Chapter 11 #3
Though dizzy, I move to step past him, but he blocks me, his green eyes shimmering in the dappled sunlight filtering through the leaves. He’s so tall and broad, casting me in his shadow.
“Get out of my way,” I sign.
He narrows his eyes, though I swear I see a hint of delight on his face, like some sick part of him enjoys a fight. “Not until you hear me out.”
Instinct sends my hand to my thigh, reaching for the knife I haven’t thought about until now.
The God Knife isn’t there, and its absence hits me sharply.
I can’t recall when I last held it. Images flip from one to another in my mind’s eye.
They’re hazy, like my brain is blurring them from memory.
I glance back at the cloak on the ground. Maybe it’s there.
“There are things you need to know,” he continues. “Like the fact that Nephele and the others were instructed to protect Winterhold.”
His green eyes dart suspiciously toward my hand, which is still pressed against my empty side. I let it fall, knowing I need to hear him out. He’s all the help I have right now, much as I wish I were with nearly anyone else.
My tense muscles relax a little. “Go on,” I sign.
“The king,” he says, “better known to me as Colden Moeshka, instructed his Witch Walkers to enchant the boundaries around his kingdom so that if anyone infiltrates those lines, a difficult journey to Winterhold is ensured. I don’t know what solution your sister and the others concocted, but I do know those Eastlanders are in trouble.
They might have traveled through Frostwater Wood undeterred for a time, but at some point, they will meet with magick the likes of which they have never seen, and they will regret ever coming here. ”
I cock my head and arch a brow. “You do not imagine those Eastlanders can unravel Witch Walker magick? Silver Hollow’s magick was no match for them. Clearly, neither was the magick protecting the other villages. Those warriors wiped us away like no more than an annoyance.”
I have to hope that, at the very least, the Eastlanders are now without their leader. I did cut him with the God Knife.
“The Witch Walkers of Silver Hollow had no time to strengthen the magick around the village,” he replies.
“I’m certain Nephele and the others have been singing and weaving vast magick since last night at sundown.
As I said, I don’t yet know what form that magick will take or how far-reaching it is, but I do know that I have every confidence in the king’s witches. I know their skill.”
Vast magick? It’s one thing for elders waiting near the barrier to unweave a small portion of magick so the Witch Collector can pass and then braid the threads back together again.
It’s another for witches to control a magick from many miles away.
It’s why each village in the vale protected its own stretch of tree line.
Vast magick is an arcane form of power. I’ve never seen it.
There’s never been anyone in the vale skilled enough to teach it.
Such ideas are legend—the stories of witches projecting their magick and will across space and time.
I don’t know how practiced the witches at Winterhold have become, obviously enough that they’ve learned inscrutable forms of magick, but if the lore is true, vast magick has limitations.
The sheer magnitude of such an attempt limits control.
Even beyond that concern, something Father used to say remains: With the right hands, most any magick can be undone.
“I am not as talented as my sister,” I confess, “but I have never heard of vast magick being selective. If the forest offers harrowing passage, then we will face the magick in the wood as well.”
He wants to take me to Winterhold, and I want to go, but what must we endure to get there?
The Witch Collector rests his big hands on his narrow hips.
“True enough. But know this: I will let no harm come to you. And the wood will let us pass. The Witch Walkers’ magick knows me, especially Nephele’s.
” His face darkens, and a gloomy shadow drifts across his pupils.
“I can’t say it will be easy or fast, but a way will make itself clear.
Your sister is more capable than you give her credit for. ”
Irritation roils inside me. The Witch Collector has a bond with my sister, the kind of bond I once had, but that has since faded.
Because she was stolen from me.
Shoving my loathing down deep, I focus on Nephele and the need to save the only family I have left.
“Move,” I sign. When he doesn’t step aside, I skirt around him. I’m not sure what I plan to do—steal his beast and flee into an enchanted wood?
I don’t get far. The dizziness from before returns and overwhelms me. My head suddenly feels fuzzy, made of clouds, and my vision tunnels, making the Witch Collector’s horse seem a million miles away.
The world tilts, right as my knees buckle mid-step, but the Witch Collector catches me before I fall, his strong arms folding around my waist. He turns me to face him, holding me flush against his body. The movement makes me even more lightheaded, and instinctively, I grab hold of his tunic.
He stares down at me, the knot in his throat moving on a hard swallow as he studies my face intently, like when someone tries to recall a memory. When he speaks, his voice falls from his lips with softer edges.
“I’m afraid we aren’t going anywhere until you can craft magick again. We can’t get inside Frostwater Wood without it.”
I shake my head, not understanding.
“I tried to enter the wood after we left the village,” he says, clearly reading the confusion on my face.
“The Eastlanders threaded a wall along the perimeter. They were clearly worried about someone coming after them. There’s no following unless one of us can summon enough power to break through their construct, and unfortunately, that means the task is yours.
Somehow, I don’t believe you’re up for such a fight just yet, much as you would probably like to disagree. ”
Before I can protest, the Collector sweeps me up into his arms and carries me back to the oak tree, where he lowers me onto his cloak. He hovers above me, folding the material over me for warmth.
I don’t know why I notice, but his lips—even though the bottom one is swollen and bears a deep cut—are a perfect, scarlet bow nestled inside his short, dark beard.
“You have to rest and recover,” he says. “We’ll ride once you’re able and pray to the gods we’re not too late.”
I grip his forearms, wanting to get up, to argue that we need to leave for Frostwater Wood right this minute. And gods, I try, because I need to get to my sister.
But my grip on him loosens, and my hands fall away, the world around me dimming. I struggle to cling to awareness, only to be pressed down by impossible darkness.
Nephele is my last thought as consciousness is carried away by an unstoppable tide.