Chapter 18 #2
I swipe the canister from his hand before he can take a sip. No part of me thought he’d try to poison me, and for reasons I don’t want to evaluate, I need him to know that.
I take a long drink, tipping my head back. My eyes flutter shut at the cool water. He must have magicked it to stay cold. It’s pure bliss. I didn’t realize how dry my mouth had gotten, but a few swallows, and I feel like I’ve been revived, pulled from the desert and given a second chance at life.
“Thank you,” I rasp when I finally stop drinking. I shouldn’t be surprised to find the canister still full as I hand it back to Elliot. He’s thought of everything.
“You’re welcome,” he says. He’s staring at my mouth as he speaks, and I’m not sure he even realizes it. His pupils are wide, nearly swallowing the irises. I don’t know if it’s the show of trust or the actual act of chugging water.
He blinks, mutters something under his breath that sounds like fuck. I’m tempted to ask when that became his favorite word. I’m tempted to ask him a lot of things.
While Elliot drinks, I adjust my bag over my shoulder.
A tight knot is forming beneath my neck, and I imagine a night sleeping in the forest won’t help.
I peek sideways at Elliot, just as he’s capping the canister.
There’s a lot I don’t know about this adventure of ours, a lot I most definitely should have asked before agreeing.
Especially since I told no one where I was going.
I don’t even know where I’m going.
Elliot is still placing his canister back into his pack when I start walking again. There’s nothing I hate quite like introspection, not even exercise. I glance at the contents of my bag as I walk, more to keep myself busy than to check I have everything.
Two jars. The glossy black Initia Stone.
A miniature container, filled with Astoria Lake water.
A separate pouch with the fae king’s hair and the mermaid scales and the dragon claw.
It’s all still in place, but the memories look more anxious than they did before we left.
It’s like they know something is changing.
Do they think I’m going to release them? Allow them to return to their owner?
I’d sooner absorb them myself.
“More to the south now,” Elliot says. I’m not sure when he caught up to me, but he’s steadily keeping pace. His pack is back in place over his shoulders, and he looks all too comfortable for someone who has been walking all day.
I puff out a breath, staring straight ahead, rather than at him.
In front of us, massive craggy mountains sprout from the desert and stretch for the gray sky.
Overhead, a slender green dragon whips between the mountain turrets.
Not far behind him, a harpy follows suit.
A male, whooping at the top of his lungs.
A teenager, I’d guess.
“Have you ever thought about it?” Elliot asks from beside me. Both of his hands are on the straps of his pack, the only possible sign he’s more fatigued than he looks.
“About what?”
“Flying,” he says. He nods to the harpy, then the dragon. I realize the latter has a rider, clinging haphazardly to its back.
“I have no interest in that,” I say. I tilt my head slightly, following their trajectory until they disappear between mountain peaks to the north. “I’ve found the ground to be challenging enough.”
“Have you?” Elliot asks. His lips tilt into a subtle smirk, but within seconds, it blossoms into a full smile. “I suppose you are sweating.”
“I’ve noticed you aren’t,” I say. Blush scours my cheeks as soon as the words are out. I rush forward, hoping he won’t read into my words. “Are you one of those people who enjoy this? Walking. Trekking. Exercising.”
He barks out a laugh, and it shoots dopamine through my entire system. The blush on my cheeks grows hotter, and pride swells deep beneath my ribcage.
Make him laugh again, my body begs. Let us hear it again.
“I do enjoy this,” Elliot says. He’s looking at me, but I do not allow myself to look back. “Even with you, Cora.”
“I’m honored,” I say. My words drip with sarcasm, and I can only hope it’s enough he thinks I don’t mean it. When, truly, my body is humming.
We walk in quiet for several minutes. We are officially in Flight Realm territory.
The ground has fully transitioned from grey rock to pale sand.
Mounds and mounds of it, the color of powdered clay and as fine as dust particles.
Every step sends a puff of it into the air, and before long, I can feel the scrape of it on my throat.
“You see that?” Elliot asks. He points at the same peak he has multiple times now. “That’s where we’re going.”
“You’ve mentioned,” I deadpan.
“No, look closer,” he says. His hand remains lifted, finger directed at that same, lopsided pinnacle. It’s one of the shorter mountains, maybe technically a hill, tucked between two enormous peaks.
I ignore my instinct to argue with Elliot that I do, in fact, see the peak.
I lean forward, eyes squinted at the peak.
There’s nothing remarkable about it. The mountains of the Flight Realm are broad and jagged, a collection of freestanding crests and interconnect stretches.
They’re all sandy and grey, dotted with dark trees and scattered boulders.
I’m still blinking dumbly at the small peak when Elliot steps closer, crowding into my space.
I can feel his body heat. It should be miserable in this desert and with my skin already sticky with sweat.
Instead, I welcome the gentle brush of his arm against mine.
I let his heat consume me like the loveliest of fires.
“Don’t look at the top,” he says. He takes my hand, and my breath catches without permission. He doesn’t comment, and for whatever reason, I don’t pull away. I let him hold my hand in his, let him point my index finger as if it’s an extension of his own body.
“There’s the peak, right?” he asks. His voice is a rough mumble as he leans closer, his chest pressing against my shoulder.
