Page 32 of A Hunt Bound in Blood

After all, I’d turned my nose up at hunting down this amulet, and so far, it had turned out to be one of the most fascinating journeys of my career. Puzzles, clues, traps. I was living the adventure stories my mother had raised me with, and even while I remained wary and more than a little concerned about the threats we might face ahead, I was enjoying myself.

Not least because of this woman and her mysteries.

“Up ahead,” she said, interrupting my thoughts. “I think this next turn in the road is the last one before the mine. Keep your eyes open for any sign of church bells.”

“At your service, dear mage.”

I grinned at the flattening of her lips, then did as she ordered and watched the skyline where it appeared through the trees. It took another long stretch of walking before I grabbed her arm and pointed. The steeple of a collapsing church rose above the branches. The bell had long since fallen, but the odds of there being two bell towers visible from this mine were slim.

“It seems your deductions were correct,” I said.

Glory’s smile was as bright as the sun, and if it carried a touch of smugness, I couldn’t blame her. “We can’t be far now. The mine should be just ahead.”

I released her arm, disconcerted at my reluctance to break contact.

The sun was behind us, urging our shadows faster and farther ahead, leading us towards the split in the road. Glory hesitated, then followed the grown-over lane that led to a boarded-up access tunnel. She frowned as she ran her hands over the rotting wood.

“If the clue was inside, Tersey wouldn’t have referenced the church bells. Or at least he would have added some other detail.” She narrowed her eyes and assessed the closed entrance. “Also, he wouldn’t have had easy access to the mine.”

I followed her gaze, noting the air of abandonment in the overgrown foliage and rock-strewn path. “I can’t believe this place still exists. It’s obviously been closed for ages. How has your king done nothing to clean it up?”

“Maybe he thinks it could be useful again someday? The tracks in the road are still there, so someone must come out this way to keep an eye on things.”

“Seems like a waste of resources to me,” I grumbled under my breath, but what did I know?

“Regardless, we should work on the assumption that the clue is somewhere out here,” Glory continued, undeterred. “If we don’t find it soon, we can take another look at the map.”

I waved my hand for her to continue. Of the two of us, she was the one who’d discovered all the signposts thus far, so I wasn’t about to challenge her opinion.

With her attention split between the church and the access tunnel, Glory approached the overgrown bramble bushes that had taken over the area. She stepped carefully, but the poky greenery grabbed at her long skirt and pulled at her shirtsleeves. She wrestled with it without seeming to notice, every ounce of her focus set on finding the next clue.

For my part, I kept to the edge of the bramble she’d waded into and limited my assistance to what I could see. Most of the trees here had been cleared away, revealing hints of grey rock that marked the start of the low mountains we’d now be skirting as we wandered closer to dragon territory.

I scanned the rock wall, and my gaze fell on a strange indentation, an anomaly I wouldn’t have noticed if I hadn’t been searching for it. As it was, I had to squint and tilt my head to double-check what I was seeing—something roundish, certainly nothing that could be found in nature without some external hand helping it along.

“Hey, Buttons,” I called, knowing it would get her attention—and probably annoy her. “What’s that?”

Sure enough, her shoulders tightened at the nickname, but she followed my pointing finger, and that glow of excitement I’d come to anticipate swept over her features.

All irritation with me—likely all thought of me—vanished as she pushed through the shrubs and bramble and whatever else to the rocky facade.

“You’re right, this is it,” she said over her shoulder. She raised her hand to brush her fingers over the surface, then stopped herself and pulled back. “No, we’ve learned that lesson. The clues are supposed to get harder as we go. Last time, there was something about the order of buttons to be pushed and the consequence was a big fucking hole in the ground.”

A laugh escaped me. Every curse out of this woman’s mouth was a treat to my ears, a subversion of expectation, and I had to admit her coarseness triggered a depraved response in me. It made me wonder what other devilry existed under her prim surface.

“If this puzzle is harder than three buttons, we can probably assume the consequences for getting it wrong will be worse as well.” She sniffed. “Although I can’t imagine much worse than being impaled by dozens of spikes. I’m beginning to think Mage Tersey might have had… issues.”

The understatement made me laugh again, louder. “You didn’t get that from the fact that the man left a dozen clues to find some necklace instead of leaving himself a note with a map? Either he was paranoid beyond belief or he had an ego the size of Golthwaine.”

“I suspect both.” She leaned forward to get a better view of what must have been writing etched in the stone. “At least this one’s legible, though that doesn’t make it any more comprehensible. ‘The miners heaved stone so the clever might thrive. They hewed through rock so the strong might survive. Move quick the weight of bramble and stone. Think quick to preserve your blood and bone.’ Friendly little message.”

She chewed on her bottom lip, and I watched the blood rush into the pale flesh. It was a nervous quirk I hadn’t noticed before, and I wondered what other emotions might prompt her to do it. Or what that plump bottom lip might feel like under my own teeth.

I cleared my throat, gave myself a shake, and joined her in the bramble to read the inscription for myself.

“What do you think?” I asked. “A test of strength?”

She nodded, but the crease between her eyebrows deepened. “But not just that. Strength and wit.”