Page 36 of Shadow Master
“Whatever we find, we’ll deal with it together,” Hyde said.
His tone was soft.
I glanced across at him to find him watching me.
Our gazes locked, and a spark passed between us, the damn spark that wouldn’t die. A lump formed in my throat.
“We should pick up the pace.” Sector three closed in around me, the mist stinging my eyes. Almost there.
I fell into a jog.
* * *
The mist thinnedand then ebbed until it was gone. I sucked in a breath, sweet and heady. It hit my brain with a zing that sent energy coursing through me.
This was fomorian air. This was fomorian soil … but there was no soil. There was hard-packed earth, cracked and hungry for rain. It stretched out ahead of us, a landscape to rival the mist, dead and unforgiving.
The sky was filled with too many stars that seemed to wink at us conspiratorially. Like, hey, did you know? Do you see now?
Dark shapes jutted up in the distance, black and gray in the moonlight. Buildings?
“It’s dead,” Hyde said. “No plant life. Nothing.”
“Is it all like this?” I asked the spy.
He sneered at me but didn’t answer.
“Is this why they want our world?” Hyde pondered.
“Hey!” Harmon appeared to our left, jogging toward us.
Athos kept pace easily.
“You guys go off course a little?” Hyde asked.
“No. You did,” Harmon replied.
They joined us in staring at the dead world we’d entered.
I crouched before the creature. “Which way?”
He hawked and spat.
I could have hit him. I could have hurt him, but I’d had enough of torture for one day.
“Listen, I don’t want to hurt you again, but I will if you don’t answer my questions. Make this easy on yourself, get us where we need to be, and I give you my word, I’ll set you free.”
“Justice, what are you doing?” Hyde admonished. “We need it.”
I kept my eyes on the spy. “We can grab another prisoner from the camp. Someone who actually knows things.”
The spy bristled. “I know things.”
I rolled my eyes. “Yeah, right.”
“I do!”
“Really?” I put on my bored expression. “I think you’re full of bullshit. I think you have no clue about anything but the tiny camp you came from.”
