Vanquished Gods (Hallowed Games #2)

Chapter 17

CHAPTER 17

O n Sion’s horse, Poppy, we rode along a winding seaside road that hugged the mountain’s edge. The night breeze carried the cold sea spray, mingling with the scent of seaweed. To our right, a cliffside rose high above us, while to our left, the land sheared off into the rocky sea far below. The waves churned under the moonlight, and each time I glanced down, my heart pounded wildly. As we rode, the horse’s hooves kicked up pebbles, and they tumbled down the sheer drop.

One little slip of Poppy’s hoof, and we’d plummet to a brutal death. Or at least, I would. Sion could probably dust himself off and walk away. But the path had been our only option; a few miles back, we’d been forced onto this alternate route to avoid the Luminari on their way to Lyramor. As the Magister had said, they already marched on the main road, fully armed.

The wind whipped over us, briny and cold. It nipped at my skin through my thin dress. After hours of riding, my thighs ached, and my throat felt as dry as bone. I held tightly to Poppy’s pommel, trying to master my fear of tumbling off the path.

“What a night for you,” Sion murmured, his voice almost lost in the wind. “You learned the Pater’s weakness, and now you get to ride on a horse with a devastatingly handsome vampire king. I know, I know. It’s no basket-weaving in a hovel, but a good night all the same, yes?”

I couldn’t even come up with a response. My focus was almost entirely on the cliff. Every time I looked at the waves crashing against the shore, the pebbles bouncing off the cliff, I felt my blood roar.

“It’s all right,” Sion whispered in my ear. “Poppy is a brilliant horse. She won’t let anything happen to us.”

“I’m not nervous,” I lied.

“Of course not.”

The marine wind kept whipping over us as I stole yet another glance at the frothing waves far beneath. My eyes closed tightly for a moment. When I opened them again, I exhaled in relief. At last, the path curved sharply upward, turning away from the edge.

“Almost there,” I muttered to myself.

We galloped up the hill onto a tree-lined path, finally leaving the sheer drop behind. As we reached the main road again, I glanced back and found it empty. I let out a long, slow breath. The worst seemed behind us, and we’d outpaced the Pater’s army.

“Can you hear them?” I asked. “The Luminari?”

“They’re a mile away, at least. We’ve gotten here in time.”

The city walls loomed ahead, built from weathered stone. The gates to the city yawned wide open, inviting in anyone who wanted to terrorize the city.

The people who slept inside its walls had no idea what was coming for them.

The sound of running water burbled nearby, and I realized how desperate I was for a drink. My throat ached for water. When I glanced to my right, I saw that just by the forest’s edge, a stream flowed down from the city, its waters glinting under the moonlight.

I slipped off the horse and sprinted to the stream. As Sion hitched Poppy to a tree, I drank water as fast as I could, spilling it down myself while I slaked my thirst. To my left, the river flowed downhill from an arched tunnel, where a carving of a bearded man seemed to watch over me from the stone.

When I’d drunk enough to keep going, I ran to catch up with Sion as he approached the city gates. From the walls, torchlight illuminated symbols of waves, tridents, and spirals. Just above the gates, statues of women with seashells on their breasts stood proudly, bathed in the sheen of moonlight.

But the important thing was the mechanism for opening and closing the gates. As we hurried, I glanced at a large lever that jutted from the walls to the right of the gates, with a keyhole beneath it. Was that the way the gates opened and closed? We needed that bloody key.

At the entrance to the city, the guard was sleeping in a chair, arms folded. His snores echoed off the stone arch above him.

I shook the guard. “You need to wake up!”

The guard startled awake, and he reached for his wooden club. “What’s happening?”

“You need to close the gate,” Sion barked. “Do you have the key?”

The guard stared at him. “What are you on about?”

“The Luminari are coming, now,” I said. “The Order has a Purification planned as soon as the sun rises, but it won’t be a normal one. He’s planning to murder the city’s children to see who reveals their magic to stop it. If you care about anyone in this city, you’ll close the gates to the Luminari. The Pater has ordered a single day of trials, here, today. They’re going to torture everyone all day and see who survives. He’ll take the five strongest, then burn them.”

The man paled. “Luminari?”

“They’re coming. Now ,” I said sharply. “The trials will happen here, in Lyramor, all in one day. Trust me, it will be hell here if they make it into the city. Many people here will die if you don’t shut the gate.”

He glanced behind him at the darkened road. “Thing is…I don’t really want to get on the wrong side of the Order, do I? Disrupting their trials?”

Bloody hell. “You’re not doing anything wrong by closing a city gate. That’s what gates are for. You’re lucky you have one, and it should be closed at night, anyway.”

“But only the Lord Mayor or the Order can give permission for that, and the Lord Mayor is asleep.”

Sion stepped out from the shadows behind me. In a lightning-fast movement, he’d picked up the guard by the throat and pinned him against the wall. The air went ice-cold around him. Sion flashed his fangs, and a shiver rippled over my skin at the wild, demonic sight of him.

“Close the gate. You’re scared of the Order, are you? There are terrors worse than death. I’m one of them. My darkness will devour you whole, and the horror I will inflict will leave you a walking shell of a man.”

Sion dropped him again.

The man looked as if he were about to vomit, and his teeth chattered with fear. “O-okay. Okay. I—I’ll help you,” he stammered. “But you need the key, and I-I don’t have the key myself. The Order has it, and th-the Lord Mayor has it. My job isn’t to c-close the gate. It’s only t-to alert the Lord Mayor i-if anyone starts to leave the city. The Lord Mayor is th-the one who wanted the gate open tonight. He w-wanted it open!”

