Chapter 64
Zadriel
“Aoife!” Zadriel shouted, leaning against the mouth of a cave, his voice echoing off stone.
Yet again, there was no answer. Where was she?
Jagged rocks tore at his tattered cloak, his waterlogged boots heavy while he trudged to the next cave, the tide lapping at his laces.
Spilling inside. The onset of spring may have stolen the bite of cold from the air, but the ocean’s touch was frigid, sinking through flesh to curl around bone.
Zadriel’s teeth chattered—he couldn’t feel his toes.
The water rose another inch, pushing until he stumbled. “Aoife, where are you?”
Mother damn me.
A curtain of seaweed slid over his brow as he dipped his head into the cavern, searching the darkness for a hint of blonde hair or sea-green eyes. “Where the fuck is she?” he muttered under his breath.
“Zadriel!” Aoife’s voice tumbled down the cliffside from above. “Get up here before the tide takes you.”
Zadriel backed up a step, water sloshing, and found Aoife waving from atop the cliff, standing in the shadow of an old spruce.
“Of course she already left,” he mumbled to no one at all, searching the shoreline for the best spot to climb.
He dragged his gold-stained fingers over stone while he trudged along the shoreline toward its western edge, Aoife following along from above.
“You should have called for me sooner!” he shouted up to her.
Aoife offered an apologetic wince. “I was hiding until I heard you calling for me. The caves didn’t feel safe with the coming tide, and you told me to stay away.”
He dipped his chin—she was right, Zadriel couldn’t deny it, but that didn’t stop him from grumbling when more icy water trickled into his boots.
He hoped they’d brought his bags with them.
It wasn’t simply his sopping socks driving him mad; his clothing was filthy, crusted with weeks’ worth of blood, sweat, and dirt, and what little sap he hadn’t forced back into the earth after Silas stopped breathing.
The shoreline dipped, the gentle incline easier to climb. Zadriel gripped a notch in the stone wall, pulling himself up, boots slipping before he found purchase. His bones ached while he scaled the cliffside, a dull thunder rumbling in his head—he was so fucking tired.
Rotten grass and soggy leaves slick with melting snow met his fingers when he pulled himself over the edge, rolling onto his back. Unwilling to rise. If only he could sleep for a week. Dream for a week. Spend eternity with the Little Witch.
He sighed, tipping his head to look up at Aoife. “Please tell me camp isn’t far.”
She frowned down at him, eyeing the line of blood on his cheek, the cut long since healed. “We hadn’t set up camp yet, unless Aedlin’s managed it on her own.”
That’s unlikely, Zadriel thought, a quiet laugh on his breath. “And where exactly is Aedlin?”
Aoife’s gaze drifted through the sparse cluster of trees, slinking eastward. “I left her in a thicket not far from here. Fair warning, she’s been in a foul mood since they took you.”
He sat up slowly, rubbing his temples, guilt twisting in his gut. “Has she suffered?”
“She’s been restless, sleeping little, pacing so much I thought I would go mad.
” Aoife crouched beside him, slipping her bag from her shoulder and rifling through her things.
“She snapped a few days ago and said she was going to find you with or without me; I don’t think she believed you’d come back on your own.
Once we tracked you down, it wasn’t easy to convince her to stay back while I took care of things, but I managed. ”
Zadriel nodded along, picking at the dry blood spattered on his knuckles. “Why risk yourself to save me? Why come with her at all?”
Aoife shrugged. “I haven’t forgotten our bargain,” she said, pulling an apple from her bag and holding it out in offering. “If I left her and Darius, and something happened to them, I didn’t want to spend my days looking over my shoulder while you hunted me down.”
A shaky laugh curled on Zadriel’s breath.
She wasn’t wrong. If she caused himself, Aedlin, or Darius harm, Zadriel had promised her death, and he’d have no choice but to honor their bargain.
The Mother would demand it. He didn’t miss the way she blanched at his quiet admittance, but he ignored it, reaching for the apple.
“Thank you,” he said, before taking a bite, closing his eyes while juice spilled over his tongue.
“Eden is close,” he mumbled around his food.
“We can finish our travels and settle this soon.”
Aoife let out a heavy sigh. “Thank the gods.” She glanced sidelong at Zadriel, her lips thinning. “What did Silas mean when he said...”
“Said what?”
She hesitated for a moment, then shook her head. “Never mind, it’s nothing.”
