The voices outside my buzzing are getting louder.What do we do, they beg.Stand up, please. Farron, we need help.
It’s as if they’re speaking from the other side of a forest, muffled and lost between the trees.
Eventually, they go away.
My eyes burn from the drifting smoke, but I cannot blink. Perhaps I shall sink into the earth like Kel.
In that faraway manner, I hear a new sound. Heavy hoofbeats and a familiar bleating. An elk’s call.
Then my brother keeps saying a name that weighs on my mind.
Dayton.
Dayton!they cry.
And all at once, it rushes back at me.
The buzzing stops, my vision clears so the pools of blood in the dirt stop swirling, and I feel the pain in my shoulder, the burns on my skin from my own flames where I took no care.
Whirling, I turn to look.
Dayton sits atop Thrand, my elk steed, his long blond hair half pulled back, the rest waving in the slight breeze. He wears a black tunic with the colorful embroidery along the cuffs and neckplate that is common in Spring. Dust from the road has settled in the creases of his face, but even so, he rides with the majesty of a high ruler.
Dayton’s eyes dart around, taking in the scene, concern overtaking his expression. He hops down from Thrand, giving the elk a reassuring pat on the neck. Dom and Billy stagger up to him. Without a word, Dayton pulls them to his chest.
They embrace him, shaking. His shoulders heave as he hugs them tighter. “Thank the gods you two are alright. Coppershire looked empty. Couldn’t find Paddy or any of you. I had no idea where you’d all gone, but he came running out of the forest and seemed to be able to follow the scent.” Dayton jerks his chin toward Thrand.
I wonder if I’ve succeeded and have started sinking to the Below like Kel, for I can’t seem to stand. Dayton doesn’t look at me. I can only imagine how this ghost of me has disappeared in the ash and smoke.
Dayton wastes no time. After pulling away from my brothers, he’s adopted the full mannerisms of a high ruler, ordering the remaining men to search for survivors, then to rally to him. Dom and Billy cling to his words like they’re prayers.
I stay there in the dirt for what may be eons, watching him. I cannot go to him, and I cannot run. Perhaps I died when that goblin hit me with the club. A corpse so pathetic, even Caspian did not wish it for a thrall.
A curl of smoke passes between us, then Dayton’s turquoise eyes flash through the murk. He sees me. I know because a pulse of lightning jolts up my spine, as it always does when he stares at me.
What will he do? Scream? Banish me from my own realm? Or worst of all…turn away?
He surges forward, moving with lethal intent, the way he does in the arena when going in for a kill.
Perhaps he’s decided it would be a mercy to end me. And he would be right.
But instead, Dayton falls to his knees before me, cups my face, tears shining in his eyes, then gathers me in his arms.
And I weep for the first time since I was reborn. Weep for the lives I’ve lost. My soldiers. Dayton’s.
My own.
28
Dayton
Ilift my fist to knock on the door, then drop it. A heavy sighescapes me.
Night has fallen over the Autumn Realm. With its mixture of stone and dark wooden paneling, Keep Oakheart has always given me the creeps after sundown. It’s not like Soltide, where even at night, a breeze drifts through the open windows off the ocean, and moonlight drips through skylights in every ceiling. Here, it seems the suits of armor decorating the halls may come alive at any moment.
But there’s no retiring to the warmth of a guest room. I need to speak with Farron.
We were silent on our journey back from the Briar to the capital. I got bits and pieces of what happened from Dom and Billy and the rest from the handful of soldiers who survived the slaughter.
