Tatters of the King (The Warren Brood Book 3)

by Bartholomew Lander

  From the gap her exit had left behind, Chelsea came running to her side. “Mandy, what the hell are you—”

  She tightened her grip on her grandfather’s cold, sickly skin, feeling the frail bones deep within bend and bow. “Shut up and get behind me.”

  Startled, Chelsea nodded and sidled around her without another word.

  With Chelsea behind her, Amanda crept step by step down the stairs leading to the first floor, eyes dancing across the faces of the Websworn in paranoid figure eights. The nearest cultists and thralls recoiled whenever her gaze fell upon them, as though she held the head of Medusa in her grip. Soon, she slid with her trembling hostage to where Kara and the woman now stood staring at her in bewilderment. Even the thing in the bloodstained yellow robe had ceased its combat with the Websworn and now merely watched her. Amanda tried to stop her hands from shaking. The pit of her stomach was crawling, her pulse hammering in her ears. She cleared her throat to cover a frightened warble. “Is everyone alright?”

  Kara gave her a confused, probing look. And then, she gasped in recognition. “Ohmygod. Amanda? Chelsea? You two are cultists?”

  “You know these two?” the woman asked.

  The spider-girl nodded with a smile. “Yeah, they’re Spins’s friends from school.” A pause. “But, why are you guys . . . ?”

  Amanda cleared her throat again, the trembling in her fingers making her blade dance against her grandfather’s neck. Eyes flickering to each face in the congregation, she was overcome by a rush of adrenaline. “Now, here’s what’s going to happen,” she said, projecting her voice to all in attendance. “Everyone’s going to stay right there. No moving. Not a muscle. Except for you fuckers on the bridge. You guys are going to get the hell out of our way and not follow. Got that? Anyone disobeys me, I’ll cut Zurt’s throat and let him bleed out right here and now. And I don’t think Urn-ma Nemo would be pleased if you let him die in his absence.”

  Her grandfather ventured a small cough before speaking with a dry and cracking whisper. “Release me at once, you impertinent child. Urn-ma Nemo will not abide this betrayal.”

  “Tell them all to stay here. And let us all go. Tell them!” She twisted his arm until something in his shoulder popped, and a choked shout splattered from his mouth.

  “L-listen to her,” he said, voice barely audible. “Do what she says.”

  She threw a threatening look behind her, past Kara and the woman. As soon as she met the gaze of the robed battalion leader on the bridge, he made a reluctant gesture with his fist that sent the phalanx of Websworn scattering like a swarm of roaches.

  The black-haired woman whistled at the display and lowered the hammer of her revolver with a soft click. “Whoever you are, you have damn good timing, that’s for sure.”

  Amanda was so distracted by the tangible rush of freedom that she didn’t at first notice the tug on her robe’s sleeve. “Hurry,” Chelsea said, “before they change their mind. Let’s go, let’s go.”

  “R-right.” She tightened her grip on the old man’s arm and let her knife drift far enough away that she could walk without slicing him open. Her feet slid over the floor at a crawl. Kara and the woman and the robed monster began to follow her lead, creeping back toward the door and casting bladed looks to and fro.

  They slipped out the door of the gathering hall. The Websworn did not move an inch from where they stood watching. When they passed the threshold and stepped into the cold breeze of the Ur’thenoth underscape, Amanda jerked her head toward where the great structure curved away toward the cavern walls. “This way.”

  She and Chelsea took the lead, and the five of them hurried along the wall of the gigantic tower. As the last of the Websworn vanished behind the bend, the woman in the blue blouse once more pulled her revolver and thumbed the hammer back. “Let me give you a hand, sweetie.” She pressed the barrel to Zurt’s forehead. “Relax your grip a bit. We have a long way out.”

  Amanda nodded and readjusted her hold, keeping the knife ready at a safer distance. With one arm relaxed, her footsteps grew faster on the march toward the upward-snaking passages.

  “So,” Kara said in an evasive tone, “are you two going to explain what the heck is going on?”

  “It’s a long story,” Amanda said. Then, an impossibly relieved sigh billowed from her lips of its own accord. She looked up at the woman whose revolver was planted against her grandfather’s skull. “I suppose some introductions are in order. I’m Amanda.”

