There will be no going back from this, but if I had to show it to someone in the wastes, I’d pick Asher. Even after everything, I’d pick him.
“Trusting you.” I turn around and tug the sleeveless shirt off, baring my brand to him. Clenching the shirt to my chest, I hear him move nearer. The air on my skin is shocking, but not as much as his touch. It starts on my left shoulder blade, the faintest pressure, featherlight and warm. He traces the Old World symbols there, so different from his, and I bite my lip, shudder against my will.
“Sorry,” he says, but he doesn’t stop tracing the brand, and I don’t ask him to. A lifetime of being told to keep it hidden, and his mere touch makes me want to keep my shirt off forever.
His finger trails down to the small of my back, and I suddenly feel lightheaded. Sucking in a breath, I step out of his reach. “Draw it on the floor,” I say. “Find what’s the same, so you can line things up, and then fill in what’s different.”
I hear him working behind me. “Done,” he says a while later.
I pull my sleeveless shirt on and turn around to face him. Despite the enormity of what waits on the floor by our feet, neither of us looks down. Our eyes are locked. His gaze dips to my mouth. Something would happen between us if I let it. The energy in the room feels tight and magnetic, the space between us quivering like my lodestone when I hold it out to spin freely. I could let myself be drawn to him if I wanted.
“The map,” I say, nodding to the floor. The air is normal again, the magic broken.
He steps beside me, and we stare at the dirt together. It is finally, most definitely a map.
The markings at our feet are no longer mere waves or harsh angles. They make sense at last, creating something coherent, and I can see now what our pack has forgotten. All those years ago, when our ancestors chose to brand two people, they didn’t create two copies of the map. They created two halves of a whole.
Our brands are just pieces. But together, overlapped . . .
“That’s Burning Ground,” Asher says, pointing to the waves in the center, flames of heat and rising air.
“That’s the Old Coast,” I say, motioning toward the obvious shore near our feet. “The Barrel.” I point to another set of lines.
We call out more landmarks. The rig near Zuly’s. East Tower. West Tower. The Backbone of the General’s domain.
“Then what’s that?” Asher asks.
He’s pointing toward a circle with an X through it—what would have been on both our left shoulder blades. It’s far north of Powder Town and northwest of Bedrock, beyond a barren stretch of desert waste that no living soul has ever dared to cross. Above the marked circle are four Old World symbols, two of which are Es, two others from Asher’s brand.
E D E N
I stare at the marked location, heart hammering against my ribs.
“That’s the Verdant,” I say. “Asher, we just figured out how to read the map.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
I was wrong about Zuly, I realize.
She couldn’t have read Asher’s brand, because it was never a complete map to be read. She simply sensed that it was important—that he was. Maybe Silla even told Zuly that the brand was to be kept secret, begged her to not speak of it for fear that harm would befall Asher if word got out.
We never needed Zuly to read the map, or an Oracle, or any gods touched. We just needed each other.
“We have to go there,” I say, staring at the E D E N mark. “Immediately.”
Asher cringes. “We invoked the right to work for the Trinity. We made a pledge in exchange for refuge. The Prime won’t let us leave.”
“We don’t need her blessing. We can go alone, sneak out together.”
“These distances aren’t exactly accurate, Delta.” Asher points to Dead River, which is positioned evenly between Powder Town and the Old Coast, despite the fact that Powder Town is nearly fifty clicks from Dead River and the Old Coast only about half that.
“So things are a bit off.” I shrug. “The brand’s been copied so many times, and everyone who wore the brand grew while carrying it. Things are bound to have spread and shifted a little.”
“But who knows by how much.”
I watch Asher’s eyes drift to the desert waste that separates Powder Town from the Verdant. How large is it truly? Doesn’t matter. I have to keep moving forward.
“Maybe if we tell the Prime, she’ll lend us some mules,” Asher offers. “She could even send the Reaper and a defense unit with us, in case we run into trouble along the way.”
I shake my head. “Show it to no one. Unless you trust them with your own life, keep it hidden. And besides, if all the rumors about the Verdant are true, we should be the first to access it. We get there first, we wield control over who can enter paradise. I don’t trust that to anyone else, not even the Prime, and certainly not the General. Plus, the Prime is busy at the moment.”
I relay my conversation with her earlier—how she refuses to take on Bedrock until the prototype is ready and she’s certain she can best him.
“I don’t need the Prime,” I tell Asher firmly. “I don’t need help from her or the Trinity or anyone in Powder Town. I just need you. The map. Us together.”
He squints at me, mouth in a conflicted grimace.
“We know the way now, Asher. We can go there ourselves, see it with our own eyes. If I shove a fistful of green earth into a jar—if I bring the General proof that the Verdant is real—he’ll let my pack go.”
“Not if you don’t also promise him access to it,” Asher points out.
“Then I will.”
“You’d allow him entry? The last green place in the world, and you’d invite in a monster?”
“No. I’d bluff. I’d promise him and his Four access to the Verdant in exchange for my pack’s freedom.”
Asher stares at the dirt. “I don’t know, Delta. I think he’ll expect that, and we’re safe here. I think we should stay put.”
“What about my pack? You left Powder Town to try to find us, but now you suddenly don’t care?”
“Of course I care. But who knows how long it will take to even reach the Verdant. They could all be executed by then.”
“They won’t be.” I tell him about what I learned from Clay, how the executions have paused and this is a perfect opportunity for us to venture north.
“That’s even more reason to stay put. Let the Prime test her prototype. Wait until she’s ready to attack.”
“And let my pack live in those conditions for potential years? While we just sit here?”
“It’s hard to swallow. I get it. But they’re relatively safe. And if we wait until the Prime is ready to attack, we have an actual shot at freeing them. The Prime might even send a scouting group to the Verdant in the meantime. But this plan of yours . . .” He shakes his head. “It’s not going to go the way you think. Finding the Verdant, using it to barter with the General . . . It’s not going to save your pack.”
“Yes it will. This is the way.”
“You think he’s going to want to share the Verdant, Delta? He won’t even share Bedrock! You use it to try to barter your pack free and he’ll hold them hostage until you grant him access to the Verdant—or worse, the power to control its border. Either way, he’ll end up with the prize and you’ll have nothing. Everyone in the wastes will have nothing.”