Traitor (24 page)

I was worried, too. I didn’t know what would be waiting for us when we returned to Maldobar. I didn’t know if Felix, Beckah, or my brother were still alive. I didn’t know if my plan would work, or what would happen if it were discovered that Jace and I were trying to slip back into the kingdom. We might very well be arrested as traitors—and rightfully so. We were about to commit the greatest act of treason possible against our so-called king.

After an uncomfortably quiet dinner, Jace and I got up to return to our room. As usual, there were more gifts piled outside our doorway. I had to rake a path clear so we could get inside.

“How does it feel to be a demigod?” There was a flavor of sarcasm to Jace’s question.

“I’m not sure,” I fired back. “How does it feel to be in love with the enemy?”

That shut him up.

He gave me a dirty look but didn’t say another word as we both settled in for the night. I guess I hit the nail on the head more squarely than I’d anticipated. It was a cheap shot to take, which made me feel a little guilty as I stretched out on my pallet and stared up at the ceiling.

I let my mind go quiet, sifting through the whispering voices in my brain that had become commonplace to me now. I looked for the one that was most familiar—the one I had pushed far away until now. Before, I hadn’t been ready to reunite with him, but things were different now. And it was time to get my partner up to speed.

Mavrik’s consciousness leapt out to greet me with excited swirls of color. I could feel him trolling through my memories, investigating me thoroughly like a dog sniffing over its master. I didn’t hide anything from him. When he was satisfied, I started relaying our plan to him. I asked him to meet me in Barrowton.

He reminded me of what I had wanted to forget. Barrowton was nothing but ash and cinders now. It was abandoned, which suited my plan but simultaneously filled me with sorrow and anger. More lives had been lost, swallowed up by the blazing forge of Hovrid’s war. He was trying to drive his own species into extinction … and he was succeeding.

At daybreak Jace and I were both standing on the front steps of the temple, waiting for Araxie and Kiran to emerge. The jungle was filled with the peaceful sounds of early morning. Birds sang high in the trees. The air was cool but comfortable, rich with the smell of plant life. I breathed it in deeply, realizing how much I was going to miss that smell.

I’d given up my comfortable gray elven robes for my dragonrider’s uniform and armor again. My scimitar was buckled to my hip, and my helmet and cloak were packed away into a bag I wore slung over my shoulder. I’d stocked it full of rations and a few useful tools I had found amidst the piles of offerings the villagers left me every day. I couldn’t take everything they’d given me, obviously, but the greevwood dagger was stuck down in the side of my boot, hidden and ready if I needed it. My mother’s pendant hung proudly around my neck. I wasn’t going to hide it under my clothes anymore.

Jace hadn’t been able to put on all of his old dragonrider clothes. They had been ripped and damaged during his fall, so he wore a hybrid of Maldobarian and gray elf attire that looked strange. His pants were more or less intact, but they were spattered with blood. So were his uniform boots, kidney belt, and cross-styled sheath for his swords. His tunic had been essentially destroyed, so he wore a dark green elven one in its place. The rest of his gear and armor were packed away in a bag like the one I was carrying.

He was shifting his weight anxiously from one foot to another while we waited in silence. I couldn’t tell if he was still annoyed with me for calling him on the obvious crush he had on my cousin or not. No guy likes having that kind of thing shoved in their face—especially when the girl in question hates your guts.

Kiran was the first to join us. He came out of the trees dressed in his warrior’s attire and carrying a spear, bow, and quiver. His long white hair was tied back in a long braid, and there were two red lines of war paint smeared down his cheeks.

“You really think your plan will work,
caenu
?” He gave me a teasing grin as he came to stand next to me.

“That depends,
brevad
.” I smirked back. I knew he was just calling me that to get on my nerves, so I’d taken to calling him the gray elven word for “short” just to even things up a little.

Kiran’s little taunting smile quickly turned into a scowl. He did
not
like his new pet name. “Depends on what?”

“On whether or not we make it to the border in one piece.” I laughed and gave him a rough pat on the shoulder, which only made him scowl harder.

“I take it you are all ready to go?” a female voice called out in a chastising tone.

All three of us turned around to see Araxie striding out of the temple. As usual, her clothes were exotic, revealing, and undeniably beautiful. It had to be painful for someone in Jace’s position to look at. Her baggy sirwal pants rode low on her hips and her midriff was bare thanks to the short, tight-fitted top she wore. She was carrying her own set of weapons, scimitars with a bow and quiver, and her shimmering hair was left to flow loosely all the way to the base of her back. She had purple and green war paint on her skin as well, outlining the curves of her muscular frame with ornate, swirling symbols. She also wore a small headdress with two short, white horns on them. That, I assumed, was to mark her as royalty. No one else wore white horns like that.

I noticed Jace’s eyes following her as she walked right through our midst and began leading the way into the forest. He didn’t say a word, but his mouth was hanging open like there was something he might have wanted to say.

Then he caught me staring at him.

I grinned knowingly. I just couldn’t help myself.

Jace’s face turned a disturbing shade of red and he let out a string of curses as he stormed away to follow her. Kiran and I casually followed, too. As bad as I felt about giving him a hard time, now I could better appreciate why Felix enjoyed teasing me about every girl he thought I liked. It was fun. And honestly, I was just glad I wasn’t the victim of the teasing for once.

We crossed over the boundary of the temple grounds and into the wild heart of Luntharda again. We didn’t usually go in this direction whenever Araxie led us on her educational sprints through the trees, so this was unchartered territory for me. We moved quickly and quietly, the way she had taught us, making as little a disturbance as possible as we slipped through the trees. I doubted I looked as graceful as Araxie and Kiran did while lightly stepping from one large tree branch to another. For them, it looked natural.

