Chapter 59
By the time we return to the cave, the wolves have finished their hunt and Ruben and Benny are already skinning the first of the hares. From the pile that sits on the cave floor, it doesn’t look like Elska and Fen left many in the vicinity.
When Benny meets my eyes, he offers a quick shake of his head followed by a glance at Elska, which I assume means the wolves returned before he got his confession out.
Given how – as far as I’m aware – they can’t directly understand anyone except me, I consider it a weak excuse, and if what I had to say wasn’t so damned important, I’d make another excuse for us to disappear and take the wolves with us.
But there’s no way it can wait, and from the way Ruben tilts his head as he looks at me, he can see that.
‘You okay?’ he asks. ‘You look … excited.’
‘The mountains are an illusion,’ I tell him, my voice still breathless with the enormity of what I’ve discovered.
‘What?’ Their jaws drop with amusing synchronicity. ‘You’re sure?’
I nod. ‘Yes. At first I thought it was the light, just moving shadows, but there was something off about the colours, so I kept looking. Kept doing what Stide taught me. And then Thessa, she saw it too.’
I look at the Sanning, who offers a nod of assurance. ‘She’s right. It’s an illusion. At least one. Maybe more – like the v?tte made, only bigger. Much, much bigger.’
Benny’s eyes widen and he stares at me for a moment, his look conveying everything he needs to say. ‘If there was something off about them, I should have been able to tell.’
‘But only if you were looking, right? It’s not like the weather’s even let us see this part of the range before.’
His jaw works slightly before he speaks again. ‘Which one?’ he says. ‘Which one do you think is an illusion?’
‘It’s one of the tall ones,’ I tell him unhelpfully. ‘With a large grey ridge. Steep edges.’
It’s hardly the most useful description, but a second later he is bounding out of the cave.
‘You really think that’s possible?’ Ruben says. ‘That the mountains are an illusion?’
The fact that he believes I saw his mother as a Rotting in a cave with an army of other half-dead but doubts what I saw in the mountains should probably make me doubt myself. But I don’t.
‘Not the entire range,’ I tell him. ‘Just small areas. Maybe it’s just that one I saw, but there could be more.’
He still doesn’t look convinced. ‘What exactly did you see that made you think this?’
My hands flex and impatience rises within me, but before I can repeat myself, Benny rushes back into the cave, shaking his head.
‘You’re right. I don’t know how I missed it. It’s here and there all across the mountain range. Maybe half a dozen peaks, maybe more. I don’t know how I missed them.’
‘I guess you’ve been a little distracted,’ Kyor says, shooting a look at Ruben while making a triangle sign with his fingers.
We all ignore him, not just because he’s missed the point of the hand gesture entirely, but because we’re all too focused on what to do next.
‘So what does it mean?’ Caz is the first to voice the question on all our minds. ‘And why would they make an illusion that big?’
‘Because no army in their right mind would try to cross it,’ Kyor answers, back in focused mode now that his joke has fallen flat.
‘Trust me, the number of times I’ve looked at those peaks, the number of meetings I’ve been in where generals suggested marching a full battalion over them …
every time we come to the same conclusion: the loss of life would be too great. ’
‘But some have crossed them, right?’ Benny asks. ‘Surely.’
Kyor shrugs. ‘We’ve sent small groups out. Small groups who’ve never come back. We just assumed the Issen killed them or they died on the climb over.’
For a second, I can’t respond. I’m too busy marvelling at the perfection of it.
With so many genuine mountains, there’s a good chance the soldiers sent did die out on the range, but there’s also the slim possibility that they slipped through the illusions.
And when that happened, well … I’m willing to bet there were hordes of Issen on the other side, waiting to pick them off, meaning the secret gaps of their fortress have remained safe, and they can cross into Morathka with ease whenever they want because they know exactly where their own illusions are.
‘But illusion isn’t a magic of the Issen, is it?’ Ruben questions. ‘It’s ice only.’
‘You mean, just like the Torailians don’t have magic, the Sannings don’t exist, and Myrkr and v?tte are things of myths?’ I question.
‘Good point,’ he concedes.
‘Okay, so what does this mean?’ Caz asks, her eyes locked on me. ‘What do we do now?’
‘Now?’ I let out a quivering breath, trying to ease the racing of my heart. ‘Now, we eat, rest, and get a good night’s sleep. Because tomorrow we’re finding what those illusions are covering, and my guess is we’re going to be heading directly into Issen territory.’
We stand at the base of the mountains. One Sanning, five Morathkians, two dire wolves and whatever the fuck I am. All there in shared silence.
Kyor is the one to break it. ‘It looks like pretty solid rock to me,’ he says finally.
‘Me too,’ Ruben replies.
‘It might be,’ I say. ‘Most of the range is real, but some parts definitely aren’t. The problem is, we don’t know if all the illusions lead to a crossing.’
‘Well, no time like the present,’ Kyor says, striding forward, his hand outstretched. When he reaches the rock face, his palm flexes and he slaps the stone, the soft thud causing snow to flutter down from above.
‘This part’s definitely real,’ he says. ‘There’s no chance of walking through this.’
