Page 96 of What Is Dark Within Me

“I swear, Nic. I swear.”

And by the time she felt brave enough to ask why he still wouldn’t let her touch his chest, it was the day they were set to speak with the Second, and that was the only thing consuming her mind.

* * *

Taddeas sawNicolas and Aleja off. It was morning in the Hiding Place, though it had become more difficult to tell the time of day these last few weeks. Nicolas had been gone less since their first night together; he’d claimed he’d done all he could to secure their allies, and that he was waiting to hear their responses, but Aleja suspected a different reason every time he pulled her into a kiss.

If the Second agreed, Aleja might have only a year and a day to train before facing deadly challenges, and she no longer had half of the Knowing One’s power. She could feel it during target practice. Her fire was reliable, and easy to aim, but it did not pour out of her in the torrents it once had. If there hadn’t been other witches locked within the Astraelis beneath the well, she would already be dead.

“Are you sure you want to do this, Al?” Taddeas asked. “No one would blame you if you changed your mind.”

“I’ve done them before. Besides, Bonnie made it through the Trials and she’s not a warrior,” she said, adjusting her backpack’s straps. She’d taken to wearing the sickle on her belt loop again, but now it seemed as ordinary as the other gardening tools in the sheds around the palace. The tiny golden box was still locked and in her pocket. There had beensomethingabout it, she knew. Something in the memories the Astraelis had unlocked for her, but it was as elusive as the others.

“They’re different for everyone. Different, but still dangerous,” Taddeas said. He seemed intent on ignoring the look Nicolas gave him—a look Aleja was having a hard time interpreting herself. It could mean anything from ‘keep your trap shut’ to ‘you’re the last person who can convince her this is a terrible idea’.

Bonnie had tried the latter already last night, when Aleja had come in for dinner, surprised to find Violet there and the two of them halfway through a pot of strong tea. Aleja had listened quietly, just as she did now, then hugged Bonnie and said that her mind was already made.

“Come on then,” Nicolas said. It was strange to see him in dark traveling clothes rather than the formal tunic or suits he wore whenever he went to the human world. “We should get going. It’s a long hike to the Second’s mountain, and the Hiding Place is feeling temperamental.”

Even Garm remained silent as they followed the trails Aleja had once explored with Roland. The small path banked sharply uphill, away from the village where Taddeas and Jack lived. Aleja accepted Nicolas’s hand when she crawled over a log blocking the path, and neither of them let go as they continued onward into the mountains.

“Nervous?” he asked when they stopped for water.

“Of course.”

“Tad was right. You could change your mind.”

“You know I’m not going to.”

“I know,” he said with a grim smile. He bent down and kissed the corner of Aleja’s mouth, but before she could turn to capture his lips properly, they both jumped at the sound of a twig breaking somewhere behind them.

“Someone’s coming,” Garm barked.

“Thanks for the warning,” she muttered.

Violet didn’t bother to hide her approach. Her cheeks were flushed from the hike, but they looked fuller than usual, as if she’d recently taken a dose of her potion. She wore the purple backpack Thierry Laurent had once stolen, with her hair tied into a messy bun at the top of her head.

“What are you doing here?” Aleja asked, rushing to her side. “You should be resting, Vi.”

Violet bit her lip, looking away. Aleja knew the expression. It meant Violet had something to say she knew would be poorly received. “I’m coming with you. I want to undergo the Trials too.”

“Absolutely not,” Aleja and Nicolas said at the same time. Aleja’s pulse pounded in her ears, and it was not from the uphill climb. Where the hell had Violet gotten an idea like this?

“If you survive the Trials, you’ll still be down a Dark Saint. And even if Bonnie hadn’t let it slip that war was coming, Isawinto the Astraelis’s mind. I saw what just one of them could do. You’re the one who must agree to take someone to see the Second, right?” she said, gesturing at Nicolas. “So take me too.”

“You should go back to the palace,” he told Violet, with less force than Aleja had hoped. “You can live out a normal human lifespan there—”

“And what?” Violet shouted, disturbing a flock of rooks on the surrounding branches. “I appreciate your offer, Knowing One. I know the others here are happy, but idling around the palace looking at paintings, and eating until my stomach hurts is not exactly my idea ofliving a normal life. And if I go back to the human world, I’ll have a couple of weeks. Maybe a month, if I’m lucky.”

Aleja sighed, wishing there was a place to sit. Violet had never expressed this directly, but Aleja knew in her heart that it must be true. Her friend was a traveler, a hiker, a thrill-seeker. Idling around looking at paintings and eating seemed perfectly fine to Aleja, but Violet had always felt an urge to wander.

“Tell me the truth, Knowing One. If I survive the Trials and become an Otherlander, will I be cured?” Violet went on, before Aleja could try to console her.

“Yes, but it would change you in other vital ways. Ways you haven’t had time to think about. You’d take Roland’s place, the place I once held, as the Dark Saint of Pride. I don’t know what power you’d be granted. And if you survive the Trials, you might not recognize yourself,” Nicolas said.

“Why are you even entertaining this?” Aleja snapped at him. Something inside her fractured. All those months, she’d held out the hope that her friend was alive somewhere and that once Aleja found her, Violet would shrug on her hiking backpack and carry on being the smiling girl who loved taking photographs.

Aleja knew she hadn’t been the one to do this to Violet—that was cancer, that was James, that was Roland, and that was the Astraelis in the well—but now, she was arguing against the one chance her friend might have to fix it.

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