The Bone Maker

by Sarah Beth Durst

  “Given the patrols, I can see why you’d believe he’s here,” Stran began. “But there’s no structure other than the tower, and as you can tell from the ruins, no one—”

  Kreya cut him off. “He’s beneath it.”

  Jentt nodded. “You can dig yourself quite a large basement in twenty-five years.”

  “It would explain how he’s kept himself and his soldiers out of sight,” Kreya said. She deliberately did not look at Marso. It wasn’t his fault she’d brought him here before he was ready. But they couldn’t have waited, not if the worst was true. “Here’s what I’m thinking: stealth and speed to enter the tower. Stran, you hide Marso inside the tower and keep watch—”

  Marso’s eyes widened. “I can’t go in there. I’d scream for certain. Give you away.”

  She considered that for a moment. They couldn’t leave him unguarded on the plain, but they also needed Stran to be lookout—it would be all too easy for the patrols to block their escape route without Stran to keep the way clear. “If you can’t handle it . . .”

  Zera rolled her eyes. “Obviously he can’t handle it. I still say gagging him is the right move. Can’t scream in mortal terror if there’s a thing shoved in your mouth.”

  “That’s inhumane,” Stran said. “We don’t gag friends.”

  Kreya weighed the options. She too didn’t like the idea of gagging a teammate any more than Stran did. But Zera was in the right here, and she knew that. No matter how much like their old selves they’d all felt in the valley, she had to acknowledge that time had passed and they had all changed, most obviously Marso. Opening her coat, she extracted one of the rag dolls. “Marso, if you can’t control yourself, my friend here can silence you. Would that be acceptable?” To the construct she said, “If he begins to scream, can you stuff yourself in his mouth without hurting him? Make sure he can still breathe.”

  Marso reached out a shaky finger and touched the cheek of the doll. He then nodded, and Kreya placed the construct on his shoulder. It wrapped its arm around the back of his neck to hold on.

  “All right then,” Kreya said. “Stran, you’re on guard with Marso. Keep yourselves hidden. Any patrol comes, eliminate them.”

  “What about the archer?” Jentt asked. “It could sound an alarm and draw more patrols to the tower than Stran could handle at once.”

  “Take the archer out now,” Zera suggested.

  Kreya shook her head. “A patrol could notice its absence.” She drew the other two rag dolls out of her coat. Addressing them, she said, “Once we’re inside, sneak to the top of the tower. If the archer grows suspicious and tries to sound an alarm, bind his wrists so he cannot use his bow and fill his mouth so he cannot cry out. Do you understand? If there’s danger, silence and still him.”

  Both constructs nodded eagerly.

  “Jentt, Zera, and I will descend—”

  “I do not like that idea,” Zera objected.

  Truthfully, she didn’t like it either. The team functioned best with Zera supporting the fighters. Putting Zera on the front line risked the effectiveness of the whole team. But there weren’t too many options, given the situation and all the unknowns. “We don’t know what we’ll face down there,” Kreya said. “You’re the only one who knows exactly what firepower we have and how to use it. We need you.”

  Zera glared at her but nodded.

  To Stran, Kreya said, “If we come out and say ‘bury it’ . . . be ready to pull down the tower. Destroy it down to the stones.”

  “But that’s not Plan A,” Jentt clarified. His eyes were fixed on Kreya’s, as if trying to read her intent. “Plan A is still reconnaissance, then regroup and determine how to safely proceed.”

  She knew what he was asking: was she planning to risk herself? All of this is a risk, she thought. “If there’s an opportunity, we take it. But we take no unnecessary chances.”

  “Agreed,” Jentt said.

  The others agreed as well, even the rag dolls.

  Kreya darted across the bare, open land between the tall grasses and the tower. She knew that with Zera’s combined speed and stealth talismans, she was barely a streak to the human eye. A whiff of cloud that could be confused for the haze of heat.

  They slipped through the broken door into the shadowed interior. Last time she had been here with Zera, they’d run too quickly to explore. Now, as the two rag dolls scurried up the stairs to monitor the archer, Kreya examined the atrium.

