The Onyx Vial (Shadows of The Nine Book 1) (17 page)

Harold jerked the bag out of her hands.

“Give it back!” she forgot her weak legs and leapt, snatching at a strap.

He dangled it out of her reach. “Answers first.”

Every fiber of her body urged her to kick him in the knee. “Are you
joking
?”

He didn’t even blink.

She matched his stare then lunged for the strap again. He let out a wicked chuckle, holding it easily out of reach.

Ariana shook. She hated him.
Hated
. No. More than that. She wished him a thousand deaths, every one worse than the last. She would watch with pleasure. “Give. It. Back.”

“Cooperate,” he said.

“Why should I?” she snapped.

A memory slammed into her, knocking her back on her heels. She’d been standing in Rockwood Pass, demanding Hunter hand over his bag or give her answers.

“Lawks,” she muttered. “I’m no better than you are.”

She stepped back, feeling nauseous.
Am I? Am I just like Harold Stratton?
She looked at his weathered face. He stared back at her with annoyance. “No,” she whispered.
I’m nothing like him. I’m not
playing
the victim the way Hunter was that day.
“You and Hunter and that…
awful
boy. You’re all the same,” she spat. “Not me.”

“Hunter?” Harold drawled with evident interest.

Ariana opened her mouth, but it closed with a flutter of panic in her chest. Should she play it off? Come up with a lie? Instead, she just stared.

The weight of the last few days sank into her bones. She felt exactly like the tired, battered, sopping wet fifteen-year-old girl that she was. Her shoulders slumped. Her head swam.  

“What are you doing?” George barked. Ariana jumped. He appeared beside her. “She’s bleeding, Harold.”

“Not my problem.” He glowered at them both, then stalked away.

“Spurge,” Ariana called to Harold’s back, feeling he deserved a particularly foul insult. He didn’t acknowledge her.

George studied her, then shook his head and sighed. “I’d have to agree with you,” he grumbled.

Surprised, Ariana swiveled to look at him, everything blurring at the edges as she did.

“Quite the mouth you’ve got there,” he added with a wink, dropping to his knees.

Ariana grinned despite herself, felt her spirits pick up a blink. She shook her head. The blur disappeared.

“Stick out your leg,” he instructed, waving a roll of gauze at her.

He secured the stretchy material tight against her thigh. After two wraparounds, the snowy white bandage blushed pink.

George grimaced. “I can’t say I’m sorry you re-opened that wound.”

Ariana frowned.

He secured the gauze. “What with the fire in the cart, I mean. Riding the horse hurt you, but it saved you, too.”

Ah. “Yes,” she agreed. “This
is
the lesser of two evils.”

He gave her leg a gentle pat and stood. “You’re raving, though."

Ariana could feel herself slipping into something like comfort with George, and she didn’t like it. He was as much her captor as Harold, no matter how nice he seemed in comparison. And no matter how tired or beaten she felt, she had to remember that. “My bag was in there,” she said as he headed toward the back of this small, low-ceilinged area they had ridden into. “The one you and Harold
stole
,” she added.

George
tsk
ed and kept walking.

Ariana stayed put. She was supposed to be their prisoner, but both of them had walked off and left her. She could escape.

As she looked around, though, she realized she was in a cave with only two ways out. One led to certain imprisonment. The other to a rocky plain of death, and then… what? Right back to the desert; only this time, no book. It wasn't really a choice. She was their prisoner, with or without a cell, as long as they had that Heledian portal book.   

She groaned, then limped after him, catching up as they drew level with two broad statues in red armor that flanked the torch-lit opening of the tunnel at the back of the cave. She wondered where it led. As she peered into the murky black behind the torches, the statues broke from the wall and stepped into their path.

Ariana startled.

“Who is she?” boomed the one on the left.

The light of the torches danced across their stony faces. Ariana recaptured her breath. They weren’t statues at all. They were guards.

“A prisoner, Titus,” George said, holding up his hands.

“Prisoner, you say?” Titus narrowed his eyes.

George nodded. “For now.”

That sounded ominous.

Titus bent low, his wide nose almost touching Ariana’s. She expected to be accosted by a metallic, sweaty smell, but instead he exuded the scent of grass. It caught her off guard and kept her from stepping back, though he was very much in her personal space. He had kind, emerald eyes that urged her to hold his gaze.

