Chapter Ten
THEA
A bitter taste spread across Thea’s tongue. For the past year, she had been hunting the traitor Wilder Hawthorne, and he’d been… What? Shacking up with an old flame?
‘I cared about her a lot. She was good to me.’ Hawthorne had told her of the Naarvian ranger over a year ago amid the ruins of Delmira. And Thea had replied that he deserved someone to be good to him. She had truly believed that, once.
‘Glad to meet you at last, Thea,’ Adrienne said warmly.
She was beautiful. Her blonde hair framed her pretty face and hung loose past her shoulders.
Her features were feminine, not even close to marred by the smudges of dirt across her flawless skin.
She smiled with full lips, luscious lips that Thea couldn’t help but picture brushing against Hawthorne’s mouth.
Her mind conjured up the image of them together, a tangle of perfect, naked limbs —
Releasing the woman’s hand, Thea chastised herself. None of it mattered. Not a single thing.
‘Thea —’ There was a pleading note in Hawthorne’s voice as it interrupted her thoughts, but he was cut off by a snort of amusement.
Adrienne was surveying the heavy manacles around his wrists. ‘Things are going well then, I take it?’
‘I’ve got it under control,’ Hawthorne grunted, approaching the fire.
For another second, Thea could see them together, so easily. The Naarvian rebel and the fallen Warsword… The way they spoke to one another was with such familiarity as well. She could imagine the blonde in his arms, beneath his body, in his bed. It doesn’t matter , Thea chanted to herself.
Adrienne gave another chuckle at Hawthorne’s expense. ‘Sure looks that way,’ she quipped, before she turned her gaze on Thea. ‘You look like her, you know…’
The Naarvian didn’t need to specify to whom she referred. The prickling on Thea’s nape told her all she needed to know. Hawthorne’s former lover was telling her that she looked like her long-lost shadow-wielding sister, Anya. The true heir of Delmira.
A flurry of memories came back to her then, shown to her once by a reaper in Delmira. A field of flowers. Two pairs of small hands braiding them together to form a necklace. The smell of heather. The darkness of being hidden in a wagon, hurtling over uneven terrain, a small body either side of her.
Thea clenched her fists at her sides. ‘If you’re in league with the Daughter of Darkness, and you’re in league with the traitor here, then you’re a traitor too.’
To her surprise, Adrienne grinned, tapping the longsword strapped to her back. ‘Oh, I was a traitor long before I met Anya, or Hawthorne’s moody arse.’
Hawthorne made a noise of agreement from afar. ‘You’ve never been one for the rules, I’ll give you that.’
‘Nor has Thea, from what I hear,’ Adrienne offered, giving Malik’s dagger at her belt a meaningful look.
Fair point, Thea thought, but there was no way she’d admit it aloud. Instead, she sought Cal and Kipp, striding to their side of the fire, noting their rosy cheeks and red-tipped noses.
‘Why aren’t you detaining her?’ she hissed, with a glance across at their unwelcome guest.
Kipp’s brow furrowed. ‘Detaining her? For what?’
‘Associating with a known traitor?’ Thea bit back.
‘You want to arrest everyone he’s ever talked to?’ Cal hiccuped.
Thea rolled her eyes. Men. Absolutely useless.
But her attention was drawn back across the fire to where Adrienne was speaking with Hawthorne.
‘Any luck?’ the ranger asked him.
‘No,’ he replied bluntly.
She clapped him heartily on the shoulder. ‘I guess it’s plan B, then. I’ll let the others know what to expect.’
‘You think I’m just going to let you go?’ Thea blurted in disbelief.
Adrienne looked amused. ‘You sound like Anya too.’
‘I’m nothing like her,’ Thea snapped. ‘And you’re mad if you think I’m setting you loose on the midrealms when you serve her.’
‘You may have your Warsword in chains, storm wielder, but without your magic, I don’t see you being able to stop us all.’
Thea’s jaw nearly dropped, for more than one reason.
This woman knew who she was. Knew of her power and her loss of it. Which meant that Hawthorne had done more than betray her – he’d sold her secrets to the enemy as well.
Her hands itched for her dagger, her sword, her throwing stars in her boots. ‘I have fought and slain worse than the likes of you.’
‘I don’t doubt it,’ Adrienne allowed. ‘But for the record… I don’t serve Anya,’ the rebel said calmly. ‘I serve the Shadow Prince.’
Thea’s mouth went dry at the mention of the other enemy leader. Someone worse than the Daughter of Darkness, who united the strange creatures that sprouted wings and talons like their monster counterparts…
‘Thea…’ Cal interjected. ‘Maybe you should eat something? Sit down by the fire for a while?’
