Darkness. Ayden had had enough of it. Yet, here they were again in the middle of it--in more ways than one. There was still no sign of Pax. Ayden's stomach flopped every time he thought of his friend. What could've happened to him? Worry tried to dominate his thoughts, but he had bigger things to deal with.
Ayden was doing his best not to stumble over uneven ground as he scrambled after Sabina and Da'ewyn. The girls were leading him and Volos to the ridge where Da'ewyn had seen the army gathering at sunset. Ayden wanted to know exactly what they were up against.
"Be careful, there's a deep gouge in the rocks right there," Sabina whispered back. Ayden tried to keep track of where she'd pointed, but still nearly twisted his ankle when he reached the spot.
Da'ewyn whispered, "That's it. That's the crook in the ridge where I was earlier."
The group made their way to where Da'ewyn pointed and peered cautiously over the ledge of stone. More darkness.
"How are we going to see anything?" Ayden grumbled.
"I can see perfectly," Sabina bragged. Ayden stuck his tongue out at her, forgetting she could also see him perfectly. "Real mature, Ayden. Maybe you should go back to the cave and color some pictures on the wall!"
"Sorry."
Ayden could hear Sabina's take another step. "Wait here. I think I can get a little closer without being detected." A soft rustling and a vague silhouette indicated that she'd just leapt over the ridge. Then, silence. And waiting.
"I wish I could see in the dark," Da'ewyn stated jealously. "Although, I can hear and smell well enough. And something reeks!"
"I swear it wasn't me," Ayden joked.
"Shut up! I didn't mean that," Da'ewyn retorted.
Ayden breathed in deeply. A faint but repugnant odor greeted his nostrils. "I smell it too. I've smelled that smell before, under the pool." He breathed again. "Yep. Sulkas. Lot's of sulkas."
"Ugh!" Da'ewyn stated. Ayden could visualize her wrinkling her nose. "Are you sure you know what you're talking about?"
"Shh! Listen!" Volos whispered and Ayden held his breath. Soft rustling greeted his ears as Sabina returned.
"We need to get back to the cave. I can show and tell when we get there," Sabina whispered urgently. Ayden could feel her excited energy like a wave of pinpricks over his skin.
The trip back to the cave seemed twice as long as the trip to the ledge had been. Ayden tripped and bumped his knees more times than he cared to count as he tried to hurry over the uneven rocks. As usual, Sabina made it through without so much as a bruise.
"You know, it's really not fair that you have the ability to heal yourself when you rarely get hurt in the first place," Ayden stated as they reached the cave. He and Volos shoved a stone aside that they had placed in front of the entrance. It didn't completely block the opening, but it was enough to deter the light of the puny fire they'd lit from cutting into the darkness. Nothing could be done for the smoke, though. He'd give anything to have Pax there with his smokeless pinpoint of light.
The four companions were greeted by three weapons, aimed and ready to do serious damage, as they entered the cave. Keena, Devlin, and Nya were prepared for any guest, but breathed easy when they saw the faces of their friends.
"Well, what did you learn?" Devlin asked.
Sabina motioned for everyone to gather near the light of the fire. Drawing on the dirt floor of the cave with her finger, she made what looked to Ayden like a lopsided hourglass, the top half much larger than the bottom. At the top of the hourglass, she drew a figure and behind that, the lake.
"Okay. There is a crevice that will keep us hidden most of the way if we want to reach the first group undetected. Here," she pointed to the small part of the hourglass, "there are at least a hundred creatures or whatever, gathered and waiting. They are all armed with bows, swords, just about anything you can think of, but mostly some type of axe."
"What did they look like?" Ayden asked.
Sabina answered, "I just said, like axes. Only they were a little more jagged."
Ayden rolled his eyes. "I meant the creatures."
"Oh." Sabina squinted toward the ceiling as she visualized what she'd seen. "Kind of like hairy potatoes."
Ayden looked at Da'ewyn. "Told you; sulkas."
"Anyway," Sabina continued, "There is nothing in this little bottle neck here, but there is no way to reach this larger area but through that bottle neck. Nothing but sheer cliffs on either side and mountains of those jagged rocks all around. But I'm not so certain we want to go any further than that anyway."
Ayden felt the hand twisting his gut again. All eyes stared expectantly at Sabina. "Why?" Ayden asked slowly.
