It took hours before Kiva was able to meet Caldon’s fire midair, and when she did, Tipp let out a whoop so loud that everyone turned toward them, Jaren included.
Kiva didn’t look at him.
She hadn’t looked at him since she’d left him beside the oasis, taking a page out of his book and acting like he didn’t exist.
It was easier this way, ignoring him, living in denial. It helped dull the pain, even if nothing could make it vanish entirely.
“I had a thought,” Cresta said, nudging her roan mare closer to where Kiva, Tipp, and Caldon were riding together, shortly after Kiva had successfully met Caldon’s attack.
“We’re in the middle of something,” Caldon told her.
“Kiva needs a break,” Cresta shot back. “She’s exhausted.”
“She’s not exhausted, she’s —” Whatever Caldon had been about to say, he quickly changed his mind, seeing the flash of anguish that Kiva wasn’t able to hide fast enough.
“I’m p-pretty tired m-myself,” Tipp said, standing in his stirrups to stretch his legs. “I’m h-hungry, too. D-Do you think we’re n-nearly close enough to w-windfunnel?”
Kiva could have kissed him for taking the focus off her.
“Soon, kiddo,” Caldon said, before turning back to Cresta. “What thought did you have?”
For that, Kiva could have kissed him, too.
Acting like their brief, uncomfortable moment had never occurred, Cresta said, “I’ve been considering what happened in the arena with those two anomaly warriors, and also how we think Navok is building a magical army.”
She had Caldon’s full attention now. But not just his — everyone else had ridden closer to listen. “And?” he asked.
“I think you and Ash” — she nodded to the princess — “should start using your magic on us during our morning training. If the time comes when we have to face elemental opponents, it’d be good to have more experience defending against them.”
Caldon tilted his head to the side. “It sounds suspiciously like you’re willing to fight with us once we’re done with all this Hand business.”
His tone was light, almost joking, but Cresta stiffened in her saddle and looked away, clearly embarrassed by having revealed that she was beginning to care about what happened to their group — and to Evalon itself. As someone who had been locked away for over five years, it would have been easy for her not to give the first damn about the Vallentis royals and the fate of their kingdom. It wasn’t even her native land, just a place she’d fled to as a child. The fact that she was even thinking ahead to ways she might help them reclaim what they’d lost . . .
Kiva realized then that Cresta had come a long way since they’d first met, and she couldn’t be prouder of her now-friend, even if it was painfully evident that the redhead loathed the attention she was receiving.
Noting as much, Caldon didn’t make her answer. “It’s a good idea,” he said, “but it’ll just have to be Ash. We only have one amulet, so unless we keep passing it around, anyone I attack is going to get burned.”
This time, it was Cresta who tilted her head to the side. “Do you think Navok’s anomalies are going to care about hurting us?”
Caldon had no response to that.
“And besides,” Cresta went on, jerking her chin toward Kiva, “we have our very own magical healer. You keep harping on about how she needs to practice — so give her something to practice on.”
“It’s a clever thought,” Jaren said, causing Kiva to tense. She stared down at Zephyr’s silky mane to keep her gaze from wandering his way. “I could certainly use the training, especially since I’m likely to respond to an elemental attack by reaching for my magic.”
Magic that wasn’t there.
He didn’t need to say it for Kiva to still hear the words.
Her grip tightened around her reins, the leather digging into her palms.
“C-Can I learn, too?” Tipp asked eagerly.
Jaren’s voice was indulging, even teasing as he answered, “That would require you waking up at a time before we have to drag you out of bed and onto your pony.”
Hearing the affection in his tone made it almost impossible for Kiva to keep her eyes down. She needed this conversation to be over so he could ride ahead again, needed him to leave.
“Well, m-maybe if dawn was later in the d-day . . .” Tipp said, clearly put out.
“I say we try it,” Ashlyn declared. “Good thinking, Cresta. We’ll begin tomorrow morning.”
Cresta pressed her lips together, fighting her outward response to the praise. She gave a terse nod and rode forward, prompting their group to return to their previous positions, and Kiva’s grip on her reins to relax.
The remainder of their passage through the harsh Jiirvan desert was spent with Kiva continuing to repress her feelings and simply focus on meeting Caldon’s attacks over and over, until Cresta’s earlier assumption came true and she did become exhausted. But at least her fatigue made it easier to quiet her mind and ignore her grieving heart. And when Galdric finally announced that they were near enough to Hadris’s capital for him to windfunnel them the rest of the way, Kiva was too tired to experience anything other than relief that they were nearing the end of their journey.
She did, however, retain her wits enough to dismount before Galdric swept them up in his wind magic again.
Of course, this time Zephyr couldn’t have cared less, acting as calm as a lamb when they touched down on the outskirts of a different kind of desert, the sand an eerie gray, almost black color. Kiva prodded it with her boot, marveling over the unusual shade, before turning her gaze to the city before them.
Unlike Zadria and Yirin, there were no fortified walls around Ersa, so the inky sand dunes crept right up to the outer edges of the nearest buildings. But it was those buildings themselves that caught Kiva’s attention, because they, too, were a near-black shade, as if forged out of ebony sandstone. Their flat rooftops allowed multiple structures to be stacked on top of each other, rising skyward, and between them were colorful scarves and strings of lanterns stretching through the empty air in a haphazard manner.
“I forgot how dark this city is,” Cresta murmured, eyeing the streets that, even from a distance, appeared gloomy and disordered.
Kiva looked at her, surprised. “You’ve been here before?”
Cresta hesitated, as if debating whether or not to reveal more of her life, before finally sharing, “Once, when I was very young. My mother had friends here, so she brought my sister and me, before —” She looked away, her jaw tightening at whatever she recalled about her sister’s tragic end. Her tone was bitter as she finished, “My father wasn’t pleased that we’d traveled so far without him. He made sure we were all aware of that after we returned home.”
Kiva almost wished Cresta’s father was still alive so he could be made to pay for how he’d treated those he was meant to have protected. Judging by the look on Caldon’s face, she wasn’t alone in her thinking.
But Cresta caught both of their expressions and scowled at them, making it clear she didn’t want their sympathy.
Caldon quickly turned his gaze back to the city. “I have a love-hate relationship with Ersa,” he said. “Aesthetically, it’s unique. But it’s also a bit like opening up an unusual piece of fruit to find the inside is rotten.”