Shadowspell Academy: The Culling Trials, Book 2 Read online

  “Welcome, everyone,” she began.

  Ethan didn’t stop to listen. “This is one of the easiest. All we have to do is beat the simpleton creatures and find the gold. I know where it’ll be…mostly…and the basic spells I’ll need. With you guys to run interference, it shouldn’t be a big deal. Hopefully by the next trial we’ll be used to working together and you won’t drag me down.”

  Wally’s voice dropped low. “This cheater always prospers.”

  The gates shimmied open and Ethan gestured us on ahead of him.

  “Go back with your team. You’re going to get in trouble. You’re going to get us in trouble!” Pete tried to shoo Wally away, like a wayward dog.

  “You’re my team. They are just my dorm mates,” she replied. “The school will catch on eventually. That’s how this works, you know.”

  As we crossed the threshold into the trial, bare dirt was all that was in front of us. A few scraggly bushes dotted the way and one lonely tree reached into the sky, its branches bare and trunk gnarled and hunched. Gradually, a hush pressed in around us, unnatural for so large of a place. The wall behind us melted away, and the desolate land stretched out to infinity.

  “This stuff trips me out,” I said as Ethan found a path on the cracked earth and followed it without hesitation.

  “Did you memorize all the right paths or something?” I asked, scanning the way for any sign of danger. A warning vibrated through my body, but it didn’t take a form or indicate a direction. We were in the thick of danger without any indication where it might come from.

  Giddyup.

  “Yes. It’s good to have friends in high places.” Ethan stopped at a fork, looked each way, then went right. “Except I don’t remember that fork.”

  “Super,” I glanced back at the others. “Thoughts?”

  “He’s the one cheating. We’re just playing follow the leader,” Pete said. “We can claim we didn’t know.”

  “I agree. This is the best-case scenario at the moment.” Wally turned in a circle while walking. “When he doesn’t need us anymore, that’s when we will need a plan B.”

  “Wise woman,” Ethan said.

  I gritted my teeth. His overconfidence that we were all idiots or incompetent would be the ruin of him. I’d make sure of it. But right now, Sunshine’s words burned through my brain. I needed to stick to the middle of the pack. To let Ethan take the heat off me so I’d go unnoticed.

  “We’re about there, I think,” Ethan said, hitting a three-way stop and choosing the far right path. He’d clearly made the correct choice at the previous fork.

  “Where is there?” I asked, winding toward the left before Ethan took yet another right turn. Then another. My brain said we were going in a circle, but my sense of direction said we were still winding our way east. The path was a mind bender for sure.

  “The bridge. It’s the easiest crossing place,” Ethan said.

  The roar of water grew louder as we walked. Ahead, I could barely see the rolling, boiling, white water of a large chasm. Foam floated up, creating a rainbow in the strengthening sun rays, then cut off abruptly as if tumbling off a cliff. The oddity was the land was flat. There was no actual cliff, no natural drop off. The chasm cinched into little more than a stream.

  “I do not like this,” I grumbled as Ethan pointed right.

  “There,” he said, picking up the pace.

  “We have all day. We don’t have to hurry,” Pete groaned, jogging to keep up.

  “I’m not the only one with connections,” Ethan said, not slowing. “The first one to the gold takes it all. I want to be the first.”

  “Don’t you have enough money?” Orin asked, drifting along behind us, in no apparent hurry.

  “You can never have enough money,” Ethan replied. “And this isn’t about the money. Not really. It’s about taking all the glory. It’s about winning.”

  A stone bridge was built into the side of the river, leading over the thinnest part of the water. The drop from the bridge was plenty steep, I had to admit, but only a trickle of muddy water flowed through, probably knee high at best.

  “What’s the task?” Wally asked.

  “Simple, we have to get across the bridge,” Pete replied as we all slowed near the stone steps.

  “It won’t be simple,” Gregory said quietly. “I can guarantee that.”

  A deep growl issued from somewhere. At first, I couldn’t figure out the source, but the growl rose in strength until a deep, booming roar reverberated from under the bridge.

