Page 52

Maev was silent for a moment. “I saw him, Livy. He was real. What’s going on?”

The crystals Ollo had stuffed in my pockets were full, no longer easing the strain from the magic.

Every bone, every nerve vibrated and shook from the power within, longing to be unleashed.

My erratic change of emotions triggered it.

I was losing control, and I needed to stop feeling .

“Nothing’s going on. Let’s get moving, okay? ”

When we left the crevice and the morning light reached us, Maev made a face. “How are you doing now?” she asked, eyes roaming over me.

I looked worse than before. I felt everything, and none of it was good. My shoulders sagged, and the weight of it all came crashing down. “Everything is my fault. Nuo, Brekt, Ollo. The floods. The fires. I—I …”

Maev stared, and the dark circles under her eyes said everything she was not.

“It’s going to get worse, Maev. I’m losing control over everything. I should’ve known a long time ago I would hurt them all,” I continued.

“How should you have known?” Maev walked next to me, wrapping her arms around herself.

She was holding herself together as we continued along the thin stretch of the canyon. We aimed for the dark cloud of smoke we could no longer see.

“I felt the power in me. I noticed strange things. I should’ve known.”

The morning sun peeked over the cliff edge creating a beam of golden light, which hit the other side.

“No one could’ve guessed they were the Ikhor,” she said, surprising me. I didn’t expect her to understand. “Half the time, I thought it was just a fable everyone believed in, that I would find nothing when I followed Ollo here.”

“The Shadow Guard knew what he was. I was stupid enough to believe I was the Aspis—what the Guards were looking for. I thought I would be the hero.”

“You think you’re not?” Maev held herself a little tighter.

“I haven’t done a single thing to save anyone. And I won’t be able to save anyone once the magic is returned.”

Her face pinched.

“I’m sorry.” I placed a hand on her arm. “I will help you. I made a promise that I would. But I need to fill your crystals and get this magic out.” I dropped my voice. “I need to save Brekt, too.”

She faced forward, hugging herself as she walked.

“Why did you follow Ollo if you weren’t sure I was real?” I asked.

Her steps slowed. “Hope, I suppose. So much was going wrong. Crystals were becoming scarce. Hate was festering in my people. Every day life looked the same unless you paid attention. No one was doing anything positive about it. So I decided to follow Ollo to find you. I knew my tracker would give him an advantage he wouldn’t have on his own.

I hoped the Ikhor would change people—that maybe …

maybe we didn’t need to go to war with Veydes.

I wanted you to solve everyone’s problems.” She gave me a weak smile.

When I laughed, her face fell. I think she remembered Ollo was dead, and that we were both trudging through danger alone and afraid.

“But this is your fault,” she said. “That we are here without him.”

Her words were a sharp knife in the heart, and the way Maev looked away from me reminded me so much of Rebeka—the deep-rooted disappointment that I was in her life.

Maev’s attention shifted back to me. “No.” She shook her head. “No, I didn’t mean that, Liv. I don’t mean it. I’m sorry I said that.”

I didn’t reply because she had meant it, and she wasn’t wrong.

I brushed the lingering sand off my clothes and fixed the straps of my bag. “Let’s focus on finding the crash site and getting out of the canyons.”

We walked in silence once more, stepping over bones and sticking to the shade when the sun was high.

“Liv …” Maev stopped, and when I searched ahead, I saw what made her pause.

They weren’t the first we had come across. Bodies—bloody bodies. There had been decaying bodies guiding our path, but these were fresh .

I gagged and covered my nose to stop myself from throwing up. The smell was … indescribable.

A shadow passed overhead, blocking the sun.

“You saw that right?” I asked. We exchanged a look and picked up our pace, sticking close to the rock walls. “I’m not imagining this, am I?” I stepped over a pile of bones and avoided a body face down in the dirt, lying in a pool of dried blood.

“The dead, stinking bodies? No, Liv, you aren’t imagining this. Stop freaking me out.”

“I’m only making sure I’m not lost in another nightmare.”

