The Night Voice

Chapter Twenty

Chane resurfaced at the base of the mountain with Ore-Locks still gripping his arm. After such a long pass through stone, he instinctively gagged and gasped, though he did not need air. His final exit from the cavern had not gone quite as planned, and his mind was churning with all that had happened there.

Back when he had first fled the cavern and down the tunnel at Wynn’s insistence, the following moments had been his longest in memory. Fretful for the others’ possible failure, he had done one more thing once out of sight of the cavern.

He took the orb of Spirit from its chest and carried it all the way to the chasm’s edge. As a result, his hunger vanished, and the beast inside him whimpered back into hiding.

In this way, if whatever was to happen did not work after Wynn lit her staff, and he had to return, he would not have to retrieve that one orb. All he needed to do was shove it over the edge into the deepest depths.

When Leesil came looking for him, obviously he had found one empty chest in passing. He was coldly furious and panicked, though Ore-Locks had harassed him along the way, trying to assure him that Chane would not take an orb without good reason. It was not until Chane led them to the chasm’s edge and the orb that Leesil realized and accepted the truth that Chane had been trying to separate the orb of Spirit from the Enemy.

In turn, Chane did not blame him for the need to take it back once Wynn’s plan for it had been explained. Ore-Locks had already buried the other four orbs in stone where they could never be found or reached. The three of them returned the last orb to the cavern. A cloak had been thrown over the sun crystal so that its light shone downward. Chane was not burned so long as he kept his distance.

However, even once the orb of Spirit was placed in against the small roots of Leesil’s branch, not everything had gone well.

Chuillyon found that he could not transport Chane out of the mountain. Yes, he tried, but it did not work. The bodies of Ghassan and Brot’an could be transported, but not that of an undead. Neither the offspring of the first tree, nor Chârmun itself, would allow this, it seemed.

So Ore-Locks had taken him out through stone.

And now, here Chane was in the dark beneath the stars, still ill from the long passage. He fell to his knees as Ore-Locks released him and, before the young stonewalker could ask anything, Chane waved him off.

“I am ... all right,” he managed. “Give me a moment.”

Ore-Locks did, and Chane looked northward. Somewhere out there, Chuillyon had moved the others through Leesil’s planted branch to the sprout that the elder elf had left behind. Osha and Wayfarer and Shade had hidden away Magiere with that sprout, and Wynn was now there, still blind.

In the cavern, after everything had ended, Chane had looked into her light brown eyes in her oval, olive-toned face. Perhaps she had known, for she turned away from him. He had felt broken inside in ways worse than wounded flesh, and there was no way to rid himself of that sorrow, for the dead could not weep.

“Are you ready to move on?” Ore-Locks asked.

Chane slowly rose up without answering.

Chuillyon had done his best to describe where he had placed his sprout with the younger trio and Magiere. Finding that place would take only a little effort; reaching it might be more troublesome. With a final nod of agreement, Ore-Locks followed as Chane hurried down the last of the foothills below the peak.

As they neared the open plain, they slowed to a pause without a word, looking out upon the carnage. Both of them could see well at night, Chane more so.

Charred, torn, and dismembered bodies were strewn everywhere; some majay-hì and Lhoin’na lay among them. But as far as Chane could see, most of the horde was dead or scattered.

He spotted a few still moving. He heard the occasional distant moan, cry, or wail. And once, a figure too dark for even him to clearly make out flitted as if running and stopping here and there among the fallen. At least once he heard a scream cut short.

Ore-Locks did not move at these sights or sounds.

Then they heard sooner than saw Shé’ith riders harrying stragglers in flight.

Much as others might see all of this as Magiere’s doing, in part, Chane saw otherwise. At the sight of so many dead, he knew this level of frenzied slaughter among the horde itself would not have happened without her. She had ignited it, and as a result, the undead servants had turned upon the horde’s greater living numbers.

Without this having happened, Wynn and anyone else out here would not have survived—even with her staff.

“Enough,” Ore-Locks whispered. “I have seen enough.”

So had Chane.

They turned northward and drew their weapons quietly. Both remained watchful for the slightest sound or movement in the dark. It took a while to search out where the others hid. It was Ore-Locks who first spotted something in the dark, and pointed.

