The Paragon let out a chuckle, quickly silencing herself with a hand pressed against her rosebud lips. “Who are you, child? Are you one of the many that believe that Moira has contacted them?” she scoffed, turning to face the men at her back, “A goddess pleading for help…” she shook her head and switched to island speak. The two men laughed.
Across the room, Maka tensed.
She knows.
Ren seriously wished that Nakato wouldn’t.
“Listen to me,” Rens fists clenched. “Moira spoke to me. She told me that the island is dying and she needs her twelve—she needs us to help her find the Shapers, Godcallers, and—”
Warmth burned into Ren’s skin as a green light fluttered over her, a matrix of squares fading in over the bright light. It slid up and down, evaluating her, drinking her in.
“Identity verified.” It chimed, the disappearing light followed by a trembling that shook the entire room. “Access granted.”
The steel pit shook, the steel floor below separating into two as it shook and moaned, parting to reveal darkness edged with pulsing blue light. A stairway dropped down into the abyss below.
“Whoa,” Ren murmured, taking a step back.
All eyes fell on her, boring into her skin. Paragon Vanda’s translucent face went whiter still before her eyes darkened. The men to the right and left of her slowly freed swords from their backs, the telltale song of unsheathed steel making Ren’s heart race.
Nakato chuckled darkly in Ren’s mind, exhilaration flooding her with glee.
“Now.” Ren hissed.
12
It started in her toes, numbness creeping up her legs and abdomen until it flooded her entire body. An inching chill wedged her into a corner deep within her mind, the same one that Nakato now escaped from.
Ren’s arms splayed, her fingers contorting, as black tendrils slithered over her shoulders and down her back. Ren shivered, expecting to feel Nakato’s slimy magic but instead feeling absolutely nothing as she rode like a passenger in her own body.
To her right and left, the Paragon’s men advanced with broadswords drawn. A choked laugh burst from Ren’s throat, Nakato’s baritone voice wavering through. The sound chilling Ren inwardly as electric popped in her right ear. The guard behind her—Maka—freed one of those freaky sparky polearms from his back. Why hadn’t Ren noticed any of these damned weapons before? She was surrounded.
Nakato simply laughed, her grin twisting Ren’s face into a pale copy of Nakato’s wicked smile.
Ren regretted this. Immediately. Swimming around in her own head like some sort of useless synapse, she watched the show from two portholes she recognized were her eyes. Hanging in what felt like borrowed skin, she was useless. Completely and utterly powerless.
Nakato. Ren warned. Don’t kill anyone.
A howl of laughter burst from Ren’s throat, “You are useless to me now, little bug. Go be a nuisance to someone else.”
Paragon Vanda stepped forward, her arms flat against their sides as her fingers involuntarily twitched. Dark shadows rode along the sharp ridges of her high cheekbones as she glued her eyes to Ren’s and closed the distance between them. Her men advanced further, attempting to push the Paragon out of the way. Black tentacles dove from Ren’s body and speared through the air, their sharp points inches away from impaling the men at the Paragon’s shoulders.
“Stop.” She commanded, eyes melting into coursing white flame that rode up her hair, settling into her white tiara. A pillar of light exploded from the ground as her fingers danced, her arms raising slightly, following the path of the pillar as it engulfed her and lit up the room. Swords clanked to the floor. Gasps rode the sudden onslaught of wind gathering around the room.
Nakato let out a piercing screech before jumping back into Ren’s mind. Ren stumbled backward at the sudden switch, her skin going pale, her breath coming in quick bursts. She brought a fist to her chest, barely regaining her balance as the massive pillar melted away into nothing. Paragon Vanda wobbled on her feet, but stilled herself, arms crossed. Her smile no longer there. Replaced with a scathing line.
“Maybe you are,” she began, taking a step back toward the podium. “Blessed by Moira. Chosen by Moira—an Outsider.” She spat the last word, shaking her head. “An Outsider to the entire island, at that.” She seemed disappointed. “Several months ago, our paradise started changing. It may make no sense to you, Outsider, but my people were once immortal—until six months ago. Imagine the terror—the panic—people felt when their mothers simply crumbled to ash, or their children could no longer wake up. We feed off of Her, there is no reason to soften it. We are like parasites and the moment there is a problem, a containment in Her soil, water, air; we feel it immediately. This time, the consequence for overlooking Her pain was death.”
