it?” As if she’d covered her ears and sang, “La la la.” I snatched up a stone and threw it at the water. “I remembered the day we killed the Moon. You took her icon.”
The eddies subsided. “I might have worn it best, Evie Greene, but you wore it next.”
In other words, the icon had transferred to me when I’d killed Circe.
“Empress, you are the only one protesting your innocence in this game. I’ve made no such promises.”
“I’m not innocent. I don’t know what I am. But I know I have zero interest in winning.” I plucked the flowers I’d grown. “You said Arcana sometimes ask you to take them to the abyss—that it’s the only place they can see to go. I didn’t understand before, but now I do.”
I braided dandelion stems to make a wreath. The prospect of my death didn’t bother me—my one-way ticket loomed—but the idea of Aric dying made my glyphs burn.
“What are you thinking about that upsets you so?” she asked.
I shrugged and tossed my wreath into the river. Water rose beneath the circlet in the shape of a head, and I almost smiled. “When I relive our interactions, I remember how close we were.”
Another sigh. “Apparently, not close enough.” A wave gulped down the wreath.
That time, I’d definitely received a warning.
30
The Hunter
Closer to her . . .
“How long till I see her?” I muttered from the backseat of our most recent ride. I dimly remembered Matthew getting yet another vehicle and helping me in.
I was still laid out. Never been sick a day in my life, but I couldn’t shake this, no. My bones ached so bad I was certain I’d caught bonebreak fever. Delirium was setting in.
I slept most hours, barely remembering the ones when I was awake. My breaths whistled as if a weight pressed on my chest, and the skin on my bum leg felt red hot, itching like something was crawling all over it. Or in it.
But Matthew had given me a fifty-fifty shot of pulling through. Had worse odds, me. “Want to see my girl.”
As usual, coo-yôn didn’t answer me.
We remained far in the west, as far as I could tell. Most roads had been blocked, and gas proved as scarce as ever. I didn’t know where Domīnija’s place was, just knew it could be reached within a week on horseback from Fort Arcana. At our present pace, it would take the Fool and me months to reach even the area.
But I had to assume he would eventually get me to Evie.
In a rough voice, I said, “Woan answer me? Then tell me this, sosie. If you can fight . . . why didn’t you ever before?” I thought of all those times I’d needed help out of a tight spot, when he could’ve changed the tide.
In the salt mine, that boy had taken out a dozen men—without a weapon. I supposed if I could see every move an opponent would make ahead of time, I could defeat just about anybody.
Pointing at his temple, he said, “If I do that, I don’t do this.”
My head pounded too hard to pursue the subject. “Can’t say I’ve missed these little talks of ours.”
“Empress made you a gravestone.”
Of course, she would’ve figured I’d died with the rest. The odds of me surviving that blast were a million to one. Then the lava, and then the flood, which Matthew had blamed on Circe. I hated that Evie had grieved for even a second. “What’d she say when you told her I lived?”
Silence from coo-yôn.
“You did tell her?” No answer. My eyes shot wide. I wheezed, sucking in a breath. “Damn it, boy!” I’d never imagined this possibility. Because I’d thought he cared about Evie in his own way. “She . . . she doan know I’m coming?”
“Nope.”
Putain! And I wasn’t strong enough to sit up, much less choke the spit out of him. If she thought I was gone, had she already accepted Domīnija? “Is Evie with Death? They together?” Say no, say no.
After she’d chosen me, I’d felt like hell for Domīnija. Actually had sympathy for the bastard, ’cause I knew how it felt to lose her.
When she’d wanted to stay with him back after he’d abducted her . . . I’d lost my goddamned mind.
Matthew said, “Not yet.”
My eyes slid closed with relief. But it was short-lived. Not yet. “Tell my girl I’m coming for her! Tell her it’ll always be Evie and Jack.”