“It’s snow,” she breathed when she realized Emily was watching, and the words formed tiny clouds of white mist at her lips. “It’s snow, ain’t it, Em?”
Emily nodded sleepily. “Yeah,” she muttered. “It’s a bunch of fucking snow. Just what we need.”
Emily’s sarcasm was lost on Celine. She watched the flakes as they drifted down around her as her bent and twisted fingers absently stroked behind Rascal’s ears.
“It’s just like yeh said, all soft and pretty like.” A flake caught in her hair, shining a brighter white, nestled amidst the thin strands, and Emily couldn’t help herself—she smiled.
“Christ, it’s cold,” Corbbmacc grumbled from Emily’s other side.
She sighed, stretched, and sat up, almost relishing the chill in the air. Perhaps even more than the start of another school year, it reminded her of frosty Halloween evenings, clad in crazy costumes she and Casey had assembled by raiding local thrift shops. She looked down at herself, at the stained and mismatched chain mail she was wearing, and laughed. Things hadn’t really changed all that much, had they?
“Something funny about getting frostbite?” Corbbmacc groused as he crawled out of his own blanket. Without waiting for an answer, he stomped away between the trees.
“It’s the altitude,” she called after him, taking another deep breath and savoring the way it stung her lungs. Oh, how she missed the ice beneath her feet. “It’ll be warmer when we get down off the mountain.”
“Thank the gods for that,” Corbbmacc muttered from somewhere out of sight.
As Emily packed away her meager belongings and slung Garrett’s bow over her shoulders, her thoughts drifted back over the dreamless night she’d spent between Corbbmacc and Celine. Though she felt rested, she was frustrated as well. She’d hoped—even expected—Derek to come to her again as she’d slept. Were his visits over? Was she on her own from here on out?
No, that couldn’t be right. Derek was a part of her as surely as the knowing was. She needed him. He’d be back. If only she could have convinced the wizard to let her take the crystal with her. She regretted having given it to him in the first place.
No sense beating yourself up over it, she thought wearily. Let it go.
They broke camp and continued their hike through the thinning trees. Celine had to stop frequently to rest, but the gentler nature of these slopes kept her from becoming paralyzed with terror as they climbed. Mostly, the view of the lake that dwindled below and behind them was obscured by the wilderness, and their progress, while slow, was steady.
Rascal scouted ahead, his black fur spotted with white from the snow flurries that surprised them all from time to time. Now and then, the cold became too much for him, and he’d return to perch on Celine’s shoulder, staring imperiously at each of them in turn, as though he were the one conducting this expedition.
Just after midday, they reached the far side of the mountain, and Emily caught her first glimpse of the desert that sprawled below them to the south and southeast. It was an endless expanse of dark browns and blacks, almost featureless, that stretched to the horizon.
She stopped at the edge of a rocky ledge that fell away in a steep descent, shading her eyes with one hand, and stared out over all that vast, empty space. Rascal, who was a few dozen yards farther along the scant path they’d been following, paused on the branch of a huge evergreen tree, looked over his shoulder, and then flapped back to her when he realized she wasn’t following.
All that space, she marveled. All that empty space, and we’re supposed to find Daniel somewhere out there?
The enormity—the impossibility—of the task suddenly came crashing down on her.
She heard Corbbmacc and Celine coming up behind her, his footsteps loud and steady, hers soft and arhythmic.
“This ’ere’s as close as I’m goin’ to that jumpin’ off place,” Celine was saying. “Yeh go over there to talk to ’er if yeh want. I don’t need no look at ’ow high up we are now, thanks.”
Rascal flew past Emily’s face and disappeared behind her, off to join his mistress. She heard Corbbmacc fussing over Celine for another moment, and then he was standing at her shoulder, his gaze following hers along the long, gentle slopes below them.
Emily could almost see the line where the forest ended and the bleak, arid desert began, as if it had been drawn into being—a comic book landscape for a cartoon coyote.
