Frost (18 page)

Echo
.

“There,” Adam said, pointing. “Do you see it?”

Through the darkness at the edge of the lake, I saw the faint gleam of metal. We rode forward, and as the light from the lantern touched the shadows, my mouth dropped open and I struggled to breathe.

“What is it?”

“It’s one of their buildings,” Adam said.

“The ancients?”

“The Forgotten Ones,” Gabe murmured.

It rose out of the darkness, a glimmering thing shivering in the light of our lantern, slick with snow and ice. The roof was smooth and white like an egg. A tangle of fallen trees and rocks lay against one side, and a gaping black maw formed a mouth in the other. We dismounted and went into the blackness together, leaving the horses tethered and surrounded by snow blossoms.

We descended steps for what felt like hours. Strange metal supports held up the ceiling above our heads, and intricate carvings covered the walls. The light from the lantern made everything glint and sparkle.

“How big is this place?” I asked, my voice echoing.

Nobody answered me, because no one knew. We kept walking.

A space as vast as a cavern reverberated with our footsteps, and the lantern slowly and faintly illuminated what lay around us. Part of the roof had fallen away, revealing the stars above. Vast metal girders coiled like tentacles from the snow that had fallen inside the structure, framing a circle that faced us like a great sleeping eye.

It was a gate, a portal, and it was like nothing I’d ever seen before.

“Quickly,” Adam said, and we scrambled across the slick ice toward it. The wind whispered through the hole in the roof of the structure, scattering little shards of ice and chilling my face. Beside me, Gabe was pale and silent. His hand found mine, and he squeezed it.

We stopped before the gate.

“What do we do now?” I asked.

“We have to turn it on.” Adam was running his hands over the metal, turning his head back and forth. “There’s a panel, help me look...”

His brother joined him. I didn’t understand what he meant, but Gabe seemed to, and he let go of my hand and jogged further down.

“Here,” Adam said after a moment, his tone sharp with excitement. “I cannot fathom how it is still whole after all this time.”

Gabe hurried to his side, his fingers moving over the piece of metal, then and the air buzzed. Light streaked up the side of the gate and the circle began to glow with faint red.

A shiver rippled through me as the power thrummed through the ground at my feet and made the hairs on my arms prickle.

“It’s time. The energy will draw the Watchers, so we must be quick.” Adam looked at Gabe and then at me. “Say your farewells.”

Gabe and I faced each other. This was the final moment. Now that it was here, it didn’t seem real. My heart beat fast and my hands hurt from the cold as I cupped his face with them. His eyes stared into mine.

“Come with me?” he asked, timid and insistent all at once.

I thought of Ivy, Jonn, Ann. All the ones I loved, all the ones I had to keep safe. “You know I can’t.” I said the words gently, sadly.

He nodded. He’d known I would say that, I could see it in his eyes. “Thank you,” he breathed, touching his forehead to mine. “For everything you’ve done for me.”

“I’m so glad I didn’t leave you in the woods,” I said back, and the rest of the words swelled in my throat, choking me. Tears swam in my eyes.

Adam touched my arm. “Time to go—”

“Stop!”

We all whirled.

A dark figure stepped from the shadows, and a gasp ripped itself from my throat as I recognized the face.

It was Cole.

HE HELD A pistol in his hand, and the black muzzle glinted like obsidian in the light of the lantern. He was closest to me, only a few feet away, and I caught a glimpse of his wild and desperate expression before he stepped forward and yanked me against him. Wrapping one arm around my throat, he pressed the gun to my head. “Stay where you are, all of you.”

The muzzle of the gun pressed an icy circle against my skin, and I gasped. I couldn’t move, couldn’t think. Adam halted at the sight of a gun to my head. His dark eyes sparked fire, but he raised his hands. Gabe and Abel did the same. Gabe’s whole face was contorted with horror.

Cole waved the gun at them before turning it back on me. “Nobody move, or I’ll shoot her.”

“Cole...” I struggled to speak as panic squeezed my throat. “What are you
doing
?”

I met Gabe’s eyes across the space between us. His whole body was rigid, his hands curled into fists as he struggled to stay put.

