Raven’s jaw clenches before he nods tersely. His eyes flick back to mine, but he doesn’t question me. If he was already awake when I went back to wake the Flight, then no doubt he witnessed my nightmares chasing me from the homestead. Gods, the walls are so worn down he could have heard me falling apart outside.
“It’s no longer safe to stay here until morning,” he says. “The soldiers must have tracked you when you left the court, and we don’t know if they’ve communicated with Keres or not.”
“More will come,” I say, the soldier’s dying words as he struggled for breath flashing through my mind. I clear my throat when all eyes turn to me. “The last soldier I…he said more will come.”
The words hang in the air, heavy and suffocating. No one speaks, but I can feel the weight of their thoughts pressing down on me.More will come.The soldier’s warning echoes in my mind, a grim reminder that we’re not safe. That we’ll never be safe. His words were sharp, like the edge of a blade, cutting through the fleeting hope we tried to cling to. Because what we’ve started here will not end once we leave Eretria behind. I see the same realization etched across the faces of my Flight—tightened lips, clenched jaws. We all understand the weight of our actions, knowing the consequences will shadow us, lingering withevery step we take, even if we escape this moment. The silence stretches on, broken only by the distant rustle of leaves in the wind. It feels like the world is holding its breath, waiting for the next blow to fall.
Quiet and solitude never used to bother me. In fact, I craved it, loving the moments when I could escape the world around me. But now the silence is suffocating. It gives space to memories I would rather forget, inviting nightmares to fester and wreak havoc on my mind. The skin along my spine starts to itch, and pain pulses in my upper thighs.
When Raven finally speaks again, I almost sob with relief.
“Take a moment to get as clean as you can, and gather your belongings,” he says. “We leave within the hour.”
True to his word, Raven has barely allowed us to stop since we left the homestead behind. We emerged from the forest earlier this morning. It continues to crawl alongside us, but to the right, rolling hills of rust-colored grass stretch out as far as the eye can see.
Behind the heavy veil of storm clouds shadowing our journey, the sun sets, casting an eerie light over the countryside. The air is heavy with the scent of decaying leaves. Each breath I take is accompanied by the taste of damp earth and the lingering tang of impending winter that will never touch these lands.
Exhaustion crawls through every inch of my aching body, and my joints are stiff from constantly being in the saddle. I have no doubt everyone is feeling the same bone-deep fatigue as I am, but our Flight has pushed on in resolute silence.
Beneath me, my stolen gelding—taken from the fallen soldiers just before we set the other horses free—moves with sturdy grace. I decided to call him Nimbus, since he looks like the storm clouds above. The dappled gray of his coat shimmers in the fading light as his hooves crush fallen leaves like brittle bones, the sound echoing through the stillness of the land. His inky mane, tangled and wild, dances in a gust of wind, and I close my eyes, shivering as spectral fingers slide against my skin.
The ring feels heavier now, its weight a constant reminder of whatI’m hiding. What I’m suppressing. The wind is softer with it on. More playful and significantly less chaotic.
Easier to control.
When I open my eyes again, they land on the large tarp-covered crate hitched to two horses that Lory leads along. I haven’t been able to tear my attention from it since I watched Lory and Lark drag it from the decrepit barn the night we left the homestead. It’s always covered, the tarp tied in place, only the rhythmic clinking of chains coming from within.
The sound has been driving me insane. Each metallic clink sends shivers coursing over my skin, and I can’t help but wonder what kind of weapon makes that sound. Unable to stand the feeling much longer, I finally give in. “So, what is it?”
“What?” Raven responds from beside me, his eyes fixed ahead, as if he’s refusing to glance in my direction.
I shift in my saddle as my heart clenches in my chest. The tension between us has only continued to grow since the first night by the stream, and being constantly surrounded by others has meant we haven’t had a chance to clear the air. Not that I’m even sure how we could.
“You know exactly what,” I say dryly. “The weapon.”
Lark shifts in his saddle on the other side of Raven, and the movement draws my attention. His shoulders are stiff, his mouth set in a firm line. It could very well be from fatigue, or the constant threat of another attack. But I know Lark better than that. He’s been acting this way ever since we showed up at the homestead. There isn’t much that can dampen his typically blithe demeanor—it’s how he copes with everything life throws at him. To be seeing this side of him means he’s dealing with something he can’t quite comprehend. The way his eyes slide to me before darting away only confirms my suspicions.
“Don’t ask questions you don’t want the answers to,” Raven says shortly.
I bristle at his response, eyes narrowing on his profile. “Don’t tell me what I want.”
“It’s need-to-know, Starling,” he says with a weary sigh. “As a Songbird, you don’t need to know this.”
I stay silent, even as words burn up my throat like acid. I swallow them down and cling to that feeling, to the bitter burn of anger. I let it wash over me until I drown in it, so I can ignore the hurt that tries to bubble to the surface. That emotion, I push down. I push it as deep as I can until it sinks into the deepest recesses of my soul.
His jaw flexes. “Don’t be like that.”
“Don’t be like what, Raven?” My frustration flares. It’s been like this from the very beginning. From the first moment Nyssa and I were brought into Lord Malis’s study, we’ve been given the bare minimum. Half-truths and carefully selected pieces of information designed to keep us in line and in the dark. And I get it—we’ve only recently been made Songbirds. But the understanding doesn’t ease my resentment.
“I’m following orders.”
“And those orders explicitly say I’m not to know?”
“Yes,” Raven growls with frustration, running a hand through his hair. Finally, he tears his gaze away from the horizon and turns to me. “Don’t use this as a reason to push me away.”
“That’s not what I’m doing,” I force out, even as a part of me knows I am. I can feel it—the walls I’m putting up, the distance I’m creating.
“What would you call it, then?”