  “Chelsea.” Her friend was staring at the spider-thing clicking happily at Kara’s ankles. Amanda herself had given it little thought; it was one of the least weird things they’d seen so far.

  “Nice to meet you. The name’s Annika Crane.” The name sat in Amanda’s ears like molasses; it was just as she’d suspected. She tried to stop herself from thinking of Kyle again as the woman continued speaking. “You apparently know Kara, already. And the thing hiding in the shadows right now is . . . Are you Dirge or Faul?”

  Amanda snapped her head over her shoulder, and was startled to find that the yellow robe had vanished.

  “Faul,” the darkness seemed to rumble.

  “Hm. Well, there you go. And if you’re wondering, Chelsea, that there is Cinnamon.”

  Chelsea’s face lost its pallor. “Cinnamon? What is it?”

  “Qul’therax-ma,” Zurt growled contemptuously. “The sacred quolls of Raxxinoth. The royal beasts of the Yellow King.”

  Kara spun about. “Wrong! She’s a Leng cat! Get it right!”

  The famed detective ignored the dispute. She leaned in closer to the hostage archon and readjusted her revolver, pressing the barrel tight against him. “Now, which is the fastest way to the exit?”

  Zurt said nothing. He just closed his eyes and remained quiet.

  Annika hummed a low note. “Are you prepared to die in silence, then?”

  He showed her a wall of uneven yellow teeth. “Kill me, and you will be beset upon by the entirety of the Dawn.”

  “Hmph.” She withdrew her revolver to a more relaxed distance. “I see this isn’t your first hostage situation.”

  “I remember the way out,” Amanda said. She nodded toward the wall of the cave ahead, which was still bathed in shadow. “There’s a narrow passage coming up that leads to the main chamber of the support caverns. From there we should just be able to head straight up.”

  “I will see to it that you do not escape alive,” Zurt said with a hiss.

  Annika cackled. “Oh, now that’d be interesting. How are you going to do that without your army of robes, huh? Speaking of which, you still here, Faul?”

  A grunt answered from the shadows.

  “How’d you like to make yourself useful? Stay around here a while and make sure nobody follows.”

  “I do not take orders from you, woman.”

  “If you want to protect the precious Princess Nexara, you should remember who the greatest threat to her is.”

  “Yeah!” Kara yelled, a hint of glee ringing in her voice. “Stand guard! That’s an order.”

  A groan answered. “Very well.”

  Annika giggled. “You’re a darling.”

  Half-confused about what had been agreed upon, Amanda just kept walking.

  The detective set her gaze back upon Amanda’s grandfather, an almost sadistic grin on her lips. “So, let’s gossip. You must be pretty damn important for the whole crusade to drop their pants the instant you’re in trouble. Tell me, you wouldn’t happen to be this famed Helixweaver everyone keeps talking about, would you?”

  A bolt of ice shot through Amanda’s nerves at the mention of the word Helixweaver. She shook her head. “No. Not him. But he’s second in command of the cult, the greatest of the archons. And he’s in command during the Helixweaver’s absence.” The darkness just ahead parted, and they were soon at the threshold of the dimly lit passage to the surface. Her lungs greedily devoured each breath. Her heart pounded between her ribs. They were going to make it. Against all o
dds, they were going to survive.

  The smoke-thing has appeared once more in physical manifestation. In the moment that it flowed there, on the edge of my awareness, it tore my hand from my wrist with a blackened spell. Though the chitin growths have stemmed the loss of blood, fear now grips my every waking moment. I now know the beast can physically harm me. No matter where I go, I am at its mercy, for it is always watching. I cannot imagine why it has continued to let me live; perhaps my attack has rendered it too weak to maintain corporeal form for long.

  I have already released the quolls of Raxxinoth to the wilds; they will be happier upon the plains, where they may hunt in peace. I no longer wish to harm anyone, and in time even those noble beasts will come to revile me. These hundreds of years alone have shown me how much misery I have caused. The Vant’therax, long extinct, were the greatest price my soul has paid.

  My time is limited. Soon, I shall be forgotten and dead, and nobody shall remember whence I came. And I now believe that is for the better.

