Reign of Shadows (20 page)

I
MOVED WITH
all the stealth Sivo had taught me, retracing the route I had taken with Fowler, my ears straining, my nostrils flaring, filtering smells. Digger traveled several paces behind me, his paws padding lightly on the ground with a cheerful rhythm in direct opposition to the sinister sounds of the infinite night. Every once in a while he would run ahead of me and then backtrack, dashing past my side almost as though he was playing with me.

Our friendship existed on his terms. He approached me only when I stopped. He chose when I could touch him. He chose when to sniff me, when to graze me with that looping tail of his.
If I climbed a tree, sometimes he joined me. Other times he ran off, not returning for several hours. I didn't mind. I was glad for his company on any terms.

I decided to head south and follow the Kangese River before turning west to Relhok City. I would briefly cross into Lagonia's lands. Sivo's lessons played over in my mind. He had taught me all about the kingdom—my kingdom, as he had frequently reminded me. He had schooled me in its geography. Beyond that, he told me about the other kingdoms that surrounded Relhok: Neliam, Carondale, and Lagonia. He had even imparted everything he knew about the far distant lands on the other side of our seas. Not that any of that mattered greatly now. I only needed to worry about reaching the capital, giving wide berth to the villages and cities that may or may not even exist anymore along the way.

Sivo had provided me with a mental picture of the world, including how it used to be and what it was like now—at least as much as he knew from residing in seclusion.

The world as it truly was, what it was actually like to live in . . . Fowler taught me that lesson.

The world was a merciless place. Hard and cruel. Except when you found someone to trust and love. Life, however fleeting, possessed meaning then. Knowing Fowler and loving him had given my life that meaning. I could always cling to that. I always would. Until the end.

I was being followed.

At first it was just a vague sense—a possibility that I dismissed
as a result of my constant state of vigilance.

I listened but could hear nothing over the wind and drum of my own heart. Digger had left on one of his private excursions a while ago, and I tried not to long for him too hard. He was a wild animal that roamed where he wished. He wasn't a pet. Shaking my head, I told myself I was just being overly anxious. Out here, alone, my nerves were a stretched string ready to snap.

It was midlight again. I could tell by the crispness draped over the pungent marshland I presently trekked across. The air felt less cold on my skin, too. I was covering good ground at least, despite the nasty stretch of bog sucking and pulling at my boots.

It wasn't an outright swampland. Each step plunged me down with a squish, mud splattering all the way up to my knees. I pushed on faster, my strides gobbling up ground, determined to put more distance between Ortley and me. Fowler and me.

I doubted Fowler would give pursuit. He had dropped his walls to trust me, and I had left him. I doubted he would understand and overcome that betrayal easily. No, he would push on for Allu.

And that was for the best—no matter how it swiped a claw at my heart.

Even the bitter sting of my thoughts didn't block out the prickle at the back of my neck. The sensation at my nape swept up, pulling my skull tight. I slowed my strides and stopped, immediately sinking deeper.

Standing still, I listened. It was there. A steady whooshing that fell evenly, like the sound a towel makes when it's whipped
in the air. It was more than that sound though. It was a sense, too. Something was coming in fast and hard at my back. Given that it was midlight, this wasn't a dweller. I turned my head left and right, assessing for a place to hide from whatever it was that was coming. I was out in the open, a stretch of barren landscape with only a few shrubs and far-off trees. My flesh puckered to gooseflesh. I was exposed and vulnerable.

Swallowing back a wet breath, I ran hard for the nearest tree, splashing through the bog. In my haste, I tripped once and ate a mouthful of foul water. Spewing the sludge from my face, I pushed back up to my feet and kept going.

The wind shook the tree's branches. They sounded brittle, but I only hoped they were sturdy enough and had enough leaves to provide some cover from whoever was out there. Slogging through the mud, I told myself it would have to do. Midlight was already fading. I didn't want to spend the day stuck up in a tree if I didn't have to. Hopefully dwellers avoided this swamp like they did lakes.

