Page 57 of A Land So Wide

I t was nearly midnight when Greer and Finn rounded the final bend.

A splintered sign spanned the road, welcoming all travelers to the Sandry Mining Company.

It had once been bright with color, but after so many harsh seasons without care, the paint had faded and peeled so badly the words were nearly illegible.

The storm had temporarily eased, clouds parting to allow moonlight to brighten the abandoned site. With her newly enhanced vision, Greer could see each of the camp’s remaining structures with crystalline detail.

The site was…rough.

Decades of neglect had taken their toll. Greer wondered what the miners had dug for, what precious resources they’d hauled out of the mountain before the Bright-Eyeds had attacked, putting a stop to operations.

A scattering of buildings bordered a work yard: an office and bunkhouse, a fenced pen for horses and pack mules, a blacksmith’s forge, and several other smaller shacks Greer couldn’t identify.

They were all falling apart, with caved-in roofs and broken windows, so thoroughly covered in moss and mold it seemed the forest was swallowing them whole.

Behind Sandry was the vertical face of the mountain, looming over the camp like a sentinel.

At its base was a large opening, braced by heavy timbers and stones: the entrance to the mine itself.

Greer felt a wave of gooseflesh break over her as she studied its darkness. It seemed to be alive, a sentient, knowing thing that watched her with equal interest.

The ground going into the tunnel was scarred with pockmarks and nearly impassable. She recalled the lengths of tracks discarded throughout the forest below. The Bright-Eyeds had torn them up, cast them out, and never bothered to repair the mess. Who cared for roads when you could fly?

Hidden in the shadows of the stables, Greer and Finn waited, scarcely drawing breath as they listened to the sounds around them.

Nothing stirred.

She’d expected to see some evidence of the Gathered: sentries posted, an aerial watch drifting soundlessly on air currents above, flickers of eye-shine roosted in nearby trees.

But there was nothing.

“Where is everyone?” she whispered.

Finn gestured toward the mine’s entrance, then flexed his hand, indicating a steep decline, a lower depth.

There would be dozens of shafts, and even more smaller corridors splitting off the main thoroughfare, a veritable maze.

They’d talked through what Finn remembered of the mine as they’d hiked and had agreed it would be best if Elowen could be drawn out into the open.

Greer was excellent at finding the lay of the land, at tracking her way through regions uncharted, but a mine was different. She’d have no landmarks, no frame of reference. There would be no sun or stars to guide her way.

It would be just her and the dark.

And the Gathered.

Finn tapped at Ailie’s cloak with meaningful insistence.

She bit the side of her thumb, worrying her teeth back and forth against the skin as she studied her mother’s cloak, watching the way it shimmered in the moonlight.

The fabric felt wrong in her hands, wrong in this place. It was too lovely and too fragile a thing, a dew-dotted spiderweb, the first skim of hoarfrost on a pond.

“Greer,” Finn all but growled, his whisper hot in her ear. “Put on the damn cloak.”

“Where is Elowen?” she hedged. “Why is she waiting?”

“Why are you?”

It was an impossible question to answer. She knew with utmost certainty that putting on the cloak would alter her forever. Nothing—no matter how strong a case Finn made, no matter how Greer accepted its benefits and inevitability—could tempt her to hasten that moment.

“Is that a Starling I hear?”

Elowen’s voice echoed out of the mine, and Greer sank against Finn with relief. Elowen had made the opening gambit, and they could sit back and decide upon the next move. Beside her, Finn drew a finger to his lips—a warning, a reminder.

From deep in the tunnel, a pair of flickering eyes approached the entrance, coming out of the darkness like fireflies.

Other Bright-Eyeds appeared. Two walked upright, flanking Elowen, while the eye-shine of some was positioned impossibly high off the ground.

Distorted bodies crawled along the ceiling with a curious scuttle, picking their path with hooked claws at the joints in their wings.

