Ravage by Lacey Andersen (ebook reader online txt) 📕

headstone and tidy the area. When I’m done, she whispers, “Thank you,” but she doesn’t need to. The dead may be gone, but I know better than anyone they’re never truly forgotten. The least I can do is tend the gravesite of a young woman murdered by her own blood.

“What are you doing here?” she asks. “Surely you’re not just out to see me?”

“Actually,” I rise, wiping my hands on my pants, “I was looking for you. I wanted to see if you could show me how to get to the tunnels under the school.”

A wave of fear hits me so hard that I stagger, then draw my walls up a little tighter. “Abigail…”

“You don’t want to go there,” she rushes out. “It isn’t just that Rayne died in the tunnels. They’re dangerous. There’s dangerous creatures in them, and the secrets within them are meant to be kept.”

I hold her gaze. “I know, but I’m not going to stop until I prove my brother was murdered. Will you please help me?”

She looks reluctant.

“Please. For Rayne.”

Slowly, she nods. “I’ll take you to the entrance, but that’s as far as I’ll go.”

“Thank you,” I whisper.

As we start to walk, I sense a creature not far behind us. It smells of blood and death. It smells of that strange combination of brimstone and what I imagine sunshine to smell like, if it had a scent. I feel within it such anger and hunger. Tonight, it hunts, and someone or something will die.

But I don’t tell the light fae. It’ll scare her, and she’s already afraid.

So we walk together, leaving behind the graveyard. Rain begins to fall, but it’s so light it’s almost a mist. Dark clouds slip past the moon, cloaking the world in darkness one moment and light the next as the moon peeks between the clouds. Normally, I’d love a night like this. But tonight I’m even more excited, because tonight I’ll be one step closer to finding my brother’s killer.

We walk for so long I start to wonder if the ghost’s mind has wandered. If she’s forgotten that she leads me somewhere. I want to ask her, but the silence around us is deafening. There’s only the patter of rain, and the heavy breathing of the creature that stalks us.

But then she points. “There.”

I follow her finger and see a crumbling structure near the wall of the academy. It looks like a building that fell into disarray a long time ago and that no one thought worthy of being restored. We continue walking toward it. Large trees grow all around it, cloaking the stone structure in shadows, and moss grows amongst the stones, almost concealing it within nature.

She takes me to the back of it, and I stare in confusion. “How will this take me beneath the tunnels?”

“Here,” she whispers, drawing closer and pointing through the thick grass.

I move to where she gestures and push back the grass only to discover steps leading down to a door. My heart races, and I let my senses stretch out. Beneath that door something evil lurks. Perhaps many, many evil things.

A slow thrill crawls down my spine. Do those creatures know one of their own will be joining them soon? Will they simply know that I’m a dark queen, or will I have to show them?

Goosebumps erupt on my flesh. “Thank you, Abigail. Do you know the path Rayne took the night he died?”

“Yes,” she whispers, and shivers. “I followed him for a short time. I can…I can show you the way, but you might not like what you see.”

The way she says it makes my stomach flip. I’d seen a lot of bad things in my life, but maybe I shouldn’t be quite as eager to follow the path that led to my brother’s death. It seems easy to pretend I’m immortal, but Rayne is a reminder that we all have weaknesses.

“I have to do this,” I tell her, but I’m also reminding myself.

Rayne would’ve done anything for me. I could do this for him.

The creature that stalks us isn’t far. He waits in the shadows beneath a tree, watching us with hunger. Should anyone spot him, I know that they would feel terror beyond anything in their lives, and that they wouldn’t live long enough to even scream.

But I ignore him, focusing on the door.

My boots sound loud as I move down the steps, and I’m surprised by how easy the big stone door pulls opens, as if it’s used regularly. Inside, it’s dark. Not the darkness of a moonlit night, but something deeper.

“There’s a torch just within the door,” she tells me.

I trust her, stepping forward and letting my fingers slide along the wall until I find it. Then I inhale slowly, and sense the right stone rather than see it, jerking the torch along it until fire sparks to life. The magic stones are usually kept near the entrance to places like this, for that very purpose.

This wasn’t my first time creeping into some dark and dangerous place, after all.

The firelight dances on the stone, revealing more unlit torches lining the walls, and the fall of the rain above us seems to grow louder and harder. Somewhere up ahead I hear the slow dripping of water, but everything else is silent. Squaring my shoulders, I start forward, sensing Abigail behind me. As we move, the tunnel slopes downward, taking us further and further from the surface.

Soon, we come to a divide. I look to Abigail.

“He went both ways, exploring most nights, but he took the right path that night.”

I nod, filing away her directions, and continue moving forward.

Behind us, the scrape of the creature’s claws ring through the tunnel, and I sense him pause, uncertain. He’s wondering if his prey knows he’s there. I don’t hesitate. I don’t give him any reason to know I’m aware of him.

We come to another split in the path.

Abigail doesn’t speak.

I look back at her. Her hands are clenched together.

“Which way?” I ask.

“This