“You’ve lost your damn mind.” She can’t help but laugh through her tears.
“Where is everyone?” I ask.
“On the other side of the bridge,” she says. “I made it to you before you completely blew the bridge in half.”
I peer down into the gap I created. The Whisting sliced clean through the stone. I can’t spot the Kilandrar below. All I can see is the canyon, blanketed in rolling clouds.
I shake my head to clear it of the remnants of my perennial nightmare and the Kilandrar’s dark whispers.
Who is this master of the Whisting?
Marcus is shouting to us from the other side of the gap, but I can’t hear what he’s saying. Aren and I stand in Estyrion, but Marcus and his men are trapped on the other side in Loegria…and boy, he is not happy about it.
I ignore Marcus and focus on the beautiful woman standing next to me.
“You should have stayed with them,” I say, weakly, wheezing. I still can’t fill my lungs.
“What, and miss all this?” she says, gesturing to the blackened ruins around us.
I collapse against her shoulder, utterly exhausted.
“You brave idiot,” she grumbles, holding me close. Her embrace warms me inside and out.
Just before I give in to the hypnotic allure of unconsciousness, I realize Aren got what she wanted after all. It’s just the two of us for the rest of this journey.
Part Three
The Great Waste
Chapter Thirty-One
Dietan
My head still throbs where Aren smacked me with her skillet.
One thing’s for certain: the woman has good aim. It’s a bearable pain—familiar, even. The fear and dread are much harder to shake.
I almost lost myself to the Whisting. If Aren hadn’t intervened, I don’t know what would’ve become of me.
“You okay?” she asks, her voice soft and hesitant. She’s been silent by my side as we walk across the rest of the bridge. It’s just the two of us now. Marcus tried to make us come back, to find a way across the gap in the bridge, but it was futile. So, we just kept walking.
I wonder what my men think of what happened. They all know now. They saw the power I hold in me. Did they connect it with the Rings of Fate? I just have to trust that Marcus can keep them from figuring it out.
“I’m okay,” I assure her, rubbing my head. “You really do have quite the swing,” I add with a half-hearted grin, trying to make light of it, since it’s clear we’re both still shaken.
My usual charm doesn’t work on her, or maybe my heart’s not in it. “You?”
“I’m all right,” she says tightly.
I know those words are masking a world of emotion. If she hadn’t blatantly ignored me, I’d be dead—or worse. Thank gods for her stubborn streak.
I know we’ve made it to the other end of the bridge when my boots suddenly hit soft sand instead of brick. The gray smoke starts to clear, and I squint at the sun breaking through the clouds. I didn’t realize how much I missed sunlight until now.
Aren blinks up at the suddenly blue sky, shielding her eyes. “That’s weird. I thought Estyrion is supposed to be all gray skies and blackened ruins.”
I nod. That was certainly the case on the other side, in Alba. But here, the smoke and acrid stench have vanished.
“Is that… Is that real?” Aren asks, her voice full of wonder as she stares at the city that rises up in front of us.
