Page 100

Being so alone that my own breath is a slap in the face, a constant reminder of my own existence—it’s enough to rip the life right out of me and set things right.

I don’t know how long I lay there, the warm sunshine mocking me, the mist wetting me in wispy layers, staring up at that arch of colored scribbles in the sky. Every cursed color there is.Take my breath away. I begged for it.

And I prayed. I prayed to the gods, not because I suddenly believed in them, but because that’s how lonely I got. Not the kind of loneliness like when I hid alone in my room for days on end, or like rotting in a cell for weeks or missing Kelter.No, I talked to the keepers of the Immortal Realm because guilt hollowed me out, leaving me so deep and hidden inside myself that I couldn’t feel.

I lost myself in that patch of grass, and without even myself to keep me company, the real loneliness set in, and I sought out shadows and gods for company.

That’s when I knew loneliness was lethal.

I’d still be there now if the dark shell I left behind weren’t so stubborn. Only a fool walks back into a realm of enemies and traitors and memory-stealing magic. So what? I’m a fool now—whatever is left of me. A fool who won’t let another child grow up with pain like mine. A fool who wants free will for a realm of people that laugh and judge. A fool who won’t leave a friend behind, who keeps deals with darkness.

After passing through the strange, flattening sensation of the border, I follow my mental map back toward the heart of Sonnet, no trace of the carriage tracks. Each step takes me farther from the haunting faces of the babies in their elixir-induced sleep, and closer to my foolishness.

For once, the sky is dry—as if it shriveled up along with my sanity—but it leaves me without liquid. It would have been a good idea to quench my thirst at the falls before I set on my way, but I couldn’t drink from the water that holds Cam’s body. So I have no plan, no food and no water, and in this state, at least a few days’ walk ahead of me. Maybe I’ll reach the river before I pass out.

Evening arrives. It’s as unwelcome as the jab of pain in my side with every guilty breath. I try to keep watch. I don’t need sleep. Sleep is for the living, and I don’t know how to live anymore.

I hug myself through the bluster of thoughts and the visions of death that stir to life when I close my eyes. I wake up from a half-sleep again and again, sitting against a tree trunk, shivering from a sticky, cold sweat—the only trace of the nightmares that stalk my unconsciousness with boldness, as though they own the place.

The light of day isn’t much better. I walk for hours, a simple agreement between my feet and the ground to keep me going. The earth pushes me along through the endless trees when I can’t take another step. I no longer know which way I’m going or where I’ve come from. Nothing looks familiar. After spending years mapping every inch of ground I covered, I’m lost, and the nature I once trusted is as unpredictable as everything else.

I wander, scanning the bushes in the undergrowth of the trees for berries, anything edible, but nothing grows here—nothing but desperation. The hunger pangs mingle with the skewering pain from my rib, and I welcome them. I stomp as I go. If I can keep feeling that sweet pain, then I’m awake and far from the nightmares.

Tonight is worse than the first night. I dream of screaming. Cam’s scream, my scream, it’s all the same. It never fades or ends. It severs my mind from my body and lives on in both, somewhere under that morbid rainbow that follows me from one nightmare to the next, until rough hands cover my face, trapping the scream inside me and sealing my mouth shut with the scraggly violet tendrils of the rainbow’s end.

The nightmares don’t even earn their name compared to the onslaught of my waking visions—the waterlogged deaths that drop me to my knees and leave me scratching my eyelids, sharp nails tearing at my skin.

Water is all I can think of when the cloud-blocked sun marks another gray midday. My throat is so parched that even my soul begs for a drop of liquid, fearing it might dry up with my body, now as light as the breeze that shoves me along. My brain is sharper than ever with the lack of food, and my body finds renewed energy that has me putting one foot in front of the other, hour after hour. What did I ever need food for?

And sleep? Crutches for the weak. I don’t need them.

The birds come for me before the sun sets. They fill the sky. Their magical wings match the slow beat of my heart. It’s peaceful when they sing, a chorus in the wind. I find a spot to curl up, grateful to finally be so far from the death that haunts me, even as my own edges near. Warm wings wrap around me, and the rumbly purr of a free blitzer lulls me into nothingness.

“Get off her, get off!” A man’s voice, then wingbeats. So familiar.

Cold hands roll me over. “Never.”

I’m not here,I tell him, but nothing comes out.

Smooth, icy metal prods at my lips, and a silky liquid trickles over and through them in tiny, lifesaving kisses, stinging the tooth punctures on my tongue.

“Never.” Eli traces my brow with his thumb, sharing scents of earth and trees and the faint prick of cloves. A breeze wisps over me, warming me from the inside out. His lightness tugs at my soul. “Come back to me.”

I open my eyes—a battle of wills at this point. It’s early morning. Black ringlets hang like a mobile above me. My head is nestled in Eli’s lap. It takes me a while to locate the rest of my body. I’m still lying on the ground, a bed of decaying leaves beneath me, surrounded by the solid, unfailing comfort of trees.

“Never,” I rasp, my voice dry.Because I’m gone. I can’t come back. I was washed over the falls.

“You have to come back. I need you.” A small smile curves his lips. His fingers pinch my ear and tug, as if he missed it. “Drink. You look terrible.”

“Elivander.” As it comes out, I remember—how I called himElias his fingers tore me apart so perfectly, the sight of his back, cuffing him. I want to jump up and put all the distance in the world between us, but I’m too weak.

“You were at the falls,” he asks and states at once.

I look away in response. Whatever part of me was at the falls is still there now—rotting.

“You could have gone home, but you came back.” He runs his finger over my lips, sliced and split, the contact unnervingly gentle.

I jerk my head back the other way, trying to escape his caress, but his touch follows. “I can’t leave Kelter here.”