27

I wear armor the color of blood and gold. My fingertips end in silver talons, and my pendant sparkles with fantastic light. I stand high upon craggy silver-gray rock. Down below, the frothy surface of an angry sea pulls beasts and men beneath its murky surface . I drag my talons, now speckled with blood, across the air, and I glimpse my reflection on each silver finger. My mouth bleeds. My skin is shredded and raw. And now, I stand alone on this barren mountain, crying, weeping, screaming, “Help me! Save me! Hurry.”

My eyes open to dark ceiling beams in a room buzzing with light. The shadows of flitting butterflies and bumblebees dance across the wall. My mouth tastes like metal and walnuts.

Where am I? I turn my head, and my bones creak.

“Good morning.” The Renrian sits on a small stool in the corner of the room and chews on the stem of a cold pipe. His eyes are no longer that sharp lilac; they are now soft brown flecked with red and blue light.

“Kai!” Olivia rushes to my bedside in noisy taffeta. “I was so worried about you!” Her eyes cloud with tears, and she flaps at her face. “I told myself not to cry, and here I am, blubbering like a baby.”

Philia comes to stand beside her. “Welcome back.”

“Where is…?” I push up on my elbows, looking for Jadon.

He’s standing in the corner of the room. His blue eyes, dark with worry, match the blue of his tunic. “I thought that I’d taken too long and that you…” His voice is hoarse and strained. “…that you wouldn’t need your amulet anymore.”

Because I’d died . That’s what he won’t say.

My heart quakes. “Did you find it?”

He shakes his head. “I looked for hours, Kai.”

“Olivia and I helped,” Philia adds.

“And then we found the camp again,” Olivia says. “And we got all our things we’d left there, so it wasn’t a total waste.”

I can’t feign excitement because nothing they retrieved helps me. How important are blankets, carrots, and tunics when the piece that keeps me more than warm and nourished—my amulet—is still lost in the woods? Nothing matters if I’m dead.

“Veril says you’re healed enough to start walking,” Jadon says.

I stretch my stiff, achy leg, but the pain stops at my hip, rather than the top of my head.

Jadon holds up a piece of paper. “Veril’s sending us out to gather plants for tonics. When we return, I’ll help you start regaining your strength. You’ll be reluctant to use that leg or turn your hips, so you won’t be able to wield a sword as effectively as before. But you shouldn’t just rely on your hands. They’re unreliable.”

I push out a breath. “Sounds good. Makes sense.”

He strides to the door but stops with his hand on the knob. “And we’ll keep looking for your amulet.” His eyes meet mine. “I’ll find it. I promise.”

A moment later, Jadon and Olivia join Philia outside. I hear them talking as they set off on their task of gathering Veril’s ingredients. Once their voices fade away, I wheel myself into the sitting room.

Veril is standing over his worktable, grinding something in one of his many stone bowls. “Don’t trust anyone to bring you that which makes you whole. They may not want you whole.” He nods toward the window. “ Especially them. Depend on you and you alone. No one else. You must even learn to heal yourself without aid from others, even me. You must also learn how to mix tonics that are not meant to heal but are meant to lessen any threat against you. There’s so much knowledge awaiting you.”

“Teach me, then,” I say, sitting up straighter. “Teach me as much as you can in the time we have together. I want to be able to heal myself and, since you won’t say it, to make poisons.”

“We’ll start now, then.” He beckons me. “Roll up to the table, dearest.”

I roll right up to the worktable, so excited that I’m vibrating.

“Have you made potions before?” he asks.

“I don’t know,” I say. “Even with the memory tea, I still don’t remember my life before. There are glimpses, yes, but they’re not ordered enough to make any sense. I’ve even forgotten my born-day, but I know that I love honeycakes, although I don’t recall if I’ve ever baked them. I know that I’ve seen burnu and sunabi before my arrival in Maford, but I don’t know when.”

I press my fingers against my achy forehead. “It’s all in here—I just need something to help bring it out. That’s why I need your help. That’s what I thought your memory tea would do, instead of presenting me with even more riddles and making me sleep.”

“You need to sleep,” he says. “Sleep helps recovery.”

I chew the inside of my cheek as Veril goes back to grinding whatever is in his stone bowl. “I know we’re protected here, but Elyn will be able to find me when we leave. Do you have a spell to make me invisible? To protect me in case she discovers me?” I tuck my shaking hands in my lap.

He raises his eyebrows. “That’s one of the tonics I aim to make for you, but only if your companions can find boar’s tusk.”

“Good.” I take a deep breath, and my muscles relax. “What about other protections?” I ask. “Can you make something to combat my Miasma?”

He rears back. “Dearest Just Kai. You don’t have Miasma.”

“I’m exhausted and weak. My chest feels tight and I want to cough—”

“You were attacked by otherworldly,” he says firmly. “Your injuries aren’t the same as if you’d been bitten by a dog or even fell out of a tree. Your body is trying to figure out how to keep you from dying, and if that means limiting your breath, then it will limit your breath. Stop pouring worry into your bowl. You have plenty on your plate.”

Outside the sitting room windows, the world turns white as a thick fog blankets the cottage and gardens. Points of light flicker through the mist, drifting along the path just traveled by Jadon and the girls, then moving toward the window before halting. Something—or someone —is out there, waiting, watching. What does it see right now? Me sitting here in this chair? A chasm where a cottage once stood?

Panic grips me, making my head spin, and I fight the urge to curl into a ball. I don’t move—moving could expose me. And so I hold my breath and wait.

