Chapter 18
18
A SET OF SPIKED WINGS protrudes from the blackness ahead.
Initially, the beast’s features lack distinction. The closer we drift in the low-ceilinged tunnel, however, the larger it appears, perched on the heavy iron gate that lies before us. Sharp, puncturing tips jut upward from bent bones, and tapered coal feathers fall in a cascade of lustrous black edged in violet. Never have I seen a creature with so vast a wingspan. They are like dark mountains, these wings, peaked atop the heavy gate below.
Red light bleeds upon the black bars ahead. The water pools like oil before us. A gleaming silver lock bars our passage.
Angling the pole near the stern, Zephyrus drags the end through the mucky riverbed to cut our speed. Harper and I remain quiet, pressed thigh to thigh, shivering in the clammy air pushing through the long tunnel.
I’ve lost track of the hours beneath the earth. Twice I have slept, shallowly and fitfully. Zephyrus assures we have been traveling for three days, but it feels longer, the hours frayed to threads, and my nerves along with them. Soon, we will reach a place of openness, light. I have to believe it.
Eventually, we drift to a complete stop. Harper shifts beside me, her breathing erratic.
“Hello, Bringer of Spring.”
A voice slithers from the shroud of encompassing darkness. It is ancient: the oldest seas, the cleaving earth, a time predating the Text, when all the world was a void. It sounds like an end. To what, I cannot say, but an end nonetheless.
Zephyrus inclines his head. “My will is yours.”
A pulse in the gloom skates across my skin. “So you remember.” The voice softens. “It has been some time.”
“A god never forgets.”
The air whispers as though the dim has become tangible. “Gods? No. But those who worship us? The world shines brightest for mortals. Every day brings something new. Forgetting is to be expected. But what brings the Messenger so far from his master?”
Even at a distance, I sense Zephyrus’ rising tension. “We request safe passage.”
“I assumed as much. Brave of you.” Something faint clicks against the rock. “And terribly foolish.”
I struggle to control my breathing, but I fear the creature hears my increasingly fitful gasps. This cannot be the Stallion, can it?
“The tithe nears, Bringer of Spring. Whatever it is you’re planning, I urge you to reconsider.” The clicking unfolds with rapid punctuations. It reminds me of a thousand insectile legs scuttling over rock. “Do not underestimate Pierus’ wrath.”
“Let me concern myself with that,” Zephyrus snaps.
Something splashes in the distance. “Very well.” I hear the smile in its voice. “You are aware, then, of the payment.”
A dagger appears in Zephyrus’ hand that I’m certain wasn’t present a moment ago. He digs the tip into his palm, twisting. Blood wells black within the hollow. Tilting his hand, he allows three droplets to fall into the water.
The ruby shine streaking the walls softens to a rich pink. A sigh of relief fills the cave, and a moment later, the gates groan open.
Zephyrus directs us through with stone-faced resolution. We are nearly through the opening when something twitches above. I tilt back my head, scanning the top of the tunnel. A wing curls inward, limp feathers rustling. Whatever creature those wings belong to is not quite dead.
My head snaps forward. Harper hasn’t noticed the movement, her gaze downcast. I remember my first visit into Under, the ways its perverse nature had pried open my mind. Willow. The two fair folk coupling beneath the tree. Zephyrus’ voice commands my thoughts more often than not these days. Closing your eyes will make no difference. You have already seen.
A frigid breeze wafts through the space. I rub my arms in an attempt to regain warmth, but to no avail. The sweet reek of rotting plants billows from the cavern ahead.
“I thought you said only mortal women could enter the Grotto,” I whisper to Zephyrus.
He pushes the pole through the current, angling it so we drift into a turn. “This is not the Grotto,” he replies. “We are entering the wilds of Under, where Pierus’ influence has failed to reach. Those who live in these parts are mostly water-dwelling creatures. They live by their own rules.”
“And the Orchid King has no issue with this?” For a man bloated on power, I would assume no corner would be left unmarked by his hand. Once more, I question the why and how of Zephyrus’ relationship with him, the events leading to the Bringer of Spring’s unwilling participation in that gruesome ritual I witnessed.
“Sometimes, the best manner of control is to let people think they are free.”
“I see.” My attention drifts to the River Mur, black on black, bend upon endless bend.
“Don’t touch,” he murmurs. “It will likely be the last thing you ever do.”
Taking a deep breath, I settle in for the remainder of the journey. The darkness has thickened since we passed through the gates. It is like none that I have experienced. We could be traveling in any direction. The river could suddenly drop off and I would not know until the fall.
“Why do you fear the dark?”
Zephyrus’ voice, coaxed from the shadows.
I stare down at my gloved hands. It’s so opaque I cannot make out their shapes. “I never used to.” In truth, I loved nothing more than to wander the forest on the threshold of eve. “But that was before the storm.” Before a lot of things, really.
“Storm?”
I shy from his gaze. “It’s the reason I lost my mother. The spring of my eleventh year, the weather was particularly harsh. Sometimes it hailed. There were long spells of drought, which killed the crops.”
My eyes close as those weary, hard-edged memories wrench free.
“The storm was sudden. Clear skies, then the strongest winds you could imagine. It splintered trees, turned entire structures to rubble. Our home was destroyed. My mother and I fled deeper into Carterhaugh.” A few heartbeats pass before I’m able to continue. “She took me to the mountain’s base. An old tree had rotted through, and she told me to hide inside its trunk, told me I would be safe there while she searched for help.”
We drift, passing quietly through eternity. I pretend I am elsewhere: a bright, open field, free of the earth’s crushing weight. “For three days, I awaited my mother’s return. It was dark. Raining. I heard the abbey bells marking the hour. On the evening of the third day, she returned, but I did not know that things had changed.” Or that it was the last time I would ever see her.
