Page 73 of The Second Death of Locke
“What do we do?” She couldn’t avoid the not knowing, no matter how much she wanted to.
“It’s your call,” he said. She shot him a brief, withering glance. “No, really—Grey, it’s your life, your identity. This is not my mission, and even if it was, I would defer to you.”
Grey sighed, looking down at her letter. It had not come easily to her until she thought of her mother and grandmother, the lofty way they’d read her stories when she was a girl, and then it had seemedeffortless. “I think I need to stop running,” she said carefully. “But I don’t want to make that decision with an army at my back.”
Kier nodded, considering. “Then we finish the plan as we’ve established it. We try for peace between Scaela and Cleoc Strata. Then you and me—and the others, if you desire it; if they too desire it—will go and try to figure out how to resurrect the Isle.”
She sat back, watching the light of the flickering candle. Her heart stirred with the anxiety of it, and something like hope. “Okay,” she said.
“Do you know how to do it? How to bring it back?”
Grey chewed on her lip. “Not exactly,” she hedged.
He raised an eyebrow.
“It can’t be as easy as me just… going into the sea. Bleeding. Giving some sort of offering. Because we grew up on the coast, and gods know you and Lot and I put one another through more than enough bodily harm. I’ve bled into the sea a thousand times, and I’ve never raised the Isle with that alone.”
“Not that I can recall,” Kier agreed. “There must be some other way to do it.”
“I suppose there must be.”
Under the table, his knee nudged hers. “Does this mean I get citizenship?”
She crumpled one of the discarded pieces of paper and lobbed it at his head. “Only if you’re very,verygood in bed.”
His eyes darkened, grin twisting with something that woke the tether up inside of her. They always flirted… but never with the potential of following through. “My lady,” he said. He reached across the table for her hand, leaning to raise it to his lips. “I look forward to the opportunity to prove myself.”
She kicked him under the table. He only laughed, leaving his hand twined in hers as they went back to their letters.
Solitude is the nature of Locke. Though it is the only nation in which the sovereigns sometimes share the title, the warm feelings of unity do not extend to the rest of Idistra: the Isle keeps its own secrets.
“Even the seas burned”: A Brief History of the Rise and Fall of the Obsidian Isleby Bell Owndig, University of Isidar
seventeen
DESPITE GREY’S UNSTEADINESS, EVENKier agreed, when morning came, that it would be foolish to stay another day. So after she returned from her sunrise wash in the frigid stream, they dressed in what little clothing they had that wasn’t covered in her blood, sweat or vomit, ate a quick and grim breakfast of jerky and dried fruit, and prepared for the road. Grey handed out the coats from her nest, wishing she could press the full extent of her gratitude into each and every one.
Kier stood over the table, tri-folding their letters one by one. “Hold on,” Sela said, grabbing the two she’d written: the first to Cleoc, her mother; the second to Scaelas. Sela drew quick lines next to the names on the two pieces of parchment.
Grey peered over her shoulder; Kier peered over Grey’s. “What are those?” he asked.
“Diplomatic symbols,” Grey said. “To ensure important letters reach the High Courts as quickly as possible. The second a rider sees them, they’re to put down all other duties and travel straight to the recipient.”
“How did you know that?” Sela asked.
Behind her, Eron muttered, “Told you so.” Kier shot him awithering look before taking the envelopes from Sela and tucking them in his coat.
“Let’s get going,” he said. “Five days to Grislar at our pace, and I’ve requested a party to meet us at the encampment. Those letters will beat us there.”
They set off, sore and the worse for wear. Eron and Brit took the lead, Sela and Ola behind. Kier insisted that Grey should ride Pigeon, which she accepted with minimal complaint. Kier was content to stay back beside her, and Grey suspected it had something to do with her unsteady progress and the way he kept looking at her.
By mid-morning, they could see the edges of a city at the base of the mountains. Kier took Pigeon and his letters and rode while the rest of them ate dried fruit and complained about the drizzle. He returned nearly an hour later and confirmed that the letters had been sent with haste.
The landscape shifted again as they walked through the afternoon, the mountains behind them growing further and further away. This was the land Grey was most accustomed to, rolling hills and stands of skinny trees, intersecting dirt paths with grass growing down the middle. They walked and walked and walked, stopping for water or food more often than usual at Kier’s insistence. This, Grey decided, was so she would not tire too easily on the road, or to force her back onto Pigeon if she was taking a turn walking.
At nightfall, they camped at the edge of a copse of trees, huddled together in the gloom as a storm rolled in. It was miserable and wet and cold, but Grey had the odd feeling that soon, they’d never be this way again. She tried her best to treasure it all, from Eron’s shitty food to Sela’s face as Grey taught her a new lesson while Brit tethered and created a pale green magelight with her power. She stored up Ola’s laugh and Kier’s bearded smile (she was surprised he still had the beard, but maybe it helped with the cold) and the swell of her own heart when she looked at them and knew that even if it remained unspoken, they understood the truth of her.
The next few days passed the same, but quieter. As the third day wore on, they could smell the salt in the air, growing closer and closer; the next morning, they could see the dark expanse of the sea on thehorizon. They had to work to avoid the cities and villages now, but with more travelers on the road, it was easier to blend in. At night, they told stories and asked Grey cloaked questions about the Isle she’d once known, letting the open secret linger in the space between them until even Sela understood.