They emerged upside down, their necks snapped at nearly impossible angles to scan the yard.

Just like bats, Greer thought, as she got her initial glimpse of the Gathered.

At first glance, every creature looked the same—pallid skin, luminescent and riddled with dark veins; shoulders so hulking and muscular they curved the spine; arcing, membranous wings; cavernously large ears; faces truncated with too many teeth—but as Greer studied the motley tableau, she noticed the differences.

Tufts of feathers, tawny as an owl’s; skin brittle with scales and patches of molt. Some had tusks, others horns.

She counted five, then six, as Elowen stepped into the moonlight, her eyes as sharp as those of a fox.

Greer’s breath caught as she saw the smaller figure nearly hidden, tucked away in the curve of the Elowen’s wings. She hadn’t seen him in the tunnel because he cast no eye-shine. He was still wonderfully, wholly human.

Ellis.

Everything in her wanted to race to him, but a swift shake of Finn’s head held her in check. They remained in the shadows, watching, waiting.

One of the Bright-Eyeds beside Elowen surveyed Sandry’s remains, his massive tusks swinging from side to side as his orange eyes took in the yard. “There’s no one here,” he announced, his voice deep and gravelly, a veritable nightmare.

“I told you,” Ellis said, sounding exhausted. “She’s not coming. She’s trapped in Mistaken; she can’t leave, she wouldn’t follow me.”

“Why isn’t he back in the roost with the others?” questioned the tallest of the guards. “He shouldn’t be out here.”

“I want him to see this,” Elowen snapped. “I want her to see him.”

Along the rock wall, one Bright-Eyed snorted; his slitted eyes were wary, mistrustful. “See what? You said she was near.” He gestured to the empty yard. “Where is she?”

“That’s no way to speak to your sovereign. We all heard the voices,” the tusked guard growled. With a powerful sweep of his wing, he pushed Ellis from the group. Ellis stumbled forward, slipping in the snow; he landed on his knees with a painful crack. “Find her,” the guard demanded.

“There’s no one to find!” Ellis spelled out, each word drawn long with fraying patience. Impossibly, he retreated toward the Bright-Eyeds. “This is pointless. It’s freezing. I’m going back in.”

“Stop him,” Elowen ordered, and the two guards stepped together, blocking the tunnel.

What are you doing, Ellis? Greer wanted to shout, but Finn gripped her arm, waylaying her before she could even think to move.

He shook his head, his meaning clear: Not yet .

“Stop these stupid games,” Ellis went on, taking another faltering step toward the guards. “I came to you as a sacrifice. Willingly. For Mistaken. Eat me or turn me or do whatever—just end it.”

“Shut him up,” Elowen hissed, and the tall Bright-Eyed swung at him, striking Ellis across the face with the long length of his winged forearm.

Ellis staggered back, losing his hat.

Greer had knitted it for him just last winter.

She’d used the finest wool, carding and cleaning out every bristle and burr before spinning the fibers and dyeing the skeins.

Seeing that reminder of home, that proof of their lives before all this, strengthened Greer’s resolve.

She wanted to go back to that—to a version of that—and never again have to worry about dark shapes falling from the sky.

Ellis clutched at his face, muffling a groan. Greer could smell the tang of fresh blood and knew his nose had been broken, even before drops of red dotted the surrounding snow.

The Gathered snapped their collective attention toward the blood, their sudden longing fierce and palpable. From high above, the smallest Bright-Eyed began to skitter down the rocky face of the cliff, drawing closer. Its eyes were large and rapturous.

Greer started forward, wanting to warn Ellis, wanting to stop the bloodshed before it could begin, but Finn’s fingers dug in deep, holding her in place.

“Wait,” he mouthed silently.

Then the Bright-Eyed was gone, hidden somewhere among the boulders clustering against the mountain’s face. But Greer could still hear him, hear the rasp of his dissent. “The mortal is right. We’ve watched for days, and the girl hasn’t come. I’m sick of such stagnancy. I want to hunt.”