He regarded her with intensity. But why? Prisoner or not, she wasn’t dangerous and she certainly didn’t look it.

Titus straightened, nodded to George, then stepped back. His partner followed suit, letting the two of them pass into the dark tunnel. Harold was nowhere in sight. Wherever they were going, he hadn't decided to join them.

George led her through a tight, angular bend, and the tunnel transformed into a cavernous passage—wide, well-traveled, and well-lit, despite the absence of lanterns. She expected stairs leading into the giant tower of rock. Instead, they marched downward on a smooth slope, every minute convincing her that the sun was setting ahead of them. But that couldn’t be right.

The passage ended, emptied into a dark, soft-orange nothingness. Only an aging wooden fence, no higher than her chest, stood at the precipice.

Ariana leaned over the railing, lost for words. They were at the edge of a steep cliff. Buildings and streets flooded the bottom of the wide cavern far below. The tallest buildings sat close to the outer rim, forming a sort of bowl.

Though on the surface it was night, in the city it appeared to be late afternoon. Light soaked the buildings from the ground up, like water catching the hem of a dress.

George cut to the right, eased down a narrow staircase with no railing, and stepped onto a wooden platform stretching along the cavern wall. The platform was divided into sections by thick railings.

“Come,” he said, waving her to him.

Ariana obeyed. But she took her time, stealing glances at the city, walking so close to the edge of the open staircase her toes hung out over nothing.

She ambled onto the bottleneck strip of platform that served as a walkway to each section, then ducked the bulging rope of the first of several pulleys studded along the rock surface overhead.

George grabbed her arm and guided her onto the platform beside him.

He made a winding gesture with his hand, and a lever-like clunk sounded beneath them. The platform sank down. The rope reeled through the pulleys. The walkway floated away above. She wondered why the system ran mechanically, instead of with etâme, and instantly distrusted it.

Below, a dock of sorts spread the length of the platforms that hovered above them—as if she and George were on a boat in a vertical bay. It was murky between them and the ground, darker here than in the city, few lights visible. It made her think of a sleeping shipyard. One dark plank path snaked away from the docks through a field of glistening, razor-sharp stones, meeting the light of the city and its soft, safe, even ground.

She hoped this was just the prisoners’ entrance. Otherwise, the place wasn’t too welcoming.  

The moment they touched bottom, the platform fitting in its slot like a puzzle-piece, Ariana scrambled off the contraption, feeling tainted by its etâmless operation. She wrinkled her nose at it, and then the smell of campfire slid into her nostrils. A lingering sense of panic swelled in her chest, tamping down her wonder at this strange new city.

She was a prisoner, deep underground. Harold Stratton had disappeared with her only means of escape. She swallowed hard and tried to tell herself she’d be alright. But she didn’t believe it.

A girl with dark, deeply tanned skin, waving curls of oak-brown hair, and bright, white-grey eyes bounded toward them, a lantern in her hand. She looked about Ariana’s age. Her dark skirt sported several smudged, chalky white handprints.

“My,” she said, her eyes on Ariana. “Not exactly what you and Harold went to the surface for, is she, George?”

Ariana didn’t register the girl’s words, too taken aback by her. She was so unexpected. So female. So young. So… free. There was a light in her eyes that Ariana had never seen in her friends. Even on their happiest days, there was something holding them back, as though they were bracing for a hurricane. But this girl was different. How strange that she should be that way in
this
of all worlds.

“Asrea,” George said, his voice full of warning.

A sigh. Her grin wavered. “Father’s still topside. I’m in charge of the prison while he’s gone.” Her eyelids fluttered with annoyance.

Ariana eyed the girl.
This
girl was in charge of a prison?

“Harold says you have a new one for maximum,” she said, peering around George, looking, Ariana guessed, for someone better resembling a prisoner than the wreck of a girl with the ruined clothes and bleeding leg.

The light of the lamp flickered, catching Ariana’s eye. She missed George’s gesture, but it didn’t matter. She knew who he’d pointed at.

“George, you can't be serious," Asrea said, the sunlight clouding over in her voice.

Ariana felt the blood rush into her face. She peered at the lantern to avoid Asrea’s eyes. Behind the glass were tiny flaming bugs. They zoomed around, thumping into the sides, leaving little scorch marks on their clear prison walls.

