Wicked Challenge (Darkwater Reformatory Book 2) Page 4

  The king hadn’t maintained his grip on the throne without watching all of his subjects closely.

  Daegan closed his eyes and clutched the oval, milkstone pendant he wore suspended on a chain around his neck. One blink, and a ward sunk through his skin, changing him into one of the security guards who worked at the front gate. Aydin or Alwin. I couldn’t remember. Soon, it would no longer matter.

  My eyes widened, and I stumbled backward, but I couldn’t stop my smile from lifting. “Awesome trick.”

  Creases appeared on Daegan’s stolen, weathered face when he grinned. “Now it’s your turn.” Still holding the pendant, he waved his hand my way. When I looked down, I wore an official security guard’s uniform. And I had a beard! Long and curly and silvery gray. It would be freakin’ cool if the situation wasn’t so scary.

  “The spell won’t last long,” Daegan said. “But it should give us enough time to get in and out of the cellblock with no one knowing we’ve been there.”

  “They’ll find out soon enough once we’ve rescued Rohnan.”

  “By then, it’ll be too late. They won’t know who did it, and you two will be through the veil and beginning a new, happier life.”

  I couldn’t imagine how wonderful that would be.

  “Let’s go,” he said, squeezing my hand. “Otherwise, the king will catch us and lock us up beside Rohnan.”

  As I followed Daegan from the room, I couldn’t shake off the feeling of impending doom…

  I woke in a flash and sat up. The blanket was gone. The basket, jug, and silvery trees had disappeared, too.

  Brodin and Tria still slept, but Akimi had awoken. Her gaze met mine, hers filled with panic.

  “Waken, please,” Akimi yelled.

  Tria and Brodin jolted upright and peered around.

  “What the hell…?” Brodin said. He raked the hair off his face.

  “Up,” Akimi cried. “We do not have time.” She had left what had been our safe circle and crossed to stand under an enormous tree with broad bluish-green leaves and clusters of deep purple fruit dangling like enormous grapes.

  Brodin and Tria scrambled to their feet.

  “I think…” Tria’s gaze met mine. “So much for a little break. Did it last more than ten minutes?”

  “I’m more tired out than I was before,” I said. Standing, I brushed off my clothing, though I wasn’t sure why I bothered. It wasn’t like I had anyone to look good for.

  Rohnan. My heart bled whenever I thought his name. Would I find him here or only his bones?

  Dreaming about what happened had only made things worse.

  Maybe I wouldn’t find any evidence he’d been here. Each test was different, right?

  Why had I stupidly hoped I’d stumble over him inside the catacombs or find him waiting for me at the Reformatory?

  “Come,” Akimi called again. “The next trial has started.”

  Five

  Tria

  I joined Akimi underneath the tree and stared up. I’d eaten already, so how why was my belly rumbling? Maybe more time had passed while we slept than I’d assumed. “Do you think we can eat the fruit?”

  She closed her eyes, and her branches wavered in the air. “Yes.”

  “Did you, um, ask the tree?”

  Eyes opening, she smiled. “Of course.”

  I started to reach for a low-hanging cluster of fruit but pulled my hand back. “Should I ask first?”

  “I just did.” She bowed to the tree. “Thank you.” Turning to me, she added, “We’re only allowed to take clusters with three pieces of fruit. No others.”

  Odd, but my belly insisted it didn’t care.

  Jacey and Brodin came over and we gathered bunches of the fruit then collapsed on the ground to consume them. Bursting with rich, deep purple juice, the big grapes went down like nectar to a starving bee. I licked my lips and wondered if I dared ask for more.

  After, we got up and paced around the small open area again.

  “So this is it? We eat fruit and…?” I asked. While I was happy nothing was attacking us, I had a feeling this trial wouldn’t be completed by eating fruit and hanging out in the sunshine.

  “Let me see what I can do,” Jacey said, rubbing her hands together. Shadows lingered in her eyes, and I wondered what she’d dreamed about. My sleep had contained nothing but rest. “I want to try out my new Seeker skill.” She turned to me. “Any hints before I jump in and wing it?”

