Chapter 3
Nyx
No matter how far we’ve come, and it feels as though we’ve walked further than I’ve ever walked in my life, the Obsidian Spire still appears so far off in the distance that we might never arrive there at all. Is it really something we can even reach? Could this be a trick of the gods?
I try to push the thoughts aside. It doesn’t matter what this is. I have to do it. For my sister.
We walked for hours without seeing a single thing that wanted to kill us.
No monsters. No competitors. No sign that anyone or anything else existed in this forest at all.
The trees stood empty. The underbrush stayed still.
Even the distant sounds that have haunted every other hour of these trials: the growls, the crashes, the screams that could belong to anything, have gone quiet.
It should feel like a gift.
It doesn't.
A silence this complete is deeply unsettling, like the forest is holding its breath. Like everything in it has either fled or gone very, very still for a reason we haven't figured out yet.
Thorian hasn't said anything about it, which somehow makes it worse. He's been scanning the tree line at regular intervals all day, his expression giving nothing away. But I've noticed that his hand hasn't strayed far from his weapon since the scream this morning.
Fenric and I have taken our cues from him, relaxing slightly in the knowledge that his senses will catch anything before it reaches us. But the longer the quiet holds, the less that comfort seems to cover.
Something is wrong with this stretch of forest. I don't know what. I'm not sure I want to.
“Maybe there won’t be a challenge today,” I say, a little out of breath.
Thorian lets out a low laugh at what I’ve said, shaking his head and ignoring the rock that slides past his boot.
For the past hour, Fenric has been trying to get him to kick a rock with him, but Thorian has been steadfastly ignoring the invitation.
Which means it’s mostly been Fenric kicking his rock, muttering under his breath about a game he and his siblings used to play on walks to town.
It made me think of that walk with Ivor to town, which already feels like a millennium ago.
“There will be something,” Thorian says bitterly. “There is always something. The gods like to be amused. They wouldn't let a day pass without ensuring we endured another gruesome spectacle. They look forward to this competition, and their bet, all year.”
“What charmers,” Fenric says, which makes Thorian snort in amusement.
Fenric darts a glance at me, raising his eyebrows like, wow, look at that, I can make the demi-god laugh, and Thorian apparently catches the entire thing, because he steps to the side and kicks Fenric’s rock into the forest, ruining the berserker’s fun.
“Game over,” Thorian mutters, which makes me laugh, and Fenric pout.
Though we’ve only been team members for a handful of days, me with Thorian obviously longer than with Fenric, it feels like we’re a little family.
I’m getting used to their quirks: Thorian’s extended silence and Fenric’s constant snacking, the way he disappears from the trail and returns with handfuls of berries and nuts, always offering them to us first.
Today, the air is cool and crisp, but we aren’t in an autumnal landscape like before.
The trees around us are brilliantly and vibrantly green.
Fenric has called them out to us as we walk, identifying the various types and explaining what their sap is like, whether or not they have seeds or cones, and enough detail that Thorian has started muttering, “Nerd,” under his breath, which makes me laugh.
For a stretch, I can’t stop imagining what it would be like to walk like this, with them, at home.
For Fenric to teach me about the trees and plants near the manor.
For Thorin to quietly protect me from any imagined danger.
The two of them could meet Ivor and Hilda, could see the bedroom I grew up in.
Could merge this world with my real world and be something… something real to me.
A shiver moves over my skin at the thought of being alone with them somewhere that isn't this.
Somewhere with four walls and a door and no immediate threat of death waiting just beyond it.
I think about what it might be like to kiss Fenric slowly, without the adrenaline of survival pushing everything faster than it should go.
To find out whether he's as careful and attentive as I suspect, or whether that warmth hides a different side of him.
I think about Thorian, about what he'd be like with the urgency stripped away, whether he'd be commanding or patient as he kissed and touched me, or some combination of the two that I can't quite picture yet but find myself wanting to.
I wonder what it would be like to have both of them in the same room. Whether that would feel like too much or exactly right.
Probably exactly right. Which I need to stop thinking about right away.
