“I am going to help you,” I told him. “I will help you leave this place before the black moon comes.”
His nostrils flared. That was the only indication that he’d heard me.
“I promise you that.”
Chapter Sixteen
“How exactly do you plan to do that,sarkia?” I asked, keeping my voice soft.
I thrummed my thumb across the deepening notch in the pillar. If I worked on it every waking moment, I thought I could cut myself from it within two days.
Mina pulled back, the dizzying sensation of her lips leaving the sensitive flesh of my ear. Briefly, my gaze flickered over her. When she’d been smiling, a quiet, secretive smile just moments before, I’d been…entranced. She’d reminded me of the female who lured me towards the Dead Mountain, that tantalizing female who murmured that she was mine, whose eyes I thought I would die trying to find again.
When she smiled, thesarkiawas a gentle beauty. She wasn’t the frightened, malnourished, broken girl who I caught glimpses of. When she smiled, I saw a hint of thekallesshe could be. In another life. In another time. In another place.
It…startled me. It made that deep instinct rear up, made me want to fight to see that female again, made me want to battle to keep her safe.
And like in the fog, I did not understand it. Not one bit.
That frightened me. That frightened me more than anything in this world.
But now, this gentle beauty was vowing to me that she’d help me escape.
And while it was everything that I’d been hoping for, why did it bring me discomfort? Because I knew what she risked? Because I’d seen how the others treated her? Like she was expendable? Something to be berated and scorned and struck when she displeased them?
So what would they do to her if they knew she’d helped me escape?
“Benn keeps the key to your cuffs in his tunic pocket,” she revealed to me. “I think it would be quite simple if I can reach them. Only one man guards the door at night. The others sleep in the room above. I can lead you from the mountain easily, if we’re quiet.”
One thing I’d learned during my time asVorakkar, during my time warring, was that nothing ever went according to plan.
“And the fog?” I asked. “How exactly do you plan to lead me through it?”
I was curious what she would say, if she would confirm my suspicions or not.
“Leave that to me,” she said, disappointing me. “I’ll get you through it. And your horde will be waiting at the border for you. I’ll make sure they know you’re coming.”
My brow furrowed. She would approach my horde on her own?
“My horde will capture you if you come close to them. Make no mistake about that,kalles.”
“Then I won’t go close.”
“Why are you doing this?” I wanted to know, my gaze narrowing on her.
Those lips lifted a little but her smile struck me as sad. “You don’t trust me?”
“Nik. I do not.”
She sighed. “I’m trying to make amends with you, horde king,” she revealed. “Before it’s too late.”
“Tell me about the witches,” I ordered. “What is their role in this?”
If she was surprised that I’d remembered them, she didn’t show it.
“They claim that they can make a heartstone on the night of the black moon,” she said.
“Heartstones are…” I trailed off, guessing what the witches had told thevekkiri. “Heartstones are not made,sarkia. They have been on this planet since before our time. They are an ancient thing and the most powerful forces on Dakkar.”
