Tears slipped between the cracks in my lids as I continued to squeeze them shut. I dared another step, and blazing white pain ripped through my head. The edges of consciousness blurred in my mind.
My hand gripped Astraeus’s wrist as I backed up a step, and the pounding eased to a light tap.
Down. It was forcing me down.
Another step, and that consistent tapping lightened.
We followed the damp, stone staircase down until we came to a dark hall, the last set of cells in the dungeon below Mount Telum. Astraeus lit a torch, and we wandered through the hall, checking cells that hadn’t been used for what looked to be hundreds of years. I ran my fingers over the bars. Old cobwebs and dust coated every inch of the place.
“Here,” Astraeus murmured. “This is the only place that’s been disturbed recently.” He motioned to a barely visible square on the wall of the far end of the hall.
The dust had been smudged there, and as I stepped forward, the tapping turned persistent.
“How do we get through?” I asked.
“Are you sure you want to?” Astraeus replied, his dark eyes wary as he frowned at various symbols along the floor.
The answer was no, but I kept that to myself as I ran my fingers over the ribbed edging on the wall. My powers bucked in response.
“It’s definitely here,” I murmured, running my fingers over the words carved into the wall.
“The weapon rests above the cage, dormant until the return of the Hidden Hero’s enemy,” I recited, brows pinching at the riddle. I’d barely finished when Astraeus’s arm wrapped aroundmy waist and ripped me back as rows of thick, long spikes shoved through the surface. My voice caught in my throat as I narrowly avoided being impaled.
I shoved at the pirate’s arm, still locked around my waist, as if he were just as shocked. He released me, and we cautiously approached. As we did so, the iron spikes sucked back into the wall.
“Fuck,” I breathed, my heart stammering. My mind reached into the chasm of power where the golden light and shadows slumbered, but they were tired. Whatever power Astraeus had used to refuel me left me uneasy with the pirate lord. It was intimate, somehow, as if he’d gifted a piece of himself to me. My reluctant gratitude edged against my constant irritation with him.
That persistent tapping returned, and I gritted my teeth. Okay, so we were doing this. Whateverthiswas.
I stepped back, and it turned dizzying. Left, the same. But if I stepped to the right, the tapping softened. My hand reached for the edge of the hidden door, and the tapping blazed behind my eyes. I snatched my hand back, instead trying for the wall, where it softened. I continued this game of hot and cold for several minutes until my fingers at last landed on a spoked wheel, so shallowly carved into the wall it was near invisible.
My fingers traced the edge, finding letters of the common tongue alphabet topping each spoke.
“Who is the Hidden Hero’s enemy?” I whispered into the darkness. The tapping intensified, as if it could hear me.
I replayed the words of King Saros, moments before his death.They are coming…
Xenelpha had called them theehp'uch, Rhashtai for…
My fingers found the six different letters that spelled out a word I’d heard only once. With two hands, I rotated the wheel until each letter matched up with the small divot at the top,spinning it until the combination was complete, and the wheel sank with a groan into the stone.
Embodied.
The hidden door hissed as it clicked. The thick stone inched forward at an angle, allowing the soft red glow of the hidden chamber to creep into the hall. A dome of iron rods, bent and curved in an elaborate cage, surrounded the Stone Witch.
