Chapter 5 - Whispers Beneath the Roots
Lyra ran blind through the tangle of iron-wood trunks, her breath tearing through her chest in hot, agonizing sobs. The briars tore at her clothes and slashed deep furrows across her forearms, but she held one arm clamped securely across Zephyr’s squirming form. Behind her, the rhythmic snapping of heavy branches and the low, guttural click of a hunting beast tracked her every step.
The rider was not hurrying. He was letting the scent of her fear and the hatchling’s sulfur trail guide his mount.
Zephyr suddenly extended his neck and opened his jaws, his tiny throat glowing with an unstable, sputtering light.
“No, hush!” Lyra hissed, clapping her hand over his mouth. A burst of light would give away their position instantly.
A sudden heavy rustle above made her freeze. She pressed her back against the hollow trunk of a decaying willow. Not ten paces ahead, the brush parted. A massive scaly snout emerged, followed by the needle-filled maw of a wyvern. Its rider sat tall in the saddle, holding a chain that connected to an iron choker around the beast’s throat.
The rider stopped, tilting his helmet to listen. The woods fell completely silent, save for the wild thrumming of Lyra’s heartbeat against her ribs.
Zephyr sneezed.
It was a tiny, high-pitched squeak, but in the dead of night, it sounded like a hammer hitting an anvil. The rider’s head snapped toward her hiding spot. With a cruel grin visible beneath his raised visor, he raised a heavy hand-crossbow loaded with barbed steel.
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“Found you, little princess,” he snarled, squeezing the trigger.
Lyra shut her eyes, but the quarrel never struck. A whistling blur erupted from the shadows above, and an iron-tipped arrow took the rider squarely through the throat, pinning him to his own high saddle.
