Page 109 of A Song of Ash and Moonlight

Madam Moreen raised her eyebrows. “Of course he is, my lord. He’s just had a pound of poisoned skin cut off of him and has lost gods know how much blood.”

“I’ll send for Illaria,” Gemma said quickly. “Talan’s delirious, but he’s also a demon. His mind is strong. Some of this might actually be valuable information, and if anyone can decipher gibberish about scents and flavors, it’s her.”

Father looked unhappy but didn’t push Talan further. He looked up at me. “You’ll go to Rosewarren?”

“And tell them what?” I said. “You speak of an invasion, but we don’t know yet where to send anyone.”

“Tell them to be ready. Mobilize their soldiers, bring them back from their assignments. It’ll take time to rally our forces, and hopefully by then Talan will be well enough to tell us where to send them.”

Their soldiers.As if the Order of the Rose didn’t include his daughter in its ranks. But I couldn’t argue with him. These were Father’s strengths—his battle prowess, his strategic mind, his ability to act quickly. And he was right. The country was already wounded, its people frightened and grieving and scattered. Gathering forcesstrong enough to invade such a place as Moonhollow, a secret city hidden somewhere in the Old Country, would take time—and with every passing moment, things could change. The moonlight road could vanish, denying us access forever, or worse, Kilraith could come sweeping down it with an army of his own at his back.

I hurried up to my rooms and dressed quickly and warmly, gave a disgruntled Osmund a kiss, secured Ankaret’s feather in my bodice, and raced back downstairs. Ryder was waiting for me at the doors, armed and ready. I drew myself up as tall as I could, kept my expression flat.Am I that obvious?I’d asked him the first time we’d sparred.To me you are, he had answered.

“I suppose you want to come with me,” I said, sweeping past him without a second glance. My arm brushed against his as I crossed the threshold; I fought hard against the urge to close the distance between us.

He followed me, looming and quiet. “I’d like to, if you’ll allow it. If I sit still and wait, I’ll go mad.” He was quiet for a moment, then said, “Do you think it could have been Trina? Could she have wilded those animals to help Talan?”

The guarded hope in his voice threatened to crack me open. I braced myself against the feeling, and my voice came out sharp and mean. “How am I supposed to know that?”

He didn’t chastise me for the unkindness. Instead he said softly, “I’m so sorry, Farrin. I know you don’t have to accept this, but I’ll say it nonetheless—I’ve broken your trust. And I promise you, with everything I have in me, everything I am, that I love you not for your music but for your courage, your strength, for how fiercely you care for everyone around you.”

His gruff voice wavered, breaking my heart anew, and yet I said nothing. What was there to say? Everything was still too recent, too overwhelming—our naked bodies moving together in that quiet, cozy room; the shock of understanding who he really was, whathe’d done. My cheeks burned, thinking of all the years I’d wondered about the shining boy, evenpinedafter him. It was a mystery I’d thought I would never solve, and all the while Ryder had known the truth. And gods, how would I ever forget the devastated expression on his face as I shouted at him in the Ravenswood trees? As a boy, he’d risked everything to save me, and I’d returned that kindness by spitting all my thorns at him. So he had saved me, and hadn’t told me. So he had loved my music for years, and through it, had fallen in love with me. Were these really such terrible things? In his place, would I not have done and felt the same?

Exhaustion fell over me like a shroud. Everything had been easier before I’d known him, when I’d been alone, enduring all my worst moods without inflicting them on anyone else. Ryder certainly didn’t deserve them. When we got to Rosewarren, I’d have to rest, at least for an hour or two. My mind was fuzzy, my thoughts scattered. Maybe sleep would scrub away at least some of this awful ache.

“After I left, what did Ankaret do?” I managed to say. We were nearly at the hedge maze, the greenway to Rosewarren churning silently within.

“She left not long after you did,” he replied. “She told me…” He hesitated. “She told me she was sorry.”

“I’m not. I’m glad she told me the truth. I’m glad someone did. Now I know the real face of things.” Even I didn’t believe myself; the sound of my voice was brittle and tired in the quiet night air.

I plunged into the hedge maze, my side aching. I was walking too fast; my legs were shaky. But I liked the force of my heels digging into the ground and my fists punching the air, propelling me forward. I followed the maze’s winding path, ducked under the arbor heavy with vines. There was a slight dip in the hedge, where a familiar, eager magic pulled at me. To anyone else, it would have looked like just another stretch of immaculately groomed bushes. I stepped into thegreenway without looking back. Ryder would follow, or he wouldn’t. What did I care? My mission was the same either way.

But I knew right away that something was wrong. I’d used this greenway to travel to Rosewarren many times. It was a fluid, easy passage, like floating on my back down a lazy river, and in only eight seconds, it always deposited me gently on the grounds of Rosewarren, behind the veil of chiming snow-blossoms.

This time, however, the passage was sharp, jolting, and all too brief. A blink, a heartbeat, and it threw me out. I landed roughly and banged my knee. Ryder came out just after me, hitting the ground with a slightly pained grunt.

We were in a tangled, brambly thicket. I winced at the prick of thorns and gingerly peeked through the branches. What I saw wasn’t Rosewarren; it was the nearby town of Derryndell, mere miles from Ivyhill. The night was quiet, the town asleep, but a few windows glowed with soft yellow light. Overhead, thunder rumbled. A flash of lightning illuminated a black line of storm clouds stretching across the sky to the east.

“I don’t understand,” I whispered.

“Maybe Talan brought some foul magic back from Moonhollow,” Ryder said, “or Mhorghast, or whatever the godsdamned place is called. It could have infected the greenway.”

“Or whatever sickness plagues the Middlemist—and Yvaine—has begun degrading other magical structures.”

He grunted. “A comforting thought. How far are we from Ivyhill?”

“Five miles or so.”

“We should start back before the storm gets worse. The greenway could work just fine next time, and it’s the quickest way to Rosewarren. Maybe this is only a momentary aberration.”

But I was only half listening, distracted by the line of dark clouds leading east—almost like a black road, or a shadowed forest path. Ishivered at the sight of it, my heart racing. It was as if some switch had been flipped deep inside me, shifting the mechanism of my body from one state of being to another—watchfulness to eagerness, caution to easy courage.

“All the storms that now live are his,” I said. “That’s what Ankaret said.Follow them to the place where they are born, and you will find his city.” I turned back to look at Ryder, beaming. “If we follow this storm, we’ll find the moonlight road. I’m sure of it.”

“And do what when we find it?” His eyes gleamed in the storm’s strange light. “We can’t go traipsing into an enemy city by ourselves.”

“No, of course not, but we can test the theory and determine whether or not this is a reliable way to find the road. If it appears, we’ll take note of where we were, how we found it, the state of the storm. We’ll bring that information to Rosewarren and send it to the capital.”

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