  Chapter 42

  Into the Fire

  “Let me get this straight,” Annika said. “You two joined up with a fucking cult just to find your idiot best friend?”

  “That’s the gist of it,” Amanda replied, dragging her uncooperative grandfather along the way. Zurt had grown restless beyond the mouth of the passage leading to the support tunnels that led upward. He hissed and groaned with each motion, subtly resisting each movement she tried to lead him into. She wondered if her kidney shot hadn’t inflicted some permanent damage to his frail form.

  Annika chuckled. “Birds of a feather, right? Although I gotta give you girls credit; you have some real loyalty. That stupid bitch is lucky to have you in her cohort.”

  Amanda’s grandfather growled. “Release me at once. Do not reject the gift Urn-ma Nemo has granted you. Do not reject our gift.”

  “Shut up.” Amanda threw her shoulder into his back, and his whole body shook. After all the cult had done, it felt justified. It felt good. “You’re just lucky we need you.”

  He hissed a mournful sound before another gravelly refrain. “I welcomed you, Amanda. I even spared you the Nothem. And this is how you treat your own blood?”

  Annika went rigid ahead of them. “Own blood?”

  With a growing nausea, Amanda nodded. “Yeah. This man is my biological grandfather.”

  The detective cut in front of her, blocking her advance. Half stumbling over Zurt’s feet, Amanda looked up into the woman’s sharp eyes. She swallowed hard as she realized she was staring down the barrel of her revolver. A frigid horror blossomed in Amanda’s stomach. “W-what are you doing?”

  Annika slid a step back, not letting her aim falter. “I was willing to give you the benefit of the doubt, but not anymore. Would you really have me believe that you being besties with Spinzie and being granddaughter of the leader of the spider-worshipers that led to her birth are unrelated?”

  Chelsea raised her hands in a calming gesture. “H-hey now, w-wait a second, we’re . . . we’re not—”

  The woman narrowed her eyes. “I wasn’t asking you. I was asking Amanda.” She edged another step away and gestured Kara back with her free hand. “Well, sweetie? Is that just a coincidence, then?”

  Amanda’s mouth felt like it was suddenly full of sand. “It is. Call it a synchronicity if you like.”

  Annika nodded in a decidedly sarcastic manner. “Ahh. I see. And if this is a coincidence, then perhaps you’d like to take another shot at explaining how you ended up in this cult-infested shit hole. If not due to a sordid connection, how else would you have known this is where Spinzie would be throwing her life away? Either you and Spinzie have been in contact this whole time or you’re lying to me. Which is it?”

  Amanda’s lips shook. “Neither. I figured out the conspiracy on my own.”

  “Bullshit.”

  “It’s true,” Chelsea said, voice cracking. Everyone looked at her, and she seemed to shake, as though their eyes projected the essence of winter. “I was with her when she found the cult book at her grandfather’s house. We were there researching the Norwegian Killer and . . . She even had a stupid board of connections that linked the cult and the Norwegian Killer’s victims, and her grandfather was on the list, and then there was an email from someone in this town telling her about the cult, and yes, Mandy, I read your damn email and I’m sorry, okay?”

  “Deceiver!” Zurt spat, thrashing ineffectively against Amanda’s grip. “You think I will forgive this treachery?”

  Annika snarled, ignoring Zurt’s outburst. “Solved this on your own. Really expect me to believe that? You’re, what, seventeen? You don’t even have your damn taste buds yet. Your brain is a nest of sex hormones and little else.”

  “Annie, stop it!” Kara said. “Mandy and Chelsea would never hurt Spins. They’ve been friends since before I was born.”

  Annika shook her head, one eye fixed on Amanda. But Kara’s intervention seemed to drain some of her suspicion. “Is all this true, Mandy?”

  She nodded, shoulders shaking. “It is.”

  The woman’s gaze held hers. “If so,” she said, “then that’s damn impressive sleuthing. But I still don’t believe it.”

  “Believe whatever the hell you want,” Amanda snapped back. “In case you haven’t noticed, we’re in the middle of something right now. If you’re going to be suspicious, kindly do it when we’re not half a mile underground and surrounded by spider fetishists, alright?”

