Page 114 of Crown of the Dunes

Erix had only seemed to withdraw more since our anza nectar-fueled tryst. I pulled my mind away from the way he had pinned me down and spread me open—making me feel alive and untamed, free of all the restraints of expectation and desired just as I was. It would all be meaningless anyway if we died here in the dark, leaving our bones to join the macabre piles.

“We may still be able to find them,” I encouraged.

As if summoned by my words, a rumbling and shaking started in the distance. Erix’s eyes widened as we listened.

“More accurately, they might be able to find us,” he said. “We haven’t exactly been quiet.”

“So much for sneaking up on them,” I grimaced, thinking of the piercing scream I had let out as I fell, and the way the vibrations of the tunnel collapsing must have echoed through the interconnected web.

Both of us scrabbled to our feet, reaching for our weapons. Thankfully, Erix’s saber remained strapped to his back, and I had not impaled myself on the sword on my hip as I fell. Now we both drew them, finding ourselves back-to-back as we both cast around, searching for the direction of the noise.

The rumbling grew into clacking and skittering as it grew close enough to make out the horrible clicking of pincers and exoskeletons. Still, it seemed like it came from every direction, echoing and refracting through the tight space.

“We might have drawn the attention of more than one tricrith,” Erix said, holding the bone torch over his head to try and illuminate as much of our surroundings as possible. I grimaced, realizing he was right.

“You told me once you wouldn’t want the desert to make herself easier,” I shot over my shoulder.

“I may be rethinking that sentiment,” he admitted.

It was all he had time to say before a glossy black pincer emerged out of one of the branching tunnels. I had barely a second to react before it reached for me. Raising my saber, I deflected the blow with an echoing clang.

A roar behind me and a satisfying crunch marked that Erix had his own opponent. I couldn’t spare him more than a thought for luck as the tricrith skittered fully out of the side passage and fixed me with its beady eyes. Its three tails curled forward menacingly as it advanced on me, and my eyes darted between them, trying to predict which would strike first.

Suddenly, a shadow fell over the tricrith as Erix moved behind me, the light of his torch disappearing as he swung it. In the sudden blackness, the only warning I had was an interruption in the flow of magic around me. I ducked to the side, the wind of the tricrith’s attack brushing my face, missing by mere inches.

“Erix!” I shouted, hoping for him to raise the torch again so I could see my opponent. The light flared again, reflecting iridescently off the glossy black coating. Already, a pincer shot out. I swerved, but I wasn’t quite quick enough.

The pincer snapped on thin air, but the blow glanced off me, knocking me to the ground. Dirt filled my mouth as I slammed into the ground. Pain shot up through my elbows and knees. I didn’t have time to register as eight armored legs pounded the ground around me, trying to pin me down.

I started crawling, weaving this way and that to avoid the tricrith’s legs as I moved under it where it could not see me. A rattling hiss of anger filled the body above me, loud enough to rattle my teeth. Distracted by the blood-chilling sound, I didn’t see one of the thrashing limbs until it was nearly upon me. I threw myself aside, crashing down onto my stomach, but the hooked tip slashed my arm.

I shouted in pain and the hissing grew louder, as if the tricrith was pleased. Still, I gritted my teeth and advanced, pulling myself forward on my elbows. The sleeve of my tunic ripped free, and I made it to the back of the tricrith, looking up to see its tails waving above my head, silhouetted by the flickering light of the torch Erix still wielded. Pulling my legs under me, I crouched behind the monster, spinning around.

The tricrith skittered, its claws and legs gouging into the side of the tunnel as it tried to turn and face me, but the passage was too narrow.

“Erix!” I yelled. “Get behind them!”

On the far side of the tricrith I had engaged, he fought another, dodging flailing claws and striking tails. A pincer shot out to grab him, and he blocked with his saber. The claw closed around the blade, yanking Erix forward as he tried to wrest back his weapon.

A metallic snapping sound echoed through the tunnel. My mouth fell open in horror as the tricrith closed its claw, splitting Erix’s saber in two—Kelvar’s saber. The top half of the blade fell to the ground, embedding itself into the ground tip first, leaving Erix holding a broken hilt with half a jagged blade.

He stood frozen, as if his mind had snapped along with the tempered steel. Turmoil poured down the tether in my gut, maddeningly loud. I shouted a wordless warning to Erix as the tricrith I had been fighting skittered toward him, the beasts advancing on both sides.

He spun, but with a broken sword, he wouldn’t have the reach to wound them.

I threw my hands up, pointing my own sword to the ceiling of the tunnel. All the power flowing from Erix I let pour into my own well of magic. It spilled over, spreading out through every inch of my body—burning through me in a wave of fire.

“Run!” I screamed as power pulsed out of me—both mine and Erix’s, one and the same. A giant fissure formed in the ceiling, spreading out in dozens of fractures from where I stood. Erix’s eyes widened and I met his panicked gaze for a split second just before the tunnel caved in.

A screeching hiss was cut off by a sudden crunch as the tricrith between us was crushed in a pile of rubble. The bolt of satisfaction that ran through me lasted only a second before something hard hit me on the head, and the world went dark.

I couldn’t move. Consciousness seeped back into my mind, thick and slow like honey, and I latched onto that horrifying truth. I tried to flex my muscles, but my limbs were pressed down by an inexorable weight.

In fact, I could barely breathe, my chest brushing the sides of the tiny space I lay in as it expanded. Panic rose up to choke me, escaping in a tiny whimper. I had always thought I would at least die out under the open sky with the company of the desert to comfort me.

Tears began to gather in the corners of my eyes, and I trembled. A sob wracked my chest, the sound swallowed by the rock and earth pressing in on me from all sides.

Keera. The name seemed spoken directly into my soul, almost imagined but clearly in Erix’s panicked voice. I reached for the tether at the base of my spine and grabbed on to it. I would not be completely alone.