Page 59 of An Archer's Reckoning

I inspected the area around the tree, but snow dashed any hope of discovering more.

Trees finally gave way as we stood a few hundred yards from the wooden walls of Grove’s Pass. The town was usually sleepy and quiet in the dead of winter, especially after a storm like the one that had just passed through, but something felt wrong in the deafening silence that filled my ears.

It wastooquiet.

Like the land around us for leagues in every direction, the buildings and roads of the town were covered under several feet of thick, wet snow.

No guards patrolled the wall or gates.

No children played.

Nothing stirred.

“The blizzard died days ago. People should be out gathering wood, caring for livestock . . .”

These were hardy folk who were used to winter’s bite. There wasn’t a single footprint or track.

Hundreds lived in Grove’s Pass. It served as a central trading town wedged between Melucia’s capital and the Kingdom’s border. Rustic cabins that housed the folks who lived at the foot of the mountain range stood quiet, their peaks frozen.

The only sound was the wind whipping through the wood of the palisade.

Órla echoed my concern through our bond.“Stay here. I’ll take a look from above.”

I stepped back into the cover of the trees and pulled my hood over my head, then closed my eyes to share Órla’s sight. She launched into the air and flew high above.

As she soared over the gate, my breath caught.

Details sharpened.

Every building was now little more than a charred shell. Blackened wood frames strained beneath the snow’s weight. In many cases, roofs had failed and snow had poured into the structure.

The snow obscuring the roads that crisscrossed the town was pristine, undisturbed.

Órla’s vision swiveled in my mind as she turned her head.

The Rangers’ headquarters came into view, and Órla dipped down to get a closer look.

The massive building was designed to house, feed, and train more than a thousand Rangers. When I had last seen the place, it looked like a colossal wooden box made of immense logs half as wide as I was tall. Hundreds of years earlier, when the complex was built, the Mages’ Guild had enchanted each of those logs to resist both weather and time.

They had not anticipated Mages’ fire.

The sight of the charred rubble of my former home stabbed me deeper than any blade, and I couldn’t sit and watch any longer. I shook off Órla’s sight, grabbed my pack, and bolted from my hiding spot at the edge of the woods.

Dear Spirits, my brothers can’t be dead. Let them be all right.

Then my heart seized. What if Ayden stopped here on his way to Saltstone? What if . . .

I ran toward the wooden wall, heedless of danger, desperate to see for myself.

As I drew closer, my gut clenched.

The southern gate now stood broken, one corner barely clinging to its frame by its last surviving hinge. Every beam ofthe wall was charred, with many little more than ashes buried under snow.

Everything in me screamed to ignore the houses and buildings and race to the headquarters, but something rising above the snow caught the corner of my eye as I passed the first house. I slowed my sprint and peered around the burned shell. Barely visible stretching up through the snow, a delicate hand reached toward the sky. I threw myself to the ground and dug with gloved hands. When I finally felt something solid, my gloved fingers worked carefully to brush away winter’s shroud. A woman’s face, frozen in terror and pain, stared into my eyes, her mouth frozen wide in a soundless scream. Scarlet-stained ice covered her chest where she’d been butchered by a blade.

My eyes fell to the bundle in her arms.

A girl, no more than three or four winters.

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