Chane bolted at the sight of shimmering hair near the base of one foothill. He was still a hundred strides away when that one rose up, drew an arrow in a bow, and then froze. Chane slowed to a quick walk, so as not to startle Osha any further as he drew closer.

Osha—cut and battered—looked stricken sick. Tracks of dried tears striped the grime and dust on his face. Chane could not find any words, though some small part of him envied those tears. Osha turned away into the foothills, and Chane followed with Ore-Locks.

The first sign that they neared their destination was the spark of two crystal blue eyes in the moonlight. Shade wheeled, rushing down the deep hollow’s left side, and turned inward ahead of them. Among the huddled forms farther in near the steep back, Chuillyon was nearest and rose up.

“We will wait until close to dawn,” he whispered, “before we try to regain the camp or contact any allies still out there.”

Osha turned back without a word, likely returning to his place on watch.

Chane agreed with waiting until close to dawn, so long as he had time to reach a tent. He looked upon the others present.

Leesil and Chap sat to one side with Wynn to the other, all looking down and toward the hollow’s rear. Chane wanted to go to Wynn, though there was little space. Wayfarer was just beyond them, curled in, half lying, half leaning on one arm, and her head hung forward.

The girl pressed a scrap of cloth around a snapped arrow shaft sticking up from a still form lying on the hollow’s most level spot.

Magiere’s eyes were closed, her mouth barely parted. Black lines like veins ran through her pale face, neck, and arms as she lay in the remnants of her armor. The cloth Wayfarer held over the wound partway up Magiere’s right shoulder was stained dark as well.

More than once, Chane had wanted to finish Magiere. Here and now it would have been so easy to do. Not even Chap or Leesil could have stopped him in time.

But his hunger for vengeance had abandoned him.

Ore-Locks pushed in at his shoulder. “Has she ... Is she on her way to her ancestors?”

Wynn lifted her head a little at that. “No, not yet, but the arrowhead was Chein’âs metal ... and had been dipped—”

“In the healing potion,” Chane finished.

Osha had done as he had instructed.

Wynn turned her head slightly at his voice. By the light of one dim cold-lamp crystal in her hand, he noticed that she looked better now than she had in the cavern, as if she were no longer in pain, but her eyes still focused on nothing.

“Where is the rest of the potion?” he demanded. “Why have you not—”

“I tried it,” Wynn said, “and gave what was left to the others, except Magiere.”

Chane took a step, but Ore-Locks grabbed his arm. In hope, he almost ripped free of that grip. One word she had said made him freeze.

Tried.

Wynn looked away—looked at nothing—and the truth left Chane cold. The potion had done nothing to restore her sight.

And now he did not care about anything else. She would never again read an old tome or map, scribble away in yet another journal, or wonder in awe at anything. She would never again look upon him in the way that no one else ever had.

Osha knelt on one knee with his bow in hand atop a low crest overlooking the plain below the mountain. He watched and listened for anything that might come too close in the dark so as to make certain the others were left in peace. He longed to comfort Wynn, to see to Wayfarer and Léshil in their worries and fears, but he could not.

Now as opposed to being lost to herself, Magiere was lost within herself. Her two sides waged war upon each other because of his arrow. Even if one side won, there was still the poison he had delivered on a white metal tip. Since he could do even less for her than for the others, at least he could see they were left in peace this night.

Yet even that was not the full truth.

Osha could not face what he had done to Magiere. Neither could he wipe her black-veined face from his thoughts.

Lingering near his daughter, Shade, Chap was nearly overwhelmed by too much pressing down upon him as he watched Osha walk away. So much had happened to the three youngest ones, though his daughter had somehow survived and kept Wayfarer out of the battle as much as possible. Even a father’s pride in a daughter left him knotted inside; he had little to do with who she had become.

There was nothing he could do for Wayfarer as they waited for the sun and to see whether Magiere survived.

He looked to Shade, almost too black to see in the dark. At least with her, he could now speak almost as easily as with Wynn. They shared much of the small sage’s voice, words, and memories.

—I must go— ... —Signal me if anything happens—

Shade huffed once, and Chap loped downslope, heading after Osha. Still, he could not stop thinking of much more. Had all of this happened before?

No, not all of it, not Magiere.

