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Far down in the valley, pressed against the hillside, stood several structures that had jagged tops, like they’d been broken down.
“Buildings?” Nadia uttered.
“The remnants of a city,” Corrine confirmed. “This is the one nearest the gate. One can assume they guarded the access to what is now the Shade. The gateways.”
Nadia and Harmiston nodded. Every school child in Agartha learned how the Shade had come about after the city had been built down there.
“Why isn’t your camp there? Surely you’d have some shelter?” Harmiston asked her.
“Those buildings are unstable and pieces fall off them all the time. There’s no safe shelter to be had.”
“What are those rings?” Nadia saw several of them in the ground, inside each other, though not quite concentrically. They became smaller and smaller, centering on a few buildings in the innermost circle. Something powerful must have caused them to burrow into the ground like that and still remain to this day.
“We believe those are the remnants of the magical protections,” Corrine explained.
“So they kept domes of magic over the cities?” Nadia frowned. “They tried living here before going under the ground? That must have taken a lot of magic.”
“Which is why only a few cities have these scars around them.” Corrine gave a slight shrug and walked on. They all followed her.
Nadia shook her head and focused on their predicament. “What happened to Blade Sarker?” she asked Terys while they walked. They were heading up a hill close to where they’d met the Wraiths. Just like Nadia had figured out, making camp was best done at high altitudes. She kept her mask off and had fastened it to her belt. The air was getting easier to breathe. Whatever gases that poisoned the air, they were heavy and mostly in the lowlands, not that the air up high felt fresh.
“He died three days after we came here. Some Bolts got caught below a rockslide. He got one out, but couldn’t save the last. There was another rockslide. They both died.”
“I’m sorry to hear that,” Nadia said. She’d barely ever spoken to the man, and he wasn’t as available as the Specters, but he had been a respected leader. “His death was an honorable one.”
“So it was,” Terys said.
“How have you survived here?” she went on. She had told them all what had happened down in the city during and since the attack. It had taken up most of the time they’d spent on the initial ascent. Now, they were following along at the same height to find the Wraith camp. “This land is poisonous.”
“It is. But there is life. Water must be fetched from up high. That’s where it’s cleanest.”
“Still tastes like metal,” one of the Shields said.
“And food?” Harmiston asked.
“There are two types of berries here. One is lethal. The other, surprisingly edible.”
“Makes sense,” Harmiston said. “The lethal one survives by not spreading its seeds far, while the other relies on animals and birds, if there are any, to do that job for them.”
“He hasn’t changed much,” Terys mumbled. Nadia suppressed another smile. They hadn’t seen Harmiston’s attack on the hybrids and had no idea. “There are some ugly-looking foxlike creatures here too,” Terys went on. “They taste remarkably good. And there are birds.”
Nadia saw the grimace of disgust on Harmiston’s face at the realization of what animal the Wraiths had been feeding on.
“Why are you here?” Nadia asked. “I couldn’t understand why you weren’t all killed, like most of the police were. I understand why they didn’t kill the Queen. They wanted her as a puppet. Many of the Ghosts were outright slaughtered, though.”
“The Ghosts are gone?”
“No. There are many left, thankfully. I’m the only recent addition to the guard.”
“Hm …” Terys frowned at that. “Yes. Well, I suppose the Ghosts have different rules than us.”
“They do,” Nadia said, and left it at that. She wasn’t here to argue the ridiculous differences in demands of the Wraiths and the Ghosts.
“But the Ghosts were always fewer than the Wraiths. The Queen tasked me with finding you.”
“From what we can tell,” Terys began, and then cleared his throat. The air was hostile, and worse on those who’d been here so long. Nadia heard them all do it from time to time. “We were put here as prey. These hybrids … we didn’t know there were so many of them. They come here to hunt us. It’s a sport for them. A few of us, like Shield Kearney, died in the beginning. We weren’t prepared for them. Now that we are, we never leave in groups of less than eight. Their strength is nearly overpowering, but they are not undefeatable.”
“No, they are not.” Nadia met Harmiston’s eyes and saw the concern there. He was still struggling to figure out his bomb, but she was sure he could do it. The answer simply needed to come to him.
