She didn’t answer, but she stayed beside me.
For a while, neither of us moved. The fire snapped softly. The temple walls whispered things in languages long lost.
Then she smiled at me.
Quiet. Real. Like something rare and unsought.
She stood, brushing her hands over her skirts, and walked back to the others to sit down and eat—tucking herself into the circle of warmth and conversation like she’d never left.
But I stayed where I was.
I watched her laugh at something Gideon said, her head tilted just slightly, her hair catching the firelight. I watched the way her shoulders finally loosened, like a weight had slipped from them without her noticing.
She walked as if the world was something to be healed.
And I followed her as if it might save me.
I remained where she drew, sharpening my blade out of habit more than need. The scrape of stone against metal steadied my breathing, gave my hands something to do while my thoughts refused to still.
A sound stirred in the trees.
Soft. Too soft for the wind.
I paused mid-motion.
Possibly an owl. Or not. I couldn’t be sure. The Wildervale held more than animals in its boughs.
I looked toward where the trees thickened into something impenetrable and was aware of something watching.
The blade in my hand stilled.
And though the fire behind me crackled warmly, I couldn’t shake the chill pressing at my spine.
Chapter Eleven
Erindor
We had left the forest floor behind just before dawn, climbing until the trees thinned and the cliffs loomed overhead like ancient teeth. The trail narrowed to a ribbon of stone with mud-slick switchbacks and knife-thin ledges that would have sent even the surest mount over the edge.
It wasn’t merely a matter of caution. It was survival.
We couldn’t bring the horses. Not up there.
“We tie them and come back,” Tyren said, glancing toward the hollow below where grass still grew and a thin stream whispered through the rock.
“You tie them,” Gideon mumbled, “it’s like offering them up on a silver platter. Predators will smell them by nightfall.”
“So we just let them go?” Tyren frowned. “And hope they find their way back?”
Alaric stood between them, hands on his hips. “Horses know the land better than we do. They’ll follow the stream. With luck, circle back to Graymere or farther.”
There was no correct answer. But we didn’t have the time—or the trail—for debate.
One by one, we removed their tack and packs, smoothing their necks, whispering old words into twitching ears.
Alaric tied blessing knots into each mane, not bridle this time—loose and worn, but deliberate. Elyrien superstition. A ward against wolves and worse.
I pressed my forehead against the horse’s flank for a moment. She huffed warm breath into my shoulder and turned, disappearing into the trees with the rest.
