37

Out of the Woods

Urgency nipping at my heels, I follow Reven back to the village and up to my room, hoping to cobble together some semblance of traveling attire. Interestingly, the first thing I see when I walk in is clothing laid out for me again. Vos or one of the others must have told Vida.

Mental note to thank her after I return.

The combination of what she’s provided this time is a mishmash. Most of the garments are clearly from Aryd and meant for traveling. The same clothing I wear when I’m Meren in the desert—well-fitted pants and shirt, both in black, that are breathable and easy to move in. The other items, though, are not of Aryd—thicker pants, boots, and a lovely white-furred cloak. These I’ll need for the harsh Tyndran weather outside the Shadowood.

I don’t waste time and change quickly.

When I open the door, it’s to find Vos, not Reven, waiting for me. He has also changed into clothes meant for travel, his own white-furred jacket tossed negligently over one shoulder. He’s not grinning or joking, though, so I’m dealing with serious Vos. Maybe even still angry Vos. I glance behind him, but no one else is there.

“Where’s Reven?”

“Walking on water,” Vos drawls.

I cross my arms, unimpressed.

“He said he’ll meet us along the way. Ready?”

No. “Of course.”

Tziah is waiting at the bottom of the stairs. She hugs Vos, who rests his chin on the top of her head. “I’ll be right back,” he assures her.

To my surprise, she turns to me, opening her arms in an invitation. Without hesitation, I step closer to hug her, little pricks pelting my heart at the sweet gesture. Then she lets go, waving as we walk away.

No one in the village is stirring, the rest of the Vanished ignorant in their beds of the fact that the woman who’d been brought here as salvation is, instead, stealing away in the middle of the night. I pause at the edge of the buildings, looking back over my shoulder. A pain twinges in the center of my chest. The same one that strikes every time I have to leave Cain and the Wanderers to return to Omma. Or leave Tabra to return to Enora.

My hand creeps up to finger the necklace snug against my skin under my clothing. A habit Omma had, too, come to think of it.

Please let me make it back to the Shadowood with my sister alive.

“Tabra?” It takes a second to realize Vos is calling my sister’s name.

I turn back to face him and have to blink. My eyes must be playing wishful tricks on me, because I think I saw a pair of aquamarine eyes in the darkness over his shoulder.

Familiarity strikes softly. All those moments before this when I thought I wasn’t alone in the shadows, when I’d sneak through the streets of the city and out into the desert…was he there? Did the shadows tell him about me? Did he hear the longings and secrets I told the dark? Maybe this is wishful thinking, projecting what I’ve learned of him onto lonely memories to make them easier to bear.

After a second, the sensation fades. There’s nothing there.

At my nod, Vos takes a different path through the trees than I’ve gone before, warning me to stay close as the shadows grow, blotting out the crescents of the moons and turning everything even more shaded. Quieter, too, like the animals know not to come here, either. And colder. Shivering, I slip on my new cloak, which is silky against the only exposed skin at my neck.

Then, with jarring abruptness, the shadows part, and Reven is there ahead of us.

He takes in my appearance with one sweeping glance and stills. Not the other ways I’ve seen from him that involved danger, determination, study, or even anger. This is different. This is the way I’d once seen a desert howler fox stalk a vixen—not as prey or competition but to mate.

I gulp. If this is what Vos sees when Reven looks at me, I understand his concern. Because an answering tumble of sensation thrums through me, pulling me taut. Suddenly, thanks to a delicious, suffocating heat, my cloak is too hot, but I don’t take it off.

You’ve got to stop this, I silently order myself.

My body ignores the command. Traitor.

“Are you sure about going yourself?” Reven asks me, the question sort of snapping me back to the mission. “I can’t guarantee your safety. Not even to get into the temple here.”

I hold his gaze. “I’ll come back. I promise.”

He blows out a sharp breath. Then, not moving his gaze from mine, he takes me by the hand and leads me off to the side. Standing close enough for me to inhale the fresh desert willow scent of him, he lifts my chin with a finger to talk to me in hushed tones. “You have your knives?”

They were among the clothes Vida left me.

“Do dead souls pass through the eye of a needle?”

He gives me a blank stare.

Do they not have that saying in Tyndra? “Yes. That means yes.”

“Good. I know you can handle yourself. If you sense danger, don’t wait for Vos or me. Run.” I start to shake my head, and he gives my elbow a little squeeze. “We can’t have you captured. You made a promise you’d come back to me. This is part of it.”

Wait. “That’s not what I promised—”

He dips his head, gaze penetrating. “I know. I’m adding my own terms.”

The part where I’m coming back to him, or the order to leave him behind if it means saving myself? There’s a lot to unpack in those two amendments, but he isn’t going to let this go. I can see it in the hard cast of his jaw, the way the skin over his cheekbones stretches tight. I truly have him worried, and the lonely child I once was—the one longing to be cared about just for herself—wants to reach out and grasp onto him. Curl into him.

I don’t.

“I’ll run if I have no other choice,” I say. “That’s the best I can offer.”

His lips press flat, and he sort of growls, though not at me, I sense. Especially as his gaze drifts to my mouth and lingers there. “I guess I have no choice but to accept that.”

I smile. “Smart man.”

I get the impression that he’s rolling his eyes at me, even though his face doesn’t do anything. Then he straightens, looking over my head at Vos. “Let’s go.”

I expect Vos to continue leading us out of the woods, but he doesn’t move, so I glance at Reven, eyebrows raised in question.

“This is where we travel by shadow.”

“Shadow,” I repeat warily. I’ve already been carried around that way a couple times. I can’t say I want to do it again.

Turquoise eyes are laughing at me, the wisp of a smile playing about his mouth. “Not like before.”

“Should I thank my lucky stars for that?”

His smile widens, turns into something more solid. “I’ll take Vos first. Then you.”

He doesn’t see Vos’s quick frown behind him, but I do. Why?

Before I can ask, Reven steps away and claps a hand on Vos’s shoulder. Darkness rises up and consumes them so fast, if I didn’t know what was happening, I would’ve wondered if the gates of the first level of the hells had opened beneath their feet.

Almost as fast, in a reverse version, Reven returns. “I have to touch you,” he says. “Don’t cut off my balls.”

“You just touched me—” I cut that argument off as it sinks in that he knows about my use of those words at all. I narrow my eyes. “Did Vos tell you that?”

He laughs outright this time. “I heard.”

And now I have part of an answer, at least. Reven laughs with his entire body, eyes crinkling at the corners even after he’s done. That brief moment of happiness lights me up inside.

“Yeah, well. That’s a last resort for the truly…evil…” I trail off, realizing what I’m saying too late.

He steps into me, surrounding and yet not touching. “Evil exists in all of us,” he murmurs. “Even you, if you’re pushed, I imagine.”

Not an answer.

“I do know something about that.” I’m not the pampered royal he thinks. Even more, I’m not as sheltered as my sister, and my entire purpose in life is driven by the fear of evil. So I do know.

He huffs an unamused, almost sour laugh. “I think I realized that the first time I ever saw you.”

I frown. Me or Tabra?

Any response I might have made is cut off when he lifts both my arms to wind around his neck, then wraps one arm under my coat and around me to place his hand at the small of my back.

Uh, this is not how he did it with Vos, but I’m too busy trying to contain my overwhelming awareness of how our bodies are pressed together to comment. His hands warm my skin underneath my thick coat.

It’s a losing battle.

Shadow envelops us, but all I see is Reven.