Endless Knight (The Arcana Chronicles #2)(32)

She frowned at him, then said to the group, “I’m Lark. And we’re in trouble.”





12

“Why shouldn’t I kill you right now?” Selena demanded with her bow aimed at the girl’s face. “Why should we trust anything you have to say?”

“Because I’ve come here as an ally,” she said. “And to prove myself, I’m about to save your asses.”

Selena gave a laugh and drew back farther on her bowstring.

Finn and I gaped at the Archer. “Let her talk!” he said.

“She’s been following us for days? And now all of a sudden she’s here to help?”

Lark nodded. “Yeah. I had to make sure you weren’t psycho like other Arcana I’ve seen. Besides, you haven’t needed my help before.”

“But we do now?” Selena scoffed.

“You’ve got a horde of Baggers to the north and gaining fast.”

“We know this.”

“Did you know that cannibal scouts to the east spotted you and are CB-ing for reinforcements right now? Four-wheel drives and ATVs will be coming, full of them. For this many healthy people, the Teeth’ll bring an army.”

“The Teeth?” I asked.

Finn said, “You’ll get it when you see them.”

Lark cast him a surprised look. “You know them?”

He nodded. “I crossed these mountains before. Invisible. I saw . . . everything.”

Selena relaxed the tension on her bow a fraction. “Baggers to the north, cannibals to the east? What about south and west?”

“One direction dead-ends in a sheer rock face,” Lark explained. “The other funnels into a narrow pass that’s littered with snares. Bear traps and pitfalls.”

I was familiar with the latter.

“And it’s rocky.” Lark turned to me. “Not a lot of dead trees for you to revive, Empress.”

Weird that a stranger was calling me that.

To Selena, she said, “And it’ll be close quarters with no vantage points. Not favorable for an archer.”

So she had recognized our tableaux and knew who we were, which meant she knew the deck, knew the game.

“Why would you guys come this way?” Lark asked. Rain ran off the brim of her hat in sheets. “You’ve got the Fool with you, and he led you here? Tactically, this is about as bad as it gets.”

“The better question?” Selena said. “Why would you stay here?”

“This is my hood. I know these brutes, know the mountains and the mines.” Her accent did sound Southern. “Plus the Teeth keep the worst of the Arcana away. But now they’ve expanded their territory.”

“Why? When?” Finn’s voice scaled an octave higher. Whatever he’d seen had done a permanent number on him.

“Recently. They’re starving down in the mines. For fresh meat and three breeders, the Teeth’ll hunt us to the ends of the earth.”

“Breeders?” I asked.

In a deadpan tone, she said, “Cannibals need love too.”

I glanced at Finn. He appeared fascinated by Lark.

Selena glared at him. Was she the type of girl who wouldn’t want her former admirer ever to move on?

Lark said, “The good news is that they will try to take us alive. Flesh wounds and clubbed heads.”

Finn muttered, “Because they lack refrigeration.” Had he sidled closer to Lark?

“Then we run.” Selena finally lowered her bow. “We take our chances on that pass, if it’s rigged as you say.”

Lark scratched one wolf behind its scarred ear. “You try running that canyon in the dark, you’re going to die.”

“Why aren’t you running?” Selena demanded. “You could’ve slipped away from all this.”

“I told you—I want in on your alliance.”

“Obviously you know all about this game,” I said. “But our group is a little different. We’re not planning to play. We don’t want to kill anybody.” Except for Death.

Lark’s lips parted, as if this news was too good to be true. Her tough-girl fa?ade cracked a little, and I thought her brown eyes watered. “Not to kill?” God, she looked so young. “I’ve been alone out here, and when I saw Gabriel and his crew closing in on the area, I freaked, thought I was done for sure.”

Selena’s shoulders tensed. “They were here?”

Damn it, I would’ve expected them to head in the opposite direction!

“So close that Gabriel almost ran into my falcon. They turned back, but I realized my cannibal cover wouldn’t keep me safe much longer. Sooner or later, Arcana are going to come for the Hierophant.”

“We’ve heard his call, then,” I said. We go now to our bloody business. “He’s near.”

Lark nodded. “Figures, since he’s in charge of the cannibals. His name’s Guthrie. He spouts all this stuff, twisting religion. He’s got them all enthralled. It’s a cult, a cannibal miner cult. They file their teeth to look like him.”

I hadn’t thought they could get eerier in my mind. They just had.

Selena’s expression was suspicious. “Why has the Hierophant never targeted you?”

“I’m pretty sure Guthrie doesn’t know about the game. He hears my call and thinks an angel is chatting at him or something.”