Gates of Thread and Stone (8 page)

This time when he started it, I watched more closely. The creature’s chest lit up, much brighter than before, and I scooted closer to Avan. I thought I felt his breath catch, but it was hard to tell.

We rode through the freight yard. The heat from the energy stone warmed the metal, but it wasn’t as hot as Avan pressed against the entire front half of my body. Any remaining frustration I felt toward him vanished as we continued through the city. We were really doing this.

The nearest gate was several miles north. We had to get to the main road, which would lead directly to the exit. I clenched my sweaty palms against Avan’s stomach.

We cut through alleys, people darting out of the way and shouting curses as we squeezed through. Even though we were only going at a canter, the buildings passed in a colorless blur. At the main road, I pressed my cheek against Avan’s back as we joined the busier traffic. On the other side, two sleek, single-rider scouts in the shape of large cats sped past. They were headed for the White Court.

Avan turned just enough for his voice to reach me over the beat of metal hooves. “Ready?”

No.
“Yeah,” I breathed.

The gate came into view, the familiar sight of the Ninurtan banner—a red sword crossed with a silver scythe—draped above the opening. The massive metal door remained closed between midnight and four in the morning, when all Grays were prohibited from entering or leaving except for city business. During operating hours, the gate was open. I couldn’t think of anyone in recent history who’d forcibly tried to leave Ninurta. The security was mainly there to keep out the gargoyles, not to keep anyone contained. Only two bored-looking Watchmen were checking each waiting scout to ensure it was approved to leave.

All we had to do was catch them by surprise and push through. The Watchmen wouldn’t pursue us into the Outlands.

It sounded so easy, but the physical act of leaving had never been the hard part. Accepting what it meant to pass through the gate and let everything here go—that knowledge stuck like a hook in my throat, dragging me back toward the city, my job, the Labyrinth, everything I’d ever known. But Reev wouldn’t be there waiting for me. None of those things meant anything without Reev, who had given me the sense of safety that Ninurta’s walls couldn’t.

The Gray shifted beneath me as Avan increased our speed.

“You know what you’re doing?” I shouted over the wind. Probably should have asked sooner.

Avan didn’t answer, but I imagined his self-confident smile.

The Watchman on the left waved the scout at the front of the line forward. Both guards stepped aside to give it room.

A jerk of our Gray to the right. A burst of speed. My stomach dropped.

The Watchmen didn’t expect us. They shouted, diving out of the way, hands slapping for the metal grate. Too late. We blew through the gate into the barren darkness of the Outlands.

We’d done it. We were fugitives of Ninurta.

CHAPTER 10

IT WAS IMPOSSIBLE
to see beyond the flat, dry earth illuminated by the energy stone. Avan checked the map every once in a while to make sure we hadn’t gone off course, but we could have been anywhere and nowhere. So far, there was no sign of gargoyles, but anything could be lurking beyond the wall of darkness. It was like riding through empty space, only the sound of metal hooves striking dirt and the wind tugging at my clothes to remind me we were moving at all.

With nothing to focus on but the red glow of the Gray’s chest and the windblown smell of Avan’s shirt, I slept in intervals. Lucidity was never far out of reach, though. Falling off the saddle and breaking my neck wouldn’t help Reev.

Being this close to Avan was a practice in contradictions. His body heat and the solid comfort of his back soothed me. I could relax against him and feel secure enough to sleep, even if only lightly. It was almost like being with Reev.

But Reev didn’t also make me hyperaware of every point of contact between us. The shift of his muscles beneath my cheek. The backs of his thighs. The way our hips aligned on the seat. For the first hour, my heart pounded so hard, it was like a battering ram against my ribs.

It didn’t help that, surrounded by nothing but the pressing dark, it was as if we were the only two souls in the world.

Stupid
. The dark could also be hiding a pack of gargoyles closing in. I glanced over my shoulder, but I couldn’t see anything except the vague line of the horizon in the blackness.

I pushed down the paranoia and rested my head against his shoulder blade. I closed my eyes.

The next time I opened them, daylight had begun to filter in through the clouds, giving my first clear view of the Outlands. Flames of light licked across a flat brown landscape. Low, craggy rock formations rose haphazardly to our left, interspersed with yellow-green cacti.

My instructors at school said most of the Outlands was desert, and I could see now that this was true. All around, patches of dead grass and copses of skeletal trees marked miles and miles of dry earth with no recognizable roads. Without the map, we would’ve had no idea where to go.

The wall of darkness was gone, but the world didn’t feel any less empty.

I leaned a bit in the saddle to try and see Avan’s face. “You should rest,” I said.

“I’m okay,” he shouted over the wind.

“I could take over while you sleep. Can’t be that hard. I’m a quick learner.” It was too bad I couldn’t speed up the threads to make the hours go by more quickly. I watched the terrain pass in silence for a few minutes before saying, “Hey, do you think it’s true that there’s nothing out here but dust and gargoyles?”

