I stumbled to my feet with Auggie’s help to regard the demon-hounds, who stood staring back at us, silently. Not attacking. Just … watching.
“What are they …” Something was coming. And whatever had stopped the beasts in their tracks couldn’t be good.
The whole area was lit up now, as four glowing creatures, blobs of molten lava in constant motion, glided into view from around a boulder. I recognized a golem when I saw one, with shallow, round holes in their bodies where their eyes should have been, but I’d never seen ones such as these. They didn’t walk on legs, but rather slid over the ground, leaving behind smoking, blackened rock in their wake.
“They’re not so bad,” Therese said, poking her head out of my bag. “Kind of cute, actually.”
“And deadly,” I murmured, noticing Narcissa as she landed on the ground beside us. She looked wary. These golems had no arms to attack us outright, but I didn’t see how we could harm them either.
Freya gritted her teeth as she backed up to me. She swung her sword at the one nearest her, but the sword merely cleaved right through it, leaving no mark. It was as if she hadn’t attacked it at all.
Auggie threw his metal rod at the one nearest him, but it was merely absorbed into its body after a brief flare up of fire and smoke. “Good God,” he said.
A stillness in the air made me straighten. I paused, staring at a man who had stepped up behind the golems. I was immobilized by his sudden, disturbing appearance.
He was twice as tall as a normal man, his skin scorched black, calling to mind a spent fireplace log. His eyes were red as coal in a furnace, like he was burning from the inside out. He wore all black, but his cape and high collar were ablaze, lighting his figure and the surrounding area.
“The Ember King,” Auggie breathed.
“It appears that I have guests,” came a garbled voice. “Welcome to my domain. I have very few visitors.” He looked to Freya. “Rather, fewwillingguests.”
“What do we do?” Auggie whispered, backing up to me as the golems drew nearer.
I thought of the cooling potion, but that lasted half a minute and would cause very little damage against this crew. Nothing else I could think of would do much, aside from a skein of water at my hip. But again, that would do very little but aggravate our captors. I had an arsenal of ingredients within easy reach. Yet my knowledge ended with my parents’.
“Come,” the Ember King said, and turned back the way he’d come.
The golems began moving in the same direction, and as we were surrounded by demon-hounds and lava beasts, we were forced to follow. There was perhaps enough space for us to slip between the creatures and escape, but should the golems move to stop us, we would be covered in severe burns, if we didn’t die outright.
“We go along with him for now,” I said softly.
“For now?” Narcissa scoffed. “As if once we’re in his castle, we’re going to be able to escape any easier. At least now we’re out in the open. I say we make a break for it.”
“Easy for you to say when you can fly.”
Narcissa cocked her head thoughtfully. “I suppose I can elude these stupid dogs just as easily inside, so I’ll stick around to see how this plays out. It will be amusing, if anything.”
“Oh, good. Happy we can amuse you.” I glanced at Freya. “I don’t suppose you know of any runes that could help us out in this situation?”
Freya shook her head slowly. “I’m afraid not. I’m still recharging my energy after creating that portal I made for Kingsbury. If we can stall for time and if I regain sufficient strength, I could open one.”
“We would have to make sure we’re all together,” I said. “But biding our time does seem the best strategy at the moment.”
Auggie nodded reluctantly. I noticed him limping and offered him my arm. He took it with a grateful sigh, and I welcomed his sturdy weight against me. At my worried look, he explained, “I think I twisted my ankle when I fell off the broom.”
His ankle. Where the necromancer had touched him. That likely wasn’t a coincidence. My earlier failure was coming back to rear its head, making things a little more complicated than they needed to be. I doubted Auggie would be able to run if it came to that.
I looked into the dark sky overhead as we were herded like cattle over a desert wasteland. The stars glistened, silent witnesses to the procession. I wondered if I could somehow best the Ember King if it came to a direct confrontation. I had some tricks up my sleeve, but he seemed a formidable witch, and I was no fighter. I couldn’t imagine a favorable outcome, should it come to that.
Upon cresting a hill, we were given our first look at the Ember King’s castle in full—a large black fortress surrounded by a river of lava in a circle around the keep. It flared sporadically with fire, sometimes frighteningly high. Several demon-hounds and golems stood guard as we approached, as if awaiting our arrival.
A drawbridge was lowered, allowing us access to the castle. Once we were inside, the doors closed firmly behind us. Auggie sent me a brave smile that shook at the corners.
The golems left us and slipped through openings in the walls into the moat of lava, as if rejoining their brethren. The demon-hounds, likewise, left us for parts of the castle unknown.
The Ember King continued deeper into the castle. Its walls glistened in the light cast by the flowing magma. The palace seemed to be made of obsidian, the floors black and smooth as marble, the walls rough, cut like the ridges of veins. The many openings that ran up the walls allowed the flowing magma outside to send a haunting glow along the corridors, so that it appeared as if the castle itself were a living thing. Those holes were much like windows but set close to the ground. A person could stumble through one to their death below if they weren’t careful, especially given that the openings were nearly five feet tall, about as large as the demon-hounds. I suspected that should the Ember King have a mind to, he could easily summon more golems into the room at a moment’s notice, which was probably why the holes were there at all.
My eyes slid to Freya. All my hopes were pinned on her ability to recharge and open a portal. If that didn’t happen, I didn’t know how we would find our way out of this.
