He laughed. “I don’t know about ostentatious—but it’s perfect. After we right a few other wrongs first.”
“Yes. After that.”
Nik joined them a few minutes later, no food in hand but gaze on the now-visible line of trees. “The elder says that once we clear the forest, we’ll quickly run out of land. We’ll be hiking on ice to the next village, and most of the way back to Reykstoll.”
Raf frowned. “Can you do that and keep from melting a hole straight down to seawater?”
Nik shrugged. “I’ll try to contain my heat but…” He turned to Kyrja, flashed her a grin. “I might need a little help.”
She made a show of considering. “Well then, I suggest you don’t do anything to annoy me.”
He chuckled and slid an arm around her waist, pulling her against him. “I’ll try my best.” He pressed a kiss to her temple that made warmth bloom all through her and nodded toward the tree line. “That feel as chaotic to you as it does to me? The geothermal activity is unstable, at best. Like what Daemon described much of Fjordlandi as being when he was first Awakened. I don’t think I had any idea how much work he and the others have really been doing all these years.”
Kyrja had to grant the point. “Even I noticed in my history lessons that eruptions and random vents calmed down a lot in the last hundred fifty years. But I had no reason, then, to doubt that it was because first my grandfather and then my father had such skill at countering the heat with ice. As for your question—yes. It’s like the water cycle is in every stage all at once.”
His gaze moved to her face, that crease forming between his brows. “Nothing you can’t handle.”
“I appreciate the confidence, but…” Her breath eased out. “I don’t know what my father’s doing. Every time I ease into the forest, he eases out of the sea. It’s a strange correlation.”
“Hmm.” His fingers tapped a rhythm of thought on her waist. “Could it just be that he’s trying to observe? If this region is foreign even to his control historically, he could be curious about what you’re doing there.”
“Maybe.” More, she’d be blazing a trail for him to track. Thus far, since they landed, all her interactions with Fjordlandi’s waters had been from a distance—not where she was. It was possible, perhaps, that he hadn’t known exactly where she was until now. Perhaps he thought she’d head straight for Harroby Dome once she reached land. Or take the usual route around the bases of first Mt. Radsla and then, forty miles later, Helviti, with the plains in between. He surely assumed she’d be heading to Reykstoll, but the details could well have been hidden.
Much like his were to her. There was no way he was in the seas where she sensed him most. He could be anywhere, reaching out along the magical paths he’d forged over so many decades. A man of his power didn’t have to be near the waters to influence them, so long as he had some sort of connection.
Although, could she trace that connection? Pinpoint his location?
“What’s that look for?”
She blinked back to the here and now, shook her head. “Just musing about how to locate my father. But that’s for later. For now, the Great Forest.”
They conferred with the elder about where the main path through the forest went, trying their best to get a gauge on what they could influence as he described it for them. Eventually, there was nothing for it but to head into the trees and do their best to mitigate any dangers.
At first, she thought her sense of foreboding had been misleading. She had no trouble holding back the curtain of icy fog, and Nik said the path veered clear of the nearest vents and lava-fed hot springs.
Then they reached the rope and slat bridge the elder had mentioned, and Kyrja sucked in a breath. “That is not a bridge. That’s a half-finished knitting project.”
Nik snorted a laugh but surveyed it just as dubiously. “Can you reinforce it with some ice?”
She pursed her lips. The crevasse it spanned was not over water. In fact, the nearest stream was half a mile away, and though there were some underground sources, they were beneath the same rocks that formed the chasm. “I can, but it’ll take me a few minutes to bring in enough water.”
His hand rubbed encouragement into her back. “No rush.”
“What about rain?” Raf had his face tilted up to the sky. Not that much of it was visible between the towering trees.
“Also possible, just not as simple as manipulating a stream, had there been one here.” But she gathered the clouds above them. Reached for the nearest water source on the ground.
Fodur’s magic sliced through the clouds, so sharp and unexpected that she screamed, lifting her arms and pointing them upward.
27
Daemon climbed up the last of the handholds and braced his feet along the wide rim of Helviti’s cone. Clouds obscured any sight of the city, but above he had an unparalleled view of blue skies and the nearly-perpetual clouds spread out below him like a woolen blanket.
So many years, he’d gazed up the mountain’s throat and yearned for a glimpse of the sky through the obscuring haze of heat, ash, and fumes. Now here he was, able to leave the volcano whenever he wanted, able to see that sky, and restlessness churned inside him.
The world stretched out in front of him, all of Fjordlandi open to him—and he had no idea what to do with it.
“You could start by asking for guidance.”
