Page 23 of Heart of the Desert

“I didn’t exactly leave you with much of a chance to make a plan,” Dhara grunted as Elion helped her sit on the ground once more.

Aderyn’s shoulder relaxed under my fingers and her brief flare of frustration seemed to melt as she saw that Dhara was injured. “I was just worried. I’m glad you all made it back. What now?”

Elion spoke first: “Dhara’s injury will need tending, and we’ll need to move on to find water for that, but we can’t move in the dark.”

“It won’t be long before sunrise.” A rustle of cloth drew my gaze toward Erix, and I found I could make out his shape more easily as he gestured in one direction. Sure enough, the darkness in that direction was slightly lighter—the thick blackness slowly leeched away into heavy grays as the sun approached the horizon.

We had made it through the night.

While the humans in our band were worse for wear after our night of battle, the horses were in much better condition than the day before. The heat of the sun didn’t seem quite so harsh, as if some of her fiery anger had been quelled by the bloodshed the night before.

Dhara was well enough to ride—and if she wasn’t, she would never admit it—so we set out doggedly, praying that today we would make it past this vast open plain and find shelter and water.

A shadow appeared on the horizon. I eyed it warily at first, but my shoulders slumped as I found that the plains were giving way to rocky ground with small cliffs and buttes that would hide scrub and vegetation. Hopefully water.

We would not be vulnerable in the dark like we had been the night before.

I glanced sidelong at my companions as they too spotted the changing landscape and relief painted their expressions. Guilt ripped through me as I watched Dhara sitting slightly hunched to guard her injury and took in the shadowed hollows under Aderyn’s eyes. Despite Erix’s assurances that I had made the right decision with the information I had, I couldn’t help feeling like I failed my companions at every turn, putting them in harm’s way.

Just like I had failed Kelvadan.

I had risen all the way to queen in the Great City I had hoped would be my belonging, only to fail so miserably as to be left without a home once again. Now, I feared it was a pattern I was destined to repeat again and again. Every time I failed to force myself into the exact shape of the leader or warrior the desert and my friends needed, I felt the ache of abandonment like a phantom limb.

Like I knew the pain that would inevitably come if I continued down this path.

I chewed on my chapped lips as we drew closer to the rocky crags and the group looked around for a place to make camp. The sun was far from setting, but after the events of last night, we needed time and safety to regroup.

“There.” Elion gestured to a rough hole in the ground, gouged as if by sharp hooves—the telltale sign of a natural well dug by wild horses and other animals.

When we reached it, I dismounted, and the others followed suit. As they began untying packs from their horses to let them rest properly, I spied Dhara still sitting on her mount out of the corner my eye. She stared down at her hands in her horse’s mane and scowled as if they had offended her.

Casually, I walked over, my hands shoved in my belt. I had seen how loathe she was to accept help from Lord Elion on several occasions and didn’t fancy being on the receiving end of her sharp bite.

“You have a lovely horse. He’s very tall,” I commented instead, cocking my head and squinting against the sunlight as I looked up at her.

Dhara huffed, like an unamused laugh. “It’s a trait I admire in him when my leg feels less likely to give out under me the moment I hit the ground.”

There was no fooling her.

“I’ll catch you,” I offered.

Now she turned the full force of her scowl on me. I looked to the side and shrugged.

“The first time I got to Kelvadan, I collapsed right off of Daiti’s back and into Aderyn’s arms,” I admitted. “And she is much shorter than I am, which I’m sure made it a much more awkward affair than me giving you a hand.”

Dhara sighed, and glanced at Aderyn, who indeed only came up to about my chin, although her shoulders were a few inches broader than mine still. Then, Dhara swung her uninjured leg over her mount’s back so she faced me. I reached out as she slid down, catching her by the shoulders, so she could land lightly, almost all her weight on her good leg.

Her lips still flattened in discomfort as she stood, and she braced one hand on her gelding’s shoulder, patting him gently in thanks. Then, she jerked her chin toward a flat rock. We walked over to it, and while she trembled as she tried not to put too much weight on me, she kept her grip on my arm.

With a sigh, she sat down on the rock, extending her injured leg in front of her as she did so as not to jostle it. I sat beside her. We would need to clean and bandage her wound, but for now I let myself enjoy the first moment of anything even close to peace since we had stopped to camp last night.

It was somewhat interrupted by the pulsing, shivering tension spilling down the tether in my gut from Erix’s end—something that had become chronic over the past weeks. My gaze slipped to him, as it so often did when there was an idle moment, like he was the lodestone to my focus.

Right now, he was looking over Alza’s legs and hooves—meticulous as always in checking his mount, even when I could sense the shuddering unrest under his skin. I admired the way his broad hands and long fingers ran over her midnight coat with care and the sharp angle of his jaw as he nodded as if satisfied with what he found. I wondered if I would ever have my fill of looking at his lethal beauty, although it seemed unlikely. With the pain and confusion I felt as a constant undercurrent in my belly with his rising madness, I found myself looking at him more and more often, as if he might disappear if I looked away too long, like a mirage.

The thought made me shudder.

Dhara’s shoulder brushed mine, jolting me out of my contemplation.