CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE ISI
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
ISI
As we flew south, the wasteland unfolded beneath us like a wound that refused to heal.
I sat behind Trew on Lakast, pressed against his back, my arms wrapped around his waist, my cheek resting against the hard leather of his tunic.
His familiar scent mixed with the rot rising from below, a jarring contrast that made my chest hollow out.
His body heat radiated through the leather, fighting the chill seeping up from the corrupted land.
Pherin perched on my shoulder, her tiny talons digging into the leather armor Naveah had crafted for me.
Ugly land, she said in my mind, sharp with disgust. Bad smell. Fly faster.
I couldn’t agree more.
What had once been fertile territory now stretched out in patches of cracked desert and fetid swamp.
The few skeletal scruffy trees that remained clawed at the sky like bony fingers.
No birds sang. No insects buzzed. The silence was absolute, the kind of quiet that came after something had been stripped away and would never return.
I tightened my fingers on Trew’s tunic.
He felt the movement and turned his head enough that I could see the line of his jaw.
“One day, the land will restore itself,” he said, his voice pitched low enough that only I could hear over the steady beat of Lakast’s wings. “It’ll be beautiful again.”
I wanted to believe him. Fates, I needed to believe him.
“There were villages here.” His hand came up to rest over mine. “Families. Farms that grew the sweetest berries in all the courts. Children who played in meadows that bloomed with wildflowers.”
He stroked my knuckles, a gentle rhythm that steadied the frantic beat of my heart.
“When we’ve sealed the veil and destroyed whoever’s controlling the Skathes, those people will come back. They’ll rebuild. Plant new seeds. Live in peace.” His hand squeezed mine. “I promise you that.”
King right, Pherin said.
To our left, Kyreth flew with Lexie and Derren on her back, his sword jutting up his spine.
Levar clung to Lexie’s shoulder in his badger form, his dark eyes scanning the wasteland below with the same wariness I felt.
To our right, Wairen carried Kerralyn, with Keek tucked into her pack, only his whiskered nose visible.
We’d been flying for the entire day. The sun hung low on the horizon, painting the devastation in shades of orange and gold that would make it look beautiful if I could squint hard enough to avoid seeing the decay.
“We’ll stop soon,” Trew called out to the others. “We need to find defensible ground and set up camp before it gets dark.”
Ahead, the landscape shifted from swamp to a stretch of rocky terrain dotted with boulders large enough to provide cover.
“There.” Trew pointed. “Between those formations.”
At his foot command, Lakast banked, his wings tilting to catch the air. My stomach dropped with the descent, but I kept my grip firm, my body moving with Trew’s as he shifted his weight to help guide the dragon.
We landed with barely a jar. Kyreth and Wairen touched down moments later, their massive forms settling onto the rocky ground.
I hitched my leg over Lakast’s spine ridges and slid down his side, jarring when I landed on the ground far below. My legs wobbled, protesting the hours of being locked in position. Trew dismounted with our bags, his hand immediately finding the small of my back.
“Set things up,” he said, already scanning the area. “I’ll layer some wards.”
Derren and Lexie were already checking their weapons. Kerralyn pulled out her journal, ready to document whatever we found. Their companions remained alert, watching the wasteland with the kind of focus that made my skin prickle.
Pherin launched from my shoulder, circling overhead. Gavelle joined her, the two of them swirling higher until they became dark specks against the fading light.
I started unloading supplies from the bags, but Trew caught my wrist.
“What do you feel here, Isi?” His golden eyes held mine. “Does the weave feel thin?”
The question wasn’t casual. He was asking for my assessment, trusting my potential veil-sight in a way that made warmth unfurl in my chest. If I could identify areas that were weaker, he could reinforce them.
I closed my eyes and reached for that part of myself that could perceive the structure of magic.
The weave pulsed behind my eyelids, a network of power branching through reality like a system of veins.
In the wasteland, those veins looked necrotic, the threads turning a sickly, shriveled black where the corruption had taken hold.
The threads appeared frayed and thin in places, twisted in others, and some sections were so corrupted they’d turned black and shriveled.
“It’s bad.” I opened my eyes. “The corruption is pressing close. Whatever wards you weave will be fighting against constant erosion.”
His jaw tightened, but he nodded. “I’ll make them stronger.”
