Page 261 of Vasmora

“Come.” Gavroche jerked his head toward a pile of stones on the building’s west wall, where a cluster of fine white strands filled the gaping entrance.

Zevander raised his palm, casting his flame like a torch that burned through the sticky silk, the ends of each strand curling and sizzling. Once clear, Gavroche stepped toward it, but Zevander gripped his shoulder, bringing the boy to a halt, and slid his sword from its scabbard.

“You can offer direction, but stay behind me.” Sword at the ready, Zevander stepped ahead of him.

A chest-crushing cold smothered them, the moment they stepped inside the dark passage. From the wall, Zevander lifted an unlit sconce and set it ablaze with violet flames. The acrid scent of pine pitch told him it burned too hot in the sablefyre, which meant he’d soon need to keep an eye out for another torch to replace it.

The arched ceiling of the tunnel housed shadows, in which Zevander was certain spider mutations sat perched in their webs, watching them.

The eyes of Pestilios.

Didn’t matter. He’d come for what was taken and would burn everything in his path, if necessary. Deeper, they ventured, Zevander’s eyes constantly scanning, skin prickling, waiting for the slightest movement.

Gavroche directed them through the curves and passages that wound in darkness. The kid’s navigational skills were impressive, given not much was visible beyond the halo of light.

As their boots crunched over the stone floor, Zevander angled the light, revealing jagged white fragments and dust that he identified as crushed bones, the occasional skull and ribcage half-buried in the dirt, as if they made up the very foundation. The stench of death and rot clung to the air so thickly, not even the pungent torch odor could suppress it.

He swept the torch across the path, and slowed his steps when they reached a curve in the tunnel that branched off into three different directions.

“The middle tunnel is where we need to go,” Gavroche said.

Dark lines across the gritty stone glistened in the torchlight, disappearing into the tunnel on the left, and Zevander knelt down, running his finger across one of them.

Blood.

Possibly belonging to one of his siblings.

“The blood is red. Mancer.” He pushed upright again and tracked the crimson path toward what looked to be an iron door in the floor, similar to Branimir’s. Without hesitation, he cranked it open with a loud creak of its rusted, iron hinges and waved the torch across the opening, illuminating a cavernous space below.

“Should we call out for them?” Maevyth whispered beside him.

Zevander shook his head. “I don’t want to rouse any mutations.”

“There are more tunnels below,” Gavroche said. “A maze on top of a maze.”

“Another level?” Torryn asked from behind.

The boy nodded. “And another beneath that. I don’t like going down to the lowest, though. I lost a friend down there once. Ventured about and never returned.”

Zevander held the torch over the crumbled stone stairs, and steps swift, he descended down into the level below, even colder than the one above, if that were possible. Once below, he scanned the open space for any sign of mutations.

Only small webs filled the corners and ceilings. Broken, moss-covered stone statues stood four meters high–ancient gods, from the looks of them. The far wall of the chamber opened around arched entrances to more tunnels, where the light caught the trail of blood.

Zevander stepped inside, and deep, guttural growls echoed from ahead, bringing his steps to a halt.

“Ça’zier?” Lothare said from behind, before striding ahead of Zevander, carrying his own torch.

Light poured over the dozen, or so, figures pressed against the wall. Three humans, nine adult razorwolves, and the runt, Rho.

Fennyx and Verena sat hunched alongside Daelan, identified only by the tattoo on his arm, each of them bleeding out of wounds. The adult wolves also carried signs of injury–busted legs and gashes. What looked like a rib bone stuck out from the flank of one wolf, while another bled from a shredded tail that clung to its body by a thread of meat.

Lothare knelt beside Fennyx, whose chest rasped as if he were breathing through a pinhole.

“We were … attacked. Dragged in cocoons to this … place. I saved … as many as I could.”

The runt hopped out of Verena’s clutch, its ears flopping as it darted toward Maevyth.

“We any of you bitten?” Zevander asked.