Page 24 of Wrath of the Fae

‘No fucking idea. No guards. No servants. It looks abandoned.’

We carry on down the stairs, taking two at a time, before landing on the lobby floor. A massive entranceway with yet more destruction and discarded bottles of wine. I see Lucca taking in heavy breaths as he watches me expectantly.

‘Down,’ I tell him again.

‘We’re on the ground floor, Pup.’

‘Down!’ I snap. ‘It’s deeper.’

‘I don’t know if there is any more fucking down!’ he bites back. ‘You’re going to have to sense it.’ He takes my hand and starts waving it about. ‘Anything?’

I snatch my hand back with a tut and reach out my palm.

‘I can’t feel anything.’ I swear with a hiss and spin, hoping to see something that might lead us in the right direction. There are six passageways off the lobby. And I bet each leads to more.

‘What did you see?’ Lucca asks with a poor attempt at sounding calm. Especially as the whole house shakes as something explodes in the distance. The chandelier above us clinks as it sways, and he steps back, taking me with him, his eyes on the potential death trap above. ‘In your dream. What did you see?’

‘Erm…’ I take a deep breath and close my eyes. What I saw wasn’t a mere dream. It was a memory. An ancient memory from the ancient magic these wings have seen before me. A ghostly shadow of a life lived thousands of years ago when these wings were first written about as a legend of war and peace. Death and survival. Monsters and gods.

The dreams started as soon as I returned. Ancient monsters that hunted the Fae.

But I was the monster.

Then the dreams started to show me things.

They began speaking to me.

A low, deep, growling voice has haunted me for days, telling me to come here. Showing me what I need to find.

Lucca was sceptical as it was a monster talking to me as I slept. But I felt its truth that this was the right thing to do.

That coming here and finding what he was showing me was my fate. My destiny.

And it’s not like we had any other plans, so here we are.

‘Patterns in the floor.’ I dig deeper into the memory of my dreams. ‘Engravings. A circle of them in a tall room with no windows. Deep underground, beneath the manor in the Thirteenth Kingdom.’ I cringe as I dig in deeper, pulling at the memory like a recently healed wound. ‘West. It’s in the west corner. Through the servant’s quarters.’

He grabs my wrist and starts running. ‘West it is.’

Through darkened halls and long corridors, we run. Above, we hear feet land with a thud and the wood covering the broken windows shatter from deeper in the manor.

They’re in the house with us. We hear a hideous snarling. Turning, we see red eyes appear at the end of the hall.

‘Ghoul hound!’ Lucca yells, gripping me harder and picking up speed.

‘What the fuck is a Ghoul Hound?’

‘Thatis a fucking ghoul hound! A giant hound with no fur or skin. With acid for spit and rage like a shaken hornet’s nest. First Kingdom uses them to track and rip us apart.’

I look back. It has a spiked collar around its neck. But the spikes rest inwards, digging into the creature.

It gains on us, jaws snapping and claws digging into the floor.

Ahead, we hear a series of heavy thuds.

Wolf bellows, appearing from a passageway to the left with his hammer held high. We run past him, leaving him to bring it down on the creature at our heels. But more are in pursuit. He steps between us, his blood-soaked weapon ready and his enormous frame filling half the hallway.

‘Get her where she needs to go, Lucca,’ he calls after us. ‘I’ll hold off the monsters.’

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