Page 42 of Lore of the Wilds

When she relaxed, evening her weight onto both feet, Asher dropped her wrist and ripped a small, thin strip from his undershirt before wrapping it around her thigh. There was a section missing from the other side of his shirt as well; that must have been where the cloth he’d cleaned her wound had come from. But where had he found the fresh water? Had he climbed back up the cliff face to search?

Where his deft fingers brushed her thigh, goosebumps rose. She could feel her heart rate spike, the blood rushing through her ears.

Just as quickly as he had appeared beside her, he finished his task, stood, and moved back to the other side of the fire. He hadn’t spoken a word to her, yet she was sure she now owed him even more.

She lay down, scooting closer to the embers. She closed her eyes and prayed to the stars that she wouldn’t see those guards’ faces in her dreams.

But she had a feeling their silent screams would haunt her anyway.

***

Sleep brought Lore no relief. Again and again, the guards’ panicked, choking faces appeared in her dreams. Their frantic expressions were seared into her mind by the time the sun shone through the entrance of the cave.

Lore woke with a start, her muscles protesting as she sat up. She sucked in a sharp breath; her entire body was sore, from the bottom of her feet to the muscles in her jaw. Shifting her thigh was hardly painful, though. The leaves Asher had put on her wound the night before seemed to still be working.

She surveyed the dim cave. The ceiling was low, and it really wasn’t very big. It somehow looked smaller in the daytime than it had the night before. The fire had died down completely in the night and the cold breeze blowing in the mouth of the cave raised goosebumps on her arms.

Asher was nowhere in sight.

Had he left her there? Changed his mind, realized his mistake in saving her, and went to turn her in to the guard?

She pulled herself to her feet, wincing with every step toward the mouth of the cave. When she reached the entrance, she gasped. As far as the eye could see, there were rolling blue waves with caps of white.

Duskmere was landlocked—they relied on a small lake for fish and an even smaller river and a few wells for their freshwater. As far as she knew, nobody in her lifetime had seen the ocean. It was beyond the boundary, which they were not permitted to cross. She had had no idea they were only a few days’ walk from this magnificent force.

They didn’t even know they could be out here in the summers, swimming or fishing. Her ancestors could have built boats and escaped the tyranny of Alytheria.

In that moment, she hated this continent they were stranded on.

No, not the continent. The creatures that inhabit it.The ones who had made her and her people’s lives so impossibly difficult when they need not be.

She sat on the edge of the cliff and peered down. Directly below her were jagged rocks. The ocean crashed relentlessly against them, as if it couldn’t stand being obstructed. As if it wanted to devour the very continent she stood upon.

Goddess.

If she hadn’t caught herself last night, she would have fallen to her death. Suddenly, the wound on her thigh seemed painless in comparison to what could have been. Her pain seemed like such a small price to pay for managing to escape the dark fae and the harm she had inflicted upon those guards.

The memory of them choked her up. She turned away from the jagged rocks and the tumultuous ocean, putting her face in her hands. What was she going to do? If Asher had actually left to turn her in, she didn’t think there was anything she could do to stay alive, and certainly nothing she could do to return to Duskmere.

The fae would find her, and they would end her life without a second thought. What was an unruly human to them but a nuisance or something to be ended and brushed aside, like a spider in a bedroom? And would the people she loved also be disposed of so dismissively? Would they suffer for the choices she had made? From what the book had shown her, they were already suffering.

She had risked everything to help them, but in the end she may have only doomed them.

Her fingers dug against her flesh, nails biting into her skin with a sharpness that should startle her. Instead, it was all she clung to. Her throat tightened, as if the air she breathed traveled through a pinhole and she could scarcely bring enough in to keep herself conscious. Her body was trembling, and she could feel the tremors of her chest, the uneven rising and falling as her breaths grew shakier.

The children—her chest collapsed inward, followed by a few short, sharp risings as she tried to inhale, to no avail—AuntyEshe,Uncle Salim. Her fingers curled deeper against her skin, the pain the only thing still grounding her—Grey and his family—she sobbed, but the breath was choked coming out of her, sounding more like the cry of a wounded animal than a human sound.All of them, all the people ofDuskmere!

She crumpled to her knees.

And what about her? She had scarcely spared herself a thought. A thought of her own future seemed futile. It seemed useless to eat up what precious time she had left with thoughts of the impossible.

Curling forward, she pressed her forehead to her legs. Even through her thick leggings, she could feel the sharp bite of the rock beneath her. But the pain was a reminder that it was not over yet. As the numbness devoured her, she knew that there was still more to endure, if only so she could make the world a better place.

She couldn’t do that if she gave up now.

Lore closed her eyes and let go of the tightness that held her body. She relaxed her shoulders, which had hunched around her ears, and took a deep breath. It was difficult to pull enough air in at first, but eventually, she filled her lungs. She pressed her hands to her chest, trying to ease the tightness in it.

Breathe in. Breathe out. Breathe in. Breathe out.

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