SHEA LOOKED up at the grey cliffs that towered over them, the Trateri warband Fallon had gathered stretched for half a mile behind her. It had taken two weeks to get to this point. Saying goodbye to Mist had been difficult. The little girl had seemed so alone and small when Shea had told her she would be staying behind with Daere. It was one of the few times Shea had regretted leaving.
Now, they stood at the base of Bearan’s Fault looking up at cliffs that would be impossible to climb unless they left the mounts behind. Even if they did, it would be a difficult and time-consuming journey since the cliffs towered over them by several hundred feet.
She took a deep breath as she stared up at all that separated her from home. When she’d first thought of coming back here, she hadn’t realized how nostalgic she would be or how much she’d missed the Highlands. It was like an old, crotchety friend that probably hadn’t even noticed she was gone. Still, it felt like a piece of her that had been missing was suddenly back in its rightful place.
“You came down that?” Clark asked, his voice hushed and shocked.
Shea nodded.
“I always knew you were crazy,” Buck said, his mount coming up on the other side of Shea’s horse. “No wonder you have no problem jumping off things.” He had a look of consternation as he looked up at the cliffs.
“I’d like to say it’s not as high as it looks, but it really is,” Shea told them. “On the Highland side, approaching the fault is like walking off the edge of the world—scary, and exhilarating, and oh so fun.”
Buck gave her a look that said she was proving his point.
“Since meeting you, I feel my life has gotten increasingly more interesting,” Eamon said from the other side of Buck. “I’m not sure if that’s a good thing or not.”
“Have any of our people ever been up there?” Clark asked. “I don’t remember anyone claiming raider’s rights.”
“I’ve never heard of any stories,” Buck said, still staring at the cliffs like they were something that had been put there to purposely thwart him. “All of our tales deal with the Lowlands and the Badlands. I don’t think our oral history even acknowledges this place.”
Shea wasn’t really surprised. Highlanders kept to themselves. Their home’s inherent isolation made that easy. The only time they came down the fault was when they were trading, which wasn’t often. The trading expedition where Shea had gotten caught by the Trateri was one of the few.
“How are we going to get up there?” Clark asked the question everyone was thinking. “How are we going to get the horses and our supplies up that?”
“There’s a way.” Shea spurred her horse on, steering it toward where Fallon and Caden had stopped.
She pulled on her reins, bringing the horse up beside them. Both men spared her a glance before turning to observe the cliffs blocking their way.
“It looks bigger than I imagined,” Caden said, his face set in a frown.
Fallon grunted. He’d faced the cliffs before when he’d calculated the chances of a successful campaign in the Highlands. Edgecomb, the town where he’d first met Shea, wasn’t far from here either.
“What’s the plan?” Caden asked.
Fallon held up his hand and gestured. From the ranks behind them, two Anateri rode forward shadowing the figure that walked between their two horses. Reece looked up at the three of them.
“How do we get up it?” Fallon asked, authority ringing in his voice.
Reece smirked at Shea. “What’s the matter, Shea? Don’t you remember the way?”
Shea took a deep breath. “It’s been over eight months since I left. I assumed your superiors would have changed the code in that time.”
There was also the small fact that she couldn’t exactly remember the location of the entrance. It would take days, if not weeks, for her to locate it. Then she would have to figure out the key to get inside. Somehow, she didn’t think Fallon’s army would wait around patiently for her to take the time to do that.
If she’d still had her maps, she might have been able to cut that time in half. The pathfinders had them coded for a reason. It would have had a hint on how to decipher the code should it have been changed.
“What happened to your map?” Reece asked with a sardonic expression. “Everything you need to know is in there.”
Shea gritted her teeth as she looked away. “They’re gone. I burned them.”
In part because Fallon’s brother had very nearly been successful in decoding them and she didn’t want their secrets falling into the wrong hands. The other reason, the main reason if she was being perfectly honest, was because she didn’t want the temptation of an easy escape from the Trateri and the warlord she called her own. It also took care of ever allowing love to cloud her judgment.
Reece let out a low whistle. “That takes some guts. I’m surprised he let you.”
Shea’s brows snapped together as she leveled Reece with a glare. “Answer his question. How do we access the cavern shortcut?”
Reece looked like he was going to continue needling Shea but a slight shift from the man at Shea’s side changed his mind. Fallon looked like he’d expended all the patience he was willing to give. Shea thought he might try to strangle her cousin if he didn’t get to talking, and fast.
“Fine. You’ve turned into such a spoilsport, you know that?”