As I leapt from branch to branch, rolling and ducking while keeping up the rigorous pace, I felt more confident than I had when we’d started our training. I didn’t look at the ground. I wasn’t afraid of falling or tripping. I was focused on what lay ahead, on the next obstacle, and on keeping as quiet as possible.

Jace had improved some, as well, though he still muttered curses whenever we got a good glimpse of how far we were off the forest floor.

We moved fast. Araxie had led us ten miles away from the village before she allowed for a break. We all took a seat on an especially large limb and passed our water skins around so everyone got a few gulps. Far below, the jungle was calm. I couldn’t detect any glaring threats from Paligno’s curse for miles in any direction. So far, we hadn’t seen anything beyond a few herds of faundra, brightly colored birds, and a snake or two.

When we started up again, Araxie let our pace slack off a bit. We took our time, moving more carefully. I could tell she was growing more and more tense as night drew in. I wasn’t sure why until I finally glimpsed the haunting dark shapes of what appeared to be buildings through the trees. We had arrived at the gray elves’ royal city.

Or at least, what was left of it.

Just as with the fort compound during the battle scenario, the jungle had all but reclaimed the area. Paligno’s curse made the plants go wild. They were eating away at every trace of civilization, smothering buildings and covering the ground. From where we stood, high in the boughs of the giant trees, I could see the ruins of the city stretched out for miles.

The buildings were squared, made mostly from carved rock. Through the gloom of the evening, I could see a few sparkling remains of gleaming mosaics in the city squares and the sparkling of gold set into the domed roofs of temples. This place had once been grand and beautiful—an ancient civilization blossoming with power and luxury.

But now it was overgrown and eerily quiet. Roots had invaded the foundations of most of the buildings, cracking them in half like eggshells. There were no lights to be seen anywhere, and not a single soul in sight.

The expression on Araxie’s face was tragic. Her shimmering, multicolored eyes panned the horizon slowly. It was as though she were trying to keep her emotions contained—as though she didn’t want anyone to see how this place made her feel. I could imagine she had a lot of memories tied up in this place. It had been her home, once. And now it was more or less a mass grave for those who hadn’t been able to flee the city in time.

There were old bones in the streets. I didn’t notice them at first because many of them were covered with plant life. But I realized it after I accidentally stepped on a rib bone and crushed it. I was more careful then.

Darkness was falling when we came to the front steps of what must have been the royal palace. Sweeping stone steps led up to a broad open passage lined with massive, pear-shaped alabaster columns. Each one had been painted with flowers and creatures from the jungle—although that paint had now almost entirely been chipped away. I noticed the bases were plated in gold, though, and the floors were adorned with huge, magnificent mosaics made from chips of colorful rock and precious stones.

“What is this place?” Jace asked in a quiet voice.

Araxie’s reply was just as soft. She was walking close to one of those large columns, letting her fingers brush against it as she passed. “It was … my home.”

Jace studied her up and down, as though he wasn’t sure what to make of that answer. Or maybe he just wasn’t used to her talking to him without her tone dripping with disdain. “What happened?”

“It began here just as it did in your own kingdom. The animals, livestock, and birds all turned on us. We thought we could manage. We thought we could survive and defend our city. But it was a foolish hope. In the end, we had no choice but to leave. So many died, and we could not even return to bury them. Paligno’s curse spares no one. Its wrath will burn eternally if the stone is not restored.”

I put a hand on her shoulder, coaxing her to look at me. When she did, I could see the moisture of tears making her eyes seem glossy. She quickly turned her gaze away.

“Will we be safe here for the night?” Kiran sounded doubtful.

Araxie let out an uneasy sigh. “We should be, yes. So long as we are quiet and we do not make our presence obvious. Come, I know a place where we can build a fire.”

She led us deeper into the palace, our footsteps echoing off the high stone walls and vaulted ceilings. There were large bronze braziers lying knocked over on the floor. Empty porcelain vases as tall as I was were overflowing with the plants that had been put in them. The mosaics on the floors had been mostly covered by moss, and shallow reflecting pools contained nothing but still, algae-filled waters. Much of the palace was still fairly well preserved, if only because it was cut off from the natural light needed for the plants to invade. But there was still evidence everywhere of the struggle—weapons on the floor. Arrows and spears mingled with the bones of animals left to rot where they’d fallen.

It became too dark to see much of where we were going. That didn’t stop Araxie, though. She seemed to remember her way around this place as though she’d never left it. When we came to a hallway lined with old tapestries, some of them having rotted off their hanging rods and fallen into heaps on the floor. She stopped. At the end of the corridor were a pair of double doors. One was cracked open slightly.

“My old chambers,” she whispered as she pointed.

Beyond was a set of lavish chambers that looked nearly untouched by the jungle’s creeping grasp. It had been well sealed off. All other passages leading in and out were barred with metal beams. The windows had also been closed off. Nothing could come or go except through those double doors. Perhaps that was why the room looked as though it had only been abandoned months ago, rather than years.

Araxie went into her quarters and we followed her without hesitation. Inside, the air held a musky, stagnant odor like stale perfumes. There were plush, soft rugs stretched out along the floor, and intricately carved low couches all positioned around a shallow marble fire pit. Cushions were strewn everywhere, and it was obvious that in their final days living in this city, this was the only room the princess had been able to inhabit. Everything was covered with years’ worth of dust. Our presence had stirred some of it off the floor, making Kiran cough and sneeze as he slipped around to investigate.