Page 5 of Wraithwound

“Searching for valuables, then?” Lena whispered back.

“Something like that,” he said. “What’s your name?”

Lena considered. It was unwise to talk to strangers under normal circumstances— anonymity was highly valued in Reimar—but this was not normal.

“Lena,” she said after a moment.

A skittering noise up above them sent chills down her spine, and her head snapped up. When she looked back at Leonid, he was pale.

“There’s something else in here with us,” he said, in a barely audible whisper.

She considered fleeing. EverGods knew it was probably safer than sticking around, but the healer in her kept her rooted in place. Or maybe it was the fear coursing through her that did that. Either way, she couldn’t leave him.

“We’ve got to get out of here,” she said.

Leonid shook his head and pointed down at his thigh.

Against her better judgement, she walked over and crouched down to get a closer look. As she did, a sharp chittering noise broke the silence. Lena looked around, trying to locate the source of the sound when her gaze snagged on a distortion in the air above the strange hole. It was beginning to ripple. Leonid followed her gaze towards the end of the room, his mouth falling open in horror as a claw-tipped hand began to emerge.

“Go,” he mouthed at Lena and pointed towards the window at the opposite wall.

But she shook her head. She wouldn’t leave him down here, with that. Lena inspected his leg again and was relieved to see it wasn’t broken, just pinned. She held her hands up and made a pushing gesture, not daring to speak. She was beginning to panic too, the edges of her vision turning black.

Leonid froze, his face draining entirely of color.

She blinked, shaking the dark spots away and waited. When he didn’t reply, she made the pushing gesture again. The skittering noise echoed in the chamber closer this time, which seemed to snap Leonid back into action, and he nodded frantically.

Lena placed both hands on the boulder and used her remaining strength to push, knowing full well the agony this would cause her wraithwound. The stone didn’t budge. As if on cue, both turned to the terrifying sight at the end of the chamber, but the claw-tipped hand hadn’t emerged any further.

Releasing a shaking breath, Lena placed her hands back on the stone. Leonid joined her, placing his free hand on the boulder to push across his body. It was so incredibly heavy, and she was so so tired. When the stone didn’t budge, she stole another glance at the far end of the room. To her horror, the hand suspended there flexed, fingers curling into a fist, and then continued to emerge. A spike of fear lanced through her so sharply that her field of vision narrowed as black converged at the edges. Convinced she was close to blacking out again, she returned to the stone and pushed, clenching her jaw to avoid screaming with the effort. At last, the stone shifted, scraping against the other stones below it. The black edges in her vision were slow to clear, likely a sign of her flagging strength, and yet, Lena couldn’t tear her gaze away from the leathery black fingers. The slightly curled claws made her shiver.

She distantly heard Leonid’s grunt of pain as he shifted his body, and then a firm, warm hand grasped her wrist. Settling into that feeling of warmth, Lena blinked and saw what might be considered an elbow break through the translucent film that covered the inky black hole. Leonid whispered her name, urgency evident in his tone.

“We have to go! Now!” he mouthed.

Leonid released her wrist and pulled himself up using the wall behind him for support. He moved with a deep limp but seemed mobile enough. He tugged gently on her arm, and they made their way to the opposite wall where Lena had woken up. Silently, they mapped a path up the wall using a pile of rubble that reached just beneath the window. Lena tested a large block towards the bottom that was angled precariously on another. It held. She looked down at Leonid to see if he might need assistance, but he only waved his arms in a shooing motion urging her to continue. Lena pulled herself up block after block, scraping her arms on sharp edges and breaking her fingernails as she worked to keep her grip on the dusty stone. Skittering and scraping noises continued nearby, which only fueled Lena’s desperation to escape the stone chamber. Leonid moved slowly but seemed just as determined to get out as she was.

Lena was nearly to the wide ledge of the window when she heard a snarl and a hiss pierce the silence. She flung herself toward the ledge, hooking a leg over the side to pull herself onto it. Leonid was not far behind, his eyes wide with terror. She crawled out, doing her best to avoid the broken glass shards that littered the space. Leonid crawled out of the window right behind her, and together they climbed from the window well into the crisp morning air of a pink-tinted dawn.

Chapter

Seven

Lena looked around frantically, uncertain of which direction to go.

“This way!” Leonid shouted, half limping, half running towards the defensive outer wall of the city.

Lena followed him across the property through a field of withered grass and blackened trees and past a crumbling stone fountain in the center of the gardens and ramshackle stables.

“Does this way lead us out of the city?” she asked, eyeing the path through the dry, cracked soil.

“Yes!”

Leonid led her towards a hidden gap in the wall where two sections overlapped, creating a passageway out. It took them to an iron door, secured by a rusted chain and padlock. Lena ran her hands through her hair, her mind racing when she heard the rustle of keys. She peered over Leonid’s shoulder to see he had inserted a key into the padlock and was removing the chain.

“How do you have those?” she asked, both surprised and relieved.

“I found them in the stables on the property a while back. Come, let’s keep moving,” he said quickly.