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“Very well.”
With a yawn, she took it, letting the Elder pull her to her feet. It was second nature to slip the Spindleblade over her shoulder.
The remaining Elders stood guard, their silhouettes ringing the camp like statues. For the first time since Vergon, Corayne counted their number. A dozen remained. As they walked over the hilltop, Valnir followed her eyeline. It was not difficult to guess her thoughts.
“I left the Castlewood with two hundred of my people,” he murmured. “Two hundred of Sirandel, immortals all. All the ages of this realm within them, all the memory of too many years to count. All lost.”
To the west, Allward spread below them like a quilt. A patchwork of farms and forest, kingdoms, peoples. Languages and trade routes. Corayne eyed the land without her usual curiosity. She was tired still, weary of all things. Even the knowledge that used to make her happy once, when the only world she knew was a cliff edge on the Long Sea.
She heaved a great sigh, unable to look Valnir in the face again.
“I am sorry, my lord. I cannot tell you how sorry I am,” she said, hugging herself against the cold. “I will mourn them all.”
To her surprise, Valnir shook his head. His hair was loose today, falling in a long red curtain. It still smelled of smoke. With a scowl, Corayne realized everything did.
“You mourn for too many already,” he said thoughtfully. “Do not take on a burden you do not need to bear.”
“They died for me,” she answered. “I say that far too often these days.”
The Elder faced the west as she did. Overhead, the sun began its slow arc toward nightfall.
“They died for the Ward, for their own, for their families. They died forme, Corayne.” His voice took on a ragged edge. A strange thing for an Elder. “It is a death they would have chosen. I would do it again if I had to, and give my own life gladly.”
Corayne felt a familiar burst of pity for the Elder monarch. As Dom had so many times, Valnir wrestled with all-too-mortal grief. His eyes shone, gleaming with unshed tears as he stared at the sky, the ground, the hills below, the mountains behind. Anywhere but Corayne.
He does not understand it. Sorrow or shame.
“It isn’t your fault, Valnir,” she said, reaching out to touch his arm. “None of this is.”
His cloak was smooth under her hand, the purple fabric finely woven, rich in color. Where it was not torn by dragon claw, burned, or bloodied.Slowly, he leaned into her palm. It felt like comforting an old tree.
“That is a question of perspective,” he forced out, looking down on her. She did not miss the way his eyes traced the Spindleblade over her shoulder, the sword of his making. “Again, I say—I am glad to die for this, if I must.”
Corayne had little will to smile, but she tried anyway.
“Get me to Iona, and perhaps the gods will call it even.”
He bared his teeth back at her, his own version of a grin. “Perhaps they will, Corayne of Old Cor.”
The name felt wrong, like a map without a legend or the sun rising in the west. Again, she thought of her father, Cortael of Old Cor. She was as much of him as she was anyone else, distant though he was. Forever lost to her.
Even so, she stretched out a hand in the darkness of her head. And wished he could somehow reach back.
The dream came two days later. Not of What Waits, the shadow always at the edge of her mind.
But of Erida, Queen of Galland.
Corayne stared at her across a great ridge, a castle she did not know behind the Queen. A strong wind blew, swelling with the scent of blood and smoke. Erida stood firm against it, like a statue against a storm. She wore scarlet silk, her ash-brown hair braided into an opulent crown of rainbow jewels. The young Queen was as beautiful and magnificent as Corayne remembered, more fearsome than any soldier.
Then her eyes narrowed, her lips pulling into a terrible smirk. Steadily, the blue sapphire of her eyes gave over to burning red.
Fear leapt up inside Corayne, so sharp and sudden she felt struck by lightning. Without thinking, she drew the Spindleblade on her back,moving to cut the Queen in two, and destroy whatever monster she had become.
Corayne woke before the sword edge reached the Queen, dawn light spilling over the rest of the Elder camp. Sweat covered her body, her clothes damp against her skin. Her pulse rammed in her ears, every breath a short, shallow gasp.
What the dream meant, she could not say. It hung over her like a cloud, across many days. Every night, she feared to sleep, lest Erida return, closer and more terrible, her burning eyes threatening to devour the world.
18