  This was the room where Eklor had issued his orders to his troops, where he’d planned his attacks. The walls had been covered in maps. There had been only one chair, a thronelike wooden seat. She crossed to where she remembered its being. Only a pile of charred sticks remained.

  “See,” Stran said in a whisper. “There’s nothing here.”

  “Except memories,” Kreya said.

  “And this trapdoor into—and this is just a guess, but I’m going to assume it’s accurate—a pit of horrors.” Zera waved lazily at a strip of burlap that lay across the floor.

  Stran scowled. “What door—”

  She kicked the burlap aside, revealing a stone that lacked any of the burn marks that streaked the rest of the tower. “Shall we?”

  Kreya grinned at her, though it was a tight grin. A small part of her had hoped she’d been wrong about an underground room, about Eklor, about everything.

  “Any more specific plans than ‘go in, see what’s there’?” Jentt asked.

  “Did you bring any cat-eye talismans?” Kreya asked Zera.

  “Owl this time,” Zera said. “They won’t work in total darkness, but if we stick close to whatever light filters through the opening . . . Activation word is nesca.” She handed one to Kreya and one to Jentt.

  Kreya looked at each of them, her old friends whom she’d led back here, and gave them one last order: “Don’t die.”

  Stran yanked up the stone.

  All of them froze as the stone scraped against the nearest stone. He laid the cover as softly as possible next to the hole. No one moved. No one breathed. They waited, listening. But no alarm sounded, and nothing came out of the hole.

  Silently, Kreya signaled: Jentt first, then Zera, then herself.

  Jentt first, because he could flee fastest. Zera next, in case he needed a talisman they didn’t anticipate. Her last, to relay any warning that they’d been discovered.

  She hated sending Jentt first. Hated watching him lower his body, his newly alive body, into the darkness. He flashed her a smile that was meant to reassure her, but it was nearly enough to make her call him back and say this wasn’t worth it, that they could still flee and pretend they’d never discovered what they’d discovered, that it wasn’t their problem anymore, that they’d given enough . . .

  She heard the soft thump of his feet hitting the floor.

  They waited. No screams. No cries. Just one soft coo like a pigeon—Jentt’s “all clear” call. Kreya nodded to Zera.

  Zera glared at her once more, making it clear how unhappy she was about this plan, but then she lowered herself into the hole after Jentt. A second soft coo.

  Climbing into the hole, Kreya dropped down and landed in a crouch in the darkness. She brought the owl talisman to her lips and whispered, “Nesca.”

  The shadows sharpened. She saw Jentt and Zera beside her, crisp shapes of gray. Each movement was vivid as they examined where they were: a chamber that branched into five paths. She felt her stomach tighten—she’d expected to find a basement, not a network of tunnels.

  Zera held two fingers together and then apart. Split up? she was asking.

  Kreya shook her head. No.

  You don’t split up. Not when you don’t know what you’re up against. And sometimes not even when you do, Kreya thought. After Jentt died—

  She cut off that train of thought. She wasn’t going to think about that time. She had to stay rooted in the present, deal with whatever threat lurked in the darkness here.

  The tunnels stank like rotten eggs, machine
oil, and a long-dead rat carcass—all of which was worrying. What if all the soldiers weren’t up on the plains? “Going to the dead,” Zera whisper-sang, mimicking Marso. Kreya shot her a look, but Zera pretended she couldn’t see it.

  Wordlessly, they chose the tunnel with the strongest stench and crept along it. The stealth talisman masked their footsteps. Kreya kept reaching out to touch Jentt and Zera, as her brain shrieked that she’d lost them or was going to lose them. Soon, they did lose the light from the opening, and the darkness swamped them.

  Another turn, and a sickly green light illuminated the tunnel. Creeping forward, they found the source: bioluminescent moss wrapped around a carved bone. “Clever,” Zera murmured.

  Indeed, Kreya thought. She’d never heard of such a thing.

