Eight Will Fall, page 14
“We have to go.” Jacque led Larkin toward the tunnel entrance, and Larkin obliged because she didn’t know what else to do. Brielle was dead. Larkin had felt her die, just as she had with Devon.
“Stop,” Tamsyn called out.
“We should have turned back when our light went out,” cried Casseem.
“I said stop!” Tamsyn shouted.
Larkin froze. Jacque shivered against her.
“Why the orchestration of something so horrific?” asked Tamsyn. Though he was as terrified as the rest of them, he studied the arch in morbid fascination. “This is disgusting, but it’s strategic. There must be a reason.”
“Whoever did this is a monster.” Casseem pressed his hands to the sides of his head. “One that’s going to come after the rest of us.” He spun around to the group. “That’s reason enough!”
“No, Tamsyn’s right.” Elf wiped the tears from her cheeks. “This is a performance.”
“Whose performance?” Jacque shouted. “Kyran’s? This could have been me. I was part of one of the first battalions, and they switched me out at the last minute. I’m supposed to be pinned to that wall!”
“The performance has been going on for some time. It didn’t begin here.” Tamsyn pointed to the tunnel entrance, his finger trembling. “It started back there. At the beginning with Devon. The soldier at the bottom of the chasm. Now Brielle.” Tamsyn turned to Amias. “Larkin said you told her what Melay’s intentions were. Well, Amias?”
“Melay thinks Kyran will let us get close.” Amias’s knuckles whitened as he clenched the dead torch. His tranquility had vanished, and he was as wild with horror as the rest of them.
“He’s not only letting us get close. We’ve been escorted this entire time,” the scholar declared. “Kyran is with us.”
Larkin knew Tamsyn was right, and she hated him for it. Who knew how long it would have taken them to find the entrance to the labyrinth if it weren’t for the dead soldier? They would have wasted their time attempting to find a way across the chasm instead of down. And Brielle—Brielle had been a sacrifice to guide them here. Larkin bit down on her bottom lip to keep from sobbing out loud.
She should have watched Brielle more closely. She should have fought against the fatigue.
Tamsyn shook his head back and forth, as though alarmed by his own discovery. “The only thing that I don’t understand is why. What are we being shown?”
Shown. They had been guided here and instilled with fear for a reason. Because they could do something that these soldiers could not.
Kyran wanted them to be afraid, and he wanted them to use their magic.
“It’s a gateway,” cried Larkin. “We need to destroy this wall.” She turned to Tamsyn for affirmation, but he was doubtful.
“If this was set up by Kyran, why should we follow him?” Casseem asked in a frenzy. “How do we know it’s not a trap?”
“Where would we go if it is?” Larkin licked her chapped bottom lip. “We go back into that labyrinth and we die. You know that.”
Elf sidled up next to Larkin. “I’ll be damned if I go back there.”
Casseem and Jacque shared a glance, and the soldier buried her face in her hands. “Ilona’s breath.”
Amias threw down his dead torch and stepped forward. “We don’t have another option.”
Casseem grunted in disapproval and trudged up to the wall. “This is insanity.”
Larkin followed him to the smoldering bodies, avoiding the place where Brielle hung. She walked to the center of the arch and pressed her hand to the stone face. Shutting her eyes, she sensed the intensity of the others. Terror collected at the base of her spine, gaining tension as she siphoned it.
A deafening crack filled the chamber. The wall shook, stone crumbling beneath her hands. It was too late to worry about a cave-in, but it didn’t matter. Larkin was getting stronger. She had more control over her magic than she thought.
Beams of cool light shot from veinlike fractures, hovering, and for a desperate moment Larkin wondered if they’d broken through to the Surface.
The rest of the rock dissolved into dust. Larkin stepped through the curtain and into the bright void, squinting as her eyes watered.
She started to laugh, a raw hack that sounded as delirious as she felt. “Tamsyn.”
“What?”
“It’s time to revise your map.”
SEVENTEEN
Impossible.
Larkin marveled at the cerulean patchwork of lichen, larvae, and crystal that glowed like a sea of stars, emulating the soft blue of dusk.
