The Tyrant's Tomb

of antiseptic and infection rising from my bandaged abdomen.
“Hooray,” I said. “More climbing.”
This time, Reyna took the lead. There was no climbing cage going to the
second level—just bare metal rungs against the side of the girder, as if the
builders had decided Welp, if you made it this far, you must be crazy, so no
more safety features! Now that the metal-ribbed chute was gone, I realized it
had given me some psychological comfort. At least I could pretend I was
inside a safe structure, not free-climbing a giant tower like a lunatic.
It made no sense to me why Tarquin would put something as important
as his silent god at the top of a radio tower, or why he had allied himself with
the emperors in the first place, or why the smell of roses might signal that we
were getting closer to our goal, or why those dark birds kept circling above
us in the fog. Weren’t they cold? Didn’t they have jobs?
Still, I had no doubt we were meant to climb this monstrous tripod. It felt
right, by which I mean it felt terrifying and wrong. I had a premonition that
everything would make sense to me soon enough, and when it did, I
wouldn’t like it.
It was as if I were standing in the dark, staring at small disconnected
lights in the distance, wondering what they might be. By the time I realized
Oh, hey, those are the headlights of a large truck barreling toward me! it
would be too late.
We were halfway to the second set of crossbeams when an angry shadow
dove out of the fog, plummeting past my shoulder. The gust from its wings
nearly knocked me off the ladder.
“Whoa!” Meg grabbed my left ankle, though that did nothing to steady
me. “What was that?”
I caught a glimpse of the bird as it disappeared back into the fog: oily
black wings, black beak, black eyes.
A sob built in my throat, as one of the proverbial truck’s headlights
became very clear to me. “A raven.”
“A raven?” Reyna frowned down at me. “That thing was huge!”
True, the creature that buzzed me must’ve had a wingspan of at least
twenty feet, but then several angry croaks sounded from somewhere in the
mist, leaving me in no doubt.
“Ravens, plural,” I corrected. “Giant ravens.”
Half a dozen spiraled into view, their hungry black eyes dancing over us
like targeting lasers, assessing our soft-and-tasty weak spots.