Perrine shook her head firmly. “She wouldn’t leave me without a warning.”
Once the rabbits were cooked, they ate quickly. Though Perrine offered him part of her rabbit, he refused; there was barely enough for her and Sabina, and he still had plenty of figs and liverwurst. After they finished eating, Sy helped them pack. They were anxious to make as much ground as they could before nightfall. Sy was, too.
As Perrine gave her rifle a perfunctory clean, Sy took Sabina aside with his kit.
“I want to teach you something,” he said, pulling out his pencil and a scrap of paper – which was dangerously low, he noted. His notes in the grotto had used most of it. He might run out of parchment before he ran out of blood.
Slowly, so she could easily follow, he drew the spell, barely two lines, he had concocted for temporary paralysis.
“It lasts five minutes or so,” he said, handing it over. “You see it’s simple enough, quick, not so costly. Should you need it.”
Sabina took the paper and pressed her lips together thoughtfully. “It’sdangerousmaking up your own spells. What if you had hurt yourself?”
He smiled. “I didn’t.”
She returned his smile, her eyebrows gone crooked with affection. “A spell of eternal life, of complete transformation. I still don’t think I truly believe it’s possible.” She put her arms around his neck. “But if anyone can figure it out, it’s you.”
As she pulled away, he nodded in Perrine’s direction. “Are you sure about this? About her?”
“I suppose this journey has put some things into perspective for me. For you too, I’d wager,” she said, grinning conspiratorially.
“Nothing has changed.”
She shook her head. “Sylas, you gave her your gloves. The only time I’veeverseen you without them is when we go to bed. And you get a lost, dreamy look when you think of her.Dreamy, I tell you. She’s absolutely bewitched you. I admit, I was distrustful of her at first, but…well, she’s proven herself worthy of you.”
An ironic laugh escaped him.And what of my worth to her?
“You sure you won’t come with us?” Perrine asked, approaching them. “Safety in numbers. Three heads are better than one – or four, if our feathered friend decides to come back.”
“He can’t,” Sabina answered for him, giving him a strange look. “I wish I could help you. If there’s anything I can do, I will.”
He believed her, but he shook his head. “There isn’t.”
“I know,” she replied sadly. “But it’s what you say, isn’t it?”
They left him, and Sy watched them go, sending a silent wish, a blessing, they would reach their destination safely.
It took him a moment to realize how very unlike him that was.
The forest has changed you, he’d said to Sabina, in jest. It had. But had it flooded her? Rooted itself into her? Spoken to her with the voice of the air?
The falcon returned, swooping over Sy’s head on her way toward the pair. As she did, she dropped something she had clutched in her talon. It drifted to the ground, directly in front of him. As the falcon landed on Perrine’s waiting shoulder and their silhouettes disappeared into the fold of green and gold, he bent to inspect it.
A feather, long and sunrise orange, with a sheen of violet and green in the midday light.
A feather from the tail of the phoenix.
He caught it between his fingers just as a gust of wind began to blow it away.
There, said the leaves above him, the roots below.There.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Anya was not afraid of the dark. But the first night in Johanna’s cottage, Anya had refused to close her eyes. After her long, lonely night in the forest – her mother’s stiff, white corpse, the things she couldn’t see, didn’t hear, still fresh in her teeming mind – giving herself to a darkness so absolute seemed unwise.
Johanna, lost as to how to comfort a frightened child but willing to try, had been patient. After several frustrating hours, she had instructed Anya that the things that could hurt her were very real, but they were outside, not behind her own eyes.
Even back then, Anya didn’t think that was entirely true.
