Their magic flowed through the air around me, alerting me to the security that the height of my anxiety had hidden.
It was foolish to have gotten so worked up; it scared me that it took so little to trigger the demons Cail had infected me with. However, it had only been hours since Ilyan had rescued me from that prison. There would be no quick recovery from my insanity.
I wanted to be patient; I just didn’t know if I could be.
“One group would not move so far away. Trpaslíks are too cowardly for that.” The lines in Ilyan’s face deepened as he took a few steps around the table, his fingers trailing over the surface as he focused on it.
I watched him move as I tried to figure out what the three of them were doing in the first place, the strength of Ilyan’s determination almost answering the question for me. The odd connection we now shared sparked. Flashes of his memory, flickers of their arrival, flitted over to me as he focused on the table.
The two men had arrived at our room minutes before, where Ilyan, in his frustration, had ushered them in. He hadn’t even considered that I had been sleeping in the bed. No surprises there. His mind had been solely focused on what Sain and Thom had come to tell him, his need to solve the problem, and on protecting his people.
What was left of them, anyway.
I tried to understand what they were talking about, but it was like they were speaking in code. I could ask the question into Ilyan’s mind, but something about the way he was focused on the table set my hackles up, making me question whether I wanted to know in the first place.
“Chances are high that there are more between them, My Lord,” Sain said, the unfamiliar voice I had heard before now making sense. Sain shifted toward Ilyan, his body still leaning over the table as if he couldn’t stand straight on his own.
“Are there any camps here?” Ilyan asked, pointing to a spot on the table as he moved back to his original place.
“There is one here, My Lord,” my father answered, his fingers pressing into a spot not far from the one Ilyan had indicated.
“How many?” Thom asked, the familiar agitation in his voice rippling through me.
“I don’t know,” Sain admitted, his voice somehow dejected, like he had failed.
I stared at the back of Sain’s head, his hair as unkempt as it had been in that nightmare so long ago. I wanted him to turn around so I could look at him with my own eyes for the first time since I was five. I wanted to see his smile; I wanted to hear him laugh.
His magic flared abruptly as I looked at him. His signature was so different than the others, deep and calming with an underlying violence and pain that scared me. My desire to reconnect with him vanished as my shoulders tightened.
“Existují zde?” Ilyan asked in Czech as his finger slid over the table to stop at another point on the flat surface.
“Unless they are really good at pretending to be trees,” Thom said, his gruff voice low as he leaned over to look at the place on the table Ilyan had indicated.
Ilyan’s lip twitched at Thom’s comment while his hand moved over the table, one piece of the picture suddenly making sense. They were looking at a map, their attention on the placement of Trpaslík that surrounded us.
It made me uneasy. I could still feel the angry waves of the Trpaslíks’ magic from where they hid among the trees, waiting for us. Why they were there was something I was already sure I didn’t want to know.
I shifted in the bed as I watched Ilyan pace before the table. His handsome features deepened in the shadows. He looked powerful, the energy of his magic rippling off him in a wave that shook me. I hadn’t seen him so focused since Santa Fe.
“What are you playing at, sister?” Ilyan growled. “You do not lead without a stronger force behind you.” He spoke like he was talking directly to her, his voice a groan of disappointment through the tense silence of the room.
“You don’t think he is here already?” Thom asked, the deep scoff of his irritation almost completely swallowed by his panic.
“No,” Ilyan rumbled, his head tilting up toward his brother. “I would feel him if he were. Besides, enough time has not yet passed. I only sent Ovailia away from the abbey last night. She will wait for him.”
I cringed at the thought of the night before; it felt like so long ago. The terror as Ryland had barged into my room, and the screams as Ovailia had tried to kill Wyn. I reached my hand up to my face, my fingers gentle as I pressed them into my cheek where Ryland had struck me. Although I was aware that my magic had healed me, I still expected the pain from a new bruise; I expected the sting. Nothing came, however, except the flash in my memory of his black eyes as he had hit me. I cringed at the reflection of the pain, pulling the blanket into me as I blocked it out.