Zadriel raised a brow but she looked away, her expression hidden by long strands of blonde hair.
“We found his weapon after they took you, the one he used to snare me. At first, it felt almost like my magic, like they wove air around it somehow.” She glanced back at him.
“The power coursing around it disappeared, though.”
It was a relief, knowing another piece of Elodie was gone.
“It was an enchantment,” he said bitterly.
“Blood magic, to be more specific, which rarely lasts long, unless you have immensely powerful reagents on hand. Elodie likely carved into a poor air Elementalist and bound their magic into her spell.”
“That’s awful.”
Gold glittered on his fingers when he took another bite of his apple. “I don’t think she’ll be doing anything like that again.”
Aoife gave him a curious look, but Zadriel ignored it. He stood, brushing orange pine needles from his tattered cloak, a dull, pleasant ache throbbing on his neck. He pressed his hand to it, wondering if there was a bruise. Remembering the feel of the Little Witch’s teeth in his dream.
It had to be a coincidence, the wound a parting gift from Silas’s fists.
“Let’s make our way to Aedlin,” he said, taking one last look at the horizon.
Deep blue ocean kissed an azure sky—it was as if Cillian watched from the heavens, the same fire in his eyes as the last time they spoke.
Guilt coated Zadriel’s stomach, a sour taste clawing up his throat and enveloping his tongue, and he averted his gaze.
They walked in easy silence, save for the squeak of Zadriel’s wet boots—he hated being so loud, it went against his nature.
Chickadees hopped from branch to branch, a blur of black and white swooping past while they searched for food.
He broke off a piece of his apple and laid it flat on his palm.
It wasn’t long before a small bird landed on his fingers, pecking at the fruit, talons tickling his skin.
Zadriel smiled, in spite of his quaking heart, his focus drifting to Aoife. “I could have sworn you were in Baith.”
A twig snapped against her shoulder, barely noticed; Aoife was enthralled by the chickadee, watching with wide eyes. “What made you think that?”
“I could feel Darius.”
She pursed her lips—how much had Aedlin told her while he was gone? Did she understand his curse? “You clearly couldn’t since we were never there,” she finally said. “Aedlin refused to listen to your insistence we journey to Baith. She didn’t want to travel that far without you.”
Zadriel’s grin dropped, the little bird carrying away what fragile hope he had left as it soared back into the trees.
“Did you arrive last night, sometime before sunrise?” It was then he’d begun to feel better, his curse loosening its grip, no longer shredding him apart from the inside.
Was it possible, in his agony, he was mistaken?
Thinking the pull led toward Baith when, in fact, it came from elsewhere?
Wind tremored around them while Aoife frowned. “No, I came straight to you after Aedlin and I settled on a spot to make camp this morning.”
A spot in the opposite direction.
His stomach dropped. Zadriel turned on his heels toward the pull he’d been feeling for weeks. Facing Baith. His tether vibrating in his chest, even now, demanding he follow.
I’ve been watching.
The apple slipped through Zadriel’s shaking hands, bouncing on the ground by his feet and rolling to a stop in front of a peeling birch.
“Brennan.” He said the word like one whispered the name of a wrathful God.
As if it may summon him. He’d been a fool to consider anything else, to hope that raspy voice in his ear was a dream.
His dark eyes scanned the woods, wide and wild as he waited for the man to reveal himself, knowing the fury he’d find burning in his bright stare.
Backing up a step, Zadriel couldn’t help his shuddering breath, nor the way he flinched when his back hit the naked branch of a maple tree. He reached for the corner of his cloak, forgetting for a moment that it, too, had been taken from him.
“What’s wrong?” Aoife asked, her face scrunched with concern, though Zadriel hardly noticed the sound of her voice.
All he could hear was the furious beat of his heart, thundering in his ears so loudly it hurt. He searched for whatever thread led back to Darius, but Brennan’s pull was too severe, too dominant—Zadriel hadn’t noticed anything else.
When he focused, however, there was a faint tug.
A tiny vibration in his soul leading east, where Aoife said they’d settled.
Turning on his feet, Zadriel didn’t wait for her—he moved as quickly as his legs allowed, sparing the occasional glance over his shoulder.
There was nothing but spindly evergreens and naked deciduous branches, speckled with buds that would bloom as the season warmed. But Zadriel could feel it. Feel him.
Somewhere out there, azure eyes watched him, waiting for the day Zadriel would return to Eden.