Kinked (Elder Races #6)(66)

The young Elf was looking down at himself. That was when Aryal realized he was bandaged too, with defensive wounds on both his forearms. Quentin walked over to him and gripped his arms. “When it comes to healing spells, I’m a one-trick pony,” Quentin said. “Are these wounds simple enough for that?”

Caerreth nodded, and Quentin spelled his arms. Afterward, he looked at Aryal. “You might as well go down below. Linwe and I will join you as soon as we can.”

She nodded dully. “See you soon.”

Her heart and head were pounding, and her mouth was dry. She had pushed past her limit some time ago. She didn’t wait to see Quentin and Linwe slip down the hall. Instead, she eased down the stairs to the cell block, bracing herself with one hand against the wall.

Aralorn and Caerreth followed. “It goes against all of my instincts to walk back in there,” Aralorn muttered. “If something happens to Quentin, and the witch traps us in there, we’re caught again and as good as dead.”

“I know,” Caerreth said tiredly. “But we might take more damage if we stayed at the top of the stairs and got caught there. I think we’ve just got to trust Quentin and Linwe to take care of themselves and get back to us with supplies.”

While Aryal heard them, she didn’t care. All she cared about was going horizontal again as quickly as she could. When they entered the cell block again, she went into Quentin’s cell because hers was too bloody.

A formless noise filled her ears, like that of the ocean. It was odd, because she could have sworn the ocean was on the outside of the cell block window. She made her knees unlock one at a time, and forgot to catch herself, so she fell in a sprawl to the ground.

That was the last thing she knew for a long, dark while.

SIXTEEN

Stalking through the dark, silent halls of the palace’s underbelly was like a video game gone bad. Any moment now Quentin felt like they were going to run into a water trap populated with piranhas, while logs swung to and fro overhead and shadow wolves jumped out of nooks to attack them.

He rubbed his face and forcibly banished the image from his mind. He wasn’t quite as bad off as any of the others, but he needed to get some rest, and soon.

He said to Linwe, “Be sure to memorize the way back in case you need to run it by yourself.”

“Aw, damn it,” she said miserably. “I’m not going to need to.”

He was terrible at dates, birthdays and such, but he thought Linwe had to be around thirty or so, which was quite young for an Elven adult. Making any kind of direct age-to-adulthood correlation to shorter-lived races, such as humankind, didn’t compute, for she had already lived as a responsible adult for several years, yet she still retained the liveliness of youth.

He remembered her as a little girl, with her wide, naughty grin and eyes sparking with some kind of mischief. She had been adorable and adored, and had pretty much run wild in Lirithriel Wood for the first fifteen years of her life. He hadn’t visited the Wood often, but he remembered once she had run up to him with a laugh that was bigger than she was. She must have been all of five years old. When she had reached him, he’d picked her up and swung her high, setting her on his shoulder.

An echo of the burning pain came back in his chest. He couldn’t let anything happen to her. Not her too, on top of all the massive losses the Elves had already suffered. He grabbed her by the arm, hauled her close and hugged her fiercely. After her first twitch of surprise, her arms came around his waist, and she hugged him back so hard her slight body shook with the strain.

He bent his head and said in her ear, “You will run if I tell you to. Do you hear me, young lady?”

“Quentin, that’s not my job …” she said.

“Linwe.” He injected all the command he could into his voice. “You don’t have the magical aptitude for this kind of fight. And you. Will. Run.”

“Fine!”

He pressed a kiss to her forehead. He knew he was being overbearing and patronizing, and he didn’t give a shit. They all had to react to stress in their own way. This way was his.

He let her go, and they moved on.

After climbing a few staircases and another fifteen minutes or so of searching, they found the kitchens, which were as large as Quentin had expected. Linwe ran to the water pump over a large basin, and pumped out enough water to immerse her head in. While she drank and splashed water on herself, he located the pantries. He checked to make sure he wasn’t near any windows, then he spelled a small ball of light and began collecting supplies.

The pantry held massive amounts of anything he could have hoped to find: wayfarer bread, nuts, dried fruits, jerky, cured meats and dried fish, wheels of cheese, apples, honey, jars of jellies and jams, olives, pickled vegetables and pickled eel, along with potatoes and other tubers, spices, oil and huge sacks of grains.

One pantry held barrels of wine, barley beer, and bottles of liquor, along with wineskins. Given the size of the palace, there were probably other storerooms full of both wine and the foods that were suitable for long storage, but the contents of these pantries alone would be enough to feed the four of them for a few months.

Not that they would need to be here for that long. He gave a quick thought for how differently time might be passing on Earth, then dismissed it. That was a reality to face at another time. It bore no relevance to their immediate situation.