I nod. "Southwest," I whisper, hearing the tremor in my own voice.
"We'll find them," he replies, his calm voice washing over me like comforting velvet as he rides us through the chaos, over the fallen bodies that lie strewn across the grass.
"How is it all?" I ask, my voice hoarse.
His hand touches my forehead. "Rennalya, you'resosick. I can drop you back and bring Stellan and Onyx to you?"
I shake my head. "How is it all?"
"You really want to know?"
I nod, holding my breath.
"Just Tuesday morning, I alone pulled twenty-nine bodies out of the water. Eleven children. Our accommodation is full, our healing tents are full, our mortuaries are full. The only places that are empty are our food reserves and medicine supply rooms."
Chills run down my spine, and it has nothing to do with the cool nighttime air. These are the darkest of times I've ever known. "Lana?"
"Killed her on Tuesday, once I'd taken the eleventh child out. I couldn't cope with her being alive any longer," he says, kicking us into a gallop as we veer off into the tree line.
If I thought the forest was eerie earlier, it sure as hell is now. The sound of the battle whooshes away as Rexxan takes us through the dense bushes, and all that surrounds us is chilling silence. A bad feeling creeps across my skin.
"Stellan?" He shouts, doing something clever with his voice. It weaves its way around the trees, carrying itself across the woodland. Rexxan has a lot of powers, but his powers in his own forests are unmatched. It's like Mother Nature herself bends to his will. I try to join in, but my voice is non-existent, stolen from me by the events of this week. I start to shake a little harder, a vision of Onyx's dead body replacing my exhaustion with dread.
"We'll find them," he reassures me, sensing the change in my body language. But words cannot fix this. Words cannot find them. Rex shrouds us in a golden glow which slowly moves away from us, vanishing through the trees like a glowing mist. One day, I'm going to make him tell me the full list of everything he can do.
He tightens his grip on me as he navigates his white stallion over a fallen tree, and I spot the glowing mist up ahead. Hope replenishes the chill in my bones, warm and comforting. He takes a breakneck turn, skidding to a halt and sliding off the horse, tugging me off behind him but catching me before I hit the ground.
His eyes carry a haunted depth to them, and I turn to see what he's looking at, and terror snatches me into its grip with razor-sharp jaws.
My life as I know it starts to crumble at the edges
"No!" I scream, running over to Stellan who lies, unmoving, on the floor. He raises his hand in a weak greeting.
"I found O. He’s hurt. He's badly hurt. Go to him, don’t bother with me. He's in the cave over there," he whispers, blood running out of his mouth.
I cover my mouth with my hand and sob. The cut to his face is minor, but the four-foot-long sword that pierces all the way through his torso is not.
And I know there and then that my best friend is dying beneath my hands.
"Onyx needs help," he repeats, his breaths heaving with agony. “Help him.”
"Rexxan, do something!" I scream, turning to face him. Rex shakes his head. He knows it too. Stellan takes my hand weakly. "Rexxan!" I scream again, my voice hoarse. He has to fix this. He has to. "Fucking save him! Do something!"
Rexxan kneels at my side, on the other side of Stellan's broken body. Stell gives him a shaky smile. "He cannot undo what is already done, Rennalya. No one has powers that great."
"No," I whisper, choking back another sob as blood seeps between my small fingers, desperately trying to stop his bleeding.
Stellan coughs, pale green eyes flicking to the sword in his chest. "Take it out, Renna. For me. Don't prolong this."
"No," I croak, my own tears leaving clean streaks on his dirty face. His hand wraps around mine.
"Don't cry," he whispers, his voice giving up on him. "You know this is what I've wanted for so fucking long. So fucking long I've waited for this, and I wouldn't have wanted it to happen any other way. We did it.This is what I want."
I feel like part of my heart is dying too; shrivelling and drying up, barren of love. I nod through my tears as his life leeches through the hole in his chest. I curse Kelen. I curse this life and all it has stripped from me. I curse this ugly world where men like Stellan die at the hands of the cruellest of others. “To be back with Jana,” I whisper, gasping each breath.
He smiles, tears running down his face too. "I can see her now, and our little boy. She's waited for me long enough. She’ll be pissed off when I see her.”
I should be happy, because he is right. He has talked about dying for so long. How he won’t go out of his way to die, but how he’ll welcome it when the day comes. I should be happy for him.