Miles in front of her, mammoth stalagmites peaked like mountains. A waterfall broke through the cliffside to the left of them and plummeted into a lake hundreds of feet below.
The vast body of water stretched from the cliffside to the subterranean mountains beyond, the surface reflecting the brilliant color from the makeshift sky. The lake’s only shore was dotted by a web of fiery light. Flames. Flames dotting roads, stringing together a cluster of huts.
“We go down?” Jacque croaked. The blue light from the lichen-crusted ceiling accentuated the hollows of her cheeks and the white cracks of her lips. The others looked just as gaunt as they crowded around Larkin. They needed water, and below them, an entire pool of it waited.
“It’s a little world,” gasped Elf. “It’s so big … so open.”
Larkin sensed a breeze of ethereal hope from her. But hope meant vulnerability. “Look out,” she warned before descending. “We can’t let our guard down.”
The switchbacks before them were lit with the blue glow, guiding her. As she maneuvered downward, the others followed.
Jacque hissed to be careful as they neared the bottom. Larkin’s toe hit a stone at the last moment, and she stumbled onto the flat earth, catching herself with her hands. Grit ate at her palms, but she only cared about one thing.
Water.
They had spilled into a small cove on the cusp of the lake. Larkin stumbled across the silky shore and collapsed, immersing her face in the water. She drank and drank. It was the most wonderful thing she’d ever tasted.
She emerged, gasping for breath. “It’s clean!” she called, realizing she was the only one at the edge of the water. Where were the others?
“Larkin!” Elf shouted.
Larkin jumped to her feet, whirling to the path that cut through rock. A man in black stood before them. She staggered back in alarm.
His pale flesh reminded her of a skinned fish, like he’d been birthed and left in the dark. Larkin couldn’t guess his age if she tried. But he was also frighteningly beautiful. And he wasn’t alone. More people lingered behind him, with the same black cloaks and haunting faces. Larkin scoured for their emotions but found very little—too little.
“Casseem?” Jacque said.
“Hold your ground.” Casseem’s voice was stern. “Who are they? Arkwright?”
“I—I…,” Tamsyn stuttered, his bewilderment a buzzing pulse inside of Larkin. “I don’t know.”
The man lifted his hand and beckoned them closer.
When Larkin took a hesitant step forward, the people surrounding the man grew maniacally gleeful. This was not a gesture of goodwill.
Before she could scream an order to run, the sand at the man’s feet began funneling upward, as if trapped in a windstorm. Casseem swore as a ghost of a sword appeared in the man’s hand, grains of sand swarming and strengthening it.
Conjuration. They were Empaths.
They watched in stunned silence as sand whipped through the air, spiraling around the hands of the other Empaths. When their swords were formed, the Empaths crouched in battle stances.
“What do we do?” Elf whispered.
“Draw your weapons,” Casseem replied.
“What weapons?” Larkin nearly screamed at him. She had one knife on her. The rest of their gear was back in the labyrinth. They should have been completely capable of conjuring weapons, but Larkin had had enough difficulty with just a rope.
“I’m the only one who kept my sword,” Jacque said. “And if you think I would be foolish enough to draw my weapon on them, you’re damned mad.”
The group drew closer as the man began to conjure again, this time creating a chain of mottled shackles. Six pairs in all. He threw them at Larkin’s feet.
“He wants us to shackle ourselves,” said Casseem, a note of hysteria in his voice.
“We have to. I don’t think the swords are for show.” Larkin wasn’t ready to die. Kneeling, she picked up a set of shackles and clumsily bound her own wrists with the cuffs.
Amias was by her side, following her lead. “I hope you know what you’re doing.”
“I don’t.” Larkin locked the cuff on her right wrist.
Elf glided forward, followed by Tamsyn, who was more intrigued than afraid. Jacque marched ahead, picking up the chain. “I don’t surrender. I’m not surrendering.”
Only Casseem remained. The leader of the strange Empaths strode toward Casseem, his sword raised and aimed at his throat.
“Casseem!” Larkin hissed.
