by Cayla Keenan
“Next time”—she advised, grabbing his head and slamming it into her knee—“just run like the rest of them.” The boy didn’t stir. Jayin bolted, winding her way through the emptying streets. She flicked her wrists and grabbed the knives strapped to her forearms, holding them in her hands as she ran. Jayin wasn’t going to be taken unawares again.
She was around the corner, just a few blocks from freedom, when a voice sounded from behind her.
“Jayin Ijaad. How nice to see you again.”
“Maerta,” Jayin said evenly, making sure her face didn’t betray her emotions before she turned around.
The witch smiled. “Hello, sweetling. Somehow I knew I’d find you with blood on your face.”
“It’s how I keep my skin so fresh and youthful,” Jayin said, resisting the urge to wipe the back of her glove against her cheek. She inhaled, shaking off the shock of seeing a Palace sahir in the middle of the Gull. “You look rougher than I remember. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you were a local.”
It was a lie, but it had the desired effect. Maerta’s eyes glittered, and the tiniest hint of a frown pulled her mouth down at the corners. She was the Kingswitch’s second, his right hand, born and raised in the Palace. If all the inhabitants of the Gull pooled their money for a month, they still wouldn’t be able to afford the tonic she used to keep her mane of chestnut curls in place. Her red satin dress was worth more than all of Jayin’s profits since she set up shop.
“Charming as ever,” Maerta said, her voice measured. “I’m glad your time away hasn’t dulled your wit.”
“It hasn’t dulled my knives either,” Jayin replied, spinning her ring daggers around her thumbs. “Now if you’ll excuse me, as much as I would love to catch up, I don’t like you.”
“Ah yes, your penchant for dayri weapons. How quaint. Going back to your apothecary?” Maerta called once Jayin was a few steps away. Jayin froze. “I have to say, I was surprised when you settled in the Gullet. Anyone with your skills could have easily left the city.”
“I’m just full of surprises, aren’t I?” Jayin said, straining to keep her voice even as her thoughts spun.
She had been so careful; she’d taken every precaution to cover her tracks. But how could she have ever thought she’d be able to evade the Palace? And if they’d known where she was, why hadn’t they come for her until now? Jayin thought the Kingswitch would want her back in the fold as soon as possible. Allowing her this little field trip didn’t make any sense.
“It’s good that you stayed,” Maerta said, flicking an invisible speck of dust off of her sleeve. “As it turns out, the King requires the services of the infamous Gulwitch.”
Jayin clenched her jaw, her teeth coming together with an audible snap. She should have left the city. She should’ve left the whole blasted kingdom.
“We want you to find Maddix Kell.”
Chapter Three:
Maddix
Maddix was almost to freedom, but he couldn’t stop to enjoy it. Not just yet. Not when he was the most hunted man in the kingdom right now.
Information was hard to come by in the Pit, but even from his cell, Maddix knew that the tale of his killing spree had reached every corner of the kingdom. And now, two years after he’d been caught, every lawman in Aestos would be scrambling to collect the bounty on his head. I’m not going back, he promised himself. Death first.
Death first. Death first. Death first. The words echoed in his mind, beating in time with his heart, and the water dripping off of the damp tunnel ceiling. Maddix let the mantra spur his every step, setting a punishing pace. With every toll of the temple bells, his chance of escaping the city slimmed. He had a three-hour advantage, but even that might not be enough.
Maddix knew every protocol for locking down the city; securing every way in and out of the Pavaal took hours. During his training, he’d participated in countless drills for this very scenario. He remembered scoffing at the idea that the Pit could be breached. It was meant to be impossible. The darkness and isolation drove prisoners mad, and even if they managed to keep their wits, they were still buried underground. There was no way a prisoner could fight their way up dozens of floors to the surface. So Maddix didn’t.
He went even deeper. And he hadn’t done it alone.
“Home again, home again, what a homecoming Mole shall have,” his companion muttered. His voice shivered in the air, echoing against the stone.
