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‘I will.’

Thea handed him the flask of fire extract, not taking her eyes off the warrior before her. He took it gratefully and drank deeply.

At last, he seemed ready. ‘You remember what I told you of the Great Rite when we were in the Bloodwoods?’

Thea nodded. That pocket of time felt like a lifetime ago, but she remembered his words exactly. ‘The Great Rite is not contained to a single location. Nor does it adhere to the seasons, or even time itself…’she recited back to him.

‘Exactly.’ Wilder took another drink. ‘Over seven years ago, I was in Aveum with Talemir, trying to herd a frost giant back into the mountains —’

‘Awhat?’ Thea couldn’t help herself.

Wilder raised a brow. ‘You heard me.’

‘What’s a frost giant?’ she asked, hardly able to contain her excitement.

‘Pretty much what it sounds like. A giant —’

‘How giant?’

‘Six, seven times the size of Malik?’ Wilder offered with a shrug. ‘Some are even bigger than that. They produce frost and ice… They’re actually why Aveum is a winter kingdom. It’s the frost giants that keep it so.’

‘But you had to kill one?’

Wilder shook his head. ‘No, just herd it back to where it belongs.’

‘How?’

Wilder laughed. ‘Well, what do you think a frost giant hates most? Fire. We used fire.’ He cleared his throat. ‘I thought you wanted to hear about the Great Rite?’

Thea was torn. She wanted to hear all the stories, about every adventure he had ever had. But she had been waiting a lifetime for this tale in particular. The frost giant would have to wait. When it came to the Great Rite, she would listen with bated breath.

He didn’t seem to notice how tense she was. Instead, he wore a far-off expression, as though he were no longer sitting by the fire in Delmira with her, but in the grips of the ancient ritual itself.

‘I felt the call on the frozen banks of the great lake in Aveum,’ he told her. ‘I remember the creak and groan of the shelves of ice around us. I remember Tal was saying something about the giant, but… Everything else faded away. It was like a song without words, a whisper in the wind that murmured my name.’

Thea was hardly breathing.

‘The Great Rite was welcoming me as a challenger. There was an opening not three days’ ride from where I was. So I went. Tal rode alongside me, but I barely remember the journey, only the call. When I reached the foot of a great mountain, Talemir couldn’t follow any further. Later, he told me I disappeared before his eyes, but to me… To me it seemed I simply wandered into a pine forest, and started to climb a mountain. I didn’t look back for him, not once.’

Thea took over stoking the fire, needing to do something with her hands to keep from interrupting. This was Wilder’s tale and he would tell it at his own pace.

His throat bobbed. ‘There was nothing to indicate the Rite had started. No marker of any kind. All I knew was that I was climbing this incredibly steep, perilous mountain. And that I climbed it for weeks.’

Thea gasped. ‘Weeks?’

The Warsword nodded. ‘It was not a simple climb. Each time I reached a plateau, I faced one challenge or another. Things I’m unable to tell you about, save for the fact that they were harrowing – more harrowing than anything I’ve ever encountered, even now. I saw things I wish I could unsee, did things I wish I could undo…’

Thea noted a bead of sweat running from his temple, his hands clasped together as though to hide his trembling. She suppressed the urge to reach for him.

He exhaled shakily. ‘When I emerged, I was where I had started. I held a Warsword totem in my hands. Talemir was there waiting. He’d been there for three days.’

Thea frowned, the question poised on her lips. But Wilder beat her to it.

‘Time works differently in the Great Rite. As does reality itself. All the new scars I had were gone. There was not a trace of the Rite on me, save for the Furies-given strength and magic at my fingertips, and the memory of it all, as crisp and clear as the snow before me.’ He watched her. ‘That’s all I can tell you, Apprentice.’

Thea exhaled, feeling a chill rake down her spine. ‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘Thank you for sharing it with me.’

He gave her a subtle nod. ‘Eat the rest of your food,’ he told her.