I drag my attention back to the trees, my face warm despite the cool air, and become suddenly and uncomfortably aware of the leathers sticking to my skin after days without bathing.
I would give a great deal right now for the chance to stop, wash my hair, and re-braid it properly.
But Thorian has been pushing us to keep moving, and I'm not going to be the one who asks to stop.
With Fenric feeding us constantly, we haven’t needed to hunt or build a fire, and so we just keep plodding along, pausing when Thorian tells us to pause, and moving when he gives us the all-clear again.
His sight and hearing are stronger than both mine and Fenric’s, even as ours are more attuned than that of a human's.
“I’ll bet the other teams took the day to recover,” Fenric says, sucking the berry juice from each of his fingers as we round a bend in the forest, the gentle twinkling of a stream filtering in through the rustling of leaves.
“After what happened with the swamp, I’ll bet they all needed rest. Especially the knights.
That’s why we haven’t come across them today. ”
Thorian lets out a low bark of laughter, “No. Not likely. The gods don’t like inaction. During my second competition, they sent a swarm of tri-stinger wasps onto a team that slept through the day, wariness leading them to exhaustion. Do you know how wasps lay their eggs?”
Fenric and I share a look, and I shake my head. Thorian shudders, “Well, be glad for that. Let’s just say these tri-stinger wasps had a preference for living hosts.”
Fenric grimaces, and Thorian goes on, “Once, they sent a group of sloth bears, their poisoned claws dragging along the ground and trees, leaving behind a sticky green goop in all their wounds. Even those who got away from the attack still died after being slashed at with the stuff.”
“Ugh.” Fenric makes a noise of disgust, clearly imagining the poisonous goop.
Thorian stares at the ground, pausing for a moment, his expression hardening from disgust into something closer to loathing.
“I imagine the divines sitting around together, drinking and laughing and dreaming up whatever they can imagine to send at us, to amuse themselves with the torment.
To take pleasure in the suffering of others is the definition of evil, and yet people excuse the divines simply because they're powerful. It's sickening.”
“Gods,” I mutter, then realize the irony and laugh, which makes the corner of Thorian’s mouth quirk, some of that hatred etched onto his face slipping away as he begins to walk again. In the distance, we can hear the trickling of water, and I itch at the chance to fill my canteen.
After what happened with Fenric, I’m taking more care to keep it full. If he has to go into his berserker form again, I want to make sure I can take care of him after the shift back.
“Sleeping and resting for too long isn’t the only risk,” Thorian says as he comes to a stop, his boot sinking into the fine silt along the stream's edge.
He kneels down, dipping his canteen into the clear water, and Fenric and I copy him, conversation pausing for a moment and leaving nothing but silence.
In moments like these, I forget where we are.
Being with Fenric and Thorian has a way of confusing me, creating a false sense of calm and ease that I know I should fight.
It’s almost like being with them is strangely similar to being courted.
Every interaction lets us get to know each other.
Every day that passes, I feel closer to them.
Yet, at the end of this there isn’t a proposal.
There’s an Obsidian Spire that we may or may not live long enough to see.
So keep those silly ideas out of your head.
With my canteen full, after drinking my share, I put it back in the bag on Thorian’s back.
We’re at a crossing, a small log providing dry passage from one side of the water to the other.
The men finish filling their canteens, then Thorian crosses the log with ease, not even holding his hands out for balance.
When he reaches the other side, he turns and holds his hand out to me, a hand that I focus on across the distance, willing myself just to reach it. I step up onto the log, the water glittering just under my feet as I begin to cross. About halfway across, I lose my footing.
Fenric is there in a second, behind me on the log, his hand on my waist to steady me. Thorian leans forward, taking my hand. Neither of them releases me until I’m firmly on the other side of the creek.
When I step out of their reach, face red, Fenric clears his voice and asks, “What’s the other risk?”
I give him a funny look.
Fenric grins. “Thorian said there’s more than just the risk of sleeping or resting too long.”
Right.
“Going the wrong way,” Thorian says, and I look up, realizing we’re in a more dense section of the forest, and can no longer see the spire in the distance. It’s as though crossing the stream spat us out from one world, landing us in another.