My jaw tightened. “And why, exactly, is the lever to open and close it on the outside of the city walls, instead of on the inside?”

The man’s throat bobbed. “A few Luminari were here last week, moving it to the outside of the gates. They removed the lever inside the city, and then they constructed that external lever. No one explained why. I just thought…well, honestly, I didn’t really think about it.”

I nodded. “Because they plan to trap everyone inside the city today. Where do we find the Lord Mayor?”

“He’s not far from here. He has the key to the city gates. But the thing is…”

“What?” Sion demanded.

“He is a member of the Order. He’s a Raven.”

“Take us to his house,” Sion ordered in a cold, quiet voice.

The guard nodded, then turned, leading us onto a narrow, cobbled street.

Sion smiled at me. “See? I am good with people. Told you I had charm.”

It was effective, I’d give him that. Just not out loud.

We passed clusters of thatch-roofed homes, nestled together over the road like gossiping hags. The windows were shuttered, and brightly painted signs swung on hinges in the wind.

When we turned a corner, a mansion loomed above the town square, built with blue and green tiles that looked like shimmering fish scales. In the quiet of night, the only sound around us was the echoing drips of the old well in the center of town.

I looked up at the sky.

Dawn light tinged the clouds a rosy gold, and my stomach twisted. The Luminari would be bearing down on Lyramor very soon to trap everyone inside.

Sion turned to me, his gold eyes burning in the dim light. “Let me do this quickly. Use my version of charm and diplomacy.”

Before I could ask what he had planned, Sion was off, a blur of shadows racing up the steps. He slammed through the great oak front door, leaving a gaping, splintered hole in his path.

I turned to the night guard. “What’s your name?”

“Dunstan.”

“Dunstan, wait here until I’m out. We may need your help once we get the key. You are doing the right thing, you know.”

Hurrying, I followed after Sion up the stairs and slipped in through the splintered doorframe. My vampire friend had already left a body behind—a guard who lay on the floor, his neck twisted at a disturbing angle, eyes staring vacantly at the sky. The poor fellow was only doing his job, but he was obviously no match for a vampire.

I surveyed the foyer—the sweeping stairwell, the multiple arched doorways that led in several directions. Not having the vampiric sense of smell myself, I had no idea which direction to take. At least, not until I heard the frantic screaming coming from upstairs.

“Serpent-touched monster!” A man’s voice echoed off the marble halls.

Women’s screams rent the air, and a servant dressed in black ran down the stairs, tears streaming down her face as she choked out sobs.

I started charging up the stairs, though I felt as if my legs were about to buckle beneath me from fatigue.

“Archon save me!” a man cried.

Another servant ran down, tripping over herself to get out of the house. When they reached the guard’s corpse and the broken door, their screams grew louder.

This was going well.

At the top of the stairs, I took a right toward the direction of the man’s shouts. I hurried down the hall to a set of open wooden doors and burst inside.

Sion, soaked in blood, stared down at the body of a half-dressed man. The Lord Mayor’s throat had been ripped out.

Bloody hell.

My heart slammed against its cage. “Please tell me you at least got the key to the gate.”

Sion’s darkened gaze flicked up to me. He looked hungry , which sent fear dancing up my spine . “Do you want me to say that, or do you want the truth?”

“So, you just killed him?”

He narrowed his eyes. “I didn’t. The bloody fanatic slit his own throat before I could question him further.”

I cocked my head, noticing for the first time the dagger in the man’s hand. “Fuck.”

I glanced at the leaded windows, where morning light was starting to slant inside. “If we can’t shut the gates, we need to wake everyone and get them out of the city.”

“Give me a minute, will you? You can wait outside. I’ll find the key.” An edge slid through his voice.

I wondered if the heavy scent of blood in the air would make him unleash his real vampiric side.

I turned, ready to leave, to scream a warning to the city at the top of my lungs, when Sion whooshed past me again like a phantom. I could barely track his movements as he tore the room apart—flinging open the wardrobe, the desk drawers. He rushed past me into a different room, his speed like wind rushing past my skin.

I barreled down the marble stairs and slammed through the shattered door to find Dunstan standing beneath the rising morning sun. My heart hammered. “Dunstan, if you give a fuck about anyone in this town, you will help me get them out of here before the Order shows up. They’re going to break people’s bones. Do you understand me? They will cut off their limbs in front of their families. Trust me on this.”

He nodded, looking like he was about to vomit. “The bell. I-I’ll ring the bell.”

He whirled and started sprinting across the cobblestones, past the empty market stalls, past the large stone well in the center of the square, to a wooden box that stood on a post.

Dunstan flung it open and pulled out a large hand bell. Apparently, this was the town’s emergency system. I didn’t expect much. But when he started ringing it, I had to clamp my hands over my ears. It was surprisingly loud.

“Everyone wake up,” Dunstan bellowed. I joined in with him as he broke into a jog and screamed along with him.

“The Order is coming,” I yelled. “They’re going to put you all on trial. They’re going to hurt everyone in this town! The Order is coming here to break your bones.”

The medieval town’s narrow streets twisted and turned, lined with timber-framed houses that leaned over the cobblestones. As we ran through the streets, bell ringing and shouting warnings, shutters flew open.

From behind, a strong hand grabbed my bicep, and I whirled to see Sion. He held up a large skeleton key.

“See? Told you I’d get?—”

Mid-sentence, he froze, his head turning slowly toward the gate. The wind toyed with his hair. And in the next moment, I realized what he was listening to, because I could hear it, too—the unmistakable rhythmic clink of marching boots, the creak of armor. My stomach twisted.

Sion met my gaze, his jaw tightening. “They’re approaching the gate. We won’t be getting past them, and neither will anyone else.”