“Where are they?” she asked in Silvan, her cowl fluttering, teased by the wind. “The Shae and the girl. Where are they?”
Flent snarled something at her, a warning probably. What a fool, he was going to get himself killed! He menaced her with the axe, his face ruddy with fear.
She looked at him, the magic surged, and Flent clutched his chest and sank to his knees, his veins bulging.
“They went ahead!” Ravin said, taking a step forward. “There’s no need to kill the Drugaen.”
Flent pitched forward in the grass, clutching his chest as he coughed and choked. His face went white like spoiled milk, and he thrashed in the scrub.
“No!” Ravin yelled. “Release him! He cannot hurt you! I told you where they went!”
“Then stop me.”
Fear clenched in Ravin’s stomach. He found himself wishing the Sleepwalker were there to face her instead. Flent sagged flat, his eyes wide with death panic. She was crushing his heart, stopping it from beating. The icy fear turned into white-hot rage. His friend was a fool, unlearned, but he was still a friend—and he writhed, unable to save himself. Why could she not just leave him alone?
“Free him!” Ravin said.
She only smiled, letting her magic crush out his life.
He wanted to fight her, to claim her power as his own. She would kill the Drugaen. She would kill anyone who stood in her way.
Ravin snarled, his slim hands shooting forward. He summoned the Earth magic in a hurricane of thought, drawing it into him with all his strength, with all his will, with every bit of desperation. He drew beyond the bounds of safety, beyond the borders of what was allowed. Forbidden magic. A coppery smell bloomed in his nose. A honey-sweet taste filled his mouth. The magic swarmed inside him, licking his bones and blood, surging with strength and emotion. He remembered the drink. The taste of her blood mingled with his. The glory of it!
This was not a fire she could quench, not Earth magic she could tame.
Ravin hurled it at her, summoning more of its sweetness that thrummed through his skin. He could do more. So much more!
She walked through the torrent as if it were a light rain. The greenish flames dripped harmlessly off her skin and robes. “Surely you can do better than that, child.”
Her hand lifted, cupping the Orb of the Firekin.
And he wanted it.
Chapter XXVI
"I can’t see anything,” Ticastasy whispered as she pulled her cloak tighter. “How do we know we’re going the right way?”
The fog smothered them with its thick wet embrace, soaking them. Thealos could not see the stars to tell how soon dawn would begin its battle against the mist and cold. The long grass swayed as they passed, the bulbous tips brushing against his fingertips.
Xenon paused a half-step and cocked his head. “Waymarkers, human. The quaere ahead is leaving a trail.”
“Can I see one?” Thealos asked.
The Wolfsman removed a hewn square of stone from a pouch at his belt and gave it to him.
The waymarker was thin, broken raw from a slab of granite with a chisel and hammer and then polished on one face. A master stonecraftsman had marked a sigil into it, but the runes were unknown to him. The stone bloomed with Silvan magic as Thealos held it in his hand, and in his mind’s eye he knew where another matching stone waited. It was not far, bearing slightly to the left. The pulse of its magic was so faint that he had not felt it emanating from Xenon.
“As we follow the trail, we collect them,” Xenon said, taking it back. He gave Ticastasy a disdainful look. “If it were our intent to lose you in the fog, it would only be too easy.”
“How comforting,” she said back, matching his tone.
Xenon smirked. “Rest a moment until I return.” He strode ahead, his hand fastened to the pommel of his leaf-blade. His expression clouded as it had during much of the hard walk through the Shoreland valley surrounding Landmoor. Thealos guessed he communed with the other Wolfsmen silently threading ahead of them in the deep of night.
“Insufferable wretch,” Ticastasy whispered after the night swallowed him.
Thealos said nothing, but he agreed.
The night’s chill bore through Thealos and he wondered how Ticastasy endured it. His toes felt like stones in his boots, and he chafed his hands together to warm them a little—in case he needed to draw the Silvan prince’s sword and fight. A sudden gust blasted into them from the south, making him draw deeper into himself and wish they were at the walls already. A pang of homesickness for Avisahn smarted inside him after he smelled the aroma of a nearby patch of wildflowers—flowering weeds, actually.
“Cold?” he asked her, not really knowing what he could do about it.
She nodded. “Aren’t you? Makes me remember the hearth fire at the Foxtale.”
“I remember it. Big enough to stick a whole tree trunk in there. I’d pay ten Arolian pieces right now to warm my hands.” He wiped moisture from his forehead and tried to contain a shudder.
“I’ll do it for five. Give me your hands.”
“I was joking, Stasy.”