When she looked up again, George's features had softened from a stern frown to a defeated grimace. “It’s Harold’s call. Not mine.”

What call would George have made, she wondered.

“But
maximum security
, George? Who is she, a Fyrennian Princess?” Asrea stared at her, incredulous.

Ariana’s mouth opened and shut, her curiosity for George’s response warring with her desire to set them straight about maximum anything. She looked at George.

He looked at Asrea and shrugged, ever so slightly. “It’s a possibility,” he said.

Bah! A Fyrennian Princess? The idea was scattered. Why jump to that conclusion? A Fyrennian spy, maybe. But a Princess? The only scenario that the Strattons could believe that of her was if she really
was
with Bintaro and he… The marking on his wrist flashed in her mind. The symbol of the Fyrennian family? No. That boy was
not
the Dark Prince.

“We don't have time to get her to talk.” George gave Ariana a nudge in the back, as if calling out an opportunity to spill the truth right here and now.

She shot him a withering glare. 

Asrea laughed. “Of course you can’t get her to talk.” She took Ariana’s hand in hers, caught her with those silver-grey eyes. Her sweet smile morphed into a wicked grin. “That’s
my
job.”

Chapter 13

Killian leaned against the sleeping
Stoalvenger
, whose feathers brushed the skin of his neck with each steady, peaceful breath. He stared at the bloody necklace in his hands, unable to find the same calm, unable to close his eyes or stop the images of death from crowding his every thought.

Here, in this alcove, he had felt safe enough to loosen the restraints of his control. But now—perhaps it was the lack of rest and food, or the constant state of anxiety that came along with being hunted—he couldn’t cinch his thoughts and emotions back up.

He forced his heavy lids shut and pictured his mother as he’d seen her last, as he saw her ever since: her pale, gracefully aging face ashen and lifeless. His cruel mind replayed the moment he’d reached for the pendant on her charred, blood-slicked chest.

He focused hard to shift the image to something different, better—a memory from a dream. A grainy photo. She was younger, her skin alive and glowing with the blush of sunset, her body whole, undamaged, adorned in a red-and-black dress that trailed ribbons down her legs.

And then, abruptly, the image of his mother morphed into that of the roof rat from Gruum, lying unconscious on the ground, dark, unruly waves of hair sprawled about her head, blood flowing freely from every limb. She wore shorts with knee-high leather boots, the flaps turned out like petals on a wilting flower.

Why? Why did that girl have to fall off the roof at that moment? Why had his mother been so flaming defiant?
Why
had he paused and let that man speak instead of plunging the blade into his neck when he had the chance?

There was no answer. There never would be. He’d made his moves; reacted to each challenge with his own interests in mind. That was it. This was not a game he was playing. It was his life. There was no going back and trying again. He had to push forward. Always forward.

He spat the bitter taste of disappointment into the dry, Heledian ground. He’d had the Strattons convinced. He’d achieved the very thing he needed to do since his father branded that symbol into his skin.

And then that girl.

She was familiar. He'd seen her in his dreams—through his brother's eyes. And Harold caught the recognition that crossed his face.

That moment had cost him everything.

A dog’s bark rent the still air. Killian froze. His senses clicked back into place. Suddenly, he could smell the tangy sweat of man and beast, hear the rustle of feathers and clink of chains, taste the saturation of body heat on the air. So deep in thought, he'd missed it completely.

Another bark. He recognized it.

“No,” he choked, dropping the necklace to the ground. “Baron.”

He pushed himself to his feet. The world swayed dangerously around him.
Of course. Of course they would use him to find me.
Guilt stabbed at him. He should have taken the dog with him. But there wasn't time. He thought he'd be safe.

Three barks in rhythmic succession. Then a pause.

Killian’s insides churned.
Don’t finish the call
.

The dog howled.

Killian deflated.

He turned to Fenix. The beast stamped and huffed, unsettled by the unseen force surrounding them. Killian darted to a fist-width gap in the rocks where he could peek out unnoticed.

A small, black, wolf-like dog stood in the open desert a hundred paces off. Baron. Behind the dog: a fleet of Watchers astride their
Stoalvenger
s. The cold, amber eyes of the beasts were set in the direction of their hidden comrade, Fenix.