For two years, Maddix had only known Mole by the sound of his voice, but in the half-light of the tunnels, he looked like something out of a nightmare. Sallow, off-white skin hung off of his bones, giving the appearance that he was melting. His eyes were black and darting, like a rat’s, and the only thing more cracked and yellow than his teeth were his overlong fingernails. The whole effect was made worse by the dim glow of the luminescent crystals that studded the walls, lighting their way. Maddix made an effort not to look at him, afraid that disgust would be written all too clearly on his face.
Despite the man’s appearance, Maddix needed him. Mole—Maddix never got his real name—was part of a colony that lived underground, inhabiting the tunnels under the city. His people had been down there for so long that Pavaal had forgotten that they existed. There was freedom in being forgotten, and that freedom had allowed Mole’s people to expand within the catacombs as they pleased. The main tunnels were maintained by the city, used for sewage and other waste removal, but hundreds escaped notice, including several that led outside the city walls.
Mole knew which were which. It had taken nearly a year of persuading, but Maddix had finally been able to pry the information out of him. On one condition, of course: Mole wanted his freedom. Maddix’s skin crawled to think of what the unnerving little man had done to be thrown into the Pit, and he tried to put it out of his mind. They were bound together, and there was no going back.
Unfortunately, now that they’d reached the safety of the tunnels, Mole would not shut up.
Maddix blocked out his jabbering as best he could, trying to focus on the task at hand. One wrong turn and they would never see the light of day. The Undercity was a maze of dead ends and switchbacks. If they lost their way they would wander in the dark until they starved.
Maddix had thought of nothing but escape for two years, but now that he’d done it, fear burrowed under his skin and poisoned his blood. The longer he was free, the more fervently he would be pursued.
Death first.
If he did survive, Maddix knew where he was going. He had been wrong that night two years ago. It hadn’t been a demon that’d taken his body from him and forced him to kill those people. Demons weren’t real, they were just stories told by people who fell for street magicians’ tricks. No Dark being had plucked him out of his own body and turned him into a puppet—it was a witch. The truth was obvious once he stopped and thought about it, and in the Pit, there was nothing to do but think.
At first, the nightmares had damn near driven him insane. Every time Maddix so much as closed his eyes, he saw the swirling Dark of the witch’s robes, felt the fiery magic crowd him into the recesses of his own mind. As one year passed into the next, Maddix forced himself to recall that night even in his waking hours. He polished the memories until they shone, and he was certain they were no longer clouded by fear.
Eventually, Maddix recognized the scar on the witch’s lip and realized it was the same man who had posed as a Guard. The one who told Maddix he would make rank. It had been a game to him; the bastard sahir had mocked Maddix’s dream, the dream of a foolish little boy, before he’d ripped Maddix out of his body and singlehandedly destroyed his life.
“You’re quiet, boy. Quiet boy, quiet boy,” Mole muttered in his slimy voice. Idly, Maddix wondered if all of the tunnel-dwellers spoke in such clipped, unnerving sentences, or if that was particular to Mole. The short man trailed long, crooked fingers over the sickly pale skin on his head. If he’d ever had any hair, it was long gone now, leaving only white fuzz in its place
“Forgive me if I’m not feeling chatty in the middle of an escape,” Maddix replied, his hand going to his throat. The Guard had taken the amulet away when they arrested him, and not a day went by that he didn’t mourn its loss.
“So untrusting, so tense. Not in the Pit anymore, no? No. Mole will not lead you astray. Trust Mole, yes.”
Trust Mole? Maddix barely trusted himself anymore. Two years of being trapped in the dark made sanity hard to come by and faith even harder. Mole didn’t seem to take the silence personally and chattered away. Maddix ignored him. He had more important things to think about than the mutterings of a sunlight-deprived madman.
A sunlight-deprived madman who soon began to sing, scraping his nails along the tunnel walls. Maddix wanted to snap at him, but at least Mole wasn’t trying to talk to him anymore. Let the weird little man sing; Maddix’s thoughts had already left the tunnels behind.
