Mask of Poison (Fall of Under Book 1) by Kathryn Kingsley (great novels to read txt) 📕

The drengil beneath her reached for the creature that was already out of their grasp.

When someone grabbed her Ember’s arm, she shrieked and went to crack her spear into their face. A hand caught it before it could hit paydirt.

“Lyon!” she exclaimed. “Where have you been? What’s going on? Why didn’t you and Lydia help him—”

“We are. This is the plan.” He frowned down at her and let go of the gold spear.

“What?” She yanked her arm out of his grasp.

“I will explain later. Come, we need to—”

An enraged scream and the woosh of a scythe cutting through the air was the first thing she registered. The second was that Lyon had pushed her to the ground.

The third was that Rxa was once more, impossibly, on his feet. And the fourth was that he was furious. “I will kill you here and now!”

Lyon staggered backward, barely able to dodge and deflect Rxa’s wild attacks. But he was running out of room to move.

The drengil had reached the door.

Blocked from two sides, there was nothing he could do. There was only one way out. And it didn’t include her. “Ember—forgive me—”

“Go!” she screamed.

Lyon exploded into a swarm of white bats. They swirled through the glass over the door. He was gone. She was alone.

Alone with a million hungry drengil at the walls.

And Rxa.

Ember turned…and ran for her life.

25

Ember didn’t know where she was going. She didn’t know which way she could go that would make any difference at all. The estate was surrounded by the largest horde of drengil she had ever heard of, let alone witnessed.

She was trapped. Helpless. Mortal in a world where she was nothing more than an insect.

Live for every second.

She would not give up. She would not surrender!

Two drengil fell from her spear as she fled deeper into Aon’s abandoned estate. Then a third. Then there were too many to fight. She turned and ran once more.

The rooms flew by as she ran through them, ducking around corners and avoiding the hungering corpses that were swarming into the building. Rounding the corner into yet another room, she jumped over a sofa and careened into the next space.

A balcony.

A gods damned balcony!

She impacted the stone railing and bit back a dismayed wail for two reasons. First, it was too high off the ground to safely jump.

And two…

Beneath her was a sea of the dead. Packed shoulder to shoulder, they filled every possible space in the courtyard and the grounds, clambering over each other in their need—their desperate need—to get inside.

To find something to kill.

To eat.

Namely?

Her.

But being torn apart and having her innards devoured was probably a better fate than if—

“Little dove! There you are.”

The simple sound of his voice made every ounce of hope for a relatively quick and pseudo-painless death vanish in a puff of smoke. Ember shut her eyes and swore with every ounce of effort she had. Because it was the only thing she could do.

“I don’t even know half those words! That’s fun. You’ll have to teach them to me later. Sorry it took me a few seconds to find you. I had to stop to steal some pants. Feels nice to have pants again. Does everyone who works for Aon always wear all black? Is it, like…a requirement or something? Oh, well.”

Gripping her spear in both hands, she prayed to the gods. She prayed to them, not knowing if they were even still alive. But it didn’t matter. If they, or anyone out there, could hear her? It was worth doing.

She whirled and thrust her golden spear at Rxa. With a sickening crunch, it punctured his lower ribcage. The sound must have been one of them fracturing as she rammed it straight through him.

Rxa sighed. “I don’t like today. Today is too stabby. Oh!” He poked at the golden spear that was sticking through his ribs. “This is shiny. How cute. Who gave it to you? Lyon? I bet it was Mr. Sappy McBeanstalk. Looks like his work. Do you mind taking it out now?” His voice lowered dangerously as he tilted his head ten degrees to one side as he gripped the spear in his hand and yanked it from his own body. She could hear the slide of metal on bone. “It stings a bit.”

She staggered away from him, letting go of her weapon. He dropped it to the ground with a clatter. “Rxa—”

“That’s better.” He strode toward her, ignoring her terrified sounds as she fell against the railing. “I was so worried! Are you all right? He didn’t hurt you, did he? Tell me he didn’t touch you.”

“Stop—”

He drew close, and she tried as hard as she could to push him away. But he was unstoppable. He felt like a force of nature. How someone could be so injured and yet feel as immovable as a boulder, she didn’t know.

I don’t belong here!

He traced his hands up her arms, seemingly oblivious to how hard she was shoving him. “Sssh, it’s all right. I know you’re scared. You must be terrified—being taken away by Lyon and then brought here? This world can be so dangerous. So cruel. If Aon touched you—if he even thought about hurting you, I swear I will let you take half his marks yourself.”

“I—”

Rxa ran his fingertips over her throat, touching one of the four pinpricks that Aon had left in her skin from his claw. When she flinched, he hissed in sympathetic pain. “That must smart.”

I flinched because you touched me. “I—I—I’m okay—”

“Poor thing. Here…let me help you.” He reached up and pulled his mask from his face. She looked up at him, her panicked struggles forgotten for a second.

His face was healing.

He was pale, and there were red splotches on his skin where she had once been able to see through to tendon and bone. She could see the yellow writing that arched over his skin with its strange spirals and pointed, jagged script. He had deep, dark circles under his pale, yellow