Isla snapped out of her memories as she and Kai neared the main street, which bustled with customers and shop owners going about their daily lives. It felt so mundane, so normal, that Isla felt out of place. She pulled the hood of her cloak up, hoping nobody recognized her and stopped them.
They passed the fountain with the statue of who Isla now knew was Rynn, and Kai snorted. “I’m glad he didn’t come with you. This would be too much for his ego to handle.”
Isla smiled faintly. “We’re getting close to my house. It’s just up this street.”
The two of them trotted along, an inexplicable sense of unease coating Isla’s tongue. After a few minutes, they reached her family’s small piece of land. Isla grinned despite the wariness that had settled in her bones, excitement bubbling at the thought of seeing Arden and Papa.
They dismounted and led Honey and Buck to the tiny stable, tying the reins to the entrance off the front lawn. Her family’s horses, Buttercup and Bella, rested in their stalls.That’s good,she thought.Arden must be home. Buttercup whinnied softly as Isla approached and affectionately rubbed his nose. “I missed you, too, boy,” she whispered.
“Isla?” Kai said apprehensively from several yards away. Dipping her head out of the stable door, Isla saw that Kai had stopped at the front of the house.
Alarms rang in Isla’s head.
She ran out of the stable and toward Kai, her heart pounding at the sight of the door splintered and hanging by a single hinge.
“Papa? Arden?” Her cries were strangled as she barged into the house.
Shattered glass from a lantern was scattered across their front room. Overturned chairs and papers from her father’s desk littered the ground. The furniture was shoved to the side, as if someone had moved it in haste. Isla’s foot caught on a piece of wood from a broken side table as she stumbled her way to the bedrooms, a sob racking her body.
“Arden! Where are you?” she called again, throwing open the door to his room. It looked untouched; his bed was made, and a candle burned low on his bedside table.Had they just been here?
She turned on her heel and pushed into her father’s room, biting back a scream as she took in the signs of a struggle. Shredded bedsheets, books and carving knives knocked to the ground, clothes strewn all over. It looked like the bed had been pushed several feet askew, if the pile of dust on the ground where it used to be was any indication. A small bookshelf lay face down on the hard floor.
“Kai!” Isla yelled out the bedroom door, her voice cracking.
This could not be happening. Where were they? Who had done this? She didn’t believe for one second it was simply a random kidnapping. Could it be the companions of the raiders she’d murdered coming back for retribution, or the dark god following through on his threats?
Was this all because ofher?
Isla sagged against the door frame of her father’s room. A piece of splintered wood dug into her elbow, but the pain was weak. Distant. She struggled to take air into her lungs, her limbs heavy as images pulsed through her mind, dragging her under.
Mama’s disease-ridden body as the healer drew a white linen sheet over her face.
Waylan’s bruised and battered form lying motionless beneath his weeping father.
Papa resting on a small cot, pale and barely breathing.
And now he was gone, he and Arden both, taken because someone wanted something from her. Had they fought their assailants? Had they been hurt? What if they were injured and unconscious on an abandoned road, or on the back of a horse flying through the kingdom, or on a ship in the middle of the Wyndsor Sea…
A shake of her shoulders pulled Isla from her downward spiral.
“Isla, listen to me. We have to go.”
Isla’s eyes whipped up to Kai. “Go? We have to look for them! We—we can ask around town, find out if anyone has seen them, see if we can catch up to them—”
Kai’s hands squeezed Isla’s shoulders once, twice. “You know the dark god is most likely behind this. He’s doing it to get to you, so we need to go back to the others before he does anything worse. The faster we get to the dagger, the faster we can end this and get your family back.”
How Kai remained so calm and collected, Isla would never understand. She wanted to curl into a ball and sob until she was a dry shell of herself.
“Let’s go back to Aataran. We can figure out a plan with—” Kai stopped dead in her tracks, her gaze fixed on something behind Isla inside her father’s bedroom. The shock and confusion staining the elemental’s face sobered Isla.
She turned her head, searching for what could have caused such a reaction in Kai. Her eyes scanned the area, but nothing stood out besides the obvious damage. Kai slowly walked to the wall that the bed used to rest against, in a daze.
Isla saw it as soon as Kai reached down: an ancient box, the wood so weathered and faded that Isla had skipped right over it, assuming it was an old keepsake of her father’s. As she followed Kai, Isla squinted past the dust on top of the box, barely making out an engraving of a lone mountaintop with two arrows striking its center.
“What is it?” she asked quietly.
Kai’s fingers shook as she traced the emblem, inhaling sharply before she responded.