The Ancient Enemy, il’Samar, Beloved, the Night Voice, had waged war a thousand years ago. But had this simply happened again and again before that? Only Magiere had been different this time from what Chap had learned, and of course those with her, including himself.

The Enemy had made the Children to recover its tools—the orbs, the anchors—each time it arose again. But this time it had made and used Magiere for that purpose. Had it seen in her, its child, a true escape rather than decimating what its kin had created? To it, the world and Existence were a prison.

Chap had now helped to enslave it again, a final time. What else could he or any of them have done? But it had cost much to do so.

Wynn might never see again. Magiere might not survive. If not, a part of Leesil would die with her, and a part of Chap as well.

Brot’an was gone, and though Chap could not help some relief in that, how it had happened left him suspicious. In what he had gathered from the memories and words of those who were there, the last strike of the assassin’s blade should have killed anyone instantly. Yet Ghassan had seized Brot’an’s head, and then both had died as Leesil struck.

Or had that been Ghassan il’Sänke at all? In flesh perhaps, but what else? Had the specter truly died in the imperial capital, or had it only let its enemies think so?

Too many losses, not all in death, left Chap desperate.

When Chuillyon had first brought their small group out of the mountain, he had tried several times to reach Magiere’s thoughts. What he had found in her was like what had been left in the guide he had possessed in the northern wastes.

There was nothing inside Magiere, not a single thought to be reached.

The longer she lingered, the worse the end would be for everyone. Chap could not save himself or Leesil from that. But he needed to save someone ... anyone.

As he neared where Osha knelt on one knee facing out toward the plain, he could tell that his approach had already been heard and identified. If not, the young an’Cróan would have turned upon any potential threat.

Osha remained facing out into the night, even when Chap was three steps away.

And what could Chap possibly say? Certainly not that Osha’s act had been necessary and the only choice. Osha already knew this.

—Hard choices ... are ... hard ... to live ... with—

Osha did not move or look back.

—You ... did not ... choose ... alone—

Osha’s head lowered slightly, but Chap could not tell if he had heard a sigh or a hiss escaping through clenched teeth.

“I had the final choice ... to act!” Osha rasped too much like Chane.

Chap hesitated. So much had been broken or ruined for Osha.

From the Chein’âs tearing him from his place among the Anmaglâhk to Brot’an’s coldhearted training in their exile as traitors, and now to possibly killing a respected friend.

Of course, Osha alone was not wholly responsible, not even for using the potion Chane had given him. In fury fed by so many undead around Magiere, Chap knew even he might have been the one to finish her—or she him. Osha’s action had given them both a hair-thin chance to survive.

But that choice had cost Osha too much, and therein lay yet more guilt for Chap.

—And we ... live ... because ... you did ... act—

Osha glared back over his shoulder.

—Go to ... the others— ... —They ... suffer ... too— ... —I will ... watch ... here—

Among all other losses, had the young an’Cróan lost respect for majay-hì, the guardians of his lost homeland? Then again, perhaps it was only Chap whom Osha no longer held in awe.

Without a word, the young one rose, strode back into the foothills, and left Chap with only his discomforting thoughts of Magiere.

By dawn, there might be one less of those who had unwittingly come to stop the end of Existence itself.

Leesil sat with his arms wrapped around his knees as he stared unblinking at his still, silent, and marred wife.

As badly off as Magiere was, they’d decided not to remove the end of Osha’s arrow from her yet. Wayfarer kept applying scraps of cloth torn off her own clothes to control the blood leaking around the embedded arrow. Those scraps came away stained in black, like the fluids of an undead, instead of red. This went on and on so long that Leesil didn’t know how much of the night had passed.

If Magiere didn’t awaken by dawn, he feared she never would.

He never should’ve let her come here. He should’ve just done this without her, no matter how she’d have fought him. It didn’t matter what she had or hadn’t done, horde or not, undead or not. There could have been another way, even if he couldn’t think of it right now.

The sound of approaching footsteps reached him, but he didn’t look back. The steps halted, and he heard Chuillyon rise to meet whoever had come.

“No change,” the tall elf whispered.

Leesil heard Wynn shift at that, but he didn’t look at her either. Likely Chane still crouched behind her. Leesil knew he should feel awful for what had happened to Wynn, but here and now all of his fear was only for his wife.

