He tries for calm, but his voice betrays him. “The ore’s holding them back. Canceling signals.”
The roar grows, swarming overhead, but never dipping more than a few feet.
“They’re watching us,” I whisper.
“Trying.”
My brows knit. “Does the ore disrupttheirsignal, too?”
Ash meets my gaze. “Don’t know.”
Fear lingers behind his words.
“Could they bring something else?” My voice stutters.
He shakes his head, shielding me with his body as the air tightens around us.
The hum intensifies, a shimmering chord. Tiny lights flare overhead. Pulses strike the ceiling in controlled intervals—not wild, not frantic. Testing. Small and localized, they rain dust and tiny rocks down on us.
The air splits. The cave screams. Stone vibrates hairline cracks into the walls.
The horses shriek, pawing dust in columns.
But the veins hold.
I’ve never been a believer in anything bigger than myself. But now I pray the rosary my mother made me recite as a child. Ash cradles me in his arms, taking the brunt of the stones and dust.
He grunts once, pulverized rock raining across his back. The mountain that shields us shifts into a tomb.
Petroglyph symbols flash through my head. They have new meaning now. Like this space with this man. Crumbling around us.
Dust chokes my lungs. I cover my ears, closing my eyes to drown it out. My body trembles and quakes.
For a moment, I think they’re splitting the sky in two. Lights wild, metal wings shimmering.
That’s when I feel it.
The press of Ash’s mind against mine.
Not frantic. Disciplined.
Like his body shielding me from the wind at the petroglyphs.
His presence spreads through the storm inside my head—steady, deliberate—pushing the fear back inch by inch.
Making room for something stronger…
Then I feel it. The tether. The signal that called them.
Ash finds it before I do. And snaps it.
The swarm erupts into a roar. Frantic. Scraping.
Fighting for purchase along the mineral veins—against Ash’s mind.
For one terrible second it feels like they might break through.
But Ash doesn’t move. Doesn’t yield.
