambled out from beneath him to see where he’d been hurt.

Horror twisted my insides when I saw the primitive fletching of an arrow sticking out from his iridescent black wing. “You’re hit.”

Kaden grunted, canting his wing to view the extent of the damage.

“Why didn’t you throw up a shield the way you did with the Vikkarni?”

“Tried,” he gritted as fresh pain rippled across his features. “It’s the damned venom. My shield didn’t hold.”

At those words, a deeper fear took root inside me. If the venom was affecting Kaden’s magic, how long did we have before it incapacitated him completely?

“I need you to pull the arrow out,” he rasped as the merpeople below nocked more arrows.

“What?” I stared at the spot where the bolt had pierced his wing. Blood was leaking from the wound, but I knew the damage was worse than it looked. “ How ?”

I’d never removed an arrow before. Stab wounds and vampire bites I could handle, but arrows ?

“Straight and quick,” he croaked, looking vaguely green at the prospect. “Hurry.”

Heart hammering, I positioned myself behind him as the merpeople released another volley of arrows.

This time, I felt Kaden’s attempt at a shield — an abrupt fizz of magic that quickly petered out. It slowed the arrows but didn’t stop them, and they clattered to the ground.

A growl of frustration slipped from his throat, and Kaden twisted, looping an arm around my waist. He tucked my body against his hip and dragged me farther into the alcove. It didn’t put us out of the archers’ range, but it meant the merpeople would have to aim a little better to hit their mark.

Hands shaking, I got into position again and studied the arrow in Kaden’s wing. The shaft looked as though it had been fashioned from a reed, and the fletching was made from some kind of fin. The tip appeared to be solid bone sharpened to a lethal point.

Taking a deep breath, I gripped the shaft as close to his wing as I could manage, pressing my palm into the thin membrane for leverage .

A shiver ran through him at my touch, though I didn’t think it was one of pain. It set off a chain reaction in my own body, but I didn’t let myself dwell on that feeling. I just gripped the arrow and tugged.

Kaden strangled a cry as I yanked out the tip, ripping the gorgeous, shimmering flesh. I couldn’t see his expression, but the hand splayed on the ground in front of me was white where his fingertips met the stone.

“You can’t fly us across,” I muttered, chucking the arrow off the ledge. “They’ll shred your wings.”

“You got a better idea?” Kaden growled, throwing up another feeble shield as more arrows rained down.

This shield was even weaker than the last. One of the arrows slipped right through, grazing my upper arm.

I hissed and clapped a hand to the wound. “We jump.”

At least then we’d present a smaller target — one that was harder to hit.

Kaden’s face tightened, but he didn’t argue. Not that I was asking. I was getting across that cavern — with or without him.

Wordlessly, Kaden folded his wings, wincing at the effort it took. I imagined that it hurt like hell, but if the Vikkarni venom was sapping his magic, he might not be able to spirit them away.

Backing up until my heel brushed the stone wall behind us, I squared my shoulders and forced out a breath, preparing for a running start.

I pushed off the wall just as the merpeople sent another hailstorm of arrows arching toward us, and my stomach left me as I leapt over the yawning pit.

I yelped as one of the merpeople’s arrows glanced off my hip, but my feet found purchase on the narrow stone column, and I landed in a crouch. I dragged in a breath as my fingers curled around the edge of the rock, deliberately avoiding the temptation to look down.

My heart was pounding so hard that it hurt, but I forced myself to breathe.

Crouched on the stone column suspended fifty feet overhead, I’d be nearly impossible to hit. But Kaden was still waiting on that ledge — an easy mark for their arrows.

Taking another breath to anchor myself, I straightened my legs ever so slightly. Without the stability of the rock wall behind me, I felt suddenly much less steady.

It was also at that moment I realized my miscalculation.

While the distance between columns had seemed feasible from the ledge, that had been anticipating each jump with a slight running start. But the column on which I now stood was tiny — barely three feet across.

Not only that, but from my new vantage point, I could tell that the other columns were spaced farther apart as they neared the opposite ledge, as though whoever had placed them had anticipated the onset of an intruder’s fatigue.

I wasn’t certain I’d be able to make those jumps, and I was even more worried for Kaden, injured as he was.

Seven more columns stretched across the cavern, mocking me even as they dared me to jump. But something had shifted the moment I felt the lure of that magic; it had become my center, somehow. The magic itself called to me.

I couldn’t turn back, I realized. I needed that book. I would get it or die trying.