Wayfarer looked up and beyond him, shook her head once, and he knew Osha must have come back. Still, Leesil couldn’t take his eyes off Magiere’s marred face. He’d had enough, no matter the risk.

“Move aside,” he ordered.

Wayfarer looked his way, and her large green eyes filled with panic by the dim cold-lamp crystal left near Magiere.

“Do not,” the girl pleaded. “Please! She might not—”

“Get out of the way,” Leesil warned.

“Do not be foolish!” Ore-Locks said. “Whatever the potion on the arrowhead, it is already in her. Bleeding will only weaken her more in fighting it.”

Leesil reached out and grabbed Wayfarer’s arm. In the last instant, he eased his grip but still firmly pulled her away.

“Please wait,” Wynn insisted. “At least until you see some sign, before you risk making things worse.”

Ignoring Wynn, Leesil pushed Wayfarer off behind, knelt at Magiere’s side, and flattened one hand around the base of the arrow’s snapped shaft. Someone behind him—Osha or Chuillyon or maybe even Ore-Locks—took a step.

He didn’t think about whom to trust to not get in his way. There was only one person who hadn’t shown interest in that.

“Chane,” Leesil said without looking, “keep them back.”

Another breath passed before he heard Chane rise.

“What? Don’t do this!” Wynn begged. “She is too weak.”

Whether that was for him or Chane, Leesil didn’t care. He only hoped that what little of Magiere remained could still fight to do what was needed. There had to be enough of the dhampir left to close that wound before she bled out.

He gripped the stub of the arrow’s shaft with his other hand.

Night came again outside the tent, though a cold-lamp crystal glowed faintly between the bedrolls inside. Next to that were a waterskin, a small cup carved from a goat’s horn, and a bit of oiled cloth holding jerked goat’s meat and shriveled figs.

Magiere hadn’t touched anything but the water.

Outside, she could hear Leesil still pacing.

The voices of the others in the camp were too muted to hear clearly. There was also the soft crackle of the campfire, its light flickering against the tent’s canvas, except when Leesil’s pacing blocked the light, time and again. Sitting there, looking at her own arms, Magiere couldn’t bear to have anyone see her, even in the dark, for while her body had nearly healed already, she knew theirs had not.

She’d taken as many wounds as any of them, probably more. Though Wynn had shared out the last of Chane’s healing potion among the others, there hadn’t been much to go around. Some would need much more time before the physical marks of what they’d been through finally faded.

Magiere continued looking at her arms.

Closed cuts barely showed at all. There were only hints of yellowing in her pale skin where there had once been bruises from blunt force. Even those would vanish in another day—two at the most.

Not so for any of the others. Not for what she’d put them through. And she didn’t even remember what Osha had done.

Magiere pulled down on the jerkin’s collar, one that wasn’t hers and had been scavenged from somewhere after her own clothing had been cut off her. She lowered her eyes to see the wound—or now scar—from Osha’s arrow.

She kept staring, for she’d never seen any scar on her own flesh.

When she’d first awoken two nights ago, she hadn’t even known what had happened. She’d simply looked upward into Leesil’s panicked, wide, amber eyes, not even sure whom she saw. Hanging over her, he’d suddenly twisted away and shouted—or screamed.

“Chap! She’s awake!”

The following moments were still vague in memory.

Something had nearly shredded the tent in trying to get in. A huge furred form nearly knocked Leesil aside in its rush. Large unblinking crystal blue eyes, sparked by some nearby light, gazed down at her over a long and narrow muzzle. And that face dropped too close, too fast, in snuffling at her.

Magiere remembered sucking a breath in sudden panic.

She knew she was awake only when she’d felt something as if inside her thoughts. It was still, silent, and as watchful at those blue eyes staring at her.

Chap almost collapsed atop her as his eyes closed.

She heard his sigh and, even though she’d finally recognized him and Leesil, this wasn’t the end of it. Someone else was trying to get into the tent.

“Please wait. Let me.”

That rasp of words sounded familiar.

Leesil straightened up, then turned away where he knelt, and she’d realized he was gripping her right arm. He didn’t let go even as he reached out somewhere beyond her sight. Chap shifted away a little to her other side as someone else crawled into view down near her covered legs. Leesil guided that one’s small hand to contact with her right shin beneath the blanket.

