Page 85 of The Broken Prince

“I’m not sure how long it takes for human remains to decompose.”

“Neither do I. But at least we know it wasn’t in the last few months.” He kicked aside more pieces, revealing the skeleton underneath, no sight of skin or flesh. Everything was gone.

Then we heard the sound of stones shifting, like someone was walking nearby.

Jeremiah and I both stilled and looked up.

“Did you hear that?” Jeremiah whispered.

“Yes.” I looked at our surroundings, trying not to breathe, just waiting for something to pop out from underneath the rubble.

Jeremiah didn’t move.

We stayed that way for what felt like an eternity.

The sound didn’t return, but we were both convinced we’d heard it.

“It could have been stones shifting after we passed through,” Jeremiah said.

“Maybe…” I wasn’t convinced. But I also wasn’t convinced that there could be anything living in this graveyard of dead bodies buried under stone.

I hear something.

I turned to where Nightshade stood at the tree line, but I was hardly able to see his dark scales in the thickness of the wilderness. Voices? “Nightshade hears something.”

Jeremiah stared at me, knowing I was focused on listening to my dragon.

I hear the ground.

My eyebrows furrowed. What does that mean?

It’s moving…

“Nightshade says the ground is moving.”

“Like an earthquake?” Jeremiah asked.

“I don’t know.”

It’s getting louder.

“We’ve got to move.” I tugged on Jeremiah’s arm and pulled him off the pile of rubble we stood on. There were no buildings or structures in which to hide, so we had no other choice but to hunch down behind a pile and hope we weren’t spotted.

It’s stopped.

Stay hidden, Nightshade.

The world was quiet and still, with no sign of danger as the sun continued to dip farther behind the mountains. The crickets became more audible, welcoming the darkness across their lands. Neither Jeremiah nor I moved. But then we heard someone whisper.

“Over here.”

I turned my head to look behind me, and about fifty feet away was a woman. She wore steel armor on her lithe body, and her long brown hair flowed in the breeze behind her. Her features were absent because the light didn’t hit her in the right way. She started to wave us toward her. “You have, like, ten seconds.”

Jeremiah and I looked at each other.

There’s a girl here… Is that what you heard?

Not unless she’s underground.

---