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I blushed harder. “I’m not ungrateful, Hyath. I didn’t mind wearing them.” A lie spilled off my tongue. “I left the furs by the river...after my swim last night, I left them to dry. I-I can go retrieve—”
“It’s okay,” Hyath repeated, placing the bundle by my feet. Her eyes burned into mine, seeing my lie, knowing why I lied, and promising a moment soon when I could tell them the truth.
Grateful tears clogged my throat as I nodded at her silent kindness.
Niya smiled at both of us as Hyath moved back to her side. Bowing her head at Solin, Niya said, “We have everything arranged, just as you requested.”
“Good.” Solin tugged on his tooth necklace before padding barefoot to his hearth of ashes and embers. He didn’t add more fuel, merely ducked, dragged his finger through the thick soot, and strode back toward me.
I flinched as he ducked to his haunches, folding his long legs enough to crouch over me. With a steady hand and fierce stare, he drew an ashy symbol on my forehead. “You are now claimed by the fire, Girl. It knows you will visit, and the soot binds you to that promise.”
Unfolding his lean, powerful body, he looked at Hyath and Niya. “Take her to the river. Pallen will be there waiting to perform the ritual.” His voice lowered with warning. “Prepare her well. The trance will begin at dusk.” He left without another word, leaving me alone with my two friends.
They shared a look.
“What ritual?” I asked tentatively, my heart already racing with what would happen, all while desperate to run to the river and rinse away last night. An image of the stranger being carried away by the wolves panged.
Here I was, about to be bathed and prepared for a trance that came with so many risks, but where was he? Was he still alive? Did the wolves have magic like him? Were they able to heal his fevers and bring him back from the brink of death?
Rubbing at the sun-shaped mark on my upper thigh, I sucked in a breath as Niya said, “The ritual will help keep you safe. You’ll have to do everything Pallen tells you, so you may walk in the flames as a spirit but be able to find your body once the trance is over.”
I shivered. “And if I’m still not ready?”
“I don’t think you have a choice,” Hyath murmured. “Niya and I pieced together what must have happened last night when you left the camp. We saw Aktor and Kivva slip away from the fire. We went to follow, but Syn went racing past, so we thought you were with her. She’s always with you these days, so we didn’t bother to go.”
Niya took over their tale. “By the time we heard the wolves howling and saw the hunters bolting into the grass, we were too late. We’re both so incredibly sorry that we didn’t go with you when you first left. If we’d been with you, Aktor and Kivva would never have been so bold. They would never have tried to—”
“It’s okay.” I held up my hand, not wanting to relive it. “It’s not your fault Kivva almost killed him, and Aktor...” I winced.
“Kivva has always filled Aktor’s head with suspicion and misplaced distrust.” Niya shook her head. “I’m so sorry they hurt you.”
“You said Kivva almost killed him...” Hyath asked quietly. “Him who?”
I froze.
My memory of last night was tangled so tightly with the stranger—his unexplainable mastery over shadows and the wolves—that I thought everyone knew.
But the hunters had only arrived once the wolves had left, and I doubted Aktor would share every detail, which meant...
They don’t know about him.
Grabbing the bundle Hyath had placed on my sleeping furs, I kept my hands busy unravelling the package. “The man from the grasslands...” I looked at the two women. “He returned while I was bathing. Syn’s bite has given him fevers. He’s...sick.”
Niya kneeled heavily, grabbing my arm. “Where is he? I can get Olish to tend to him.”
I ached beneath her concern, all while my skin tingled where she held me. “He...” I shut my mouth, unsure how to tell them that the wolves had carried him off. Wolves that acted like his family and not the predators we were taught to fear.
Hyath rubbed her pale arms, her skin so white compared to Niya. “If you’re worried that the Nhil will hurt him, like Kivva did, I can assure you that won’t happen. Guests are honoured amongst our people. We would give him the same care you received. Surely, you know that?” The hurt in her green gaze pinched my heart.
Shifting beneath my sleeping furs, I reached for her hand. She inhaled as I squeezed her fingers, her eyes searching mine as I said, “He’s different, Hyath. I can’t explain it. He survived more than any mortal could withstand. Kivva hit him around the head with his staff and—”