  “Normally, I’d use thread power.” It was nice not to have Brodin mocking me about it. But I’d proved him wrong. When we first met, he’d said I’d never harness any power here in the fae world. Instead, the sketar magic skills I’d learned from my stepdad had saved our lives more than once. But while the tenna wristlets we wore suppressed our regular magic, our quad and the Challenge gave us access to each other’s skapti, or innate abilities we’d trained to enhance with magic. Mine was that of a Seeker. Before coming to Darkwater, I’d looked forward to a career in the Seeker’s Guild, tracking down lost things, wizards, and providing security and police duties.

  Now that I was incarcerated, that career choice was gone. I had no idea what I’d do when—if—I escaped Darkwater.

  “Since I can’t pull in thread power, I’ll fling something out there,” Jacey said with intensity. She closed her eyes and hummed, much like she had when we hid from Titan high in a tree. Her humming had called Akimi, who’d helped us. Stirring, Jacey pointed to the fruit tree. “To find the next challenge, we need to go that way.”

  Brodin scratched his head and peered in that direction. “You sure about that?”

  Ignoring him, Jacey strode toward the tree. She passed it and turning back to us. “See? It’s the only way. Come on. I hope… Each test could…”

  Ahead of her, partly hidden in the vegetation, a path snaked into the jungle, slowly winding upward.

  “Great job, Seeker,” I said as I passed her.

  “It’s an awesome skill you’ve got there. I’m going to try it…” She closed her eyes and when she opened them, stark pain filled her gaze. “It didn’t work.”

  “What did you do?”

  “I tried to find Rohnan.”

  “Seeking people can be harder than locations.” I rubbed her arm. “Emotions get in the way.”

  “I’ll keep trying. You know I will. This could be my only chance.”

  When considered Brodin, I had a feeling I’d be tempted to do the same.

  Jacey shrugged off her pain, probably the only thing she could do, given the situation. “I heard you used influence on Lars.”

  A change of subject might be needed. How long could she keep searching for him before she gave up?

  I glanced over my shoulder, and my eyes met Brodin’s. “With Lars, I combined influence with sketar magic and it made the command more powerful. No hesitation, no difficulty manipulating the magic.”

  “Definitely looking forward to trying it.”

  “I think you’ll find—” Not watching where I was going, I slammed into a metal pole, the kind that would hold a light in my old world. Here, the top ended in a point.

  “Maybe try influencing the post to stay out of your way,” Brodin said with a smirk that only made me laugh.

  “Sure. Shouldn’t be too hard as there’s only one of them.”

  He nudged his head forward, toward the rising gravel-strewn path. “More than one. Watch out or they’ll jump in front of you like the last.”

  Why hadn’t I noticed them right away? The eight foot tall metal poles marched beside the path at regular intervals. One, two, three, plus more. “Weird. I could understand them being here if they had lights, but they feel…random.”

  Brodin shrugged and started up the path. I caught up and walked beside him. Akimi and Jacey had taken the lead.

  “Hey, Jacey,” I said. “How exactly did you phrase your question when you used Seeker magic?” I did not ask about how she’d sought Rohnan.

  Turning, she walked backward. “Since m
agic can be tricky, I was very specific. I asked the power to take us to the next challenge rather than just a random where do we go from here.”

  Good. That should work.

  I leaned in close to Brodin as we walked. “What do you think the next test might throw our way?” I scanned the jungle surrounding us, waiting for threats. I’d learned a valid lesson during the trials we’d taken to reach the prison. Would bugs drop onto us from overhead? Or would creatures like the kertins attack? The fluffy bat-like creatures’ bite put a person to sleep so its bigger parents could eat you. They were just one of the fun beasties we’d met while making our way to the prison. “Perhaps…” I snatched up a stick from the jungle floor and brandished it. “I need to taunt them. Come at me, babies.”

  “Are you talking to the plants?” he asked.

  “I’m talking to whatever attacks next.” I swirled the stick over my head. It felt good to have something I could use in our defense. “Call this kertin insurance.”