“Looks like it.”

“But seriously. You’ve seen the archived maps. We can’t be the only ones left. It’s just not possible.” Not to mention it’d be incredibly lonely. The maps in the records hall showed whole countries spread across vast lands, filled with cities.

“If enough people around here survived to rebuild, then it’s likely the same thing happened somewhere else,” he said.

I had to agree. The alternative was too depressing. But if there were other cities hidden within the expanse of the Outlands, then the people had never tried to make contact. Maybe they believed they were alone as well. Maybe there were even other
mahjo
out there.

It made me wonder about those scouts leaving and entering the city. What exactly were they doing? Scouting for habitable land? Harvesting natural resources?

Either way, it was possible to survive out there if the Black Rider had set up a base somewhere in the Void. Especially if he was sustaining an army of kidnapped Ninurtans.

When we found Reev, would he still be himself? Or would the Rider have already . . . I chased away the thought.

“If there’s anyone else out there,” Avan continued, “they’re too far away to get in contact with. I doubt we’ll run across anyone. Look.” He pointed ahead.

The terrain was so flat that I could make out a strip of brown and green far in the distance. The border of the forest. It looked like moss growing against the horizon. I couldn’t be seeing that right.

“We’re almost at the forest already? But it’s only dawn. We can’t have been riding for more than eight hours. How fast are we going?” I looked down, watching the Gray’s hooves practically fly over the ground.

I could hear the pride in Avan’s voice when he said, “Pretty sweet, right?”

“But Grays can’t go this fast in Ninurta.”

“We’re not exactly in Ninurta anymore.”

“But I didn’t think they were even built to reach this speed.”

He turned enough for me to glimpse the dimple in his cheek. “I made some modifications to this guy.”

“Illegal ones.”

“Says the fugitive.”

I preferred not to think about that. Anyway, I was grateful for the “modifications.” Not only would we get to Reev sooner, but I’d have to spend less time plastered to Avan’s back. I wasn’t used to being physically close to anyone for so long, not even Reev.

“How much farther until we reach the forest?” I asked.

“About an hour.”

“We can rest then,” I said. “You need sleep.”

“I’ll be okay. I’ve stayed up longer than this.”

I didn’t want to know why. But the curiosity remained at the back of my mind.

“Nervous?” he asked.

I was. Our knowledge of forests came strictly from school. The trees in Ninurta bloomed for one week a year, but they were sickly and yellow, nothing like the green leaves in the history books.

White Court experts theorized that there was either a vast source of water hidden inside the forest or an underground reservoir that fed it and kept it alive. But their theories had never been confirmed because they couldn’t get a team of researchers past the gargoyles.

“I’ve read about the forests. They’re dangerous. Lots of places for wild animals to hide,” I said.

“What do you really think, though?”

“I can’t wait to see it,” I admitted. Had the Rider given Reev the chance to appreciate the forest?

The air became steadily hotter as the hour passed. Moisture gathered where our bodies touched, and although the feeling wasn’t exactly unpleasant, I tried inching back to give us some space. When it grew difficult to swallow, I twisted around to rummage in Avan’s bag for one of the canteens I’d seen him pack. I had forgotten to pack water myself. If Avan had let me go alone, I would’ve died of dehydration before ever finding Reev.

I hated feeling so incompetent. With a sigh, I maneuvered the open canteen between his arms so he’d see it.

“Drink?”

“Thanks,” he said, taking it from me.

I relished the wind against my face. I drank from a second canteen, taking even more sparing sips than I would have in Ninurta. We didn’t have a pump out here. I took another deep breath of hot, dry air before putting away the water. Something dark flickered at the corner of my eye.

I jerked my head to the side and scanned the line of rocky outcroppings. Maybe it had been a trick of the li— There it was again!

A figure darted between the rocks, keeping pace with the Gray despite our speed. I squinted. The figure ran on all fours, with a long tail whipping behind it.

“Avan,” I rasped, my hands flattening against his stomach.

A gargoyle.

CHAPTER 11

GARGOYLES HAD BEEN
native reptiles once, before Rebirth happened more than two centuries ago. But the mass collision of magic and technology during the war had changed them and killed off their major predators. Then, Kahl Ninurta I had taken their evolution a step further by combining them with other lizards to create monstrous chimera. But something had gone wrong—I didn’t know what; I assumed the Kahl lost control of them—and he’d abandoned the project, killing those he could and unleashing the rest into the Outlands.

“They’ve been following us for a while,” Avan said evenly. “I didn’t want to alarm you.”

Several more figures darted into view. Their powerful legs carried them over the jagged rocks with little trouble. My heart jumped. Of course—they traveled in packs. They must’ve been aware I’d seen them because the one on the rocks jumped off and continued along the flat earth, less than twenty feet away and in full view.