They stood that way for a moment, neither of them speaking. The frigid air tugged at Emily’s hair, and she shivered. Leaves from a few trees she couldn’t identify tumbled down the mountain, swept away on the autumn wind, their reds and golds bright specks of color against the dark and desolate backdrop of the land below.
“It’s going to be tough to find him out there,” Corbbmacc said, running a hand through his hair.
“No shit,” she retorted, unable to mask the rising helplessness she felt.
He flushed and looked away, and Emily immediately wished she could snatch the words out of the air between them. She reached out and gently put a hand on his arm, and he, almost reluctantly, looked back at her.
Emily saw him then—really saw him—for perhaps the first time since they’d left Michael and the others beside the lake. There were dark circles under his eyes, and his face had a strange greenish pallor that made her uneasy. How hard must this be for him? He’d left his sister, his nephew, and a chance to return to Paige and the Dragon’s Brood, redeemed for his part in their little mutiny. Wasn’t that the kind of validation he’d been seeking for years? Why had he chosen to come with her now?
The question quivered, unspoken, on the tip of her tongue for a moment, but when she opened her mouth, something else spilled out.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I just…” she looked back out at the endless sea of nothingness spread out below them. “…I just didn’t realize how big it was. I don’t even know anything about these Reavers we’re looking for. How the hell are we supposed to find them out there?”
“They’re drifters,” Corbbmacc said. “They live in their wagons, as far as I know, and travel around, mostly trading with other bands of Reavers and anyone else who will deal with them. A lot of people, especially in the towns and cities, won’t.”
“Why not?”
“You can’t trust them. A lot of what they trade is stolen or worse. They’re thieves and bandits. Of course I say that, but they’re always able to find someone to do business with.”
“But why would they take Daniel?” she asked. As her fingers tightened, she was suddenly acutely aware of her hand on his arm, and she let it fall back to her side self-consciously.
He didn’t answer for a long time, and when he finally did, he muttered the word, his face averted.
“Slaves.”
Emily’s heart sank, but she wasn’t really surprised.
So the Reavers dealt in stolen lives as well as stolen goods. After what she’d seen in her vision, it only made sense, she supposed. But Jesus! Poor Daniel. He’d leapt right from one cage and into another.
“What’s that?”
Celine’s voice tore Emily away from her black thoughts, and she turned to find her friend pointing past them, down the mountain. Their path, apparently made by some form of large animal, wended its way between the trees in that direction.
“Probably a deer trail,” Corbbmacc offered.
“Not that. Jaisus, I’m older than I was, not feckin’ blind. Anyone can see it’s a trail. We’ve been followin’ it for days. But what’s that?”
She pointed more emphatically, and Emily moved to stand behind her and follow her line of sight.
And then she saw it—a black smudge far down the trail. Something glowed orange in its depths, almost lost in the shadows beneath the wide branches of the tallest trees.
“Looks like what’s left of a campfire,” Corbbmacc said slowly at Emily’s shoulder.
She looked at him sharply and found him staring back, his face grim. Neither of them spoke
the obvious question aloud, though Emily could see it echoed in his eyes.
Who else was up here on the mountain?
***
It was a couple of hours before they reached the remains of the campfire. They knew, long before they gathered around its cold ashes, that they would find no one there. There were tracks in the soft earth that were definitely human, others that definitely were not, and a place where the fallen leaves and pine needles had been beaten down into a makeshift bed, but otherwise, they were very much alone.
They stood close together, looking down into the little ring of stones in silence for a moment.
“One of the Reavers?” Emily asked, looking into the thick forest around them uneasily.
“No,” Corbbmacc said as Rascal leapt down and sniffed at the cinders. “Reavers only ever travel in groups, usually large ones. This was only two people, three at most.”
Emily glanced down at the jumbled mass of overlapping footprints all around them.
“How the hell can you tell that?”