  “Maybe they won’t send anything at us until we reach the next challenge. Which…” His arm splayed out. “I don’t think this is it.”

  I leaned away from him, puzzled. “You’d trust a living game? Warden Bixby is involved in this somehow.”

  “She’s back at the prison.”

  “She’s here,” I called out to Jacey and Akimi, and they dropped back to walk with us. “I don’t know who saw which of our trials when we formed our quad, but in one of Jacey’s …”

  “I saw it,” she said grimly.

  “I did not see for Jacey,” Akimi said. “Tell us.”

  “Brodin?” I asked, peering up at him.

  “I saw for Akimi, Tria, and myself.”

  Ah, so he’d seen himself fighting the Master Seeker. In that path, he’d known I hadn’t killed his mother. Ramseff, the Master Seeker—and Brodin’s father—had murdered her. But his path hadn’t revealed the blood bond I’d made with Ramseff. In exchange for transporting me to the prison, where I still hoped to find my birth father and confront him, I’d made a bond with Ramseff to complete a task he’d refused to reveal until I’d made my promise.

  I was tasked to kill Brodin. I was no more capable of killing than a baby. I refused to do it. We’d find a way out of the blood bond, or I’d die to keep it from happening.

  Ahead of us, Jacey gulped and came to a complete stop. Stepping backward, she bumbled into us.

  Past her, on the path, two small creatures watched us. About the size of a small cat and with pale green fur, they had whiskers, short perky ears, and six legs. No claws, but that meant nothing in an alternate reality.

  Jacey stepped forward then crouched down, her fingers extended. “Come here little guys,” she said in a coaxing voice.

  I leaped forward and held her back with a tight grip on her shoulder. “What are you doing? If you want, I could chase them off the trail with my stick.”

  “No way. They’re cute. Fuzzy.”

  “And they probably bite, sting, or leap on our faces and suck out our brains.”

  Akimi snorted but wove around Jacey. When she got near to the creatures, she extended a branch and one of them sniffed it. They bounded around her and skipped up to Jacey.

  Jacey cooed and carefully stroked their backs and under their chins. Their eyes closed, and they let out high-pitched squeaks that sounded cute. But when I decided to join in on the fun and approach them, they hopped into the jungle.

  “I’m sorry,” I said, tucking my stick behind my back. “I bet I scared them with my weapon.”

  Jacey straightened and gave me a soft smile. “I don’t believe it was you. I think they were here for me to find.”

  I frowned. “Do you mean they’re part of the test?”

  “Perhaps. It’s just a hunch on my part.” She strode forward. “I imagine we’ll soon see. Let’s go.”

  As we walked up one small rise after another, we wove through the jungle. Other than a few random bird cheeps and the never-ending hum of insects, the world around us hovered in silence, as if waiting.

  In the distance something called, “Grook, grook, grook.”

  “Under normal circumstances,” I said to my friends. “I’d hope that sound was a friendly bird. However…” Lars hadn’t renewed my faith in feathered friends, though he’d been more a monster than a bird.

  The grook sounds came closer. Unease traveled up my spine, and I broke out in a sweat. Hot, moist air drifted out from the jungle and hit me like a downpour on a muggy day. I’d feel better when I could see more than a few feet ahead and if I wasn’t surrounded by plants, insects, and something hiding in the trees.

  “No harm in hurrying, correct?” Akimi said, her gaze trained on the forest where we’d last heard the calls.

  “Do you know what it is?” Brodin asked Akimi, catching up to walk beside her.

  “No, but…” Her bark brows drew together. After a moment, her face stiffened. “It’s—”

  “Grook!”

  The cry came from overhead. When I tipped my head back, I found only blue sky and puffy clouds. A few branches extended over the path from the jungle, green, outstretched fingers, that nearly connected.

  I wasn’t excited about whatever was tracking us.

  “Faster,” I suggested, picking up my pace to a jog. Lately, what should be a pleasant walk in the woods always involved running.