‘So I guess we just head to each of the illusions and hope there’s a crossing?’ My voice lifts in question
If any of the others have better solutions, I’m more than willing to hear them.
After all, the range stretches for miles in either direction.
If we pick the wrong lead, it could add days to our search, and with the clouds once again low and covering the mountain – both real and illusory – even Benny’s struggling to see where the phantom mountains are.
‘What if we go in different directions?’ Caz suggests. ‘Three one way and four the other, with a wolf accompanying each group. If you and Fen went in different directions, we’d be able to contact each other if we found something, right?’
Logically, it’s a good idea. And yet it causes a queasiness within me. I don’t want to be separated from Fen, and I certainly don’t want to be without him when we finally find the Issen. I wouldn’t have survived the Torailians without him, and I’m not going to take that chance here either.
You do not give yourself enough credit, Little Raven, Fen’s voice tells me. It must be a sign of just how distracted and fearful I am that I hadn’t noticed our bond was open. You’ve survived worse than them before. You have a great strength.
Maybe I do, I respond. But I don’t want to be separated from you.
‘No,’ I say firmly. ‘We’ve got this far together. We do this together.’
I look to the left and the right, trying to decide which way to go. What I need is a sign, but currently it’s lacking. Knowing that I need to make a decision, I start to walk left, only for a pressure to strike at the base of my spine. But does that mean I’m going the right way or not?
‘Rose?’ Kyor questions. ‘You okay?’
‘Maybe?’
I glance down at my ring as I continue in the direction I was heading, only for the pressure to deepen, almost to a point of pain. The minute I switch back and go in the other direction it stops.
‘This way,’ I say, pointing in front of me.
The others exchange a series of looks that they don’t even bother hiding from me.
‘You want to tell us what made you change your mind?’ Kyor asks, but I shake my head.
‘No. Not at the minute,’ I say. I am not going to tell them the ring is picking our direction.
I speed up, aware of the release in my spine as I head in the ‘right’ direction.
We don’t talk. Not about the cold that bites our skin.
Not about the warriors we are about to meet.
Instead, our eyes remain on the rock faces.
Occasionally, one of us will move forward and touch the rocks and, for a little while, Loch walks with his hand dragging along the stone, but the rock is always solid, and the longer it remains, the more doubt claws at the back of my mind.
After all, maybe the pressure I felt was a sign we should have been going in that direction.
And maybe it was just a delusion caused by weeks on the road and more magic in my veins than any one person should have. But I don’t believe that.
It will not be long, Little Raven. Fen’s voice shifts into my mind as I try the base of another mountain and find it solid. Look at what you have done. How far you have come. It will not be long now until you have what you need.
What I need? What is that?
A cure for William.
A way to control my powers.
To know who I am.
A way to convince the Issen that I’m not a threat and they don’t need to kill me the instant they see me.
I’m working on quite the list, and the latter is probably the most important one, and I have no way to ensure that won’t happen.
But we didn’t come this far, battle whatever the fuck that Myrkr was, and lose Stide to fail now. Not a chance.
Loch is once again dragging his hand against the rocks when a mountain up ahead of us shimmers ever so slightly.
My eyes immediately go to Benny.
He nods. ‘Yup, I saw it,’ he says. ‘I thought I spotted it before, but I didn’t want to say anything until I was sure.’
‘But now you are?’ I question.
‘As sure as I can be. I mean, this is crazy magic. Better than even Seiren’s illusions.
The type of power that must be required to do that …
’ He shudders rather than finishing his sentence, and I get it.
The thought that one person could have enough power to sustain an illusion like this is truly terrifying.
Almost as terrifying as knowing that any minute now, there’s a good chance we will face them.
The tension of the group builds further still, all of us afraid to even speak. The wolves walk out in front of us, and when I open my mind to Fen, he doesn’t offer a response, all his focus on what’s to come.
A small spinney of trees blocks the path in front of us, but rather than moving to go around it, I stop.
‘It’s in there,’ I say, pointing through to the rock face, which is barely visible through the brittle, bare branches. ‘That’s where the illusion is. That’s where we need to go.’
No one argues. No one questions.
Kyor steps forward.
‘Elska and I will go first,’ he says. ‘You and Fen follow behind me.’
‘No.’ I place my hand on his shoulder, stopping him before he can move. ‘It needs to be me. I need to go first.’
I glance down at my ring, as if it might offer a sign of agreement, but there’s nothing. No tug moving me forward, no pain telling me to retreat. Nothing but my own self-assurance.
You’ll be right beside me, right? I ask Fen, trying but failing to hide the fear that flickers in my voice.
I wouldn’t be anywhere else.
Drawing in a deep breath, I take my first step forward towards the spinney. The trees look real enough, and when I step into them they hold fast. Not an illusion at all. But the mountain base in front of me … that I’m not so sure about.
My breath trembles as I approach the rock face, my fingers twitching at my side, ready to stretch out and touch it.
‘At least take your dagger out. Arm yourself,’ Kyor says.
I look back at him only to see the entire group staring at me with the same sense of trepidation. I unsheathe my dagger, turn back around, and close my eyes. With my breath held, I take one step forward and then another. Only after the third step do I open my eyes.