Page 20 of Exquisite Monster

But each day that passed allowed restlessness to seep in. What was being done to them? Would Andaros kill them when he was done with whatever his revenge was? Would I be too late to save them?

Would I ever see them again?

When Gleym declared us finished, I faced her, out of breath and aching. “What do you mean to teach me?” I asked.

“I would have thought that’s been clear.”

“It is. What is not clear is how much of this you expect me to accomplish before you’ll let me go.”

She laughed softly. “You view it as a trial. That I am putting you through a strict set of rules you must pass before you can leave, but it’s not the case. Regardless of what you think of me, I am trying to keep you alive.

“Do you really think the King of Craisos will let you simply waltz into his domain and take your mates back? Do you think he won’t kill you because you managed to survive when he thought he’d killed you? He will not. If you want a chance at all, you will learn.”

That night I started exploring the place where she lived more thoroughly. She probably heard me,Varícurling himself around my neck as I did so, but I didn’t care. My deepest instincts told me that I was running out of time, and if there was a way to leave, I needed to know it.

Yes, everything was stacked against us. And yes, there was every chance I would fail. But I wouldn’t allow the men I loved to die simply because I hadn’t gotten to them in time.

Evrítha was at the center of Viria. At best, I would have to walk probably three weeks if traveling on foot all the way to Craisos. Less than that if I could find a horse… or a friendly dragon. Though that seemed unlikely.

I explored the same way I might if I were trying to find my way out of a maze. Turning left out of the roomVaríand I stayed in, and then only taking lefts. Honestly, it felt a lot more like a hoard than I’d anticipated. Gleym kept me busy and tired enough that I hadn’t strayed much. But she certainly hadn’t lied about collecting things that fell from the surface.

There simply wasn’t any other explanation for the room that was filled with broken barrels.

Varílooked at me like he was just as confused as I was. But we both knew ifVaríhad a hoard bigger than his coin, it would be filled with shiny, pretty things.

There were larger broken pieces of ships that had foundered on the rivers.

Many of the things from the rivers were clearly broken. They held a strange kind of beauty, like the ghost of something lovely that had transformed.

But then there were the rooms which brought me true pause. Rooms filled with books where no ink was smudged and no parchment was waterlogged. Dried foods and herbs that showed no signs of ever being damp, despite the environment.

Everything someone could need to live beneath the earth for as long as Gleym clearly had. And I still didn’t understand how.

Wandering further, I heard the gurgling of the water beneath the fall. As we had descended some of the water had turned into mist, but there was also plenty of pure water falling. The roar of everything was loud enough to be heard through the stone walls. The fall from Evrítha must be right on the other side of this one.

But below the roar of the water was something else. A thrumming energy that seemed to run over my skin. The room feltalivein a way that was…

I didn’t know.

I looked around the mostly empty room, confused. There didn’t seem to be anything special about it other than the fact that the wallsweren’t square and smooth like most of the other rooms. One side was angled and jagged. Like it had been formed around the natural stone instead of at the expense of it.

“Do you feel that?” I askedVarí.

He chirped, and I assumed it meant yes, because he was perched on my shoulder, wings slightly flared, looking around like he too sensed something invisible.

While I didn’t sense any danger, the change in the air was unsettling.

“I wondered when you’d find it.”

I startled at Gleym’s voice behind me, turning to find her with an amused smile on her face. My curiosity overwhelmed my irritation with her. “Find what? There’s nothing here.”

“But you feel it, do you not?”

“I feel something. I don’t know what it is.”

“Thesheyten.”

Most of the world knew them as the Fallen. Idroal had explained right after the four of us?—