Thea’s whole body was taut with tension, but Kipp came to her side and nudged her gently with his elbow. ‘He’s right, you know. No one is going anywhere yet. There’s roast goat to be had and wine to be drunk, and it’s too fucking cold to leave the fire.’
Thea suppressed a sigh as she scanned the campsite. No one was fleeing the scene; no one was whispering treasonous plans in the dark. In fact, Hawthorne had edged away from the group, and was tending to his stallion as best as his bound hands would allow.
The memory hit her without warning, and the Wesford Road materialised before her, Hawthorne at her side.
‘You never told me what your horse’s name is…’
Wilder’s cheeks flushed and he outwardly grimaced. ‘His name is Biscuit.’
Thea blinked. ‘Biscuit?’
Wilder was clearly trying to keep a straight face. ‘Malik and Talemir’s idea of a joke,’ he admitted. ‘Bastards were there when I claimed him. They jumped in when it came to finalising the poor creature’s name. It stuck.’
A laugh bubbled out of her. ‘ Biscuit . Your warhorse, the gift you received for being one of the most infamous warriors in all the midrealms… is called Biscuit .’
Not long after, Hawthorne had threatened to follow her to Tver and name her stallion Pancake . She’d only laughed.
Now, Thea watched him, the man who’d shed the facade of friendship, of something more, to ally with those who sought to destroy everything she held dear.
She tracked his tender yet masculine motions as he brushed the burrs from Biscuit’s coat and checked the shoe on each foot for stones.
The picture before her was a myriad of contradictions.
‘What even is a ranger?’ Cal asked Adrienne loudly. ‘Are you some sort of spy?’
The newcomer laughed. ‘We’re more like scouts, I suppose. We guard and protect the remaining lands of Naarva. That can mean spying or conducting raids… Mostly we deal with the blight of the shadow wraiths.’
‘But without Naarvian steel, how do you —’
Kipp came to Thea’s side. ‘You alright?’ he asked quietly.
‘Fine,’ she replied, trying to block out the delicate sound of Adrienne’s voice as she chatted to Cal with so much ease. ‘Where’s this food, then?’ Thea couldn’t remember the last time she’d eaten properly, and now, as the aroma of roast goat filled the air, her stomach rumbled.
Kipp threw an arm around her. ‘Come on, I’ll fix you a plate.’
Thea let Kipp lead her to a fallen tree and sit her on one of the saddle blankets. She couldn’t help but watch the ranger and Hawthorne, something ugly prickling under her skin as she did.
‘Kipp?’ she asked, remembering what the Warsword had told her in the cave. ‘What do you know of Aveum springwater?’
Kipp’s brows furrowed. ‘You mean beyond the widely known healing properties? That it comes from the sacred Pools of Purity in the winter kingdom?’
‘Yes, besides all that. Is there anything that…’ She swallowed the lump in her throat that formed as she watched Hawthorne pass Adrienne a flask. ‘Is there anything that makes it more potent?’
‘Surely Wren would have told you?’ Kipp said casually.
Thea imagined there were many things Wren had told her in their early days of alchemy that she had been too stubborn to learn. She had been too focused on wielding swords and shields to commit much else to memory back then. ‘Told me what?’
He followed her gaze to the Warsword and Naarvian. ‘That when it’s used on someone you love, it’s the most powerful healing tonic known to the midrealms.’
Thea blinked.
Kipp nodded across the campsite to Hawthorne. ‘He used his vial on you after the initiation test, didn’t he?’
Thea ran a hand over her face, fighting down the emotion welling up inside her. ‘He did.’
Kipp sighed. ‘Don’t suppose you fancy a drink?’
At last, Thea tore her gaze away from the duo and glanced up at her friend. ‘Actually, Kipp… A drink sounds fucking amazing.’
Dusk settled around them, the hours passing quickly with the chatter between Thea’s friends and Adrienne.
Thea kept to herself, sipping on the flask of wine Kipp had given her and picking at her plate of meat.
It was the most relaxed she’d seen her friends in a long time, and she fought the voice within that told her to force them onwards to Vios.
For Adrienne was right: without her magic, there was no way she could detain Hawthorne and stop the ranger from leaving.
Hawthorne sat closer to the group, resting his elbows on his knees, contributing to the conversation every now and then in a low, barely audible tone. Whenever he spoke, Adrienne listened intently, sometimes laughing at something he said.
Thea finished her food and wine, passing the empty flask back to Kipp. ‘I need to rest,’ she told him.
She wasn’t sure she liked how his face softened in understanding.
‘We set your tent up just over there. I put a heated stone on your bedroll. Hawthorne said…’ Kipp cringed, as though he expected her to erupt at any moment. ‘Well, he mentioned you had some trouble with cold exposure in the tunnel. That you needed —’
‘Thank you,’ Thea interjected. ‘Thank you, Kipp.’