A shadow shifted out of Killian’s view. He moved to see it and moaned behind clenched teeth.

Archer, the Watchers’ finest bowman, and his personal archery instructor stood beside the dog, the thick cords of muscle piled on his arms and chest visible even from this distance. His bow was drawn, the tip of the arrow aimed at Baron’s head. The dog, unaware of his hostage status, sniffed the air and howled again, his big blue eyes trained on his master, though Killian was hardly visible.

“Prince Killian Gunnar Fyrenn,” the contingent leader spoke, disguised in the line of riders. “An order has been issued for your retrieval—through whatever means necessary—by your father, the King.”

“I know who my father is,” he grumbled.

“You will not dishonor him with non-compliance. You will come out and pay the penalty for your actions.”

Killian fumbled for the tethers of his mental restraint, then pulled them tight. He had to shut himself off to all his worries and all the men waiting for him out there. They’d caught him off guard. But they
would not
defeat him.

He maneuvered to a spot between the rocks where he had a clear view of Baron and Archer. As he did, he began tuning his body to the hot, dry air. If he was going to get out of this alive, it would take every bit of his ability.

The hair on his arms prickled. His skin hummed. His thoughts shuffled, rearranged, molded to a singular purpose. Then he allowed his etâme to leach out of his skin and fuse to the air.

He had to disarm Archer and release Baron from immediate danger. Once Baron was safe, he could fight.

With deliberate slowness, Killian centralized the etâme in his hands, felt its half-imagined weight like clay as he shaped it. A translucent strand grew, tentacle-like, between his palms. A wire of air and etâme. It tugged and twisted in the fibers of his skin as he coaxed the etâme out, weaving it into the air, and extending the length of the strand toward Baron. As it elongated, he drew the sun’s warmth into it, using the invisible wire as an extension of his arm and charging it with heat.

The leader spoke again, but his words were nothing more than mangled sound waves.

Two strides from his target, Killian felt his way to the end of the wire and forced it to fork, aiming each tip in opposite directions. The middle of his forehead split with pain. He blinked it away. Air was so much harder to work with than fire.

His hands shook. The double-tip of the pole was as unstable as a feather in a sandstorm. Any movement on his end was amplified on the other end. He had to get this over with. Quickly.

One smooth, slow breath, and he threaded the pronged end between Baron and Archer.

“I’m sorry, friend,” he whispered, hoping that his plan would work.

With a hard shake, he sent the end of the wire into a whip. The prong slapped the back of Baron’s leg and rebounded into Archer’s shin. Killian discharged the heat, releasing his hold on the etâme so that it flooded down the wire and exploded against the man's leg. Baron’s yelping scream mingled with Archer’s howl of agony. The dog shot forward as Archer loosed the arrow.

The point drove through Baron’s flesh and pinned him to the ground.

Killian's blood went into free fall. Before he could register the sound of his own horror-stricken cry, he leapt over the rocks and ran into the open.

He slid to a stop on his knees beside the dog, holding his breath. He was an easy target for his skilled enemy—men he knew well—if they wished to kill him. But at the moment, he didn’t care. When he’d traced the path of the arrow through Baron’s front thigh, he exhaled, thankful it had missed its original mark.

He loosed the shaft from the arrowhead but dared not remove it from the wound. The whimper-wine of the pup dug into him like sharp teeth.

Killian felt strangled. His vision wavered. Sounds warped and passed by him as though he’d put up a shield of air. He fought past the sensation and focused.

The
Watchers were closing in. His muscles tightened. The tingle of a kindled ember emerged in his palms.

Archer’s bowstring twanged.

Killian braced for the shock of the arrowhead tearing through his back.

It didn’t come.

Sound rushed back to his ears, smashing into him. Killian looked up.

Men shouted, throwing flames and twisting air. Red earth flew around him in a cloud, obscuring his view. What was happening?

Dust swirled and solidified into a curving wall surrounding him. If he stayed still, he’d be trapped. Safe, but trapped.

He left Baron beneath the forming barrier and sprinted back to the rocks.

An arrow glanced off the ground beside him. He leapt to avoid it. He heard a shout. He'd been spotted. He dropped to the ground. An arrow flew over his head and crumpled against the boulder ahead of him. He scrambled up the side of the boulder and slipped back down into his shelter.

