Chapter Twenty-three
THEA
W ilder led her into the depths of the Aveum mountains, and after a time, wordlessly handed her his cloak.
She could barely feel the bite of the cold, but then, she hadn’t known she’d been slowly freezing to death in those caves, so she took it gratefully, glad for its weight and warmth around her shoulders, glad for the scent of him that wrapped around her with it.
She didn’t like that they’d left the others in the middle of a skirmish. After everything she, Cal and Kipp had been through, it didn’t feel right that they weren’t together. They had stood by her through everything, they had —
‘They’re safe with Torj,’ Wilder told her gruffly.
Thea unclenched her jaw and relaxed her furrowed brow. She supposed her worry had been written all over her face, as usual. ‘But the attack —’
‘They had it in hand.’
‘How can you be sure?
‘The Bear Slayer just saved my life,’ he replied. ‘If he said he’ll bring them to the meet point, that’s exactly what he’ll do.’
There was no room for argument after that.
As they trudged through the undergrowth, a sliver of moon appeared, the eclipse shifting at long last. Thea didn’t know what it meant, that it had lasted so long, or that it was finally fading. She didn’t ask.
In the returning moonlight she could see the furrow of Wilder’s brow, the conflict across his face.
He was at odds with himself; she’d seen that look many times before, often pertaining to her.
But this time… This time guilt curdled in her gut.
She didn’t have the whole story, not yet, but she knew she’d been wrong about him, and that thought alone mortified her into silence.
She had felt in her bones that it didn’t add up, but she had hunted him across the midrealms anyway.
She had cursed his existence and had him thrown in the ice dungeons.
She had allowed hatred to make her bitter, to make her resent what they had once shared together.
But here he was – stoic and sturdy as ever.
The tension between them grew tauter with each passing moment, and she knew he was processing his own feelings about it all as well. What could she say to undo even a little of the damage? What could she do to take away the pain she’d caused him? She didn’t deserve his forgiveness.
The heated kiss they had shared in the Vios stables came back to her, as did the words he’d spoken to her there.
‘I’ll never stop being yours.’
Thea hardly knew what to feel about everything unfolding around her, but she knew that she’d been wrong, so deeply and utterly wrong. And that Wilder had paid the price for it.
Every time a question formed on her lips, she bit it back. How long until they met up with the shadow-touched? What had become of the monster in the floating dome, and of all their friends? How would they face the realms now, knowing all that stood against them?
The silence from Wilder reminded her of their first journey together, when he had escorted her from Thezmarr to Harenth to petition the rulers to become a shieldbearer. That had been two years ago. Two years that felt like a lifetime with all they had endured between.
‘Watch your —’
But it was too late – Thea slipped on the uneven terrain as they descended over a ridge.
Wilder caught her, his warm hands closing around her waist, his long fingers spanning her ribs, the strength of him near-intoxicating.
She couldn’t help it; she breathed him in, relishing his familiar scent, the touch that seared through her clothes.
And just for a moment, his gaze dropped to her mouth, his eyes darkening.
But then the heated look was gone, and he cleared his throat, holding her until her feet were steady beneath her once again.
‘Thanks.’ She willed his touch to linger.
It didn’t.
‘Wilder…’ she started, unable to bear the quiet any longer.
‘It’s just down here,’ he said, cutting her off and moving ahead of her.
She followed, noting how twisted all the barren trees were in this part of Aveum, as though some force had swept through and tangled them.
A particularly large naked trunk stood in the middle of the woods, its base surrounded by jagged boulders covered in a pale green moss that reminded Thea of fine lace.
With a grunt, Wilder put all his weight behind one of the giant rocks and pushed. The huge stone rolled to the side to reveal an opening just beyond.
‘I thought we were going to a campsite…’ Thea said tentatively.
‘We are. Of sorts.’
‘Where are we, then?’
‘We’re still in Aveum, just deep underground.’
‘Is this where we’re meeting Torj and the others?’
‘Not yet. We’ll meet them after. They won’t be far from us.’ He motioned to the gap. ‘Princesses first.’
Out of habit, she shot him a look before she remembered herself.
At a crouch, Thea entered the dark space, placing her hands out before her face and finding that she couldn’t see a single finger as she edged into what must have been some sort of tunnel.
