Absolutely not.
Not even if she bit down on my foot and shook me half to death … though I’d rather she didn’t.
Creators, what if I just gave her the idea?
Shivers scuttle up my spine.
I swim harder, faster. Punch free of the lake and clamber across my shore, into my outer self faster than I ever have.
My eyes pop open.
Heaving breath, I check that I’m still in the slumber nook, relieved to find no shreds of meat caught between my teeth or blood slathered on my hands. Hopefully signs my Other didn’t go on a murderous rampage while I was getting emotionally beat up at her trauma trade station.
“Creators,” I mutter, kneading my face with the heels of my hands, stuffing down visions of somber folk staring out across a crumbled mountainside—past the obsidian peaks of a buried village.
Silencing echoes of a devastating song pushed from young Elluin’s lips as she stood beside an unfamiliar, powerfully built male with hair as black as mine who looked down on her with reverence. A song used to shift the crumbled glacier in slow-moving increments, revealing the broken village beneath—
The many folk who did not make it out alive.
Most of all, I stuff down the swell of pride my Other felt as she stood at little Elluin’s back, watching her sing until her legs gave out … hoping to find even a single survivor amongst the snowy carnage.
I sigh, digging my fingers through my hair.
There’s nothing quite like choking on the aftertaste of martyrdom while preparing to hack a heart from someone’s chest cavity.
At least the trade was sufficient.
My arms flop to the pallet, jostling a piece of parchment. Frowning, I snatch it and scan Kaan’s script, feeling my heart sink past my belly button.
Creators … How long did I sleep?
Seems deep-diving into my internal lake has its disadvantages. Like missing important shit I’d usually wake up to.
Groaning, I burst into action. I fasten my white leather pants, securing the matching jacket beneath my chin when I notice my white cloak draped on the hooked seater that dominates the room, the faintest hint of somethingluminousglinting from beneath.
I still. Then move faster than I ever have.
Whipping back the cloak, I’m doused in a wave of brisk air that makes my skin pebble, squinting at the small silver moonshard—no bigger than four fists lumped together. Shimmery.
Beautiful.
A cold ache swells between my ribs.
He did it. He got it.
The backs of my eyes sting with such ferocity I squeeze my lids together—hard. Wait until the flare of pain subsides before I open them again, beating back the urge to touch the shard’s jagged edges. To caress the smooth dip that looks a lot like the ridge of a wing. To take it in both my hands, pull it to my chest, and ball around it like a moon.
If I do any one of those things … I’m not sure I’ll be able to part with it again.
Instead, I release a slow breath and drape my cloak back on the shard, gently tucking it into place. I turn away, ignoring the shudder that crawls up my spine—achingly similar to the feeling I had while I was rushing back to the surface of my internal lake.
Not now.
I’m not ready to face that yet.
Jaw clenched, I get to buckling both sheaths around my thighs and stuff them full of blades, as well as all the hidden pockets in my pants and jacket. I wrap a dark shroud around the lower half of my face, just moving to the stairwell when I come across my muddy boots on the ground beside it.
Notwhere I left them.
