Page 121 of Eldritch (The Eating Woods #2)
CHAPTER SEVENTY-SEVEN
KAZHIMYR
A top a hill that sloped down to the edge of Hagsmist forest, Kazhimyr peered around the mossy tor. He, Dravien, and Ravezio crouched there, watching one lone guard who slouched in the saddle as his horse aimlessly plodded along the stretch of woods.
“A single guard? That’s all the king could spare?” Ravezio asked beside him.
“I suppose everyone is busy chasing after someone. Besides, we’re the only fools reckless enough to seek out the mortal lands. Poor bastard’s probably bored to death.”
Dravien groaned. “Are we doing this or are we going to stand here whispering all day?”
“I’ll do it,” Ravezio said, pushing to his feet.
Kazhimyr yanked him back to the ground. “I’ll do it. Last thing we need is a statue to commemorate the moment.”
“Ah yeah, better that he collapses into chunks of meat all over the lawn. I’ll bite my lip, spit on the bastard and it’s done.”
“Hurry up about it, will you? I gotta piss.” Dravien gripped his groin where he sat on the ground beside us.
The moment the guard turned away, making another sluggish circuit along the treeline, Ravezio jumped to his feet and tore across the lawn toward him.
He managed to get right up on the guard, knocking him off the horse which galloped off without him.
They rollicked across the grass for a moment as Ravezio fought him, wrangling him beneath his body.
Kazhimyr pushed to his feet, striding toward the two with Dravien hobbling along just behind him.
His wounds were mostly healed, except for the blade he’d suffered to his knee that’d penetrated the bone. That one would take another day.
“Is he killing him or fucking him?”
“Must be savoring the moment.” Kazhimyr sneered, hastening his pace when Ravezio finally spat in the guard’s face.
The guard seized and convulsed on the ground and all three men strode past him into the woods. Once cloaked by the trees, Dravien drifted off, presumably to piss, returning minutes later.
“Took you long enough,” Ravezio muttered as he sharpened his blade on a rock.
Dravien sailed a mirthless smile back at him. “Big cocks take a while to drain.”
“Enough of this. Let’s get to that archway,” Kazhimyr said and in swift strides they tore through the trees, ignoring the annoying spiritynes that buzzed at their heads or the catallys that watched from their perches.
Over fallen trees and vegetation, they trekked deeper into the woods until, they finally reached the boundary and the archway to the dreaded mortal lands.
From his pocket, Kazhimyr fished out the scroll that Dolion had given him—the chant that would grant them passage. “Anyone know how to read this?”
“I could try. Not sure about my pronunciation. If I’m wrong, we all plunge into the chasm, right?” Dravien yanked the scroll from Kazhimyr’s grasp and pressed his palm to the shimmering ward. He spoke the words inked on the parchment. “Zi da’dignio, septmiusz me liberih iteriusz.”
The barrier flickered and Dravien glanced over his shoulder. “Here goes.” He pushed his hand through the ward and disappeared to the other side.
Kazhimyr exhaled a breath and followed after him. A strange vibration pulsed through his muscles as he stepped through to the other side where he found Dravien, in a clearing of thorny bushes, looking around. There, the forest had darkened to twilight.
Ravezio stepped toward them, also glancing around. “Strange. I imagined the deadlands to look…dead.”
“C’mon…we’ve no idea what the rest of it looks like.” Kazhimyr took the lead, using his sword to hack away the thorns that reached out for him as they crossed through the bushes.
“How do we even know where to begin?” The question had barely passed Ravezio’s lips when Kazhimyr spied a familiar object ahead.
He hastened his steps toward the black sword lying on the ground and lifted it up to examine it. “It’s Venetox,” he said, confirming that it was Zevander’s sword.
The distant sound of a thunderous screech tensed Kazhimyr’s muscles.
“The hell was that?” Ravezio asked.
“Not sure,” Kazhimyr answered. “But it sounds big enough to have overpowered Zevander with a sword.”
Trudging over bracken and decaying vegetation, they followed the echo of that roar. A crackling sound beneath Kazhimyr’s boot brought him to a stop and he looked down to see bones and skulls scattered over the ground. “Must be some sort of hunting grounds.”
“How wise of us to eagerly follow what sounds like a vicious predator then,” Dravien said humorlessly.
The mist thickened around them, and Kazhimyr raised Zevander’s sword when it became far too difficult to see ahead of them. The roar of whatever creature they’d heard at a distance sounded closer now and Kazhimyr scanned the trees for it.
A colossal shadow cut through the mist and the three of them stepped cautiously toward it.
