Dungeon Runner (Book 1 and 2)

Stepping Up, Chapter 64

Tibs tried the wrap his essence around the wound. But the pain made it hard to concentrate. Then he saw the archer on the roof of a house notching another arrow.

"What—" Carina started asking, but Tibs grabbed her arm as she crouched and pulled her off balance and on his other side.

"Archer," Tibs said through gritted teeth. The motion had made the pain more intense. An arrow broke on the pillar behind where Carina had been standing.

Air essence accumulated around her hand, took a shape, but Tibs couldn't focus on it. It had never been this hard to think, to concentrate. The shape adjusted around her moving hand, then she flung the weave at the archer. It continued to change, then it was out of his range.

The archer flew out of sight as if Jackal had punched him while fully stoned.

Tibs tried to grasp at the details through the increasing pain, but all he could get was archer and pain.

"Cover."

There might be others.

Where were the attendants? Where was the one who had come with them? The people waiting to travel? Where was everyone?

Carina pulled him behind a pillar, and Tibs looked across the platforms to the houses on that side, they were one story. They were taller further back, but the ground slopped down on the way to the mountain.

Maybe this was why every other city he'd traveled to had a market around the transportation platform. It made it harder for anyone to shoot at the arrivals.

"We can't stay here," Carina said, glancing around before focusing on the arrow in his shoulder. Tibs screamed as she pulled at the skin around it and she stopped.

"There's something else. It hurts too much."

"Can't you wrap your essence around it? That helps with the pain."

He shook his head and regretted it. "Mind's fuzzy."

"There's poisons," she mused.

"No corruption." He could tell that, at least.

"There are other kinds." She looked around. "We need to move."

"The inn," Tibs said. Whatever was going on, the answer would be at the inn. That's where he'd find Jackal, and the fighter always knew what was going on.

She hesitated, then pulled him to his feet. He screamed again, it felt like the pain was spreading away from the wound. He looked around the pillar. The road was empty in all direction. The road to the platform was never empty.

A raid, he thought, the guards were raiding the Street.

He shook his head to clear it. No. He was no longer there. This was something else.

Someone else.

"We shouldn't have left," he said. "We left the town to Sebastian."

"This was your one chance at Purity, Tibs. And nearly every other Runner left. If the Conscript couldn't keep this from happening, I doubt you would have made a difference."

"It's my town." His growl came out as more of a whine to his ear.

"How do we get to the inn, Tibs? I'm thinking we want to stay off the streets, but I don't know the alleys."

He tried to focus on the alleys he could see and remember the layout. This part of the town hadn't changed in months, but the fuzziness made it difficult.

"That one," he pointed, then his hand dropped as if stones had been attached to it. "It's like a maze, and there's going to be creature, no, people there to stop us."