Eva's heart was in her throat as Mist suddenly focused on her, the full weight of her gaze bearing down on her. "You no longer have the time to be lost. We need you."
The scene dissolved around the edges. Eva lurched forward, reaching for Mist and failing as the girl's figure was swallowed by the mist.
Her words echoed in the haze. "Be the strength who unites us. See beyond..."
Mist's words faded as Eva lost her grip on the scene. The blackness of true rest claimed her.
Eva drifted. The world snapping into focus in disjointed pieces. The feeling of rocking. A warm embrace holding her tight. Caden's husky voice in her ear as he issued orders. His scent promising safety.
Through it all Eva could distinguish the clop of hooves against stone and dirt. The soft snorts and whickers of horses. The low drone of other voices.
Eva opened her eyes to slits, registering her surroundings from a distance.
Cliffs stretched to the sky on her right, trees and rock formations gracing their tops. Steep mountain slopes jutted above them.
To her left, the ground dropped sharply, transitioning into a deep gorge. A river wound through its bottom.
The day was cloudy and wet, dampness clinging to her skin.
Pebbles skittered down from the cliffs above, amber eyes meeting hers from the trees. The Tenrin girl darted out of view in the next second, disappearing back into the shadows almost as soon as Eva registered her presence.
Eva's eyes drifted shut before she forced them open again.
Caden's arms tightened around her as her head shifted. "Eva?"
With the last of her waning strength, Eva looked up at him, her gaze already losing focus.
"Caden." Eva tried to smile, her face numb as the world retreated from her grasp. "Safe."
Eva's eyes slipped shut, unsure if she'd managed to convey her message. One Caden needed to know.
Lips touched her forehead. "You are. Rest well, my love."
Eva let herself sink back into slumber, barely registering Caden tucking her closer to his chest, his cheek pressed against her head.
"Thank you for coming back to me."
Eva's consciousness dimmed, a drowsy promise on her tongue—always. She'd always come for him.
Eva opened her eyes to find a fabric ceiling above her. It rippled in the wind as Eva lay unmoving, trying to understand the nagging sense of wrongness plaguing her.
There was a gap where her memories should be, she realized. Instead of the forest where she'd been standing, she was now here. In a tent that wasn't her own.
Scenes came back to her in drips and drops. The cicadas and the drone that had knocked her unconscious. Her conversation with Mist.
Eva inhaled, releasing it slowly. That was no dream. If everything Mist told her was true, they were in danger.
More importantly, Eva had lost a lot of time already, wandering in her dreams.
"You're awake," a gentle voice interrupted her thinking.
Chirron's eyes were kind as they met Eva's, the softness in his expression a contrast to the sun at his core. The power was as dense and strong as diamond but with the delicacy and fine control of an artisan.
Strange how themyeinkept popping up around her after a lifetime of thinking she was alone.
His power was easier to see now. Maybe because of the cicadas or the time spent wandering in the dream mist.
Eva started to sit up only for Chirron to push her back down.