We worked together in the fading light, Trew tracing patterns in the air while I pointed out the weakest sections of the weave, the places where corruption was trying to eat through. He adjusted accordingly, reinforcing those areas with extra layers of protection.
Derren unpacked bedrolls while Lexie assembled a small fire pit from rocks. Kerralyn organized supplies.
Trew handed me a waterskin as he passed. Our fingers touched, and he held the contact a moment, stroking across my knuckles before he released me.
I took a long drink, finding the water cool and clean despite the dissolving world around us. When I lowered the skin, he was watching me with an expression that made heat pool low in my belly.
“What?” I asked.
“Nothing.” But his mouth curved into that small, private smile that sent my blood racing. “Just appreciating the view.”
“Of the wasteland?”
“You.”
Before I could respond, he’d turned back to his wards, but that smile lingered, making my insides simmer.
I passed him a piece of dried meat as he worked, and he caught my eye as he took it, that same smile playing at his lips. These small, intimate moments felt precious alongside the decay.
The fire caught, small and stubborn. Lexie fed it carefully, coaxing it with the kind of patience she usually reserved for ancient tomes. Its light pushed back the shadows by maybe ten feet in every direction. Beyond that, the wasteland swallowed everything.
I sat back on my heels and listened, hearing nothing.
This was an emptied nothing, scraped clean of every living sound until only absence remained. No insects sang. No night birds called. The wind didn’t even bother moving through the spindly trees. The silence pressed against my ears like something physical, like it was trying to get in.
Pherin, I asked. What do you hear?
Nothing. But her tone wasn’t reassuring. It was uneasy. Wrong nothing. Loud nothing.
I understood exactly what she meant.
She dropped from the sky a moment later, landing on my knee rather than my shoulder, which was unusual enough to make me look at her. Her eyes scanned the darkness beyond the firelight.
Go look? she asked.
I glanced at Trew, still tracing the last of his ward patterns, his jaw set with concentration. Then back at Pherin.
Stay close. Don’t go past the boulders.
She launched off my knee, a silent dart of shadow disappearing between the rock formations. I watched the darkness where she’d gone, turning a piece of dried meat over in my hands without eating it.
Kerralyn appeared at my shoulder, lowering herself to sit beside me. She didn’t speak. We both watched the dark together, the fire crackling softly between us and the silence that had no business being this loud.
Pherin returned from the far side of the boulder cluster and landed back on my knee.
Nothing there, she said. But. She paused, and through the bond I felt her unease like a splinter under my skin. Bad smell. Far away. Coming closer.
I set down the dried meat.
Trew froze, staring around. “My wards.”
My heart leaped into my throat. A check showed them unraveling quickly just beyond a cluster of boulders.
Something…, Pherin said in my mind. Outside. Watching. She swooped down, passing over our heads before continuing out over the encroaching wasteland. No see yet.
I reached for the blade at my hip. “Trew—”
“Everybody,” he snarled. “Weapons ready. Something’s breached my wards.”
The others moved fast, their training showing in the way they positioned themselves. Derren drew his sword, the steel singing as it cleared the scabbard. Lexie’s short blades appeared in her hands. Kerralyn pulled a pair of throwing knives from her belt, her journal forgotten.
The dragons shifted where they’d been resting on the ground and rose to their feet. Lakast’s head swung toward the left side of the open area. A low rumble built in his chest.
I caught movement between the boulders. A serpentine thing, its body undulating with joints that bent in ways no natural creature should move.
“Fuck, no,” I breathed. It couldn’t be. “They look like the thing that attacked me in the Rite of Bonds.”
My stomach dropped. The bone plates splitting across the skull. The tri-sectioned maw. I knew what those were. I’d almost died to one—one—at the Rite of Bonds.
And now seven of them emerged from different directions, their segmented bodies flowing across the rocky ground with terrifying grace.
I help, Pherin cried out.
No, keep watch. We can’t risk more rushing at us without knowing they’re on their way.
I felt her dismay but acceptance.
The first creature reared up, the bone plates splitting across its skull to reveal a tri-sectioned maw lined with needle-sharp teeth. Six black eyes fixed on me with ancient hunger.
“Stay together,” Trew barked. “Don’t let them separate us.”
We moved as one, muscle memory and trust carrying us into position. Trew at the front, Derren to his right, Lexie to his left. I took the opposite side with Kerralyn, my blades singing free of their sheaths.
Their companions shifted and flanked us.