  I tapped Brodin and Akimi’s sides as I passed them. Watching them, rather than the trail, I nearly ran into another pole. If I wasn’t careful, I’d turn this into a habit. Until a moment ago, I’d been looking for them to avoid a repeat of my mistake. Five so far, with two more evenly spaced ahead.

  We’d crested yet another peak on the trail when I spied something gleaming ahead through the trees. My steps slowed.

  “Keep going,” Akimi shouted, scurrying past me. “It… It is right behind.”

  The ground shook, and the wind stalled. A pall of hot, moist, energy fell on me like a sodden blanket.

  As I raced along with my friends, I peered over my shoulder.

  A wave of water rushed toward us.

  Six

  Tria

  “How can this be happening?” I chuffed as I ran beside Akimi. “I didn’t see an ocean or body of water capable of generating a wave that high.” At least three stories, the water sloshed and flowed, enveloping the path and much of the woods surrounding it. It rushed so fast, it would engulf us in minutes.

  “It’s alive,” she said, new creases appearing in her bark face. “An entity all on its own.”

  “But…why is it saying grook?”

  “’Tis its master’s call, not that of the wave.”

  “Someone in the trees was directing the water?” Brodin asked. His hair flopped across his face, and he shoved it back.

  “’Tis the huntress,” Akimi said. “Hurry!”

  While the path curved right and then left, the water continued to follow. Definitely alive. No sea would be able to direct itself like this. The grook sounds had stopped, as had every other call I’d heard in the jungle. Everything living had fled the advancing wave.

  We reached the end of the path and nearly slammed into a solid stone wall blocking further passage. With no way back and no way forward, we’d be crushed. The wall reached higher than the sky and stretched as far as I could see in either direction.

  At eye level in the center of the wall, three five-sided designs had been etched into the surface in a row. Each of the designs contained five circles in the corners and top, but while some of the circles wrapped around numbers, others were empty. Five circles were empty.

  “I think it’s a puzzle,” Brodin said, leaning forward to study the shapes.

  A drop of water fell on my head, and I shuddered. Sunlight streamed around us, telling me this wasn’t rain.

  When Jacey peered past me, her eyes widened with dismay.

  I didn’t look back. Didn’t need to look back. Water dripped steadily on the ground in front of me and hoarse breathing behind
told me the wave had caught up. Would it plunge down over us then drag us away? After all, it needed to feed its huntress.

  Brodin’s hand reached out toward the wall.

  “Do not touch,” Akimi said, one of her branches tapping his shoulder. “Not until we are certain how we wish to play this part of the Challenge.”

  “Good point.” His arm dropped to his side as he continued to study the patterns.

  Jacey and I joined them at the puzzle.

  “I see something…” Jacey said, her voice shaky. “On the bottom left of the left shape, which I’m going to call a house since it’s a square with a two-sided roof, there’s a six within the circle. And on the bottom left of the middle one, there’s a four. In the far-right circle, we’re missing a number in that same position.” She tapped her chin and turned to us. “So, six minus four equals two. Or six plus four equals ten. It must be one or the other. I think…” Boldly stepping forward, she traced a two in the empty spot with her fingertip.

  A click rang out somewhere deep within the wall.

  When nothing else happened, I wasn’t sure if we should cheer or groan. But those empty circles told me there was more to this than adding one number.

  “Great guess,” Brodin said with a grin. “Brave guess since I have a feeling,” his gaze cut to the water, “that a wrong guess could result in a disaster.”

  My belly churned at the thought of how close to death we hovered. While she might be a necromancer, Jacey wouldn’t be able to bring us back, not with her tennas in place. And I, for one, wasn’t eager to give necromancy a try unless it became absolutely necessary. Jacey said she’d trained for years to achieve even a bit of skill. None of us would learn how to craft and use the ability overnight.

  “This one was easy for me,” Jacey said, shrugging. “I didn’t have to guess.” Her relaxed smile equaled Brodin’s. “Remember, two animals hopped up to me on the path. There were no other circles missing a two. I knew this had to be the right number, for this part of the puzzle, at least. For the rest? I have no idea.”