“Judge me later,” I say. “We need to get past them. Can you help?”
“Yeah, that’s why I’m here.”
Will takes a step around Jeremy and strokes his mane.
“I have a handful of ideas,” he says, focus sharpening his face. “I’m not sure any of them are actually feasible. The issue is, we still need to travel by horseback after the bridge, otherwise I’d let Pigeon take Jeremy home. It’ll take too long without him.”
He flattens his palms against the horse’s neck and closes his eyes. His mouth moves in a whispered spell and before my eyes, Jeremy starts to disappear, the forest filling in where his neck once was. The invisibility spell bleeds out from Will’s fingers, but as it travels down Jeremy’s shoulders to the main bulk of his body, Will hisses. His face screws up.
It reminds me too much of the dungeon.
“Will, stop.”
Will flinches and blinks rapidly. I rush to take his elbow as all the visibility floods back to Jeremy.
“Okay, scrap that one,” Will says, his breaths a little haggard. “He’s too big. The spell is only meant for humans.”
I dig my fingers into his arm. “Don’t do that.”
“Sorry, Princess.”
“Plan B?” Pigeon asks, hands on hips and ready for action.
“Uh…” Will looks down at me, hesitant. “I’m not sure anyone will like it.Idon’t like it.”
“Go on,” I say.
“I can use the invisibility spell on myself to sneak past the guards. Once I’m on the other side, I can create a fog that will cover you as you bring Jeremy over. Pigeon can stay on this side of the bridge and, if need be, distract the guards.”
“I have a little phosphorus left,” Pigeon says. Will shoots her a look. “I saida little.”
“Don’t use it while Fliss is still on the bridge.”
“Wait—” I interrupt. “We have to go separately?”
Will smiles sadly. “A lot of spells require concentration, so I can’tdo the invisibility spell and anything else at the same time. We need a way to get Jeremy over to the other side and using fog might be the best shot to do that. I told you I didn’t like it.”
“Neither do I,” I say.
“I’ve got your backs,” Pigeon says, pulling her bow into prepared hands.
“Will…”
He grins at me. “Let’s give it a go. See you on the other side?”
I grab his collar. “Promise.”
“Promise.”
He kisses me, the lightest brush of his lips, then he’s striding to the bridge and fading from view. I wait for Howell to shout, for the sound of metal scraping from a sword being drawn, but it doesn’t come. Pigeon brings Jeremy’s bridle to me, and I curl tense fingers under the leather as we head back to the tree line.
“He’ll be okay. He always has a knack for getting out of trouble somehow,” she says, and leaps onto a tree root to peer ahead. “The first time we met, I’d been stealing from travelers in the forest and ended up bumping into some guards. Will helped me out of it and only asked for the medicine back. We shared the food.”
I’d seen that in Will’s memory. She’d looked so gaunt at the time.
“I hope living like that becomes a thing of the past, not just for you, but for everyone.”
Pigeon’s braid swings sideways as she jumps onto a lower root. “I do too. Sometimes. But it’s not something I allow myself to get hung up on. I have my family to feed, which means being pragmatic rather than idealistic. I can’t indulge in hopes and wishes.”
