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Ana was taken aback. “And you knowhowthey will take you?”
“If you mean riding on the backs of a hundred ravens, then yes, I’m fully apprised of the insanity awaiting me.” He cupped her face and kissed her. “See you up there.”
“But—”
“See you up there, love.” He winked and disappeared into a sea of black leather.
Ludya stepped forward. Grigor hung back a step, hovering close to Addy. “We’ll be here when you return. And youwillreturn. Not on the backs of the ravens, as Tyreste must do, but by the strength of yourownwings, Anastazja. Often bent, never broken. The kyschun showed you the path, and our Ancestors lit the way. There is only one thing left to do.”
Ana wrapped Ludya in a hug, nodding. She sniffled and pulled back. “If the worst happens—”
The vedhma’s eyes narrowed in disapproval. “We do not invite tragedy.”
“But if it does, Ludya, I need to know... to know...”
“I will look after them all,” Ludya vowed. “A promise that will prove wholly unnecessary.”
“Thank you.” Ana met Grigor’s eyes behind Ludya.
He nodded once.
She returned it and blew a kiss to Addy.
From the corner of her eye she saw the ravens rise in perfect concert, a moving platform of black feathers. Tyreste lay in the middle, his pupils dilated with fear, but he was looking not at the ground but the skies. Ready. As she must be.
One by one, the other Ravenwoods shifted and took flight.
“Go,” Elyria commanded. “I will be right behind you.”
Ana folded her hands over her chest in silent prayer. Within her, Mortain knocked and rattled, demanding to be heard. But there were louder voices, and it was to those she paid heed.
The last words Ana heard as she launched into a sprint and turned her mind toward the most important shift of her life werehere I am.They were not her own words, but they were the ones she needed.
Her arms elongated into wings, mouth forming into the arch of a beak. Her legs turned last, and she held her breath, expecting them to disappear altogether, but perfectly formed talons appeared.
Ana joined the throngs of Ravenwoods in the night sky, the lone warrior of orange and red among a sea of black, and aimed herself toward Midnight Crest.
When the melee subsided, Grigor nudged the Penhallow girl and nodded for her to follow him back to Fanghelm. He had half a mind to return her to her parents, but a hunch told him she’d just find her way back to him.
“Arkhady,” he said when Ludya fell in beside him. The vedhma appeared to be somewhere else, lost to her thoughts, her worries... something. Her face was expressionless, her body moving on its own. “What can be done?”
“He’ll recover, in time,” she said in an even voice that matched her countenance. “There are vedhma and veduhn with him now.”
“He should be there when his daughter returns home.”
“We agree.”
“So you will make this happen.”
Ludya’s eyes rolled upward, the first sign she was truly paying attention. “Focus on the girl. I’ll do my part.”
Grigor’s lip curled. “What shall I do with her?”
Ludya judged him from the side. “Play with her?”
“Play?” Grigor’s face contorted in befuddlement.
“You were a good onkel to Ana and her brothers,” Ludya said with another scathing glance. “Once.”
