A Soul Like Glass (Kingdom of Betrayal #4)

Chapter 5

Chapter 5

I speak before Thaden can respond, raising my voice at the guard. “You haven’t told us your names.”

The first woman barely spares me a glance, but I don’t let that deter me.

“There’s one name I know very well,” I say quickly, and then I enunciate carefully, “Dusana of the Dusk. Have you heard of her?”

The fae standing on either side of me stiffen. So, I sense, does the woman standing behind me.

“Please tell me your names,” I say, more loudly, “so that I may repeat them to your Queen.”

The guards glance at each other. The first woman has stiffened, her jaw clenching.

“Or perhaps you would rather let us pass,” I say.

With a huff, the first woman flicks her hand, at which the others step back from us.

Ahead of me, Thaden doesn’t waste a beat, striding past the first woman and paying her no further attention.

Gallium and I keep pace with him, but I’m very conscious of the hate-filled glares the women cast at me as we pass.

The first woman spits in the dirt when I reach her.

I don’t rise to the insult, but it draws my attention downward, and I notice for the first time how bare the ground is. There’s very little vegetation here. From above, the encampment appeared almost sparkling. But now that we’re down here…

In the distance, a child cries.

I’m suddenly conscious of the hacking cough coming from another tent. Then, the quiet weeping from the tent beside that.

The flap of that tent is partially open, and I catch a glimpse inside, where a fae woman with golden hair leans over a child who is lying on a stretcher. A male fae kneels on the other side of the stretcher, his hand covering the child’s. Tears glisten on their cheeks.

My heart wrenches to see them.

Clearly, the child is gravely ill, cheeks and lips tinged with gray.

From behind me a voice calls, and I glance back to see that it’s the same blue-haired fae who stepped into Thaden’s path.

“This is what Blacksmiths have done,” she says, her brow furrowed and jaw tight. “Are you pleased with yourselves, Blacksmiths? Are you happy with the suffering you’ve inflicted on our children?”

One of the other guards—a woman with golden eyes—quickly takes hold of the blue-haired woman’s arm and pulls her away, shushing her.

My heart sinks even further.

A glance at Gallium’s pale face tells me he feels their pain as intensely as I do.

“Our people have a lot to answer for,” he growls beneath his breath, a hint of anger in his voice. It’s so unlike him to feel rage, but it’s justified.

“Not us, Gallium,” I whisper. “We didn’t do this. We weren’t even born when Malak and his followers turned the earth into a wasteland. We were children. Powerless children.”

Despite my assertion, my legs feel heavy, as if my heart has descended so far to the ground that it’s nearly impossible to keep moving.

“Could your power help them?” Gallium’s focus falls to my arm, where I have concealed my medallions. There’s a spark of hope in his eyes. “Could you try healing them? Do some good?—”

“ Do not try .” Thaden’s voice is shockingly cold, his presence at my side, sudden.

My focus snaps up to him and my eyes widen. I struggle with my own anger now. My disbelief at his command. “How could you tell me not to try?”

His shoulders slump and his voice softens. “Because your power will only make their illness worse.”

“How?” I ask, struggling to understand.

His broad shoulders sink even further and his expression is now bleak. “It is because of magic that the blight spreads. You will understand once we get closer to it.”

He turns away from me, his back stiff, his gaze turned toward the mountains that sit in the distance. “You will see soon enough.”

I don’t want to believe him.

I want to help the fae. To prove to them that Gallium and I are nothing like Malak and his followers. But there’s something about Thaden’s posture…

Just as I have learned how to recognize the smallest changes in his behavior, the tension around his eyes and mouth, the quickly hidden clenches of his jaw, and the tightness in his voice that tells me when he’s lying, I can also discern when he’s telling the truth.

“There must be something we can do,” I say. “If not now, then we need to find a way.”

Thaden gives me a nod. “For all supernaturals. Not only the fae.”

Without another word, he continues ahead.

Once more, Gallium and I follow, as we will continue to do for now.

We walk to the sounds of misery. Tents filled with illness and sorrow. Softly crying fae. Coughing children.

By the time we reach the other side of the encampment, my eyes are downcast.

I glance back once more at the tents.

Queen Karasi spoke proudly of an army and I saw for myself the warriors training within the castle walls. I saw the women flying their thunderbirds and spent the last few days surrounded by the Queen’s favored fae—all of them healthy and physically strong.

But now I wonder at the true extent of her army and if it’s mostly a bluff?

Thunderbirds positioned strategically in the sky in a way that makes it look like there are many of them…

Fires are kept burning in the encampment to appear as if a thousand warriors are ready and waiting to strike…

Even the mountaintop castle that makes Karasi’s position appear lofty and dominant…

All of it is designed to give the appearance of strength when the reality is that her people are suffering.

