Catacombs (The Sekhmet Bounty Series Book 2) (11 page)

That was unacceptable. Not only did I want to eat, more importantly, I wanted to dry off. I got up and helped her look. It was utterly hopeless, though. Unless… “What about the legs?”

She came over. “Maybe. We could try it.”

We sawed the caterpillar-like legs off until there was a good pile. Frost hovered her hands over them. Nothing happened. She rubbed her palms together and tried again. Nothing. Her jaw tightened. “Maybe I’m too tired,” she said, as not so much as a wisp of smoke rose from them.

“Well, look at it this way. You’re one hundred percent better than I am at creating magical fire. But if we can find some rocks, I might be able to get those to spark.”

She laughed under her breath and her shoulders relaxed as she reached behind her, grabbed two stones, and handed them to me. It took me a few tries, but the rocks eventually sparked and the pile of legs actually caught on fire. It was a damn miracle.

After we had tucked into heaps of what looked and smelled like lobster meat around the fire, even I started to get sleepy. Frost picked at hers, eyes heavy, but never managed to get a piece past her lips. Mostly she scooted it around and poked it as she stared off into nothing.

I had no such qualms, plopping piece after piece into my mouth. “If I had magic like you, I’d use it all the time.”

Frost shook her head. “Magic has a price. It isn’t free. The more you use it, the more dependent you are on it. It’s better to find your own way before it leads you to a place you never intended to be.”

That made sense. Most things came with a price tag. Why should magic be exempt? “And the coven—how did you fall in with them?”

She completely abandoned her dinner and worked on re-braiding her hair. “Luck, I guess.”

I raised an eyebrow. “But going from being a bounty hunter to hanging out with a bunch of human witches has to be strange.”

“I guess.” She closed her eyes and curled up in a ball on the floor, her back facing me. Obviously, Frost wasn’t in the mood to talk. I didn’t hold it against her. She needed rest. We both did. I lay back, trying to relax, but my feet kept tapping against the stone. Instead of actually resting, thoughts about everything hit my brain all at once. How were we going to get out if there was only one exit—that we’d demolished? There was always Olivia. At the very least, she could get us help. What would it be like to never have anyone touch you without dying? That had to suck, but maybe there were perks too. “I bet the curse gets you out of the awkward friend hugs,” I said to break the silence.

“Less than you’d think,” Frost answered, but I could hear the smile in her voice.

I laughed. “Earlier you said Sy saved you. What’d he do?” I asked.

Frost took so long to answer that I didn’t think she would. “It’s a long story. I’ll tell you about it once we’re out of this place.”

I smiled a little to myself. Sy saving her wasn’t a stretch of the imagination. He couldn’t help but get involved. It was one of my favorite things about him.

“Since we’re divulging our personal lives, what’s happening between the two of you?” she asked, still sounding sleepy.

“Nothing,” I said quickly. “He’s dating Katrina.”

She rolled over to face the fire and me. “But you like him?”

I shrugged, staring up into the darkness. “Everyone likes Sy.”

“That’s not what I mean. What if he isn’t serious with Katrina? Would that change anything?”

I shook my head. “Sy and I are friends. I don’t date my friends.”

She snorted. “I’m certainly no expert on the subject, but you should listen to your heart. You always seem to know what you want and resisting just because you’re afraid of losing someone will only ensure the fact that you will eventually lose them. Nothing stays the same forever. That doesn’t mean you don’t collect experiences along the way.”

I drew patterns on the floor with my fingernail. “Even if it changes your relationship for the worse?”

She shook her head. “At least you’d know—and you won’t come to the end of your life and wonder what it would’ve been like to try.”

“I don’t see any reason why Sy and I can’t be friends my entire life. Lust doesn’t last; neither does love. On the very rare occasion that you meet your soul mate it might, but it’s still a liability. I’d be used against him, he’d be used against me, we’d become resentful of each other, or we’d distance ourselves. That’s what my mother did. She distanced herself from my father until he was no more than a servant to her. Maybe that’s why he went on his adventures. Maybe he just wanted to feel something.” My jaw tightened. “That’s the way of my people. I’m not sure I could resist the instinct to protect myself.”

“I thought you didn’t remember your father.”

I looked up. “I remember enough, and I’ve heard stories.”

“I still think you should take a chance.”

“Like you do? Who are you seeing?” I fired back.

She flattened out on her back. “No one exactly, but I haven’t closed myself to the possibility.”

“It’s not like I’m some warrior virgin. I just don’t want to be tied down to one person.”

Frost stood up. “Good for you—but now we should find a way out. Time’s wasting.”

I finished off the rest of my meat and stood up. My jeans were mostly dry. Frost snapped her fingers over the fire and it went out without so much as a trail of smoke. I guessed her magic was back. She moved the light around with us as we searched for an exit, which I found about twenty feet above our heads. Finding barely existent footholds, I climbed to the top.

Once Frost was up, we headed back into the labyrinth’s tunnels. The silence was eerie and all encompassing. Without a speck of ambient noise, our every movement, shuffle, and step screamed out. If anything was nearby, it had to know we were coming, but given the silence, maybe nothing was out there. Nothing at all.

“It’s so quiet, so blank. Like no one has ever been here.” Frost wrapped her arms around herself. “Or maybe it’s my imagination.”

I shook my head. “No, I feel it too. There’s nothing in these corridors.”

“Doesn’t that worry you? We can’t get back if we went the wrong way,” Frost said. “The cavern, the room—”

“Yes, I remember. I’m aware.” That was a comforting thought. “We aren’t going the wrong way, though.” I spoke with more conviction than I felt.

Miles of twists and turns, without any sense of options, didn’t do much for my flagging confidence. Conversation grew rare as the weight of what we had already been through, and worry that we had somehow made a horrible mistake, began to take root.