His ambitions stretched beyond Pavaal’s borders, all the way to the coast. Maddix had never cared for rumors and stories when he was in the Guard, but in the Pit, they were currency. The only currency. Maddix had paid dearly for a single story, one that woke something within him, something that felt like hope. He’d given everything—not that he had very much when they were all just voices and groping fingers in the dark—for the story of the witchhunters.
They were supposed to have a camp somewhere on the eastern shore, where the ocean faced the witches’ homeland. From what Maddix had learned, they were a small, secret division of people that had taken up against the witch infestation that had plagued the kingdom for so long. Though they were few in number, it was said that they had destroyed dozens of covens throughout Aestos. They had something that took the witches’ magic away, some kind of anti-magic weapon. Once stripped of their magic, witches didn’t stand a chance.
All Maddix had to do was find them. Which was easier said than done for a fugitive with no way to get to the coast.
He shook his head, pushing his lank hair out of his eyes. It was strange, having to sweep it away in order to see. In the Pit, Maddix had allowed his hair to grow long in order to hide his face from sight. It was a silly, ridiculous thing, but the shred of anonymity helped somehow. And after two years of squinting in the darkness, using his eyes at all was strange. The prisoners who had been there the longest said that they had adjusted to the dark, but Maddix chalked it up to meaningless babble. He hadn’t seen the sun in two years and probably wouldn’t for a few more days, but even the dim light in the tunnels gave him headaches. Maybe he’d just travel by night and avoid daylight altogether.
So wrapped up with thoughts of finding the witchhunters, it took Maddix several long minutes to realize that they weren’t following the path Mole had laid out for them. At first, the slimy little man tried to keep the plans to himself, but Maddix insisted he share the directions, so they could both find their way. Maddix didn’t bother hiding his distrust then, and it surged anew as they passed through yet another tunnel he didn’t recognize.
As a Guard, Maddix had memorized every street and alley in the city, and during his time in the Pit, he began to do the same with the Undercity. It had taken almost a year, but his map of the catacombs was nearly complete, with a single path leading from the Pit to freedom. Mole was taking them somewhere else, down a path Maddix didn’t recognize.
“We’re going the wrong way,” Maddix said, his voice shockingly loud as it bounced off the stone walls. He winced. Nothing in the Pit was ever louder than a whisper.
“Not wrong way, no, not wrong,” Mole said quickly, running his tongue over cracked teeth. “Different, just different. Many cave-ins, tunnels filled with water. Mole has been gone for a long time. We must take a different route.”
Suspicion welled in Maddix’s chest, but he stayed silent, making sure to keep behind Mole as they walked. He didn’t trust the small man, but he didn’t have much of a choice if he wanted to get out the tunnels without getting lost or starving to death. He wished he’d been paying more attention to where they were going instead of losing himself in his thoughts. Sometimes it felt like he was just as naïve and idiotic as he had been two years ago.
Maddix kept his eyes trained on Mole as they picked their way over fallen rocks and debris that had been shaken loose from the walls and ceiling.
Perhaps Mole had told the truth about cave-ins.
The thought had barely formed in his head when a shuddering groan split the air. Maddix leaped out of the way, barely avoiding being crushed by a falling slab of stone. He pulled his head close to his chest, barely breathing until the tunnels stilled again.
“Bleeding stars,” he swore, coughing and spluttering. Wiping dust out of his mouth, Maddix stood and pulled at the stones that had stacked up, trying to find a way through. “Skies.”
Wet blood marked the rocks as Maddix pounded his fists against them. He tried to force the stones away but they wouldn’t budge. There was no way back now.
A small, wheezing chuckle rattled out from behind him, and Maddix turned to see Mole smiling. His face looked as if it was splitting in two, revealing dirty, yellowed teeth. They looked sharp enough to tear flesh. Suddenly, the timing of the rockslide didn’t seem so incidental.
“What the hell is this?” Maddix demanded, fighting to keep his voice even. He was very aware he’d just been sealed in with a madman without anything he could use to defend himself.
“Stupid boy,” Mole said, still smiling that splitting smile. There was a glassy quality to his eyes. “Stupid boy, stupid boy. Freedom for Mole – “
“Freedom I gave you,” Maddix said, interrupting. It was the wrong thing to do. Mole’s eyes slid back into focus, looking Maddix up and down.