“I’m not positive, but I’m pretty sure. Look.” He gestured toward the human footprints. “All these tracks are the same size.” He sidled a couple of steps to his right and knelt down beside the much larger, much less human ones. “And so are all of these.”
Emily looked, but so many of the tracks overlapped or were partially obliterated that she didn’t know how Corbbmacc could possibly make any sense of them at all. If it had been only a couple of people, it looked as though they’d done a hell of a lot of pacing around.
“I didn’t think no one came this way none,” Celine said, moving a few steps away from them and settling down with a groan between the huge roots of the tree beneath which they stood. “Least ways, no one ’sides Reavers.”
“We’re here,” Emily pointed out.
“Yeah, well, we’re mad, ain’t we? What with all the stories of monsters and Reavers and ’ellians and all, I never thought I’d see the other side of these mountains.”
Corbbmacc turned toward the cold ring of stones.
“I’m going to get this going again and then see if I can find us some food.”
“And I,” Celine yawned, “am goin’ to take a nap, I am.” She closed her eyes, and Rascal crawled companionably into her lap. “Yeh’ll warn me, won’t yeh, dearheart,” she murmured to the kitsper, scratching behind his ears without opening her eyes, “if any monsters come sneakin’ up to pounce?”
“I’ll come with you,” Emily told Corbbmacc. “As long as we don’t go too far.” She glanced over at Celine. Corbbmacc followed her gaze and nodded. Whether Rascal was keeping watch or not, Emily didn’t want to venture too far from Celine.
As Corbbmacc stoked the embers, Emily turned and scanned the forest around them. The mountainside seemed very still in the lengthening afternoon shadows. She could almost taste autumn in the air.
Far off, the screech of some bird echoed between the peaks. Its cry was particularly ominous amidst the silence of the woods. How many creatures were out there that she’d never dreamt existed? Mermaids? Unicorns? How much of what was left in the two worlds was still hers, now that they’d been forced together like discordant notes of a familiar melody?
And here was another thought—how much of her world had even been left by the time the merging was over? She’d seen glimpses of things she’d recognized here and there, but far more that she hadn’t. The world she’d left behind hadn’t exactly been all roses and sunshine. What if, by the time her world and the Haven had come back to one another, there hadn’t been much left of hers? She didn’t even know how many years had passed between now and that December day when she’d been torn from Minneapolis. Ten years? A hundred? A thousand?
“Coming?”
Corbbmacc’s voice broke into her reverie, and she looked around to find him watching her. Shaking her head, she tried to dislodge the dark mood that had swept over her.
“Yeah,” she said. “Sorry.” She looked past him. Celine was already fast asleep. A tiny fire burned beside her in the ring of stones that had been set up by their unknown fellow traveler.
“You all right?” Corbbmacc asked, and her gaze returned to his face. The familiar line between his brows was there, but for once it wasn’t accompanied by his customary scowl. He looked genuinely concerned.
“Sure.”
Looking away, she started into the trees, listening for the sound of Corbbmacc’s steps behind her.
“What are we looking for?” she asked, trying to fill the awkward silence.
“Whatever we can find. Eggs, maybe. We haven’t had a decent breakfast in a while, and there are a lot of birds in these woods.”
Emily paused and looked back at him.
“Eggs? Not chicken eggs, I guess.”
Corbbmacc raised his eyebrows. “Have you seen any chickens?”
Emily sighed. She supposed it couldn’t be worse than anything else she’d eaten since finding herself at Seven Skies, but still, the thought was less than appealing. “It’s not breakfast time.”
Corbbmacc rolled his eyes and stepped around a birch.
They made their way through the brush, moving in a widening circle around the campfire where Celine and Rascal slept. They caught glimpses of them now and then between the trees, and though neither said any more about it, Emily could feel their mutual reluctance to lose sight of her.
She was staring up into the branches of an especially tall pine, looking for a likely nest, when her foot caught on a large root, and she stumbled. One moment she was staring up into the branches, and the next she was in Corbbmacc’s arms as he caught her before she could do a header.
