Volcrian's Hunt (The Cat's Eye Chronicles) (28 page)

"Crash?" she called, and he looked back at her, raising one eyebrow.

With a deep breath, she said, “I need to know something.”

“What?” he asked.

“If we're going to travel together, I need to know that you're not keeping anything from me.” There, she said it. It was hard enough to trust him—he was a trained killer, after all, and now some sort of demon. She still didn't understand all of the details. But she had to learn more, to rediscover him. She couldn't let this get in the way of their journey.

Crash looked at her calmly, giving thought to her words, then slowly nodded. "Alright," he said. "No more secrets."

Sora was surprised that he had agreed so easily. Her lips parted, letting out a silent breath of relief. She had been braced for an argument, some sort of denial or justification. But none was forthcoming.

“Is that all?” he asked.

“Uh...yes.”

“Alright.”

They continued walking. Sora squinted as the sand blew up in her eyes. Wind and time had turned the stone to a fine chalk. It clung stubbornly to her clothes and hands, glittering mischievously, caking under her nails and coating her boots.

She felt slightly disappointed. Despite her words, nothing had changed at all. He was still quiet, in fact, probably more so now than he had been for the past few days.
What did you expect?
her inner voice chided.
If you have questions, just ask!
The thought was still intimidating. For so long, she had respected his closed manner. His silence was like a fortress, an impenetrable wall that needed to be climbed.
Silly,
she told herself.
Just say something.

Sora blurted out the first thing that came to mind. "Laina didn't see anything, did she?"

“See what?” he responded.

“Your...uh...?”

"Transformation," he interjected. "No, I believe she fainted." She heard the distaste in his voice.

“That's fortunate,” she said helpfully.

Crash shook his head. “I should have given it more thought...but there wasn't time.”

Sora frowned, thinking back on the horrible experience. There had been a sound...a strange howling noise. She shuddered. Had it been an echo of the ravine, or something more? Something alive?

She glanced upward at the massive cliffs. She hated to think of what might have happened if Crash hadn't dived after her. She would be a bloodied, flattened mess on the ravine floor.

She remembered his wings. His strange, hardened skin, black as night. Claws....

“What if you hadn't come out of it?” she asked suddenly. “Your transformation? That...creature? What if you'd remained in your other form?”

Crash paused. “Then you would have been in danger.”

His blunt answer took her off-guard. Sora stared at his bare back, the firm muscles and broad shoulders. She was speechless for a moment. “You mean...you would have attacked me?” she asked softly. A bit of fear bloomed in her. She could remember the intensity of the monster, its dark aura, the way her body had shuddered and convulsed.

He shook his head. “I knew who you were, I knew what I was doing, but....” his words hung in the air.

“You can't always control it, can you?” she asked.

“No, I can't.”

“Are all of your people like that? Barely containing this...this
thing
....?”

He shook his head again. “Most, maybe. But there are those who embrace the demon and learn to summon it, to use it. It's a long and difficult process. For some, it takes a lifetime.”

Sora frowned at this. “Why don't you?” she asked. It seemed like a worthy cause, if it would make him safer, more in control.

He shrugged. “There are other dangers in using one's demon.”

There it was—the half-answer she had expected. She waited for him to elaborate, but he didn't. She pushed on. “What kind of dangers?”

He was definitely growing uncomfortable. She could tell by his quickening pace, the set of his shoulders. She hurried until she was directly behind him, almost at his side. She reached out and touched his arm. “Crash?”

He flinched slightly. When he looked at her, his expression was hard, guarded. “We are not like the Dracians,” he said. “Our other form is not ourselves. It is a separate creature.”

“I don't understand,” she said cautiously.

He sighed, irritated, rubbing his hand across his face. “So many questions!” he suddenly growled.

Sora paused, but she didn't retreat as she once had. Instead, she glared at him. “We agreed—no more secrets.”

“I know,” he said harshly, giving her a cold look. Then he went back to walking, focused on the trail in front of them. “You're not going to like what you hear.”

“I'm prepared,” she said immediately.
Am I?
She pushed the thought away.

When Crash spoke next, he sounded angry, impatient. She had seen him like this before—but not for a long time. “Inside each of the Unnamed, there is a shard of the Dark God,” he said. “Some of us suppress it, others of us embrace it. Those who embrace the Dark God, who learn to summon and use its power...the demon takes over their minds. They become...twisted.” He looked at her as though he truly wanted her to understand—as though his words carried a terrible weight. “They become the demon, and the man is lost.”

Sora felt the hair prickle on the back of her arms. “Forever?” she finally asked.

He nodded.

She frowned. “And this can happen to you?”

Crash turned back to the path ahead. “Yes.”

It felt as though something had just slid into place. She understood, suddenly, why he had left behind his home, his traditions. And she understood the darkness she saw in him, the moments when he turned away, when he seemed like an untouchable force.

An awkward silence enveloped them. She ran her hand down her staff anxiously, in search of something to say that would bring him back.

“And what of your life in the Hive?” she asked. She remembered the word he had used from the day before. A colony, he had explained. “Did you have a family? Brothers or sisters?”

“We are all brothers and sisters in the Hive,” Crash replied. “We are raised communally.”

Sora's brow furrowed. “That must make marriage difficult,” she said, trying for humor.

“We don't marry.”

“Ah....”

“We have seasonal festivals where men and women can join,” he explained.

Sora felt the conversation take a different turn. She hesitated, wondering if this was truly worth knowing about—but curiosity got the best of her. “Join...? You mean...make love?”

