All of this is over.
While I slept, the Hematite warriors from House of Crimson rode into our camp and destroyed everything.
“Everly.” Her name burns my lips. “Everly!” I scream into the wind, hating it, hating this.
I failed her.
Oh, how I have failed her.
ChapterTwenty-One
Ibrace my hands against the ground, wanting to curse this Hematite land, to curse everything—the sky, the red dirt, the jagged cliffs. Perhaps if I did, they would weep and mourn with me.
Sobs claw at my throat as I dig my fingers into the earth, trying to scar the ground, to leave a mark on the gods.
Why did they lead me to save so many, only to allow five to perish, and then rip away Everly and Tersah, the only allies I had on this journey?
“Why?” I scream into the wind, seeking to understand the high gods’ logic.
Perhaps then, I could grasp why they led me to my enemy, made me fall in love, only to cruelly force me to leave him. They are the ones who gave me two opposing gifts—gifts that war and vie for my soul.
They did this.
They did all of it.
Rock and clay burrow under my nails as I grasp fistfuls of dirt. “What do you want from me?” I scream, but the high gods offer no answers, no comfort.
The wind shifts, swirling dirt around me, and raising ghostly images of the dead slaves from the earth. They spin and twist until they are joined by Mother, Kassandra, and Praxis.
“Please,” I whisper, begging for the visions to vanish. Instead, it grows clearer—dancing around me, mocking me as Everly and Hector’s faces join them.
“No!” I scream and claw at the earth, needing to escape this nightmare, but the ground lurches, keeping me captive in this horror.
Feverishly, I gulp in quick breaths, but everything keeps spinning, keeps dragging me through living flames. Flames that seek, that destroy, that take everything from me and drag me to the rundown cottage in Rock Mountain.
Red fringes my vision as rain pours through the hole in the roof. The wind howls, banging against the walls like wild horses in a relentless stampede. Round and round they go, as the whirlwind turns into a tornado, ripping away the roof and walls, and fracturing the floorboards.
I hunch in half, needing to escape the unrelenting wind. But it keeps beating against my face. My hair. My skin.
Desperate, I pull Hector’s cloak closer and imagine his arms binding the broken pieces of me, holding together my sadness, my grief.
[Sol, get up.]Warmth fills my chest at the sound of his voice, that deep tone I’d recognize anywhere, anytime.
[I can’t.]
[Yes, you can. You are strong. Now, get up.]
I breathe in slow, calming breaths until a gentle breeze strokes my skin, bringing me back to the present, to the feel of the parched earth beneath me. My eyes flutter open, and I rise on shaky legs.
[Hector.]
Pain empales me asI look around, but he’s not here. Keen disappointment burrows into my chest.
[I need you.]Surely, he hears my desperation,feelsmy desperation.
[I’m close. Head north. I promise you. I will find you.]
I gulp in a calming breath and turn back to the charred camp. There’s something I must do before I leave. Something I would want people to do for me.
