“You’re going to break me,” she says, and I let her go, smiling so hard that my cheeks ache.
Grabbing her hands, I check for frostbite. There’s some, but it’s not severe. I can heal it quickly.
I clasp her face. She looks exhausted, and her skin is chapped and reddened from the cold, but otherwise, she looks…whole. Healthy. And though a hint of sadness shadows her eyes, she’s smiling.
I’d worried that there would be nothing left of her by the time we returned, that the wraith would’ve turned her mind enough that she no longer remembered who she was. The relief inside me is overwhelming, enough that I can’t help but draw her to me and cry.
Once we’ve both shed a host of tears, I pull back.
“How?” I ask.
She shrugs and wipes at my face, then sniffles and scrubs at her own. “I don’t know. Whatever that thing was, it left a day or so after you. Time is impossible to follow here. I felt it leave me like a sucking wind, and off it went, screeching into the wood. After it was gone, the tree that held me withdrew.” Her eyes go wide with wonder. “Was that Nephele too? Like the lake?”
Raising my brows, I nod, understanding her dismay, though I fear I’m about to slay her with all the things she needs to know. She’s about to learn my secrets and Alexus’s too, and stories of shadow wraiths and the Frost King and Fia Drumera and the gods and the God Knife and—the possible end of life as we know it. We could soon live in an age of gods. At least an age of a god.
But we won’t let that happen. We won’t.
As long as Alexus can keep Neri contained, that is.
“How did you find me?” I ask, stunned by this girl’s fortitude and stalwartness, though I shouldn’t be. She’s young and naive at times, but a fire lives inside her that few possess. She could be a warrior like no other. She just needs the freedom to let that fire burn.
I suppose she has that freedom now.
“I headed toward the mountains,” she answers, “and came upon a group of dead Eastlanders. It wasn’t fun, and it wasn’t pretty, but I removed one’s clothes. I had to, or I was going to freeze to death right there with them.” She rubs the place over her brow where a gash had been. “I’d hoped that General Vexx was among the dead, but that wasn’t the case.” She holds up her hatchet. “At least I filched this.”
The Eastlanders we found beneath the trees. I almost killed Helena with one of their blades.
“I came across a campsite,” she goes on. “Too fresh to belong to the Eastlanders. They’d been dead for days. After that, I picked up on your trail like Father taught me while tracking deer. There were only two sets of hoof prints where the snow hadn’t covered them. I held out hope that it was you. At one point, the tracks led forward, but there was a quake, and the tracks vanished. I kept going, until I came to a hole blown into the earth. There was only one way to pass, so I followed. Not long after, I entered the ravine. I saw smoke rising from this cave. It could’ve been anyone, but I had to know if it was you.”
Amazed by her, I tug my hair over one shoulder, thinking about what it would’ve been like to have endured the wood alone, but Hel’s blinking eyes catch my attention. She touches the backs of my hands, my neck, my chest, her eyes wide, like she’s only now noticing my witch’s marks. And I suppose she is.
“What in gods’ stars, Raina?”
I gesture toward the smoldering fire. “Come. Sit. We need to talk.”
I tell her everything, beginning with my abilities. I show her my skill at fire magick and healing, drawing out her frostbite and giving her fingers and toes, cuts and bruises, new life, as well as mending the cut on my side. When that’s done, I tell her what happened during the attack and everything after. Even how difficult it was to watch that wraith take her away from me. When I tell her about the God Knife and that Alexus is the Un Drallag from eastern lore, she stops me, an unsettled look taking over her face as though she’s piecing things together that I can’t see.
“Raina, the prince’s men had that knife. Because of me.”
I tilt my head, and she reads my expression, understanding that I need her to explain.
“After I left you at Mena’s, I headed for the fallow fields. I had Finn and Saira with me at one point, but we got separated.”
I remember this from her tale at the lake, but her memory had been broken, probably because the wraith divided her reality.
“I made it to our cottage,” she continues, “but my mother and sisters were already dead. I started toward the fields, but that’s when I ran into Vexx.” Again, she touches her brow, remembering. “When I came to, it was still dark. I ran to the green, and you were there, but I thought you were dead. You were lying so still, next to the Witch Collector, and I was…mindless. There was blood everywhere. And that knife, the one with the white hilt, lay on the green. It…called to me. To take it. Not a voice, but a knowing. It was next to your hand, and I wanted some part of you with me, so I took it.”
A sigh escapes me, and I press a hand to my face. Gods’ death. No wonder I couldn’t remember what I did with the knife.
“After that,” she says, “I went east and found a way through the barrier they erected, a wedge of an opening filled with thorns. I ran through Frostwater until I couldn’t run anymore.” She glances at her hands, nervously picking at a nail. “I was devastated. I wanted to make someone pay.”
I reach across the space between us and take her hand. I know that feeling. I know what she went through.
“I stumbled upon Vexx’s men at the tunnel mouth, and they captured me. When Vexx saw the blade I carried, he confiscated it, but I don’t think he knew what he had until later. There was no urgency until the next day, after we made it over the lake. He stalked out of the woods and ordered one of his men to bring him the knife. After that, we traveled harder and faster. They wanted to catch up to the prince; I remember that now. He was ahead with another band. Vexx wanted to kill me or at least leave me behind, but there’s a red-haired warrior in that group. Rhonin, they call him. He seems important, though not as important as Vexx. He demanded that Vexx let him keep me.”
“And of course, Vexx agreed,” I sign.
“Of course.”
Disgust roils through me. I want to kill both men, and I don’t even know them.
Helena looks up, and that fire of hers flickers in her eyes. “I realized by the way Vexx was acting that the weapon was important. I just didn’t know how important. Still, I managed to catch all of them unaware in the middle of the night. Even with my hands tied, I stole the knife from Vexx’s thigh and ran like the wind.”
She smiles, and I smile too. “And Rhonin let you go?”
“It seemed that way. He came after me, and there was a moment when he was mere strides away, watching me through the trees. He could’ve taken me, but he didn’t do anything.” She shrugs. “He just told me to run.”
“And after?”