One, whose claws raked away stone and soil without pause. Cab didn’t like to see her toil like that, but she told him she was happy to sharpen her nails for the next group of enemies. Cab left it at that.
All the while, the face in the coffin watched them.
The fae face.
When the fae had first opened his eyes, he’d screamed in horror, mouth open wide behind the coffin’s glass lid.
Once he saw One, though, he had stopped screaming and now showed no sign of fear. The sight of the silver lizard, a fragment of the Great Paragon, was enough to earn immediate trust, though Cab wasn’t sure it was something he deserved.
They had the coffin halfway out when they heard human shouting, echoing down a nearby tunnel and coming closer.
“We’re not going to get it out in time.” Einan cursed. Wiped dirt out of her eye. Smashed the dagger against the wall in frustration. “Fuck me! Should have waited for them to finish digging and then attacked, instead of getting caught with our pants around our ankles—”
“Something tells me there’d have been more Queensguard in place by then,” Cab said. “Like the Queensguard who are coming now.”
When they came, they’d bring deadly force. Moves Cab knew so well, he practiced them in his dreams.
Another shout. Almost on them.
The coffin exploded.
Einan threw her arms up to cover her face. Cab didn’t, knew he didn’t need to before registering why he knew. One wasn’t afraid. And not only because she was made of silver and couldn’t be cut.
The glass blasted to either side of them, leaving them unharmed. The body within slid out.
It hit the ground and the earth began to shake. Cab reached for it.
Protect him. One’s voice in his head. Then, Look out!
Cab spun around, stepping in front of the fallen fae. The Queensguard had reached the mouth of the tunnel. They carried torches, the flames glinting off royal armor and steel swords, making it easier to see how outnumbered they were.
The odds didn’t matter. Not to Cab. Not when One had no fear.
Einan shifted her weight uncertainly. A slender hand reached out and wrapped its fingers around Cab’s ankle.
I will borrow your connection to One of Many, a new voice said, and thank you for allowing me this sacred trust.
What? Cab’s palms were sweaty where he gripped the sword. If the fae needed One, then it was One he needed to ask.
“Shit,” Einan said. “What are we doing? What’s the plan?”
Strength, One explained. He’s been asleep for a long time. Needs a jolt to get him started.
The Queensguard began to pour in, and Cab lunged, stepping away from the fae to knock the first Queensguard back into the tunnel with a hard, swift blow from his stolen sword. He’d create a bottleneck to better their odds.
The Queensguard dropped his torch but it didn’t go out, flickering against stone. Cab smelled something singed. Hoped it wasn’t his trousers.
Right, he said to the fae. Do it.
It happened all at once, like the arrival of a summer storm. He felt something shift, a push from the inside of his skull.
With that push, jagged stalagmites erupted from the ground, rising like stony prison bars across the mouth of the passage. The Queensguard shouted, then were silenced, the light from their torches doused. Those who couldn’t move out of the way fast enough were impaled. Rock acted to protect the cave where the fae had been unearthed, lunging free of the ceiling into new formations to shield Cab, Einan, One, and the fae where they stood.
It would’ve made a prison for them underground, but more stone was crumbling away behind them, creating a narrow corridor through the earth. Their escape route was clear.
One’s voice in Cab’s head was approving as the sense of otherness receded. Then only the two of them remained in his head. Cab fought off a bout of dizziness from the strain. Stumbled, then kept moving.
Good work. Not that I expected any less.
“We have to find our way back to the others,” Einan said.
Her eyes were on the fae they’d discovered. Cab could only guess at the joy she felt knowing Sil wouldn’t be alone. If it was anything like what he’d felt when he’d encountered One, Cab was proud to have had a hand in it.
“Can you run?” Cab asked the fae.
The fae lifted his young, golden face. On his brow above his nose was a tattoo of a black crescent moon. He was marked with tattoos like Shining