A Dance of Ruin | ONC 2024

Chapter Seven

Before heading home to the convent, I checked the alley once more in case something had appeared in the bricks but my efforts had been in vain. The temptation of climbing back to the ruins flickered in my mind but there wasn't any point if Fenik was busy. He wouldn't be there to teleport or talk to me.

For the rest of the day, I hid in my room so Niluth wouldn't interrogate me about where I had been. There still weren't many people in the convent as even more Draxinite sightings had been reported. A few members had returned injured, but they were eager to head back out to track more of the beasts down.

The next morning, I left early to head back to the alley and scan every single brick for a sign of how to return to Feink. My hope dwindled as I finished searching one side, however, as I began the next I found a brick with a dark symbol etched onto it with black chalk. It was like a light sigil yet it wasn't. It consisted of the same curved lines and ancient letters, but it wasn't anything I recognised.

I touched the brick and it felt loose, easily sliding in position. Trying to pull it out proved fruitless, but pushing the brick all the way into the wall gave me the results I was after. Shadows escaped the edges of the stone and wrapped around my body, pulling me into the teleportation I was expecting.

When I appeared in the corner of the sparring room, racks of weapons towering above me, Fenik was on the mats training by himself. He fought against an invisible foe, striking forceful blow after blow to a phantom Draxinite. The Death Assistant had foregone a shirt, revealing the defined muscles glistening with sweat.

I couldn't help but admire the way his body moved, each attack clean and precise. Determined to kill and protect. My eyes traced every line in his arms, the tattoos that rippled as Fenik twisted to parry a fictitious Draxinite claw. They dipped lower, heat rushing to my cheeks, as I spied the beginnings of a V line running beneath his trousers.

While his skin was grey and unnatural, his veins dark and soulless, I couldn't help but imagine what it would be like to touch it. Would he feel the same as someone who hadn't been submitted to the bidding of the Underworld?

I shoved the thoughts out of my head, realising what I was doing. How could I think that way about an abomination of Death?

"Do you like what you see?" Fenik asked with a hint of a smirk tracing his lips. While I had been caught up in my improper thoughts, I hadn't noticed he'd seen my arrival. His voice was breathless, not helping with the images running rampant in my mind.

"What?" I fought the embarrassment creeping up my neck. "No. Of course not."

His smile grew as he approached me. "You forget I have the gift of telling lies from truth."

Mortification won our inner battle and I felt myself flush completely red. I wished Fenik had also installed a way to leave the sparring room, but there wasn't an escape in sight.

"You're here early," he began, changing the topic to save me from melting into a puddle of humiliation. "Unless I was training for too long and it's early noon already."

"Oh, right. Yes. I wanted to talk to you about a few things before we started." Now wasn't the time to observe the way Fenik's chest heaved up and down, the veins along his neck and arms prominent. Draxinites were being set loose in the Kingdom of Wrosite that needed to be stopped.

"Of course." He summoned a towel from the air, catching the black fabric and using it to wipe away the remnants of his training. "What about?"

I swallowed the nervousness trapped in my throat and kept my eyes trained on the ground. "Did everything go okay yesterday? For whatever you were summoned for?"