“Well, unfortunately for me, I am here in this nightmare with you. And ugh —” Maev gagged, swallowing and holding the back of her hand to her mouth. “Stop flinching at every sound. I’m supposed to be the one scared, not the all-powerful saviour. This isn’t a good look for us.”

“I can’t be all-powerful when it’s that power that calls the Aspis.”

“It’s probably what keeps blocking out the sun. And I doubt if you called it, it could squeeze its head in this section of the canyon. It’s too tight.”

If the path forward hadn’t been so narrow, we might not have had to step over bodies—some of which were bent in grotesque ways, like they had fallen from above. The next one I passed over had its arm bent underneath its back. An Aethar, easy to see from the scars.

“This one hasn’t been dead long.” I stopped before Maev passed, reaching a hand out to stop her. “Don’t touch it, Maev. Look at that one.”

The body hadn’t been dead for long, and there were rashes around its neck. Dark, red veins protruded from their throat, arms and temples.

“Disease, I think.” Maev did her best to avoid touching the Aethar.

We agreed to walk in silence after that, and stuck close to overhangs and large rocks, listening for any sound of danger. Somehow, the red-coloured canyons had become far scarier than the nightmares with the half-beast.

Another day of travelling in the canyons led nowhere, with no signs of the airship.

Maev swore she was tracking the sun’s patterns and taking us in the right direction, and I had no option but to trust her.

It was awkward travelling like this. With someone you knew was angry with you. Sleeping side by side was even worse.

On the third day of walking, red became my least favourite colour, the lines of the canyon walls dizzying and blurring as I passed them. At least I hadn’t seen that shadow again.

Maev said we would search one more day for the ship before giving up.

She had packed our bags with dried food and water, but we needed it to last. It was late in the afternoon, and the sun disappeared behind the cliff when she rolled up the stolen map, having scribbled some more lines below the canyons, and stopped me to shove it in my pack.

The sweat that gathered on my brow dried to salt before it dripped into my eyes.

“I’m too hot to remove my bag,” she said. “You can carry it for me. Easier to grab.”

“Don’t squish it in like that,” I argued, wiping my hand across my grime-covered forehead.

She snorted. “As if you plan to return it to the Guard one day?”

“Are you sure you know your directions?” I dragged my feet, holding onto the straps of my pack to keep myself upright. At least the pack was getting lighter since we had eaten some of the supplies I carried.

“Liv, the canyons will take days to cross. This is day three, and we have been searching for the ship, barely making any headway.”

“I’m getting anxious. Maybe it’s from the hundredth decaying body I just stepped over.”

“We have to find that ship.”

“I know we do,” I said, swallowing around a dry tongue, dizzy. “Just be prepared for what you’ll find.”

Maev stopped and pinned me with a scowl. “He’s alive.”

That wasn’t the first time she had said it. “I know. We will find him.”

“You don’t believe me. But I know it.” She stomped forward, eyes darting back and forth, searching.

“How do you know?” I tripped over a rock, then kicked it, mumbling a curse.

“It’s a twin thing. We are connected. I know. I would feel him gone from this world. He’s alive.”

I was connected to someone, too. I was too lost in my grief to understand it before, but I think … I had known he wasn’t truly gone. “If you feel it, Maev, then he is alive.”

I wasn’t sure if I was trying to convince her or myself.

“When do you think we will come across the first shrine of Mayra?” I asked an hour later, the sun gone from the trail.

When I first arrived in Veydes, I loved being in the sunlight. Now? Now, I almost wished to be under the canopy of the Endless Forest.

“The one I know of is far north. But there must be many along the coast. We will exit the canyons and follow the sea.”

“Will we pass any Southlanders?”

“Very likely, yes. They’ve taken over much of South Rydavas. I can’t say how close they settle to the sea, but we will find out.”

I hopped down off a large slab of rock. The pathway we were in was tight, and Maev had complained of something called claustrophobia, which I learned was a fear of small spaces. I wanted to know how she would have felt living in my old shack.

“Let’s sleep under this overhang.” She motioned to a small space where we could hide from anything coming from above. We dragged some rocks from around the pathway ahead to block anyone seeing us from the ground, and sat against our packs, side by side.

Without saying another word, we waited for the long night to pass.