None of us know what he’s saying most of the time. Not even Lillian, who speaks fluent fae. He’s the one who built the damn iron enclosure, but I’ve kept him in there, hidden from anyone who would kill a necromancer on sight.
Which is most people these days.
Silas’s frantic voice breaks before he dissolves into hysterical sobbing.
“Did he eat today?” I ask, my voice barely audible as I decide this isn’t a good time for a visit.
She shakes her head.
I’ll have to tell Douglas to magically force-feed him again. Keeping this deranged fae alive has been exhausting, but I refuse to give up. And it’s not just because my keeper had me promise to take care of him. If I’m honest, seeing the cutthroat, annoyingly sharp prodigy I knew as a child reduced to this condition is just…harrowing.
I turn away from the iron hell comprised of stone, bare-boned iron fixtures, chains, and the iron cocoon he stays in most of the time. Heaviness weighs on my chest as I try not to think about what’s left of my old quintet.
“What about the Decimuses? Any word from them?”
Lillian tries warming her hands again. “A caster transported here earlier with a message about the water elementals you sent as reinforcements to the Purcell mountain range last week. They’ve been helping to contain the worst of the fires, but…”
Her hesitation tells me it’s bad news, so I make an educated guess. “But the dragon’s been killing them again.”
“Yes,” she admits sadly. “And there have been more hunters than ever trying to get to him.”
On autopilot, I’ve started wandering toward the only courtyard not filled with frozen trophies. The one that contains a large greenhouse now filled with snowdrops and a simple, honorary headstone, along with what few things she left behind. Douglas enchanted it so that only I and Lillian can enter, but I want to be completely alone right now.
Hurting alone is always better.
“Don’t let the soup go cold on my account,” I tell Lillian.
It’s clearly a dismissal, but she stays. “Everett. Can’t you sense it? Even as we speak, I feel like something has changed. Maybe my prayers are finally being answered. If you could hang on to hope for a bit longer?—”
Bitterness makes my words too sharp. “Hope is useless, and praying is for idiots. I should’ve listened to my keeper sooner because she was right about the gods. I’m done with them.”
Lillian studies me for a moment before sighing sadly. “Maybe visiting Syntyche’s makeshift temple to mourn would help you rest better at night.”
Damn it. Is it that obvious that I haven’t been sleeping again?
“There’s no shot in hell of that happening,” I mutter, turning toward the exit that will take me to the greenhouse. Back to the sweet oblivion of mourning the only woman I’ve ever loved, before I go out to see if I’ve lost another piece of my broken quintet. “Enjoy the soup.”
5
MAVEN
The car tookme two and a half hours closer to Halfton before it ran out of fuel. Since all the gas stations I passed were out of service and abandoned, I got out to hike the rest of the way.
That was ten minutes ago, and I’m already freezing my ass off again.
Not to mention, everything fuckinghurts.Especially my injured ankle.
I limp through the snow as quietly as possible, my lungs burning from the sharp cold as I try to make decent time. If I don't get to Halfton or find somewhere relatively safe before nightfall, I'll be a demigoddess Popsicle.
That first aid kit was mostly empty, with only enough bandages for my shoulder. It still stings like hell from where the vampire bit me, and I can’t put weight on my bitten ankle for longer than a second before it tries to buckle with each step.
The thin road I’m following is surrounded by wintry, frost-glazed trees whose barren branches reach for the hazy white afternoon sky like millions of skeletal fingers. Wind picks up occasionally, whistling softly before it fades to a heavy, foreboding silence. The increased tension in my nerves eversince I got out of the car tells me that shadow fiends and other dangers lurk out here, even if none have ventured close to me in this beautifully haunting white wilderness.
Ravens flutter nearby, their throaty calls disrupting the silence for a moment. Now and then, my chest warms to an alarming extent before it fades again.
Walking gives me time to think.
I remember almost nothing about Paradise, but apparently, I did something drastic to return. Something Galene thought would kill me. Whatever I did, I’m not a revenant anymore,but I still have no heartbeat.
