the huntress 04 - eternal magic Read Free Page A

living supernaturals’ signatures. But this place was different, and in all likelihood, haunted.
    “I think the booby traps are about to get a lot harder,” I muttered.
    “Yep.”
    A moment later, the path opened up into a room. It was mostly empty with the exception of a statue of a seated god. The body was human, the head that of a jackal. 
    “Anubis,” Del said. “God of the dead.”
    Around him, the walls were decorated with hieroglyphs. Every inch of stone was carved to tell a story that I couldn’t interpret.
    “The door will be behind Anubis,” I guessed.
    We approached slowly, our footsteps silent on the stone floor. I kept my gaze trained on Anubis’s face, waiting for any sign of life. Just because he was stone now didn’t mean he wouldn’t hop up and curse us.
    I was so intent on his face that I almost missed the hieroglyph to the left side of his head starting to glow. It looked like a bird, which could mean just about anything. The symbol shined bright, then peeled itself away from the wall.
    It shot toward us, quick as flame, and I threw myself to the side, pushing Del out of the way. As it flew by, the magic smelled like decay. Sick and dark.
    “Curses!” I said. “Don’t let them hit you.”
    There was no way to fight cursed hieroglyphs. Swords would do nothing, and neither of us had any kind of manipulation magic. If that would even work. If they hit us, they’d impart whatever curse they carried.
    I did not want one of those. 
    Another glowing hieroglyph shot from the wall. I lunged left, avoiding it by a hair’s breadth. 
    Shit, shit, shit.
    I called upon my nullification power, praying that it would work. Disempowering the magic that fueled the hieroglyphs was our only hope.
    Normally, my innate magic felt distinct—the burn of flame or the chill of ice. But the nullification power felt like nothing. I reached for it anyway, praying I could get ahold of it and actually use it to my advantage.
    On a stretch of mad luck, the nullification power surged, making my insides hollow out. I envisioned the cursed hieroglyphs falling to the ground and disappearing. 
    Two of them did just that, their glowing forms fizzling out as my nullification power dampened their magic. The dampening charm we were looking for was similar to my new power. But I  hoped to use it against my new power.
    Del looked around warily. “I think you’ve done it.”
    “Yeah. Don’t know why it worked this time when it didn’t with the sphinx.”
    “Practice, maybe.” 
     I glanced around warily, in case any other curses decided to jump off the wall.  “I don’t think so. I never feel like I’m in control. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t.” And I’d never been very successful with the few times I’d tried to practice.
    “Well, whatever it is, let’s get out of here before you can’t hold them at bay.”
    “Agreed.”
    We walked to Anubis and peered around the back of his stone chair. There was a small passage. The exit was so easy. There wasn’t even a door. I swallowed hard, shivering.
    “If it’s this easy to get out, those curses we dodged were definitely deadly,” I said. They’d planned to drop us in our tracks before we could even hope to get through this unguarded exit.
    “Yep.” Del ducked and went through. 
    I followed, holding my light out ahead.
    The passage on the other side was narrower than the one we’d been traveling down, but we could at least stand upright.
    “It leads up,” Del said.
    I raised my ring to reveal the path that tilted sharply upward. “We’re getting close.”
    I led the way up the path, keeping my light and my blade raised high to find any razor wires.
    “Watch the ground at my feet,” I said, thinking back to a time five years ago when Del and I had been raiding a tomb in Southeast Asia. I hadn’t watched the ground ahead and had almost fallen into a pit of spiders. Del had caught me just in time, but I didn’t want to count on her doing