The Onyx Vial (Shadows of The Nine Book 1) (38 page)

Chapter 32

The front door hung like a loose tooth, half attached, useless, out of position. Hunter stood in the open frame and peered into the darkness of the house.

“Hello?”

Only his echo answered.

Then something metallic clanged in the bowels of the house.

“Madame Veren?” He reached for the dagger. Clutching the handle of a weapon he hoped he wouldn't need, he stepped inside.

By what little sunlight crept in with him, he could make out a hallway of closed doors leading away from him on the left and a wide opening to his right.

He peered into the room beyond it, his eyes adjusting, to find a sea of paper. Ottoman-islands and couch-corner crags were all that broke the jagged beige surface.

A swirling, tugging sensation formed in his stomach, but it wasn't from Switch.

What had happened here? Had Madame Veren been attacked?

He waded across the room, creating waves of potential paper cuts. He saw no blood, no obvious signs of a struggle. This was not the scene of an attack; it was just a giant mess, at the end of which he found himself standing in the doorway of a tiny kitchen.

The smell of cooked vegetables wafted from the small brick oven at the far end of the room. The scent overwhelmed him, setting his mouth watering.

A squat little woman shuffled over the stone floor.

He startled.

She yanked on the handle of a cabinet above her and the door groaned as she swung it open.

“Um. Madame Veren?”

The woman stopped and turned to face him.

Hunter was hit with the sudden, distinct image of a mole.

The woman’s eyes were irisless black dots in her round face. Her puffy curls of reddish brown hair were dirty and unmanaged. Her pointy, protruding nose and equally sharp, narrow lips convinced Hunter she was part rodent.

“I am,” she replied.

Hunter stared at her, confused.

“What can I do for you?” she prompted, her voice the pitch of a rusty hinge.

It reminded him of her front door. The woman’s house had been ransacked and she stood, unconcerned by the stranger who’d appeared in her kitchen? Hunter stumbled over his reply. “I—I thought that—” he jabbed a thumb in the direction he’d come from, “did you know your door is busted down?”

Madame Veren closed her largish eyes and nodded. “Has been,” she said, her lids popping open again. “You didn’t come all this way to tell me that, Hunter.”

“How did you…?” Bardoc must've told her.

She turned away from him and stuck her hand in the cupboard. “Hungry?” she asked, eyeing him over her shoulder. She removed two plates and set them on the stone counter. Then she pulled open a drawer, stuffed her hands in some mitts, and plucked the cookware out of the oven.

Hunter swallowed the saliva collecting under his tongue as she placed the dish—brimming with a glazed assortment of vegetables—onto the counter. He forced his eyes away. He didn’t want to be hungry. There was something discomforting about this woman—this house.

"You're late," she growled, grabbing a serving spoon from a drawer and scooping the myriad of vegetables onto the plates.

"I'm sorry," he said. "I couldn't have gone any faster. Also, you live at the center of a maze. That doesn't exactly make the front door easy to find."

Madame Veren shrugged. "That is the point." She gestured at the table. "Sit. You must be hungry."

Hunter gritted his teeth. His stomach said stay, eat, rest—there's nothing to worry about. But his mind was itching with wariness.

Madame Veren was next to him in a blink, her small hand clutching his wrist like a python. For such a tiny woman, she had a mighty grip. “Sit. Eat,” she said.

Hunter stared at her, the scent of the vegetables invading his nostrils, anxiety constricting his throat. He couldn’t deny he was hungry. But he couldn’t deny that she made him uncomfortable either. Switch's wind whorled inside of him. She must've sensed his anxiety, because he could sense her worry for him.

“I’ll not let you starve,” Madame Veren insisted.

Hunter frowned. He willed Switch to relax, but realized
he’d
have to relax in order to convince
her
. In the end, his stomach won out. “Alright."

Madame Veren smiled—her small teeth not nearly as sharp and rodent-like as he imagined—and released his arm.

He sighed in relief.

She took the plates from the counter and carefully walked them to the table. "Don't make me force you to sit, Hunter," she warned, setting a plate in front of him.

This time, he obeyed her, and tried not to drool at the sight of the food.

Once he took a bite, he practically inhaled the rest. He ate so quickly he barely recognized what the vegetables were—even as he tasted them on his tongue. All he cared to know was that they were crisp and juicy with flavor.

By the time he'd cleaned his plate he was stuffed and drowsy.

He looked over. Madame Veren had barely eaten two bites. She stared at him, almost bewildered, her forkful of vegetables hovering halfway to her slack mouth.

He grinned sheepishly. "Sorry, I haven't eaten real food in a while."

Madame Veren blinked and placed the fork back on her plate. "Would you like more?"

