Dorian stepped out from the room where he’d spent the night, and Thalassa turned to him. “Did you find what you wanted?”
He gave a nod. She passed him a mug, and he took it. I wondered what had passed between them, but I didn’t ask. I sensed neither would tell me.
I took a sip from mine. The drink was hot, sharp, and almost unpleasant—but not quite. I drank it all, and when I set the mug down, Thalassa gave me a slow, approving nod.
“This is for you,” she said, passing me a small sack bound in twine. “Eurydice Waters of the Kingdom of Storms.”
My name had never sounded so regal in another’s mouth.
I moved to untie it, but her hand stopped mine.
“Not now,” she said. “Once you’re safe.”
“It’s time,” Dorian said, already near the exit. His footsteps moved lightly over the dirt.
Thalassa shuffled beside him. “It won’t stay open long. The hedge allows only three seconds of manipulation.” For a moment, I heard the younger fae she must have been—brilliant, sharp, not yet dulled by time or solitude.
I stepped up beside Dorian. “Thank you,” I said to Thalassa, though I wasn’t sure what I was thanking her for—the hospitality, the conversation, the sack now tied at my belt? Maybe just that one additional night of life she’d gifted us.
She spoke a word in what must have been Faerish. Her voice dropped low and the leaves began to rustle. The brambles shifted. Gray dawn broke in slivers across our feet.
The Eldermaze. There it was. It had always been there, just beyond the hedge. But inside, you could almost forget. And sometimes, to sleep even a little, forgetting was easier.
Dorian ducked and stepped through, his cloak sweeping behind him.
I followed, but as I bent forward, Thalassa’s fingers gripped myforearm. Her voice came close to my ear, rough and urgent: “The way out is more straightforward than you think.”
Then she shoved me through.
I stumbled into the maze, catching myself on my hands in the dirt. Already I felt the heat, the barrenness, the desperation.
Dorian steadied me with one arm. “What was that?”
I rose slowly and turned. Behind us, the hedge was already shifting. Leaves whispered back into place, closing the opening like it had never existed. Within seconds, Thalassa’s home was gone. Only the whorl remained.
My blood cooled. Amazing how much power a wall of thorns could hold.
“She said something to me,” I murmured.
“What?”
I looked up at him. “‘The way out is more straightforward than you think.’”
A bitter smile touched his lips. “Of course. A magic-drunk fae with her nest of trinkets and bone soup gives you a cryptic farewell.”
“It’s another riddle,” I said.
“The question is”—he blew out a breath—”how diluted it is by her crazy.”
That was the question. Her face flashed into my mind, her voice: Thalassa hadn’t been mad. Not in that moment. There’d been clarity, the kind that cuts through everything else.
She’d been trying to help. But no answer came to mind.
“Let’s walk,” he said. “I think better when I’m moving.”
So did I.
We walked the maze. The sun heated us, the sky blue, blue, blue. My mind felt on fire as I turned the riddle over, as my scalp burned. Where were the fucking clouds? Even acid rain would be better than this endless heat, this slow death.
