“And they will until we destroy this devil.” The priest turned toward the village square, the hem of his black robes swaying about his naked feet as he let his voice shatter through the busy night. “Hear me! Your loved ones shall find no rest until the good people of this realm have helped us capture the King of Flesh and Bone!”

“Grandma said nobody can enter his kingdom, so it’s not like we can drag him out,” Gregory said, which earned him a few nods from idle bystanders and those preparing to open the pit’s gate. “Met a trapper once who works around the Blighted Fields. Said he saw dead beasts go through the Æfen Gate, but never a man, dead or not.”

“Pray to Helfa,” the priest said, stretching his arms to the sky. “Pray that we will capture him soon.”

I scoffed, hooked my arm into Pa’s, and led him up the path toward the house. “As if the priests and temples haven’t tried for… for what? The last hundred years?”

“Longer.” Pa shuffled up the hill, the daub on the walls of our home weatherworn. “The question is, what do you do with a creature of such power?”

I crossed the garden in the direction of the stable beside the house. “Someone once told me he’s been captured before and contained with fire. Said there was a book—”

“Shh…” Pa glanced over his shoulder. “Don’t speak of books this close to the priests. You know how they get with ungodly writings about this devil—”

Bang.

The entire stable shook at the violent kick of iron against wooden boards. Panicked snorts followed, letting my heart match each beat as it all repeated with aggressive fervor.

Bang. Snort. Bang-bang. Snort. 

Another kick.

Wood splintered.

My heart clanked against my throat as a hoof shot through a wooden board. Was there no end to this miserable day? I ran toward the stable, cursing the damn mule—that animal couldn’t have chosen a worse day to die.

Pa hurried up behind me. “That damned animal. You should’ve sold him to the butcher, like I said, when the beast refused to get up last week. He’ll tear the entire stable down.”

Should have, could have, would have…

None of it kept John in the ground.

I turned toward the cart. “I’ll get ropes so we can hobble him.”

“The beast will head toward the Blighted Fields the moment you open the stall.”

“Serves me fine since the cemetery lies that way,” I said and grabbed a set of ropes. “At least the stubborn thing will go in the direction I want him to for once. He can rest his bones with the King all he wants, but not before the cart stands on the grave.”

I returned to the stable, stealing nervous glances through the gaps in the wood. “Stand aside.”

The latch quivered in my clasp with each kick and trembled with each whinnied squeal that ended on the distorted haw of the mule. Old Augustine had been stubborn in life, and chances were, he wasn’t any better in death.

“Easy now.” Slow steps carried me to his stall, hands working one end of the rough rope into a catch noose. “You pull that cart for me one more time, and then when they release the corpses, I’ll lead you to the village gate myself.”

He flared his nostrils and pawed at the ground, eyes wide with panic, pupils staring at the open stable door with purpose. His leather harness hung crooked. A strap dangled loose where it must have caught on something before it had ripped.

I swung the rope over the beast’s neck and lowered the noose to the ground where hooves trampled. “It’s too dark, Pa. Open the door wider.”

More moonlight filtered in.

Augustine’s deafening squeal ran gooseflesh across my skin. When the damn thing finally stepped into the noose, I pulled hard and fast, tightening the rope around its pastern. I swung the rope to the other side and prepared a second noose. The mule stepped into that one fairly quickly. Hobbled like this, Augustine kicked with more fervor, and the stable moaned its age beneath the force.

“I’ll bring him out now.” I tied the rest of the rope around the mule’s neck before I climbed the wooden partition and tied the end to the harness.

Pa’s voice filtered in. “You’ll get yourself killed.”

Reins in hand, I led a hobbled Augustine out of the stable, the beast hopping beside me toward the cart. “I won’t let John escape just so some Fletcher brat in another village can carve him to pieces.”

Pa hurried away, tugging on the shafts a moment later. “I’ll turn the cart.”

Augustine reared, the breath coming from his nostrils already so cold it no longer billowed. The reins burned inside the tight grip of my fist. I wouldn’t let go.

“Hardheaded bastard.” I righted the harness before I led the mule to the cart. “Come on now!”

Augustine’s demeanor grew frenzied, whinnies taking on the wheezing qualities of the corpses in the pit.

He reared once more.

A hind leg slipped.

Augustine staggered.

Leather ripped with a crrk-shk, slapping my cheek like a whiplash. I stumbled back, my shoulder crashing against the mule’s unforgiving rump. Heels sunk into the mud before I slipped.

The ground pulled out from underneath.

Thud!

Pain spread through my skull.

Darkness crept into my vision

Something tugged on my ankle.

“Help! Catch the mule before the beast drags her to death!” Pa’s voice hollered around me, but it soon faded into the clip-clop of shod hooves.

That, and the incessant cries of a babe.

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Chapter 2

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Ada

Damp fabric clung to my skin.

Thud.

Something knobby prodded my spine.

Thud.

Pain ate away at me, inside and out.

Thud.

What had happened?

I blinked my burning eyes open, staring at a dark lavender sky. Was it… almost morning? God’s bones, where was I? Another thud around my shoulder and my head tilted to one side, pupils catching on tattered clothes, gaping wounds, black-veined skin—

A scream formed at the back of my throat, but it lodged between raw muscles. Shocked into silence, I stared at the corpses lining my left and right.

They stared right back at me.

A young man missing a hand.

Thief. 

A boy with blisters on his skin.

Pox. 

Both stared, but not the soldier beside them, his breastplate edged with rust, his eyes pecked into a set of black, gaping holes. Perhaps by the crow sitting on what remained of his shoulder, arm dangling on little more than skin long dried around the shredded edges.

Something cracked beneath the weight of my shifting body. Twigs?

Muscles strained, aching, I glanced back over my shoulder, fighting against the darkness blurring the edges of my vision. A trail of mud and misery lay behind me, paved with crushed corpses poking from the ground where they didn’t pile in heaps as tall as five men to each side.

My breath stalled.

Many heaps.

In fact, I’d only ever heard of one such place.

I lifted my head, glancing toward the slosh of hooves sinking into the mud before each one lifted with a wet pop. Hobbles gone, Augustine trudged along the parting crowd of corpses. He walked over those too dismembered to move, trampling them into the ground with blood-curdling cracks.

I was dragged over what was left.

Devil be damned, I had to free myself.

I reached for the piece of leather wrapped around my ankle. A little more… Almost…

Pain seized my muscles.

My head hit the ground and blood seasoned my tongue.

From the corner of my left eye, a gray structure rose above me, casting a cold shadow over my shivering body. The damn mule had dragged me to the Blighted Fields, but I couldn’t pass the Æfen Gate into the Graying Tower. No human could enter—