"Actually," he said, realizing just how tired he was, "is there somewhere I could rest for a while?" He hoped she didn't say the living room. He didn't feel like cleaning anything just so he could sit on it.

Madame Veren nodded. "First room on the right," she said, pointing to the hallway opening behind her.

He started to stand, but his legs felt so heavy he almost didn't want to.

"I'm sorry," she added.

Hunter frowned. "Why?" But then his eyelids drooped and his arms got heavy.

She stood, pulling his plate away from him and catching his head as it fell forward. "I didn't realize you'd be so tired," She laid his head gently on the table. "I wouldn't have had to drug you."

Chapter 33

Hunter stirred, registering the sounds of banging. Shouts.

He opened his eyes. Panic shot through him. He stood too fast and blood rushed behind his eyes. He gripped the chair back and blinked hard to reorient his vision.

A golden glow stretched across the house. Sunset? The room was cold, empty. Madame Veren was gone.

He reached to his hip, heart in his throat. But the dagger was still there.

"Hunter!"

"Tehya?" he croaked, voice rough from sleep.

"Hunter!" Several voices at once. The pounding grew insistent.

He rushed to the door as fast as his spinning vision would allow, and flung it open.

Perry, Tehya, and Dilyn crowded the doorway.

"We have to get you out of here," Perry said, grabbing his arm.

"Why?"

"It's a trap, Hunter," Tehya whimpered.

At that moment, a swirling tug in his chest signaled Switch's distress.

Hunter scrambled away from the table, "What are you talking about?" he asked. "Your father—"

"Is a traitor." She grabbed his hand. "We'll explain everything once you're safe."

Hunter shook his head to clear the confusion, but it stuck there. "What?"

They headed for the door. "They're coming for you," she said.

"Who?"

"The Huntsmen," Dilyn answered as they burst into the front yard.

Hunter barely had time to notice that the courtyard, which had been verdant and flourishing when he'd entered, now looked bleak, on the verge of winter. And then something hissed behind them. They turned to see a white arrow lodged in the doorframe, the feathers sparking blue.

With a mighty
whomp
, the house burst into flames.

"We're too late."

Chapter 34

The setting sun bathed the walled-in grounds of the distant estate in cherry gold. From Ariana’s view astride the Stoalvenger, it was nothing more than a patch of color amidst the pure white snow. But she was headed in the right direction. She knew it. She could hear it.

Rain.

Faint, familiar, and out of place, the noise was a beacon. The Onyx Vial was near.

She dug her heels into the Stoalvenger’s sides, urging her on. She worked her powerful muscles, her wings cutting through the air like oars through water, each beat spurring them forward.

The estate grew larger as night overtook the sky. The patch of color became a swath of brown and faded green.

She guided the Stoalvenger to the ground in the little clearing. The moment the hooves touched down, the crisp, fresh winter air was overwhelmed by the sickly-sweet scent of dried flowers on the verge of rot. She slid off the Stoalvenger’s back and tried not to gag as she peered down the long, treelined pathway they’d passed over coming in.

There was no obvious sign of danger—no Huntsmen or dead bodies in the road—but the branches reached ominously toward the empty space with long, skeletal fingers. Dagger-sharp icicles hung from the tips like gleaming overgrown nails.

She shuddered and turned toward the hedge-lined gardens.

This view was no less disturbing.

Leafless black vines snaked along the hedge walls, a tangle of tentacles devouring them whole, leaving dark, gaping maws into which she could see only rot and ruin.

Her stomach knotted itself around her heart and she swallowed her panic, listening for the sound of the rain.

It was there. Distant. Somewhere beyond this courtyard. Toward the middle gap. Dried flowers hung limp and frozen from the archway.

Something wasn't right. This place reeked of death. Hunter had come here willingly?

She shook her head, took a deep breath, and proceeded.

But she hadn't taken more than two steps into the corridor when she stopped cold.

A small, rodent-like woman, stood in her way, arms outstretched. She stared at Ariana with wide, vacant eyes—the irises a milky white. Her mouth hung half-open, revealing a pale pink tongue—a garish contrast to her ashen-green skin. Her face was a pantomime of horror, pain, confusion.

She appeared to have been burned alive.

Ariana’s stomach clenched. Bile crept up her throat. Tearing her eyes from the woman’s lifeless face, she turned and ran back through the arch, dropping to her knees beside the Stoalvenger, choking back her urge to retch. But there wasn't time. She had to get herself together.

She forced herself back to her feet. The Vial continued to call to her. It was somewhere close by. Whether that meant Hunter was too, she didn’t know. But she couldn’t ignore the fact that if she found him, she might only find a dead body.

As she got a handhold on the Stoalvenger and prepared to mount, a distant scream shattered the looming silence. 

