Page 135 of Moonmarked

She didn’t belong in that court. Not in Verenthia at all. I was going to give her freedom back to her even if it meant burning down kingdoms to do it.

The ground seemed to swing to the sides with every few steps I took, and I knew it was all in my head, but it looked so real. I swung to the sides with it, too, holding onto tree trunks, getting closer to the darkness in the middle of the woods. Raja’s magic hung in the air around it, humming a familiar tune in my ears. It was a very well-made illusion that even sorcerers wouldn’t be able to pick apart—provided they didn’t come too close to feel the magic.

Raja knew what she was doing, though. I trusted her more than anyone in my life, and not because she had been my mother’s friend all those years ago. The stars know that time changes people. It was because of the way she behaved and spoke andactedafter she found me again. She’d built the trust I had for her brick by brick, and that’swhy I didn’t hesitate to slip into the darkness, even if I was too far gone to see anything. I slipped in and I saw the other side, the half-ruined house made out of stone blocks and broken, burned wood.

The door was missing, the windows broken, and half the roof had long ago caved in.

But fire burned somewhere inside, and then someone moved, came to the hole in the wall where the door used to be, that now looked like the screaming mouth of a terrified creature.

Raja stepped outside with pieces of wood in her hands, which slipped from her fingers when my leg gave and I fell to one knee, unable to hold myself upright anymore.

But I’d made it, and that was all that mattered.

Half the work was already done.

forty-three

Rune Kalygorn

I staredat the fire dancing on the logs in the blackened fireplace as Raja bound the wound on my side. I couldn’t even remember exactly what the giant had hit me with, just that it had hurt. It still did.

But Raja had put her sorcerer potions on me, and she had cleaned the bleeding wound thoroughly.

It wasn’t going to kill me, anyway. The pain I could handle.

The house she took us to was indeed abandoned a long time ago, the walls and the rooms bare. But the wooden floor still held, though it sounded like it was in pain from the weight of us, and the walls surrounding us were better than nothing. Plus, the fireplace still worked, and the fire gave us light and warmth as we sat there on the floor in front of it.

The chain made of dragon bones was piledup between it and us. Raja would know why I brought it. She knew what it was.

“Were you a big enough fool to go after a giant yourself?”

Her voice was sharp, ice-cold. “Raja?—”

“Answer me, boy. Answer me now.”

I knew how she sounded when she meant something, and I knew she wasn’t going to talk to me about anything else until I answered.

“No.”

There were no secrets between Raja and me. At least there hadn’t been before.

“He orchestrated it. Put me in the Hollow for a match of Crown’s Gauntlet. Pushed me into the grounds just as the game began and the Hollow locked down.” Even as I said this, I felt…filthy. Like I was betraying Lyall. Like hewasn’tthe person who saved my life. “The giant had dragon bones around his hips. I saw the opportunity. I made the best out of it.”

Raja paused for a short moment. “You did good.” And she continued to dress my wound.

“Raja,” I started again, my voice strained from holding in pain for so long. It was fading already, though. The potions would work in no time, and they’d already begun.

“Now, after all this time I begged you.Nowyou want me to try,” she said.

“I have to,” I forced myself to say. “She’s still there and I can’t keep her safe, not like this.”

“It’s notyour jobto keep her safe, damn it!” she said, her voice louder than I expected. And when she was done with my wound, she jumped to her feet, began to pace in front of the fireplace with a hand around her chin, her long dress swooshing to the side, creating a melody for my ears.

Cold sweat covered my face. I didn’t waste energy to wipe it.Just a little more.

“I’m not asking you because I want to, Raja. I’m asking because I don’t have a choice. I would crawl through fire before I put this weight on you.”

Her head fell back, and she laughed. “But I don’t see you burning, boy!”

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