Shea fixed him with a gaze that said she was not amused. She had always been the spoilsport among the two of them—the voice of reason in whatever insane plan that struck him.
Reece turned to walk towards the cliffs. Caden stiffened and let out a sharp whistle. The Anateri guards Fallon had posted reacted immediately. They kicked their horses into a gallop and circled Reece, weapons drawn as they herded him back towards Fallon.
“What the hell are you doing?” Reece asked, his face flushed as he glared at the guards as they used their horses to force Reece closer to where the three of them waited. It was move or be crushed, the horses snorting and bobbing their heads any time Reece looked like he planned to stand his ground.
“Shea, will you ask that musclebound idiot at your side to call off his lackeys? I don’t know how you expect me to find a way into the caverns, if his men keep acting like a bunch of newbies jumping at the least provocation.”
“You can tell us the location of the entrance. We will do the rest,” Fallon said. He eyed Reece like he was a bug he wanted to squash.
“That won’t work,” Reece said, finally addressing Fallon directly.
Shea could have told him earlier that pushing Fallon was the best way to not get what you want, but she figured she’d let him dig his own grave. He was her least favorite cousin, after all.
“As your lovely friend over there could tell you, if she planned on being the least bit helpful, these entrances can be a bit tricky. If you don’t know what you’re doing, you could walk right past it, best-case scenario. Worst-case, you trigger something that leaves a lot of people dead, including yourself.”
Caden scoffed. “You want us to believe your people have some sorcery to enable you, and you alone, to access this place. Next, you’ll want us to believe that the sky might fall unless you’re there to hold it up.”
Reece looked at Shea. “How did you allow yourself to be caught by these dunderfucks? And why have you stayed this long?”
The guard behind Reece kicked him in the back of the head. Reece fell to his knees. He glared over his shoulder at the guard.
Shea regarded the Anateri with a wry look before addressing Reece, “That’s how.”
Amusement crossed Caden’s face, tugging at his lips, and was gone before Shea could do more than blink at him.
“The Trateri can be very persuasive as you’ve just experienced,” Shea said before turning to Fallon. “He does have a point though. The caverns aren’t entirely natural and have been rigged with traps should they be breached by the enemy.”
“I’m beginning to believe your people are the real force behind the Highlands,” Fallon told her.
Reece snorted. “You’re just figuring that out? Guess she does have some loyalty after all.”
“Enough, Reece. Stop picking and prodding to see how he reacts,” Shea said, fed up with him. “Or I’ll let Fallon do to you what he’s been wanting to since you snuck into our home.”
“I don’t know how you can call that piece of cloth held upright by a few sticks a home.”
The faces of the two Anateri behind Reece darkened, neither man liking the insult. The horse of one stepped forward and shoved Reece in the back with its nose, the force almost toppling Reece back to the ground.
Shea regarded her cousin, unimpressed. “Stop saying shit you don’t mean to get a rise out of them. You and I both know we’ve called much worse accommodations home in the past.”
She knew he remembered the time they’d lived out of a cave for three months when they were teens and apprenticed to a master pathfinder. Their master thought it would be good for them to experience what it was like to be lost and alone in the Highlands, so he’d left them stranded hundreds of miles from the nearest village. They’d been lucky for that cave too, or they would have had to sleep exposed to the elements and any beast wandering by.
Reece dipped his chin as he stared up at her with a frustrated expression. She raised an eyebrow.
“If you two are done fighting, I’d like to get back to the matter at hand,” Fallon said in a mild voice. The only hint of impatience was in the way his horse shifted under him and pawed the ground, picking up on its master’s emotions.
“I told you a pathfinder has to find the entrance, or you risk getting a lot of people killed.”
Fallon bared his teeth in a semblance of a smile. “Good thing you’re not the only pathfinder here, then.”
All eyes turned to Shea. Reece looked at her with a considering expression.
He shrugged. “That could work.”
Shea sighed. “Tell me what I need to know so we can get this over with.”
Reece crouched and picked up a rock lying next to him on the ground. “Fine, get down here so I can show you what you’re looking for.”
Shea dismounted and handed her reins to Fallon before walking over to where Reece was drawing a symbol on the ground.
“You’re looking for this symbol.”
Shea recognized the swooping circle with the squiggly line bisecting it. “This is Lodi’s cavern.”
“Yup.” He gave her a cheeky grin.
“Why would you bring us to Lodi’s pass?” she asked in a scandalized voice. “You know this place is dangerous.” Not to mention unlocking it was a giant pain in the ass.
“What’s Lodi’s pass?” Fallon asked, coming to stand beside her so he could look over her shoulder.