Slowly, Casseem bent down and picked up the final set of shackles. “This is a mistake.” As he locked himself in, the man in black scrutinized each of them before grabbing the end of the chain and yanking them forward.
Larkin stumbled but regained her balance quickly. The strangers surrounded them, walking the prisoners toward the village.
“Gods,” Tamsyn breathed. “How long do you think they’ve been living down here?” He held out his fingers, counting, and then clenched his fist.
“Since the Reach was closed off,” Larkin replied. “How else would they’ve gotten in?”
“The dynasty’s opened the portcullis for the occasional adventurer. None of them reemerged, of course.”
“Not Empaths,” Larkin corrected. “Unless they were banished here.” But she’d never heard of such a thing happening since Kyran was condemned.
Then where had these people come from?
The Empaths’ conjured swords glistened in their hands like metal fresh from the forge. One of the Empaths glanced over her shoulder at them. Larkin noted her curiosity, like she couldn’t understand the party’s conversation. Despite the elaborate show of conjuring swords, the Empaths didn’t seem threatened by them. But Larkin didn’t know if that was necessarily good.
As they approached the village, the man in black yanked them forward by the shackles once more, the metal cutting into Larkin’s scraped arms.
“Stay afraid,” she told the others. The Empaths before them were hardly emitting any emotions. “In case we need to escape.”
“Fear feeds them as much as us,” said Amias.
Larkin swore beneath her breath.
Huts of marbled glass and smelted metal lined the pathway. The glass appeared onyx until she saw light from within one of them, and the color morphed into a striking violet. Other huts held different colors within the glass—bloodred and moss green. Blue the color of deepest midnight. Pale faces peered out from within, expressions warped behind the melted glass.
Larkin tried counting them, but there were too many. Hundreds of them.
The Empaths who led them stopped at one of the huts, their leader gesturing for Larkin’s party to enter. There was nothing inside but a barren floor, and when Larkin turned around, the leader blocked the entrance.
He was not angry, but fierce. Confident. He gestured toward the floor, and when Larkin didn’t move, he pushed her backward until she tripped, tangled by the chain that bound her to the others. Elf held her up.
The Empath gestured to the floor again. Simultaneously, the six of them sank to their knees.
“Say your final prayers to Ilona.” Casseem was angry. They hadn’t fought when they had the chance, and now they were cornered.
“Shut up,” ordered Jacque.
“They could have killed us by now if they wanted to,” said Amias. Larkin focused on his calm to clear her head, and as she did, their captors parted, and a woman entered the hut.
The woman pulled off her hood, a sheet of white hair tumbling around her shoulders. Her beauty was surreal, her skin impossibly smooth and eyes ethereal as she gazed at the six prisoners. The bodice of her violet dress was adorned with silver shafts shaped like human ribs, and delicate silver bones were fused to the backs of her hands, mirroring the finger bones beneath. Larkin had never seen such conjuration magic. It was almost beautiful.
Larkin’s stomach flipped as she sensed the woman’s confusion. Concern emanated from the man in black. The woman spoke impatiently to him, but the language was harsh and nonsensical. A few words sounded familiar, but she could make no meaning of them.
Tamsyn clapped his hand over his mouth before dissolving into terror.
Blood thrummed in Larkin’s ears. “Who is she?” she hissed.
“I think that’s Bianca Elesandre,” hissed Tamsyn. “Kyran’s right hand.”
A disciple.
“Bianca?” Elf gasped.
“Quiet!” Jacque hissed.
The shock of the party buzzed beneath Larkin’s skin. A thousand-year-old outlaw stood before them.
“Maybe I’m wrong,” Tamsyn said hesitantly. Then he violently shook his head. “No, no. I can’t be wrong.”
But if he was correct, Kyran’s favorite disciple was standing before them. After all, they had suspected that Kyran had guided them here. This could be the moment they had come down here for, to confront Kyran and all of his disciples face-to-face, and here Larkin was, surrendering. Despair tugged her downward as she thought of Garran, and how far they’d come only to fail.
