Page 4 of HeartTorn

“There now,zylnala.” I hold her hair back as she empties her guts on the ground by Elydark’s prancing hooves. “The tea you drank this morning should steady you.”

“Oh, really?” she gasps, before heaving again. “I’d hate to think . . . where I’d be . . . if I’d not drunk your damnable tea!”

A smile tugs at the corner of my mouth. Having her mortal existence stretched across realities hasn’t dampened her spirit.

She sits upright at last and wipes her mouth with the back of her hand. “Can’t believe I ever thought I wanted travel and adventures,” she mutters, more to herself than to me. Then, shaking her head, she straightens her shoulders and assumes that imperious air which I’ve come to realize is her one shield against the perils surrounding her. “Now that I’ve finished making a miserable little idiot of myself, shall we continue?”

A faint vibration, like a chuckle, ripples from Elydark. I never would have believed it possible for my licorneir to develop a liking for a human, but I feel a surge of real affection from him now. He steps into motion, plunging into the depths of the forest. Ilsevel rides well, better than one might expect for someone unused to a licorneir mount. She keeps her back lance-straight, her chin high, her hands resting on but not gripping the pommel. She prefers to touch me as little as possible, and I honor that unspoken wish to the best of my ability.

“Tell me, warlord,” she says, breaking her frigid silence, “do the Licornyn design their saddles with the view of sweeping up maidens and carrying them off in mind?”

I blink, uncertain how to answer this.

“Not that I’m complaining,” she continues, musingly. “If this saddle were designed for a horse, I should either be suffering agonies on the pommel or obliged to bounce along behind, clinging to your back like a barnacle. This is certainly preferable.”

“I’m . . . glad to know you’re not uncomfortable.”

“But do you?”

“Do I what?”

“Make a habit of sweeping maidens off their feet?”

“Not ordinarily, no.”

“But now and then, surely. Just to keep up the practice.”

“Well, one wouldn’t want one’s maiden-sweeping technique to be found wanting when need arose.”

She snorts. It’s not quite the ladylike sound one would expect to accompany such rigid posture. But then this young woman has presented a series of contradictions from the moment I first laid eyes on her. Who is she, exactly? Beyond her name, given with extreme reluctance last night, she has told me very little about herself. I know only that she was traveling on a pilgrimage with her sister when they were caught up in the attack on the temple. Otherwise she is an enigma. A mystery I would like to unravel, if only I dared.

“Ugh.” She shakes her head abruptly. “Why is everything soblurryaround the edges? Is it from the gate-crossing?”

I glance briefly at the forest surrounding us. While the path Elydark follows is clear enough, and the trees lining it remain in place, everything beyond gives an unsettling sense of shifting movement that is not found in any other reality. Over the years, I’ve grown used to traveling through Wanfriel, accustomed to the oddities of this particular realm, but it must be very strange to her.

“Don’t strain your sight,” I say when she rubs her eyes with the heel of her hand. “We are on a fae path, which leads through many layers of reality at once. If you try to see what lies beyond, you will go mad. Best to look straight ahead or simply close your eyes.”

Rather to my surprise, she opts for the latter. She even rests her head back against my shoulder. My heart lurches at this small act of trust, and when her body relaxes still more, her rod-straight back curving to bend against me, I fight the urge to slip my arm around her waist and pull her closer. My hand, resting on my thigh, curls into a fist instead.

After some while a faint humming catches my attention. At first I think it must be Elydark’s voice. Then I realize I’m hearing it with my ears, not my soul. It is an unexpected sound, similar to a licorneir song, but not made with a licorneir’s voice. Only when it dips suddenly into a lower register do I recognize what I’m hearing: Ilsevel. She’s humming some remnant of the song she and Elydark sang to me last night, when they drew me back from the virulium. It’s so odd to hear such a song made with throat and tongue rather than spirit. Beautiful, though. Strange and beautiful.

As though suddenly realizing what she’s doing, Ilsevel utters a little gasp and sits upright once more. “Don’t stop,” I say, sorry to be deprived not only of the song, but of the sweet warmth and shape of her body against mine. “That was lovely.”

She straightens her shoulders and lifts her chin once more, clearing her throat aggressively. As though to drown out even the temptation to sing, she says abruptly, “I thought all the fae forests were burned down long ago.”

Something knots tight in my gut. “That sounds like a story spread by your own King Larongar of Gavaria.”

A little shiver races down her spine. She half-turns her head as though to look back at me but thinks better of it. For a moment she doesn’t speak again, and when she does, she seems to be trying to disguise a tremble in her voice. “Are you saying there are still forests like this in my own world?”

“Yes and no. Your own forests are, by and large, devoid of magic. But there are forests which lie closer to Wanfriel than others, and the Miphates mages would never allow these to be completely destroyed.”

“Why not?”

“It would greatly reduce their access to thequinsatra.”

“And what is that? Thequinsatra?”

I frown, surprised at this question. “Thequinsatrais the realm of magic—the plain of reality from which pure magic originates. To access its power, magic must be drawn from that realm into the realm of the user. The farther a world is from thequinsatra,the harder this task becomes. Humans find it incredibly difficult, though Miphates mages have developed some interesting techniques.” I look down at her again curiously but can discern no answers from the back of her head. “Do you not know this? You are possessed of magic, so I would have assumed . . .”

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