Page 194 of The Last One
By late in the day, the rocky gravel and mossy stones give way to richer earth—far from perfect, this part of the desert, but green thrives because of the better access to light. There are sharp, spiky-leafed plants and low shrubs with red berries over there. More low-growing shrubs with purple lavender there. Patches of twisted junipers that soar into the air here. Groves of pine trees that don’t require much water over there; their thin needles remind me of a teen boy’s first mustache. Curious-looking trees with low branches and ironwood trees with dense, hard barks everywhere. The sparkling trail winds around the trunks of these pine trees.
That pulsing in my gut urges me to move on. I take a deep breath and continue my hike, passing dead trees that look healthier than the living ones.
Far in the distance, the faint, unmistakable sounds of battle drift through the trees.
How many soldiers will be at the end of this trail? How many otherworldly? How many angry Dashmala who’ve heard that I drove a pike through the skull of one of their fiercest warriors? Maybe Gileon Wake and his men are part of this battle and that is why the moths are leading me this way. Could Olivia be near? Or Jadon?
The sparkling trail ends at hedges that surround a knoll. I push through the tangled greenery and…
“Well, who the fuck do we have here?” A single soldier sits upon a tree trunk, his legs splayed out, casual, unbothered. He resembles an anteater with his long, narrow nose and nonexistent lips.
I know he isn’t as alone as he appears. I heard the others. Smelled them, too.
Soon, they roll like fog from behind the trees and logs, wearing copper-colored breastplates, grinning and self-congratulatory, as though they’d successfully hidden from me.
They wouldn’t know success even if she pushed through tangled greenery and stood before them.
“Look who’s here,” one soldier sneers, his teeth tobacco-stained brown.
“Wake’s whore,” another soldier cracks.
Eight, nine…eleven soldiers. One me.
I like those odds.
Beyond the forest, the sounds of battle continue.
I point in the direction of the distant fighting. “Shouldn’t you assholes be out there killing something other than my time?”
“Look at her,” Broken Nose hoots. “Look at her weird eyes.”
“Oh no. They’ve gone all screwy!”
“You better watch out.”
The stained-tooth soldier steps forward from the crowd. His hazel eyes glitter cruelly, and the smile cracking on his face reveals an even crueler heart. “Looking for this?” The stained-toothed soldier reaches beneath his breastplate and pulls out—
My amulet!My precious pendant—the object I need more than anything else in this realm—hangs from his dirty fingers.
“Thought you’d never seemeagain, right?” The soldier with the big ego, this one resembling a donkey with those teeth and that forehead, sidles toward me, his arms folded, a smirk on his lips.
“See youagain?” I say, head cocked. “When was the first time?”
The smirk flinches some. “At the Broken Hammer.”
I blink at him. “Okay.”
“We fought, you and I,” he insists.
I lift my eyebrows. “Okay. If you say so.”
Hee-Haw grimaces—men hate being forgettable. “I cut your cheek. My blade—”
“Had the snake venom,” I say, pointing at him. “I almost died bythis much,” I say, pinching my thumb and index finger together. “But you couldn’t finish the job. Bet you hear that a lot, don’t you?”
His face goes red, but before he can respond, I swipe my hand and use wind to throw him against the closest pine tree. There’s a crack of his head against wood, of that violated wood splintering. Then there’s a rush of wind as that tree falls, its branches and needles serving as a shroud for the soldier who almost killed me bythis much.
Is he Number Sixty-Five?
