CHAPTER 10
The sprites were arguing.
I heard their shrill voices before we had even cleared the Forests of Dalhur. Moric’s memory of the marked checkpoint relative to Valhan House was remarkable. Lana had only questioned him once during the day-long trek back from the caves.
I was beyond starving. My body past numb. My bones felt like brittle bark, chafing beneath my skin with each step. It was a monumental effort not to curl up on the ground and take a nap.
I patted Moric on the back, giving him a weak smile as I stepped toward Calendula. The sight of her made me want to cry. I didn’t know exactly where we were, but we had left the tall cluster of trees behind us and that was all that mattered. I didn’t want to see a forest again for a very long time.
Calendula’s wings were fluttering furiously in midair as she yelled at Osmanthius. “Don’t you dare tell me what I ought or oughtn’t do! This is my mortal.” Silver sparks drifted around her like a hailstorm.
Osmanthius’ eyes flashed dangerously at her. “Are you implying that I do not care for my own mortal?”
Calendula made a pfft noise. “Obviously. If you hadn’t been such a rule follower–”
“I dare you to finish that sentence, Calendula Mirau. You may be the granddaughter of Mirau Titan, but I am descended from Voldun the Fearless.”
“Fearless?” Calendula scoffed. “I’ve seen mortals more fearless than you, rule follower!”
I approached the warring sprites. Moric’s woodland sprite, I noted, had been observing the argument from the sidelines and, as soon as she had spotted Moric, floated daintily over to land on his shoulder.
“What is going on here?” I asked, holding my hands out.
Calendula spun to face me. “I tried warning you not to go west.”
My brows rose. “You did?”
Calendula nodded crossly. “I threw an acorn right at your head.”
My hand lifted automatically to the spot the acorn had hit. “That was you?”
“Yes. And I would have thrown another had Osmanthius over here not stopped me.”
Osmanthius shouldered past Calendula, his wings bristling. “We were under specific instructions not to assist. What is the point of a survival challenge if their sprites are there to tell them which direction to go?”
“I don’t care about the instructions. I am a shadow sprite. I bow to no one.”
“You’re under Valhan rule.” Osmanthius rolled yellow eyes at her.
Bright yellow.
“I saw you,” I said to Osmanthius. “In the trees. I saw yellow eyes. I thought it had been an animal chasing us… but it was you. You were there the entire time? Even when Anama…?” A lump had formed in my throat.
The same one that appeared each time I thought of her.
The spark in her eyes when she spoke about her passions.
The warm smile I would never again receive from her. My chest constricted painfully.
The cliffs of Kraventhorn would mourn her loss.
Osmanthius nodded gravely. “We are most sorry for her death. There was nothing we could do.”
Not exactly true. They could have told us we were going in the wrong direction. That could have prevented Anama’s death. But honestly, it wasn’t entirely their fault. Osmanthius was right. They had been under instruction. It was the instructor who was truly at fault.
“Where is Anama’s sprite?” I swallowed past the hard lump.
Calendula sighed. “She has gone home, to Avendir, where the river sprites reside. She was most upset at her mortal’s passing. I don’t think we’ll see her again next season.”
Next season. The thought made me want to be violently sick. But maybe that was also the lack of food, sleep and heavy blood loss.
“Are you allowed to help us get back to Valhan House?” I aimed this question at Osmanthius.
“Of course. We were only barred from assisting you within the forest. And I’ll have the record show that I care a great deal for my mortal.” He squared his shoulders, looking affronted. “There were numerous times I wanted to intervene, but not all of us lack restraint.”
Calendula gave him a withering look.
I didn’t feel anger toward her. She had done more than she should have – more than any of the others, in fact – to prevent the outcome. I was too stupid not to have recognized the sign for what it was.
I sighed, turning back to wave Lana and Moric toward us. “Take us back to Valhan House, please.”
Osmanthius and Calendula were surprisingly quiet on the walk back.
It seemed, having aired out their argument, the effort of flying back was now taking its toll on them.
Calendula refused to sit on my shoulder, claiming she deserved better than a shoulder perch, earning her a scathing look from Osmanthius, who was nestled against Lana’s neck.
Instead, Calendula made me hold out a hand for her to rest on.
It was infinitely more effort than my screaming joints and muscles could muster but I ignored the pain, just like I had ignored it for the past three days.
