The Tales of the Wanderer Volume One: A Book of Underrealm (The Underrealm Volumes 4) by Garrett Robinson (elon musk reading list TXT) 📕

“I am always wary,” said Mag.

“That is a lie,” I said.

It became clear, the farther we went, that the cliffs we kept encountering were in fact one long cliff, the edge of a trench that ran for miles. Tuhin’s guidance meant we encountered it rarely, and only when they became turned around for a moment. But I realized after a time that it was far too straight to be natural. It was a man-made trench that must have been dug in ancient days. I remembered Victon’s words, that it had been put here to divert lava away from Opara and into the surrounding land. I marveled at the thought of it. Magic must have been used in its making, for I could not imagine that even an army could have dug so deep, and for such a great distance.

“Halt,” said Tuhin suddenly.

We stopped short behind them. Just ahead of us, the path delved into a slice through a hill, both sides slick with fireglass. Half a span in, the path curved sharply to the right and out of sight.

“Maunwa is on the other side of that passage.”

They unslung their bow from their back, and I did the same. Mag had her spear ready, for she had been using it as a walking stick. Now she hefted her shield off her back and onto her arm. Tuhin pressed close to one side of the path, creeping forwards to the sharp turn. I was just behind them, with Mag bringing up the rear.

Tuhin came to the corner at the end of the path and stopped. I pressed forwards a bit, trying to see around. Tuhin saw me edging towards them and beckoned me closer. I leaned over, my shoulder to theirs, and looked around the bend.

Only a few paces from where we stood, the steep-sided path emerged into the open air. And there, mayhap three spans away, sat the fortress of Maunwa. It perched upon the top of a rise, but behind it the land fell off into the sheer cliff of the trench. A thick iron gate sat in its northern wall, visible from our vantage point, and a road ran out of it—the same road, I knew, that we had been following before we left it for the wilderness.

An uneasy feeling came over me. I had approached a stronghold in the mountains in much the same way not that long ago. Then, as now, I had anticipated foes within, and then I had lost someone dear to me.

I shrugged the feeling away. Yes, there might be Shades here, as there had been when I had led Jordel to his doom. But I had not had Mag by my side, then.

“I see no one on the walls,” I murmured to Tuhin.

“Mayhap it is abandoned,” they said, frowning. “Yet I am still uneasy. We should check to make sure.”

We crept forwards. I whispered hasty instructions to Mag and Oku to stay well behind the two of us. For all her skill at fighting, Mag was no master of stealth.

I followed Tuhin’s lead until we were out of the narrow path, and then we split up and cut wide, creeping between rocks and mounds of fireglass. I kept my eyes firmly fixed on the stronghold, wary for any sign of movement inside. But there was nothing. The gate remained open, and it looked as though it might have been that way for years.

Of course, we could not know that the Shades were aware of us. We could not know that Kaita had warned them, and that they were fully aware we had left the city, thanks to an agent of theirs in the Rangatira’s keep. Nor could we know that they had sent their best scouts to shadow us, agents so stealthy that even Tuhin did not detect them, except as a vague sense of unease. We did not know they had us surrounded.

Until they struck.

I heard the whistle of an arrow a blink before it struck Mag, too late to do anything about it. Too late for me, at least, but not for her. She whirled on the spot. Her cloak billowed around her with the movement, and the arrow passed harmlessly through it.

“Down!” I cried, flinging myself behind a boulder that jutted out of the ground, its bottom half embedded deep in the earth. Oku yelped and pressed against my legs. But no sooner had I hit the dirt than I spotted a flash above me. Sunlight reflecting on metal. Without thinking, I threw myself down and rolled.

An arrow splintered against the rock. If I had been a moment slower, it would have struck me in the chest.

I came up ready to fire. My shaft sped for where I had seen the archer above me. But they were too wily, and had already hidden themselves. My arrow passed futilely through the air.

“Agh!”

Tuhin cried out as an arrow impaled their right shoulder. I spared them only a glance before looking wildly around.

The archer who had fired at me had been opposite the one who shot at Mag. They were in a half-circle that wrapped around us, and we could find little cover out here, despite the boulders. For a mad moment, I thought of running for the fort, but that would put us in open ground long enough for them to fill us with arrows. I looked around desperately.

There. A small depression, not quite a cave, in the side of the hill nearby. It would block vision from above.

I sprinted for Tuhin and seized them by the back of their shirt. Ignoring their grunt of pain, I dragged them towards cover. Oku came pelting after us, whining.

“Chao!” I cried over my shoulder.

Mag had been peeking out from behind a boulder, looking for a way to approach the archers above. She glanced over, saw what I was doing, and ran to join