Page 38 of The Light Between Worlds

So it is that here, at the end of all things, Jamie and Philippa and I find our places again. Jamie joins Hector while Philippa and Alfreya brave the blood and horror of the hospital tent. And Cervus and I tend the dead, bringing what peace and beauty we can once hope has gone. The ground is still icy, but we build stone cairns until the clearings around our secret encampment are filled with silent monuments.

The news that the Empire’s forces are only a mile from our camp is brought to me late one night, along with Dorien’s lifeless body. I blink back tears and rainwater as they leave him with me, and Cervus slips away. Arrows mark the stonewarden like wicked thorns.

When Cervus reappears, Jamie and Philippa are with him. They stand with their arms around each other, heartbroken just as I am. I kneel beside Dorien with his head cradled on my lap.

The noise and clamor of the frontline reach me for the first time, drifting through the trees on a gust of wind. I push myself to my feet, though I’m tired to the point of exhaustion, and join Jamie and Phil.We stand beside our fallen friend, heads bowed, bearing the weight of worlds.

I straighten first. I will tend to the dead as I’ve done this past fortnight so their restless hearts will find their way home should we win the day.

I can’t think of what will happen if we lose.

“Jamie,” I say to my brother. “You’ve got to get back to the front. Draw your sword.”

Jamie nods, slowly. He wipes rain from his face with one sleeve, and then a sweet steel note rings clear through the damp air as he unsheathes Anvar.

I want to call him back as he strides through the trees toward the mud and mess of the battlefield, back to his place with the fighters. But we swore. Oh, we swore.

To serve. To stand fast. And I would not break my oath for anything in all the worlds I’ve known.

Philippa’s still motionless, staring down at Dorien’s body with unseeing eyes. I reach out and put a hand on her shoulder, but she jerks back.

“Don’t, Evelyn,” Philippa warns, and when she finally turns her face away from Dorien, there’s anguish in every line of her profile. “Don’t. Not when it could be you or Jamie next.”

I have no comfort to offer. The words she’s spoken are true, and hard, and I can’t deny them.

We go our separate ways, traveling to opposite ends of the encampment like ill-fated stars. As I go, I remember another night, long ago and a world away, and the words that stung my lips as bombs fell onLondon: anywhere but here, anywhere but here, anywhere but here.

But I couldn’t speak those words now if I tried. Instead, my heartsong is this: nowhere but here, nowhere but here, nowhere but here. If I’m to die, let it be as a Woodlander. Because a Woodlands heart always finds its way home.

28

I’VE NEVER ARRIVED AT A RAILWAY STATION LIKE THIS—with my hand on someone’s arm. Mum and Dad put up a bit of a fuss at the idea of me heading off with a stranger, and a boy at that, but Jamie silenced them with a few terse words. And it was Jamie who drove us to the station and gave me a hug so tight it was as if we were saying goodbye forever.

Tom is careful with me, helping me up into the train carriage. We sit side by side in an empty compartment and share a bag of toffee, but stay quiet for the most part. I like Tom’s quietness best about him—that he’s a respecter of silence, and doesn’t feel pressed to fill it with pointless chatter.

I only realize I’ve fallen asleep when I wake with my head on Tom Harper’s shoulder. I keep absolutely still for a moment, eyes shut, trying to sort out the smell of him. Burnt sugar and chocolate from the toffee, wool and fresh air from his overcoat.

I sit up abruptly and scoot away, putting inches between us and muttering an apology. Tom flushes, red as his hair, but there’s a smile hiding at the corners of his mouth.

The lunch trolley comes and saves us from our own awkwardness. The choices are a suspicious egg salad or the ever-present stale ham and cheese. I’m growing quite fond of those stale ham and cheese sandwiches. I’m even fonder of them after I nibble my own and watch Tom eat four in quick succession. We have more toffees after that, and tea from a thermos Tom pulls out of his bag. Outside, the dales flash by, grey and dreaming beneath a blanket of snow. The sky broods overhead and sheep gather in the valleys or huddle next to protective bluffs. I try not to see tree spirits in the wooded copses or stonewardens in the shadows of the crags, but they’re always there, my own set of unbelievable ghosts.

This time, though, I see past them. I watch the sheep, the clever collie herding the flock, the shepherd working with him in a partnership without words. I look for the beauty in those things. I look for magic.

To my surprise, I find it. It’s in the way the dog anticipates his master’s whistle, and the way the sheep bunch and run together. It’s in the starlings we frighten as we speed through the lowlands, which take wing and move of one accord in a murmuration of feathers and will. It’s in the trees I’ve always found lifeless, that in this strange world still stretch their bare bones to the winter sky, reaching for the stars beyond.

When I turn away from the window, Tom’s watching me with a curious expression.

“What did you see?” he asks.

“Everything,” I say. “The world.”

“And what do you think of it?”

It’s a loaded question, that, seeing as I’ve known another. Iconsider my words before answering.

“I think,” I tell him, “that right now I’m happy to be here, with you.”

The train begins to slow and the porter comes down the aisle calling out our stop at Edgethorn Halt.