An odd expression passed over Crash's face. “You could call it that.”

A blush crept up from her neckline. She had very little experience in that arena. Lily, her handmaid, had given her all sorts of bawdy details about young men and haystacks. But as a member of the nobility, she had been expected to wait for marriage. Which, of course, had never happened.

Occasionally she thought about it, but since living with her mother, the subject hadn't come up. Which was probably a blessing. She couldn't imagine how that conversation would go.

“And the women of your race...prefer this?” she asked with a sideways glance. “Not to be married?” It was a foreign concept. She had been raised with only one model for a family, one way of rearing children. Everything he was telling her seemed wrong, somehow cruel.

“They do.”

She fidgeted with her staff. “And have you participated in these...festivals....?”

He cast a glance at her. A wry grin curved along the corners of his mouth. He looked at her a little too long, and it made her stomach squirm, her cheeks flush self-consciously. “Several times,” he said. “Would you like more details?”

“Uh, no, I'm fine,” she said briefly.
Yes!
her mind admonished.
Yes, ask him!
No, it would be far too awkward, she could already feel the blush spreading from her cheeks up to her forehead. She wondered what he must think of her. She felt terribly clumsy and naïve at that moment.

His smile widened and he laughed softly, turning away. “Innocent,” he murmured.

Sora frowned, trying to regain her speech. “Well...uhm,” she licked her lips. “Some people value innocence.” Her blush deepened, and she wondered why she felt the need to defend herself.

“A valid point,” he said, and met her eyes again. He held her gaze intently.

Sora almost tripped over her own feet. She slowed down a bit, allowing him to move in front of her. She needed a moment to regain her composure. So Crash had been with women in his colony—fine, she hadn't expected him to be a virgin. He had a good handful of years on her, anyway—seven or eight; she had never asked directly. Still, for some reason, the thought of him being with a woman of the Sixth Race...some tall, beautiful woman who had no qualms about joining...who was experienced in the ways of making love....

Her thoughts made her choke. More disturbing was how her body reacted—she felt warm, slightly weak....She forced her mind away from that territory.
Dangerous,
she told herself,
to be thinking of him like that.

Suddenly the assassin stopped in his tracks. Walking up to him, she noticed that he was staring hard into the distance. Concerned, she said quietly, "What is it?"

“Listen,” he said.

Sora paused, turning her head. It took a long moment. Then, from the hollow distance, she heard a reverberating howl. It began with the low-pitched ferocity of a wolf, then grew in volume, amplified by the sunstone walls. It ended in the high shriek of a wildcat.

A shudder went down her spine. She almost dropped her staff.

“What was that?” she asked, her mouth dry.

“I don't know,” Crash said, then he turned to look back the way they'd come. “But it's getting closer.”

“What should we do?”

“Run.”

Crash bolted down the crevice, grabbing her hand and hauling her behind him. It took a moment for Sora's legs to catch up. She was still stunned by the eerie howl. Now that she was listening for it, she heard another one begin. It rumbled low to the ground, then ended high in the air, a shrill and furious pitch. Her breath caught. It was the same howl that had shaken her from the rock bridge. Fear raced down her spine, through her legs and into her boots.

“Faster,” Crash breathed.

Within a minute, she heard another sound—the thunder of feet against the ground. Or paws. A creature of some kind. She chanced a look over her shoulder, but all she saw was a rising cloud of white dust, kicked up from whatever was following them.

“We're trapped,” she panted. “We should save our energy and fight.”

“Look ahead,” Crash said, and pointed.

Sora narrowed her eyes, squinting into the white distance. “What?” she asked.

“It looks like a wall...or perhaps a door. I think we can climb it.” He didn't sound very certain.

Sora gripped her staff, her mind whirling, trying to come up with a solution. “How far?” she panted.

“Under a mile.”

So they would reach a dead-end. The thought unnerved her. But given the circumstances, they could only keep running. She mentally reached out to her Cat's Eye, hoping for some sign, some indication of what to do.
Yes,
the necklace breathed.
This way.

Suddenly, the ground dropped out from under them. The sand hid a steep slope from their eyes. They skidded downward, holding each other for balance, then staggered back to their feet at the bottom. They leapt back into a full run, sprinting onward, moving as one. The creature's howls increased in volume.

Finally, the end of the ravine came into view. Sora would have gasped if she weren't running for her life. True to Crash's words, there appeared to be a wall in the distance, but as they neared, she noted strange irregularities along its surface. No, not a wall—a door. A giant door, perhaps hundreds of feet high, stretching far up the edge of the ravine. No human could have opened it—or built it, she suspected. Perhaps an ancient relic from the Harpies. She had difficulty thinking it was real, it was so large.

As they grew closer, bold designs carved by ancient hands stood out on the door's surface: suns and moons, stars, swirls and lettering. The doors were carved from sunstone, as smooth as glass.

“Climb!” Crash yelled, and he threw himself on the doors, starting upward at a formidable pace.

Sora stared after him, shocked. Climb? The doors looked shiny and slick, though the carved shapes would offer handholds and footholds. But the howling was now so intense that it made her head hurt. It ricocheted off the walls, echoing through the cavern. The creature was almost upon them.

She shouldered her staff. When she reached the wall, she used her momentum to run up its side, then grabbed onto a large star-shaped carving that was several yards above the ground. She pulled her weight up the side of the door, but she couldn't move half as fast as the assassin.