His gaze was thoughtful as it met hers. Silence stretched between them before he prodded her forward. “Come. He’ll get impatient before too much longer.”
*
Shea stumbled forward for the third time. Her legs quivered as she fought to keep up with the rest. They had passed the gate three days ago, leaving its narrow corridor behind as they faced a mesa with strange formations growing from the ground.
It was a surreal landscape, dreamlike and odd. Shea had never seen anything like it.
The sand created strange patterns in an array of colors ranging from almost pastel to bright, vivid ones that rivaled any field of flowers Shea had ever seen. There appeared to be pools of water interspersed in the patterns, their depths the most vivid aqua Shea had ever seen. From each of these pools rose a formation that looked like a cross between a rock and a plant.
That was on one side of her, on the other was what Shea termed a graveyard, its inhabitants half-submerged in the pools, while others appeared as long rows of rectangular forms partially thrust up out of the land. They’d been metal once, Shea was willing to guess, but had rusted in the long centuries since they’d last found use. There was a countless number of them, all discarded like toys no one wanted to play with anymore.
The metal seemed to have contaminated the surroundings, creating large dead spots marked by plumes of red around them.
Shea looked down at her feet, noting that the route they walked was the same red color, stretching in a long line in front of her. A mountain range loomed in the distance, bumpy rolling hills before them.
Several yards to the side, there was another path of red, broken and disrupted though it might be. The beasts had decided to use it, making a game of hopping from one red spot to another.
Shea looked at the mythological where he stalked in front of her. He wore a loincloth but not much else, his arms and chest left bare to the pale sun. His body was powerful, muscular and defined.
Her gaze lingered on his back where two long scars skated vertically across his shoulder blades. Shea had a sick feeling he’d once had wings. Those scars were all that remained. Someone had cut them off, and recently too. The scar tissue was still shiny and new.
It confirmed her suspicions. He was the same species as Covath. Being sent here made more and more sense.
Shea tripped, her feet tired and clumsy. She staggered sideways and would have fallen headfirst into the pastel sand that bordered their red path, if the mythological’s hand hadn’t shot out, yanking her back.
“Careful, little mouse. You venture into that and no one will be able to save you,” he cautioned in a mild voice.
Shea murmured a thank you and edged back to the middle of the red path. She didn’t know what was wrong with her. Everything took more effort than it should have. It drained her willpower to keep moving forward, when all she really wanted was to curl into a ball and rest.
For someone who’d spent their life testing their body on the most rugged terrain they could find, from mountains so high nothing but snow existed at the top, where the air was so thin, each gasp felt like your last, to ridges and valleys there were challenging to navigate, it was incomprehensible to have her body fail her now.
Her legs quivered with exhaustion and a faint pain told her she had pushed past the point that was wise. Her thoughts felt oily and slippery, hard to hold onto. It felt like she’d been on the trail for months instead of days.
The ground was relatively flat and the going easy. She shouldn’t be having any trouble.
As she trudged forward, one of the beasts made an awkward leap. The ground beneath it gave way. It trumpeted an alarm as it landed in the sand, sinking into it up to its knees.
The grindle’s eyes rolled with panic as it started to thrash. Shea watched tiredly, not understanding.
Pitiful, pain-filled sounds filled the air as it fought to escape, only sinking deeper as it did. The sand shifted as if alive, strands lifting to wrap around the beast like a vine.
The grindle’s struggles became more pronounced, breaking free of several of the tentacles. Great patches of fur and skin were missing from where the tentacles had touched.
The tentacles of the pastel colored sand reformed, reaching up and wrapping around the beast once again. Gradually, the beast’s struggles weakened as it sank ever deeper.
Ajari prodded her forward before it had even disappeared under the sand’s depths. “As I said, no one would be able to save you.”
Shea looked back, her eyes wide as the beast trumpeted a final time before slipping fully under the sand.
She turned back around, seeing the pretty colors and odd formations around her with new eyes. The pretty, surreal scenery hid a deadly secret beneath it. Suddenly, the red path didn’t seem as safe as it once had.
“What is this place?” Shea asked quietly.
“The painted sands and the graveyard of forgotten things,” Ajari responded, not looking back at her.
“Long name,” Shea said.
He made a sound of agreement but didn’t look back or add an explanation. Shea assumed that was all she was going to get. That was fine. Talking and walking were getting harder.
