Centuries

Chapter 8

"You're pathetic."

Maybe he worked better under pressure?

"Shut up, I'm trying!"

Well that didn't work. I just needed to wait for him. My adrenaline was wearing off and the throbbing in my hand and head was returning. It took an eternity and lots of threats but the Darkling finally made it to the top.

"What's the next part of your horrible plan?"

There weren't any ways of starting a rockslide that I could think of.

"You're going to kill me but now that we're actually up here my plan won't work."

I could see the fear in his eyes, I wasn't sure if it was from the height or because of me. I slapped him across the face.

"Slapping me won't make me think of a plan." said the Darkling

"I know. I just felt like slapping you."

He was definitely going to hate me after this.
"I have an idea." I announced.

It wasn't better than his but I was open to anything at this point.

"We lead them to us and when they climb almost to the top we hit them with a rock or stick and then they'll fall and die." It wasn't the most effective way to kill someone but it would have to do.

"A bit violent but it'll probably work."
said the Darkling, now that we were stopped I could see that he didn't look much better than I felt. He'd somehow gotten a cut on his jaw and his hand was still bleeding.

"How long do you think we have until they find us?" I asked

"Probably not long, we weren't exactly quiet."

I didn't know why this made me feel worse than shooting the Fijerdans. This wasn't as fast as a gun but not by much. These were drüskelle, they had definitely done far worse to grisha than we were about to do to them. I scanned the forest trying to spot people.

"Can you see anyone down there?" I said turning to the Darkling.

"I don't want to look down." He replied

I wanted to tell him to do something but I wasn't really sure what that would be. How did either of us run the second army and this was the best we could come up with?

I continued to look for anything in the forest while the Darkling sat there being useless. Well not entirely useless since some of his power had returned and he was keeping us hidden. The sun was setting and making it hard to see so hopefully the drüskelle found us soon so we could get back to camp before dark.

"They must be trying to draw us out." the Darkling said breaking the long silence that had settled around us.

"If you're right then we need to rethink this." I whispered

"What if we drew them out?"

he had the right idea but how would we do that?

The Darkling's shadows were beginning to flicker and I could see that he was growing tired. Something needed to be done soon.

Something about this seemed wrong. It wasn't at all like the soldiers we had fought before. There was nothing stopping them from climbing up here. The Darkling and I were both exhausted, even though we had the high ground we were at a disadvantage. Unless we weren't their focus.

"I think we walked into a trap." I said

"How so?" the Darkling asked

I explained that the Fijerdans could have been trying to get rid of us and go to wherever they needed to be. I wasn't exactly sure where that was yet.

"They could be trying to communicate with General Janazain. We need to find them soon."

the Darkling was right. If anything passes between General Janazain and the drüskelle we need to stop them. The Darkling and I decided to find a different way down than the way we came up since it would take an eternity and I didn't want to climb down in the dark any more than he did. When I stood up I was dizzy from how tired I was. Walking several miles and fighting Fijerdans without weapons seemed impossible.

Eventually we found a steep path hidden in the bushes. The sun was no longer visible from behind the mountains; the only light was the few rays of light seeping through the trees were the only thing keeping me from tripping over tree roots and rocks.

I expected to be gone in a few hours and didn't bring a lantern. If I didn't need to hide my power that wouldn't be a problem. I longed for Mal to be with me even though it would put him at risk. I missed having him at my side for everything. Although I liked the Darkling's presence far more than I wanted to admit.

We were almost at the camp when we saw two dark figures sneaking away from the boundary. We were too late.