“I’ll keep watch,” Merrick grunted, nodding to Laurent and Lenna, the latter staring into the fire, twisting her pale hands. He knew that the visit from Esmeray had shaken her, but he hoped her resolve held firm to still help them.
“Get some rest.”Merrick said through his ring.“We need you at full power tomorrow.”
“I’m not going to argue that.” Laurent sounded exhausted through their shared mind speak.
Merrick straightened, rolling his shoulders back. It was going to be a long night, but he owed it to Laurent to stay awake and keep an eye out for any sign of danger. He looked out into the darkness beyond and couldn’t make out a damned thing.
Chapter eighteen
Lenna
Asthefirstsignsof morning light shone down into the Pyritee Pass, Lenna breathed a small sigh of relief. During the night, she had a hard time distinguishing the black behind her eyelids from the surroundings in their alcove. Three walls of ebony stone cut off her view of the starless night sky, confuddling her own perception of depth and distance. Even widening her eyes, straining to make out a shape was pointless. The adrenaline in her veins had left her shaky and overstimulated, and when goosebumps had risen on her flesh, she felt a rolling nausea that seemed determined to get her to lose the meager contents in her stomach.
Lenna opted to curl up against the cool back wall and pray to whatever god happened to be listening for safety. She wondered if being the Oracle held any sway with the gods above, or if her prayers were merely added to the unending list of requests the gods received. It didn’t help that as soon as Laurent closed his eyes, the flame that steadily grew weaker in the middle of their makeshift camp winked out.
Lenna spent the next few hours using her cloak as a pillow, laying on her back, her gaze unseeing. The pitch-black kept befuddling her senses every time she tried closing her eyes. With the hard ground below her, sleep came fitfully at best. Lenna’s ears had strained to pick up anysounds, but only heard a few quiet curses following thetinkof a loose stone shifting against another, confirming to Lenna that Merrick was also unable to see well, and wasalsotripping over the rocks littering the ground as he kept watch.
The events from Spinella weighed on her. She couldn’t get the sound of Esmeray’s shrill scream of rage out of her mind. Lenna kept replaying the nightmare of the old man–who she now assumed had been the previous Oracle–again and again.
How had Esmeray captured him?
How could she avoid the same fate?
Why was Esmeray hunting her?
The silent night pressing in around her provided no answers.
Apprehension plagued her thoughts. Thoughts that drifted towards Doortan. Lenna had felt so alone, unnecessary, nothing more than a servant disguised as a wife. She wondered if Leon notified the city guards of her disappearance.
She doubted it.
Gritting her teeth, Lenna warred with the emotions inside her. Their marriage had started out loving, but that love had been used up quickly, diminishing to nothing within a year. Lenna was still lost, though new fears slithered against her mind now. The idea of having a mate somewhere in this big new world was steadying, and she clung to that slim hope that there was a being out there who was designed to love her the way she needed to be loved.
The path forward was fraught with peril. But it was a path, and shewasneeded and acknowledged here, even confided in. Merrick and Laurent were kind and caring, and she held onto that feeling tightly, too.
When morning began slipping through the opening of the alcove, Lenna got to her feet, her back muscles tight after laying on the hardground. She groaned as she stretched her arms over her head. Her hips hurt, her back hurt. She hurt all over. Lenna squeezed the muscles at the nape of her neck, trying to get the blood flowing.
Merrick appeared in front of her, flashing a tight grin, “I do apologize for the lack of luxury you’ve experienced since you arrived in Irridessen, M’lady.”
Giving up on getting any relief to her sore muscles, Lenna worked on her hair, tying it out of her face with the grey scarf she used as a miniature blanket last night. She shot Merrick a bemused smile. “It’s still more interesting here than Doortan. Even though my company keeps putting me in precarious situations.”
Laurent appeared at her side, making her jump. He was so quiet she never heard him coming.It must be a fae thing,she thought to herself. Stealth. “Let’s get moving.” Was his only response before picking up his pack and sword.
Lenna glanced from gargoyle to fae. “Did you both start the new day on the wrong side of the rocks?” Their weird mood made her skin crawl and her nerves jumpy, but she kept her tone nonchalant.
“It’s…weird. Being here,” Merrick admitted. His wings rubbed against each other, as if it comforted him. “A lifetime ago we rode and flew through this Pass while we trained. Now, it doesn’t feel familiar.”
Lenna empathised, knowing the feeling he experienced. How her own home had become a stranger to her over the years. She wondered if she would ever see Doortan again–wondered if she would everwantto leave and go back to the Slate Kingdom. Even with the events of the night before, she couldn’t see herself going back.Was this land her home now?She couldn’t give herself an honest answer.
So many questions, but no answers looming around the corner. It was unsettling after a lifetime of knowing what was coming, everything cutand dried. Be a subservient wife, stay out of Leon’s way when he was drunk, keep the house and servants running smoothly.
She was completely out of her element now.
Lenna took a deep breath, determined to see where this journey took her. Maybe once they cleared Keerian’s name and Esmeray was locked up–maybe she would find a small town in Irridessen to call home or go back to Spinella. She wondered if Laurent or Merrick would come visit her, or even think about her again after she helped them. They very well could equate her with this terrible time in their life and want nothing to do with her after.
Lenna, Merrick, and Laurent made their way back to the openness of the canyon, and her jaw dropped. What she was unable to see last night was now bathed in morning light.
Surrounding her on both sides were towering walls of black stones, veins of silver glittering across their facets as the sun shone down. The Pyritee Pass was at least fifty feet high, wide enough for at least ten horses to stand side by side comfortably. It all felt very ancient. Lenna herself felt very small.
