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I reach down, gripping her and lifting her into my arms. Gently, I lay her on the bed, glancing over her features one more time.
“You can’t just have the bed carry me over?”
I can’t hide my puzzlement as she leaves for the world of dreams. Her eyes close, and she begins to snore.
11
ARIE
My senses come to me one by one.
Where I expect the Warden’s soft reassurances, there is nothing and no one. I reach out before my eyesight returns and feel only soft fabrics and heavy down. My mind is strangely quiet, except for my own thoughts.
I dare to peek an eye open, then the other, blinded by the soft glow of daylight filtering through the cave’s vast ceiling. But soon, my sight adjusts to the radiance, and I gasp.
This isn’t my cave.
And it’s certainly not anywhere I’ve been before. I think. At least it doesn’t spark any memory I can recall. The place is simple but polished, with high stone walls and shelves with trinkets – skulls and things I can’t see from the vantage of this oversized bed.
Even the natural swirls in the stone look crafted by a mindful hand. No tools could have done finer work.
“Where am I?” I ask no one and get no answer.
When I move to sit up, a flash of memory strikes me. It’s jumbled and feels unreal, of glowing flesh and murmured praises. I can’t tell if it’s a dream I had when I tossed and turned in this fine bed. Or if it was a hallucination brought on by Maya’s heated gaze, ever watchful.
My every muscle screams for me to lie back down, but I push past the sensation and rise. I land lightly on the balls of my feet, but that is the only thing light about my body. I sway with fatigue, but I need to find answers.
Did a kind stranger rescue me from the desert?
This place doesn’t seem abandoned. But the owner is out at the moment.
“Mother?”
The silence is strange. If she was here, she isn’t any longer. Nor is Warren or Ezekiel or the rest. Just Maya’s diffused light whispering through the channels above. It’s really beautiful. The owner seems to care quite a lot about the state of their dwelling, so I’m surprised they dragged my sorry self into it.
The bite of the desert still burns my tawny skin.
I hear myself laugh, the echo coming to my ear like it’s someone else.
The exit is wide enough for a cart and two equu to fit through, side by side. I’m not sure who needs such a large entryway, and though elves and orcs cross my mind briefly, I dismiss them instantly. Dark elves wouldn’t stoop to living in the wilds for anything when they have their fine cities, and orcs don’t have the eye for such beauty.
“Not elves,” I tell myself aloud, exhaling that knowledge with a sigh of relief. “It’s not elves.”
The solace only lasts a moment before I hear a different sound. The sound of someone navigating the cave. Soft footfalls against the smooth stone.
I slip against the wall and hold my breath. Maybe it’s the benevolent person who rescued me, and maybe it’s not. Either way, I won’t be taking chances. I try to make myself as small as possible, refusing to make a sound.
The clarity of my reality is so stark here, I wonder that the last few days have just been a waking nightmare. A hallucination I couldn’t rend myself free of, caught in the grip of paranoia after being left in the sun to roast. With the way my skin comes alive at every touch, I must have been out under Maya’s rays for longer than I realized.
The intruder gets closer.
They don’t make a sound or a murmur, just quiet steps that draw nearer with every moment. And that’s when they appear in the entryway.
Everything seems to pause.
Four sets of pale blue eyes fall upon me and pin me to the wall with muted curiosity. But it’s his form and figure, what I once thought the product of madness, that nearly drives me over the edge again.
“Y-you. You’re-”
