20. Chapter 19
Chapter 19
Sorrow and sadness are not the same. Sadness is the feeling a child has when she loses her toy. Sorrow is the knife that rends the soul. Sorrow is the blade that ends a life. And there is no worse sorrow than watching hope die.
~Inni the Destroyer, A History of Magic and Dragons
Cole
I struggle to keep up with Maeve as she leaps from pillar to pillar, a new one rising each time she lands. The raven wings that keep me aloft should let me catch up to her easily, but Maeve wears the Painted Crown, and she’s embraced her gifts, even ones that I barely understand.
We’re nearly a mile into the Nothing, and I can barely make out my cottage in the distance. How she’s hopped from pillar to pillar this far without losing any of the anger inside her is incredible. What’s even more impressive is that no tendrils of mist have reached up to grasp at her. Maybe she hasn’t stayed still long enough? Maybe the Nothing isn’t sure how to deal with someone who is above it?
She screams in anger and stops. Revulsion shadows explode around her, but they’re gone in half a second as they near the mist below her.
Another scream rips from her throat, and I can’t help but feel the pain inside her across our bond. It’s like liquid steel coursing through her veins, and this time, instead of lashing out with shadows, stone manifests above the mist. It falls, creating a true hole in the impenetrable white for the first time. I see the briefest bit of green through the white. The forest floor.
Then I hear a shriek. It’s a sound I know, although I’ve only heard it a handful of times. The only thing it could be is a banshee or something very similar. The sound comes from the gap in the mists, and luckily, I’m far enough away to only feel a mild uncomfortableness rather than the paralyzing agony that they normally bring on.
There’s a banshee or something similar living inside the Nothing. I may have thought I’d seen something a hundred times when I’d fought it, but this is the first time I’ve had proof rather than a bit of color out of the corner of my eye.
And then Maeve falls.
I don’t have time to think any more about the banshee’s cry, because as soon as Maeve falls, the Nothing begins to climb the pillar she’s laying on. I dive the twenty feet to where she lays, and I pull up just before I hit the pillar hard enough to break my legs. My raven wings, which aren’t meant for pulling someone my weight out of a dive, strain hard enough that the muscles threaten to rip.
Then I land, my knees taking the brunt of the impact, and I scoop Maeve up. Flames explode below me as I burn away the tendrils that are only inches away from us. The Nothing climbs up the pillar again, but I’m gone long before it can reach us.
My raven wings flap hard as I carry us away from the Nothing, and I have no idea what to do.
Maeve was just beginning to heal, and her father was a large part of that. Now he’s gone. Now everyone’s gone. The Nothing has swallowed every person she’s cared at all about other than me, Darian, and Lee.
I fly back toward the cottage. There are things in that cottage that we’ll need. A few supplies, but more than anything, the Shadowed Cloak. I need to create some distance between us and the Nothing.
But what can I do? I can’t fix this. I can’t bring the people she loves so much back. I can’t bring her Da back.
I grab the cloak and put it on before picking up our packs and slinging Maeve over my back. Then I take a deep breath and fall into the void.
The darkness presses on me almost instantly. It feels like every time I come to the void, the weight is heavier. Maybe I’m weaker every time, or maybe it’s slowly convincing me to give into it.
It’s like falling into a lake with weights on your feet. The longer you stay in, the deeper you go, and the more the pressure gets to you. The time that Maeve rescued her father, I was sure that I was going to give in to it until she wrapped me in her shadows. I don’t understand how she can feel so at ease here.
I don’t stay long. Immediately, I think of a clearing that Maeve called the Shade to her on the way to Draenyth. It’s a safe place many miles from here, but one that she’ll remember.
I pull her from the void, and we land on dry and brittle pine needles that crunch under our feet. We’d been here at the beginning of summer when the winds had been hot and humid. The evenings had come later, and the winds had brought scents of flowers. Now, the wind brings nothing but a dark chill. The flowers are gone, and snow is coming. Not yet, but soon. I lay Maeve down on the brown needles that cover the clearing, and before I do anything else, I take a few long, deep breaths.
This is going to be worse than it was before. I know that. What can I possibly do to keep her from shattering? Or has she already? I’m terrified to enter her mind. She’s never truly allowed me into it. Each time, the shadows kept me on the outskirts of the forest of her inner landscape. Even when she’d been whole and in love, I’d only ever been able to stand on the edge. It was enough to talk to her, but it wasn’t close enough to understand her. I can’t truly help her heal from there.
Then again, am I strong enough to do anything? Sure, I can feel the way she helped me, but she’s stronger. And she’s… she’s human. Her emotions are strong and contagious. When she laughs, it’s hard not to laugh alongside her. When she smiles, I can’t help but feel the coldness inside me thawing.
I don’t know what to do.
I need someone to help me, but there’s no one. Just like that day that Brenna handed me the Shadowed Cloak, I can’t depend on anyone else, and there’s no room for mistakes.
I take another long breath, like I’m taking a drag from a pipe. The breath comes in low and slow. I have to do this whether I think I can or not.
Even if she may hate me when it’s all over, I have to force Maeve Arden to survive this. She cannot break.
That’s the only thing that matters.