Endure - Sara B. Larson Page 0,95
his stallion to a waiting stable boy. There were very few people in the courtyard, but the tension in the air was palpable as Damian came to my side and together we followed King Osgand toward the tall wooden doors painted red and carved with intricate twists and curls that would admit us into his castle.
“The Summoner?” Damian finally questioned under his breath.
“If we survive this battle, I’ll tell you everything, I promise. But right now, the only important thing to know is that I lived and he didn’t, and his death was probably a fairly large blow to Armando.” I spoke rapidly, my voice quiet.
He glanced down at me but didn’t say anything else. Instead, he reached over and took my hand in his, and together, we stepped through the doors and into King Osgand’s castle.
It seemed like hours later, but in reality probably only an hour had passed when we reemerged and looked out at the now mostly empty valley. The majority of the two armies swarmed the city below us or hid in the mountains and trails surrounding the city and palace. King Osgand had instructed his generals and captains who could speak any Antionese to help divide Damian’s men between their own companies of soldiers and sorcerers and then guide them where to go. The Blevonese knew this land and were able to tell Damian’s people where the best places were to defend and fight the oncoming enemy. But I still felt a terrible foreboding as I stood on the castle steps and stared down at the land that was quiet and peaceful. Tomorrow, would the streams run red as they tumbled out of the mountains and through the city down into the valley, stained with the blood of both of our people, while Armando looked on in victory?
Osgand had given Damian and me fur-lined capes; Damian’s was black on the outside and mine was a lighter silvery gray. I pulled it tighter around my body as we followed the king of Blevon around the side of the castle, toward a small iron gate that had three locks on it. He used a keychain attached to his hip to unlock two of the three — the last was a key that he wore around his neck, beneath his clothes — and then opened the gate, and Damian, myself, Rylan, Mateo, and Asher all followed him and his guards onto a narrow, snow-dusted path that wound up and away from the castle, deep into the mountains.
There were two ways to reach Sì Miào Chán Wù — the Temple of Awakening to Truth, where the golden waters were hidden and the Rén Zhsas lived — King Osgand had explained to us. A large contingent of his army was placed along the other, easier-to-find path. This second path was narrow and more easily defended, so there were a few soldiers spread out along the trail as we hiked farther and farther away from the castle, but not nearly as many as we’d been told were positioned along the other parallel path that we couldn’t see from our location.
The trail twisted through the unfamiliar trees of Blevon and around massive boulders, sometimes rising steeply before flattening out again. It wound around a sharp outcropping of rock and then plunged deeper into the mountain range, taking us into a canyon. The sides of the mountains rose sharply above us, sheer and terrifying. A glittering layer of snow lightly dusted everything, but the higher up the mountain we climbed, the thicker the snow became, until we were tromping through several inches of it. My feet were cold; my hands were cold; my nose was frozen. Was the curse placed on Blevon because of Prince Delun truly why the terrain and weather were so different — and miserable? And if so, what would happen if we managed to defeat Armando and his horde of black sorcerers? What kind of curse would the land suffer this time?
I didn’t dare ask.
The sun had begun to arc down to the earth again when Damian suddenly ground to a halt in front of me. I nearly ran into him before glancing up sharply and skidding to a stop right behind him. When I looked past him, I realized why he’d stopped.
The path had expanded in front of us, giving way to a small field. To the left was another, larger path that headed back down a second, wider canyon. But to the right, rising out of the