Page 284 of Blade of the Nightking

Blue blood welled around the shaft, trickling down the bridge of her nose. She collapsed without a sound.

CHAPTER 60

Ispun so fast my boots slipped in the mud as I strained to see past the thick brush crowding the shoreline. I scarcely dared to breathe, could barely hear past the wild thumping in my chest.

Nothing moved.

Darkness lay so thick between the trunks that I couldn't see more than a few feet into the wilderness.

I could feel an awareness pressing against my skin.

We were being watched.

At my feet lay the Brinnekin's crumpled body, her enormous eyes still open and glazed in death. The gills at her neck no longer stirred.

"Fae or human?"

The call came so suddenly and from so close I nearly jumped out of my boots. Low and husky. Undeniably female.

I couldn't tell where the voice had come from.

The groan of wood bending carried through the trees.

A bow.

Every muscle in my body locked.

I glanced down at Rìan, waiting for him to tell me what to do, how to navigate this precarious situation. But to my astonishment, the corner of his mouth quirked.

Had he gone mad?

"I said..." the voice came again, sharper now, edged with open hostility. "Fae—or human?"

Rìan answered before I could.

"Neither." His voice was infuriatingly calm. "But surely you wouldn't shoot your lost Prince—Saskia?"

Silence settled, so complete I could almost feel the shock rippling through it.

Then came the snap of twigs and the crunch of leaves as figures emerged from the shadows, peeling away from the trees as though they’d been part of the forest all along.

Skeletons.

Dozens of them moved between the trunks, skull after skull materializing from the darkness, glittering eyes fixed on us as they approached.

They drew nearer and nearer, nimble as foxes through the underbrush—and that's when I realized.

Those weren't skeletons. There were people beneath those bones.

Ribcages had been lashed over torsos like grotesque cuirasses. Half-skulls crowned their heads as helmets. Splinters of polished bone pierced noses and lips, vertebrae were threaded into collars and wrist cuffs, and long bones had been strapped along forearms and shins, concealing much of the flesh beneath. Mud caked every inch of exposed skin, filthy tatters clinging to slight, lean frames. Bows were held at full draw, spears braced, knives bared. Every weapon was trained on us.

They advanced until they stood a stone's throw away, forming a silent half-circle.

Only then did I realize—they were all women.

One of them broke from the line.

She lifted the half-skull from her head, revealing dark blond hair dulled by dirt and grime. Her skin was bronzed by the sun, a scattering of freckles dusting the bridge of her nose, which was pierced clean through the septum with a polished bone spike. She wasn't beautiful by any means, yet there was something deeply arresting about her all the same, a wildness in her features that made her striking, terrifying, and impossible to look away from. Despite standing a full head shorter than me, she possessed a presence that made me feel suddenly, absurdly small.