  Her heart thudded hard in her rib cage. She was torn between being grateful for the dim light and being afraid of what it meant. They crept slower, even more cautiously, alert for guards and traps. Her eyes swept the shadows in front of them, and her fingers trailed along the wall, feeling the chipped stone—these were man-made, not construct-made, tunnels. There shouldn’t have been so much underground area to explore, and yet there was. She wondered how far they went, and what they’d find at the end.

  And then she didn’t have to wonder anymore, as the tunnel widened into a vast cavern. It glowed with the eerie greenish light, which bathed everything in an even glow that came from every direction, washing out but not erasing shadows. Filling the cavern were horrors.

  Skeletal soldiers lined the walls, their skulls drooped on their necks as if they slept. Constructs cobbled from the bones of mountain lions, stone fish, river lizards, and bears dominated the center of the room. And then there were the machines. Killing machines, with knives for hands, metal jaws with tearing teeth, and saws locked into their torsos.

  She’d expected a few. She’d never expected this.

  “Shit,” Jentt whispered.

  She felt as if her blood had frozen in her veins. As commander, she always tried to think of every possible outcome, to believe in her team while still considering every worst-case scenario. But in all her imagining and all her planning, she’d never imagined anything of this scope. She wanted to run out of the tunnel screaming. Flee and never look back. But she didn’t. They had a job to do.

  “Count them,” Kreya whispered back.

  As Jentt counted and Zera invented new curse words, Kreya committed to memory the weaponry of Eklor’s new army. If they had to muster a force against this, she wanted exact information on what they’d face.

  In the Bone War, so many had died when confronted with an army like this . . . And that time, they’d been ready for it. They’d come with the finest soldiers that Vos could muster. Focus on the task at hand, she ordered herself. Assess the threat, and get out.

  As soon as she felt they’d seen enough, she signaled for them to retreat. Creeping back through the tunnel, she signaled again for them to investigate a second tunnel. Ahead of her, Zera had halfway climbed back up the hole, using handholds carved into the rock. With a barely audible sigh, she descended again.

  Kreya waited for her to rejoin them, and they crept along the second tunnel. It too opened onto a cavern filled with inert soldiers and machines. The third tunnel was the same.

  He had created an army that would have overwhelmed his original force.

  The horror of it made her feel as if her heart had stopped. Her blood felt sluggish with ice in her veins. This was beyond any nightmare she could have ever had. He’d made himself stronger than he’d ever been.

  She shoved every bit of fear into a tiny knot that she stored at the base of her stomach. This was not the place for fear. It was the place for caution. Learn as much as they could. Retreat. And regroup. She could not allow herself to think about the scale of the horror that lurked underground.

  He must have been assembling this since his defeat, she thought.

  So many years, and he’d been using them all to rebuild.

  She abandoned any thought of confronting Eklor now. They didn’t have the firepower to face such a foe. No one did. The guild must be warned, she thought. The cities would need to prepare.

  If they could.

  If it wasn’t already too late.

  All five tunnels were stocked with a battalion each. Every soldier and machine was inactive, but Kreya had zero doubt that they were fueled by powered bones. She wished there were a simple way to take one as proof, but touching one could activate all. It was too great a risk, even if she set aside the problem of safely transporting such a construct. She was acutely aware of how tremendously outnumbered they were. At peak strength, they never could have fought so many.

  Better to leave them here and formulate a plan from a reasonable distance. With time, with space, maybe she could see a way forward. Besides, there was one question they hadn’t answered yet: Where is Eklor?

  Only when they’d searched all the tunnels did they return to climb back up into the tower. Kreya went first, not because it was sensible but because she had the sudden fear that she’d made a grave mistake and that both Stran and Marso were in danger and that none of them should have come here.

  She felt a hand grab her arm. Only old training kept her from screaming. Stran helped her climb out. She turned to help Zera and then Jentt.

  “What did you find?” Stran whispered.

  Marso moaned softly. “Death.”

  The rag doll construct caressed his cheek.

  Jentt pushed himself out of the hole—

  And they heard a whirring noise, followed by clicking—the familiar sound of machines starting up. Screaming began from far belowground, high pitched, from throats that didn’t exist and shouldn’t have been able to cry.