Elowen sighed. “And you will, when this is over. We’ll return to the cove and destroy those damned Stones. We’ll drink the town dry, but first we need—”

“No, now!” he yowled, racing out of the shadows.

Finn was on her in an instant, one hand cupped over Greer’s mouth to stifle back her cry as a lynx sped toward Ellis, haunches long and paws massive, a feral bloodlust winking in its eyes.

As much as she wanted to thrash free, Greer slackened against Finn, understanding that the element of surprise was their greatest asset.

Before Greer was even aware she’d moved, Elowen was across the yard, intercepting the cat.

It began to shift back into a Bright-Eyed, growing larger, its spine lengthening and flexing like a snake.

But before the transformation could complete, Elowen snapped its neck and tossed it over her shoulder, discarding it as though it were nothing more than a game bird.

The Bright-Eyed landed with an ungainly thud, a monstrous tangle of limbs and wings, now wholly motionless. The remaining Gathered swayed uneasily, their eyes darting from Elowen to their fallen kin.

The tusked guard made a motion toward the dead Bright-Eyed, but Elowen’s snarl stopped him short. “Farrow?” he called out instead. In the following silence, his eyes narrowed. “You killed him!”

Elowen whirled around, meeting the eyes of her court, her face contorted with fury. “And I’ll do the same to any of you who goes after the boy.”

With disgust, the tusked Bright-Eyed stalked into the tunnel, throwing muttered curses under his breath.

“Laithe! I did not dismiss you! Get back here or I’ll—” Elowen started after him, but stopped short, a look of uncertainty playing across her vulpine face.

“Already set to kill another?” Ellis asked, sneering up at her. He turned to the others. “How quick she is to throw you all away. She exiled the first only hours ago…”

Salix, Greer thought, remembering the Bright-Eyed she’d killed. She wondered what he’d done to make Elowen cast him out. Perhaps her court wasn’t as loyal to her as Finn had feared.

“…then this poor sod,” Ellis went on. “And now she threatens Laithe. Are you going to stand for this? Are you going to let her kill the lot of you?”

Elowen’s nostrils flared, and even from across the yard, Greer could hear her teeth grind together. She growled at the tallest Bright-Eyed, snapping her orders in a language Greer did not know.

He offered a short bow before reluctantly turning in to the dark.

Greer could hardly believe her luck. Just three Bright-Eyeds remained outside the mine. Success was still uncertain, but she felt a wash of relief as the numbers began to tip toward their favor.

Then Ellis began to laugh.

It sounded like broken glass, its edges sharp and dangerous, dark with loathing and teetering into madness. He paced about the yard like a feral animal, caged and raring for a fight. As he approached the stables, his eyes fell on Greer.

Time seemed to freeze, catching the breath in her chest.

Ellis had always been an open book, and Greer watched the wide range of emotions tumble across his face. Disbelief and wonder, love and worry, fear, and—finally—horrible realization.

Greer saw the exact moment when Ellis understood what her presence here meant. What her presence here made her. His eyebrows furrowed, and his eyes grew wet with welling tears. He pressed his lips together, and she wasn’t sure if he was fighting the urge to cry or to scream.

For a long moment, they simply stared at each other.

Greer drank in every detail of him, the exhausted circles under his eyes, his ruined nose, the mouth she hungered to kiss.

Ellis stared back, saying so many things with his eyes that he could not speak aloud.

But then he disappeared into thoughts Greer was not privy to.

His expression darkened, and a stab of fear staked through her middle.

“I love you,” he mouthed, offering one small smile.

Then Ellis whirled back to the court, slipping out the iron knife secreted in the sleeve of his sweater.

He hurled it toward the Bright-Eyeds, his throw powerful and precise.

It sailed through the air, flipping round like a silver spinner, until it struck Elowen, stabbing her directly in the hollow of her throat.