Not so this morning.
Vines have woven themselves into fanciful arches and loops at the clearing’s edge. Some knots resemble antlers, others spiral into whorls like dust devils. Stones lie stacked in improbable arrangements: boulders piled into precariously balanced stacks. From one angle, the stacked rocks take on the shapes of badgers rearing on hind legs. Mounds of dirt rise in playful postures reminiscent of dancing horses.
“Did you do that?” Basten asks, his awe edging into worry.
“DidI do that?” I echo, looking down at my hands. My fingertips pulse with dwindled fey, as though I’ve spent all night depleting my energy. I blink, flushed, and huff an incredulous laugh. “I think I did.”
Basten rakes the hair back off his face, taking in each beautiful but strange sculpture. He murmurs, “Gods, Sabine. It’s art.”
My chest softens to know heseesme—what I’m capable of.
A ray of light cuts through the branches overhead and starts to burn off the morning fog.
Myst snorts,Um…where is my breakfast?
I laugh softly at her impatience. She doesn’t care about my late-night artistic accomplishments, only her belly.
I rake my own hair into place, wrapping the blanket tighter around my shoulders.
“We should get an early start,” I say. “Maybe we can even make it to the border wall by nightfall. Be in Astagnon tomorrow.”
Basten looks to the south—toward the kingdom we both call home—with an odd expression. He’s wary, but there’s something else there.
Something softer. Something not all sharp and sparking.
“We’ll get on the road soon,” he says. “But there’s one more thing we need to do before we reach Astagnon.” His voice catches, a strange glint in his eye, like a secret. “I’ll need somewater to bathe—and I need you to tell that damn forest mouse that it’s time I call in another favor.”
I tilt my head, curious, but he only offers me a cryptic smile in return.
Chapter 10
Basten
This gods-damn comb.
Standing waist-deep in the stream, naked as the day I was born, I drag a silver comb I pilfered from Drahallen Hall through my dripping hair, where it catches on a snag, and no matter how I tug, won’t work itself free.
I’m not one for combs in general—let’s be clear. But I have plans for today. Big plans. And it won’t do to have pine sap tangling my hair in filthy knots, my usual look.
I left Sabine back at the clearing to groom Myst, who decided straight after tromping through the stream that was the perfect time to roll in a patch of dirt.
Sabine will be busy for a while.
Water runs down my bare torso, frigid as glacier ice, finding the valley between my muscles. Winter is coming to Volkany, and it won’t be that much longer before it reaches Astagnon, too—trailing our heels on this journey like a silent hunter.
But I clamp my jaw against the chill. It keeps me alert—not that my nerves need any more stoking today. I’m practically jumpy as a baby goat.
“Come…on.” I tug the comb once more, and it finally pulls free.
I toss the comb on the riverbank, next to my open knapsack. The bar of lye soap, too. It’s done as much damage as it can. I’ve scrubbed every damn inch from my scalp to my toenails, until my skin is raw, and I smell fresh as a damn chambermaid.
As I grab my towel from a tree branch, the forest mouse scampers onto a river rock near the bank, wiggling her whiskers at me.
“Yeah, yeah,” I mutter. “I’m hurrying.”
Truth be told, it wasn’t easy to set up my plans for today with a mouse. I don’t have Sabine’s godkiss; I can’t understand its squeaks, and it can’t make sense of my barked curses. I was hopeful that we’d manage, since we reached a tentative way to communicate while exploring the murals in Drahallen Hall’s basement.
Turns out we were back at square one. Before I left Norhelm, the mouse and I spent a few frustrating days pointing at book illustrations to one another and trying—uselessly—to reach an understanding. If it hadn’t been for Captain Tatarin’s intervention, we’d be sunk.
