Page 16 of Skalterra By Nightmare (The Skalterra Duology #1)

The worst part about the Nightmares was the silence.

There were no battle cries, no grunts, no yelling of commands to their comrades.

Just the slippery hissing of falling Skal behind Tamora’s throne as body after body descended on us.

Tiernan cried out behind me, splitting the horrible silence, but I kept my focus on the Nightmares attacking from the back.

They moved as one, rushing at me in tandem with Tamora’s scimitars in hand. I had banked on dodging in my fight with Ciarán in the woods. If I did that here, Fana and Galahad would be vulnerable.

I tried forming a shield like Orla’s, but ended up with a second flail. I flung it at the nearest Nightmare and willed extra strength into my muscles to brace for the oncoming onslaught. My arms and legs bulged under my tunic and greaves, and Nightmares collapsed into dust clouds beneath my remaining flail only for new Nightmares to quickly replace them.

“Tamora, stop this!”

Galahad bellowed. His back jostled against mine, and gold and green flashed in my periphery as Orla and Tiernan fought back against the onslaught.

“We aren’t the enemy!”

“No, you are just thieves and liars!”

Tamora sang.

“You’ll ruin the Barony if you free the Frozen God!”

“I will not take advice on how to run a province from a Lyrian of all people!”

Tamora called.

A fresh wave of Nightmares fell over me, and pain ripped through my arms as I willed my bones to form the lethal spikes I’d used to fight Ciarán. White spikes tore through muscle, skin, and leather, and I drove them into the nearest Nightmares.

They weren’t real, I had to remind myself as the Nightmares dissolved into ash. Even if the resistance of flesh against weapon felt real, I wasn’t killing anyone. If anything, I was freeing them from a poor night’s sleep.

I wondered if I knew any of them. If Linsey or Liam or even Gams might be unwittingly piloting the Nightmares I was skewering. A scimitar cut through my thoughts and my greaves to graze my thigh.

Better armor, I told myself as I ran my bone shards through the Nightmare who’d nicked me. I’d made a Von Leer hoodie. I could make better armor.

Leather turned to kevlar, but why stop there? The Skal in my veins lost its warmth as I burned through it, but I wasn’t done. I needed more. I searched for more magick inside me, feeling for its familiar buzz.

I found it in my chest, trickling in from an unseen source. It had the same sludgy feeling as the Skal Galahad had formed me out of at the beginning of the night, but it would have to do. I drew on it, and my skin itched and crawled as it thickened into heavy scales.

Galahad slumped against my back and slid to the floor, though I wasn’t sure how he’d been hit. Orla cried out in pain, but I couldn’t look away from the descending Nightmares. For each one I destroyed, there was a new one to take its place before the former’s ash had even settled.

The gold to my right sputtered out as Tiernan fell. Ferrin shifted, trying to fill the space left open, but there was less and less room to maneuver. Less room to fight.

Tamora had an endless supply of Skal and Nightmares. We couldn’t fight them all.

But we could fight Tamora.

I threw my flail away into the crowd of Nightmares.

Armor, I told myself. Gray and green scales peeked at me through the tears in my clothes. I pulled on the diluted Skal I could still feel trickling into my system. Strength. Speed.

Pain lanced my fingers as each one elongated into a talon, and I tore into the crowd of Nightmares, pushing past Orla and Ferrin. I kept my eyes on Tamora’s bright red hair as I ripped a path of Skal and ash through their ranks. Titus, the large man who’d held Galahad, stood between me and the throne, but he stumbled back at the sight of my bone spikes, dyed red by my own blood.

To her credit, Tamora sat unfazed as I pressed a spike against her throat. She rolled her eyes behind the monocle and raised a lazy hand.

The room stilled behind me, but I kept my boot on the lip of the throne and my spike at the ready.

“Now, aren’t you disgusting?”

Tamora drawled. Her eyes raked over my arm spikes, my kevlar armor, my talons, and the scales that crept up my neck and to my face.

“I should’ve known what you are when you walked in here with blue hair, Nightmare. What’s your real name, then?”

“You may call me Blue,”

I said with a wry smile, remembering Ferrin’s warning about sharing my full name.

“Ferrin, you know lucids are illegal.”

Her voice was light and airy, though she remained tense underneath me.

“What are you going to do about it?”

Ferrin grunted.

“Kill us harder?”

Tamora’s red lips twisted.

“I could feed this one to a rotsbane. We’ve got one under the mansion. Would you like to see?”

“You’re going to give us passage to where we want to go.”

I pressed the spike tighter against her throat.

“And you are going to give us the Skal we need to get there.”

“You’re formidable, I’ll give you that,”

Tamora conceded.

