“The gods?”
He nodded.
I turned the question over in my mind. I’d grown up with ceremony, with worship offered more from duty than devotion. But that mark on my arm, the whisper in the canyon, the way the statue had felt, I couldn’t ignore it anymore.
“I think,” I said slowly, “that belief isn’t about being sure. It’s about listening. And when something calls out, something sacred, something terrifying, you don’t have to understand it to answer.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
Erindor
The further we walked, the more the cold crept in.
The heat from the mountain was behind us now, and with it, the smoke-warmed winds. In its place came the sharp bite of winter in our bones. Snow clung to the shadows between the lifeless hills, forming uneven patches along the rocks. The grass was brittle and low to the ground, more cinders than green, and every gust of wind dragged the charred scent of old fire across the slope.
The sky had turned the color of wet stone, heavy and low, spitting flurries that melted on contact. Ice rimmed the edges of our cloaks and lashes, delicate and sharp as a breath held for too long.
Even Bran had stopped bounding ahead. He stayed close to Alaric’s heels now, his ears flat against the wind.
The sun hovered behind thick clouds, pale, distant, and cold. A silver coin buried in wool. It gave no warmth, only the sense that something above was observing.
We were two days out from Caerthaine now.
And the land felt like it knew.
I walked ahead, scanning the horizon as the path dipped. Behind me, the others followed, quieter than usual. Gideon’sjokes had faded by midmorning, and even Alaric had barked orders in the last hour.
The silence wasn’t peaceful. It was pressure.
Wyn moved beside me. She hadn’t spoken for some time, her shoulders pulled in against the wind. Snow clung to her hair, and her steps had slowed.
She was exhausted.
The weariness wasn't from the long journey, but a crushing burden built over weeks of tension, haunting visions, dark magic, and inescapable deaths. It was the weight of every unvoiced truth, every shared silence.
“Crevices ahead,” I stated firmly. “Stone’s splitting from past burn lines. Don’t trust the edges.”
No one answered, but I saw Jasira adjust her footing. Bran gave a low chuff and nudged Gideon, who was still scanning the slope for movement.
A patch of blackened thorns stretched like claws across the ridge to our left. Beyond them, tucked into the rock, the top of a structure jutted from the hillside, cracked and leaning, half-buried in ice. A collapsed watchtower or what remained of one?
Something had burned through the stone.
I slowed as we approached, narrowing my eyes. Clearly, someone had abandoned the tower decades ago. Rusted spikes still lined the fractured perimeter, although many had fallen. Vines, or the remnants of them, clung to the south-facing wall, their texture brittle like old paper.
Alaric came up beside me. “We push forward. We can make the next ridge by dusk.”
“No,” I said.
His eyes snapped open. “We’re close enough to see the coastline. If we make a push tomorrow—”
“And we’ll get there faster if we don’t stumble into a crevasse or an ambush by traveling tired,” I said, keeping my voice even.
His jaw twitched, but he didn’t argue further.
I looked back at Wyn. She had stopped beside a patch of sleet-covered logs, breathing quietly, one hand pressed to her side. Fatigue rimmed her eyes, and her skin was pale beneath the dirt.
That sealed it.