That light glides across the garden, moving away from my companions and disappearing into the dense forest. The fog begins to thin until the bank becomes wisps, and the wisps fade into memories.

“See?” Veril says from his chair. “The enchantment is still working.”

“You saw it, too,” I whisper, feeling nauseous. “That fog? The light?”

He tilts his head. “Nothing escapes my notice, dearest. Once again: you have enough worry on your plate. Eat what you have first before returning to the realm’s banquet of bother.”

Silence slips through the cottage, and the walls flicker with shadow and flame. The air shimmers, and I spot a silk strand of a spiderweb drifting past me. I take deep breaths as I watch it and I wonder about the spider who spun it and I wonder if she hates having to build a web every day that must be then rebuilt every night. Does that spider—a creator—ever become frustrated with the realm’s banquet of bother?

I chuckle as I imagine a spider throwing up her eight legs and saying, “I’m tired of this shit,” stomping out of her raggedy web, and finding love with a robin who promises to never eat her if she agrees to catch a fly and a cricket for dinner every now and again. Could that ever happen? Each creature teaming up and going against their nature for the sake of survival? Is there a grand plan for every living thing, even for those as small as a spider and robin?

“Veril,” I say, “do all Renrians believe in Supreme?”

“Certainly,” he says. “As well as all the manifestations of Supreme. And I don’t mean manifestations created in a fever dream Syrus Wake says he had.” The old man points to me. “Tell me. You are…?”

“Kai.”

“Your right hand. What does it do?”

I blink at him, then say, “It writes. Scratches my hair. Waves.”

“Now: your left eye,” he says. “What does it do?”

“It sees. It blinks.”

“Are both a part of your body?”

I nod.

“Do they do the same thing?”

I shake my head.

“But they are still a part of you, a part of Kai, yes?”

“Each part of me has different functions but are still of the same accord.”

Veril points his pipe at me. “And so it is with Supreme. There are orders—like the Executioners—who act as the hand. Other orders act as the heart. Still another, the brain. And so on and so forth. My order: we are the record-keepers, the connectors of ages. While we are not immortal, we have been blessed with long life. And I recognize our role, and if I believe in me, and I believe that Supreme is all, then I believe in those entities mortals call angels and gods.”

Hmm. Never thought about it like that.

“What am I, then?” I ask. “Where do I fit into all of this?”

His eyes twinkle. “That’s what you’re trying to figure out, yes?”

“Do you think it’s possible that I’m suffering from a false sense of importance and have no place?” Am I just a simple garden spider with a raggedy web? Building and rebuilding each day, catching fly after fly but never eating enough flies to rid the garden of them?

“Your pendant tells me that you have worth, Kai. You were given it for a reason. You’re not simply drifting through the realm all your life, heading toward death.”

“That,” I say, pointing at his fox amulet. “Who gave it to you?”

He presses the pendant between his fingers. “My patron chose this for me long, long ago. She saw something in me that I didn’t.”

“That you’re cunning?” I ask.

“And resilient.”

I cock an eyebrow. “Tricky?”

“Resourceful.”

“Radiant?”

“And very protective of those who matter most to me.” The old man claps his hands. “Should be ready now.” After a quick stir, he ladles some of its contents into a bowl, returns to the table, and holds the bowl of steaming liquid out to me. “Drink. This is an actual tonic, not just lentil stew.”

Cunning. Tricky .

I hesitate. “Didn’t you just put nightshade in that?”

“Did I?”

“How do I know if you’re—?”

He lifts an eyebrow. “Trying to poison you?”

I watch his face, then stare down at the bowl in his hands, unblinking. I take it, and the clay feels cool in my hands, even though it holds bubbling broth.

“Know your friends,” Veril says. “Know your foes.” Then he holds up a twisted brown stick the length of a caterpillar. “This is rumored to make people remember those things they wish to forget. Let’s see if this will help you.” He drops it in my bowl. “Drink up.”

I sip, and immediately my tongue feels like it’s being pulled over my nose and my head weighs more than the realm. I’m forced to rest my forehead against the table, eyes squeezed tight. The pain is so great my blood turns frosty and my heart crumples and expands in my chest. My lungs compress like they are in a vise, and I can’t even gasp.

As the liquid slips through me, the tightness across my scalp eases and I can take long breaths through my nose. A calm finally worms up my spine and seeps through my skin. Relaxes the lids of my closed eyes and—

A man wearing a crown. And exploding light. I fall from the heavens, spears of silver-gray rocks chasing me as I fall toward a sea, screaming, “Save me. Help me. Hurry!” The man wearing the crown roars as I plunge beneath the sea and —

I open my eyes. Heart racing, I struggle for air. “I can’t breathe.”

Veril holds up a vial of black liquid. “Absorbs toxic substances.”

I take the vial and drink, and I taste earth, smoke, and bamboo. Sharp pain erupts in my stomach, and I pull myself into a tight ball. Beads of sweat break out across my skin.

But then lightness comes. No pain.

“You remembered something,” Veril says, watching me carefully.

I pat my sweaty face. “I don’t know what it means yet.” There’s too much light in this cottage now. I want to close my eyes. “I’m tired, Veril. I can’t say anymore right now.”

He pushes me back to the room and helps settle me in his bed.

I drift off to sleep thinking about my perilous fall from the heavens, about that man and his terrible light, about the horrors awaiting me in the depths of that caustic sea…