“And Mole is very grateful. Boy should be grateful too, grateful, grateful…” His words petered off, and Maddix saw that he’d pulled a long, serrated knife out of his filthy prison uniform. How Mole had managed to hide it was a mystery, and again Maddix cursed himself for being so distracted.
His heart pounded so loud he was sure the tunnel-dweller could hear it, and Maddix tensed, every instinct screaming at him to run. Mole advanced slowly, muttering something about sacrifices and offerings, the knife hanging loosely in his hand. Maddix backed away from him until he felt the press of jagged rock against his spine.
“Grateful,” Mole said again and lunged at him with the knife. The world slowed, and Maddix could feel fear thrilling through him like poison, his eyes tracking the knife’s movement towards his chest. Ducking to avoid the blade, Maddix dropped his head and slammed his shoulder into Mole’s midsection. The little man staggered backward, but he recovered just as quickly, stabbing at him again.
Maddix twisted away, casting around desperately for something to use to defend himself. There wasn’t much room in the sealed-off tunnel, and he had barely enough time to breathe before Mole was on him again. The tang of copper and iron mingled with the dust in the air, and Maddix cried out as the knife bit into his skin.
“Falling, bloody stars,” Maddix swore, gritting his teeth and pressing his palm against the wound. His fingers came away bloody and he rushed Mole again, forgoing defense altogether. “Let go, you crazy bastard!” Maddix shouted, managing to shove Mole against the wall.
“Can’t go back,” Mole screeched, raking his broken nails against Maddix’s face. Blood poured into his right eye, and all the wind was knocked out of his lungs as Mole tackled him, knocking them both to the ground. One of Maddix’s arms was pinned under him, immobilized under their combined weight. “Can’t go back without an offering, can’t go back!”
Maddix swore, cursing every star in the sky. His blood-slicked hand caught the knife just inches before it plunged into his chest. Mole’s mad eyes were just above him, his rancid breath hitting Maddix square in the face. Somehow Maddix managed to keep the knife away from him long enough to free his arm, and he reached blindly for something—anything—he could use to fight back.
His fingers brushed against something roug
h near the wall, and Maddix yanked it free with all his strength. Blood pounding in his ears, Maddix brought the rock down on Mole’s head just as the knife struck true, stabbing clean through his shoulder.
Maddix screamed, and the pain made his vision go dark. He smashed the rock into Mole’s skull again and again until long after the little man had stopped moving.
“Stars,” Maddix breathed, shoving Mole’s body away from him. He scrambled as far away from the body as he could until his back hit the uneven stone of the tunnel wall. His breath came in short, ragged gasps as he took in the ruined mess of a man that had been alive just a moment ago. Mole’s head was crushed in, and Maddix could see something grayish oozing out of the crater he’d made with the rock. “Stars,” he swore again, sliding to the ground and pulling his knees against his chest.
Mole was dead. He was dead, and his blood—his brains—were all over Maddix’s hands.
Maddix didn’t know how long he sat there, rocking himself against the tunnel wall, clutching at his throat as if the pendant was still there. As if his star still gave a damn about him.
When the shock finally wore off, all of Maddix’s injuries made themselves known at once. His side screamed, and blood wept from half a dozen shallow cuts on his back and arms. Most pressingly, Mole’s knife was still in his shoulder, the hilt sticking out sideways like a vestigial limb. It had to come out.
One, Maddix thought. He exhaled, gripping the handle. Pain scraped up and down his spine. Two. Three. Sucking in a deep breath, Maddix pulled. The world tilted as the knife dislodged from his shoulder, spilling more blood onto his ragged clothing. He pressed his good hand against the wound, but it wasn’t enough to staunch the bleeding.
Cringing, Maddix tore strips from Mole’s prison shirt and used them to bandage the wounds. It seemed impossible to think about forging ahead, but he couldn’t stay here. He had to keep moving, especially now that there was a body in his wake.