Page 12 of Cursed Shadows 4
“You will not run, you will not hide—you will step onto the bridge and into the second passage.”
The moment I land on the other side, the moment my boots are swept from this land to a mountainside, his power over me is cut free.
Until then, he is a master to a slave, the very reason he tricked me into signing away my freedoms to him and his authority. Because until the moment he steps through the portal, I belong to him.
I cannot go anywhere. Not unless he allows it.
I wish he would—but I know he won’t.
I look down at the rug. I say nothing.
Gazes fall away from me. No one speaks.
And since I throw no glances to anyone at all, I see no looks of acknowledgement from the carved from stone warriors around me who will have such higher chances of survival than I do.
We leave Hemlock House.
Silence keeps to us through the streets of Kithe.
The fae we do pass, join us in our thick quiet, or they speak in the smallest of murmurs,whispers.
The path comes to Comlar.
Rune leads the charge, and I’m a mouse tucked behind him. Daxeel and Dare flank me, and I look at neither.
Surrounded, I feel as alone as I have my whole existence.
More fae merge with us on the trail to Comlar. Contenders, spectators, warriors, light and dark.
The atmosphere doesn’t change.
The air is wrought with silence.
Fleetingly, I think of taut violin strings, hushed. No murmurs, no whispers, no laughs, no growls. Nothing but the pressing suffocation of darkness.
I yearn for so much, always.
But most of all, in this moment, I yearn for my Eamon.
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Past the abandoned games just off the path, where empty bottles of tavarak are littered about, this steady, silent pace brings us to the mouth of Comlar’s courtyard.
It strikes me like a sword.
I cringe against the rising waves of sound, waves that crash over our tense silence.
The courtyard is packed, full. More spectators than ever have piled their way through the stone ruins, and they squeeze and shove between thick throngs of contenders.
The murmur that hums over the crowd is gravelled, a buzz of barbed accents and husky murmurs. Strategies swapped out here in the open, alliances made and doubled, or even families whispering what could be their goodbyes to their beloved contenders.
Fae splinter off from our arriving group.
My pace is not as determined nor purposeful; it is cautious through the mouth of the courtyard.
Faces I don’t recognise pass me by, shoulders brushing mine, the scent of coffee thick in the air.
