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Baltisse grins darkly. “You’ve been touched enough by unwanted hands for one day.”

Dawsyn swallows and winces at the stab she feels along her airways. She braces herself. “Do it.”

The mage’s hands grasp Dawsyn’s neck gingerly. “Close your eyes,” she warns, and then there is a shock of white light.

Dawsyn groans at the shudder of power she feels snaking through her, down her throat to her lungs, her fingers, her feet. Her muscles press back as though resistant.

When the light beyond her eyelids recedes, Dawsyn opens them and finds Baltisse’s face close to hers, the churning of her irises now a solid, gleaming gold.

“Odd,” the mage murmurs, observing her closely, she then looks to her shuddering fingers. Dawsyn wonders if they beat the same unfamiliar pulse Dawsyn’s do in this very moment.

It is not the first time Baltisse has called her strange. She does not dwell on it. The soles of her feet no longer protest the ground they rest on; their flesh is restored. Her throat is blessedly free of its aching, and she is here. She is out.

Freed byBaltisse,no less. And…

“Salem…” Dawsyn murmurs, seeing again the guards that pushed his face to the ground.

“Salem will be halfway back to the inn by now,” Baltisse says easily, not a hint of concern in her tone. “He looks and speaks like an oaf, but he kicks like a fucking mule. There was a plan in place, sweet. Esra had a horse and cart waiting.”

“How did you know?” Dawsyn asks. “How did you know where I was?”

Baltisse waves the question away. “Every man and woman in the kingdom knows, sweet. It’s been the talk of town.”

Dawsyn nods.

“And,” Baltisse continues, “we heard of… of Ryon.” Her voice wavers. “I am sorry, Dawsyn.”

Dawsyn’s throat tightens uncomfortably. She looks away to the ground and doesn’t respond.

“It must be–”

“Thank you for saving me,” Dawsyn interrupts, unable to bear the woman trying to articulate the way Dawsyn must feel. Baltisse herself was Ryon’s ally. A friend. Dawsyn is sure she would not care to hear the way Dawsyn truly feels. “I’m grateful for the risks you all took.”

It is more than just a diversion. Dawsyn is indeed grateful. All three of them, plotting to free her? It is… baffling. Such risk for a person they owe nothing to. On the Ledge, small favours had to be repaid ten-fold. A scrap of food would often cost more than she had to give. For a moment she feels wary of what debt she now owes, but then she remembers Salem’s vehemence in the courtyard. She thinks of Esra’s open face and considers that they likely saved her out of… loyalty.

Dawsyn’s hand reaches out. It grips the mage’s, her long fingers resting limply in her palm. Dawsyn is not well-versed in offering affection, but the mage is even more inept. Baltisse’s hand grips mechanically, with a muscle memory long since faded. She allows Dawsyn to grasp it for a moment, and then pulls it back. “I asked your consent, and you could not return the favour?”

Dawsyn smirks. “Thank you, Baltisse.”

“Do not thank me, Sabar. There is more ground left to cut those feet on.” And with that, she turns on her heel and strides away, into the trees.

They push through the forest and do not break pace for much of the day. Dawsyn is oddly light. She wonders if the mage’s magic cures the ache of the mind as well as the body. Or perhaps it is the air, unsoiled by the dank and damp of the palace dungeon, freeing her at last. Perhaps it is the small sounds of life in the trees and on the ground, the distant whispers of water as it cuts its well-worn path through the kingdom. Whatever the cause, she is, for this moment, blissfully unburdened.

Baltisse never once glances over her shoulder; Dawsyn doubts she would need to. The woman seems to possess senses outside the realm of humanity. Every so often, her hands outstretch and she drags her fingers across the trees, leaves and petals within reach, stroking them with the careful affection that she withholds from people. She seems familiar with them, and they with her. It reminds Dawsyn of the way her own feet knew the gradient of the Ledge, the way they would counter-balance with each step. The way they expected the parting of snow as her boots sunk, or the density of ice underneath. Months have passed since Dawsyn left the Ledge, and still her legs tilt, leaning her body away from the Chasm.

Baltisse lifts her hand to a rope of hanging ivy and it seems to shy away to let her pass. In fact, her palms seem to unconsciously seek all foliage within her reach without any observable purpose. It is a strange thing to watch. Is it the habit of a mage to be connected to wild things? She seems oddly at home here in these woods – not something Dawsyn would have predicted. The only part of Baltisse that seems fitting of the wilderness are her eyes – catlike and predatory. The rest of her is in contrast. Her hair, blonde and straight, glistens so brightly Dawsyn wonders if it isn’t charmed. Her skin is flawless, body lithe, clothes regal and unmarked. If there is a scar or scratch anywhere, Dawsyn has never seen it – not befitting for a woman of the forest, so unlike Dawsyn herself, whose body is nothing but the wear of her labours.

And yet, the forest glows as Baltisse passes, the sun finding ways through the canopy to brush her shoulders, her cheeks. The branches and leaves stretch on the breeze toward her, then deflate once again in her absence.

Baltisse stops amongst a copse of trees ahead and smells the air. It seems to rattle in her lungs, as though she is tasting it, dissecting it.

“We will drink here,” she says. And with that, she pushes aside the woven vine to reveal a small pond.

Dawsyn approaches and eyes the layer of green that covers the murky water. “It does not look drinkable.”

Baltisse’s lips slide upward. “No, it does not.” She bends to the forest floor and turns to look up at Dawsyn. “Most pure things in this world are disguised.”

The mage turns back to the pool, and pushes away the moss and slime, making a hole in which to cup her hands. She rises to her feet and holds the water out to Dawsyn.