The room above shimmered with light. It felt too far away, too impossible to reach.
A mirage swirled in front of me, juts of smoke and sinew struggling to form into a beast. Calling power and infusing it into shadows, I sent them at the forming image, and it popped.
My arms trembled as I reached higher, the stones under my palms slick, almost alive, moving as if they were trying to wriggle free from my grip. It didn’t make sense, but nothing about this climb did. The air buzzed with a low hum that rattled my teeth. I couldn’t breathe right. Something heavy sat on my chest.
“Come on, come on,” I hissed through clenched teeth, though I wasn’t sure if I was talking to Farris, Lore, or myself.
The slope felt steeper than it had before. The world kept tilting around me, making my head spin and my vision blur. My fingers slipped, and my stomach pitched as I slid backward. Lore’s hands latched onto me before I tumbled back to the bottom.
My heart jumped into my throat as the mirage solidified again, this time into a crow that dive-bombed me, its talons snagging in my hair.
Damned Prager.
She beat her wings against my skull with a sound like crackling paper, and she dragged her claws across my scalp. I yelped and ducked, slapping at her with one hand while clinging to the stones with the other.
“Get away,” I shouted. She cawed, her cackles slipping through to mock me. Her claws tightened around my hair, pulling like she was going to rip it out by the roots. Or lift me up and carry me into the sky, where she'd drop me.
She'd come to end this.
I yanked my blade from its sheath and swiped out at her, gouging a line across one of her wings. Her crackling caws turned to ear-piercing shrieks as her grip on my hair loosened. She snapped away so fast she impacted with the side of the tunnel.
Then she dove at my face.
Lore tried to thrust himself between me and the threat, but he couldn't find purchase on the slope. Rocks on the walls gave way, tumbling to the smooth tunnel below us, unsettling him.
He slid backward.
His horrified gaze blazed into mine, but I could tell his fear was for me. Never himself. He'd give his life to save me.
Prager smacked her wings in my face, blinding me.
With a growl, Farris spun, a blur of gray and white fur and snapping teeth. He almost toppled down the slope as he launched himself at her. His snarls drowned out her crow cries as his teethbit down hard. She squawked, and a flurry of feathers spiked out around us, some embedding themselves in the wall. Her high-pitched screech ricocheted through my mind as he latched down on one wing and tore her away from me. She flailed as she tried to wrench herself free from his bite.
He shook his head, smacking her against the tunnel wall, and flung her, sending her spiraling through the air, passing Lore who'd made his way back up to me. Her wings flapped awkwardly, and when she landed hard on the tunnel below, she hissed and scrambled to her clawed feet. Her glare showed she was gathering strength to come at us again.
Farris barked, his lips drawn back to expose sharp teeth and she remained where she was, her furious gaze locked on us.
I pressed a hand to my head, pulling it away to find blood. My scalp burned where her talons had caught me.
I only had time to give Farris’s fuzzy head a quick stroke. “Good boy.”
“She's coming again,” Lore barked, his head turned to watch her. “Go!”
Gouging my blade into the floor of the tunnel, I used it to hold my position, scrambling up the slope with Lore urging me from behind. Farris followed, keeping himself between us and Prager.
When I reached the top, I burst from the tunnel, hauling myself out, grunting when I smacked on my belly on the damp soil.
Farris scrambled up to join me, landing squarely in the depression we’d gouged into the throne room floor. He leaped around, snapping at the dark hole, yapping at Lore as if telling him to hurry.
The ground erupted again, shifting harder this time.
Lore sprang from the tunnel, landing squarely on his feet, and hauled me up to stand with him.
Leaving me, he wrenched his body toward the circular cover while I guarded the opening with Farris snapping at my side, and my blade ready to swipe through Prager if she appeared.
Lore hefted the cover, his arm and shoulder muscles straining, and lobbed it into place over the hole. A grating boom echoed around us.
Claws raked across the other side and her piercing shriek ripped across my skin.
