Page 30 of Nightingale (The Broken Kingdoms #1)

V rea hadn’t lied. To Rian or to herself.

She was a fast runner.

Her feet barely touched the ground as she darted over it, her thighs stretching over the mile without so much as a single burn. She got three feet before a creature shot for her, its war-cry echoing down the valley and causing a crumbling avalanche. The mountains shook with tremendous force as boulders began to wedge free, tumbling down the slanted sides and crushing anything in its path.

Small spiders became nothing more than globs of sable and twitching parts, legs sticking out at odd angles. The slate balls rolled back and forth, up one side and down the other, causing a rocky barricade that allowed Vrea to dash forward another four feet before a massive arachnid leapt for her. It hurdled over a large boulder, a boom following as it landed sixteen inches away.

She spun around, ready with her dagger in her hand as it attacked. It screeched as she slit its front leg off, swiping in an angular cut that added another to the pile. Vrea was faster than the wind sent by a summer sun, hurling enough of her might that she wouldn’t expend herself too quickly, but enough that she could fend off the beasts without losing herself.

Rian did the same, grunting as he rolled under a second spider, slashing at the pinchers that aimed for him with a nasty click. They were both spotted with dark blood, which Vrea knew wouldn’t be the end of it. Their clothes were ruined, that much was for sure.

It didn’t matter where they hit the creatures, a thick spray always followed.

Rian dodged a blow to the rib, skidding back in the conglomeration of dirt and blood, a thick mix that stuck to them like glue as he stabbed upwards, succeeding in taking the Blackleg down. He spared one look in her direction as she finished off on her own, twisting the blade in a direction that would render the spider incapable of anything anymore.

He had the audacity to flick his red eyebrows suggestively, mischievously smirking like a wild plains-cat of Niroula as he lunged up and started to run once more. Vrea hopped off the dead creature and poured her strength into her legs, following. Two more chased after them, gaining a handful of feet with each reach of their long legs.

Vrea bounded over a fallen rock, skidded around the slight bend in the canyon and ran as fast as she could. Rian was a good foot ahead of her but he didn’t stop. She didn’t feel the burn in her lungs yet, the ache in her muscled thighs as she darted through the pass, eyes pasted to the colourful war tents up ahead.

She knew that an old family friend would be stationed inside, one that she missed nearly as much as Teminos. Alpheus, Eamin or Malik could appear on the horizon. There was even the possibility of her mother being on the front lines, earning a personal escort back to Vasthold if anyone recognized who she was. With the captain of the guard unquestionably within the tents, she knew there was a likelihood of that happening.

Rian stumbled as a divot appeared, pebbles rumbling down as the spiders created an echoing vibration. One with yellow triangles high on its body brushed past her, aiming like a shooting star for the Moordian Prince as it tapped its beak in a bone-rattling way.

A blur of speed, and its leg pierced him.

He let out a dismayed cry of alarm, sinking back against the rocky wall as one pointed leg speared the side of his shirt, tearing the fabric as he yanked away.

Vrea’s heart was a trembling bird as her attention was called to the dribble of scarlet on his golden skin.

He clapped his hand over it, grimacing as he pushed off and thrust his sword directly into the Blackleg’s meaty head, earning a shivering groan from the beast in return. It snapped and clawed at his face, but he only shoved the weapon in deeper. Black oozed down his arm, sprayed his face, stained his clothes.

Rian added an additional heft of steel, withdrawing as the creature slumped back and toppled over. He edged around it, his skin blackened and blanched.

“Rian-” Vrea started for him but he waved her off before she could gain four inches in his direction.

“I’m fine,” He panted through clenched teeth, stretching his back until he stood up straight once more, whipping his sword over his knuckles and catching it back into his grip with his thumb. “Come on, Vre. We can’t pause or I fear we’ll become lunch.” He pointed his blade behind and she didn’t dare look to see if he was right or not.

There was no need.

The canyon shook softly as more Blacklegs poured from the tunnels, racing for them as the main spider held its ground at the very back, blocking any sort of escape in that direction. Not that either of them were particularly fond of the idea of retreating towards the caves, back towards the way they’d started.

They were more than halfway to the camps, enough so that Vrea could make out a couple of figures standing and watching their escape.

An idea popped into her head.

“Rian, start waving!” She commanded him, flinging her arms over her head and swinging them back and forth as she started up again. As she jogged along the path, she continued to wave.

Out of the side of her peripherals, he did the same. Wincing, and dropping his wounded arm back to his side as he tried to keep up with only one.

Vrea contained her spark of concern, the interesting care for the male she’d known for some time. It was different, seeing him outside of the palace. As if he didn’t have to hide who he was, as if he were a completely different person. Suddenly she wondered if perhaps the pressure of being the Golden Heir, the selected sovereign to take over had molded him into someone he didn’t want to be. Maybe she’d misjudged him from the start, from the role he had to play in order to gain his father’s approval.

But it was undeniable that her heart twanged for him. And even if she scolded it for the impertinence and horrible decision regarding a lover, there was nothing she could do to dissuade it.

She liked Rian.

She wanted him.

And not in the one and done sort of way that her brothers often engaged in, taking pleasure for the night and finding it again in a stranger’s bed. No, the sort that lingered after the wrings of a well-earned climax, the desire to stay wrapped in each other’s arms.