“Easy,” Leesil said to the newcomer. “You’re right at her feet.”

The visitor, smaller than he was, pushed back a draping hood.

Magiere looked upon and even recognized Wynn.

She’d wanted to say something but couldn’t. It took every effort just to breathe and keep her eyes open a little longer.

Even back on the first night, it had seemed strange—frightening—that Wynn didn’t look at her or Chap or Leesil. The last thing Magiere remembered of that night, when she couldn’t keep her eyes open any longer, was Leesil calling out ...

“Magiere ... ? Magiere!”

Two more nights and days had passed, and she’d wakened sporadically.

There were times, as she heard bit by bit some of what had happened, that she’d wanted them to stop. She didn’t want to hear any more. All of that came after Chap told her that Leesil and the others had succeeded.

—This time ... the Enemy ... will ... never ... come back—

Leesil or Chap, and sometimes Wynn, were always there whenever she awoke a little longer each time. Fragments of memory returned that she’d rather have forgotten but couldn’t. They ran backward from a final instant of agony.

She’d nearly turned on Chap—and he on her—and she might’ve killed him.

She’d snapped the neck of another majay-hì a moment before he’d rammed her.

How many of the living had she killed among the undead that had driven her—the dhampir—into something worse than what it hunted?

The afternoon of the second day, with her one arm in a sling, she decided to try stepping out of the tent, no matter how much Leesil tried to stop her. She didn’t see the girl until too late.

Wayfarer nearly knocked her over when the girl slammed into and wrapped her small arms around her. At least Leesil had been right behind to hold her up.

Others around the camp rose, and that was when she saw their state. There were some greetings and good wishes, some questions and answers, but none of that really mattered as she kept looking all ways. Of course, Chane wasn’t there, likely hidden from the sun in one of the other tents, but someone else was missing.

Osha was gone.

Leesil wouldn’t let her go off and look. Instead, he forced her back into the tent and eventually shooed out Wayfarer, halting the girl’s fussing. After that, all Magiere could do was collapse, and it was dark out when she awoke again.

Now she sat up and remained there after rubbing the crystal left by the bedroll. The wound in her shoulder no longer pained her. For any of the others, it would have taken a moon or more for a wound like that to heal over and leave a scar.

She listened to the muted voices outside while Leesil kept pacing, likely caught between looking in on her and not wanting to disturb her rest. Or maybe he was just keeping the others from doing so. Finally, she couldn’t tolerate sitting there any longer, though she left the sling in place.

After taking a deep, shuddering breath, she crawled to the tent’s flap. She was only halfway out when Leesil stepped in, pulled the flap back, and grabbed her arm. She let him help her up rather than let the others see she was better off than they were.

Again, Osha was nowhere to be seen.

Some fussing ensued when she approached those around the campfire.

Wayfarer wouldn’t leave her alone, though she didn’t mind. She was too relieved to see the girl was unharmed. And then there was Wynn—blind—with Chane hovering at the small sage’s side.

During the time that she’d been recovering, Brot’an’s and Ghassan’s bodies had been rendered to ash. Leesil and Ore-Locks hadn’t cared much about Ghassan’s receiving proper rites, but for some strange reason, Chap had insisted. Chuillyon promised to attend to returning their remains to their respective peoples, somehow.

As Magiere now sat by the fire, Leesil began recounting everything that had happened in the mountain. He was just finishing when they heard horses’ hooves approaching. Magiere tensed, but Leesil shook his head as he stood. Four Shé’ith riders came upslope out of the dark.

The leader dismounted outside the ring of tents and stepped toward them. He was unusually tall with several wounds on his face and arms. Chuillyon rose, hurried around the campfire, and met him halfway.

“Althahk, I thank you again for your assistance. The Enemy is gone this time ... for good and always.”

The tall one studied the strangely mixed group around the fire and perhaps fixed on Magiere the longest. It took effort for her not to glance away from his severe amber eyes, but he looked away instead of to the others.

“No one is to speak of what happened here—not ever to anyone,” he commanded. “We will not risk others coming to see ... and search.”

Such arrogance might’ve once put Magiere on edge, causing her to verbally take him apart, but not now, not after what she’d done.

