Page 56 of From the Myths of Kings

To Saoirse’s bewilderment, the underguards began slapping their palms and spears against the stone walls. They continued up the stairs, making as much of a racket as they could. The sounds of clanging metal and pounding footsteps reverberated down to the bottom of the pit. Saoirse could practically feel the walls vibrating.

“Hel’s teeth,” Neia hissed. “This isn’t good.”

“What?” Saoirse breathed. “What’s going on?”

“Abandoned quarries are extremely dangerous.” Neia scanned the trembling walls, her eyes practically glowing with panic. “Not just because of the sinkholes, the collapsed tunnels, or the toxic minerals that are sometimes unearthed when they dig too deep. Sometimes, they flood and become deep reservoirs of water. Cavefish thrive in these flooded reservoirs. There’s a certain predator native to the tunnels of the Under Kingdom that prey on these cavefish. They can sense the vibrations in the stone from many leagues away. In this case, we’re the cavefish.”

As the trial’s challenge dawned on Saoirse, she felt her jaw go slack and her heart stutter in her chest.

Wyrms.

The underguards were summoning Wyrms.

“Wyrms can tunnel through the bedrock quite fast. We’ll have a few minutes at most before they’re upon us. When Wyrms detect the vibrations of cavefish in flooded quarries, they burst through the walls and swallow several fish at a time. When they rupture through the walls and find the pit empty of water, they’ll find us as a substitute meal.”

When the underguards had climbed halfway up the staircase, they finally stopped their clamorous riot. A pale-haired woman began descending the stairs, passing the throng of soldiers as they ascended. Larken.

The stone-singer placed her hands on the limestone and began forming a barricade of rock along the steps. Larken frowned down at them, no trace of pleasure or satisfaction on her face as she summoned the stone. A slab of rock expanded from the wall and configured into an impenetrable barrier in the middle of the already perilous staircase. Even if they wanted to escape, they’d be blocked from continuing up the stairs to safety. And if Rook used his wings to carry them out of the pit, he would be shot down. Once she’d arranged the stone obstruction to her liking, Larken stalked back up the stairs, leaving them fully entrapped within the chasm.

“The quarry is not warded against magic,” Hasana breathed, her eyes traveling down from Larken’s barricade to land on Rook. “Lift your tunic. This might be the only time I’ll have to heal you.”

“We need to arm ourselves. We’re completely defenseless,” Neia argued. “Now is not the time to heal the Auran princeling.”

“Now is the time,” Hasana snapped. “He’ll be no use to us half-dead.” Her eyes began shimmering with golden light that swallowed her pupils. Her palms started glowing, her Healing magic flooding her veins. Rook obediently lifted his tunic and bared his stab wound to her.

Saoirse nearly fell to her knees. His injury had grown much, much worse. The tiny threads of black had expanded across his muscled abdomen like rotted roots. Most of his flesh had darkened into a sickly bluish-purple hue, blackened at the center of the wound like a smudge of charcoal. The spiderwebbing veins of poison disappeared beneath his bunched-up tunic, likely crawling up his chest and shoulders. Rook winced in pain as Hasana pressed her glowing hands to his wound.

The walls began to shudder. Loose pieces of rock fell, and sections of the wooden scaffolding collapsed as tremors continued rumbling through the quarry.

“Sounds like two of them,” Neia guessed, her head cocked toward the vibrations. “Hurry up, Princess.”

Hasana’s palms glowed even brighter, her magic sensing the urgency of their situation. Glowing light spilled from her hands like liquid gold and seeped into Rook’s sickly skin. He gritted his teeth in pain, jaw flexing hard as Hasana’s magic raced to combat the source of his infection. Rook had told Saoirse the wound wouldn’t fully heal, but Hasana’s abilities could hold it at bay and ease his pain. Indeed, a few of the dark threads of infection seemed to retreat backward like stitches of embroidery yanked out by a seamstress. Healthy color began to flush Rook’s cheeks and his posture seemed to uncurl under Hasana’s ministrations. Saoirse could practically see her healing ability searing away the inflammation bit by bit as Rook’s energy was restored and his weary gaze became clearer. The festering wound would return with a vengeance, but for now, he finally looked more like himself.

“They’re nearly here!” Neia yelled over the shuddering walls. “Your healing session is over!”

Rook looked worlds improved when Hasana reluctantly removed her palms from his abdomen. Now that the feverish gleam of his gaze had subsided, fresh awareness burned in the depths of his eyes. To Saoirse’s utter shock, he closed the distance between them and caught her hands between his own. A bolt of electricity shot through her body at the touch of his fingers. The words he’d been holding back exploded from him: “Saoirse, I’m so sorry for what happened. I was such a stubborn ass. I was hurting and angry, and I shouldn’t have?”

“Now is not the time,” Neia interrupted. “You can spout off apologies to your lover later. Preferably, while you grovel at her feet. But now we need weapons. Over there!” Before any of them could respond, she hauled them over to a crumbling bit of scaffolding, their connecting rope straining between them.

Any euphoria tingling through Saoirse’s limbs from Rook’s fleeting touch evaporated as the walls of the pit quaked. The peels of unhinged laughter emanating from the top of the quarry were somehow more spine-chilling than the hideous shrieking sound rumbling through the earth. Saoirse stumbled forward as Neia sprinted to the scaffolding, shackles chafing her wrists as the commander dragged them along.

They reached a hazardous-looking ladder and Neia charged up the rungs. Saoirse scrambled after Hasana, feeling Rook clamber up behind her. Though the ladder creaked and buckled under their collective weight, it remained anchored in place by metal rods drilled into the wall.

The first Wyrm exploded from the side of the quarry. Fragments of rock erupted from the wall as the creature hurled itself into the pit. Saoirse made the mistake of looking over her shoulder as the beast burst through the bedrock.

She’d imagined the parasitic creature would be grub-like and soft. But the limbless, writhing Wyrm was armored with scales from head to toe, its thick hide made for tunneling through dense rock like an iron wedge. She’d expected it to have an insect-like jaw, but the sightless creature’s head was more serpentine in nature. Its gaping mouth revealed several rows of spike-like teeth that could easily cut through stone and snap bones in half. Milky eyes were positioned on the top of its head, clearly blind and useless. Saoirse’s blood curdled at the sound of the Wyrm’s frustrated screeching when it landed in a heap at the bottom of the pit. It curled in around itself, its body coiling up like a worm on a fishing hook.

“Saoirse, keep going!”

She tore her gaze from the thrashing Wyrm and found Rook staring up at her from the lower rungs, fear blazing in his eyes. “I’m right behind you!” She hadn’t realized she’d stopped moving. Her fingers felt numb as she forced herself to move. Terror splintered through her as the Wyrm’s bellowing echoed through the pit like tearing sheets of metal.

At last, they reached a rickety wooden platform that trembled on rotting structural beams. Saoirse scrambled over the side, turning to help Rook up the rest of the way. Once he was safely over the ladder, she scanned the abandoned mining equipment littered across the platform. In total, there were two pickaxes, a hammer, a rust-coated shovel with a splintered shaft, and several smaller chisels bent beyond repair.

High above them, Grivur’s insufferable voice whined, “I told you to remove anything that could be used as weapons! They’re not supposed to have a fighting chance!” He sounded as unhappy as a child who’d had their toys taken away, as though he were playing with inanimate objects rather than with lives.

Neia grabbed one pickaxe for herself and thrust the other into Saoirse’s hands. She offered the hammer to Hasana, whose eyes were wide with fear.

“I don’t know how to use that,” she breathed. “I’ve never even held a sword.”

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