Page 25 of Hearts Lost

ITHRONEL

WHAT ARE YOU?

Aloserin keeps looking at the forest.

We’d stopped walking when we’d reached the place where the river enters the strange, inky ocean in drifting fans of brilliant blue and ebony. For a while, we watched the confluence in silence as the wind blowing off the black waves pushed air against our faces that’s so hot and steamy it feels almost soft, like velvet. Eventually, we unpacked two of the fruits, settled on the dark stones, and ate. I stared at the blue-tinged water swirling into the dark waves as I ate, but Aloserin’s eyes kept drifting upstream and tangling in the trees.

He doesn’t like the forest. Every time he looks upstream, his fingers drift to the hilt of the sword on his waist. The forest itself seems to be drifting farther away from us right now, its pale, intertwined branches growing smaller and blurring together, which would have filled me with panicky fear a day ago. But now Aloserin is awake, and I have no reason to care how far away the field of blue grass drifts. I have no fixed point anymore, and the feeling is almost liberating.

“What is it?” I finally ask.

Aloserin’s eyes dart back to me with an expression that seems almost guilty.

“What’s what?” he asks.

“What are you looking for?” I press.

His brow wrinkles in a way that I’m sure he does not intend to look attractive. He turns back toward the forest, then to me, and finally wipes his hand across his mouth.

“How did you survive?” he asks.

His dark eyes narrow as he stares at me. There’s something hard and sharp in his expression and, not for the first time, I think about what it was like when he was unconscious. How I’d tried not to stare at him, to follow the patterns the shifting light made on his skin, which is so pale it’s almost translucent. How I could trace the blue spiderwebs of his veins on the underside of his arm. How strangely beautiful and delicate he’d seemed when he was asleep.

But, now that he’s awake, there’s nothing at all delicate about this man. He seems to pivot between hard suspicion and bitter sarcasm, with a nice shock of pure terror every once in a while just to shake things up. But I still can’t figure out what in the stars he’s so afraid of.

I think of a dark room, late at night, with King Grathgore standing beside his desk, and something inside my chest aches in sympathy. What did his king do to Aloserin to make him like this?

“What do you mean?” I ask, and my voice has picked up his hard edge. “I gathered fruit. I drank water from the river. I built the shelter—”

“No,” he says, shaking his head. “I mean, how did you avoid the monsters?”

I stare at him.

“The void beasts,” he continues. “The shadow… things. Under the trees.” He waves his hand almost angrily in the direction of the forest.

“You mean the animals?” I ask.

“The beasts,” he replies. “Those monsters have killed more trekkers than I can count. They’re incredibly aggressive, and even one scratch from one of them, no matter how small, can carry a fatal dose of void touch.”

Stars above, I don’t mean to laugh. But he looks so serious and so afraid, and I just can’t help myself. I clamp my hands over my lips. The laugh comes out anyway. Aloserin glares at me like he’s considering corporeal punishment.

And that thought only makes me feel even hotter. I turn away, swallow hard, and try to compose myself.

“Sorry,” I say when I can finally bring myself to look him in the eyes again. “But, you’re talking about the shadow animals? The ones that look like smoke?”

He nods stiffly.

“Those aren’t monsters,” I continue. “They’re just…animals. They were really scared when we arrived—”

“Scared?” Aloserin asks, cutting me off. “How can they be scared?”

Irritation flares in my chest, like stepping on a shard of broken glass.

“How? The same way anything can be scared,” I snap. “They kept thinking of pain, like they expected me to hurt them. It took me days before they’d even let me see them.”

Aloserin stares at me with wide eyes.

“You’re a handler,” he says.