Chuillyon nodded politely. “We are all sworn to silence.”

Althahk looked about. “Where is Osha? Does he come with the Shé’ith?”

Wynn shifted, turning toward that voice. “I think not.”

Althahk hesitated. By the furrowing of his brow, Magiere guessed Wynn’s answer was less than satisfying. But if the sage hadn’t said so, Magiere would have—and not so politely—for she had something else in mind for Osha.

“What of the Foirfeahkan?” Althahk asked. “I have not seen her since last night.”

That seemed to distress him, and Magiere followed his gaze to Wayfarer.

The girl lowered her eyes and looked only to the fire. Stranger still, Shade rose up at Wynn’s side and growled at the tall Lhoin’na. Chuillyon was slow in answering.

“I have sent Vreuvillä and ... and her tribe ... home with their dead.”

Magiere knew that “her tribe” referred to the majay-hì.

Althahk remained silent a moment longer. “Then you will do the same for the Shé’ith at dawn.”

He turned back and mounted without another word. Those with him did the same, and all four Shé’ith wheeled and left.

Chuillyon was quiet after that. And no one noticed—or at least no one said anything—as Magiere looked about the camp and beyond it. They also wouldn’t know how far she could see in the dark, though she wasn’t watching the riders.

—He left ... again ... upon hearing ... you ... rise—

Magiere found Chap watching her.

—Are you ... well ... enough?—

She didn’t answer, merely got up, and in leaving said, “I need to walk.”

Wayfarer grasped her hand, and Leesil was on his feet instantly.

“No you don’t!” he warned. “You’re staying—”

Chap’s sudden snarl cut off everything, and even startled Ore-Locks.

“You keep out of this,” Leesil said to Chap.

Magiere grabbed her husband’s arm. “I’m all right,” she whispered. “Just stay with Wayfarer. Maybe it’s time to tell her some things, and I won’t be long.”

—Find him ... before ... it is ... worse—

At that Magiere sighed in frustration, though she nodded to Chap. On her way out, heading west, she saw something more.

Her falchion lay in its sheath next to one tent. It didn’t matter that someone tried to clean the blood and other stains. That sheath would never come fully clean.

Magiere walked on into the dark.

She’d failed to control the horde and had instead driven it into a frenzy around her. That might have kept it from going after the others outside the mountain, but she’d killed more than undead out there. She’d endangered everyone, and what more could have happened if she hadn’t been stopped?

Everything that she, Leesil, and Chap had seen in those phantasms long ago in her homeland had been true. It simply hadn’t happened the way they’d seen. It hadn’t ended the same way either because ...

Magiere slowed upon hearing someone ahead coming upslope in the dark. And that someone stopped in three steps upon spotting her. Osha backed away and quickly turned.

“Stop!” Magiere ordered.

He dropped his head. She went for him, and when he heard her, he tried to walk off again.

She grabbed the back of his cloak and jerked him to a stop. When he refused to turn and face her, she forgot pretending that she was as unhealed as the others. Throwing an arm around him, she pulled him against herself.

“You listen to me,” she began softly.

Back in the camp, Leesil fidgeted and forced himself not to pace again, but he still kept looking off to where Magiere had vanished in the dark.

—Leave ... her ... alone—

He turned about to fix Chap with a stare.

—What she does ... is necessary—

Leesil turned toward the open darkness again, though Magiere was long gone.

—The worst wounds ... are not ... of flesh— ... —Healing his ... will heal ... hers—

Maybe Chap was right, if she found Osha.

“So, we are done,” Wayfarer whispered. “And everyone goes home, at least most.”

She sat staring into the fire.

“There is a place for all,” Chuillyon said, speaking to the girl, this time with his typical soft smile. “When I return the Shé’ith, I will take you to—”

“No,” Leesil cut in, also speaking to Wayfarer. “You’re going home, to a real home.”

She looked up at him. “I do not have a home anymore.”

“Of course you do! You’re coming with us.”

Everyone around the fire fell silent. Even Wynn raised her head. Shade’s ears pricked up, and Chap hauled himself up with a dog’s grumble.

Wayfarer’s eyes were locked on Leesil.

“If I don’t convince you,” he added, “I’ll never hear the end of it from Magiere. And if you’re around, maybe you can keep that mangy mutt clean.”

