Page 168 of Blade of the Nightking

“They'll sense it and they’ll come.” He looked back at me over one shoulder, “There are monsters in these woods. Remember that.”

“I imagine you'll feel right at home, then.” The words escaped before I could stop them.

His expression soured at once. He turned away a little too abruptly, and resumed clearing our path. The next vine he encountered lost a rather excessive amount of its existence.

A satisfied smirk tugged at my mouth.

We continued like that for what felt like hours, him fighting the forest so there would be enough space in the brush for us to keep going. It felt like we were crawling forward inches at a time.

The air smelled of damp earth and rotting vegetation. Mist drifted between the trees, trapped beneath the dense canopy where the light couldn't quite reach it. I tipped my head back, searching for the sun. I found only a tangle of leaves and branches overhead.

If the forest could swallow this much daylight, I didn't want to know what it became after dark.

Silently, I willed Rìan to hack faster.

The underbrush rustled suddenly to my right.

I startled violently and lurched forward, colliding with Rìan hard enough to jar my teeth. The back of his shirt was damp with sweat, but the male beneath it might as well have been made of solid rock.

He paused and glanced toward the source of the sound. A flash of gray fur burst from the bushes and vanished into a burrow beneath a nearby root. A rabbit.

Rìan slowly turned his head and looked back at me, one dark eyebrow raised. “Things sound bigger than they are in the woods.”

“I know that.” The reply came out more defensive than I'd intended.

But he'd already turned away.

I fixed my gaze on Rìan's back as I followed him deeper, the curved blade flashing again and again. Branches, vines, and saplings exploded beneath each strike, as though the forest itself was an enemy to be conquered.

What did he see with every swing? The faces of the Full Circle? Aedric's?

Gradually, the undergrowth thinned and for the first time since entering the Wildlands, Rìan lowered his blade.

A moment later, I heard it. Water. The faint rush of it carried through the trees.

Rìan altered course immediately, striding toward the sound. I followed close behind until the forest suddenly opened around us. A spring emerged from between a cluster of lichen-speckled boulders. Ferns crowded the banks, shafts of sunlight striking the water in flashes of gold.

I slowed.

Not sunlight.

Thin streaks of light darted between the rocks like schools of luminous fish.

Rìan crouched beside the spring and shrugged his pack from his shoulders. After rummaging through it for a moment, he withdrew a tightly rolled parchment and spread it carefully across a patch of grass.

I immediately stepped closer.

A map of Elantis. The outline of the continent had been covered with a network of hand-drawn colored lines that crisscrossed mountains, forests, and seas alike. The Veins.

I immediately sought the three markings denoting the wells, but before I could look more closely, Rìan folded the parchment beneath itself, bringing the section of the Wildlands to the forefront.

His finger traced one of the golden lines that curled over the page. Only then did I notice that one section of it overlapped a thin blue line, and I knew without a doubt it marked the spring beside us. For a short distance, the gold Vein and the blue waterway traveled together across the map before separating once more. Just before they parted, a small mark had been inked beside them in red.

The Gate.

Rìan's finger came to rest upon it. He studied it for a long moment. Then he grunted. Given Rìan's usual economy of words, I’d learned that was practically an entire speech.

We were on the right path.