Blackveil

“What is it?” he asked.

“A creature or . . .” It looked, insanely, like one of the tree roots.

Hissing grew around them, rumbling through the ruins, tree branches quivering. More and more of the tendrils rippled to life—they were tree roots. They roiled out of the shadows and slithered toward them like thousands of snakes.

“We must go,” Graelalea said. “Now!”

Even as they turned to flee, a root lashed out and wound around Hana. She screamed. The Eletians leaped to with swords to hack at the root, but it snatched her through the air and into the woods and out of sight in the blink of an eye. Her screams trailed behind her until they abruptly stopped.

“Hana!” Lhean cried. He surged after her, but Ealdaen and Telagioth caught him and spoke rapidly to him in Eletian.

Then to the rest, Graelalea shouted, “Follow me! Run!”

“What’s going on?” Yates demanded.

Karigan grabbed his arm and hauled him out of the way as a root whipped out at them. Everyone broke into a run for the center of the clearing.

Roots swarmed the ruins, crushing walls and remnants of roofs. They exploded from the building of the skulls, the skulls pouring out through broken walls. They smashed through the house with the mosaic and Karigan thought of the maiden and her lover shattered into millions of tiny, sparkling pieces.

The roots surged across the clearing after the company, hissing against bare rock.

The companions grabbed their packs at a run, Karigan still pulling the stumbling Yates behind her, following at the end of the line as Graelalea plunged into the forest on the opposite side of the clearing. One glance back revealed writhing roots rippling across the clearing after them. The ruins, which had abided the centuries in quiescence, had been pulverized in mere moments.

“My pack,” Yates said. “We need to go back for my pack.”

“No,” Karigan replied, sickened by the image of those roiling, fingering roots and the loss of Hana. “We can’t go back.”

She struggled to keep Lynx in sight, but Yates constantly tripped and fell. He could not move fast enough. Dragging him behind her and trying to keep him on his feet exhausted her. When he fell, more often than not he wrenched her down with him, and desperate to keep up with the others, she’d lunge back to her feet and help Yates to rise, and then urge him on.

The others were almost lost to her ahead.

“Lynx!” she cried. She was met with only the silence of the forest and the fading footsteps of her companions.

“Lynx!”

Then there was nothing but her own harsh breathing and the drizzle folding down on them.

Karigan yanked Yates after her and hastened through underbrush and branches in the direction she’d last seen the company, her heart pounding.

“Slow down, I—”

“We can’t!” she snapped. “We’re losing them.” She did not say aloud that she thought they were already lost.

Yates bravely tried to keep up, but there were too many roots and rocks tripping him and he was again a force holding her back. She halted, her ragged breaths steaming the air. As she stood there and gazed at the sameness of the trees, she did not see or hear any sign of the company, and she had no idea which way they’d gone.

“Why are we stopping?” Yates asked.

She heard the fear in his voice.

“Because,” she replied, turning to face him, “we are—” Something snagged her right leg, and when she looked down, she saw she’d stepped into a tangle of thorny brambles. The thorns, which were hooked and as long as her thumb, had slashed through her trousers and raked her flesh like claws. It felt like a swarm of bees stinging her leg.

“Damn,” she muttered, pain pitching her voice high. She fought the urge to thrash out of the brambles knowing it would only entangle her further.

“What?” Yates demanded. “What in all the hells is going on?”

“Don’t take another step,” she told him. He’d stopped short, she saw with relief, of walking into the brambles. “I’m stuck in a thorn bush.”

Carefully she pried away the grasping brambles from her leg, but they seemed determined to cling to her. Finally she drew her long knife and cut them away. The canes oozed a yellow ichor she hoped was not poisonous.

It seemed to take forever to free her leg, sweat streaming down her face, the pain of the stabbing thorns sending chills through her body. Finally when she was able to step clear of the bush, her leg buckled and she fell to her knee with a grunt.

“Karigan?” Yates asked. “You all right?”

“Help me up.”

He extended his hand and she leveraged herself back to a standing position. The stinging pain spread through her leg again, but it held her weight. She removed the bonewood from her pack and leaned on it.

“I think we need to set up camp here,” she said.

“What about the others?”

“They’re gone. We got left behind and I don’t know if I can locate their trail again. It’s best if we stay where we are so they can come find us.” She wondered if they’d even try, recalling how they had not gone after Hana. She closed her eyes and shuddered.

Whether or not the others sought them out, Karigan needed someplace to sit and remove the rest of the thorns from her leg. She could not go far like this.

She limped away from the thorn brambles, towing Yates behind her and keeping close watch for any other dangers. Of course if a flock of hummingbirds descended on them, there wouldn’t be much she could do about it.