The crunch of rock sounded behind her, and she heard Wilder brushing his hands off as he followed her inside.
There was a strike of flint, and a moment later the cavern was illuminated by torchlight.
‘This way,’ Wilder said, taking the lead once more, down into the depths of the underground.
‘Is this place at all linked to the tunnels beneath the midrealms you mentioned?’
‘It is,’ he allowed, glancing at her as though he were surprised it had taken her this long to break the silence with one of her questions.
‘As far as I’m aware, the network is modelled off a similar design in another realm beyond the Veil.
But for our tunnels, it started with connections between five key points. ’
‘The five ruling kingdoms,’ Thea guessed.
‘A little more lowbrow than that… Remember I told you of the connected sister taverns?’
Thea pushed a loose strand of hair from her eyes. ‘The Laughing Fox in Harenth, the Dancing Badger in Naarva, the… Stag in Delmira…’ She trailed off, the rest of the names escaping her.
‘The Flying Stag, yes. And the Blushing Bear in Tver, and the —’
‘Singing Hare in Aveum. I should have remembered that one. Kipp has been harassing me for months to go there.’
Wilder huffed a gruff laugh at that. ‘Why am I not surprised?’
Thea shrugged tentatively. ‘Kipp is Kipp.’
Wilder continued down the path. ‘In any case, those taverns were the starting point for the whole network. Originally it was to counter a particular prohibition law, then it was to avoid the kingdoms’ various importation taxes.
It’s far more extensive than that now, but few know of these tunnels.
And those who do, well… They were the people likely to frequent the original taverns in the first place. Riff-raff, so to speak.’
The Warsword grew quiet again after that, but as they moved deeper into the caverns, Thea could hear other sounds.
People. Crackling fires. Children.
At last, the tunnel opened up into a much larger cavern, which was filled with golden light from small campfires, torches and candles.
Domed tents were set up all around the space in little circular hubs, just like a village or town might be structured.
Judging from the parents chasing after their youngsters with laughter on their lips, this place was safe…
It was a community, a family. That was obvious, even to an outsider.
Somewhere in the distance, a fiddle played, and Thea sucked in a breath.
‘This isn’t like…’
But she didn’t finish her sentence. She’d never explicitly told Wilder about the visions of Anya she’d had.
Of the Daughter of Darkness cutting her hair and stalking through the torture camps, screams echoing in her wake.
There was no screaming here, no torture.
In fact, it was the warmest place Thea had been to in a long while.
‘Not like what?’ Wilder asked, frowning at her.
Thea opened her mouth to tell him what she’d seen of her supposed sister —
As the name formed on her lips, the Daughter of Darkness in question came storming towards her through the small crowds mingling around the fires.
And that was what she was – a living storm. Embodying the very magic Thea herself had once had and lost. That hollow yawned wide inside her, searching for the kernel of power that was no longer there. The absence of it hurt, an ache deep within.
‘Storm magic runs deep through the Delmirian line… It is just as powerful in each of us,’ Anya had said to her.
Now, Anya’s eyes were bright with an unbroken tempest as she stopped abruptly right in front of Thea.
She looked every bit the fearsome leader of an enemy force, with her shaved head, the lines of her face razor-sharp, and that savage scar that sliced from above her brow through her right eye and halfway down her cheek.
It looked even more pronounced than Thea recalled.
‘A shame we’re not meeting under different circumstances,’ Anya said stiffly, surveying Thea from head to toe.
‘We’ve met,’ Thea reminded her. ‘When you took my sister hostage in Notos.’
‘Our sister,’ Anya replied, her voice rough with emotion, her great wings flaring behind her. She looked even more fierce, even more vengeful.
Thea could only stare. The words Malik had once spoken to her came rushing to the forefront of her mind: ‘Beware the fury of a patient Delmirian…’
Anya was fury personified, alright, and it took all of Thea’s backbone not to yield a step back.
‘Our sister,’ Anya repeated. ‘I’m your family, whether you like it or not.’
‘You didn’t leave a great first impression.’
‘At least you remembered me this time.’
The two women stared at one another. It wasn’t just eye colour they shared, but their dark, strong brows as well, both currently fixed into scowls.
Sister . The word vibrated through Thea like a bell as she took in the proof of it before her eyes. ‘Why did you not come forward and tell Wren and me who you were, rather than hiding in the shadows?’