Page 40 of Eldritch
Had it beenmywill to kill my own sister?
I inhaled a shuddering breath, still shaken by it.
I’m not killing her. I will not kill her. It isnotmy will!
“Do you hear me?” I whispered aloud, to myself and whatever was inside of me, perceiving her as my enemy. “I will not kill my own sister!”
“Maevyth.” The sound of my name, barely whispered, broke my attention, and gasping, I leaned in closer, careful not to touch her.
“Aleysia?”
Another soft murmur accompanied the movement of her lips.
My heart leapt to my throat on a surge of excitement. “Aleysia?” Keeping my fingertips off her, I gave her a soft shake. “Aleysia, can you hear me? I’m here.”
Smiling, I watched with guarded hope for any other small movement.
“C’mon. Say something,” I whispered. “I’m here. Please just open your eyes and look at me.” Seconds turned to minutes, and I began to question whether I’d actually heard her speak, or if it was merely the voice inside my head again.
More minutes slipped past, until I’d watched her a half-hour, staring at her face for so much as a twitch.
Had her lips actually moved, or was it an illusion?
The groaning of wood on the other side of the door cast a chill down my spine.
It’s just the wind, I reminded myself, as I’d heard it before, rustling the thick thatching.
Even so, I turned toward the bedroom door. “Zevander?” It must’ve been two hours since he’d left the hovel to chop more wood, given the waning brightness of the sky. I’d gotten so wrapped up in my thoughts, I hadn’t even paid attention to the time.
Palming the back of my neck, where an incessant tingling persisted, I crept toward the door. It croaked as I opened it and peered in on the stillness of the other side.
“Zevander!” I called out, and when he failed to answer, another chill slithered beneath my skin.
Relax, I chided myself.
I searched each of the small rooms with the prickling of my senses goading my every step.
Zevander’s cloak lay draped over a chair, and I swiped it up, startling at the light clang of something tumbling out of the pocket onto the floor. Frowning, I crept toward it and lifted a deformed object resembling the whistle I’d used to summon Raivox. Hardly the shape it’d once been, the metal looked as if it’d melted and cooled into an entirely new shape. It was only the intricate carvings on the surface of it that I managed to recognize.
How had Zevander come into possession of it?
Peeling out of those thoughts, I tucked it into the pocket of my trousers, and after wrapping a blanket around me and slipping on my boots, I headed out into the snow.
“Zevander!” I called out, rounding the dwelling. I kept on, toward the small clearing where he’d chopped wood a few days before. Split planks lay about, but neither he, nor his axe, were anywhere in sight.
“Zevander?” I scanned the edge of the forest, and on spotting what looked to be his discarded shirt at the archway of The Eating Woods, I hurried that way, over the hard snow that crunched beneath my boots. Lifting the tunic, I caught sight of boot prints on the other side of the archway and frowned. Going after him would be foolish, but I couldn’t just walk away, either. He could’ve been hurt.
The image of the spider atop him flashed through my head again, and determination urged me past the archway, trudging through the forest in search of him.
The deeper I pressed, what little light had beamed through the overcast sky was dimmed by the looming, gnarled skeletal branches that hung thick with frost. Only a small bit of snow breached the canopy overhead, making the search for footprints a bit more challenging in the rotting patchwork of decayed vegetation and mud.
Mist rose up from the ground, the scent of decomposition even stronger than the last time I’d ventured beyond that unsettling boundary. A buzzing sound reached my ear, and I looked up to see two wickens hovering before my face, their humanoid faces carved in malice.
Infernal creatures.
I held up my hand, my black-tipped fingers one swipe away from grabbing the little beast. “If you so much as attempt to bite me, I will turn your little stick bodies to ash.” The wickens tipped their heads and exchanged a glance between them. The moment I lurched forward, the two buzzed off, and with a relieved breath, I lowered my hand, watching them flit through the trees.
I pressed on, the crunch of frost and dead vegetation crackling under my boots. A dark object lying on the forest bed caught my eye, and as I passed, I paused to see the grotesque remains of a half-devoured raven. From its ribcage, emerged a strange black centipede, whose face reminded me of a skull with deep sunken eye sockets. Sharp teeth bit down into the macerated flesh clinging to the bird’s rib bone. The sucking sound that followed cast a shiver down my neck, and I hurried away from the bird, resuming the task of finding Zevander.