My focus rises to the castle we left behind, the eastern side of it now lit with the first rays of dawn.

How the Queen’s desperation must be growing. Assuming she actually cares beneath her self-centered facade.

A feeling of dread settles at the base of my stomach.

Desperation can drive even good people to do terrible things, and a monarch like Karasi is already primed for cruelty.

It takes us an entire day to climb the top of the mountain at the edge of the valley.

A sparse forest sits across it, made up of scraggly trees with leaves that appear brittle in the fading light.

The wind whistles past them, making their boughs creak and groan, and I find myself shivering, not from cold, but because the air is weirdly heavy up here.

We traveled at an angle, heading upward but easterly, and as we pick our path through the fallen vegetation—old branches and crackling twigs—my skin prickles.

From up here, I can see that this mountain range sits farther north of the mountains that circle the Cursed City. I can nearly imagine it in the distance, but I can’t be completely certain how far away it is.

Thaden is relentless, pushing onward even as night falls.

He glances back regularly to check that I haven’t fallen behind.

I don’t complain. Or try to slow us down. Although that strategy does occur to me.

The farther we go, the more I find myself studying him.

The air around him is changing.

Maybe it’s the way he carries himself, more upright. Maybe it’s the expression on his face when he looks back—the little tension lines around his eyes and mouth that have eased somehow.

The way his breathing sounds different… Deeper, maybe.

There’s a scent in the air.

Of copper and… something else…

Something not quite right.

I can’t quite put my finger on it, but I know that Gallium is aware of it, too, because every now and then, his hand brushes my arm. His focus will glide from Thaden’s back to a point in the environment around us, as if he wants me to take note of it.

A tree with oddly black bark extending up one side of its trunk.

A fallen branch with trails of a dark, goopy substance crisscrossing all over it.

The faint rustle of leaves when the trees appear to shiver as we pass them by, except that it isn’t caused by the wind because it happens when the breeze dies down .

Finally, when the moon sits high in the sky, Thaden draws to a halt. He studies our surroundings, his head held high as he draws an audibly deep breath and then nods to himself.

“It’s safe enough to stop here, but not for long,” he says. “We’ll need to take turns keeping watch.”

“What makes it safe here and not elsewhere?” I ask, keeping my voice to a low murmur.

He gives me a grim smile. “The creatures in this forest wake up at night. I think you noticed the black bark and the trails of slime?”

The fact that he was aware of us doing so concerns me a little.

Nothing seems to escape his notice.

“The beasts of this forest sleep within the trees during the day,” he continues. “They wake up at night. But there aren’t any nesting in this location.”

I take note of the tree trunks and undergrowth, all of it brittle and brown. No black trails in sight.

“We should sleep while we can,” Gallium says. “I’ll take the first watch.”

I’m so tired I can barely nod.

It’s only because of my power that I’ve kept going, and I’m certain Gallium is the same. We haven’t slept for the last thirty-six hours and we can’t ignore our sleep deprivation much longer.

Thaden, too, wears dark circles under his eyes, but he shakes his head at Gallium’s suggestion. “I can draw on the dragon’s energy to stay awake longer,” he says, dropping his pack at the base of the nearest tree. “I’ll wake you in three hours to take over the next watch.”

Allowing Thaden Kane to guard us while we sleep isn’t a good option.

I was already sliding my pack from my back and now I grip the handle, desperately trying to think of an excuse to stay awake, too.

A brief glance at Gallium and the close-lipped smile he wears tells me it’s no use.

“Thank you,” I say to Thaden. “Both of you. Wake me if you need me.”

Within minutes, I’ve settled against the tree nearest to Gallium, eaten a little of the food in my pack, wrapped my fur around me, and tucked my hammer firmly against my side.

My eyes close.

What feels like seconds later, I wake to a light touch on my cheek.

My eyes fly open, but I relax to see Gallium crouching beside me.

“It’s morning,” he says.

My brow creases as I take in our gloomy surroundings. “But it’s still dark.”

He gives me a firm nod. “Yes.”

As he rises to his feet, moving back through the undergrowth, I untangle myself from my fur, my hammer firmly gripped in my hand.

Around me, the trees are shrouded in shadows. Not a glimmer of sunlight makes it to the ground, even though the canopy of branches is sparse.

Black clouds boil above us.

The air smells like copper, filled with the heavy scent of blood.

I gasp. “If it’s morning, where is the sun?”

On the other side of the clearing, Thaden Kane stands with his head tilted to the sky.

“The blight is surging,” he says, his voice sharp.

He turns to me, his gaze piercing and the tension around his eyes growing. “Your presence is drawing the darkness to us.”