SHADOW FANG

CHAPTER FOUR

SHADOW FANG

—Not dead in the woods, not drowning at the bridge’s fall, not broken at the wall’s base—

OCTAVIA

My throat tightens around a scream that never comes, strangled by the crushing grip on my wrist. Rai’s fingers dig in like iron, pain radiating up my arm, numbing my hand as I dangle helplessly above the gorge. The mist swirls below, concealing whatever abyss waits to claim me.

Each breath burns, tearing through my lungs as my heart thunders in my skull. I can’t think, can’t focus—only the sheer drop beneath me, veiled by the fog but impossibly real. My chest tightens, old fears bleeding into fresh terror, twisting together until I can’t tell where one ends and the other begins.

Rai grunts above me, his muscles trembling as he clings to the bridge, barely able to hold himself steady, let alone my weight.

"Octavia!" His voice scrapes raw, strained to breaking. "You need to—" His words fracture as his body jerks, fighting to keep us both from plummeting.

I feel his grip faltering, every nerve in my body screaming in fear.

"I'm trying.” The words are more breath than sound, thin, useless, lost in the roar of blood in my ears and the relentless rush of the waterfall.

"Look at me!" Rai’s command cuts through the panic, anchoring me.

I force my gaze upward, finding his eyes.

"There's a ledge across.” His voice steadies, even as his arm shakes. “When I swing you, you have to catch it. Do you hear me?”

I nod, even with the panic clawing at my chest, I did.

"Octavia.” He says my name again, gentler this time. His face is tight with strain, but his eyes... his eyes are locked onto mine, reassuring. "I won't let you fall."

The words pierce through my terror, sinking deep. I cling to them, to him. He won’t let me fall.

"One... two... three!"

On three, he swings me forward with a force that rips through my body. The ledge rushes toward me, but I barely register it. My fingers stretch, scrape against stone— and miss.

Panic flares, but Rai yanks me back, pulls harder. "Again!" His shout barely penetrates my fear-addled mind, but I hear it, and my body responds. I reach out again, throwing myself toward the ledge.

This time, my fingers latch onto the stone. It’s rough, unyielding, but I dig in, nails bending and breaking under the strain. Every muscle screams, but I don’t let go.

I’m not falling. I’m not falling.

But Rai—

I look up just in time to see his grip fail. "No!" His body pitches toward the gorge. My hand shoots out, snatching his wrist as he plummets. The impact nearly tears me from my perch—only my white-knuckled grip on the bridge rope keeps us both from the depths.

"f**k!"

“Rai!” His name rips from my throat, raw and despairing, my muscles shaking from the weight of him. His eyes lock with mine, wide with shock, before he starts scrabbling for a foothold, anything to save us from the drop below.

My strength bleeds away with each passing heartbeat. My fingers spasm, my shoulders threaten to dislocate, and his weight drag me closer to the edge of what I can endure. I can feel myself coming apart—tendons tearing, bones grinding—breaking piece by excruciating piece.

With a last, desperate surge of strength, I haul him up, the scream tearing from my lungs as I fight against the weight, against the pain. Inch by inch, until finally, finally, we collapse against the ledge, trembling and gasping like drowning souls pulled from the deep.

For what feels like forever, there’s nothing but the sound of our ragged breathing and the distant roar of the waterfall.

Rai moves first, calloused hands exploring the rock face above us. With a grunt of effort, he drags himself up, muscles cording beneath his shredded sleeve. Once secure, he extends an arm down to me.

"Come on." His voice is gravel-rough.

I grasp his hand, and he pulls. White-hot agony stabs through my wrist, but I bite back the cry of pain—likely fractured from how tight his grip was earlier.

"You good?" Rai’s eyes flick over me, scanning for any sign of injury beyond the obvious.

I manage a nod, dazed. “What?”

He answers with a pat on my shoulder, firm but not unkind. "Then you're good."

But his attention has already shifted. A low rumble reverberates through the ground beneath us, and my gaze follows his to the bridge. Two figures emerge from the mist, their silhouettes distorted by distance and fog. The first sprints precariously close to the massive steel sphere still rolling in its deadly path, while their companion trails behind. Close.

Two runners. s**t. s**t. s**t.

"Run."

We run.

Not the measured pace of training runs, but a frantic sprint toward Naxthir that sets my lungs on fire and makes my legs scream in protest. Behind us, the bridge vanishes into the mist, swallowing the thunderous sound of steel and death. But we’re not safe. We're never safe in the Gauntlet.

"How far?!" The words scrape past my raw throat between gasps.

“Half a mile to the Death Wall!" Rai yells back. "Don't stop when we reach it—not for anything!"

Questions about the runners die in my throat as the wall materializes before us. It rises like a titan in the darkness, a craggy, towering slab of rock against the starless sky. Two hundred meters of pure hell.

