Shadows crowded close as we entered, the air damp and heavy, the mountain itself disapproving of our intrusion.
Ford’s voice continued to carry anyway. “If something jumps out of the dark, I’m throwing Verena at it first. She’s scarier.”
My chuckle came out more of a snort.
Ronan halted mid-step, turning his head just enough. “Enough quivering, Ford. Or you’ll make that darkness think you’re prey.”
Ford muttered under his breath, falling silent shortly after. That was when Callum moved, shoulder squared, his stride subtle as he slid ahead of Ronan.
I saw it. So did Ronan.
“What’s the deal with the bird, anyway?” Ford asked. Not his first, or fifth, question since we’d entered, but anyone’s first time wanting to bring it up. “Is it your pet?” He lifted his finger toward where it was perched on Nezra’s shoulder, snapping his arm back when its eye swirled. “Some winged companion to soothe your soul or keep your secrets?”
Nezra giggled as we filed through the narrow path one by one. Although the front opening had stretched wide, the deeper in we went, the more the ceiling had fallen in over time. Forcing the cave to devour us whole.
I swallowed as the flame in Callum’s hand caught nail-sized etchings along the walls. This had all the makings of a terrible idea, but if someone wished to vanish, a cave hidden beneath the ocean floor wasn’t a bad choice.
“No,” Nezra muttered, ducking under a low-hanging ledge, the part ready to collapse at the next flick. “Heis not my pet. We found one another when company was necessary.”
Ford stopped dead, forcing my face to collide with the pack along his back. Callum’s light carried on and the passage shrunk tightly, consuming everything but the dark. “Wait, you can actually understand it?”
She glared at him.
“I meanhim.”
“Ford.” I lovingly shoved him forward with a hiss as Ronan groaned behind me, his broad shoulders scraping the sides and ceiling. “Keep moving.”
Nezra’s voice drifted back. “As much as I need to.”
“So...” Ford uttered. “You speak bird?”
“He is a raven,” Nezra corrected. “They have their own tongue. And I speak all of them.”
The markings along the wall vanished, all the scratches gone, as if whatever had been dragged had lost its grip on the stone. A sick weight leveled in my gut. Darkness shifted under my skin, up my neck, savoring the taste of it.
A sound drifted forward, soft, almost delicate—
The raven shifted on Nezra’s shoulder, its head cocked, eyes glowing as a low hum spilled from its throat. It lilted through the cave like a half-remembered lullaby.
I froze, my blood chilling to ice as recognition raced up my spine.
Iknewthat song.
Somewhere buried in my memory, in nights of forgotten dreams. The darkness stopped, constricted, coiling tight around my lungs.
Nezra only smiled, letting the sound float by like the reminiscence had been caught on its tide, and she was waiting for me to remember.
“Opening.” Callum’s voice broke me from it all. “Ten feet ahead.”
The entrance was crushing, the edges grating our backs as we bent low to squeeze through. Ronan and Killian struggled worst of all, their ample frames twisting and contorting to fit.
When the rock split wide, when Callum’s light illuminated my path once more, the worry evolved to wonder.
The walls inside were made of clay, rouge and slicked with moisture that pooled against the rutted ground. My breath fogged with stale air as I looked up, where stalactites hung from the tarnished ceiling, all poised and protective above what unexpectedly lay dormant in the center below.
Tombs.
My hand shot out instinctually, but Elva was nowhere near me.
