A Land of Fire

CHAPTER THIRTY

Gwen lay nearly lifeless on the deck of the ship, her body feeling so heavy, barely stirring as a rat crawled over her wrist. She opened her eyes, so heavy, not having the energy to brush it off. She felt herself burning with fever, every muscle in her body aching, on fire. She saw that she was lying face-first on the wooden plank, her ear to the wood, the hollow sound below echoing in her head of the ocean lapping against the ship.

The early morning sun spread out over them like a blanket, and as she lay there, she opened her eyes just enough to see all the bodies sprawled out on the ship. She saw hundreds of her people, none of the moving, either too weak to move—or, she hated to think it, already dead. She thought of the baby, somewhere with Illepra, and prayed she was still alive.

Gwen slipped in and out of consciousness, the gentle rocking motion of the ocean keeping her awake. A flapping noise pervaded her dreams, and Gwen looked up, squinting, to see the mast, high up, a lone sail, flapping in the wind. The ship was drifting aimlessly at sea, no one manning it, at the mercy of a random breeze and wherever the ocean tides should take them.

Gwen had never felt more exhausted, not even when she’d been pregnant with Guwayne. She felt as if she had lived too many lifetimes, and a part of her felt that it did not have the strength to go on. A part of her felt as if she had already lived far longer than she was supposed to, and she did not know how she could muster the strength to keep going, to start all over again, even if they ever found the Empire. Especially without Thor, without her baby, and with all her people in such a state. If they were even alive.

Gwen let her head drop back down to the deck, it feeling too heavy, ready to give in. She tried to keep her eyes open, but she could not.

Thor, she thought. I love you. If you find our son, raise him well. Raise him to remember me. To dream of me. Tell him how much I loved him.

Gwen slipped out of consciousness for she did not know how long, until she was awakened by a distant noise, from high above. It was a lone screech, high up in the clouds, sounding so distant Gwen did not even know if she had really heard it.

The screech came again, insistent, and she dimly recognized it as that of an animal she knew from somewhere in her life. It sounded as if it were trying to rouse her.

It invaded her consciousness, refusing to let her sleep, to slip away—until finally, Gwen opened her eyes, recognizing it.

Estopheles.

Thor’s falcon screeched incessantly, then swooped down, until Gwen felt it grazing her hair. Gwen lifted her head, brushed the rat off her hand, and with all her strength, she pushed hard, and got herself up to one knee.

Gwen rose, struggling, on shaky legs, and grabbed the rail on the side of the ship; with all her might, she pulled herself up, just enough to see over the rail.

There, laid out before her, was a sight she would never forget. Lying before her, filling the horizon, was land. It was a land unlike any she had ever seen, a city perched on the ocean, and in its center, shrouded in mist, two enormous stone pillars rising hundreds of feet into the sky, heralding a great city, a city of shining gold, sparkling in the sun like the entrance to heaven.

The ocean here was a foaming, fluorescent red, and it crashed against the shore, its glowing foam shooting up into the air, a shoreline of infinite variety, with endless contours and terrains, making the Ring seem minuscule. The two suns were huge in this sky, and beneath them, the red glow hung over everything, making it look like a land of fire.

Gwen took one final look at it, enthralled, and then she reeled, dizzy from hunger, burning from fever, and crashed onto the deck. She lay there, feeling the tides pulling them in.

If they lived, soon, they would be there.

The Empire.

Dead or alive, they had made it.