If Morrgot hears me, he doesn’t answer.
I probably shouldn’t be distracting him from mapping out our course. I’d really hate to end up embedded in a tree trunk.
If only Bronwen had allowed Antoni to come . . .
What I wouldn’t give for someone to talk to. And a soft bed. A warm bath. Strawberry gelato. Cool water. A bag of ice for the bruises blooming on my inner thighs.
My list is long.
For the next few hours, I add more things to my list, in part to keep my mind off the pain and fatigue, and in part to keep myself alert.
Furia books a sharp turn, his body listing so far to the right, mine begins to list too. I grit my teeth and hold on with every last crumb of my energy. The forest vanishes, making way to a wall of rock that seems to rise all the way to the heavens.
However hard I tug on the reins, Furia neither slows, nor swaps direction. He forges on ahead at full canter. I try to reassure myself that he didn’t run into any trunks, so there’s really no reason he’s going to hurl us against the mountainside.
And yet, fear curdles my stomach as the sulfurous scent of Rax is replaced by the chalky aroma of twilit stone. I yank on the reins, angering my baby blisters, but Furia forges ahead. I crane my neck and call out to Morrgot for help, wondering if it’s slipped the bird’s mind that neither my horse nor I can transform into smoke.
Unless Furia can . . .
The crow veers to the right, and my steed, thankfully, follows, but then the crow hooks a sharp left, and so does Furia. My heart flattens itself against my spine, and I shut my eyes.
I hate this treasure hunt.
I hateeverythingabout it.
Why did I accept? For a golden coronet and Dante’s love? If I die, I’ll have no head to crown and no heart to give.
I should’ve jumped off this mad horse while I still could.
Furia rolls his powerful shoulders and jumps. When hooves click against stone, I crack one eyelid open.
We’re climbing up a steep and narrow passageway lined in moss and paved with stone. Is this the path land-travelers speak about over pints of Fae wine inBottom of the Jug? I expected it to be wider and festooned with sprites. From what I can see and hear, it’s just me, a horse, and a crow.
The world grows quiet and dark as we progress deeper up the trench with, for noise, only the steady clip-clop of Furia’s hooves and the occasional scrape of wind against the dank stones. Whenever I feel the walls around me pressing against my knees, I tip my head up and stare at the stars overhead, reminding myself that I’m not enclosed in a box.
I’m free.
Sort of.
“How long until we reach your friend?” I ask.
The crow peers down at me and offers no response.
I wait a few minutes and ask, “So, Morrgot, any chance you know what Kahol means?”
Another look. Another stretch of silence.
I’m starting to think I imagined it was the crow sending me the visions when the stone walls around me stretch and stretch, and Furia vanishes, and the twinkling firmament becomes obscured by timbered beams.
Footfalls resound on the other side of a wooden door inlaid with silver grommets. When it swings open, I jerk back. Then take another step back as a giant of a man fills the doorframe, shoulders and head skimming all three sides.
Although there’s a lot about him to take in, it’s his eyes that call out to me. They are black as keyholes, made even darker by the black dirt smudged around them, as though he’s dipped his fingers in mud and dragged them across his lids and cheekbones.
The man stares straight through me with an intensity that makes me flinch. I start to turn to see whom he’s looking at, when he pants,“The king was just found dead.”
“The king?” I gasp, pulse clattering. What king are they speaking of? Is this a vision of the past, or of the future?
The incensed stranger doesn’t react to my utterance, which means he can’t hear me, the same way he can’t see me.
