Zera grinned.
Keeping to the trees, they crept parallel to the wall until they spotted a culvert. Sure enough, the grate that had been welded so proudly into position was riddled with rust. Even from here, Kreya could see the red-brown flakes on broken bars.
“Not one single guard is watching their weak point,” Zera said. “I’m embarrassed for them. Honestly, how do they look themselves in the eye as their take their pay when they’re doing this shoddy a job? If it weren’t utterly against my interests to do so, I’d report them.”
“We still proceed carefully. Stupid to survive the monsters and get taken out by a kid with an itchy bow-finger. Come on.”
Together, they used stealth talismans to slip across the open stretch to the grate. Kreya didn’t hesitate to wade into the river. Here, it was knee deep, and the chill bit her skin. River water swirled around her shins. The low arch shielded them from view.
Carefully keeping the hem of her coat out of the water, Zera picked her way over the rocks. She squatted on one rock and peered at the grate.
“Definitely rusted,” Zera whispered. “Break it?”
Kreya shook her head. Breaking it would be too loud. Even the most inattentive guard would hear that. She mimed swimming under it, as an alternative to bashing through it.
“Fine. We do it the boring, careful,wetway. You know, you used to be fun.”
“No, I wasn’t.”
“Yeah, you’re right. You weren’t.”
Zera shed her coat and handed it to Kreya, along with an empty pack. She then swam under the grate. Pushing the coats and packs through the holes in the grate, Kreya then swam under it as well. On the other side, Kreya shivered.
Checking the wall—the sparsely posted guards were still unaware—they shared speed talismans and sped away from the wall across the plains. As she ran, wind whipped against her, chilling her wet skin and flinging droplets of water behind her. She was like horizontal rain, defying gravity as she sped over the plains.
Kreya felt a burst of joy.We’re here! Jentt, we did it!
Three miles from the wall, beyond the limit of how far anyone could see across a flat surface and therefore safely out of sight of any guards, they slowed.
Zera whooped. “Loved that! Want to do that again. So refreshing to run without fear of crashing into a tree or falling off a cliff or being chased by a monster.” She shook her sleeves. “Hey, I think we ran ourselves dry. Mostly. Perhaps I should add that to my sales pitch as a benefit of the speed talisman.” She pulled her coat back on and executed a spin. Her coat flared out around her.
Pulling on her own coat, Kreya was only half listening to her. Yes, they’d made it, and that was wonderful. But as the adrenaline faded, she began to look at where they were: the place she’d sworn to never return to, and the place she returned to every night in her nightmares. She’d been so focused on saving Jentt, she hadn’t fully anticipated what this moment would feel like.
Standing on the plains, she felt as if a hundred memories were crashing into her, threatening to drown her. Here, they’d come to fight Eklor. Here, he’d unleashed his army of atrocities. Here, they’d been outnumbered and, for the first time, she’d tasted fear and doubt. Until then, she’d believed wholeheartedly that the righteousness of their cause would lead to triumph. She’d been naïve and focused only on their goal, and this earth had soaked up Jentt’s blood, as well as the blood of the hundreds of soldiers who had fought and died with them.
Yet twenty-five years later, the plains looked peaceful, with hip-high verdant green grasses blanketing them for miles. Lacelike white flowers swayed in the breeze, as well as stalks flush with lavender blossoms. Shining gently, the sun made it all shimmer for miles and miles.
In the distance, she saw the silhouette of a tower, broken. It was as jagged as the scar on her thigh, and she remembered how, at the height of the fighting, the tower had burned. Today, though, it was only silent stone. A tomb.
Beside her, Zera surveyed it all as well with her hands on her hips. “I can’t decide if it’s pretty or creepy, which, come to think of it, is about the same way I feel about you.”
“The worst of the battle was closer to the tower.” Kreya pointed. They should find the highest concentration of bones there.
They walked eastward, toward the ruined tower. A few birds were singing, perched in a nearby tree. Unlike the narrow pines of the mountains that strained toward the sun or the twisted trees of the valley, this young tree looked fat and free, with its arms spread wide and flush with leaves.
“Looks like nature found a way to bury the lost without any human help,” Zera said. “Maybe we don’t need to burn anythingafter all.” Her voice was subdued, and Kreya wondered if the memories were flooding into her as well.
A few minutes later, they found the first skeleton.
Stripped of flesh, the bones lay curled within tattered fabric, all that remained of a soldier’s uniform. Kreya knelt beside it, laying her fingers on an arm bone. She felt its power: weak but still there. “I’ll need several, to match the potency of the freshly dead.”
Zera sighed. “I suppose this is my last moment to stop you.”
Kreya tried to keep the flash of fear off her face. She knew Zera’s coat pockets were full of talismans. If Zera wanted to, shecouldstop her, and it needn’t be right here. She could raise the alarm with the guards on the wall on their return if she didn’t want to dirty her own hands, and there was very little Kreya could do to prevent it. She fingered the speed talisman they’d used to get here. If necessary, she could use it to flee, with as many bones as she could grab. Maybe it would be enough. “Well?”
“We came all this way together, and you still don’t trust me. Thanks, Kreya. Love you too.” Zera turned her back on Kreya and walked a few paces off, then stopped. “There are more remains here.” She stood there, quietly, and Kreya didn’t push her. Zera looked at the bones. “If Jentt hadn’t done what he did, I’d be lying with them. Along with the rest of the guild’s army. We bring Jentt back, and then you destroy any trace of the spell.” She looked up at Kreya. “That’s the deal.”
“Sorry. I—”