Reaching the tree, I climbed it easily, scaling up its length, muttering one of Fowler's curses. It creaked under my weight, bits of bark flying off and crumbling under my clawing fingers. One of my nails cracked. I pushed on, whimpering as a sliver of wood imbedded itself in my palm.

The trunk was nowhere near as large as those of the trees that had surrounded Ortley. It swayed in the wind as I reached as high as I could go. It was with some effort that I balanced myself in the nest of fragile branches. Finding as solid a perch as I could,
I waited, listening again to all the obvious and not so obvious sounds around me.

The whooshing grew louder. I turned in its direction, hanging on tightly from my position. It was a person. I marked the even two-footed tread, the loping gait. That one foot . . . the right foot that always hit the ground just a fraction harder.

Fowler.

Relief coursed through me. My head dropped and I sagged, tension slipping from my shoulders. Outrage followed, eclipsing all else. I adjusted my weight, stiffening at the sudden protesting crack of a branch. My nails dug deeper into rough bark. Leaving him was the hardest thing I had ever done. Even harder than leaving Sivo and Perla. I didn't know if I had the strength in me to do it again.

I waited, hoping against all hope that he might pass the tree and keep going. It was possible. Any tracks would be hard to read in this bog. Any steps I'd taken had to be swallowed back up the instant I made them. If I could just hold silent and use the branches for cover and not make a sound—

“Are you going to come down from there or am I going to have to come up and get you?”

My heart jumped in my chest at the deep stroke of his familiar voice. “What are you doing here?”

“I thought that would be obvious.”

I clutched the branches and leaned down to call to him. “You should have let me go, Fowler. I didn't want you to follow me.”

“I gathered that, seeing how you tricked me into drinking a sleeping draft.”

I batted back the niggle of guilt over that. “I wouldn't have had to do that if you'd just let me go.”

“Luna, come down here so—”

“No!”

With a curse, he grabbed onto the tree and started to climb up.

“What are you doing?” I cried.

“You won't come down to talk to me, so I'm coming up.” The tree shook with his weight and movement.

“You can't make me go back with you, Fowler,” I said as he came to a stop on the branch across from me.

I braced myself, prepared for his argument. Instead, he circled the back of my neck, leaned forward, and covered my lips with his. The familiar scent of him overwhelmed me, heady and male with that undercurrent of wind and woods.

My heart lurched to my throat. He kissed me long and hard. There was punishment in it, but also something desperate and needy. I felt its echo run through me.

When we finally broke apart, I breathed in the changing air. I felt dizzy and more confused than ever. Air crashed from my lips like I had run a great distance.

Turning my head sideways, I softly uttered, “Midlight is gone.”

“I know,” he replied.

I dipped my head, hoping it somehow lessened his impact on me. He couldn't stare directly at my face, and his mouth wouldn't be so close, the memory of his taste beckoning me in
that hairbreadth of space between us.

“Fowler,” I began. “Think about all these girls dying. Because of me.”

“Not because of you,” he returned. “Because of a madman.”

“But if he had me, the killing would stop.”

“You can't be sure of that. He kills all the time. Indiscriminately. That's what he does.”

I angled my head, mulling over his words. There was an edge to his voice I had never heard before.

“I can't go with you. I can't leave Relhok while this is happening.” I winced at the volume of my voice. I lowered it to say, “I won't be able to live with myself.”

“And what about me? Us?” He hated to ask the question. I could hear that in his voice. He hated that need. He hated exposing that vulnerability in himself.

A lump rose in my throat. “You'll go on without me. To Allu.” I stopped to swallow again, fighting back that lump. “You'll find other people. Good people and you will—”

“No,” he bit out, almost as though he sensed I was intimating that someday he would find someone else to love. “You can't go. You don't know. You don't understand—”

“What? What don't I understand, Fowler?”

“You don't understand what kind of man my father is!”

I jerked as though slapped. Everything inside of me repelled away from him. My spine arched. Another fingernail split from the pressure of my grip.

His father.
Father.
The word reverberated through me and
my stomach twisted. I pressed a hand to my belly and swallowed back the bile. “Your father?”

