Page 23 of Vicious Is My Throne

7

TRISTAN

Anaria’s jasmine amber scent staved off the tunnels’ musty damp for those first few hours. The pack mule was docile, willingly trotting beside me, never yanking at the reins like most of his obstinate brethren.

We quickly fell into old patterns, moving fast and efficiently, Raziel setting the pace, his flickering torch weaving in the shifting air every time we reached an intersection where the currents changed.

No one stopped.

We sipped from our waterskins when necessary, Anaria keeping up with no complaint, despite the fact her strides were half as long as ours.

We spoke little that first day but not at all on the second, when the crushing weight of the rock overhead became unbearable, when claustrophobia turned as stifling as the endless dark. There was only Raz’s torch lighting the way, the rest of us stumbling along, and me at the end of that long line, chased by that creeping darkness nipping at my heels.

We passed offshoots from the main tunnel, dark passages that branched off to our left and right, belching foul odors and small, furtive sounds that made us pick up the pace. I’d overheard Lucius’s warning about staying to the main tunnel and, from the fetid smells, had no desire to stray.

But with every step we delved deeper, my wyvern howled in protest.

He despised places like this.

Dark. Closed off.

He craved the open sky, to soar amongst the high winds howling above the clouds with the sun warming his back.

There was no sun down here, no warmth, although last night Anaria had slept in my arms for the first few hours before crawling over to Raziel. When we’d awoken, she’d been nestled in Tavion’s lap, her head against his chest, small hands curled into fists. He’d carried her for the first hour before she’d awoken, then today we’d taken turns walking beside her.

All of us braced for some foul thing to spring out of the darkness.

With every breath, I tested the air for subtle differences, searched the impenetrable darkness for movement. The tunnels tasted different than before, but was that because we were being hunted by an Old God, or was there something else down here stalking us?

Last night we’d questioned Tavion and Anaria at length about these creatures they called Night Crawlers.

Today, I wondered how many other foul things Corvus had made, waiting to send out of his darkness after us. Soul Reapers and the enormous foul centipedes up in the Dearth, and now these…bugs.

Zorander lifted his fist into the air and we stopped, filling our canteens from the underground river none of us dared get close to for long, managing a few bites of food. We plundered every cache we came across, and the mule’s pack was brimming with dried meat—totally suspect, as Dane feared—and even drier bread.

There were moments I was so angry I didn’t know what to do with all my fury.

When the unfairness of the task resting on Anaria’s shoulders knocked the breath out of my lungs. She’d killed the two most powerful tyrants in the world, restored the magic to two magicless realms, and now…now she was expected to do the impossible.

Kill not one Old God but two.

She was smart and clever and determined, but at what point would her luck simply run out?

My brave, beautiful girl has been fighting since the moment I’d first seen her, that lovely face surrounded by a tangle of wild, white hair, green eyes shining with resolve as she begged me to save her friend.

More than anything else, I regretted not helping Anaria that day.

How many times had I replayed that moment, the choice that could have changed everything for Ember? But I’d been a grunt following orders. That’s what I’d told myself, and now here we were. Ember was dead and Anaria carried her death, along with so many others, close to her heart. On those shoulders that looked so impossibly fragile.

There would be no more regrets for Anaria.

No more personal losses for her to bear. I’d make sure of that.

A familiar fire seared through me, scorching through centuries of doubt and excuses.

I’d been angry at this world for so long, I didn’t know how to be any other way. Was so used to dragging the weight of my failures around with me, I’d grown accustomed to drowning in misery, but watching ’Naria hold her head high and pretend she could handle whatever this world threw at her made me realize how weak I’d been all these years.

I’d wasted centuries of my life tied up in knots over the past.

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