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Lokene and Bion burst into laughter, earning them a quelling look from… everyone.
“Where do I find the Ancients who are tainted by the Lure?” I got straight to the point. We’d wasted enough precious time. Once I was near enough, the call would guide me to my prey, but I needed to be closer.
Anthony looked uncomfortable. “We have heard reports they are in the Caves of Zavionia. I would start looking there.”
I would have preferred more specifics, but this would not be the first time I headed to war with little more than a vague idea of where the enemy lay. This was just another day in the building.
The office,Lokene corrected in my mind.It is just another day in the office.
I fail to see the difference. An office is a building, is it not?I narrowed my eyes at him.
Well, yes. But…Lokene trailed off when he realized I was correct.
You aren’t correct.Lokene’s words in my mind were little more than a mumble.
“You will leave my mates alone, yes? All of them?” I addressed the Ancients but focused my attention on Jacque.
“Yes, you have our word that we will not use your mates to get your attention,” Anthony spoke, and each Ancient around the room nodded their head in agreement. Several looked livid about it, but they gave a jerky nod of agreement anyway.
Satisfied, I turned on my heel and strode toward the door. “Good. Then I will take my leave. I have work to do.”
I heard the rumblings of the Ancients behind me, but I ignored them. Excitement pumped through my veins.
It was time for war.
It turns out the Caves of Zavionia made up an area of Iolatara the size of a large city. It had taken all day to make it to the mountain range that marked the beginning of the caves. We stood on top of a mountain precipice, looking out over slate-covered mountains as far as the eye could see.
“Can you sense other Ancients in the area?” I asked, carefully surveying the rocky valley below for any signs of life.
“I should be able to, but they’ve done something to confuse things. It is almost as though we’re in a house of mirrors. I can feel the presence of Ancients nearby, but I can’t pinpoint which direction.” Lokene rubbed at his temples as though staving off a headache.
“How about you? Can you sense the Lure yet, doll?” Bion asked, standing behind me, close enough that the soft blue fabric of his shirt brushed my bare arm.
I’d been surprised Bion hadn’t disappeared the moment we’d left the meeting with the Ancients. He’d delivered me to the Ancients, so his assignment from the Ancients was finished. When I’d asked where he was off to, Bion had made a joke about tagging along for a bit because he had nothing better to do. He’d not been able to meet my eye when he said it, and I wondered again what he was hiding. Pain? Loneliness? Maybe I’d find out on this journey. Secretly, I was glad I didn’t have to say goodbye to Bion yet.
Belatedly remembering I hadn’t answered his question, I sighed. “No, we aren’t close enough yet.”
“This would be easier if we could just pop from mountaintop to mountaintop like we could do if we were on Earth,” Bion grumbled.
“No. I prefer doing this the old-fashioned way. I want to head into the valley and look for signs of life having been here. If we can find some well-traveled roads or paths, I will be able to track them. Lokene says they are near, but if they are confusing their location on purpose, this is our best chance.” My bloodlust was eager to begin the hunt.
We spent the next several hours searching the valley for signs that the Ancients had been there recently. Toward the evening, when the light from the twin suns began to fade and their moon cast an odd purple light on the landscape, we decided to stop and make camp for the night.
Ignoring Lokene and Bion’s complaints, I found an abandoned cave with enough room for a small fire. Lokene growled in frustration.
“I wish we could teleport back to the human world tonight, but the nearest travel stone to the caves is almost a half-day walk away. If we blink to Earth tonight, we’d be forced to spend hours hiking back to this same spot tomorrow. The caves seem to cause interference for those wanting to blink deeper into the cave systems. We’ve never found a place in this valley where it was safe to place a travel stone.” Lokene looked around the dim cave and shivered. “There might be spiders in here.”
“There are spiders on this world?” I asked, intrigued.
“Yes, butt-ugly spiders as big as the dogs in your world.” Bion fake gagged.
“But you are the Ancients? Why can’t you just make spiders cease to exist?” The more I learned of the Ancients, the less sense they made.
“We tried that, but it didn’t work. So then we tried burning everything to the ground, but that didn’t work either. All that did was force us to create a new planet to live on, and somehow, the spiders still found a way onto this planet, too.” Lokene sat gingerly on a stone near the cave’s entrance, not willing to rest his back on the cave walls.
I couldn’t help my snicker. The big scary Ancients were scared of spiders?
“You won’t be laughing when you see the size of these things!” Bion warned. “And they infest like the roaches of your world.”