“Well, I’m alarmed,” I snapped, and then felt immediately guilty. “Sorry. I didn’t mean—”

“Don’t worry about it.”

I’d heard plenty about the gargoyles but not much about how they looked. The creature following us had a broad head with frills extending over a thick neck and a spiny back. It was lean and long, with sinewy muscles stretching beneath brown skin that looked as hard and dry as the earth.

Seeing a gargoyle for real made me think about the demons they were whispered to be. The creature looked like something that might have crawled out of fire and brimstone, breathing shadow and smoke.

“What are they waiting for?” I asked.

“Not sure.”

The Gray’s hooves stumbled. I tore my gaze from the gargoyles and held on tight as Avan maneuvered the Gray into a steady gallop. I peered over Avan’s shoulder at the controls. I didn’t know much about Grays, but I could figure out what a frantically flashing light meant. Even in full daylight, I could tell the energy stone was considerably dimmer.

“Hmm,” Avan said, sounding a lot calmer than I felt. “Definitely smarter than I expected.”

I connected the dots. The gargoyles had been biding their time, waiting for our energy stone to die out. I tried not to panic but didn’t do a very good job.

“I thought you said the stone would last us to the Void,” I said.

“That was my optimism talking.”

I dug my fingers into his stomach and felt his muscles contract. I slid my hand higher, my palm pressed to his chest, and was somewhat relieved to discover that his heartbeat wasn’t nearly as steady as his voice.

“Hold on,” he said.

He bent lower over the Gray’s neck, and I followed suit. I turned slightly to keep an eye on the gargoyles as the Gray burst forward. My arms tightened around Avan. The wind stung my face and tugged at our clothes.

Every sense sharpened as we raced closer to the tree line. The gargoyles picked up speed along with us. But we were faster. They slowly fell behind.

The forest was less than a mile ahead. We could make it.

The gargoyles must have realized this as well because they abandoned their strategy to bide their time and began aiming their claws for the Gray’s legs and flanks. I could hear their snarls and guttural snorts. Clicks and grunts.

“I think they’re talking to each other,” I said. Maybe the Kahl had combined them with other creatures we didn’t know about.

Up ahead, the trees were a blockade of brown bark and dry branches, rushing to meet us. I didn’t see enough space for the Gray.

“Drek,” I whispered, and clenched my eyes shut.

We crashed through the forest. I held on as the Gray galloped along, jarring us back and forth. Bark scraped my arms. Branches raked across my skin and ripped through my hair. I tucked my face between Avan’s shoulder blades as he forced the Gray through. I dared a glance behind us but couldn’t see the gargoyles. I heard them, though. They mowed through the underbrush with the coarse sound of claws tearing through roots and dirt and scoring the trees.

The Gray stumbled again.

I gasped as its front legs rammed into a raised root, the noise screaming in my ears. Or maybe that was me. I lost my grip on Avan, and we flew off the saddle, sailing into the branches. Brown and green whirled in dizzying and painful confusion. I brought up my arms to shield my head as something smashed into my back and shoulder. The air rushed from my lungs. For several excruciating seconds, I couldn’t move or breathe.

Then I groaned, prayed nothing was broken, and pushed up onto my hands and knees. A few yards away, the Gray lay on its side, metal warped and chest smoking. I blinked through my burning eyes and found Avan also lying nearby. His arm didn’t look right.

My ears were ringing. I tried to say his name.

A huge gargoyle burst through the trees and landed on top of the Gray. The metal groaned beneath the gargoyle’s weight. The creature looked at me and then at Avan. It pounced.

Time crept to a near stop. I heaved forward, fighting against the threads that tied me to its flow. For the first time, I felt them snap around me. My limbs moved quicker, more easily. I focused on Avan’s prone form and the gargoyle—its body extended midleap, its open mouth exposing two sets of serrated teeth, and its curved claws aimed at Avan. The threads brushed against me but didn’t drag. I was free of them.

I scrambled for the rear of the Gray, reaching for the prostitute’s knife that had fallen from my strewn bag. Then I threw myself in front of Avan and brought up the knife, slashing at the gargoyle’s chest just as my grip on time slipped. Time sprang forward.

All the air left me again when the gargoyle crashed into me. My back hit the ground, the creature crushing me. I couldn’t even shout.

My hands came up as I braced for the pain of claws and teeth—but the gargoyle slid off me, slumping to the forest floor. Blood from the knife wound pooled around its chest.

More gargoyles broke through the trees, pausing near the Gray to take in the scene. They growled, coming closer. I forced myself to my feet, standing between them and Avan. I gripped the knife so hard that my hands hurt.

Don’t think. Don’t think.
I could move free of time now. I could do this.

I reached again for the threads.