"s**t," I breathe, but even that's stolen by the wind.

"Not pleasing, is it?"

Other runners dot the wall's face like scattered ants—some already halfway up. At its base, two more wrestle for position.

"Left side!" Rai barks. "Fewer climbers!"

I veer left, fingers already reaching for the rock. But just as my fingers scrape the rock, there’s a grunt behind me—a body slams into Rai, sending him sprawling.

"Keep going!” he yells.

I glance back. One of the runners—faster than the other—has him pinned, and something twists in my gut.

I need to climb. I need to survive.

My fingers scrabble desperately against the too-smooth surface and I start pulling myself up. The moon slips behind the hill, plunging everything into shadow. I've barely gained three feet when fingers lock around my ankle.

I look down, my heart trying to punch through my ribs. A runner has me. I lash out with my free leg, trying to kick free, but—

No!

The world spins. Then comes that sound—that horrible, unmistakable macabre sound of bone giving way.

Crack.

Agony flares through my skull as I hit the ground. My vision fragments, doubles, triples. Everything blurs except the agony pulsing from the back of my head. Something warm and wet seeps down my neck.

Darkness crowds the edges of my vision. No. Not now.

I lash out, catching the runner in the face. Cartilage crumples beneath my knuckles. I strike again—this time it's like hitting concrete, but it works. He staggers back.

Through my swimming vision, I see him coiling to charge. Then Rai's there, a dark blur of motion, tackling him aside. Yelling.

"Climb!"

I turn to the wall. My skull cracks against stone as I press into the wall, stealing one precious breath. Just one. The rock face bleeds cold into my bones. But my left shoulder feels shattered, each tiny movement sending jolts of agony through my chest. But this stopped being about endurance the moment I stepped into this trial. It's about what I'm willing to break through.

I'm not here to prove I'm unbreakable.

I'm here to show that being different doesn't make me weak. To sculpt my own path.

Up ahead, runners scramble higher, some already halfway up the wall. My fingers find a grip in a narrow crack, and I pull myself higher. Below me, the sounds of combat continue—flesh hitting flesh, scraping boots, someone's muffled cry. My left hand slips, catching again with a jolt of pain that sends stars across my vision.

Breathe. Just breathe.

"Getting winded already?" A voice drips down from above, mocking.

I look up, and there's Tyson, straddled like some hunting bird against the rock face, watching me struggle. His hair gleams like a smear of blood in the night. Three runners crawl beneath him, but his focus is on me. I surely did bore him with my eyes at the Styx to get this noticed it seems.

I bare my teeth in what might be a smile or a snarl.

"Just enjoying the view," I bite out, forcing my body to keep moving. I didn't survive hell just to fail here.

I look down, my heart hammering against my ribs as I spot Rai already scaling the wall. The runner who had ripped me off lies crumpled at the base, leg bent at an unnatural angle. A small victory, but it means little with seven other runners ahead of him on the climb.

Blood runs in hot, slick streams down my neck, my head pounding with the effort to stay conscious.

Tyson shifts, leaning out to look down. “I could lend a hand,” he calls, smugness bleeding from every word. He’s untouchable. Maybe. No one stands between him and victory now. Just empty air and sheer rock.

I shut him out, focusing on the rock in front of me. One step. One pull. One more breath. Grateful my chosen path keeps me from being directly beneath him.

Movement flickers in the corner of my vision. A runner near Tyson slips—her fingers claw at nothing as she slides. Something almost human flickers across Tyson's face as he catches her wrist. Then he looks at me and his lips twist into a cruel smile. "Bye-bye," he whispers, and lets go.

She falls with a scream that tears through my senses, her body becoming a deadly projectile that takes four other climbers ahead of me down with her, webbing others below.

"Fewer competitors now,” Tyson calls down to me, his grin a twisted smear in the darkness. "Now you owe me one."

Ice fills my veins. I want to scream, to curse him for the monster he is, but the bone-deep certainty that he'd do the same to me freezes the words in my throat. Those people – gods, let them have survived. He doesn't wait for my response, just smirks and resumes his climb.

Rai's making steady progress below, three runners between us now. The others lie scattered at the wall's base like broken marionettes. A dark, shameful part of me whispers: fewer obstacles. Almost gladly. The thought makes me sick, but survival doesn't leave room for nobility. Or maybe the Gauntlet had already broken something in me.

Tyson reaches the top first, of course. He pauses at the edge, flashing another one of those inhuman grins before vanishing over the rim. Movement catches my eye – another woman matches my pace on the far side. Too fast. If I don't push harder, she'll beat me to the summit.

Fight like hell.

