I looked at him questioningly, and he shrugged.
“I can create a magical barrier, as long as I am patrolling, monsters cannot get through,” he said confidently as he walked away.
And I’d be left alone. Either to drown in my thoughts, or?—
I watched the darkness creep through the gnarled branches of the Mourning Woods and felt something inside me settle. I would find the Fire Fates, and learn the truth, whatever it cost me.
Twenty-Five
Fire Fates
Icounted under my breath, matching each number to the ghost-soft fall of my feet across the dry leaves that littered the Mourning Woods. The darkness here wasn’t just an absence of light—it wasalive.It curled around me like breath, coiling between the trees, whispering things I couldn’t quite hear. My power stirred beneath my skin, a restless tide responding to the primal terror prickling along my spine. I wished I had my axe, or any weapon, for that matter. I had nothing but the wild pulse of my heartbeat and the brittle resolve in my bones. I pressed myself against a tree, counting the seconds it would take Solas to get to the other side of his perimeter.
One… Two… Three…I slipped past the path Solas had been patrolling and walked straight into his magic. The barrier shimmered at the point of contact, invisible but solid, resisting me like a living thing. It clung to my skin as I pushed through, thick and warm as honey. Power thrummed through me, sharp and electric, raising the hair on my arms as the ward yielded and snapped closed behind me. I ran into the dark woods, praying to the Gods thatSolas hadn’t felt me move through his barrier. The woods swallowed me whole. Leaves crunched like brittle bones beneath my boots, and I slowed, reaching out blindly, skimming the bark of the trees to stay upright. I didn’t even know where to look. The Fire Fates would be close to our camp. But where? The sky was starless, a yawning void above me like even the heavens refused this place. Like the Commander’s eyes.
A twig snapped behind me, and the woods held their breath. I froze, and the hair on my arms lifted ominously, as if I were being watched. Slowly, I turned, eyes straining against the black. Nothing. But the silence that followed was suffocating.Laughterechoed. Warped and inhuman.
Run.The voice whispered through the stillness, and instinct took over before thought could follow. Branches clawed at me. My feet pounded against the ground. The laughter followed. I ran through the suffocating darkness for what felt like forever, stumbling, colliding with tree trunks, skin burning where bark tore at me.
I came to a stop, leaning on my knees and panting as nausea clawed up my throat. Perhaps I would find nothing but my death in these woods, after all. But a small part of me didn’t want to die anymore. I just wanted answers.
Cold breath brushed the back of my neck like a whisper from the grave. I stilled. I turned, tears pricking my eyes. Nothing but darkness and dead trees. My heart thundered against the deadly quiet, eyes scanning the dark for monsters.
“Lyra…” a soft whisper slithered through the silence. I spun, and my heart lurched into my throat.
Shehovered over me with hollow eyes and translucent hair drifting as if underwater.
The ghost from my dreams. The same unearthlywoman who had led me to the axe. She lifted a hand and turned, gliding between dead trunks. If she meant to kill me, she would have done it already. Last time, she’d led me to power. She turned and wove through the dead trees.
Her unearthly glow illuminated the trees around us, and I was grateful to be able to see. My feet moved forwards, following her. To a horrible death? I wasn’t sure. But I wanted to know who she was.
She led me towards a mountain that loomed, jagged and foreboding against the void-slick sky. Muted light leaked through the trees like a dying star from the base of the mountain, flickering through the dense trees. The light spilling from the cave wasn’t warmth, not really. But it was the only light I’d seen in this forsaken place.
My boots slammed through the dead leaves as I followed the ghost—every step sounded like a gunshot in the silence. My legs burned with each frantic step, but still, I ran. I stumbled, hands out for balance?—
Only to feel something wet and sleek beneath my fingers, a scream lodging in my throat. I snatched my hand back and ran as fast as I could. An unearthly snapping sound echoed against the darkness, right behind me. Then another followed—warped, and wrong.
The unearthly woman disappeared into the cave’s entrance and I dove after her. I skidded on my stomach and my breath whooshed out of my lungs before I rolled onto my back, panting, bracing for?—
Nothing. No monsters loomed behind me. No teeth. No claws. Only eerie stillness. I sat up, scrambling backwards. Each ragged breath filled my nose with the sharp scent of sulphur.
“Who are you?” I panted, turning to the woman. But she was gone. Nothing remained but rocks and an unnaturalorange light flickering from deeper in the cave. I glanced back towards the woods, quiet. Watching. The trees leaned like mourners frozen in grief, their twisted limbs silhouetted against the starless sky. No footsteps marked the path behind me. Only mine. Was I imagining it all? My chest heaved as silence rushed back in, heavier than before. No laughter. No whispers. Maybe I was alone all along. I let out an uneasy sigh before pushing to my feet and walking deeper into the cave.
Lava dripped lazily from cracks lining the caves, like blood dripping from an open wound. It hissed where it met the stone floor. The molten liquid cast the cave in a flickering, hellish glow that pulled sweat from my skin. I walked slowly towards a bubbling pool of molten lava as steam coiled from the hissing liquid. The heat rolled off it in waves, blistering my skin. The glowing liquid rippled unnaturally, and my steps faltered.
The liquid seemed to bend, two heads breaking the surface. Their skin was cracked and glowing like smouldering embers, hair slick and clinging to their lithe, feminine forms. Their eyes opened, twin infernos that locked onto me with an intensity that made my spine arch. The lava lapped at their rocklike skin just beneath their breasts as they watched me. It felt like they were looking into me. The dark-haired one tilted its head. Her lips did not move, but her whisper slid across the cave like silk soaked in poison. “Maraveth.”
The blonde echoed it, and the words layered over the first, like two instruments playing different melodies in the same key.
“You seek truth…”
Goosebumps prickled down my arms. I stumbled back a step, rubbing sweaty palms against my shirt. The lava clungto their skin like silk, glowing veins of flame pulsing beneath their cracked flesh.
“Are you… Are you the Fates?” My voice barely made it past the heat-stifled air.
“Obviously,” they said in perfect, chilling unison. “We see all,” one hissed, while the other rasped, “We see what was… What could be…”
I forced myself to swallow, though my throat felt carved from ash.
