Page 44 of Frosty and the Reaper

“So, Famine did kill them,” Ramsey growled bitterly.

Kellen shook his head. “A skeleton army? Shit just keeps getting weirder hanging out with all of you.”

Ramsey snorted in derision. “Like you aren’t weird, apex alpha.”

“You have a point,” Kellen said with a wry grin. “What do you want to do now? Keep searching or wait?”

“We can’t wait,” Lia insisted. “I don’t know why, but I feel like time is running out.”

“Then, we keep searching,” Jackie declared. “Be careful and try to watch out for more of those magical dark zones.”

As they continued to search, Kami had to stop herself from reaching out to her mate several times. The last thing she wanted to do was distract him while he was fighting a magical skeleton army.

When they reached the end of the corridor, it opened into a massive dark room. The concrete hall was filled with tall, fluted columns that rose up in perfect symmetry. The walls and arches were adorned with cracks and fissures that hinted of age. The minimalism of the space wasn’t that surprising since it seemed like nothing more than support columns for the structure.

As they walked between the columns, Lia’s amulet was glowing even brighter, illuminating the room and casting shadows across the walls.

Kellen paused to glance around. “This room branches off in three other directions. Should we split up and search them?”

“I don’t think we should split up,” Jackie said. “Safety in numbers and all that.”

While the others debated, Kami glanced around the empty room. Perhaps it was her artistic eye that noticed there was something off about how the shadows played across the columns and walls. She wandered around, trying to figure out exactly what was wrong. When she saw a strange ripple out of the corner of her eye, alarm shot through her. That was when she realized that her god powers were allowing her to see something the others couldn’t.

“Get out!” She shouted. “This is an illusion!”

The others started to run in the direction they had just come from, but one of them stepped on a trigger that activated the room. Thick sliding doors slammed shut before they could reach the exit, and water started flooding into the room. The icy water surged across the floor and swirled around their ankles.

Micah slammed his fists against the door, then he tried to use his magic to pry it open, but it wouldn’t budge. When his magic struck the wall, hidden runes started glowing on the stone columns. The brilliant display of light showed that they had been surrounded by powerful spells the moment they had stepped into the room.

Jackie threw her arms out, using her magic to part the water and clear a space for them to stand in. The sound of rushing water echoed off the columns, making it difficult to hear. Kami searched the room for another illusion or clue that might help them escape, but it was getting harder to see anything around the rushing water.

“Calm down, mate,”Zander ordered through their bond.“Use your magic to break the column on the far left, directly at the top. That should disrupt the formation holding you in the room.”

His voice was both a comfort and an anchor, steady and unwavering amidst the chaos. Even while fighting his own war, he had reached across time and space to help her. Kami instantly felt calmer. Doing what he’d told her to do, she flung magic at the column and watched as it sparked and burst into tiny pieces. The runes covering the columns sputtered, then disappeared.

Once the magical formation was broken, the water stopped rushing into the room and the doors slowly slid open again.

“Way to go, Kami! You saved all our asses!” Lia praised.

Kami smiled weakly at her. “Let’s get the hell out of here.”

“You don’t have to tell me twice,” Ramsey said. “Which way?”

Micah picked a route at random, and they hurried toward the corridor under a wide stone arch. As they rushed through the exit, Kami felt the familiar pressure that came with stepping through a portal. Her breath wheezed out as she was thrown to the floor with a hard thud, her knee striking the stone floor hard enough to send a jolt of pain through her.

She lay there a moment, trying to catch her breath. Using her magic, she eased the pain in her knee and felt instant relief. However, when she reached out to Zander to tell him what had happened, panic flickered through her when she couldn’t reach him.

Something was blocking their bond.

Pushing up on her forearms, she glanced around the room and immediately knew she was in deep shit. While she had been with her sister and friends a few seconds ago, she now found herself in a cavern that had a dark, oppressive feeling that made her want to flee. The air felt heavy, thick with the acrid scent ofsmoke and damp stone, as if the very atmosphere was warning her to keep away.

More glowing runes were etched into the walls and ceiling, covering every available surface with eerie light. Shadows twisted and danced across the jagged walls, cast by the torches burning with devil fire that formed a perfect circle around the large mosaic on the floor in the middle of the cavern.

A sense of dread shot through her as she stared at the mosaic.

“Oh, shit. Is that what I think it is?” Lia whispered.

Kami gasped when she realized her friend was sitting next to her. Twisting around, she searched for the others, but it was clear that only she and Lia had fallen through the portal.