Zephyrus has stopped propelling the boat. By the Father, I swore I would never return down this road. My mother’s behavior had deteriorated, lapsing into the erratic, the far-fetched, the reckless, all motivation rooted in paranoia. She could not yank me out of that tree fast enough, hauling me toward the pealing bells in the distance, Thornbrook’s white spires.
“I do not fear the dark because there is no light,” I tell Zephyrus. “I fear the dark because of what it means to me: solitude.”
And that is the most I have ever spoken of this weakness—to anyone.
The tips of his fingers brush the top of my forearm. “Give me your hand.”
Once I loosen my grip, he places something in my palm. Round, light, delicate as a flower petal. I squeeze it in curiosity. It has no give. “What is this?”
“Tap the side.”
A faint ring echoes, and I blink against a sudden rosy light. “Oh.” How lovely. And familiar. I’m positive he showed me this object prior to entering the Orchid King’s lair.
“It’s called a roselight.” His face, caught within the disk of illumination, softens. I frown, peering closer at him. For a moment, I could have sworn his features had altered. “Once Under’s roses reach maturity, their petals are harvested into a substance of eternal light.”
“It’s beautiful.” I lift the object higher, let the brightness devour the gray as the walls open up and the River Mur empties into a vast underground lake. Holding its heartbeat in my hand, the darkness recedes, and I calm. This roselight, yet another unsolved mystery surrounding our immortal guide. There is much I do not know about the West Wind.
“You mentioned before you favor the bow,” I say. “But I have never seen you carry one.”
“Ah.” Lowering the pole across the length of the boat, he crouches next to me, Harper at his back. “My bow is long gone, unfortunately. I gifted it to my elder brother’s wife.”
This statement is made of pieces, and I mentally examine each one. If he believes people are inherently selfish and goodwill is naught but smoke, what was his motive? There, I think, is a story yet to be told.
“Wren is a gifted archer,” he continues. “I know she will care for the weapon. But I regret the manner in which I gifted it to her. As such, I am barred from Boreas’ realm forevermore.”
“Why?”
Zephyrus taps a finger against his leg. Tension climbs, cresting to cloud his eyes with what I believe is regret or grief, perhaps both. “Because I made poor choices. Because I was selfish. Because I did not learn.”
It tells me nothing. I want to know. I must know. Again, I demand, “Why?”
“Let me ask you something. Do you ever wonder why some people have all the luck?”
“All the time,” I reply truthfully.
“Doesn’t matter what they do. The world unfolds before them, shaping itself into the most pristine path. Others may try to do what is right, but their attempts are twisted, impure. Any progress is countered by another obstacle.” There is a pause. “My brother is a good man. He’s made mistakes, but haven’t we all?” His throat bobs, and he runs a hand along his jaw, the hiss of skin on stubble loud in the dark. “He’s moved forward and built a beautiful life for himself. He deserves it. Me? I question whether anyone could love someone with a past like mine. Someone like me.”
It is perhaps the saddest thing I’ve ever heard, and yet I understand to a frightening degree what Zephyrus feels—the inadequacy.
“Cold?” he murmurs.
Despite his smaller stature, his hands swamp mine. They sit like wheaten gold against my slim brown gloves, flushed pink by the roselight.
Though I have not answered his question, he lifts my hands to his mouth to blow on my fingers. Even through the leather, his hot breath engulfs my icy skin.
Our eyes lock across the shroud inundating the underground lake. There is a thickness to the air that wasn’t present a moment ago. Another exhalation streams across my palms, and the sting begins to thaw into a pleasant tingle.
Zephyrus lowers my hands. “Better?”
My voice has fled. I can only nod. And I have officially been staring for too long.
Shifting out of reach, I turn toward Harper to see how she is faring. The boat, however, is empty.
I whirl around. “Harp—”
Zephyrus catches my shoulder in warning. “Take care with your friend’s name.”
“Where did she go?”
A beat of silence passes. “She cannot be reached.”
“What?”
Grave is his expression, entrenched in the weight of mortality. But it is not his own mortality he fears. For Zephyrus, Bringer of Spring, cannot die. “They have taken her.”
“Who has taken her?” My eyes strain as I scan the open water. What manner of creature dwells beneath the surface? “How?” We would have witnessed her abduction, right?
“The naiads,” he whispers. “Nymphs who dwell in fresh water. They are shrewd creatures, able to manipulate the air and water to mask sight and sound.”
Something has frozen inside me: my heart, or my stomach, or my lungs. The air had changed. I did not imagine it. I see nothing. I heard nothing, not even a splash. She could be just below the surface. I lean over the side of the vessel, searching—
A firm yank drags me backward, and I land hard on my rear, rocking the boat. The roselight hits the bottom of the hull with a crack and rolls beneath the bench. “Naiads paralyze their victims upon contact. A numbing kiss, they call it. She will drown once the paralysis wears off.”
“Paralysis?” Was my distraction the reason she was taken unaware? If I had been more attentive, if I had resisted Zephyrus’ allure… “How long does the paralysis last?”
With a kindness I have not often encountered, the West Wind says, “It is not a painful death. She will have no awareness of what is happening.”
I may dislike Harper, but to perish in water, away from life-giving sunlight, her soul will be forever barred from the Eternal Lands. I wish that fate upon no one.
Slowly, I push to my knees, adjusting the skirt around my legs. I then reach for the roselight, grasp its sleek, cold shape. What do I need? Time, and it is already gone.
“Look at me.” Zephyrus grabs my arm, but I shake him free. “It’s too late for her.”
“It’s never too late,” I say, and dive into the oily black lake.