rested only when Obritsa needed it, which was far too often for Rielle’s liking. Didn’t she understand? They had to keep moving. It was important, and Corien didn’t care for delays.
But the horrible girl could only carry them a hundred miles at a time before collapsing from exhaustion, which forced them to stop far too often and rest for a night or two in some dreadful filthy inn, or in a shabby cottage after disposing of its occupants, or even out in the open, in the dirt, like beasts.
And in this blur of interminable eastward movement, during which every day brought a new landscape, an unfamiliar dialect or style of clothing, each of which made Rielle feel more unsettled, more alarmingly far away from home, Corien was her only anchor. The only steadfast thing that knew her and loved her.
So, on the dry, flat bank of the canyon river, she touched him. She touched him as often as she could, even when the nausea of traveling through Obritsa’s threads left her shaking and damp with sweat.
“Do you want to stay here for a while?” she asked, ignoring Obritsa’s muted cries of pain as the girl caught her breath nearby. “We could explore the ruins. Maybe artifacts remain that we can salvage.”
Corien’s gaze softened, which happened only when he looked upon her face. The relief of this constancy brought tears to Rielle’s eyes. He was a bright moon shining down upon the gray, fog-draped sea in which she now lived.
He kissed her brow. “For a night. We’ll find an old house, an angelic house, one that used to be as grand and glorious as you, and sleep there until dawn.”
Then, without turning, he addressed the girl and her guard.
“Onward, Your Majesty.” He loved mocking Obritsa, which tickled Rielle. “You and your noble companion may lead the way.”
He pointed down a broad footpath that followed the river, waited for Artem to trudge ahead and Obritsa to limp after him, her small body trembling with exhaustion. Artem loomed over her, tall and sturdy, with light-brown skin and shaggy brown hair, his eyes bleary and troubled. Tied around his torso with six leather straps, resting against his back and shoulders, was an enormous canvas pack. Every time Rielle looked at it, her head spun and her throat tightened until she was forced to look away, then promptly forgot it existed. This happened again now, and when she swayed, Corien’s hands at her waist steadied her.
Then he lifted her palm to his mouth and drew her other arm through his. So joined, they walked on.
• • •
It wasn’t until later that night, curled up on a filthy pile of furs and blankets they had found—most likely, Corien had said with contempt, left behind by one of the roving bands of treasure-hunters that roamed Vindica’s ruined cities, seeking angelic loot—that Rielle remembered seeing Tal.
The memory returned as she slept, slamming into her with the force of a physical blow. Her eyes snapped open, and she barely managed to stifle a sharp cry.
Several things occurred to her simultaneously:
Corien was sitting a few paces from her, gazing out the open window of the manor house they were occupying for the night. The ceilings were high and the corridors wide, designed to accommodate the flaring wings of angels who stood at least eight feet tall. The proportions made Rielle dizzy. His eyes were open but glazed. When she slept, he often used his mind to “work,” he had told her, refusing to offer more information. He was doing that now, his chin propped in his hand as if he were lazily inspecting the horizon for clouds.
So occupied, he hadn’t yet realized she was awake—nor that she had remembered the memory he had hidden from her. Tal, lying in the mud, reaching for her, calling for her. I’m here, Rielle! And with that single heartbreaking memory came all the others, right on its heels. The fog in which she had lived vanished, and she saw everything clearly at last, as if she had been violently thrust from darkness into stark light.
She had to leave. Now.
Rising shakily to her feet, Rielle’s eyes flooded with furious tears. She now understood with devastating clarity how she had been living for the past fortnight. It seemed obvious now, and she raged to think of how stupid she must have seemed, how pliable and senseless.
With his power, Corien had muddled her mind, then dragged her across the world through Obritsa’s threads. Oblivious, Rielle had let