Ren was slack-jawed. They were immortal? “Were,” being the keyword here. “What?”
Paragon Vanda rolled her eyes, sneering. “Why would she choose you?” she closed her eyes and shook her head, “It doesn’t matter. When problems arise, we would open the Heart,” and she flicked an open palm at the hole in the floor, a staircase poking out, “and go to the Core. We would cleanse it and everything would be well again. But, this time, we could not open it.”
One of the men—the Paragon’s adviser, Ren assumed—cut across, his tone one of warning.
“I could not open it.” She corrected herself. “Yet, you could.” She huffed. “There may be something to you, Outsider.”
Vanda took a step toward her. “I have a proposition for you if you will hear it.”
“Does that,” Ren pointed at the staircase, “does that lead to the bottom of the Great River?”
Vanda’s eyes shifted, scanning between the staircase and Ren. She nodded, “Yes. Yes, it does. It also leads to the Core.”
Ren’s hands shook as she kept her finger pointed at the staircase. The repercussions of letting Nakato take control of her body hit her like a slap of ice-cold wind. Her mouth went dry, her tongue becoming cotton in her mouth. She fought against the need to let her knees buckle.
“Listen.” Vanda came closer. Planting her hands on Ren’s shoulders, she shook her gently. “Descend. Open the way to the Core and I will do the rest. You said that the Northern Shore is dying, correct? Well, finding the Core will save it. It will save the entire island, Outsider.”
It sounded like a plea. “But, Moira said…” find my twelve and descend into my Heart. Ren stood on the edge of Moira’s Heart—but was missing a huge part of the puzzle.
“Moira is down there,” Vanda strained, “and she needs your help.”
Right along with someone else. Someone way more important.
Ren nodded. If this staircase led to the bottom of the Great River, then she’d go down. She’d find Kato first—then the Core. She could do this. She could win this.
“I’ll do it.”
The Paragon danced back and clapped, her forced smile back on her face, shining like glass. “Wonderful! Maka,” she called the guardsman over and slid into island speak. She opened her hand toward the stairway and nodded once at him, all queen-like and graceful.
Maka pursed his lips.
Taking her first step along the staircase, Ren stared down into a murky sea of black. From time to time, blue lights pulsed. Electric blue veins running along the walls lighting up the passageway intermittently. Beating quickly like her racing heart.
A presence behind her told her that Maka was coming too, whether he liked it or not. Ren took a few gasping breaths and stepped further down, slow at first, her fingers grazing the smooth rock walls.
Darkness pervaded her vision as a wheezing buzz hissed above her. The light from above fizzed out as the steel doors above their heads clamped shut.
13
Ren slowed whenever the blue veins blinked out of existence. Maka kept going, threatening to shove her down the forever twirling staircase accidentally.
“Watch it.” Ren hissed as Maka grunted, palm
splaying against her upper back.
Maka clicked his tongue, growling. His sparking weapon lit up the planes of his face and her shoulder, casting his eyes in a shadowy blue-tinged hue. “I do not enjoy the darkness.”
“Join the club.” Ren rolled her eyes.
Skittering talons echoed in the stairway, clacking across a floor made completely of graphite. Dropping off of the final step on the staircase, Ren slapped her hands to her knees and bent over as the ground floor spread out before her.
Without the light from above—way above—this place was totally pitched black. They were in a cave, low ceiling, flat, shiny floors. Stalactites dripped from the spiky ceiling, hanging down to the ground like frantically sculpted pillars holding up an ever shrinking ceiling. The blue veins pulsed, lighting up the cavern in a dim blue light that caught a stocky black silhouette shifting behind tall stacks of stalactites. Beads clapped as the figure moved, shrinking away from the intermittently pulsing light until the cave went dark again.
Talons clacked against the ground.
O…kay.
“Where to?” Ren turned to Maka, straightening herself.
