Two breaths and I’m running, my feet hardly touching the ground. The Half Links swarm the circle. I shove down everyone in my path, following the scent of her fear, the beat of her heart.Mine mine mine.He can’t have her.
The room shakes, the ground and walls trembling hard enough to steal my balance. The dirt beneath me divides, cracks opening up like darkness overtaking the soul. Deep black chasms form, swallowing up anyone unlucky enough to be at the edge. Screams bounce off the walls as bodies fall, then travel back up as echoes, eerie shadows of the fear they once embodied.
I’m farther from Never despite every step closer. Walls crumble, crushing limbs, splitting skulls. I climb over bodies and splash through puddles of blood, disconnected from the scene around me. From the screams. The death. Nothing will keep me from Never. Nothing.
The ceiling crashes down, burying me in rubble. Half Links are squashed and severed in two around me, and I’m grateful for the small pocket I’m trapped in. Dust billows thick, sucked into unsuspecting throats, choking us. My lungs burn with every inhalation, but I’d breathe in fire to get to her. Anything, as long as I don’t lose her.
But the only way to her is through this newly formed wall of stone-like earth.
“Find someone who’s still conscious that can shift matter. Or that can move this shit. Or some gift that’s actually useful.” I speak to anyone that might be alive, running my hand through my hair and grabbing a fistful. How did I let this happen?
“What’s wrong with you? We don’t have gifts anymore. We’re Half Links,” the man next to me wheezes.
Shit. I forgot. I’m surrounded by Vaile without magic.
Hands slide around my neck and squeeze in the darkness, one warm and wet, weakened. “You stabbed me!”
“Not now!” I rip Kelter’s hands away. “We need to get to her.”
“And then what? Fight a god? How’s that going to go? Dammit. Why not let me win when you had the chance?” He collapses at my side. “You ruin everything.”
Chapter 29
EVER
Zandrite’s arm smashes my ribs. I hold him tight, trying again to summon the magic in me and inflict the pain he deserves. And failing. Maybe because a version of godliness actually does exist beneath his golden skin. Sweat wets my palms and sticks to the fluffy hairs on his arm. I writhe and fight with twists and fists, but he simply gathers me closer, his putrid scent of raw meat and moldy dirt drilling violently up my nose.
So I curl inward and sink my teeth into his abdomen, not holding back at all, pinching flesh. I spit out a coarse hair and hold my breath for the roar of pain, the backlash. But only a shallow chuckle forms in his chest. It spills from his throat like a slow-motion slap in the face.
“I’ll have to fill that mouth to keep you satisfied.”
“You’ll regret this.” I batter him with useless punches. “You don’t know who I belong to!”
“You belong to me now.”
Those five words only start a riot deep within me, searching for a path to the surface. He can’t strike my bravery down despite the fear that crawls under my skin and nestles deep. We round another corner and slip between two rough walls with rocks embedded in the dirt, but even with how close they are, my hands find nothing to grab onto as they fumble over the surface. A sharp edge slices my leg open, and I’m not sure how bad it is until the heat of blood runs down my calf. He ignores my cries.
We enter a deep, narrow cave—not wide or tall enough to be considered a room. Hides of creatures I can’t name decorate the dark space,tacked onto the wall with razor-sharp teeth and tail spikes for pins. Zandrite sets me down unceremoniously, as though he just got home with a bag of groceries. A fur rug with claws tickles my toes, and that riot inside me grows.
The lack of food must be getting to me, because it takes another sweep of the space to register Coen and Sola sitting against the wall, each with a thick rope in their mouths that ties behind their heads. More ropes bind their ankles together and their arms to their sides. They fight the restraints at the sight of me dropping to the cave floor at their feet, my leg bloody.
Sola’s wrists are heavily bandaged, her missing hands a haunting reminder of the savagery in Sonnet. Her short black hair is mussed, gray dress torn and stained. Bruises line Coen’s cheeks and jaw, and his normally silky hair is coated in crusty blood. Unlike the other men in brown pants, he still has his own shirt and black pants. But their feet are bare, and I have to wonder where everyone’s boots end up after entering the Underbroke.
“Looks liketheyknow you as well. What have I stumbled upon with you?” Zandrite asks, strangely calm for just having stolen me away from a collapsing arena while the ground shook. He guzzles down a purple liquid from a glass vial he pulled from his pocket and rolls his shoulders back.
Tremors strike every minute or so, startling my heart into a shaken state over and over. From the dark depths of the cave, the thud of boots on the dirt ground echo dully. I twist my neck. The skirt of a long dress swishes with each step.
“Hello, my love.” My mother smiles down at me.
“How did you get here?” I should have known she was here when I saw Sola and Coen. How did they end up restrained instead of her?
“You know her too?” Zandrite asks my mother.
“This is my daughter, Everielle.” She caresses his upper arm while shooting me a gloating glance. “It helps to have a god on your side.”
“I am not on your side.” Zandrite brushes her hand from his hairy arm like a non-existent speck of lint. “You have access to something I want. Nothing more.”
“Which puts you on my side. I brought you a solution.”