“But you won’t last. Your Skal’s almost gone. Just look at what you did to your poor nocturmancer. Bled him damn near dry of his Skal. If this temporary threat upon my life is my only reason to help you, then you have nothing.”

I glanced back at Galahad where he was collapsed on the floor. Had I done that? I didn’t remember hitting him.

“You’ll help us because Ferrin is right.”

I twisted back towards Tamora. I could worry about Galahad later.

“If you release the Frozen God, or if we fail to protect Fana, your kingdom is ruined.”

“Kingdom?”

A red eyebrow arched over Tamora’s monocle.

“Barony. You’ll ruin your barony.”

“Oh? And you know all about keeping a barony running?”

“Not really,”

I admitted.

“but I know enough about supply and demand, and that’s what this place is built on, right?”

“Supply and demand?”

Tamora mulled over the words for a moment. “Explain.”

“You have power because you have Skal and other people need Skal. You have supply. They have demand.”

I pointed at the waterfall behind her throne. Hunger rumbled in my stomach at the sight of the Skal. I wanted it. I needed it. But I forced myself to focus on Tamora.

“If Fana dies, and Keldori with all its Skal opens up, you don’t have control over supply, and they don’t need you anymore.”

Tamora scoffed.

“Even if I lose control of the Skal supply, I still own every steamtrail across Skalterra. No one has technology as advanced as ours. We will expand my province into Keldori—”

“Steamtrail? You mean the railroads? I don’t think Keldori will be as impressed with those as you think.”

“Your land doesn’t stand a chance against the technology of the Grand Barony,”

Tamora sneered.

“The Keldorians will have no choice but to bow to me and—”

I laughed, forcing as much false confidence into the sound as I could. I drew my spikes away from the Baron, and pushed off her throne with my boot. I did not know who this new, threatening, scaly Wren was, but I liked being her, as hungry as she was.

“I’m almost tempted to let you try just to watch.”

Tamora’s gaze flitted away from me, and she locked eyes with Titus. I took the moment to look towards my friends. Tiernan was still on the floor, but he was breathing. Fana hid behind Ferrin, clutching the straps of his leather armor in her fists. Orla’s short hair ran with blood, and she held Galahad in her lap on the floor.

Ferrin stood with his blazing sword ready as he stared up at me with a new apprehension. I gulped and felt my scales sink back into my skin. My burning thirst for Skal dampened just a little as they did.

“Congratulations, Nightmare.”

Tamora clapped her hands, and I spun to face her again as she stood.

“Very few people are able to convince me to change my mind once it’s made, and you’ve just become one of them. We leave tonight. Let’s take the river to avoid any rotsbane.”

“We?”

Ferrin growled.

“Of course. If the future of my barony rests on the survival of this child, then Titus and I will join you to help ensure she, and my province, stay alive.”

She strode down her dais, and the legion of Nightmares silently split to let her through. She stopped in front of Ferrin and Fana.

“Your Nightmare is fascinating. I look forward to learning more about her. Titus, take them to the docks.”

She stalked past, stepping over Tiernan’s splayed legs, and exited through the large doors we’d entered from. Ferrin turned to tend to Tiernan and helped him into a sitting position.

“I told you, didn’t I?”

Orla sang.

“I said you should see the things Just-Wren can do.”

“Yes, it was quite something, wasn’t it?”

Galahad’s soft rasp was labored and weak.

“How long have you been hiding those tricks?”

I faltered as I walked down the dais towards them.

“You’re the Nightmare expert. You didn’t know I could do that?”

I looked at the passive Nightmares that stood at the ready around us, then at Galahad where he lay in Orla’s lap.

“What’s wrong? Are you hurt?”

“You took too much,”

Galahad wheezed.

“Too much what?”

My talons retracted back into fingernails, but Ferrin kept his sword raised.

“Skal, dammit!”

Galahad spat.

“You did the same thing the other night in the woods, didn’t you? I thought it was the running that was exhausting me, but it was you, bleeding me dry.”

I thought back to the magick I’d felt dripping into my chest and how I’d pulled on it. I hadn’t realized it had been the magick that flowed between Galahad and me. I hadn’t realized I would hurt him.

I put my hands up in surrender.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t know.”

Galahad and Ferrin shared a look, and when the latter nodded, Galahad turned back towards me while Ferrin watched Titus where he lurked near the throne.

“We can talk about it later,”

Galahad growled.

“For now, it’s best you go home. The Baron folded too easy, and I don’t like the way she was looking at you.”

“Wait, but—”

“Goodnight, Wren. We’ll see you on the river.”

And the Baron’s throne room slipped away.