“You don’t look good,” she mocked.
“I look as well as can be expected. My foul brother has chained and drained me—what’s your excuse?”
She ignored my bitter comments, searching the bodies of the guards. Her large body moved with surprisingly agile speed as she sifted through their robes.
“What are you doing?” I hissed.
“Getting the keys to your little bird cage. This castle was the original safe house for the Acolytes. That”—she pointed to the hole from which she’d just emerged—“is a safe passage that will eventually lead us back to the temple—it was built centuries ago, and forgotten. Till now.”
The Acolytes.
Perhaps I was saved after all.
“For some reason,” the woman continued, “my master wishes you free, and so I am here doing his duty. Despite my personal feelings toward you.”
“I don’t care about your personal feelings.” I coughed, hacking up blood-tinged phlegm. “But I can’t walk out of here. You’ll have to let me syphon off you.”
“Absolutely not,” she retorted, jangling the keys in the palm of her hand. “Ah, here it is.”
She bent down toward the lock, her ginormous behind protruding into the air as she fiddled with the key.
“If you’re a servant of the master, then you are a servant of mine!” I started to syphon off her, but I was too weak. She laughed, returning the favor. I squealed, falling back onto the stone floor.
“Control yourself,” she snapped. “As soon as they realize the shadow is a diversion, they’ll come to check on you. We are running out of time as it is.”
She unlocked the door, letting it swing open, but then returned to the hole in the floor, waiting by it expectantly, her irritation evident.
“I was being honest,” I whimpered. “I can’t move. You will have to carry me.”
“Get up!” she said.
“Where is our master?” I cried, hating this wretched woman who he had sent in his place. All the Acolytes I had known had been of some standing—ministers, lieutenants and commanders—not simple-minded medicine women. “Why did he send you?”
“If you don’t stop complaining I will leave you here, no matter what the master says. I will happily take your place!”
At her threat, I struggled onto my elbows, then grabbed hold of the bars, using them to pull my limp body into a standing position.
“Fortunately for you, the tunnel is small—you can crawl most of the way.”
I gritted my teeth, unable to speak.
“Come on! Our master waits most impatiently! Every moment you spend in here you delay his plans and our day of glory!”
My day of glory.
My bones feeling like rubber, I stumbled toward her. The room spun, my own sweat falling down onto my lips with the effort.
“You smell entirely foul,” she added, gagging. I reached out, using her podgy arm for support, but she shook me off.
“Crawl,” she spat.
I nodded, staring down into the black hole, just large enough for me to enter. If I’d had the energy, I would have laughed. I had absolutely no idea how she had managed to crawl through it in the first place.
“Now!” she screamed. “They’ll know where we’ve gone. We have to hurry, or they’ll chase us down in the tunnel!”
“I…am…moving,” I exhaled, sliding my body further down into the dirt.
“The shadows will give us cover at the cove,” she added, heaving her body into the hole, legs first. “Just pray that we get there in time—your brother has been joined by a supernatural fighting force of some kind. We can’t be too careful.”
A supernatural fighting force?
Perhaps the woman was truly as mad as she looked. A heavy clunk sounded as the stone was replaced, and we were submerged in complete darkness.
Derek
I was starting to feel a similar sensation to the one I had experienced when the woman from the tower drained us of energy—the gray dots dancing about my vision, and the light-headed, woozy effect which indicated I was on my way to losing consciousness. The only difference was, it never happened. The sentry syphoning off me, a robed minister who had attended the meeting, seemed to maintain a precarious balance of his energy supply—never draining me too much, keeping his supply constant. Begrudgingly, I had to admit that it was impressive.
“Derek, you okay?” Lucas asked me.
“Fine. You?”
My brother nodded. He was standing next to me, providing his services to another minister. Everywhere I looked I could see members of GASP standing stone-still, running down like batteries. Only the witches managed to stay strong, using their own innate power to uphold the barriers. For the rest of us, there hadn’t been time to ask where or how we would replenish our energy supplies, but it would have to be done swiftly if our efforts to repel the shadow worked.