And so I do. Every muscle screams in protest, my body a symphony of agony, but I push through it all. Each movement is a battle won until finally – finally – my hand slaps against the top edge. The moon bursts from behind its cloud cover just as I haul myself up, its light mixing with some distant flash that nearly blinds me. Pain lances through my shoulder as I roll onto solid ground, but I force myself upright on trembling legs and stumble forward.

Twelve steps to the finish line. My legs shake with each one, threatening to buckle. I cross it, collapsing to my knees as unshed tears burn my eyes.

I made it. I'm in Naxthir.

Not dead in the woods, not drowning at the bridge's fall, not broken at the wall's base. Here.

The other woman drags herself over the edge moments later, and I'm distantly aware of others who've already crossed the line. Some stand already, gathering what strength remains. My legs quiver like a newborn colt's, as I push myself up, hands braced on my thighs, eyes fixed on the cliff's edge.

Waiting.

He has to make it. He has to. The tally of successful climbers burns in my mind like a curse—how many spots remain? How many chances does he have left?

I repeat the words like a prayer, a desperate mantra that pounds in time with my thundering heart: Make it, make it, make it. Then—a hand turns up at the edge, and hope surges through me like lightning—but when the figure hauls itself up, my heart plummets. Not him. Not him at all.

My body betrays me, trembling uncontrollably.

This is Rai's second Gauntlet. His final chance. If he doesn't scale this cliff soon enough, he'll never get another shot. And he's in this hellish position because of me. Fear devours me whole, corroding through what should be a triumph. I stand here, technically victorious, but the joy crumbles with each passing heartbeat. Because this—all of this—rests squarely on my shoulders.

Another hand appears at the precipice, right where my gaze has carved a hole waiting for him. But then—another palm slaps the rock beside it. Someone else, barely within reach.

Then Rai's head breaks over the edge.

His face is far more battered than when I last saw him. The instant his boots touch solid ground, he launches forward—sprinting toward us, matching pace with another runner stride for desperate stride. I can't breathe. Can't think. He runs like death itself nips at his heels. Because it does.

Then his boot crosses the line. Ahead of the other.

And that’s when a shot goes up into the night sky. A blinding silvery flare shoots upward, cutting through the dark night like a shooting star. The others around me roar in celebration, but I'm already moving. My body acts on pure instinct as I sprint forward, colliding with Rai hard enough to steal what little breath remains in both our lungs.

He grunts at the impact, and agony shoots through me, making my legs quiver. I'm laughing, trembling, fracturing at the seams.

He made it.

“I knew you’d make it," I breathe, my voice shaky with relief.

Rai groans again, but this time it’s more playful. "You’re crushing me, Octavia."

I pull back, wincing as the pain in my shoulder flares again, and his eyes wrinkle. "You’re bleeding," he rasp, frowning, even with his nose broken and bleeding too.

I wave it off, shaking my head despite the way it makes the world tilt. "It's nothing." A lie—my skull feels like it's been split open, but none of that matters now. We made it. I made it. Adrenaline still courses through my veins like liquid fire, but a smile tugs at my cracked lips as I survey our surroundings. We're surrounded by a sea of survivors—perhaps eighty candidates, all standing, all breathing, all broken but undefeated. We survived the Gauntlet.

"What now?" The question escapes me in a shaky whisper.

"We'll find out soon enough," Rai murmurs behind me.

Across the finish line, built into the mountainside like a giant's fortification, stands a wall bristling with crenellations and watchtowers. Overseers dot the ramparts like crows. The silver flare that ended the Gauntlet originated there, marking our passage onto the bridge that spans the gap between this peak and the colossal mountain beyond.

Naxthir Brigade College fortress rises before us like a crown of shadows, carved from living rock and kissed by eternal night. Its gothic spires and watchtowers impale the sky, wreathed in perpetual storm clouds. My first glimpse of it steals my breath—they say it's carved from steel and stone, though the distance makes it impossible to tell what truly comprises those ancient walls.

Warm light bleeds from arrow-slit windows and torch-lit battlements.

My attention snaps back as my eyes land on Lance on the rampart.

My stomach performs a nauseating flip.

For a heartbeat, a smile threatens to curve my lips, but it dies stillborn. He remains rooted in place, makes no move to approach as I'd half-expected. But his lips twitch just enough—a crack in that glacial exterior. It's sufficient for understanding to dawn.

Not yet, Avi.

I mask my glee. For now.

To his left stands another figure, taller, with an otherworldly vision in the chaos. His hair, a tumble of midnight, windswept waves that partially cover one side of the face, roughly to the collarbone. It frames a face that could slice diamond. When those eyes find mine, when the light catches them, my heart stutters to a stop. One eye storms with midnight; the other gleams like liquid moonlight.

A body crashes into me from behind, shattering the spell. "You made it!"

Renna?