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Jack persisted, as if to convince himself, “They don’t usually kill people like him.”
When Roman finally answered them, his voice was flat. Hopeless. Just like his eyes, his expression. “Do you know what that is? That’s the fucking Basilisk.” He stared at the mass of scales continuously shifting over the door, faintly glowing with black light.
The Basilisk was a serpent king with a lethal gaze—one that could turn any living thing into stone, an ability it hardly needed when it had a body that could crush a ship, a mouth that could swallow monsters twice its size. Many legends had been written about this demon, and while legends could be muddied by the passing of time, there was one that had held on throughout the years, as true today as it had been when it was first uttered hundreds of years ago.
Roman spoke the truth aloud now in a brittle whisper. “No one has ever survived it.”
108
The Elevator
YVESWICH, STATE OF KER
Max had never been fond of elevators. In fact, he hated them. Once, when he was a kid, he’d got stuck in one with Maya. Only five minutes had passed before the hotel staff had got the doors open, but those five minutes had felt like a lifetime to two young kids.
And Max and Dallas were already going on ten.
Dallas jammed her finger into the button again, to no avail. She swore and spun around to face Max. “Anything?”
Max put his phone away. “Nothing.” He couldn’t get a bar down here, and when he tried his watch, all he got was static.
With panting breaths, Dallas scanned the ceiling—the emergency escape hatch in the top. “What about climbing out?”
“That’ll take forever.” They were way too far below the earth to even attempt that, and regardless, there was nothing to grab onto, the shaft sheer and smooth.
Dallas’s wings twitched. “We could fly.”
“You could fly,” Max corrected. “You can’t carry me.” He was too heavy.
She cursed again. “I’m not leaving you.” She chewed her lip. “What about your magic? Can you push us—”
The elevator shuddered.
Sank a couple inches.
Max held his breath. He grabbed onto Dallas with one hand, pulling her close, the other grasping the handrail that was so cold, it felt like an icicle, even through the glove of his bodysuit.
The lights began to flicker.
“Max?” Dallas’s question, strained with fear, was barely a whisper. “Max, what’s happening—”
Max’s stomach hollowed out, and Dallas screamed at the top of her lungs as the elevator dropped at light-speed.
109
The Tar Pits
YVESWICH, STATE OF KER
Shay followed the others out to the tar pits. Riding in the back of Darien’s truck was not her preferred method of travel, especially not when Travis drove it as if he’d stolen it, every speed bump and corner jarring her bones, but circumstances called for this.
The others had no doubt believed she’d left the moment Roman had told her to, but the bodysuits they all wore, Roman included, had only piqued her curiosity—and her concern.
Something was happening. And whether Roman wanted her help or not, it didn’t matter. She wasn’t leaving. Not until she at least found out what was going on. Where they were going, why they were dressed in those magically-enhanced bodysuits—the suits designed specifically for use in the most dire of emergencies.
Travis parked Darien’s truck at the tar pits. He and the others got out and began walking across the dark grounds.
Shay held her breath and listened carefully, sensing that not everyone in the group was gone.
