Page 108 of Boundless

I couldn’t tell you how I knew, but I could have sworn I heard her voice in my head, and she was calling for me to follow.

“We need to go,” I said and slammed both heels onto the sides of my horse.

Rune didn’t argue. The next second, his horse was galloping next to mine, and we were moving to the other side, following the echo of the howl. My heart beat just as fast as the horse hooves hit the ground because that call could only mean one thing. Either Maera had found the heir somehow, or she’d found Lyall—and I had no idea how in the hell we were going to handle either scenario.

Even so, we ran.

We went all the way around the gorge’s rim, so close to the cliff yet our horses didn’t once slow down. As we neared the main pathway, though, Rune pulled his toward the trees as his shadows spread out of his fingers to come wrap around us in whatever illusion he was creating. I barely breathed as I followed, but I was perfectly focused, eyes zeroed in on the darkness beyond the dense trees, waiting to finally make out the main road that would lead us to that bridge. I was sure that that’s where we were going, that we’d need to make our way down to those cages, but…

“Stop!” I said half-heartedly and pulled the reins of my horse with all my strength. The horse stopped, and by some miracle, I managed to lock my body down tightly enough that I didn’t fall forward. Rune stopped, too, though I wasn’t sure if he’d heard the howl that stopped me. It was Maera, and she sounded different than a moment ago, and for the life of me I couldn’t explain it if I tried.

Then there was the light.

We were close to that main road that the people here used to get in and out of the Keep—though that was a very misleading name for a fucking graveyard full of cages—and a few of them were moving on horseback right now. Small golden and silvery-white lights hovered in the air over the men and women whowere rushing away from the Keep, and they all wore armor. My instinct was to back away, to jump off the horse, hide behind a tree, but then Rune raised his finger to get my attention. When I looked at him, he brought it in front of his lips to tell me to keep quiet.

The guards did not see us. They didn’t even look our way, and only then did I feel the thick layer of magic that surrounded us—Rune’s magic. The shadows that had already disappeared into thin air, but their power still remained.

The howling came again. The lights burning over the seven soldiers were barely a dot in the distance, and so Rune and I ran forward, followed Maera’s howl all the way to the other side of the road. No more horses or soldiers that we could see, only the giant gates at the very end that would lead to the bridge, I assumed—and they were closed.

Maera was howling as she continued to run to the other side, deeper into the woods.

“What is shedoing?!” Rune called as we followed, the horses barely touching the ground as they took us forward. I had no clue what to tell him, just that that howl was clearly a call, and I trusted Maera. I trusted she knew what she was doing, so I didn’t stop. Neither did he.

I wasn’t sure how long we rode, but I didn’t bother to even look behind to see if we were being followed. That’s how I saw Maera, in her human form, standing there stark naked between the trees only a few feet away.

Could have been a dream.

For the second time, I pulled the reins with all my strength and stopped the horse before I slammed into her. She was really there, hair wild and all over the place, skin dirty here and there, glistening with sweat, her chest rising and falling rapidly as she brought a finger to her lips.

Rune and I stopped even breathing loudly, and all the questions I’d prepared to ask her died on the tip of my tongue. Then Maera waved her hand to tell us to follow her, and she turned around and went deeper between the trees.

I dismounted the horse as silently as I could, and by the time my feet hit the ground, Rune was there to wait for me, take the reins of my horse and tie them loosely to the nearest branch.

Ashes on the ground, gathered near the tree trunks, atop branches here and there, some floating about in the air without direction. The silence was haunting. Maera walked ahead, her bare feet against the rough ground, yet she didn’t even flinch or look where she was stepping. She could have been a fucking ghost if my eyes were closed and I had to rely on my ears alone. Rune was the same, barely a shadow, indistinguishable from the darkness, but I heardmyfootsteps just fine. I heard them together with the wild beating of my heart as we went closer and closer to Maera, and she slowed her steps.

Then stopped, raised a finger to the side, and…

Snap.

I heard it as clearly as I heard my own breathing. Something moved ahead—someone, and when I followed the sound, I found the two figures in the distance, half-hidden behind the trees.

Eyes made of fire locked on mine. For a split second, the world didn’t exist at all.

The roar that followed, coming from somewhere over our heads, made the blood in my veins freeze with ice magic. The figure in the distance, the one with those fiery eyes, moved, and someone else was beside him.

They ran together.

I didn’t even need to think or look at the others before I ran after them. Rune and Maera, who was still naked, were already ahead. I pushed myself to keep up, not really thinking I actuallycould,so imagine my surprise when my legs moved almost withthe same speed as theirs. I was fuckingflyingthrough the woods so fast it scared me shitless, and we kept going, following the movement ahead for quite a while.

Until we saw red.

A flash of red—a piece of fabric swooshing ahead of us—and then gold. Golden eyes in a face I knew so well I could paint it in detail. It was Lyall, and my heart jumped even before he disappeared again.

We stopped running, slowed our steps, spun around as our eyes searched for movement, for a shadow, for a sign.

“Where…where…”where the fuck did they go?!Because they were right there some fifteen feet away from us just seconds ago, and now they were gone.

“Illusion,” said Rune through gritted teeth, shooting his shadows forward while Maera growled.