Fenix was standing, tucking and unfurling her wings repeatedly at her side with obvious anxiety. The ruby-centered silver pendant glinted at Killian’s feet. He snatched it from the ground and looped the chain over his head, then mounted.

Fenix took to the sky. Below them, chaos reigned.

The Watchers’
Stoalvenger
s beat their wings frantically as they sank up to their shins in the suddenly malleable red earth. Their wild thrashing threw off the few riders stubborn enough to have remained seated.

The rest of the men, on foot now, shouted and ran around heedlessly, their ranks maligned in a cloud of suffocating dust that never settled. They tried to fight their attackers. But their flames and arrows launched at phantoms. Whoever they fought was quicker, smarter, more skilled. Unnervingly so.

Killian scanned the scene with a studied eye and caught a glimpse of a man not wearing the Fyrennian Reds. He wielded fire like swords in each hand, sidestepped arrows deftly and laughed, with wicked mirth, at the men who attempted to fight him hand-to-hand. Killian reveled in the man’s skill.

As the thought crossed his mind, he spotted the cocoon of dirt where Baron still lay. He had to get down to it. He circled the fray, one eye on the mound, another on the fight. An opening appeared in the dirt cloud. He guided Fenix into a nosedive.

A flaming arrow snuck up to him.

Fools.

He pulled Fenix out of the dive and reached for the fire-tipped arrow. His etâme leapt from his palm and sent the flame tearing through the arrowhead and up the shaft. The next instant, he was spattered in ash.

The distraction dealt with, Killian looked down again, but he’d lost sight of the mound.

Something caught his eye in the distance. He focused on it. Sticking out from behind another large outcropping of rocks, two Heledian horses, one chestnut colored, the other as red as the clay, flicked their tails patiently, waiting for their masters to return. Killian felt lighter than Fenix’s feathers.

The exceptionally skilled man down there was Harold Stratton. They’d come back for him after all.

Recharged with hope, Killian circled Fenix back around and dove again for Baron. Flaming arrows screamed toward him. He raised a hand and every one of them hit him in soft, grey-black flakes.

Fenix landed in the cover of the dust. Killian slid off the horse and ducked into the opening in Baron’s shelter. Blood had seeped into the ground around him. The shaft of the arrow stuck out of the dog's glossy black coat as vertically as a grave marker. Killian’s stomach turned. But Baron was alert, still alive. His big grey eyes followed his master’s feet as he approached.

He knelt and scooped the dog into his arms.

“Promise kept,” came a familiar voice.

He turned.

George stood behind him, barely out of breath.

He was, again, impressed. “You’re late.”

George nodded, gestured for him to hand Baron over. “Draw them off. Circle around the Wayland Fins and meet us at the Talons. I'll take the dog and tend to the wound. He'll be safe with me once you leave. They're after you, not us.”

Killian hesitated, wary. George held his gaze without a flicker of change in his sturdy countenance.
The Talons? The ones that marked the edge of the Plains?

“Come on, boy, or we’ll all be dead.”

Killian thrust Baron into George’s arms and ducked past him. He mounted Fenix, and did exactly as he was told.

A small chunk of the Watchers had extricated their
Stoalvenger
s from the ground now. They came barreling through the cloud of dust, wings stuck to their sides in the first thrust of ascent. Killian urged Fenix forward.

He guided Fenix through the snaking plateaus of the Wayland Fins, diving and twirling, exemplifying the
Stoalvenger
's superior speed and agility. At the end of the next fin was a tower. Killian circled around it in a tight, spiraling nosedive. A rider attempting to outsmart him by circling the opposite direction got a wing to the face that sent him plummeting to the ground. The
Stoalvenger
chased after him, trained to catch its falling rider. Its quick change of direction alerted a second to follow, heedless of his rider's protestations.

Two down. Three more.

Killian pulled out of the dive and shot toward the dark shadows cast by the plateaus. They raced low to the ground, almost low enough for Fenix to touch down and run. He stayed in the shade until his eyes were fully adjusted, slowing Fenix enough to let the others gain on him. He glanced over his shoulder, gauged the distance between each rider and himself, then, when he was sure their reaction time was stunted, guided Fenix straight up.