When the light pulsed, she watched his head shake from side to side. “This…place truly…”
Ren had no patience for this.
“Where to?” she demanded gruffly, turning to face him completely.
Dancing light sparked around the polearm attached to his back. “I do not know.”
Well. That admission felt like a knife to the gut. Ren let out a little gasp. “What do you mean you don’t know? Isn’t that why pillar-of-light lady sent you down with me?”
Yellow eyes rested on her face. Maka pursed his lips before gazing over her shoulder. He grumbled at her in island speak as he shoved past, stomping forward.
“Where are you going?”
“Straight.”
Awesome. Ren stood there for a minute, fists balled up at her sides. They had been traveling on the staircase for what felt like days, but Ren knew it was probably just hours. Wiping at the sweat gathering on her forehead, she listened to silence crawling around in her head. What? Had Nakato finally had enough of her? Figures. Fair weather “friends” always leave when shit gets real.
Kato could be down here somewhere, Ren’s spine straightened, I have to remember that.
Catching up to Maka, Ren’s fingertips grazed against the smooth stone of the tunnel. Blue light breathed in and out of existence, almost like she was in a car going through a tunnel. Total darkness faded into blue brightness before dipping again. Falling beneath blackened waves of nothingness.
The talons came again. A heavy wheeze wandered over her left shoulder. When the light blared, she twisted on her heel to catch a lanky silhouette, this one different from the one she saw before. Something gigantic and pointed followed the movement of its head as it tried to hide.
The light faded. Ren pressed her palms into Maka’s upper back to urge him forward faster. He huffed at the sudden contact, glancing over his shoulder with confusion knotting his eyebrows. Ren’s lips twitched as the scrapping of talons rushed across the tunnel floor.
Something is fucking following us.
What’s down here?
Ren flinched at the scrapping sound, shoving Maka as he began to jog. Her eyes snapped to the left and right as the blue light came again. Two figures stood on either side of her, their bodies pressed against the obsidian walls. Bleached skulls caught her eye, large and pearly with black eyes sunken into the base of the skull. Darkness descended and a whoosh of hot air blanketed her shoulder, followed by the tips of taloned fingers.
“Move,” Ren said, shoving Maka with more force. “Move, move, move!”
Wilds Spirits. What in the fuck were they doing down here? If Ren remembered anything, it was that Wilds Spirits did harm before they did any good. But the question still remained—why were spirits of the Nyx Wilds down here?
Maka froze mid-stride and stopped. Ren slammed into his back, cheek first, gaze firmly planted over her shoulder.
The light came again.
A Wilds Spirit with a massive bull skull weighing down its head blocked Maka’s path. It reached for him, talons contorted into a small circle, and Ren yanked Maka back by the shoulder.
“Don’t let it touch you.” She told him, twisting around. As if things couldn’t get any fucking worse. Two stood at her end, barriers to their escape. A bird skull weighed down the head of a female Wilds Spirit, while the colossal skull of a great cat swallowed the head of another.
Why are they down here? Ren was in no shape to fight. Her Scion crystal was empty. Nakato zapped what energy Ren had left with her little tentacle show. When Ren could have used her, of course, she was nowhere to be found. Ren racked her brain for what she could do. If she pulled power from the life sources around her, she had a one in three chance of killing Maka. She wasn’t sure if she could live with those odds, knowing her luck.
She faced off with the two. “Are you fuckers following me?” she said, her voice shrill as her fingers trembled. “Why are you down here?” she demanded, backing up as the two Wilds Spirits took lurching steps forward. “What in the hell do you want?”
Bird Skull cocked her head. She chirped like a crow, the sound grating Ren’s ears. “Reset her. She told us.”
“Reset her.” Cat Skull murmured, bringing both arms to her chest.
“The Core wakes.”
“She does.”
Maka rumbled a growl, slowly sliding his sparking polearm from his back. “I don’t understand.”
“You’re not meant to.” Ren clenched her jaw. Wilds Spirits always spoke nonsense. Core though. They spoke about the Core. If Ren were in a questioning mood, she would have tried speaking to them. Asking questions. But surviving was pretty important right now. Wild Spirits weren’t known for their peaceful natures, she could vouch for that.