  “No,” I said, shaking my head, knowing exactly what was coming. Mom had read me enough fairy tales for me to know what lived under bridges. “No freaking way.”

  Another roar like a garbled “ahhhhhh” followed, shaking the ground and sending my senses into overdrive. Everything in me said to run. To get away. Fighting whatever was under that bridge was absolute madness. You didn’t slap a lion on the nose and then put up your dukes. No. You climbed a tree and hid like a coward. Right?

  My laughter rang out, a reflex I couldn’t control, as a huge green head poked out from under the bridge. Warty and hideous, it had a wide nose with big nostrils dripping thick yellow goo. An enormous hand grabbed the edge of the bridge, its thick fingernails chipped and deeply lined with the color of dried blood.

  “Who’s going first?” Ethan asked, taking his wand out of its canvas holder.

  Almost as one, everyone looked at me.

  Chapter 3

  I shook my head as the others backed away from the bridge and the oversized deep green troll climbing out from under it, which effectively put me out in front. I stood sideways so I could keep an eye on both the troll and the traitors.

  “Some friends you all are,” I said.

  “You’re the quickest of us,” Wally said, her eyes glued to the troll. “If you can get the troll to follow you, then maybe the rest of us can get by with minimal fighting.”

  “Basically, what she’s saying is, you first, Shade,” Ethan said. “I’ve got your back, but we all know you move like lightning.”

  I turned a look on him. “Really? Compliments now?”

  Pete snorted but didn’t step up. “He’s trying to sweet talk you into going. You know, as if you were just as dumb as he is.”

  A bellowing roar snapped my head around and I took a few steps back. I couldn’t help it. I might be braver than I was smart, but even I could see this was far from a slam dunk.

  The troll now stood fully exposed in the center of the bridge, flexing his big hands with those disgusting cracked nails. His feet and toes matched his hands, right down to the chips in the nails and the junk jammed under them.

  But to be fair, that was not what had my attention. I blinked and shook my head. When I said he was fully exposed, I do mean fully exposed. The big bastard was over eight feet tall and his hands, feet, and…other appendages…were about three sizes too big for his body.

  “How does he not step on it?” Pete wondered out loud. I had the same question, but I was as irritated as a cat who’d been thrown into bathwater. The irritation kept me from freaking out and letting fear control me.

  “Put some clothes on!” I snapped and pointed a finger at the troll. “Ain’t nobody got time for that.”

  The troll bent at the waist and roared in my direction, showing off cracked and broken teeth, a tongue split in three and a maw big enough to stuff my entire head in and bite down.

  Fear tickled at me, working its way down my spine. I fought it hard. Pushing it away as it fought to take me over. “You look ridiculous. Like an oversized Shrek, you know that?”

  “Yelling at him won’t work,” Gregory said behind me.

  “Really? What are you going to tell me next? That the pope is Catholic?” I brushed the hair from my eyes and adjusted my hat. “So what will work?”

  “Why are you asking him?” Ethan barked. “Get moving!”

  I rolled my eyes and held my ground. “Gregory?”

  “His sensitive
spot is not what you might think. Trolls are capable of—”

  A crack behind us preceded a burst of light as though a series of fireworks had been let off. Gregory yelped, and something snapped my ass like a metal-tipped whip on steroids.

  “Ah, what the hell?” I jumped forward as heat and pain sliced through my right butt cheek, making me gasp. Cold washed over my body. The troll startled as though I’d snagged my foot on a trip wire.

  “Ethan!” Wally gasped. “How could you do that? He’s on our team!”

  “We need him to move. He’s the bait today.”

  As if I needed any confirmation of who’d just shot me and with what. I put a hand to my butt, but my rear end was far from my biggest problem.

  Apparently, there was an invisible line I’d just crossed—a line that Ethan had known about and pushed me over on purpose.

  And now the troll was coming for me full tilt, mouth wide, hands outstretched as it made grabby motions with those wretched fingers.

  I darted to the right, drawing the troll back to the bridge. If I could get him to follow me to the other side, then my crew would be free to cross. Maybe this was like those golems from the Shade trial, and we could leave the troll behind to terrorize the next set of kids.