The woman flicked her silver-laden fingers back and forth. The rocky floor surrounding the party disintegrated and re-formed around their chain, shackling them to the ground. Another flick, and Larkin’s cuffs dissolved.
Before Larkin could register her freedom, two of the Empaths lunged forward and grabbed her, dragging her to her feet.
“Wait!” Amias cried.
Larkin’s heart hammered in her chest as the woman approached her, the beautiful Empath drenched in loathing. Her perfect lips pulled up in a sneer.
The panic of the party stole Larkin’s attention. She needed to use it, break everything around her, make a distraction, fight for her life. If she tried, however, this woman would certainly kill her.
One of the men who held her gripped her wrist, his fingernails sinking into her wounds. She cried out, struggling against him as he forcefully straightened her arm.
“What does he want?” the woman asked Larkin in the common tongue, furious. She spoke their language!
“I don’t—”
Pain tore through Larkin’s arm, and she nearly buckled to the ground.
Everyone was yelling, their words and emotions confusing and vivid, the way dreams so often felt.
This is a dream, thought Larkin. It wasn’t real. It couldn’t be.
“Tell me what he wants,” the woman repeated. “We had an arrangement. No more visits. No more puppets. Why is he breaking his promise?”
“Who?” The word scraped the back of Larkin’s throat.
The woman lifted a finger, and silver bones dragged down Larkin’s arm. The skin dissolved, and Larkin’s vision clouded as her knees buckled. She tasted iron.
“We don’t know anything,” Elf cried, or Larkin thought it was her. Beneath the ringing in her ears, Elf sounded so far away. Miles away.
Larkin tried siphoning, but the pain was too great.
The woman clutched Larkin’s jaw and yanked her face upward. “I know he tortures you. It must be agonizing, but I promise you a quick death if you tell me…”
Larkin had been wrong. The woman wasn’t beautiful. She was haunting—terrifying. And Larkin knew she’d kill each of them just like this.
After everything they’d already been through.
Through the black dots swarming her vision, Larkin saw the porcelain skin over the woman’s cheekbone split open.
Startled, the woman released Larkin’s jaw to catch the blood trickling down her face. She drew her fingers from the wound.
“Leave her alone.” Amias’s voice rang out.
The woman’s eyes found Amias. “An Empath?”
Larkin tried to yank herself back, but the woman wasn’t finished. Larkin cried out when her arm began burning, but when she looked down, she watched in wonder as her flesh knitted itself back together. By the time the man who held her released her, even the scratches from the labyrinth were gone.
Larkin’s knees gave out. Elf and Amias were by her side, lifting her up and dragging her back to the rest of the group at the edge of the small hut. Amias’s anger was a pulse of heat and brimstone. As quick as he’d caught her, he was gone, and Elf was the only one left clutching Larkin.
They were no longer shackled, their manacles having dissolved back to sand. The party swarmed around Larkin to protect her.
“Bianca,” Larkin croaked.
Bianca’s surprise confirmed that Larkin was right. “What sector are you from?”
“What does she mean, sector?” Elf murmured.
“I … I don’t know.” Tamsyn’s dismay was a weight spiraling slowly through Larkin’s body. “Gods, I should know this!”
Casseem shook his head. “Don’t say anything.”
But Larkin couldn’t help herself. “We don’t know what you mean by sector.”
“Who is your disciple?” Bianca asked.
Larkin shook her head.
Bianca grew frustrated. “Where in the Reach did you come from?”
“Larkin…,” Casseem warned.
“We’re not from the Reach,” said Larkin. “We’re from the Surface.”
“Larkin!” Jacque snapped. Casseem swore under his breath.
Bianca took a step back. “The Surface? Has the dynasty begun exiling Empaths to the Reach once more?”
“Queen Melay has sent us into the Reach to find and kill Otheil Kyran,” Larkin said desperately. There was no sense in lying. They had nothing to lose.
“I don’t understand.” Bianca narrowed her pale eyes, eyes that looked as though the color had been washed from them. They reminded Larkin of the river quartz lining the canal in the capital. “Why you? Why now?”