Shea exhaled a gust of air. “It’s the least used of the caverns. No one takes it unless they’re desperate. There are things in there that don’t take kindly to strangers. It’s a real bitch to find, too.”
“And there’s your answer right there.” Reece stood and tossed the rock up, catching it as it came back down. “It’s nearly impossible to locate even if you’ve been through it before and the denizens don’t even allow pathfinders access all the time. Your Warlord and his army will have an impossible time trying to get back through it after this.”
“We’ll have a devil of a time getting through it this time too,” Shea snapped. “That’s if I can even find it.”
“Aww, does the great and wonderful Shea have a little self-doubt?” Reece sneered. “Too bad your Warlord refused to be reasonable, or I’d help you out.”
They both looked at Fallon. He stared back at them with a ruthless expression. Shea knew without asking that he didn’t plan on bending. He didn’t trust Reece as far as he could throw him, and Shea couldn’t say she blamed him. Reece wasn’t trustworthy under the best of circumstances. His role within the pathfinders almost demanded a bit of shiftiness, and since he’d first appeared, he’d seemed to be doing everything in his power to antagonize everyone around him.
“Can you do it?” Fallon asked, his gaze direct.
Shea pinched the bridge of her nose and sighed. “I don’t know. I’ve never come through here before. I doubt Reece even has, for all that he wants to make you think otherwise. All I have are the old stories to go by.”
Fallon nodded. “That’ll have to be enough.”
She sure hoped so.
*
Shea pulled herself up onto a rocky outcropping. She was dirty and sweaty, her shirt a different color in places. And she felt no closer to finding that damn symbol.
“See anything?” Trenton called up to her.
She leaned over the edge of her ledge. “Nothing yet.”
“Horse lords, girl. Stop leaning over things.” Trenton mumbled to himself, his voice carrying on the wind, “You’d think she had a death wish or something.”
After walking along the edges of the cliffs for a good hour, Shea had given up on finding the entrance below. Fallon’s men had continued to look while she decided to climb, hoping to spot something from above. As her guard and one of the few with experience climbing—something he’d gained while chasing Shea all over Airabel over the past few months—Trenton had been tasked with following Shea up the cliffs.
Shea leaned back and looked up. The clouds today were light and puffy, creating shapes that shifted and changed with every breath. It would have been the perfect cloud watching opportunity.
She sighed and looked back down. The Trateri were spread in a long line up and down the cliffs. She could just make out the faint sounds of voices below as they called back and forth to each other.
If they couldn’t find this entrance, Shea had a feeling Fallon would face a lot of opposition from the other clan leaders for dragging them on a wild goose chase.
They needed to find it.
She turned back to looking. This thing could be anywhere. Reece had gotten them in the general vicinity, but that didn’t help much. This entrance hadn’t been used in decades. It was entirely possible the symbol marking it would be covered up or weathered away. Shea doubted it had been maintained over the years once the guild decided it was more trouble than it was worth.
That brought her back to why Reece had brought them to this particular entrance. She believed him when he said it was to keep Fallon and his men from invading once the pathfinders had gotten what they wanted from him, but there was this hunch buried deep inside her gut that said there was more to the story.
She used the wall to stand, clinging to one handhold as she hung away from the edge.
“Will you please quit doing that? I know you’re half spider, but there’s no reason to test fate,” Trenton yelled from below.
Shea allowed a small smile to cross her face before she started searching again. There was nothing that stood out in the cliffs close to her. She turned and looked up. Could the original keepers of this entrance have placed the symbol higher up in the hopes that those not worthy would be unable to locate it?
Other entrances were concealed in small crevasses at the bottom of the cliffs or hidden under the long grasses that came right up to the edge in some places. This entrance had plenty of rocky outcroppings and crevasses to search but no vegetation that came close to the cliff.
What did she remember about Lodi’s Pass?
For starters, the cavern was the closest to the Badlands so its original keeper would probably have been doubly paranoid about keeping unwanted visitors from trespassing. They would have done a very good job of hiding the symbol.
If Shea had been the keeper, she would have hidden it somewhere high and not easily seen from the ground.
Trenton finally reached the small outcropping Shea had taken advantage of to rest on. His breath was coming in pants and his skin was soaked in sweat.
“Why is this so hard?” he asked, catching his breath. “I don’t remember the sky villages being this hard to get to.”
“We’re at a higher elevation. It makes breathing and physical activity more difficult. Also, the soul tree had easy hand grips that could be used to climb. This requires a different kind of strength. It can be taxing on the body.”
Trenton nodded. “Wait, where are you going?”