Sabina tapped the dirt in the center of the larger circle, sending small wisps of dust into the air. "Here, there are hundreds of men, beasts, elves, dwarfs, even Veela," she said looking at Da'ewyn. "There wasn't any creature in this world that wasn't mingled in that army. Except vampires," she said thoughtfully and then continued, "And they're all heavily armed."
Sabina lowered her eyes and traced her finger through the dirt to where she'd drawn the figure before the lake. "Degus waits here. At least, I think it's her. She was the only one sitting on an elaborate throne carved out of sheer rock. She's guarded by five trolls and what looked like humans stood on either side of her."
"How many humans?" Ayden asked to confirm he understood.
"Just the two."
The only sound in the cave was the crackling of the fire as everyone stared at Sabina's drawing and pondered her words. Keena spoke, her strong voice reflecting Ayden's thoughts, "Even if we defeat the sulkas, we will not be able to withstand an army of that size. We cannot win this battle without help."
"What if we attack now, while it's dark. 'Catch them off guard?" Sabina asked.
"Because, unlike vampires, we can't all see in the dark!" Da'ewyn hissed.
Sabina scowled back. "Have any better ideas?"
"Let's all give this some thought. After awhile, we can brainstorm. Maybe there's something we're not thinking of," Volos said.
After a moment's hesitation, the group dispersed throughout the cave. Ayden sat with his back against the cold cave wall. Da'ewyn and Devlin were whispering near the entrance; Keena and Volos sat back to back, their eyes closed, meditating. Sabina crouched near the fire. She had Pax's bag and pulled out its contents, mostly books.
Nya sat beside Ayden and attempted a smile. He tried to smile back. Their kiss earlier suddenly seemed like it had happened ages ago. He felt his cheeks warm at the thought nonetheless.
Ayden tried to focus on some sort of plan. What could they possibly do against such an army? The sulkas might not be such a problem, although there were quite a number of them. At least a hundred.
Sabina was thumbing through Pax's books. Ayden thought that was rude, considering they weren't hers. But he found himself curious about what she was finding; especially when, after reading a few pages of one particular book, tears formed in her eyes. She continued to read, entranced by the words before her.
"Sabina? Son vule sen?" Nya asked.
The dimming firelight danced off of the tears pooled in Sabina's eyes as she turned her attention to Nya and Ayden. She quickly wiped her eyes and cleared her throat. "Uh, yah, I'm fine." She stuck her nose back in the book as Ayden and Nya exchanged curious looks.
"What are you reading?" Ayden asked.
Sabina looked at him, her cheeks flushing. "He, uh, he was keeping a journal," she said, her voice carrying a hint of guilt.
"You're reading his journal? That's private, Sabina!" Ayden scolded. But he wanted to know as much as she did what was written in the thin, leather covered book. "Well?" Ayden asked as he raised a brow.
"He was writing about me."
"And?"
"And, nothing. Like you said, he has a thing for me."
Nya was looking back and forth trying to comprehend what they were talking about.
Sabina read on and then gasped. "Ayden, you'd better read this!"
She handed the book to Ayden and pointed her finger at a particular spot on the page. Pax's chicken scratching was hard to decipher, but he was able to get through most of it. Pax was jealous of him, which was nothing that Ayden was surprised about. And it wasn't really what Pax said about him, but the way he said it that made Ayden's skin crawl. Venomous words leapt off the pages, hitting Ayden almost as forcefully as if someone had slapped him. This was not the Pax he knew.
"Are you sure he wrote this? I mean, look. Even the handwriting is different," he said as he pointed to the jagged scrawling of ink on a particular page.
Sabina looked again more closely. "It is, isn't it? But, my handwriting changes with my mood, too."
Ayden read a few more lines. Pax wrote about having strange and dark visions and feeling the pull of a magic far greater than his own. He feared it, and yet, longed desperately for it. His words were unsettling, to say the least.
"What does it all mean?" Sabina asked.
"I don't know. Right now, it really doesn't matter," Ayden answered to Sabina's shocked expression as he handed the book back to her. "Don't get me wrong, Sabina. I am worried about him. But we can't do anything for him right now. We don't even know where he is." Worry and guilt overrode Ayden's attempt at being calm about Pax's disappearance. Maybe if he hadn't been such a jerk to him?
Nya squeezed his hands as if she'd read his thoughts. He tried to smile, but his mouth was determined to remain a frown.
