“Ever the optimist.” Quinlan nudged me with his shoulder. “If Garreth can convince the clans to unite, they might stand a chance.”
“That’s a very big if .”
We reached a shallow stream, splashing through rock-strewn rapids, the water clear and cold. This one was easy, but there were many more to cross that would be deep with strong currents. It felt like madness to do this with no guide, no map—nothing but a key I didn’t understand how to use, and the vague instructions of a god.
I let my mind quiet with the stillness around me. Veronis? Are you here?
There was no answer but the cry of gulls overhead.
“It nearly killed Garreth, letting you go,” Quinlan said. “But I made him promise not to come after us, no matter what happened.”
I imagined Garreth and Quinlan clasping hands, the insinuation of that promise burning between them. If Solvei used us as hostages, or if Garreth never heard another whisper about our fates, he would put our island and its people first. I couldn’t fault him for it. Garreth had his duty, and I had mine. “Thank you for talking sense into him.”
Our boots crunched over the rocky slope as we emerged on the other side of the stream. “I didn’t just do it for him,” Quinlan said.
I kept my eyes forward, focused on the hills and mountains, the journey ahead. Anything to keep from acknowledging what I heard in Quinlan’s voice, what I knew lived in his heart, things that I once thought I felt for him too. Things that seemed impossible to ever feel again, for anyone, when my own heart belonged to a dead man.
The plan was to stop and make camp at the first glimmer of sunset. We kept pushing onward as the valley became a mossy canyon, steep rock walls rising on either side of a foaming river. Our stomachs grumbled, our legs shook. Still no hint of dusk.
“Wait.” I halted suddenly on the canyon’s lip, sending a spray of pebbles over the ledge. “It’s summer. So it’s nighttime already, in a sense. The sun won’t set until around midnight.”
Quinlan looked at me like I’d lost my mind. “If the sun is up, how can it be night?”
“It just is. Trust me.” I’d scoffed, too, when Reyker told me that in his country, the sun burned during summer nights, and sank long before daytime ended in winter. “We should stop as soon as we’re clear of the canyon.”
He rubbed his hands over his face. “I’ll agree that day is night if it gets me fed and off my feet.”
It was another hour before the canyon walls gave way to a flat sandy plain, leaving us on safer ground. I dropped my satchel at the foot of a boulder and slid down it, my back against the stone. Quinlan joined me, pulling dried fish from his pack, offering me some. We shoveled bits of fish into our mouths, not bothering to light a fire.
“Either hunger has made me delusional or this is the best meal I’ve ever had,” he mumbled.
“Likely a bit of both.” I washed the fish down with a skin of fresh water, filled from a stream. Even the water here tasted different—cleaner, crisper, like it was bubbling up from the source where all water was born. “I’ll take the first watch.”
Quinlan didn’t argue. Between bouts of seasickness and the beating he took from the island-serpent’s wave, we both knew he was in worse shape than I was. He wrapped himself in a wool bedroll. “How can I sleep with the bloody sun still out?”
“I’m sure you’ll manage.”
Minutes later, he was snoring.
Climbing atop the boulder, I watched the sun dip slowly to the horizon, drenching the clouds in beams of pink and orange. The sky it left behind was a velvety blue, darkness mingling with light rather than smothering it. A pair of bleating sheep wandered by, a few cooing loons nested in the brush—I could sense them, their energy, their souls, but only faintly. The burden of carrying so much power had eased since leaving Glasnith, and this respite was welcome. And yet . . . I’d begun to miss the hum in my blood. I missed feeling strong enough to defend myself against monsters and men, and those who were both.
Was this what Torin had felt? Was it why he’d not fought harder to resist the god of death?
I tried not to worry about Garreth, tried not to be speared by grief over my father and Reyker, and failed. The sun rose again a few hours later, and I woke Quinlan so I could sleep awhile.
It was hard to know what time it was when we set off once more, after a small meal of dried fruit and hard bread. The landscape turned rough, as did the weather. A labyrinth of jagged black rock stretched out as far as I could see, liquid fire that had spewed from a mountain and hardened into uneven stacks that we had to step, and climb, and sometimes crawl across. Above us, the gray-bellied clouds broke, joining forces with the wind to pelt us with raindrops that fell sideways and stung like falling needles. We shivered in our soaked clothes, but we didn’t stop.
Half a day crept by as we crossed the lava field, and the closer we got to its end, the louder the sound of water on the other side became. When we cleared the rocks, another canyon stretched out before us, but this one had a wide river above it that rushed over the edge in a roaring wave, as beautiful as it was violent. Mist veiled the air like smoke, and it would have drenched us if we weren’t already wet. There were thousands of waterfalls all over Iseneld, named and unnamed; it felt like I should know what this one was called, like not knowing was disrespectful. I wished Reyker was here to tell me.
Quinlan and I stood as close to it as we dared. Beside the falls, we were small, insignificant. Mortals in a land of gods and beasts.
By the time we made camp, we were both too tired to keep watch. We’d gone far enough that I wasn’t worried about the Mountain Renegades tracking us, and if Draki found us there would be no outrunning him regardless. Our clothes were still damp, as were our bedrolls, so we lit a small fire and huddled next to each other for warmth.
I let myself dream of Reyker, even though I shouldn’t have, even though beneath the bliss of those stolen moments I felt the ache in my chest worsening, the pit of grief widening. When Reyker tried to speak of anything beyond the ruins, I shushed him, and when he tried to get me to speak, I ignored him.
“I’m losing you, aren’t I?” he said.
“My wolf. My love.” I pressed my fingers to his lips. I did not say, We are already lost to each other, but he heard it still.
Sometime later, I woke, confused by the pale sun, until I remembered where I was. Confused even more by the arm slung across my waist, the breath rustling my hair. Before I could think better of it, I shoved the arm off me and pulled away.
Quinlan sat upright, blinking, half asleep. “What’s wrong?”
“You can’t touch me like that.”
It could have been dawn or dusk, based on the gray light. It illuminated Quinlan’s face, the hurt written there that I tried to ignore. “You were shivering. I was just trying—”