The mud in the pit felt like freezing hands pulling her down. Every time Elara tried to jam her fingers into the walls, the earth crumbled, filling her fingernails with grit and ice. She was exhausted, her muscles screaming, but the sound of Caleb's howl in the distance acted like a jolt of electricity to her spine. He was close. He was coming with the fury of a man who had been made to look like a fool.
She looked up at the roots dangling from the edge of the sinkhole. They looked like tangled snakes. She took a ragged breath, shoved her silver dagger into her belt, and leaped.
Her fingers caught a thick, wet root. It groaned under her weight, showering her face with dirt, but she didn't let go. She swung her legs, finding a small ledge of stone embedded in the mud. With a guttural cry, she hauled herself upward, her skin scraping against the jagged edges until she finally rolled onto the surface.
She didn't have time to celebrate. The three indigene sentinels were standing ten feet away, watching her with cold, unblinking eyes. They looked disappointed that she had made it out.
"The wolf king is at the border markers," the woman with the bird-bone braids said. She didn't look worried. She looked annoyed. "He is screaming for his property. He says you stole something from him."
"I stole my own life," Elara panted, pushing herself to her feet. Her legs were shaking so hard she could barely stand. "That is all."
The woman stepped closer, her nose twitching as she caught Elara's scent. "He is breaking the ancient pact. No city wolf crosses the markers without a blood price. If we give you to him, the pact remains. If we keep you, we go to war."
"He doesn't want me," Elara said, her voice turning hard. "He wants to bury me. If you hand me over, you aren't keeping a pact. You are doing his dirty work."
One of the male sentinels stepped forward, his hand resting on a spear made of darkened wood. "Why should we care about the fate of a stray?"
"Because I know his routes," Elara lied, bluffing with everything she had. "I know how his council thinks. I know where he keeps his stores. You hate him for encroaching on your lands? Give me three days, and I will tell you how to cripple his borders so he never looks North again."
The indigenes exchanged a look. The drumming in the earth grew louder, more frantic. The forest itself seemed to be reacting to Caleb's presence at the gate. He was likely clawing at the stone markers right now, his gold eyes glowing with a madness he couldn't control.
"Three days," the woman finally said. "But you do not stay in the village. You stay in the Trial Hut. If you are still alive when the sun rises on the third day, we talk. If the fever or the forest takes you, we throw your carcass back over the line for him to find."
They grabbed Elara by the arms, dragging her deeper into the mist. They passed small, low-slung huts made of sod and bone, where eyes watched her from the darkness. Finally, they tossed her into a small, windowless shack at the very edge of a ravine.
The door was barred from the outside. There was no bed. Just a floor of cold stone and the sound of the wind whistling through the cracks.
Elara slumped against the wall, her body finally giving out. She was safe from Caleb for tonight, but she was a prisoner of the Old Blood. And as she drifted into a fitful sleep, she could swear she heard his voice on the wind, calling her name like a curse.