Black wings gave the impression that it might’ve been a bird, a massive bird, but the scales on its four legs and the teeth lining its beak indicated a dragon of some sort.
The monstrous beast raked its talons over the ground, just outside of an enormous tree that appeared to be rotted, the way bare branches reached upward, curled and gnarled.
“What in seven hells is that thing?” Ravezio asked from behind.
The beast swung around, and let out a roar that ruffled Kazhimyr’s hair, sending a cold blast across his skin.
Godsblood, he hadn’t perceived cold in years.
The dragon bird lurched for them, and those bladed teeth snapped a threat seconds before it lunged toward Kazhimyr. He raised the sword and the beast paused. It sniffed the weapon frantically, as if it recognized it.
“Do you know Zevander?” Kazhimyr asked and to his surprise, the creature growled at the tree, clawing the ground.
A deep cavity in the trunk of the tree seized Kazhimyr’s attention and he stepped closer. “Is he inside the tree?”
The bird ruffled his feathers and chuffed, restless.
Frowning, Kazhimyr stared back at the hole where light seemed to flicker from within. “Let’s go inside.”
Dravien snorted. “You speak bird dragon now?”
“I just feel like he wants us to go inside.”
“Of course he does. There’s probably a nest full of them inside, all starving.” Hand resting on the pommel of his sword, Dravien jerked his head toward Kazhimyr. “The two of you can go. I’d rather take my chances with the one out here.”
“What happens if one of us dies?” Ravezio smiled, his voice taunting.
Dravien groaned and rolled his shoulders back. “Fine. The sooner this is over the quicker I can get rid of the two of you.”
Ravezio patted his shoulder as he passed him. “What meaning is your life going to have without us?”
The three of them entered the tree to a descending staircase.
“Fucking hell, is that skin?” Ravezio followed Kazhimyr down the staircase where small, white bowls of flame lit their path.
When they reached the bottom where the stairwell opened to a cavernous space, Kazhimyr glanced up toward the mass of webs. “Branimir would feel cozy here.”
Ravezio chuckled, trailing after him.
Ahead of them hung a swath of webs around a human body. Kazhimyr studied the man’s face where the surrounding webs looked like they’d been torn away.
The trapped man’s eyes opened to black orbs.
He snapped his teeth and Kazhimyr sank Zevander’s blade into his throat watching as a black substance oozed out of him.
The man twitched and wriggled, dangling from the web, and movement inside his mouth captured Kazhimyr’s attention.
He frowned when a small black spider emerged past the dead man’s lips.
Ravezio backed up a step. “Ah hell, that’s revolting.”
Another spider scampered out of the man’s body. And another.
Kazhimyr backed away and when two of the spiders darted for his boots, he stomped on them.
The man’s face contorted in an unnatural way right before a mass of spiders poured out of him.
“Get back!” Kazhimyr yelled and sent a blast of misty ice toward the horde, stopping them in their tracks. A jerk of his hand exploded their guts.
“I don’t like this,” Dravien said, peering toward all the webs overhead.
“C’mon.” Kazhimyr jerked his head. “We’ll do a quick search for Zevander and get the hell out of here.”
As the three of them strode on, a foreboding chill slithered over the back of Kazhimyr’s neck. The webs and thick roots they’d seen outside of the tree bore an unsettling resemblance to the dream he’d had while recovering from his bite. A scritching sound brought all three men to a halt.
“Do you hear that?” Kazhimyr asked, cocking his head to listen. He slowly lifted his gaze to the webs overhead. Hundreds of spiders peered down on them. Some the size of a bear, others small as mice.
“Get out!” Kazhimyr sent a blast of cold toward them, but they scampered down the webs quickly, faster than he could freeze them in place.
In seconds, the three were overwhelmed, separated from each other as they maintained their own halo.
Dravien swung a sword while Kazhimyr showered them in the white mist. Ravezio slid his blade across his arm, flicking them with his blood which landed on the ground in a hiss of steam they seemed to avoid.
Kazhimyr backed himself away from a larger spider that prowled toward him and when it reared up, he frowned, staring back at the human face embedded in the dark carapace underneath.
His boot slipped over the edge of something and Kazhimyr fell through the dirt floor, watching it close overhead.
His spine smashed into the ground, knocking the wind from his lungs and he turned over to his side, coughing.
He shook his head and groaned at the ache in his neck, rubbing the spot where he must’ve hit the ground hard.
He sat up, glancing around to find himself in a cavern similar to the one above, but without the mess of webs. All around him stood walls of roots.
Dread curled in his stomach as he pushed to his feet, eyeing a door ahead of him.
A door that looked precisely like the one in his dream.
Fuck.