“Right,” I say. Barely a whisper.
“Good,” he says. He lowers my hand, guiding my pointed finger down the mountain.
There’s no reason he needs to be using my hand. There’s no reason he should be touching me at all.
I haven’t taken a breath since the moment he did.
“Right there,” he says, stopping abruptly. “Look.”
I follow my own finger, still wrapped in his hand. My thoughts are mush, completely incapable of thinking beyond Elliot and his voice. It takes all my concentration to do as he commands.
I don’t see anything, not until he whispers an unfamiliar spell against my ear.
I blink, and then, it’s there. A blurred rectangular rock, about one quarter from the bottom of the mountain. Amidst the light soil and the sparse trees, the black rock is like a blot of spilled ink.
“What is that?” I ask. My question lingers in the air, as unsteady as I feel.
Because though I’ve asked, I don’t need Elliot to tell me. I know exactly what I’m looking at. I just didn’t believe it existed. The realization twines between my ribs, a pulsing beat that warns me of dangerous, incomprehensible magic.
“Do you know?” he asks.
He still hasn’t released my hand.
“It can’t…” I trail off. I’m foolish to even think the words the Cursed Grounds, and I can’t bring myself to say it out loud. As much as I want to make Elliot laugh again, I certainly don’t want him to laugh at me.
“It can,” he says. He drops my hand, fingers trailing reluctantly over my wrist, as if he’s debating holding on.
I let my hand drop at my side. I’m still staring at the mountain as Elliot surges forward again, back onto our mission. I keep my attention locked on the black rock and press a hand to my chest, counting my heartbeats as they spin out of control.
Everyone in the Day Realm—and likely beyond—has heard of the Cursed Grounds.
It’s named in our history books and whispered in scary stories, but I’ve doubted its existence for years.
I’d once gone looking for these grounds with Milas, and after weeks of searching, I decided it was nothing more than another clever myth, thought up by the witches to seem more powerful than they are.
“Are you coming?” Elliot calls, looking back at me. He’s not smiling, but there’s an unexpected tone of amusement in his voice.
“I didn’t think it was real,” I say finally. I walk quickly to catch up to him, my hand still pressed to my sternum. “I—I’ve looked for it before.”
“It’s veiled,” he says. “Mama showed me a few years back. You can’t see it unless you’re shown.”
“And you showed me?” I ask. I don’t bother trying to mask my shock. “Why would you do that?”
Elliot slows, and I do too. I stare at him, fighting the strange flutter in my stomach. I hate the way he seems to see me. It’s like he’s tracking every detail, noticing things no one else ever has or will.
I hate it almost as much as I love it.
“I met with Margot,” he says. He’s watching me, face carefully blank, and I have to work hard to do the same. “She spoke highly of you.”
I swallow. My tongue suddenly feels two sizes too big.
I haven’t seen Margot since the night I was imprisoned. Even now, I can picture her tear-streaked face. Black lines of makeup on her cheeks. Her hair messy from having woken in the middle of the night. Mama Blake holding her against her chest, telling both of us that it would be all right.
She was wrong, of course, and I think she knew it.
“That’s it?” I ask. My voice is brittle, sharp. “She spoke highly of me? And that was enough for you to change your mind?”
I don’t know why I sound angry—or even surprised.
I knew Margot would speak highly of me, even after everything.
She probably assumed I was innocent all along.
Perhaps she assumed Elliot knew the truth.
Perhaps she knew he and I were more than the acquaintances we pretended to be.
She knew we kissed at her birthday party…
but maybe she knew about other times, too.
Maybe she simply knew I was in love with this man, and that once upon a time, he was in love with me too.
“She didn’t change my mind,” he says. He steps closer, tilting his head as he looks at me.
His lips part, but for a long moment, he says nothing at all.
He just studies me like there must be something he’s missing.
“She simply reminded me I don’t know the whole story.
She made me realize how much I need it.”
I don’t know how to respond, so I don’t.
Eventually, Elliot turns to face the mountain.
We’re hours from the base still, a thought that makes my stomach tighten.
Soon enough, we’ll have to stop for the night.
There are too many dangers to be unprotected, even in the Flight Realm.
We’re not nearly far enough from the vampires to feel safe, and since we’ll be out in the open…
“I hope there’s a secret cave you know about,” I say, rather than commenting on his little epiphany. Thanks a lot, Margot. I shift my bag higher on my shoulder, just to give my hands something to do. “We’re going to get slaughtered if we’re sleeping in the open. You know that, right?”
“Fine, we don’t have to talk about it now,” Elliot says evenly.
He sighs, sounding far more content than he should.
“As for caves, I unfortunately don’t keep a record of them.
That said, I’m honored you trusted me to take care of you.
The Cora from a few weeks ago would’ve wanted a printed itinerary and had it cleared by her precious master. ”
I roll my eyes and opt not to comment.
“I’m not going to let you get eaten, don’t worry.”
“Big words for someone incapable of taking on a couple drunken, vampiric goons.”
“There were four,” Elliot says. He laughs though, and the sound is too delicious not to smile. “But anyway, I could have taken on the goons. I would have, eventually. And I promise, if any find us tonight, I won’t let them hurt you.”
I swallow, stomach twisting. That is exactly what I’m afraid of.