  I ran up onto the edge of the bridge, climbing the stone railing so that I was almost as tall as the troll. “No questions? Isn’t that how the fairy tales work? Shouldn’t you ask me questions before you go crazy and try to kill me?”

  “No, don’t engage him! Keep moving! He’ll overwhelm you!” Gregory yelled.

  The troll curled his lips and rolled his wide shoulders as he slowed his advance. “You wanna question, little duck? How about a rhyme? Do you think you can outsmart me?” The troll’s lips curled and pulled wide, a grotesque sort of smile if I’d ever seen one. “Give me a moment, and I’ll have you.”

  He wiggled the index and middle fingers on his left hand, and a strange sizzling feeling rolled over my skin—his magic, if I had to guess. Trolls clearly had magic.

  I worked to brush it off, but a scene interrupted my vision. The troll stood over me as I lay with my limbs bent at strange angles, my eyes wide and pleading.

  I blinked my eyes then rubbed them, trying to clear away the image. Trying to root myself in reality and shake the visual he was forcing on me. I couldn’t quite do it, but it no longer commanded my attention. Pain throbbed through my body as though his huge, meaty foot had stomped on me.

  My legs shook from the visceral reaction, so badly, I had to lock them to keep standing.

  “See?” the troll breathed the word, hissing it. “Now you see. You see what I will do to you. What I will enjoy doing over and over again.”

  Gregory groaned. “It isn’t real, Wild! None of what he will show you is real—ignore it and fight!”

  I gave a slow nod and breathed through the washes of fear coming at me, like breakers in the ocean. I squinted through the double vision. “Try again, dumb ass.” I gritted my teeth as I made myself grin at him.

  His bulbous eyes bugged out even farther. “Not possible! You will fear me!”

  I couldn’t stop myself from flipping him off, even though the effort left me shaking. I forced my frown into a grin. “So much eloquence coming out of a big, dumb-looking, booger-riddled creature. Why is that? What do you have? Some smarty-pants magic user feeding you lines?” I adjusted my stance on the thick stone railing of the bridge. Or tried to. I fought to lift a foot, but I was stuck to the stone. The troll’s smile widened and the bugger winked at me.

  Oh crap.

  “Six little ducks went out one day.” He took a step toward me.

  “Get ready to run. He’s about to be very distracted,” Ethan barked, but I didn’t think it was at me. No, I was the distraction here. My crew would run to safety, leaving me to handle the troll.

  The troll took another step and the image it was taunting me with shifted again, showing my intestines spilled out into the water below the bridge, the water turning pinkish red. I blinked it away and fought to keep my balance as vertigo hit me hard and left me swaying.

  “Over the bridge and far away.” The troll took another step and I tried again to yank my feet off the stone. Glued, I was damn well glued to it with some sort of troll magic.

  “Boots, get them off!” Gregory yelled.

  I bent and ripped frantically at the laces. Got one of them off.

  “Mother duck called quack, quack, quack.” The troll reached for me before I could free my foot from the other boot. “But only five little ducks came limping back.”

  That big paw of a hand swept toward my head and I did the limbo backward on pure instinct, my one foot stuck in the boot that was still attached to the stone. I yelled as I swung down, the force wrenching my knee before that foot came loose at the last second.

  I tumbled through the air, landing in the water below with a sickening thud. Not enough water to cushion my fall, not enough mud to sink under me. I groaned as I rolled onto my belly and feet, soaked through.

  “Hurry!” Wally said. “Trolls are known to eat as many as ten people per annum.”

  I lurched toward the far side of the creek, the cold water soaking my clothes and chilling me despite the warm weather. A huge splash behind me told me all I needed to know. My new friend had followed me, allowing the others to cross.

  I spun, reaching for my knife as I whipped around.

  The troll was a hell of a lot bigger than I’d thought, that or he’d grown in the last few seconds.

  “Little duck, you are going to die. Better that I do it now than you see what is coming for you. What is coming for you, oh, that is much worse than anything I could do.” He grinned and pointed a finger at me. A magic finger that could make me see horrible things.