Chap growled and wrinkled his jowls.

Magiere tightened her arm around Osha every time he tried to pull free. He still hadn’t said a word.

“You stopped me when no one else could!” she told him. “No one else could’ve done what you did, made that shot ... or I wouldn’t be here.”

She felt him shudder.

Magiere half pulled, half stepped around Osha. When he turned his face away, she took hold of it, though he was taller than she was. She forced him to look at her.

“You saved me,” she added, more softly this time. “Don’t you ever think of it another way.”

There’d been too much harm done because of her. He’d suffered more than most would for skills that no one else had. Certainly Brot’an, if he’d been there, could’ve taken that shot, but only Osha had done so with any thought for her life.

He’d missed her heart and still stopped her. An anmaglâhk wouldn’t have bothered. No matter what he thought he’d lost, he was better than they were.

Osha finally looked at her, his eyes glassy. Before his tears fell, and she couldn’t stop the same ...

“Come on,” she added gruffly, “or they’ll start talking about us being out here alone so long.”

At that, Osha blinked, making one tear, but his eyes then widened in shock.

Magiere sighed. Leesil was the funny one, and she just wasn’t any good at it.

“Oh, forget it,” she grumbled, jerking him around to push him ahead.

By the time they’d neared the camp, they could already hear Leesil.

“What?” he half shouted. “That is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard you come up with.”

“It has to be that way,” Wynn countered. “We have to be certain.”

Magiere stepped around as Osha slowed. Chane stood behind Wynn, dour as ever. Ore-Locks was eyeing Chane, not Wynn, and he didn’t look happy. Chuillyon was the only one who appeared to contemplate whatever Wynn had said that set Leesil off.

Strangest of all, Chap was still and silent—and that worried Magiere the most.

“What’s going on?” she demanded.

Leesil threw his hands up, bit off something foul before he said it, and coughed an exhale instead. He jabbed a finger at Wynn.

“She wants to stay here ... in the mountain!”

Magiere stopped in her tracks and felt her own mouth drop open.

“What?” she finally got out.

“I must,” Wynn continued calmly. “If the staff goes out, someone must reignite it. That can be only me.”

Magiere was still numb, and any outrage wouldn’t come out. Leesil got to that before she did.

“You can’t stay out here,” he snarled. “There’s nothing to eat, there’s no water, there’s no—”

“I’ll manage,” Wynn interrupted.

“And I will stay with her,” Chane added in his rasp.

Another shocked silence came and went, though not without Osha stepping past Magiere to look between Wynn and Chane.

“Oh, that’s even better!” Magiere finally erupted, fixing on Wynn and forgetting any sorrow for her friend’s loss of sight. “And where are you going to find enough livestock for him if you can’t feed yourself? A moon at most, and he’ll be hunting again.”

Chane’s answering rasp was more pronounced. “I have no need to hunt. There is one orb still exposed. It will sustain me ... as I have not fed—in any way—since before we even arrived in the empire’s capital.”

“We’ll be all right,” Wynn said. “What would happen otherwise if the crystal goes out? We must stay to make certain it remains lit. There’s no one else who can do so.”

Magiere couldn’t find another argument, and as Leesil said nothing, he was at a loss as well. Even Osha didn’t make a sound and just stood there. But to Magiere, the pain on his face was evident until he looked to Chane.

Everyone knew the unspoken contention between those two concerning Wynn.

Wynn had made a choice. She’s chosen to remain here, and she’d chosen Chane.

But in addition to Osha, there was another affected by Wynn’s choice.

Magiere carefully glanced aside and found Wayfarer watching Osha. She hoped the girl didn’t see this as an opportunity. Leesil would’ve already told her where she was going, where her home was now—with them. But Osha would not forget this moment for a long time to come.

If Wynn wouldn’t be swayed, then something had to be done for her survival. The sage had already lost too much for what had to be done. A few ideas came to mind, though they might involve a small breach concerning Althahk’s demand for secrecy.

Still, that would have to wait as well.

Magiere reached out, grasped Osha’s shoulder, and pulled him around. “Take the tent with Wayfarer and Ore-Locks.”

He barely looked at her, not saying a word.

“Be packed and ready in the morning,” she added. “You’re going home—to our home—or I’ll come after you again.”

