Page 4 of The Last Wish of Bristol Keats
Kasta had read Tyghan’s mind, but still, he hesitated.
“We’ll have you surrounded. Nothing will get past us,” Kasta added.
“Let’s do this,” Bristol said, and Tyghan released the veil hiding them.
Bristol immediately flinched.
“What is it?” he asked.
She pressed her hand to her breastbone. “My chest is so tight.”
“Should we leave?”
She shook her head. “It’s here. Somewhere close.” She peered south. “That way.”
Tyghan looked in the direction she pointed, confused. That wasn’t what the scouts had indicated. “Are you sure—”Of course, he thought. South. Just over the mountains. It was the closest straight shot from Fomoria to the Stone of Destiny. Only a short ride away if Kormick encountered resistance and Maire had to summon more demons to the ceremony at the last minute.
They headed for the ridge. As they neared, Bristol lifted her palm, as if reaching for something. She nudged August slightly west. They had only gone a dozen yards when she tensed back against Tyghan.
“Hold,” he ordered, and midair, August hovered, his legs still pumping.
Bristol stared at the base of a cliff, tilting her head to the side, listening for something. Tyghan didn’t move or speak, afraid he might break the magic in her.
She reached out, trying to connect with whatever it was. And then she froze. “There. At the foot of that cliff. That wall of rock. I sense . . .” She jerked her hand to her stomach, clutching it like she’d been stung. “That’s it,” she said. “It doesn’t feel like the others. It’s different.”
Only seconds later, a writhing demon emerged from the solid rock, only to be yanked back by a tentacle curling around its throat. The demon squealed and clawed against its captor until it disappeared into the solid rock once more.
Bristol shivered, still holding her fisted hand to her stomach.
“Let me see,” Tyghan said. When she opened her palm, it oozed with bloody blisters.
Tyghan cursed. Some wicked part of that portal had reached out and burned her. He whispered words of general healing, and for good measure, other spells to counteract poisons, as he cupped her palm between both of his. “Miche obray,” he said, sealing the magic. “Doman fi.” He felt the fiery sting of her skin against his, a thousand razor-sharp cuts, and then a gradual cooling. When he pulled his hand away, the blisters were gone.
He glanced back at the portal. Even from a distance, its malevolence was caustic. It wouldn’t be gone soon enough. If only his archers had their sights on Maire, he could let Bristol try to close it immediately. If only Maire was already dead so she couldn’t open it again. But he had promised Bristol he would call off the kill. Now he questioned if that had been the right decision.
At least they had finally found the Abyss portal, and that was victory enough for today.
“Let’s get out of here,” he said, and nudged August back in the direction of Queen’s Cliff. “It’s time to get Cael.”
CHAPTER 4
Queen’s Cliff belonged to no one. It never had. Not even to a queen. Mostly because no one wanted it. An old haegtesse, who wished to be left alone, claimed it for a time and chiseled out a fortress at its pinnacle. Its name came from the queens and kings who paid her handsome amounts of gold to watch and report threats from the northern seas, back in a time when giant dragons—and the more cunning smaller varieties—were a danger.Easiest money I ever made. Royals are fools, the hag was reported to say after she collected her debts. But for centuries now, the dragons mostly stayed in their northern isles, tucked in the icy caves, preferring their own company to fae, and once the hag’s value disappeared, so did she. Some said she was eaten by the beasts she had spied on, but others said she only moved on with the great chest of gold she had accumulated to find more gold elsewhere.
Being adjacent to Queen’s Cliff, the Fomorians mostly claimed it now, but no one cared. It wasn’t a destination spot on anyone’s list, as Sashka proclaimed, until Kasta hushed her.
The squad hovered offshore, waiting for Dalagorn to determine the exact landing spot, based on their old maps. They gazed at the towering rock rising up in the middle of the Mirthless Sea like a hungry siren. A headdress of ghostly clouds floated above her, and a bloom of forest skirted her middle.
Rose’s upper lip lifted in disdain. “Hard to believe anyone could live on that dreadful thing.”
“Which makes it the perfect place to hide someone,” Julia replied.
Avery pulled in a deep breath, like she was preparing to dive into something that was way over her head. Maybe it was.
Bristol’s heart skipped.We trained for this, she thought. She tried to remember that they were all here because they wanted to be, but guilt still nagged at her that Rose had almost died at the hands of the demon her mother had summoned. That her whole squad might—
“This way,” Dalagorn said softly, cutting off her thoughts, and he signaled for them to follow. They landed on a flat, rocky ledge just below the tree line. The northern winds whined through the forest above them, and Bristol’s hair whipped across her face, the icy air biting her cheeks.
She looked north, far across the sea, and made out the distant islands of Tattersky—realm of the dragons. Ribbons of purple clouds drifted over the islands. They appeared peaceful, and yet only giant dragons and the banished avydra lived there—power-hungry shape-shifters like Pengary, who burned and ate a queen and her children. Still, for a brief moment, Bristol wished she were there instead of on this rocky mountain that seemed void of any life at all.