Bird Skull reached for her, the spirit’s fingers contorting into a semi-circle of black claws. Bird Skull reached for Ren’s chest, searching for her heart in the pulse pounding darkness. When blue light lit up the tunnel, Maka swung the butt of his polearm into the creature’s forearm.
A sickening crack thrummed through the tunnel. The Wilds Spirit didn’t even scream, just stared at them with those sunken black eyes and cocked its head further. Bird Skull looked like it might break its own neck.
Ren followed Maka’s attack with a savage knee to the spirit’s gut. Bones grazed against her knee cap, rubbing skin. The spirit fell backward, arms lazing at its sides, as its talons splayed in a spiral of black. Blue flooded the tunnel, Maka lunged forward with his polearm, jabbing Bull Skull in the eye.
The weapon glanced off. Darkness came again. Two pairs of hands slapped to Ren’s shoulders and held her steady.
Blue light. Black eyes.
Darkness. Fetid breath.
Blue light. Contorted claws.
Darkness. Claws piercing her flesh.
Ren screamed. Shrieked as a barrage of bird caws sanctioned the air around her. A murder of crows bled through the blue light in a horizontal line of black feathers and sharp wings. They whizzed through bone and broke Bird Skull’s grip on Ren’s shoulders. Pounding the spirit over and over on its bleached skull, Bird Skull flew backward. Ran. Cat Skull held its ground and fought off the crows, while Maka slapped himself against the rock wall and Ren did the same, panic drilling down into her bones.
Talons skittered across the graphite in the darkness. Blue light blinked back and the spirits were gone. The crows too. In Bull Skull’s place stood a woman half Ren’s size, her left arm outstretched and covered in dripping black sludge.
“I don’t care who you are,” the young woman barked, throwing her outstretched hand down, “But someone important knew you were coming.”
Someone important? “Who?—”
“Nope.” The girl turned on her heel. “Don’t care. If you know what’s good for you, you’ll follow me.” She was barefoot, her feet slapping against the
ground as she walked away.
Ren and Maka exchanged glances.
14
“Are you from the Heart?” Maka asked for the third time, his face twisting up as he searched for the correct words to say.
The girl didn’t bother. Ren and Maka still followed her anyway, not knowing where they’d end up if they didn’t.
You could be following this child off a cliff and you wouldn’t bother looking at the edge until you fell off.
Ren’s eyebrows shot up. “Nakato!” her shoulders tensed when Maka’s confused gaze fell on her. The exclamation gradually became a whisper, “Nakato…”
She was happy. Happy to hear the dead woman’s voice in her head again.
Why?
Do you know where you’re going? Blue light pulsed across Ren’s face as the tunnel opened up into a yawning cavern. What am I saying? Of course, you do not.
Ren’s excitement over Nakato returning wained. “Did Vanda’s light scare you?” Nakato had pretty much told Ren to get out of her own body—you’re useless to me now.
What had she meant by that? Ren stuck out her lower lip. There was no use in pretending she didn’t know.
“Are you trying to get rid of me?”
Stop speaking out loud. I can hear your thoughts, stupid girl.
But how would Ren distinguish her thoughts from Nakato’s? She didn’t give a flying fuck if these people thought she was iffy.
Are you trying to get rid of me? Ren tried again as they entered the cavern. Natural light swam in from her right. Sunlight.
A purring laugh rolled through Ren’s skull. I curse the gods every day for planting me in here.
Ren snorted, that made two of them. Why are you in my head?
Nakato’s answer was muffled by the low sound of buzzing conversations. People going about their daily lives. Following the young woman’s lead, Ren stalled as a long pair of steps came into view. White marble led the way up into a bustling city constructed from blackened wood and bright marble pieces. Looking up, towering statues glared down at her, both affixed in the kneeling position. They stood to either side of the massive staircase, gazing at every person that entered the little city. A humid breath wafted over Ren’s should from her left and she followed the breeze. It ambled over a lake running out into the bright noontime light outside. If she listened closely, she could hear the roar of the Great River.
Wild Hunt (The Island Book 2) Page 5