Page 113 of Kiss the Fae

I push through the cavity where stalks of bracken pierce the gap. Not long after, the route crimps into a stone staircase ascending a gorge in the bluff. I focus ahead, ahead, ahead.

Nothing else. Nobody else.

Thirty minutes pass. Based on Tímien’s original flight from The Mistral Ropes, I don’t know what the hell Cerulean was talking about, because there’s no way I can reach the crest from here. That would place me on the eastern terrain, on the opposite side of the range.

Yet the steps level into a copse that peers over a turbulent void. Sure enough, it’s The Mistral Ropes. I have to credit whatever magic my route yielded to dump me right where I left off. That is, if I don’t count having lost my grip and nearly fallen to my death before finishing the climb.

In the copse, a shimmering signpost awaits.

The Siege of Herons

The Lost Bridges

The Wild Peak

Cerulean mentioned that last one. It’s got to be the mountaintop.

But if I know this labyrinth, this signpost points out the location but not the actual route leading there. I unspool my whip. The wind catches the rope and urges it toward heron territory.

Three days left. My pulse jackhammers from the recent trek. Unable to continue without a break, I hunker beneath a rowan and sleep.

The days blur into a single belt of time. I stay vigilant of predators, crossing paths with batches of fauna, some tame like the bobcats. Others, like the vultures hunching on brittle offshoots, wait for me to keel over and decompose for their supper. Also, I try not to think about where the cougars live, because the friendly one at the tower can’t be the only member of its species.

At The Siege of Herons, the coin of a lake reflects the stars. Bubbles steam from the surface, the water sparkling a vivid hue reminiscent of melted lapis lazuli. The blue-grey birds waddle on toothpick limbs at the bank, their beaks inlaid with spiral markings. I don’t see any eggs that need protecting, but the upright birds rustle in my direction, intending to shoo me away. If feeling threatened, they could shift size and skewer me, or they could simply attack in numbers.

On a whim, I bow. Seems to calm them, because they stride off. I make camp from the lake’s opposite end and gawk as they fish for translucent-looking crustaceans, the herons’ spiral-marked beaks elongating, extending far and burrowing deeper for their catch.

Using my cloak for a blanket, I curl up and listen to the lapping water. Cerulean said it would get worse. Don’t see it that way so far, which can’t be good. Even the Solitaries have given me a wide berth, like the calm before a storm.

As I coast into dreams, a draft brushes my hair.

The thirteenth night smears cobalt across the sky, with constellations crystallizing in the hemisphere. I scale rungs embedded into the precipice, then crab-walk across a honeycomb of interlaced hammock ropes swaying over a gulley. With a handful of hours left before dawn, anxiety churns my stomach. Once the moon yields to the sun, it’s over.

The panorama spreads before me, a great mural of summits adorned with bobbing rowans and lanky trees, the hedges speckled with torch poles. I pause and scope out the highest cliff.

The Wild Peak.

But what’s that hodgepodge of planks leading to the summit? Although too far away to tell from this vantage point, the crossing is reachable from here.

I could make it. I could win this.

Problem is, an unlucky shaft leads to that hodgepodge. I’m standing under a hole that burrows into an overhanging chunk of stone. It’s ten feet off the ground, a well of black that reminds me of…

Fuck. I step back.

It resembles a chimney flue. This is what Cerulean meant by the end hurting. He knew I’d have to face this artery, where brackets of rock disappear into the darkness.

My chest rises and falls. With shaky hands, I flick my whip into the chute’s throat. The weapon catches on one of the juts, and I use it to haul myself up into the duct. Murkiness assaults my vision, the walls shrinking, my unsteady breaths filling my ears.

Rubble skitters over the uneven stone, granules raining down. Flakes tumble into my eyes. Dust pinches my nostrils, and my cough vibrates up the enclosure.

I’m eight years old, wedged inside a vent of bricks, smoke, and cinders. I’m scared and don’t want to fall. Meanwhile, the grate’s teeth wait to snare me like an animal.

My toes scrape the crags, finding purchase on an unsteady surface. The rocky interior takes a bite of my elbow and scrubs my knee through the split in my skirt. Soot clogs my lungs. I throw back my head, gasping at the sky’s pupil. I’m tired, already tired, so very tired.

…you didn’t need wings to free yourself.

His words filter through. On a growl, I climb, climb, climb.

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