I shoved it in the box of things I was too afraid to ever open again. It was getting surprisingly full.
The sun was setting, limning the snowy crests in glistening gold, by the time we started up the cobblestone pathway to the gate of Valhan House. Kilian stood at the arch, arms folded across his chest. As if he had been waiting.
When he saw me trudging up the steps, something inside me flickered back to life.
Anger. Panic. No, not panic. Terror. Icy fear unlike anything I had ever felt before.
Kilian stomped down the pathway, meeting me halfway before I could even cross over into the courtyard.
His hands reached for my face but did not touch my skin.
His expression was a mask of fury and rage, and something indescribable. “You’ve been gone for three days. Three. Days.”
I looked up into his impenetrable silver eyes. “I wasn’t aware there was a time limit on this challenge. We were told to simply survive.” My voice was a cold creature, a beast of ice and snow.
Lana and Moric paused a few feet ahead, but I could see the other instructors waiting just beyond the archway, so I motioned them forward. “Go on. I’ll be there soon.”
Kilian shifted back into my field of vision before I could get a response from my friends. “I’ve been waiting–”
“If you were so concerned, you should have sent a servant into the woods to check on us. That way you wouldn’t have had to wait.”
“I’m not in the business of keeping servants,” he snapped. “And you’re missing the point. I thought you had died.”
“Why would you think that? Doesn’t your little link tell you if I’m dead?”
“Yes,” he said, through gritted teeth. “I felt your pain. It felt like my own body was being ripped to shreds. And then it went silent.”
I made to move past him, but he blocked me.
“What am I supposed to say? I’m sorry the link was silent.
I was dealing with more pressing issues, like staying alive.
Besides, I heard you chirping in my head.
You asked me if my friends’ lives were more important than my own.
You told me to take both daggers and run, leaving them defenseless. ”
“I told you to save yourself. The Mortal Trials are no game, Lirahna. You can’t hope to stay alive and save your friends. There are no winners. No friendships. There are only survivors.”
“I don’t want to survive if I lose those most important to me in the process.”
“That’s a fool’s answer.”
“Then I am a fool. Let me pass. I have been traipsing the forest for three days. I need to eat. I need to sleep. I need to see a godsdamned medic.”
“Are you hurt?”
“I’m fine. I took impid root, but I’ve lost a lot of blood. I need water, and I need to rest. I don’t have the strength to be standing in the courtyard having it out with you. I’m alive. Can you let me go now?”
He took a step closer, crowding my space, his scent hitting me for the first time in days. “You’re angry with me.”
Despite the swelling of rage in my chest, I hated how my body drew instinctively toward his. It made me even more enraged. I wanted to reach for the blade at his side and sink it into his neck. I wanted to cut him where it would hurt the most.
“Are you serious? My friend is dead because of the challenge you set. Because you commanded the sprites not to help us. Because you kidnapped us to compete in challenges no one asked to be a part of. I’m not angry, I’m fucking furious!
” I shoved away from him, pushing my legs to stalk off.
I just had to make it to the med hall and then I could collapse.
Kilian had the fucking gall to reach for my arm, gripping it firmly enough to whirl me back around. His voice was soft when he said, “Not everyone is going to survive these challenges, Lirah. They’re not meant to.”
It was the straw that broke my back.
I hadn’t even had time to mourn Anama. To grieve the loss of what had truly happened in the forest. And he was implying…
what? That everyone I had come to know and love here would die trying to pass the Trials?
The thought of anything happening to Lana or Moric made me see red.
Sleep deprivation and hunger clouded my vision, anger blossoming into an unruly, wild monster, woken from a century-long slumber.
I wrenched my arm from his grip. The voice I used was colder than any summit snow.
“The problem with you elven is that you think you’re so much better than mortals.
Our lives may be fragile, and death may be on the precipice each moment we breathe, but it takes strength to be mortal.
To love, in spite of the overarching threat of death at any minute.
To forge real, genuine friendships with no expectation of receiving anything in return. To share in sorrow and loss. To feel.”
Kilian’s eyes darkened. “You think we do not feel? That we are incapable of love, friendship or grief?”
“I don’t think it. I know it. We have something you will never understand.”
“What’s that?” he snarled.
I leaned closer to him as I drove my point home. “Humanity. And I feel so fucking sorry for you.”