Osha walked off, and Magiere waved Wayfarer after him. She wasn’t certain of the latter choice but didn’t want him to be left alone.

“Ore-Locks,” Leesil said, “we need to talk about some ... arrangements in the morning.”

“He and I have already spoken,” Chane interrupted. “If you have considerations we have not thought of, those are welcome.”

Magiere eyed Leesil, wondering whether he’d had notions similar to hers where Wynn was concerned.

“I would appreciate it,” Wynn began, “if all of you stopped fussing! I am not half as incapable as everyone keeps assuming.”

Magiere couldn’t remember how many uncomfortable pauses had passed, but there was another one. How they could part this way, even if there were plans as yet so that it wouldn’t be forever?

“Chuillyon,” Magiere said.

The elder sage, who’d been watching in uncomfortable silence as he sat near the fire, looked up and blinked in surprise.

“You’ll be needed in what we have in mind,” Magiere added, exchanging a glance with Leesil. “I’ll tell you more tomorrow.”

Chuillyon frowned in puzzlement. “Very well.”

“And Shade,” Wynn began, catching all off guard, but then her voice began to falter, “you are going with them ... little sister.”

“Wait, what?” Leesil cut in with a step.

Even Magiere had assumed Shade would stay with Wynn—and Chane. Wynn ignored Leesil, but Shade was already up on all fours, as was Chap.

“You have to go, Shade,” Wynn added.

The dog’s ears, though pricked up, flattened as Shade gave a mewling growl. She began barking, even snapping, but Wynn dropped off the stone she sat on and grabbed for Shade’s head. Fresh tears flowed down Wynn’s cheeks.

“You need to have a life of your own,” Wynn said. “It’s not here in the heat and sand. Go with Wayfarer and your father. At least, you’ll have trees, rain, forest ... and I believe we will see each other again, somehow.”

Magiere then noticed Chane.

He looked down upon Wynn and Shade with an expression she couldn’t have imagined on his face, the face she’d see more than once turn into the bloodthirsty monster that he was inside.

Was that sadness?

The sight hit her hard as she thought on how the past few years had changed them all. Here they were at the end of it—the trials and battles they had never asked for, never wanted.

It was finally over.

Shade pulled out of Wynn’s hold. A strange mewling whine shook her all over. She turned and raced off toward where Osha and Wayfarer had both vanished into their tent. Chap just watched after his daughter for a moment and looked back to Wynn, who crumpled upon the ground in tears. Chane knelt beside her.

Battles were done, but there were still wounds being inflicted. Hopefully, time could heal those as well.

Chane raised Wynn up and started to see her off to their tent.

Ore-Locks cleared his throat uncomfortably. “I—I will look in on the younger ones.”

“I think I shall retire as well,” Chuillyon said.

Both went off.

“Come on, Chap,” Leesil said, heading for their tent, and then he looked at Magiere.

She nodded silently and turned to follow. Leesil lifted the flap, Chap crept in slowly, and Leesil looked up. Magiere faltered upon spotting something else beside that tent.

“In a moment,” she said.

Leesil frowned but nodded and slipped inside.

Magiere stood paused over her falchion. There was no other blade like it for what it could do to the undead. She picked it up, began to draw it slowly, and stopped before a three-finger breadth of the blade showed. Then she turned as Chane was about to duck inside a tent behind Wynn.

“Wait,” Magiere called.

Chane froze without flinching, though he eyed the sword and then her. Magiere slammed the falchion back into its sheath and threw it at him across the camp. Stunned, Chane straightened in dropping the tent flap as he caught the weapon.

For a moment, Magiere couldn’t speak.

“Just in case,” she said finally, “should something come looking for what we left in the mountain. I won’t need that blade anymore.”

Before he could say anything, she turned and swatted her way into the tent.

Inside, with the cold lamp she’d left there now dimming, Leesil lay on his back upon a bedroll with his head propped against Chap’s shoulder. Both had their eyes closed in exhaustion.

If they were actually asleep, she didn’t want to wake them, and if not ...

Magiere dropped and crawled in, putting her back against Leesil’s chest and her head up against Chap. Nothing more needed to be said, though she heard Leesil whisper, whether asleep in exhaustion or not.

“Home ...”