Vrea never stayed in anyone’s bed, never let herself get close to anyone in that sort of way before. It was dangerous, in a world where anything, anyone, could be taken away. A weakness, in a realm where one couldn’t have any. Especially not as a Greenvass heir.

But there it was, as they ran side by side.

An undeniable flicker of attraction, of a starting emotion that might have been a scarier one. She wanted to tangle up with Rian in the sheets, to see what made him moan, to cry out her name. And even more terrifying, was the small sliver of wanting to stay afterwards. To have his toned arms fall over her naked and spent body, to have him pull her into his warmth and to hear the soft rise and fall of his chest as his laboured breaths sent him to sleep.

Not to kill, even if that temptation was still there.

But for her own sake.

Her own comfort.

Vrea had gained a weakness, when not even her own brothers could be classified as that. Not even her mother earned that sacred place in her heart.

She was a fool.

A stupid, childish fool.

Rian was her enemy.

She couldn’t care for him, not like that.

Not if they intended to survive this, to live to see another day. Not if he was truly going to take her home, to see her personally escorted to Vasthold and stand before her mother. Vrea was worried, and she was drenched in fear at the idea of what her mother and brothers would do to him.

Rian shuddered, his knees bucking and she darted for him, a fourth of the mile left.

“Come on you stupid bastard,” She said and took his arm, draping it over her shoulder as she hefted half of his weight into her. He wasn’t light by any means and she was strong, but it was an additional load that slowed her significantly.

“For someone so determined on wanting me dead, you sure seem to enjoy saving my life.” He mumbled, and with a horrifying understanding, Vrea realised that the Blacklegs must have carried a venom in their veins.

A paralytic poison to slow their enemies down enough to wrap them in their spider-soft silk and consume them. His limbs were becoming heavy, as if he couldn’t bear to hold them up any longer.

“Don’t you dare give in.” Vrea bellowed at him, struggling to avoid the four Blacklegs that trailed behind them. They weren’t far, and if she had to continue to support the Prince for the remainder of the way, the spiders would eventually catch up.

She wasn’t going to be eaten by spiders.

That was not how her story ended.

At least, that’s how she refused for it to end.

If she was going to die, then it would be at the hands of her brothers or by a Moordian’s.

Castil’s, if she had to guess.

But if he tried to slay her, then she’d sure as hell take him with her. If they were going to burn in eternal damnation, then he was going to burn alongside her.

“Come on.” Vrea gritted her teeth as the male groaned, his knees buckling. “We’re almost there.”

“I know. I’m sorry,” He remorsefully whispered, sweat sliding down his taut forehead. “I’m trying.”

“I know you are.”

It wasn’t a lie as she took a quick scan of his form, the way that his legs quivered as he attempted to stand on his own. On the way his arms shook with the determination of a man who wanted to do this on his own, of someone who didn’t like to lean on others for assistance. As someone who had been raised to never need anyone but himself.

“I’ve got you.” She replied and his pain-stricken eyes darted towards her. His irises were thin, far thinner than they should have been as she said, “I won’t let you go.”

His arm tensed around her shoulder as he pulled his gaze away towards the floor as if guilt and something else racked through him. The statements meant more than what she intended them to, and they both knew it. Her blood was warm, her head spun with the confession, her skin alight with strain from the way that she heaved them both towards the end of the valleyway.

Everything hurt, everything was a pain that she didn’t want to endure as she struggled to carry them both.

He saw it all, as he always did.

Saw the effort that she was putting into it, in the nervous darts of her eyes behind them as she gauged how much time they had before the spiders caught up to them. They weren’t far off, maybe six feet or so.

Rian inhaled sharply, bared his teeth like a fierce wolf and forced himself upwards. The weight immediately lifted from her lean shoulders as they ran together.

The sudden lightness nearly caused her to trip.

But she ignored it, focusing on the length ahead of them as he did.

He panted and barked out in agony, a weakened system working against him in the way that his back was coated in sweat, his chest covered in blood from the spiders and himself. He hissed every now and then, grabbing at his shoulder as if it could staunch the poison that slowly spread through him for just a second more.

They made it another foot, then two, then three.

The war tents were fastly approaching, a crowd gathered to see the oncoming beasts that hurdled for the canyon exit. Rian was doing it, he was running as fast as she was.

And then he fell.

His knees gave out and he shouted a warning as he went down.

Rian did not get up, and he did not move.

Vrea gargled a scream, something that her brain couldn’t process as she faltered to a stop, dropping to her knees beside him and shaking him violently as she yelled for him to get up, to move, to do anything but lay there looking like a corpse to be as the Blacklegs neared.

He did nothing.

She held her knives up, dashing in front of him as the Blacklegs slowed, circling them with a war-cry that haunted her. They rattled their legs, tapped the tips against the ground and snapped their pinchers down at her. She lunged, forcing one back as it tried to make for them.

“Back off!” She screamed at them. “He’s mine !”

She was bound to him, whether she liked it or not.

Vrea fended them off, her hair as wild as the booming thunder crash of fear and the flashing lightning of finality that washed over her.

She wouldn’t leave him.

An arrow shot past her, sinking deep into the flesh of the tall Blackleg that aimed for her once more.

It fell back without a single sound.

Vrea whipped her head around, to see ten riders that wore the Niroulian colours as they reloaded their bows, and unleashed hell on the Blacklegs.

As Niroula came to their aid.