I scowl as Pyrok slides the laden mug back into my unappreciative atmosphere. “Well. I’m happy for her.”
A guttural groan heaves across the courtyard, crisp and clear, as if Siharna’s standing right beside us. Like Clode personally lumped it on the table for us tonotenjoy.
Creators, it’s getting worse …
Pyrok leaps to his feet and charges toward the far wall. “First to three gets crowned with”—he plucks a white wreath off a hook and waves it around, the red buds glinting like rough-hewn gems—“this.”
Kaan raises both brows. “The irreplaceable family heirloom that’s been passed down through generations for so long we have no knowledge of where it came from or what it even is?”
Pyrok frowns down at the thing, shrugging as he flops it on his head. “If it’s so important, it shouldn’t be on a wall hook, gathering dust.”
He’s just kneeling beside the table when the door shoves open, exposing us to another blow of wind and snow.
We all watch Roan move into the entryway with an orange quill clamped between his teeth, cracked spectacles low on his nose, eyes on the Book of Voyd spread open atop his gloved hand. He nudges the door shut, blindly kicks off his already unlaced boots, then moves like a waif toward the kitchen counter—the dirty hem of his oversized white robe dragging behind.
He jerks back a stool and settles in with the book splayed across the table, pulls a notebook from his pocket, pries it open, and jots something down before he gets back to studying the page.
No hello.
No wave.
Not even a blink of recognition.
Right.
Collectively, we turn our attention back on the game.
“Everyone understand the rules?” Pyrok asks before another scream ratchets through the room, guttering to a groan that makes the skin on my arms prickle. “Twos, fours,andsixes,” he tacks on, to which Kaan and I both answer the same blasted word.
“Deal.”
Predators cackle and howl somewhere in the distant murk, echoing across the plains of snow and gleaming sheets of ice—only the odd sharp rock punched up from beneath to give me any sense of expanse. Of the distance I’ve moved.
Of how far I still have to go.
A shiver runs me through.
Out here, the world’s bigger, more brutal. One wrong move will bury me in the pinch between this barren wasteland and the dark, moon-pocked sky. Though it’s no less than I deserve, there’s still something I need to do.
Butfirst—
I lift Kaan’s weald to my bare, throbbing shoulder. Use the light to inspect the ugly pucker of pink skin I sizzled shut four daes ago, struggling to keep my hand steady. Not helped by the fever boiling my blood. Nor the welling anticipation of what I’m about to do.
“F-f-fuck it,” I mutter, deciding it’s best to cut first, think later. Either way, I’ll need to dig around until I find whatever’s left in me. It’s going to hurt as much no matter where I stick the knife in.
I’m transferring the weald into my other hand when another howl heckles me.
I scour my surroundings, looking past more scattered black stones jutting up like loose teeth, toward the wave of white towering over the plains like a constant threat.
Miel Et Muíem smothers my view of the bright horizon, blocking my path to The Fade. Not that I believed I could get there once Bharon buried himself in the sky. Nobody survives the Ergor Plains without a mount. Provisions. Shelter. I’ll die of starvation before I make it near enough to the border to open my bond with Zekhi and call him to me without risking his well-being. Butthose Mists—
They might be the answer to everything.
If I were to pass through them, I’d likely get soul-suckled to death. Not my favored way to go. But if I can simply get close enough to catch the attention of one of the resident waifs, they might be willing to pass amessage to Borg; ready the moment Kaan decides to pop the cork on his vial next.
A great plan. Unfortunately, the wind squealing past this rock I’m sheltering behind is keeping the Mists perpetually out of reach.
That, and I’m pretty sure I’m dying.
