“How will you find us? After … after that?”
“The alert-stone. Evrane can ignite it, and I’ll see its light from sea.” In two long steps, Merik was to Safi. “Ride east, and I’ll find you. Soon.”
Safi shook her head, a sluggish side to side. “I don’t like this.”
“Please,” Merik said. “Please don’t argue. This is the best plan—”
“It’s not that,” she cut in. “I just … I have a feeling I’ll never see you again.”
Merik’s chest split open, and for half a second, he was at a loss for words. Then Merik cupped her face and kissed her. Soft. Short. Simple.
She broke the kiss first, biting her lip as she reached for Merik’s shirttails. She tucked in the edges, smoothed the cotton front. “I lied to you, you know. You aren’t the last person I’d choose.”
“No?”
“No.” She grinned, a mischievous flash of teeth. “You’re the second to last. Maybe third.”
Laughter swelled in Merik’s stomach. Up his throat. But before he could summon a worthy retort, Safi glided back and said, “Safe harbors, Merik.”
So he simply replied, “Safe harbors,” before walking to the cliff. Then Merik Nihar stepped off the edge and flew.
*
Safi did not watch Merik go. The need for haste spurred her to action—as did the all-too-fresh memory of the Bloodwitch. The way he’d locked her in place … The way his eyes had swirled with red.
It lifted the hairs on Safi’s arms. Sent fingers walking down her spine.
Safi wove through the forest, accelerating … accelerating until she jogged, until she sprinted. Fern tendrils lashed her arms, spores tumbled down. To think she and Merik had only just rushed through this same jungle.
Safi stumbled into camp to find it already struck and the horses saddled. Evrane was roping the bedrolls to the saddlebags and Iseult was adjusting the girdle on the roan. The horses tossed their heads—ready to ride, despite their long journey from the day before.
At the crunch of Safi’s boots, Iseult’s attention whipped to Safi.
“Leaving … without me?” Safi panted.
“We heard the drums,” Iseult explained, tack jingling as she tugged the girdle tighter. “Evrane told me what the message said.”
“But where is Merik?” Evrane asked, moving away from the mare’s saddlebag. Her cloak was in her hand, her baldric cinched tight to her chest.
“He flew to the Jana,” Safi said. “He’ll try to head off the Marstoks.”
Iseult gave the slightest frown. “We aren’t riding north, then? We aren’t going to flee?”
With a quick headshake, Safi shuffled to the campfire. “We can still reach Lejna before the Marstoks.” She kicked dust and ash over any remaining embers. “Then we can flee north.”
“Mount up, then,” Evrane ordered.
“Safi, you can ride with me—”
“No. You each get a horse.” Evrane shrugged on her cloak, fastening the buckle with efficient, mechanical movements. “I will wait here and stop Aeduan.”
A taut pause. Then Iseult: “Please don’t do that, Monk Evrane.”
“Please,” Safi agreed. “We’ll outrun him—”
“Except you cannot,” Evrane interrupted, cutting her voice over Safi’s. “Aeduan is as fast as any horse, and he will catch up to you no matter where you go. I can find a defensible point in the path, though, and do my best to slow him.”
“Slow,” Iseult repeated. “Not stop?”
“Aeduan cannot be stopped, yet he can be reasoned with. Or, if necessary, these”—she patted her only two remaining knives; the buckles clanked—“are not just for show.”
“You’ll get yourself killed,” Safi argued. The demand for speed breathed down her neck, yet she couldn’t let Evrane do something so profoundly stupid. “Please, just do as Merik ordered and come with us.”
Evrane’s face stilled, and when she spoke, her tone was knifed with impatience. With offense. “Merik forgets that I am a monk trained for battle. I will face Aeduan myself and you two will ride to Lejna. Now, mount up.” She offered a stiff hand to Safi, and though Safi hardly needed it, she accepted.
After helping Iseult mount as well, Evrane stepped purposefully to the gelding’s saddlebag and rifled out the quartz alert-stone. It glimmered gray, like the predawn sky above, and as she murmured “Alert,” a brilliant blue light flared within.
“Now Merik will find you.” She offered the stone to Safi. “Keep it out whenever your path goes by the sea.”
Safi stared at Evrane, her silver hair rippled in the dawn breeze and flickered with sapphire from the stone. Safi unfurled her fingers to accept the heavy quartz.
Evrane gave a mollified nod. Then she removed her sword belt. “Iseult, take Merik’s cutlass. It’s strapped to the roan’s saddle. And Safi, you take this.” She laid her sheathed blade over Safi’s lap. “Carawen steel is the best, after all.”
Safi gulped. That small attempt at a joke had reeled her back to the moment—back to the heavy truth that many people were risking their lives to ensure Safi got to Lejna and that Merik got his trade agreement.