“Aren’t you afraid to go into Under?”
“No.”Yes. “Are you?”
She sniffs delicately. “Not in the slightest. But it matters not.” She brushes past me. “I am not traveling with the likes of you.”
This, too, is expected. She thinks me a pawn to be positioned at the point of greatest advantage. But my future at Thornbrook depends on the outcome of this quest. I will not go quietly.
“How do you expect to enter Under without a map? Is your plan to wander Carterhaugh until you stumble across an entrance by happenstance?”
“Obviously not.” She holds out a hand. “You will give me the map.”
Too easily, the noose tightens in the face of confrontation. I swallow to draw moisture to my mouth. “No.”
Harper stares at me. “No?”
I force out the rest. “I’m not giving you the map. Traveling on this journey alone is your choice, but eventually you’ll realize how little you know of surviving beyond these walls. How will you protect yourself from the fair folk? How will you know where to shelter, what water sources to avoid, what plants are toxic?” Her skin pales, snow against the ebony fall of her hair, and I am glad of it. Let her understand that I have knowledge of such things. Let her feel the weight of her own ignorance. “If you were wise, you would want to travel together.”
“And how does that benefit me?” she counters, eyes ablaze. “If we each want to find the sword first, who’s to say you wouldn’t leave me to fend for myself?”
But I would do no such thing. Because I understand what it is like to walk alone. Because I know how much darker the nights are without a fire. Because, despite my intense disdain for Harper, I cannot in good judgment abandon her to the dark. I have seen its face.
Maybe that makes me weak.
“It’s your choice,” I reiterate. “You are free to travel alone, if you wish.” Moving to the door again, I rest my hand on the knob. “I will bein the fields tomorrow before dawn. I will wait until the sun breaches the horizon. Then I will leave, with or without you.”
Harper holds herself stiffly, every harsh angle whetted by panic. Fear that I am right. Fear of what will happen if she attempts the journey alone and realizes she was wrong. “I’ll be there.”
“Then you’ll need this.” I offer her my extra dagger, which I’ve concealed against the small of my back. It should fit her hand well.
Her eyes widen. “What use would I have for that?”
“To protect yourself.”
There was no bladesmith when I first arrived at the abbey, but in my sixteenth year, I stumbled across the old, dusty, forgotten forge. I peered through the cobwebs of abandonment at the overlooked hut, and asked Mother Mabel about its purpose.
Thornbrook’s last bladesmith had passed on decades ago. Since then, no one had taken up the mantle—until me. It was Mother Mabel who suggested I wield the hammer.Light the forge, she’d said.
What do I remember?
The weight of that hammer, the awful ache of fatigued muscles the following morning.
What do I remember?
Smoke. How horribly I’d hacked and wheezed until I had the good sense to open the doors.
What do I remember?
The first blow against blistering metal, its singular clarity.
What do I remember?
Strength like I’d never experienced before. Strength like elation, like relief.
Lifting the dagger higher, I study it from all angles. Harper frowns, snatching for the weapon, which I pull out of reach.
“Careful,” I whisper. “It’s sharp.”
11
