“Nope.” My connection is down. My sword is still right in my hand.
We all look at Marcus, but we know it’ll be no different. He lifts the scythe off his shoulder and gives it a sweeping turn in the air—his favorite way of calling it forth and sending it back—but, like the bow and sword, the scythe goes nowhere. His mare, Ruin, starts to prance anxiously beneath him. “Nothing.” Marcus sends me a pissed-off look. “We can’t fold, either.”
I reach for Riot anyway, asking him to go to fire. It’s like we’re in the dark, no way of finding each other. Riot bobs his head up and down, about as happy about this as I am.
This isn’t good, Gideon. I can’t protect you if we can’t fold.
I rest my hand on his withers. “We’re good, big guy. All good.”
If our abilities as horsemen are gone, the only good news is we won’t have to worry about my anger contagion in here. Marcus and Jode, too. Their effect on others would also be gone. Not that either of them struggle as much as I do. They’re both way more adept at controlling fear and will than I am at controlling anger.
The only thing left to verify is whether we’re still capable of rapid healing, but the cut inside my lip will answer that soon enough.
“GPS doesn’t work,” Low says. “Neither does my compass or my watch.”
“Digital?” Cordero asks.
“Negative, it’s windup. Both hands have stopped moving.”
Everyone looks at me, and my gut sinks. I can’t get my prosthetic to change gestures. It’s stuck in a half-open position like a metal mannequin hand. But at least it came through with me. I’d worried it wouldn’t. “Only one of my hands stopped moving,” I say, to be hilarious.
“I told you about this,” Daryn says to Cordero. “I told you my phone didn’t work before.”
“As we’ve verified.” She looks at Suarez. “We’ll have to adjust.”
Lots of setbacks, but we do adjust. We’re prepared.
Cordero takes the orb from Daryn to return it to the lockbox. “It’s getting worse. The damage is more severe,” she says, pausing to study it in her hand. There’s a note of actual concern in her voice.
“Yes, it is. Take good care of it,” Daryn says. “And don’t lose any more pieces.”
Marcus catches my eye and smiles.
We immediately break into two groups, as planned.
Cordero, Ben, Low, Suarez, and Maia will dig in here at our entry-point location. The rest of us will conduct the search. Jode will keep track of time using our riding pace. Marcus will mark the earth with his scythe, indicating our direction. All four of us will look for Bas.
“Let’s bring him home,” I say, and we ride.
CHAPTER 13
DARYN
We fall into a formation.
Jode in the lead, followed by Gideon, then me, and finally Marcus.
The plan is to search for forty minutes, then retrace back to the B Team, at which point we’ll “assess,” which I’m pretty sure means “Cordero decides what to do next.”
We’re looking for Sebastian but we know there are threats in the Rift, like the Harrows and probably Samrael, too. Which is why I didn’t want all these people to be here, risking their lives, but that ship has sailed.
As we head away from the B Team, the trees close in, dampening sounds. Maia’s voice vanishes quickly behind us.
I’m struck by an unsettling thought: We’re no more than mice crawling under the folds of a cloak. Small and blind.
And scared.
It doesn’t feel right leaving the others. And even my group feels wrong, like we’re together but not together. It’s no time for doubt, though.
“These trees,” Gideon says, with the same awe I felt when I first saw them. The branches look like broken limbs, the knots like yawning faces.
“They look like they’re going to come alive,” Jode says.
The silence thickens even more. I feel it settling into my bones. The sound of the horses’ hooves seems loud. So does my own breathing. And every shadow reminds me of the Harrow, with its spidery speed and agility. Its depthless eyes and raspy voice, speaking in riddles.
You won’t succeed until you fail. You won’t win until you lose.
I don’t know what it meant but I’m not losing. I’m not failing.
A dull ache has settled at the base of my skull, just like the last time I came here. It’s more pressure than it is pain, but it’s still distracting. I have to force myself to stay focused.
Cordero’s briefing had a section on identifying signs of human presence. Any tracks, broken branches, or scratches in tree trunks are worthy of investigation—but as we ride I don’t see anything.
Until the flowers.
As soon as I spot the sprinkling of begonias up ahead, I’m struck like a music cymbal. A tremor rolls through me. My hands start to shake and Shadow snorts, sensing my unease. The petals are brighter in the gloom than I remember, glowing from some internal source, like Lucent.
“You okay, D?” Marcus asks.
They’ve stopped with me—even Gideon, who’s been avoiding me all day.
My cheeks start to burn under his gaze. Last fall I told him about my mother, and I know he’s thinking about that conversation right now. As tense as things are between us after last night, I still feel connected to him. The bond between us may be damaged, but at this moment it feels indestructible. Crisis-proof. Or maybe crisis-bonded.
“I’m fine.” I cue Shadow. “Let’s keep going.”
We ride on, and my heart riots inside my chest as I see that the flowers make several paths that curl through the trees in different directions. I want to break into pieces so I can follow them all.
Is my mom at the end of one of them? I need to see her again. I need to apologize and tell her that I love her and I’m sorry I left her.
Beside me, I hear the hiss of Marcus dragging the blade of his scythe across the earth, leaving a groove to mark our direction. He settles the staff on his shoulder, the blade curving behind him like a steel wing.
“Daryn,” he says.
“Yeah, what’s up?”
Gideon and Jode have pulled slightly ahead.
Marcus runs his free hand over his close-shaved head. “The headache you said you got last time. I have it.”
“You do? Have you had it since we got here?”
“No. Just started.”
“Ho—halt,” Jode says in front of us.
Something is nestled in the white flowers in the distance, something glaringly different from the trees. I don’t even think; I vault from the saddle and run. Gideon is beside me in seconds. He reaches over his shoulder to unsheathe his sword.
“What the hell?” I hear him say as we reach it.
The silver car is nestled in the tangle of roots between two close-set trees. It’s an older-model Mustang, dented and scratched. With tinted windows and Chicago license plates. The driver’s-side door is open. Inside, the darkness is deeper but I can see that it’s empty.