  “Oh, shit,” Jentt said.

  “Close it,” Kreya ordered, unnecessarily—Stran was already throwing the stone over the hole. It wouldn’t be enough. She thought: Nothing we can do will be enough. You could drop a mountain on an army this size, and it wouldn’t stop them. “Bring the tower down.”

  Zera passed him a fresh strength talisman. He caught it and activated it as they all ran toward the door. Outside, he pivoted and slammed his fist into the stones at the base of the tower. It shook.

  Above, the archer raised a horn to his skeletal jaw, and a rag doll knocked it from his hands. The other rag doll wrapped around his wrists.

  “Return to me!” Kreya called to them.

  Stealth was over.

  Now was the time for action. And luck. Please, let us survive this, Kreya prayed silently. Great silence, do not take my friends. She’d only just found them again. She couldn’t lose them.

  Stran slammed his fists again and again into the base of the tower as the ground rumbled beneath them. One more hit, and it crumbled. The rag doll constructs tumble-ran down the side of the wall as it fell. They launched themselves into the air and spread their arms as if they were sails. Kreya caught them. She pivoted, ready to run.

  And saw what they’d failed to discover in the tunnels.

  “There was more than one exit,” Jentt said.

  Zera began swearing, colorfully and ceaselessly.

  Across the plains, the skeletal soldiers and killing machines were clawing their way up through holes in the earth. They encircled the tower in every direction. Back-to-back, Kreya and her friends drew their weapons.

  “Anyone see a weak point?” Kreya asked, her voice calm and steady. There had to be a way out of this. They’d faced terrible odds before and survived. They were the Heroes of Vos—this couldn’t be their end.

  I won’t let us die in secret and in vain.

  The horrors kept spilling out from at least five points across the plain. As they emerged, they spread, clicking and whirring and crying to fill in the space between them.

  “There, where they’re climbing out.” Zera pointed. “Yes, it’s less dense in between the exits, but those soldiers are prepared for us. The ones emerging are jumbled.”

&nb
sp; Kreya nodded. “Aim for the exits, then run straight for the wall.” It wasn’t much of a plan. In fact, it was a terrible plan. But they couldn’t fight an army this size. Their only option was to try to flee before the enemy was at full strength. She hoped Zera had enough talismans. It had seemed like so many back at the farmhouse. Now she didn’t know if it would be enough.

  “Stealth and speed?” Jentt asked.

  “No stealth. Unnecessary. The enemy knows we’re here.” And at this point, it didn’t matter if the guards saw them. Especially if they also saw the army. They only had one goal this time: survive.

  Stran flexed his muscles. “We do it like we did before. Jentt unbalances the enemy, and I take them out.” He squeezed a talisman in one hand and adjusted his grip on a knife with the other.

  “Not like before,” Kreya snapped. “Only speed.”

  All that mattered this time was escape. She watched the nearest point—they had to hit it when it was at its densest and use the confusion. Even then . . . We’re not going to make it, Kreya thought. This is impossible. I led them to their deaths. All of us, this time.

  Zera passed out her strongest speed talismans. “These are carved for speed but not endurance,” she warned. “You’ll get a ten-minute burst out of each, and that’s it. Use it well.”

  As Zera’s fingers touched hers, Kreya could feel the power buzzing through it. Later, if there was a later, she’d ask what kind of bone Zera used. For now, though—

  “Run.”

  Marso took off first, a hair faster than the others, but Jentt knew how to use every bit of power inside a speed talisman. He soon stretched into the lead. The others were a blur around Kreya.

  It took mere seconds, but Kreya felt as if her mind slowed to see it all: the blueness of the sky, the sway of the autumn wildflowers, the deadliness of the force arrayed before them.

  We can make it! We can—

  And then she heard a voice behind them:

  “My old friends, you must stay and visit.”

  His voice was soft and urbane, yet it carried, amplified, to all their ears, and beside Kreya, she saw Stran slow at the sound of Eklor’s voice. Only a slight hitch to his stride, but it was enough.