Page 68 of On Burning Paths

“Terranis chose the Ashen Hounds as his team,” Thorian says, his voice level as he looks to the sky, as though it might give him some strength. “Now that we’re nearing the end of the competition, he’s going to start trying to take out the strongest competitors. The gods say they don’t interfere, but they have every time.”

“Perhaps we should take solace in the fact that Terranis considers us to be strong contenders,” Fenric mutters, though he doesn’t sound like he means it.

“Perhaps we should get moving,” Talon says, glancing at the sky. “Before he sends more trouble our way.”

“Has anyone ever told you you’re a massive baby?” Thorian asks, and despite how close we’ve been growing, I still glance at him in surprise when he jokes like that.

It’s so different from the Thorian I met back in the city, propositioning me in the bar to join his team, that it still catches me off guard.

“Definitely a baby. The earth opening up to swallow us is hardly a big deal,” Fenric mutters, which makes all of us laugh, the tension from finding Willem fully dissipating.

“Talon is right, though,” Thorian says, brushing away the rest of the debris and sighing, pointing into the woods and away from the hole in the ground. “We’ll need to circumnavigate this and continue moving ahead. Carefully.”

We start walking and Fenric snort laughs. We all glance at him.

He laughs again. “Did you see Thorian’s face when he started falling?”

Talon snickers. “It was like, ‘wha! What!’”

And then we’re all laughing. Except Thorian, who shakes his head, but there’s a smile on his face.

20

Fenric

“This must be the next trial,” I say, the pit in my stomach growing even though I try to laugh past the feeling.

“This is where the gods’ magic led us, so you’re guess is pretty accurate,” Thorian answers, not sounding happy.

Not that he sounds happy that often, but I've gotten good at telling which level of grumpy he's at, and this cave has him upset.

The four of us stare into the entrance to the cave, not speaking for a long minute. The darkness inside it is absolute. It’s not the kind that adjusts to, that softens as your eyes adapt. It’s the kind that simply swallows light whole, that seems to push back against the sunlight.

Thorian stands completely still beside me, like he’s calculating something. It's not fear exactly. With Thorian it's never quite fear. It's the controlled quiet of a man who is figuring out another way to avoid death.

Talon, for his part, is uncharacteristically silent. No quip, no raised eyebrow, nothing. He just stares into the dark with his jaw set.

And Nyx is so rigid beside me that I'm fairly certain her body has to be aching with the effort of it.

So far, all the trials have been out in the open, arguably too out in the open, like with the canyon, but none have been like this. In a cave. With no other hints as to what to expect.

“Well, what the hell do you think they’ve got waiting in there for us?” Talon asks.

“I don’t know,” I say, ribbing him with my elbow, “why don’t you turn into a bat and go find out for us?”

Thorian cuffs me upside the head, and I don’t have time to dodge.

“Hey!” I laugh, rubbing the back of my skull. “Since when are you on his side?”

“Come on, Fenny,” Talon says, turning to me with a smirk, clearly pleased that Thorian backed him up. So much for ganging up on the new guy. “We need to take this seriously.”

Thorian hits Talon, too, and the vampire turns, his laughing halting in its tracks as he mimics my pose, with one hand on the back of his head. “Wait—what did I do?”

“Too much sarcasm,” Thorian says, crossing his arms and staring into the cave, amusement buried deep in his tone, far underneath the steady determination. “Makes me think you’re not really trying to take this seriously at all.”

Talon rolls his eyes, “If taking things seriously was a requirement to be on the team, you should have told me before we consummated⁠—”

This time, it’s Nyx who hits him on the head, and he whirls around pretending to try and catch her arm. If Talon wanted to, he would have, but this is flirting, plain and simple. She steps back, her face a deep scarlet.