“Pretty Lia Weaver,” Cole said to me, stroking my cheek with his free hand. “I’m afraid you’ll have to suffer some more of my willful rudeness until I get what I want.”

“And what do you want?”

He ignored my question. “I always thought you were too sensible to get caught up in all of this, but I see I’ve misjudged you. I should have known you’d turn out just like your parents.”

The mention of them tore at my heart. What did he know about them and their involvement with the Thorns? “My parents?”

“Don’t play dumb,” he growled, jamming the gun harder into my skull to emphasize his words. “I know exactly who they were—traitors to this village, conspirators with that band of terrorists, the Thorns.” He reached down and ran his other hand over the brooch pinned to my cloak.

I could barely breathe. Obviously there was no use pretending ignorance if he’d seen the brooch. “How did you know?”

He laughed. “I have my ways. People barely notice me, you know, but I’m clever. I know how to watch people, how to learn their secrets after months of careful observation. I was the one who shot them in the forest after luring them out with a forged note from the Brewers,” he said. “I lured the Brewers out into the woods, too, because they made such convenient scapegoats. How ironic that they were the ones I was looking for all along.”

His words hit me like a punch in the gut. He’d killed my parents. He’d just admitted it. “You will pay for this.”

“Correction—I will be
paid
for this. And quite handsomely.”

Tears filled my eyes as I thought of my beloved Ma and Da lying dead in the snow. Their bodies had been mangled by the Watchers. No one would have seen the bullet marks after the Watchers had finished mauling their bodies.

“Who else knows what you know?” Adam demanded. “Who knows what you’ve done?”

“No one, yet,” Cole said. “I gave that map to the Mayor, but I'd botched my mission—I didn’t catch the true Thorn contacts. Your parents were just soft-hearted civilians. They were not the ones I was looking for.” He grinned cruelly at Adam. “But now here you are, the real contacts. And here
you
are,” he said to me, “working with the Thorns and making the same mistake your parents did.”

“I’m not working with anyone,” I snapped. “I’m just trying to help my friend.”

“Ah, yes, the Farther runaway.” He tipped his head to the side, looking at Gabe. “Bringing him in will surely land me a handsome appointment with their higher-ups. That’s what I’ve always wanted anyway. Not to be stuck in this forsaken place. My parents taught me better than that. They taught me that I could succeed if I was clever and paid attention. That’s exactly what I’ve done.”

I remembered how he’d followed me in the woods, how he’d asked Ann so many questions about me, how he’d pursued me. “You were pretending to want courtship so you could see if I was in contact with the Thorns,” I accused.

“Of course. But you didn’t cooperate. It took me far too long to figure everything out. But I knew something was up when I saw you talking with Adam Brewer tonight,” he said, giving me an ugly smile. “So I followed you home. When I saw the Farther, I thought maybe the rumors about this mysterious Thorn place were true. Thought maybe you could take me to it. So I followed the tracks of your horses here. You weren’t moving fast, and you were easy to catch up with.”

We were silent, stunned.

Cole continued. “Now I am about to become a very rich man. The Farthers have been asking questions about this place for a long time.”

“Rich? We don’t even use money here,” I protested, trying to think of anything that would dissuade him.

“You think I want to spend the rest of my days in this frozen wasteland? I’m going to Aeralis.”

“The soldiers will only use you and then kill you,” Gabe said, his voice low and urgent. “You’re a fool if you think any different.”

“Don’t try to threaten me, Farther,” Cole snapped. “I know exactly what I’m getting myself into. I’ve been planning this for some time now.”

He cocked the gun.

“Cole,” I whispered, “I’ve known you since we were babies. We were friends once. How can you do this?”

“I’m sorry.” And he did sound sorry. “My courtship offers weren’t only for the sake of my investigation. Maybe we can come to some kind of an arrangement, you and me.”

“You disgust me.” He’d killed my parents, and he thought I would consider marrying him? “I’d rather die.”

“Don’t make too many promises yet, Lia. You haven’t even heard my terms. But first...” He straightened his arm, aiming the pistol straight between Adam’s eyes. “I need to take care of these two, and then you and your precious Farther can come with me to have a chat with the soldiers in the village.”