Volos, Keena, Da'ewyn, and Devlin made their way back to the nearly non-existent fire. Sabina put Pax's books away as Ayden and Nya joined the group. Devlin spoke first, "Da'ewyn and I were wondering about the path that leads to the first group, the sulkas. It seems a little too convenient, don't you think? It may be a trap."
Heads nodded and brows furrowed as everyone thought about what Devlin had said. Ayden asked, "But how else will we get to them?"
Da'ewyn answered, "We'll have to go over the rocks above the path."
"I guess that might work. The rocks weren't as bad there as they were at the bottle neck. But won't they see us then?" Sabina asked.
"Better for them to see us than to be trapped in the pathway," Keena stated.
Ayden thought about their plan. A flash of memory of the lake, blood red against the setting sun, shot through his mind. "If we go at sunrise, we'll have the advantage of the sun at our backs and to their faces. They'll be partially blinded by the light."
"Good thinking, Ayden," Volos stated and then continued, "We have to believe that we can handle the sulkas. They're not all that bright. Then, Keena and I were thinking, if we could draw small groups of the larger army through the bottle neck, we could take them down slowly."
"VERY slowly!" Da'ewyn snorted. "We'd be fighting for days with no rest--all the while against fresh warriors!"
Volos rubbed his head. "Well, our most pressing task is getting Ayden to Degus," he said conversationally. Ayden's stomach lurched. The sulkas didn't worry him much and the larger army was scary, but nothing would be as bad as facing Degus.
Volos spoke again, "We will have to be Ayden's body guards. The quickest path to Degus is straight through the center of the army. If we could force our way through the center, just enough to get Ayden there?" He didn't finish his sentence, and Ayden could see in Volos' eyes that even Volos thought this plan stunk.
No one spoke. Everyone stared at Sabina's drawing. "If only we could fly," Sabina stated. Ayden wished they could. But the only one who could've even begun to get them air-born would've been Pax.
"We have no other choice. There is no other way to get to Degus," Ayden said.
"What about the lake?" Nya asked after Sabina had translated.
Everyone studied the dirt-map. Then Keena spoke, "I wouldn't trust that route. Degus is no fool. She'll have guards around the lake. And if she has no guards, she'll have a spell on the water. She would never expose her back so carelessly."
"We may just have to take things one step at a time," Volos sighed.
"You mean, wing it?" Ayden asked. He almost felt a smile touch his lips.
Volos did smile as he looked at Ayden. "There is a time and a place for everything," he said, echoing some of Freya's words. "Winging it, as you put it, might be the best thing."
Devlin was smiling at the idea, but the rest of them shifted uncomfortably.
"We need to try and rest. We only have a few hours left until dawn," Keena advised.
The companions went to their separate corners in pairs. Volos and Keena once again leaned against each other and meditated. Devlin and Da'ewyn stayed close to the cave opening as guards. And Nya and Ayden took their previous place leaning against the cave wall, holding hands. Sabina curled up on the floor and hugged Pax's belongings. No one slept.
Ayden thought about Freya. Other than Volos mimicking her words earlier, Freya's voice hadn't sounded in his mind for a long while. He didn't want all this time to ponder what that might mean. His stomach would not settle, and he felt like running out of the cave and screaming down to the army below. He just wanted to get the battle over with.
Nya massaged his hand, sending her magical warmth through his veins. Ayden focused on her, but his nerves refused to be abated. His eyes trailed down Nya's body until they rested on her bare feet. He cringed at the sight of the scars where the cat's tongue had torn her flesh. In her language, he apologized. "I'm sorry for your feet, Nya. I'm sorry for all of this. You shouldn't even be here. You shouldn't have to fight. In fact, I don't want you to," he said urgently. "I want you to stay here, in the cave." He looked imploringly into her eyes and knew immediately he was fighting a losing battle.
Nya's eyes bordered with white flame. "You would ask me to stay and wait while the rest of you risk your lives? The waiting alone would be more torturous and would cut deeper than any wound received in battle! You cannot be so selfish, Ayden."
Ayden knew she was right. He would never agree to such terms if the tables were turned. "I had to try," he said and touched her cheek, dousing the fire in her eyes.
"I know. Try not to worry. We will help each other. There is strength in our companionship," Nya answered. Ayden wasn't sure if she just meant the two of them, or everyone. For some reason, her words were disappointing.
Chapter Forty-Three
Battle