  Well, that was enough of that garbage.

  I lunged toward him and slashed with my knife, aiming for that finger. He was far too slow, and I took the finger off at the second knuckle before he could so much as blink.

  We both stared as the digit fell into the water. Bloop. For just a split second, there was nothing, no noise, no drop of blood, and then it all went to hell.

  The troll fell backward, swinging up his hand, and in the process, spraying me with blood the color of a grapefruit’s innards. Pale pink splattered over me—the smell of it not that far off citrus either—and I pushed my back against the solid ditch behind me as the troll wailed at the top of his lungs.

  The fear was gone as were the visions he’d superimposed on my sight. But for how long?

  “My fingy, my fingy, she took my fingy! You said I wouldn’t get hurt. You said I’d scare them and get to eat them, but none were mean enough to hurt me! Oh, I’m going to tear this bitch apart.” He roared the words as he straightened himself up, his eyes coming back to find me on the far side of the ditch.

  Time to go.

  Panic clawed at me. I had no boots, a single knife, and a troll that had just decided I needed my body parts rearranged.

  “I need help!” I yelled up at my team, hoping they hadn’t gone far.

  “Here, I have a stick,” Pete called from above me. I spun and reached my hands up to see he’d oversold it—it wasn’t a stick but a twig that was thin and wobbling even as he stretched down to me. I spread my hands wide.

  “That isn’t a stick, Pete! Find a branch, not a sliver!”

  His shoulders slumped. “Sorry.” And then he slunk back, leaving me there.

  “Damn it, I still need help!” I yelled.

  “Oh, the humanity! I’m going to tear her a new hole!” the troll hollered. He slammed into me again, but his eyes were rolling as though the pain in his finger was nothing short of incapacitating and it made him super sloppy.

  Score one for me.

  I spun with him, like some sort of horrible tango. His snot slapped onto my face. He gripped at me with his good hand and something bumped my leg.

  “Get off me, you freakshow!” I yelled and shoved him away. Shockingly, he f
ell backward, right onto his butt into the water, still holding his hand, still crying massive crocodile tears as he spewed obscenities.

  “Pain in his hands is his downfall. It steals his magic!” Gregory leaned over. “You did good. That injury will keep him occupied for at least a few minutes.”

  “I’m coming, Wild!” Pete yelled from above.

  I stared at the wall of dirt and stones that comprised the ditch, able to see some handholds now that the troll’s magic had diminished. “I can climb out, just warn me if he’s coming.”

  Only Pete didn’t wait for me. No, Pete was in what I like to call white-knight mode. Was it because he knew I was a girl now? Yeah, most likely.

  A new snarl from above cut through the air and then a honey badger came flying down.

  A furry Pete —in full on honey badger form—landed between me and the still inconsolably sobbing troll.

  Gregory groaned. “He will be far deadlier once he snaps out of the shock. You two need to get out of there!”

  A snarl of serious ferocity ripped out of Pete and the troll opened his eyes.

  “Oh, no.” Gregory said. “Get out of there!”

  “Trying!” I yelled back, only now I couldn’t leave. Not without Pete.

  He snarled and lunged at the troll’s foot, snagging a big toe in his mouth and flipping his head back and forth so hard his body was a blur.

  The troll bellowed bloody murder as Pete put the toe hold on him. “I’m eating badger for breakfast!” he roared.

  His hand shot for Pete and I lunged forward without thinking, knowing only that Pete was one of mine to protect. I slashed with my blade, catching two more of the troll’s grasping fingers.

  They plopped into the water and the troll lurched to the side and puked as his newly cut fingers bled pink into the churned-up water.

  A gargled ahhhhhhh ripped out of the troll. “Imma kill her ten ways to the solstice and back!”

  Jesus Murphy, he was going to unmask me if I didn’t get my ass out of here.

  “Come on, Pete!” I grabbed his stubby tail and pulled him backward while he fought to get closer to the troll, clawing at the ground, muddying up the waters even more as he went.