“No—”

A growl split the air, echoing through the room and cutting him off. We all froze. All the hairs on my neck stood up. I saw Abel and Adam straighten slightly and exchange glances.

Cole’s arm quivered against me. “What was that?”

“You know exactly what it is,” Adam said evenly, meeting Cole’s eyes. “You’ve heard it before.”

“Watchers,” I whispered aloud.

Across the room, Gabe’s eyes were wide as they stared into mine.

“If this is some kind of trick…” Cole sputtered.

Above us, through the hole in the roof, something rustled just out of sight. The branch of a tree quivered. Snow hissed down into the room around us.

“No trick,” Adam said. “Do you want to die?”

Cole shoved me forward. I stumbled, and Gabe caught me in his arms and cradled me against him. Cole was backing up, shaking his head.

“All of you stay where you are. I just want the Farther. If he comes peaceably, I’ll let you have a fighting chance with this thing—”

Something whispered against the snow, like the sound of something heavy being dragged. The ice crunched behind him, in the blackness of the room. A guttural growl rumbled through the air. And then, deep in the shadows, a red glow flickered.

Cole gasped and spun, waving the pistol.

Adam started forward. “Give it up and we can save you, Cole.”

“Stay back.” Cole swept the gun at us all, turning another circle.

Adam froze.

Another growl came from the shadows. Cole took a few steps back. A vein in his throat throbbed.

Gabe’s hand found mine again. I pressed my lips together to hold back a hiss of terror. Cole’s fingers fumbled with the trigger as he reached down for the bag of snow blossoms at his belt—

Something swept out of the darkness in a swift, blurred movement. I saw a flash of fur, a glint of metal, heard a sharp squeal that as almost like the sound of a knife being drawn over another knife, and Cole was gone. There was a single, wet crunch, and a spray of red splattered the ice.

The gun bounced into the snow and lay there.

“MOVE,” Adam ordered to us.

There wasn’t time to even think about what had just happened with Cole.

“Quick,” I said, pulling out every blossom I carried and flinging it down into the snow. “Make a circle.”

“Here.” Adam yanked one of the contraptions from his belt and employed it with a snap of his wrist. A metal hoop strung with snow blossoms expanded around us. Beside him, Abel was pulling out a net similarly woven with the flowers. He tossed it over himself and held up the edges for us to join him.

“Hurry!”

We worked fast, standing together in terror as the shadows rippled again.

A thing emerged from the darkness, and every hair on my body stood straight up.

A Watcher
.

The shadows writhed as the creature took shape. It was almost indescribable—like a snake crossed with a bear—the neck long and elegant, the body furred and square. But it didn’t quite move like an animal—the movements were at once jerky and precise, unnatural. I caught my breath.

“Look,” Gabe muttered.

Another creature slipped from the shadows, this one even larger and more sinuous than the previous. It swung its head from side to side as if sniffing for us. Its fur rippled in the light. I saw a glimmer of something metallic along its back, like a row of knifes against its spine.

And then from the shadows, a third and even larger Watcher emerged.

“Three Watchers?” Adam breathed. “Can it be possible? Has any Frost dweller ever lived to see such a thing?”

They circled us, their red eyes gleaming and their necks undulating like snakes. In their wake they left massive tracks. The ground shuddered as they moved. Every inch of my skin rippled in pure terror as they all turned in unison to regard us.

“
Don’t move
.” Adam gritted the words.

The largest Watcher stepped close. Its massive head swung down toward us, and it growled again, a strange and terrible mixture of clacking and snarling that made every single muscle in my body pull taut with tension. The red glow emanating from its eyes bathed us in lurid light, and we huddled together. There was nothing between us and gruesome death except a circle of flowers and a net as flimsy as silk.

I couldn’t breathe.

The creature stopped, and made a sound that was both a hiss and a clatter. I couldn’t move. Incisors sharp as knives hung before my eyes as the creature examined us. Gabe gripped my hand.

The red light played over the blossoms, and the Watcher hissed again, blowing back our hair.

I shut my eyes.

But then, with a rush of air, the Watcher drew back as swiftly as it had come. Together they turned, snarled one last time, and vanished.