“Up. I think we need to get higher.”
Shea concentrated on her next hand grip, hauling herself up and placing her feet carefully. They really should be doing this with ropes and anchor points, but she was too impatient to wait, and they weren’t going that high.
“I’m going to remember this the next time I have you in the training ring,” Trenton shouted after her. When she didn’t answer, he used the wall to stand and started up. “I’m beginning to think Fallon and Caden have a grudge against me.”
Shea paused where she was, brushing at an oddly shaped rock in front of her. It wasn’t the symbol, but it was something. It was oval with a raised etching on it. Using one hand to anchor herself, she placed her feet carefully on the side of the rock before she set her other hand on it and brushed away some of the moss that had grown over the years. It turned just barely under her hand.
“I think I may have found something,” Shea told Trenton.
“Good. Then maybe we can get down off this cliff.”
Hm. The symbol was a series of lines that pointed up, but if she turned it as far as it would go, the lines pointed to her right. She looked where they pointed and saw another knob very similar to this one.
“Go back down to the outcropping we were just on. I want to check something out.”
“You know I’m supposed to go with you.”
“I have to climb sideways, and I don’t know where this leads. You sure you want to do that?”
Trenton looked where she motioned. A low curse reached her.
“Just do what you have to do and don’t worry about me,” he told her.
Shea rolled her eyes. Men and their stupid egos. If he fell off this cliff because he reached muscle failure, she wouldn’t bother to care.
“Suit yourself,” she said before making her way, hand over careful hand, to the knob she thought might point them in the right direction.
It wasn’t until several knobs later, after climbing and then descending several feet of the cliff that she found what she was looking for. The knob she’d turned pointed directly down. Shea moved so she could get a good look.
There below her, on a rock outcropping, the top of which could only be seen from the spot Shea currently clung to, was the circle with the wavy line inside of it. The outcropping in question was sandwiched between two other rocks that jutted out from the cliff sheltering the one with the symbol. She would have to descend between the two mammoth rocks to get to the column with the symbol.
“Found it,” she shouted back at Trenton where he was resting on a ledge several feet away.
“Finally.”
She began her descent. She was almost to the first rock when there was a shout from below.
“Eagles. The eagles are coming.”
Shea looked up, her heart in her throat.
Trenton leaned over the side of his ledge. “Get to the symbol and open the cavern.”
She clung to the side, her face upturned. He was a sitting duck where he was. The eagles could snatch him right off that ledge.
“Go, I’ll be right behind you.”
There was nothing Shea could do but listen. She climbed faster, stopping only for the briefest second to make sure that Trenton was following her. His face was a mask of concentration as he descended as fast as he could.
Shea was in the shade of the two rocks, her handholds suddenly cool under her hands. She was still several feet up when the sun was blocked by a giant pair of wings. An eagle’s head thrust between the crevasses, the beak closing inches from Shea’s face.
A loud squawk sounded and then the head withdrew only to be replaced by another bird’s, this one smaller with a cream-colored head that shaded to gold near the neck. It had several brown spots around its neck and chest. Using its smaller size, it darted inside, its beak growing larger and larger as Shea watched in horror. She yelped and jerked back as the hard beak brushed against her. That jerk was what saved her, the bird snapping at air as Shea fell the last few feet to the rock pillar.
She landed hard, the breath exploding out of her. No time to hurt. She needed to get moving and protect herself. Rolling to her side, she crouched as she looked above. The eagles both tried to thrust their heads inside, only to get in each other’s way. The bigger eagle flared its wings and let out an ear-piercing shriek. The smaller one answered its challenge with a full-throated cry of its own. It dived to the side, the bigger one following with another shriek. They circled above, intent on a furious battle as they dived at one another.
Shea didn’t question her luck, grateful that the two were more concerned with defending their territory than picking her off.
She turned back to the symbol below her—a circle filled with another circle and bisected by the wavy line. She’d found what she was looking for, now she just needed to make it work.
The eagles above broke off their aerial battle, disappearing as they dove at the ground below. Shea hoped the Trateri out there managed to evade them long enough for her to figure this out.
According to the story that Shea could remember, the entrance responded to the fire of the great eye and the blood of the chosen children. The second part should be easy enough. Whatever made her a pathfinder should open this thing. The first part though—what in all the Broken Lands was the fire of the great eye. Was it fire? That had to be too easy.
“You figure this out yet?” Trenton shouted down at her, his head peering over the side of one of the stone monoliths.
“You’re alive?” The question popped out of Shea before she could censor herself.
“Not for long if you don’t get this thing open.”
“I’m working on it.”