  The detective’s lips thinned. “Feisty. I think I like you, kid.” With a small sigh, Annika turned and nodded further down the hall. “Fair warning: I’m going to cavity search your alibi as soon as we’re through with this. And if I find your story half as holey as your granddad’s arms, you and I are gonna have trouble, sweetie. Now let’s go.”

  Relieved at the reprieve, Amanda sighed and nodded, though Annika had already turned away from her. “Thanks. And don’t worry. You won’t find anything—”

  Something smashed into the bridge of her nose, and a wet pain ripped through her. Her vision went white. Amanda staggered backward, hands drawn at once to her face.

  “Impertinent child!”

  The voice was distant, somehow unreal. She only realized what had happened when she felt the blade of a knife slice through the gap in her ribs.

  Annika realized she’d made a mistake as soon as her muscle memory moved her revolver toward the holster hanging on her hip. For a brief moment, she’d broken the first rule of hostage situations: never take your eyes off your damn hostage. She spun around just in time to see the back of Zurt’s skull slam right into Amanda’s face. Stunned, Amanda shuffled back a step. The old man slipped out of her grip and spun around, ripping the dagger out of her hand. “Impertinent child!”

  Annika raised her gun, a threat hanging on the tip of her tongue, but it was too late. The archon plunged the blade into Amanda’s side. A hideous shout exploded from her throat. Her eyes went wide in shock. Zurt withdrew and lunged forward, sinking the knife into her side a second time.

  Chelsea shrieked in horror. “Mandy! Ohmygod, ohmygod!”

  Annika’s mind went silent. Rage overtook her, and for a moment all the doubt she’d felt toward the girl evaporated. A clever girl looking for her lost friend, but in over her head. It struck far too close to home. Hostage or not—leverage or not—she was not going to suffer this injustice. Annika dropped the hammer and a bullet struck between the archon’s shoulders.

  The whole room spun from the percussive sound. Zurt’s back arched. He dropped to one knee, leaving the dagger buried to the hilt in Amanda’s side. Blood pouring from his bullet wound, the archon reached up for the blade, but Annika was upon him. She threw a hard kick into his side and sent him crashing to the ground in a wild roll. “You son of a bitch!” she shouted.

  Chelsea and Kara both rushed to Amanda, yelling her name and crying questions of concern. But Annika only cared about the moan coming from between the old man’s thin lips.
She kicked him again in the side, and a dry cracking greeted the toe of her boot. Zurt rolled until the stone wall stopped him, his chest toward the ceiling. She took aim at his prone form with her Ruger.

  Zurt glared up at her, pain etched into every line of his weathered face. “Kill me,” he wheezed, “and you will never leave here alive.”

  “I’ll play the odds.” Annika fired the remaining four bullets into the archon’s chest. Rigid convulsions rocked his body to and fro, his screams silenced by the deafening reports. When the man’s movements ceased, and the growing puddle beneath him grew near her boots, she turned her attention back to Amanda.

  One hand on the cavern wall, Amanda stood half-hunched and panting, eyes clenched shut. She didn’t seem to hear the questions Chelsea and Kara were leveling at her. She just stood there, head lolling from side to side, as her fingers feebly wrapped about the dagger’s hilt.

  “Don’t pull that out,” Annika yelled. She grabbed Amanda by her wrist and immediately noticed the warm wetness rapidly soaking her robe. “Oh, God.” She seized the girl’s shoulder and started easing her against the wall. “Chelsea, help me get her on the ground.”

  Chelsea trembled. “R-right.”

  The two gently moved her into a reclining position against the wall. Annika then pulled her own knife from her ankle-strap and sliced Amanda’s cult robe down the center, opening the site of attack. Staring out from the girl’s stained shirt was a deep wound gushing blood, and beside it was the weeping slit the dagger still stood in.

  Annika wiped her palms against her jeans and took a deep breath. She pulled one of the loose segments of cloth over the mouth of the wound and pressed down as hard as she could. Amanda yelped in pain. “Easy, girl. Chelsea, give me your robe.” Without a word, the girl did as instructed, peeling it back over her shoulders and passing it over. Annika accepted the garment with one hand. “Okay. Now, I need you to come over and apply pressure to the wound, just like I’m doing. Can you do that for me?”