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Chapter Eight

Ena’s body hurt all over. Her wrists were chafed raw from the handfast bindings, her thighs were shaking from holding herself upright on the horse for hours, and her head pounded.

The sun was just starting to crest the horizon, bathing the forest in a delicate blue light.

Birds were starting to shuffle around in the trees, and in the distance, Ena heard a creek bubbling cheerfully.

She wasn’t sure which direction they had been riding all night, but she figured the creek must be one of the smaller tributaries that ran into the River Wry.

Her theory was confirmed once the creek came into sight.

It was a decent size, about ten feet across, and filled with large boulders and downed logs which formed small eddies and rapids.

But just glancing downriver, she could tell it meandered widely, which meant that if she were to escape, she could try to follow its flow to the River Wry, but it would likely take her far longer than the route they’d just taken from her village.

She’d had a million thoughts like this all night—thinking through every possible escape route, every possible way she might be able to slip away from them and find her way back before they got too far.

But they’d ridden fast all night without stopping, and not a single opportunity had presented itself.

Besides, her hands and mouth were still gagged, which put her at a significant disadvantage.

As they approached the bank of the creek, the man in the hawk mask, who she’d refused to even glance back at while riding all night, called to the others.

“We’ll stop here to water the horses and take a short break, then we’ll ride on.

We need to put more distance between us and her Coven in case they come looking. ”

The man pulled their horse to a stop, then dismounted.

He turned to face Ena and gripped her waist with large hands.

Lifting her off the horse after him, he put her down directly in front of him.

Ena was too tired to fight him, and her legs wobbled as she tried to stand.

The man held her by the shoulders, his grip somewhat gentle, as he said, “I’d like to remove your gag so I can give you some water.

I know you must be thirsty. If you try to scream and draw attention, I’ll just have to put it right back in.

You should know, we’re far enough away that I don’t think anyone will hear you anyway, so it would be useless to try, but I won’t take any chances. Do you understand?”

Ena stared daggers at the man, but nodded obediently nonetheless. At this point, she had no choice but to acquiesce. She wanted water and this gag out of her mouth so badly.

The man reached behind her head to untie the gag and pulled the cloth out of her mouth. Ena sighed in relief, using her tongue to remoisten her impossibly dry mouth.

“Here,” he said, offering her a leather waterskin that he pulled from one of the saddlebags. “You’re also welcome to relieve yourself behind that tree over there if you have to, but if you go too far, or try to run, I will just have to catch you. And I will, so don’t even try it. Understand me?”

“Yes, Master ,” Ena replied sarcastically, venom dripping with every word.

She meant it as an insult. Only daemons called Iblis “Master,” and among witches, to call someone that was like calling someone a sadist. But it clearly didn’t have her desired effect, because the man just looked satisfied as a small devilish smile graced his lips.

Turning away from him, she lifted the waterskin to her lips and chugged the cool water.

It felt like heaven in her mouth and down her dry, scratchy throat.

Taking a peek over her shoulder, she saw the three men leading the horses to the creek and talking quietly amongst themselves.

She felt relieved at their momentary distraction and wandered over to the tree the man had pointed to.

As she crouched down to relieve her bladder, she took the private moment to frantically think of a plan.

She had to get her bearings and figure out where she was.

Now that the sun was up, she would hopefully be able to see landmarks more clearly, or if they came to a high point in the land, she could try to orient herself to the Chasm Mountains and the sun’s angle.

As it were, being this deep in the heavily canopied forest, it was hard to tell from which direction the sun was even rising.

Coming back around from behind the tree, Ena saw the men washing up and filling up their waterskins in the creek, and it was the first time she’d gotten a good look at them in the daylight.

They were all dressed similarly, in the same type of clothing anyone would wear this time of year: gray or brown woolen trousers and leather boots, linen shirts, and thigh-length black woolen coats with polished bone buttons.

They carried more weapons than usual travelers, which made sense now that she knew their purposes.

Each of them had a dagger strapped to their sides, and the tall one she’d been riding with had an axe strapped to his back.

Weapons for killing other people were usually hard to come by on this side of the Chasm Mountains.

The villages and the Covens usually existed in peace, and any skirmishes between mortals were usually brief and stayed confined to those villages involved.

People more often than not used the farming and kitchen tools they had to defend themselves if anything went wrong, but there usually wasn’t much theft or violence.

The fact that these men had weapons at all was certainly suspicious.

As they turned away from the creek to huddle together in conversation once more, she realized that they’d also removed their masks and she could see their faces clearly for the first time. When the one she thought she recognized turned to face her, her heart leapt to her throat.

Seeing his face, maskless, in the early-morning light, there was no doubt. It was Ty.

He was clearly older, in his late twenties now, and he was bulkier than she remembered.

His limbs had lost the thinness of youth and his arms and shoulders were more densely packed with muscle.

His hair was different too. Instead of the slightly too-long, shaggy cut she remembered, he now had shorter hair that was shaved on either side of his head, revealing a series of tattoos along his scalp.

And he had a beard. It was full and dark, perfectly complementing the darkness of his brows, which framed his unmistakable light-green eyes. Those hadn’t changed at all.

He caught her looking at him and she quickly looked away, busying herself with the mouth of the waterskin she’d been given.

She’d gotten a good glimpse of the other two men, who had revealed their faces as well.

The one called Steig looked to be about thirty years old, with short, curly black hair and dark eyes, but the other one who had been wearing the raccoon mask—and who’d burned down Heran’s house—looked younger, though by how much she wasn’t sure.

His short hair was dirty blond and his eyes a striking blue, but overall, his face had a surprising innocence about it.

They were both strong-looking, as well, and from what she could see of their arms and hands where their shirts were rolled up as they had washed in the creek, they were covered in tattoos too.

Ena’s hands were still bound and clasped around her waterskin like it was her only lifeline as she walked back towards her captors, who were readying the horses again.

“Ready?” Ty asked her. There was still no hint of recognition in his eyes, no sign that he remembered her. Was she really that forgettable?

“Do I have a choice?” she asked bitterly.

“Good point,” he said, as he reached for her waist and lifted her up onto his horse.

Again, Ena didn’t fight him. She knew her best course of action was to figure out her whereabouts before she made her escape, rather than blindly running and yelling through the woods.

These men could certainly outrun her in her current state anyway.

They rode all day, stopping only briefly to relieve themselves a couple times.

Ty graciously offered Ena some dried meat of some kind and an apple at one point to eat in the saddle.

She ate them both begrudgingly, only to keep her strength up.

She spent the rest of the time letting her Knowing soak up all the information around her.

What animals and birds were there? What types of trees were around?

Where was the water flowing? What direction was the sunlight coming from?

All of these clues led her to believe that they were likely west of her village, a direction the witches in her Coven did not usually travel—and for good reason.

But she couldn’t say for sure. She needed to confirm her theory before she escaped.

She didn’t want to end up wandering aimlessly through the woods, as that was a surefire way to die.

She also spent time contemplating what the hell these men wanted with her.

They clearly didn’t want to hurt her, which they easily could have done by this point.

This led her to believe that they probably wanted to use her for something.

They had obviously been looking for something at Heran’s house.

But what could that be? She knew at least one of them was a daemon, the one whose name she did not yet know but who she’d seen burn down Heran’s house with his bare, heat-wielding hand.

However, she wasn’t sure about Steig. And Ty…

well she thought he had been mortal. She needed a way to confirm what they were so she knew what she was dealing with.

Luckily, she had a method at her disposal.

She reached out with her Knowing.