“Work faster.”
Shea dragged her foot across the stone, brushing away any debris that had accumulated over the years. The symbol itself was in pretty good shape, the white paint showing no sign of erosion or damage.
“Shea, you need to get this open.”
“I told you I’m working on it.”
She looked up. Trenton’s face was tilted away from her, but something very close to fear covered the part she could see.
“No, you need to get it open now. There’s a black cloud in the sky coming from the Badlands, and I’m pretty sure it’s not the kind filled with rain.”
Shea grumbled to herself. A bright flash of light near where Trenton crouched caught Shea’s attention.
“What’s that?” Shea pointed.
Trenton looked down, blinking as his eyes adjusted to the dim interior. His gaze went to where she was pointing. “It looks like a mirror or a glass of some sort.”
“Of course, that’s it.”
Fire. What was the sun but a massive ball of fire creating heat and light? Shea wasn’t really sure where the eye portion came from, but this place was built right around the cataclysm. There could have been all sorts of weird sayings or religions to explain the world falling apart.
“Trenton, I need you to climb down to that mirror and aim at the middle of the circle.”
“Do you see where that mirror is? How do you expect me to cling practically upside down and then move it? Not all of us are descended from spider people,” he shouted back.
“I need that light to get this entrance open. You’re the one that can see what’s coming; you tell me if it’s possible.”
There was a growl from above and then he threw a leg over the edge, lowering himself over the side. Shea hoped his arms weren’t spent during their impression of mountain goats earlier.
She bounced lightly on her feet as Trenton made his careful way down the side of the monolith he’d been crouched on and across to the mirror. Time was of the essence, and every second he took felt like grains of sand sliding through an hourglass—inevitably bringing doom closer with every breath.
“Come on, come on,” she muttered under her breath. She didn’t want to distract him or cause him to fall, but he was taking so long.
“I’m here. What do I do?” he asked, not looking back at her.
“You need the mirror to catch the light and shine it down here.”
He nodded and reached over to tilt the mirror to catch the sun that shined down at an angle, the beam never touching the pillar on which Shea stood.
“It’s stuck,” Trenton grunted, wrestling with the mirror. He moved over, finding grips in the rock face for his hands and using a leg to kick at the mirror.
“We need that mirror, so don’t break it,” Shea warned.
“I’ve almost got it. Almost there.” With one last kick, the mirror turned with a screech to rival the eagles’ cries.
It glittered as the sun caught it, rotating and reflecting down into the crevasse. Its beam dragged across the rock, closer and closer to where Shea stood.
“There! Keep it right there.” It was pointed directly at the middle of the circle. Shea saw why they’d called it the eye of fire in the story. From this angle, with the mirror reflecting the light it looked like an eye had caught fire.
“Time for my part,” she said in a soft voice. She pulled out a knife and looked at her hand.
“Shea, what are you doing?” Trenton asked in a calm voice. He’d paused in his descent when Shea withdrew the knife.
“It needs sun and blood to work. Don’t worry; I know what I’m doing.” Sort of. She hoped.
“The Warlord is not going to be happy about this,” Trenton muttered.
He was right. Fallon was going to be very upset if he got in here and found Shea bleeding, even if it was from a self-inflicted wound. That was to say, if he survived the eagles and whatever black cloud Trenton had spotted.
She set the knife against the palm of her left hand. Hesitation stayed her hand. She moved the knife to her forearm. She might have need of her hands before this journey was through, and a cut on the palm was an absolute bitch to heal when you used it constantly. Not to mention painful.
“Here goes nothing.”
Shea drew the knife across her skin, biting down to keep the sound of pain inside. Cutting yourself on purpose was totally different than a wound you received while going about your life.
She knelt and held her arm over the eye. The story hadn’t said where the blood needed to fall, so she figured the eye was as good a place as any.
“Work.” She willed the thing. If it didn’t, she didn’t know what else to try.
For a long moment, the cavern was silent. Nothing happened. Then there was a rumble—one that was felt more than heard. The ground under her started to shake.
Trenton cried out as the wall he’d been descending started moving. He lost his grip and tumbled off, missing the monolith Shea stood on and falling to the ground below.
“Trenton!” Shea cried, throwing herself to her knees on the side of the platform. The area he had fallen was shadowed, and she couldn’t see his form to know if he was alright. That was all the attention she could spare for him as the rock around her began to move. She clung to her perch as it shook and quaked.
Perhaps this hadn’t been her best idea.
Rock and dust cascaded from above, the monoliths closing in on each other and sealing out the sun, leaving Shea alone and in darkness.