Reign of Shadows (Reign of Shadows, #1)(6)

We all froze at the first cry. Now there was no doubt. They were coming.

Other dwellers chimed in. The eerie cries bounced off one another from every direction. It wasn’t the first time I heard them, but the sounds they made were no less terrifying. Monkeys went wild in the trees, jumping and rattling vines and branches, safe in their perches, but no less agitated.

A strangled sob spilled from Dagne. She clutched her brother closer. “I’m not leaving you!”

In a sudden surge of energy, Madoc shoved his sister at me and I caught her. The effort made him lose his balance and he fell back to the ground. “Take her! I can’t go on.”

Dagne was fragile in my arms, as easy to snap as dried kindling. She was only sixteen, but she felt smaller. She reminded me of Bethan with her slight stature and eyes big like a wounded animal’s. I couldn’t protect her. I couldn’t be responsible for another life.

I wouldn’t be.

I glanced down again at Madoc’s crushed leg. He was right. He wasn’t going anywhere.

“Fowler.” He bit out my name. “Take her and go. I—I’ll delay them.”

Delay them. He meant they would be too busy slaughtering him to come after us. Dagne choked out a little cry, understanding his meaning, too. I nodded once and tightened my grip on her arm, tugging on her to follow me. She struggled, pleading, and I knew, despite my nod, this wasn’t going to work. Not with her. Not with me. Not together.

A twig snapped.

I released Dagne and shoved her behind me. Yanking an arrow from the quiver at my back, I swung my bow into position. Blood pumped fast and hard in my veins. I drew my string and lined up my arrow in one fluid move, pulling back until my curled fingertips brushed my cheek. As effortless as breathing.

Body braced, I rotated on the balls of my feet, my gaze scanning the area. The moon’s glow relieved the black pall of night to a deep plum. I marked the darker motionless shapes of trees and shrubs easily, searching for the slightest movement.

My nostrils flared. The usual odors were there. The ripe, loamy odor of the outdoors infused everything. But an underlying whiff of something else mingled there, too, ribboning through the familiar. The source was faintly mint, a little peppery, like the black tea grown in the hills of Relhok. It wasn’t a dweller but something else. Someone else.

The new arrival stepped cautiously forward from the thick press of trees and low-hanging branches, moving slowly.

I peered through the gloom at his face. Not a him. A her. A girl.

Her eyes gleamed darkly in a pale, dirt-free face. The clean face gave me pause, instantly telling me she had a shelter nearby. A safe place.

I lowered my bow a notch. Her arrival meant a chance for Madoc and his sister. I opened my mouth, but before words formed, an arrow whistled past my ear on a trajectory straight for the stranger.

The girl jerked to the side at the last possible moment, swiftly dodging the arrow. It vanished into the darkness. I whirled around, grabbing Dagne’s bow from her bone-thin fingers.

She sputtered, “I need that—”

“You kill what needs killing.”

Dagne’s eyes widened. “I thought she was a dweller!”

“Quickly. This way.” At the girl’s voice, I turned. She stood in front of me, oddly composed. She motioned to Madoc on the ground. “Can you carry him?”

“Who are you?”

“Luna,” she answered, as though her name were explanation enough.

She angled her face, head cocking sideways. Listening the way animals did. “They’re coming,” she announced in a voice as smooth as water-polished stones. “Too many to fight.”

Almost on cue, the familiar cry split the night. It sent off a cacophony of responses.

“We don’t have much time.” She uttered this with such confidence, such knowing.

“Figure that out all by yourself, did you?” I slung my bow around my shoulder and leaned down. Wrapping an arm around Madoc’s waist, I hauled him to his feet. He draped an arm around my shoulders, lips compressed so that only a small groan escaped.

“Keep up,” she said in that sleek-as-glass voice.

“You heard her. Keep up,” I ordered Dagne.

I propped up Madoc as we walked, his feet dragging over the ground. I grimaced at the rustle of leaves and crack of twigs in our wake.

The girl moved fast, cutting through the dark foliage.

I could hardly track her. And then I couldn’t. She was gone like a flame snuffed out. One moment there. Gone the next.

I stopped and blinked, peering around with quick turns of my head.

The dwellers were on top of us, their musky scent everywhere. I couldn’t use my bow while holding up Madoc, so I pulled the blade from my side with my free hand.

“Where did she go?” Dagne clasped my arm, shaking it, edging into hysterics.

My sword wobbled in front of me. “Let go,” I ordered, but it was too late.

A creature materialized in the night, its body near my height. No hair sprouted anywhere on the gray, dimpled body. Even though its flesh resembled molding clay, I knew its body was dense, composed of sinewy tissue not nearly as yielding as the tender flesh of a human. They were still vulnerable enough to a well-aimed arrow and a precise, strategically thrust blade, however. One simply had to get close enough.

Its mouth gaped wide, long feelers rising out of its face to taste the air and detect the presence of prey. The eyes were small, dark orbs that saw very little—if anything. But they hunted us just fine without sight, relying on their hearing and those feelers that vibrated like a nest of snakes, seeking us.