Right.
I take a cloth and skein. “Cold sponge bath it is.”
Noeve pulls out the half-spent smoke stick she must’ve tucked behind her ear at some stage, pinches it between her lips, then blazes the end. “And you’re both buying me new cushions!” she belts out with a puff of smoke.
The Ditch is desolate. An empty stage Clode whips through and flicks about, tossing up yellowed posters peeled off the walls. Her shrieks and howls are the only sound other than our footsteps crunching through the crusted snow—so thick I doubt it’s been cleared since news of the impending moonfall hit, with only the odd set of prints dimpling it.
“At least Clode’s enjoying herself,” I mutter as a lone parchment lark flutters past my head toward a veil of mist that smudges the usually clear view between both sides of the wall, making the place feel eerie. Haunted.
A corpse that’s been picked clean.
“Guess the panic set in,” Kaan murmurs, watching the lark disappear into the churning mist—Ahvi on his back, swathed in his filthy white robe that blends with the atmosphere.
The mists part, revealing a hint of the Moltenmaw moon perched in the most opportune spot to crush Gore into the ground, then smush together again, swallowing the view.
“Ahvi, is your shield still up?”
Kaan arches a brow, passing me a warm gaze I’m not sure what to make of. So I ignore it.
Ahvi nods.
Looking in the hollow of his hood, I meet his eyes glinting like silver moons. “Don’t forget to tell me if you catch a hint of anyone’s presence.”
His gaze lifts. “Just fae, or …”
I follow his line of sight, hand on the hilt of my blade when I notice a pair of large yellow eyes peering down at us from one of the skybridges ahead, the rest of the large, fluffy white creature mostly blending with the mist.
It blinks. Scurries away with a swish of its long tail.
“Anything that’s thinking of hurting us.”
Ahvi nods again.
“Thought I heard one of the soldiers say the city is at capacity,” Pyrok mumbles, peering past the crooked door half hanging off the hinges of a looted bottle shop—his hood pushed forward. Gruffin’s bandaged to his chest like a growth, and though Pyrok grumbled to begin with, he hasn’ttaken his hand off the small hatchling. He drops a knee, grabbing something from the rubble that looks suspiciouslyflask-shaped. “Guess he meant the Undercity.”
Another playful swish of air dances past us, and I pluck a piece of yellowed parchment from the wind, scanning the muddy message:
“You’re right,” I say. “They’re all beneath.”
Makes sense. The Undercity is more vast than the city itself. It couldgobble up Gore’s entire population with a single sip and still have an empty belly. But only a small section is actively mined, the rest derelict, belonging to predators who skulk in from the south and those brutal or broken enough to sketch out a living alongside them.
“It’ll be carnage down there.” I release the note back to Clode, who immediately starts batting it around again. “Many won’t crawl free when this is over. Those who do will never be the same.”
My words seem to echo between the walls like a haunt.
“He’s harmless,” Ahvi whispers, and I spin to look at him. Then follow his gaze back over his shoulder to a busted-in shop, its window shattered, yellow glass spat across the snow like shards of gold.
Despite Ahvi’s words, I shift, positioning ahead of Kaan as a wide-eyed, pale-faced null scampers out through the window’s jagged hole, his red garb torn and filthy, orange hair matted.
He stumbles to a halt atop the shattered glass, heaving breath as he looks at us through eyes set too deep in his skeletal face. A single beat where he seems to reconsider his options before tightening thin arms around the jars of preserves bundled against his chest.
He runs into the pale murk, leaving a trail of bloody footprints in the snow.
The mist opens like a pale curtain being pulled wide. My gaze is drawn to the shadows dangling from the lowest skybridge like washing left to dry. “Creators,” Kaan grinds out as I reach behind him, pulling Ahvi’s hood farther down. Buffering his view of the bodies strung up by their necks, most getting picked apart by fat black rodents who’ve managed to descend the ropes.
I take them in, one by one. Heart pounding like a war drum.
Though some are too far gone to tell, those who still have ears boast the same nick in the shell as I do—not an elemental bead in sight. In fact, most wear the torn and filthy clothing I’ve come to attribute to the folk I used to offer bloodstone to.
