Page 85 of A Legacy of Poison and Lies

Holt had gone first with the torch, Laydan and Daizin close behind. Though Zylah had seen Holt light fires with nothing but a flick of his wrist, she knew he held the torch to preserve his pool of magic. She’d seen first-hand how deep his well of power was, and though she was certain it had a bottom to it, she’d yet to see it.

Her thoughts drifted to sitting with him in their room at the tavern back in Virian after they’d fled from Marcus, of how he’d moved and fought against Jesper the day Raif died. Holt had fought and fought with a savagery that some part of her knew should have been frightening, but she had never been afraid of him. Not even on that first day when he’d found her in the springs.

The staircase twisted on, the air growing colder the further they descended, magic pressing at her skin. If it hadn’t been for the vanquicite already draining her, she’d have felt nauseous, weak, at the way it seemed to cling to her. She pressed a hand to her chest as they seemed to step through yet another ward.

Daizin cleared his throat behind her. “There are spells in place to weaken any who enter. A constant drain on your life force to encourage you to turn around and leave.”

To prevent raiders, Zylah presumed. “How many are buried here?”

Laydan chuckled quietly. “To begin with? No one. It’s a decoy tomb. But now it’s the resting place for the countless foolish creatures that came to pillage it.”

“A decoy for what?” Zylah asked, uncertain if she truly wanted the answer.

“Who,” Laydan said as the staircase ended, and they stepped out into a space so large the torchlight disappeared into the darkness.

Ranon. Zylah didn’t want to say his name out loud. Not in this place. But somehow, she knew that would be Laydan’s answer.

He gestured to Holt for the torch. “There are fake tombs dotted all over Astaria, warded and spelled not only to prevent anyone from entering but to keep them trapped inside should they succeed in getting past them. So although the tombs were once empty, that is no longer the case.” The witch seemed almost happy as he spoke, the torchlight casting flickering shadows across his features, and Zylah hoped it was just his cheerful nature as she stayed alert, her eyes taking in small details in the darkness.

It wasn’t as large a space as she had first thought; the walls looked as if they had been gouged by claws in some spaces; in others, there were stacks of rock, great columns stretching above their heads. And every now and then, scattered across the stone beneath their feet, were large bones, picked clean by whatever had discarded them.

There were remnants of the lives that had managed to breach the wards at the perimeter: a scrap of fabric that might have once been a cloak, a rusted sword, a few scattered arrows. It felt more like a prison than a tomb, but Laydan had been inside before and made his way out, so it eased some of Zylah’s discomfort to hold onto that thought.

Holt was quiet beside her as they followed Laydan and Daizin, but as if he’d felt her watching, his attention slid to her, a smile lifting the corner of his mouth as his eyes met hers. For a moment that familiar voice whispered in her ear all her faults and failings, telling her she shouldn’t have kissed him, shouldn’t have given him the hope of something that was doomed before it had even begun. That she would be nothing but a curse to him, and how could he care for her like this, when she was nothing but a broken shadow of herself? But this time when the thoughts came, she let them go.

He slid a hand to her lower back, healing magic pouring into her and pulling her from her thoughts. “Just in case,” he said quietly, as she raised an eyebrow at him in question.

She didn’t regret kissing him. She just wished they’d had more time. And as she offered him a smile in thanks, she realised she owed it to him to tell him the truth about the vanquicite. She was nothing but a hypocrite if she didn’t.

The moment they were back at the Aquaris Court, Zylah vowed to offer him the truth.

Laydan led them through passageways and down stone staircases that crossed others, darkness yawning open beneath them as if it had no end to it.

Every now and then there were signs of people who had come before them, and the treasure they had tried to pillage.

“Why would an item, an actual key to protecting an entire court, be concealed in a decoy tomb, and how did it end up here?” Zylah asked.

Laydan shrugged. “We’re just here to retrieve it.”

Zylah wanted to press him further but felt it unwise given they might need him to get them out of the tomb.

He stopped at a wall, pressing a hand against the stone, and as Zylah stepped closer, she realised it was another door. This one was circular, more swirls and lines gouged into it, and as Laydan murmured, two halves split away from each other with a grinding sound, opening just enough for them to pass through.

Zylah sucked in a breath at the sight that unravelled before them.

The torchlight glinted off more glittering gold than she could ever have imagined, and as Laydan grinned at her, a loud boom echoed through the tomb, his smile fading at once.

“I’ll go check it out,” Daizin said quietly. “Get the key. Stay together.” He shot a look at Laydan before his shadows concealed him, and he was gone.

“I thought you said they couldn’t get in?” Zylah asked Laydan as he paled.

He tipped the torch to a channel etched into the wall above them, and the room lit up with firelight. “Let’s just find this thing,” he said, waving his free hand at the room before them, piles of gold and stacks of items on every surface: chalices, crowns, swords, statues and thrones.

Zylah tried to shake off her unease. “Why do I get the feeling that if I take the wrong thing this entire tomb is going to swallow us whole?” It occurred to her then, that the boom might not have been from someone entering the tomb, but from something that was already within it.

What better way to protect a hoard of gold than with a creature to guard it?

She silenced the thought. Focused on the task at hand, her attention sweeping across the room. It could take her days to search the space, and she had no idea what she was looking for.Find the key, find the key, find the key, she repeated to herself, as if thinking of it might make it appear before her. Wishful thinking. Every item glittered back at her, winking as if to mock her in the firelight.

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