Ariana’s blood ran cold. That voice, even without words, was unmistakable.

“Tehya.”

Ariana launched herself onto the Stoalvenger’s back. She jabbed her heels into the horse's sides. She beat her wings and shot into the air.

The sun had set, but the night had yet to slip on its inky black cloak. Taking to the sky was a risk if the Huntsmen were near, but it was the fastest way to find her. She’d just have to hope it was dark enough that she wouldn’t be spotted.

They sailed over the hedge, swiftly gaining altitude.

Ariana scanned the brown hedges and the frozen, withered gardens contained in them. But her eyes quickly found a source of light ahead, nestled in the dark mass of hedge that wove inside and around itself in the centermost section of the leaf-shaped grounds.

As she drew closer, the sounds of the Vial grew to a gale, and she could make out a massive diamond-shaped courtyard, its center alight with flame. Several dark shapes dotted the blue-white light.

Huntsmen.

She guided the Stoalvenger down to a section of path a safe distance from the entrance, leapt off her back, and ran.

She could hardly think for all the noise the Vial made in her head. She stopped at the entrance and peered past a broad arcing set of stone steps that led into the massive courtyard, her eyes on the island in the center of a body of water. Its smooth surface reflected the light of the hungry flames eating away at a house at the far side.

Cast in shadow by the harsh light were more than a dozen figures in some kind of standoff on the island. She squinted, trying to bring them into focus.

Her breath caught.

Hunter stood in the center of the cluster of black-clad Huntsmen. His arm outstretched, he waved the pointed tip of a dagger—its glowing handle she recognized instantly as the Onyx Vial—at the only men who had not given him a wide berth.

But he didn’t fight them. He couldn’t.

They were using Perry, Dilyn and Tehya as human shields.

Something shifted and crunched to her right. Ariana spun out of the archway and pressed her back against the hedge. A Huntsman stalked past.

She stood frozen, bracing for someone to come around the corner, listening.

But after a minute or two of nothing, she eased off the hedge, and crept as far into the threshold as she dared. She peered into the courtyard again, this time her focus on the inside perimeter.

There were Huntsmen backed up to the hedge on every step until the water’s edge. Their bows were drawn, arrows loaded and aimed at the center island. Farther on, in the left and right corners of the courtyard, sprawling trees cast deep, menacing shadows on the islands they crowded.

Ariana had no doubt there were more Huntsmen concealed. But they were cut off from the center island. There was only one other way onto it; a long wooden bridge, easily the length of eight horses in a line, starting from the stone steps.

She stood no chance of crossing unnoticed.

Over the Vial's roaring wind and hammering rain, Ariana heard Hunter yell, “Stay back! I swear I’ll kill anyone who comes near me!”

“Surrender, boy,” snarled a Hunstman. “Or you’ll be dead before you have the chance to strike.”

On the steps, the Huntsmen’s bows drew taut.

“Kill me, and there won’t be a soul to hand it to your King,” Hunter spat.

So he knew the score. Good. At least he wouldn’t do anything foolish.

The Huntsman holding Tehya, one arm wrapped around her body, the other around her neck like a noose, moved forward. Tehya’s mouth opened and shut as she gasped for air. She kicked her legs feebly.

“Then your friends will die in your place,” he announced.

This shouldn't be happening. Tehya shouldn't be here. None of them should.

Her anger redirected from the Huntsmen to her former Instructor.

Bardoc.

His name tasted bitter on her tongue. There was not a word vile enough to accompany his name. So she spewed them all at him under her breath.

Tehya would
not
die in her mother's place.

She let her senses take over, gauging the amount of water she had to work with by focusing on her etâme. There was plenty. She could easily douse the flames on the house. And the night’s temperature was cold enough that she could use the air to form ice. But what to do with it?  

“You hurt her, I’ll... use it myself,” Hunter challenged.

Ariana grimaced, her focus shattering. “Hunter, you blocker…”

“We can’t have that,” the Huntsman said. Too calmly. His arm lifted.

No. She gritted her teeth as bowstrings creaked under new tension.

“Hold,” she heard one of the archers order. “Wait for the signal.”

She held her breath, her eyes locked on the Huntsman’s raised hand.

If Hunter was killed, the Vial would never be destroyed. He had to surrender. Or at least pretend to until she could find a way to get them out alive.

“No, wait,” Hunter said.

The Hunstman’s fingers twitched.

Ariana’s heart leapt in her throat.

Then both Hunter and the Huntsman lowered their arms, mutually standing down.

Ariana sighed in relief.

She didn't register the twang of the bowstring until she saw Hunter fall, the firelight illuminating the shaft of an arrow in his chest.