She had the briefest of moments to register the heat flooding into her face before the world winked out around her.
CHAPTER TEN
She stands on a wooden porch, staring over the rail with its peeling white paint at the groups of children, most in their early teens, who scurry through the thickening shadows between the houses of this little neighborhood. The edges and details of everything around her are soft and blurred, and she feels the queer doubling of the world around her that she has come to associate with the knowing taking her into the heart and soul of another. Usually, it has been her past or future selves; once it was Celine.
Who am I this time?
A sob escapes her lips, but the voice that accompanies it is not her own.
“Come back inside now,” someone says behind her, and she turns to find Mona towering over her. This isn’t the Mona she knows. This Mona is young, gangly, and a little scrawny, though even now Emily can see the beauty of the woman she will become shining through the awkwardness of adolescence.
“I don’t want to,” she sniffles, wiping the tears from her face. “I want to go with you.”
“We’ve been through this already. You can’t. You’re not old enough.”
“I am old enough! I am!”
“I’m sorry. I know it’s hard. Come back inside.”
Mona’s voice is gentle but full of authority, and a part of Emily—the part that isn’t really her at all—knows better than to push any further. Angrily, she stomps back across the porch toward the house.
As she shoulders past Mona and steps over the threshold, she catches a glimpse of her reflection in the tiny window set into the door. She knows it will not be her own familiar features staring back at her, and so she is not surprised when she sees Corbbmacc’s face, framed by his golden hair, regarding her. His features are softer—rounder—younger—but no less recognizable for all that.
The door slams behind her, and she turns to press her face—his face—to the glass and watch as Mona leans against the rail, right where she had been standing a moment before, and waits.
Boys and girls stream by. Some carry masks on the ends of sticks; others are dressed in their finest. It is Samhain, and they are all laughing and singing and carrying on.
“…First we make a ghost, of the man we love the most…”
Emily watc
hes as a pair of figures breaks away from the crowd and comes up the walk toward Mona. They are dressed in black cloaks of heavy cloth, painted with autumn leaves in a dozen different colors. In the lengthening shadows, the illusion is one of miniature whirlwinds moving through the twilit streets.
“Mona!” a deep voice cries, and the larger of the two pulls back his hood. Garrett’s strange reptilian face appears beneath it.
“Garrett! Paige! You look wonderful!” Mona cries, and she hurries down the steps toward her friends.
Emily feels Corbbmacc’s resentment; she can taste it in the back of her throat like a bitter pill.
I am old enough, he thinks.
Don’t do something stupid, she thinks at the same time, but it is useless. This has all happened already and cannot be undone—not by her, anyway.
She watches as the three friends hurry off, mixing with the other revelers. Corbbmacc’s heart pounds in their shared chest, and she knows what he will do before he does it.
There is no one else here. Their parents have gone off somewhere, doing something for the Brood, she thinks, or maybe just celebrating Samhain themselves.
All she can do is watch as she quietly opens the door and sneaks out. The click of the latch sounds very final as the door closes behind her. One step…two steps…she is across the porch.
And then, all at once, she feels Corbbmacc’s abrupt, paralyzing terror as a man appears before her with such suddenness that he might have sprung up, fully formed, from the very ground. His clothes are ragged, dirty, and torn, though the coat he wears may have once been fine. He holds a paper mask on a stick before his face, and only a bit of graying beard peeks out from behind the pointed chin of a goblin’s painted visage.
“Ahoy there, young master,” he crows, and she takes a step backward. The resentment is gone, replaced suddenly—entirely—by the pounding of her heart—no, Corbbmacc’s heart—in her throat.
“Oh, did I startle you? Forgive me!” The man bows with a flourish. The gesture might be funny if it wasn’t for the fear still coursing through her.
Haven Divided (The Dragon's Brood Cycle Book 2) Page 11