As we came around yet another turn, the tunnel once again changed. It went from being completely empty to being packed with people. Almost standing shoulder to shoulder for as far as I could see were men, women, and children all dressed head to toe in pure white. There were two rows of them, facing each other, making two narrow paths that might be possible to squeeze through. They didn’t move or blink, standing still as statues.

Frost looked from them to me with wide eyes. “What are they?” she whispered.

I shook my head. They appeared to be human, but it was hard to tell. “Wait here,” I whispered. I crept up on the people, but the closer I got, the stranger they looked. Everyone’s eyes were a bright light blue that put the sky to shame. I waved my hand in front of the blank face of the person closet to me. Nothing. Not even a blink. What could do something like this? They were frozen.

I beckoned Frost forward. “Do you think this is some sort of magic?”

She shook her head slowly. “If it is, I can’t feel it. Are they alive?”

“Touch one and find out.”

She glanced at me. “No, thank you. We don’t know who these people are. For all we know, they came here the same as us and this happened to them.”

I shrugged and poked the man on the end with my fingernail. A spot of blood welled up on his white shirt. “Looks alive to me.”

Frost swallowed visibly. “This is going to be fun.” She pulled her hood up again, tying it tightly around her face.

“You need to take off the gloves,” I said.

“Not a chance. Do you know how easy it would be to kill someone?”

“You’re vulnerable if you’re not ready to fight. We can’t be responsible for these people.”

“It doesn’t mean we have to kill them.”

I didn’t want her to clear us a path or anything, but I wanted her to be on guard and prepared to battle. Who knew how long these people had been here or if they could even leave if we did wake them? For all I knew, they were as much a part of this maze as anything else we’d fought since arriving.

“Which row do you want?” I asked.

“Doesn’t matter.”

We stepped up in front of the parallel rows. “Good luck.”

Frost made one last check that she was as covered as possible.

I slipped between the rows, moving sideways, and suddenly there was a loud shriek behind me. Powerful hands grabbed at me. I swung my arm, hitting the person to my back as hard as I could. All of the people around me were moving now, tearing at my hair and neck, knocking me back and forth as they attacked from all sides.

Frost shouted as she too tried to fight off an attacker.

There was another war cry as fingernails clawed at my back and shoulders. Tearing myself away from the attack, I stumbled out from between the two statuelike people who now had blood—my blood—dripping from their frozen fingertips.

Frost was still batting at hands and fighting them off. Her hood had been torn off and her hair and face had been clawed. I reached into the fray and grabbed her shirt, yanking her from harm. She continued to fight a moment longer, eyes closed. My back and neck stung from the scratches. I gently touched the spots; chunks of flesh had been torn away. This complicated things.

“Bet you wish you’d removed your gloves now.”

She was already pulling them off, eyes bright and angry. Hanks of white hair were pulled loose from her braid. Trickles of crimson dripped from the gouges on her cheeks and forehead. “I don’t think it’s going to matter.” She pointed at her face then back to the inert people.

“Are they undead?”

Frost rolled her shoulders and made a useless effort to smooth her hair. “That’s what we’re going to find out.” She held up her hands, face twisted, chanting again.

Nothing happened.

Her jaw set at a stubborn angle, but still nothing changed. Finally her hands dropped back to her sides. “I have no idea what they are. I can’t kill them and I can’t control them. What else is there?”

I didn’t know, and for once it didn’t matter. “There’s no way to go around. We have to make it through.” I sized up the witch. She was tiny. Barely five feet, if that. I had doubts she’d be able to do what was necessary without magic.

“Can we find another path?”

“How? There were no other tunnels or options. This is it. We have to make it through, and I only see two ways to do it. One, we kill them—but that route depends on them being able to be killed and that isn’t looking likely. Or two, we endure the attacks and charge through at a hard run.”

Frost nodded. “It’s worth a try.”

I waited for her to consider her physical limitations, but she didn’t. Humans. “Do you think you can do it? I mean, I’ll try to knock over as many as I can, but they’re sturdy. When I bashed into one, he didn’t even budge. You could climb on my back, but you’d have to wear the backpack, and we can’t lose it.”

Her eyes narrowed. “Did you just offer me a piggyback ride?”

“Well, if you’re going to be touchy—”

“I am. I can manage on my own. You worry about you.”

I shrugged and started to braid my hair, so tight my scalp ached. The less I had to grab, the better. Frost followed suit. “I’d lose the layers.”

She started to remove her sweatshirt, but paused with it half over her shoulders, mouth creased with worry. “If I get trapped, don’t come back. It’s too risky.”

I wasn’t going to leave her. I may have talked big, but I wasn’t in the habit of abandoning my friends, or Frost—whatever she was. “Stay low. You’re small and that’s your advantage.”

I stretched my right arm, then my left, and shoved Frost’s layers in the backpack. I hunkered down, about twenty feet back from the people. Then I took a couple breaths and ran as fast as I could at them. The hands grabbed me, latching on to my arms and legs and body until I could barely step forward. Blood ran down my skin as I pulled through their razor-like fingers. I wasn’t even ten feet in. This wasn’t going to work.

I stopped fighting, hoping they would pull me back closer to where we’d entered, and crossed my arms over my chest in a futile attempt to protect myself a bit. They jostled and prodded and shoved and twisted me until I was so dizzy I couldn’t see straight. But I was moving in a steady one-way direction somewhere.

The hands were clammy and waxlike against my skin, but when I didn’t struggle, they didn’t cut me. The entire process was uncomfortable, for sure. Strange hands touched and prodded at me like I was a doll, but at least I’d make it out with my skin still attached. That had to count for something.