I felt him nod. His clothing rustled and a branch groaned as he shifted closer to me, his voice a feverish rush. “Don't look like that, Luna. It's not—”

“The high chancellor . . . Cullan . . . he is your father? The king?”

“Yes. But I left. Two years ago—”

“Your father killed my parents.” The truth washed over me awfully and settled like poison in my stomach, curdling there. I pressed a hand to my mouth, certain I was going to be sick.

I peeled back my fingers to choke, “When you found out who I was back in Ortley . . . why didn't you tell me then?” My voice sounded alarmingly calm to my ears despite all that I was feeling. It felt like the person closest to me in the world had just perished with all the unfairness of a vicious and sudden death. I was left grieving, sick to my stomach, and bewildered.

“I couldn't. I didn't want you to do what you're doing now.”

“Which is what, Fowler?”

“Looking the way you do. Like you think I'm a part of him,” he snapped, his voice fierce and raw. A curse followed and I heard the flutter of his hair as he dragged a hand through it.

“You are,” I whispered, working my lips, trying to suddenly rid the taste of him from me. My eyes stung and I blinked them rapidly, shaking my head. “You're his son.”

A new sound rose, penetrating over the murmuring wind. We stopped. Not a word. Not a move. I couldn't even hear
Fowler breathing beside me anymore.

The swamp stirred, the wet ground shifting, bubbling like soup in a pot.

Fowler whispered my name in warning. Squelching sounds gurgled under us.

I nodded and bit my lip to cut off all sound. I didn't need to see to know what was happening. Dwellers were waking, rousing in the swampy ground.

The ground right below our tree frothed and rustled. Clawed fingers slapped mud and silt. A dweller pulled itself free near the base of the trunk with a great sucking sound.

More of them came. They were pulling free everywhere, the mud sucking and sluicing down their stout bodies as though the swamp wanted to keep them buried forever. I assessed the landscape, counting over twenty. Maybe the ground was easier to penetrate here. There were so many, groaning as they came to life, their heavy bodies roiling, squelching the sodden earth.

Fowler's hand closed over mine. I squeezed back. We held ourselves as still as stone. I didn't dare make a sound. I held my breath, my fingers flexing against his warm flesh.

A cracking sound split the air and suddenly the tree gave out. It tilted to the side, jostling us in the branches. I lost my balance and fell forward. My legs swung free, but I locked my arms around a branch. A sharp cry escaped before I could smother it.

Fowler's arm wrapped around my waist and hauled me back up, plastering me against him. I panted into his neck, clinging to him.

“I got you. I got you.”

I nodded fiercely, a hot tear spilling down my cheek. I buried my face in his chest, listening as the dwellers rumbled and surged against the tree, aware of us now. The tree shuddered against the force of their actions.

They started battering the base with their bodies. I clung tightly to Fowler. He held on to the tree for both of us.

“It can't support us,” Fowler whispered.

I nodded, pressing my lips against his skin directly above his collar. This was it.

The pack of dwellers was frothing under us, clawing and tearing at the trunk, those horrible wet breaths sawing from their lips. The tree made another crunching sound and jerked a foot down. My stomach bottomed out. I whimpered and bit my lip until I tasted the coppery flow of blood against my teeth.

“Luna, Luna.” Fowler's steady voice drew my attention to him. “They're not going to go away.”

I bobbed my head, latching on to the sound of his voice, so calm and mesmerizing. I inhaled, searching for composure. If I wanted to live, if either one of us was going to have a chance, then I couldn't be a hysterical mess.

“We can't both stay up here.” I nodded again, even though his words did not fully penetrate. Was he saying we were going to have to make a dash for it? Through all those dwellers? I bit back a cry as the tree jerked again with a splinter of wood. Even if we fought our way free, how could we clear them without getting a fatal dose of toxin from so many receptors?

Fowler released a deep breath and cupped one hand against my face, his thumb stroking my cheek tenderly. “Luna, I don't regret it. Any of it. Not since the first moment I met you in that forest.” He paused with a deep inhale. “Understand me?”