Raven Nightshade's Arc

Chapter 8 of 8

The dead wall lay in two frozen halves behind them. Raven led the way down the black stair, her people close at her back. Then the steps split. Two dark mouths yawned before her, one left, one right. Cold air breathed from both. She stopped. Somewhere below waited the feeder, the living thing that kept every curse alive. A wrong turn would cost time she did not have. She had promised her twins she would come home. Each hour spent in the dark broke that promise a little more. Lyra knelt and pressed her palm to the stone. Her purple eyes went distant. "I feel something," she said. "A heartbeat. But it's faint. The rock is thick." She turned her hand left, then right. Her mouth tightened. "Both ways feel the same to me. I can't split it." Armin stepped past them. The Keeper of the Fog studied the two openings with his dark eyes. "Let the fog find the path," he said. He raised one hand. Gray mist poured from his sleeve and split, sliding into both tunnels at once. He closed his eyes and listened through it. "The left runs shallow. It ends in fallen rock. The right drops deeper." His jaw set. "But the right also has a wall of old bone. My mist can't pass it." Raven cursed. Two paths, and neither one certain. Talon crouched beside her, wiping frost from his blades. Her brother had been dead to her for five years, and still he read her like an open page. "You want to save time," he said. "So we don't guess. We split." Raven shook her head. "If the feeder knows we're coming, splitting is how it picks us off." "Then we go fast and we don't stay apart long." Talon nodded toward Lyra. "She senses hearts through stone. Send her with me down the deep side. If we find the feeder, she'll feel it grow. If we find bone and a dead end, we turn back and follow you." Lyra rose and stood at his side without a word. Above them, Ayla's silver crystal glowed at the stairhead, holding the shadows back. "I'll keep the light between you," Ayla called down. "If either group screams, I'll know which way." Raven hated it. But every breath spent arguing was a breath stolen from her children. "Fine," she said. "Lyra and Talon, take the deep stair. Ayla, Armin, and I take the left. First to find the feeder calls out." Talon touched two fingers to his brow. Then he and Lyra dropped into the right tunnel and the dark swallowed them. Raven turned to the left mouth. Armin sent his mist ahead. She started down with Ayla beside her, the crystal lighting the steps. The choice was made. Now the dark held only one question. Which of them would reach the feeder first, and what would it do to whoever came alone.