40 DAYS UNTIL THE AUTUMNAL EQUINOX, DAWN
Everything felt raw: my head, my limbs, my heart. Every cell in my body ached.
It took a monumental effort to open my eyes. Around me, ghosts moved and swirled, their stories now mine, etched on my brain for life. Rives stared at me, as real as the ghosts, as if I’d conjured him up too.
“Skye.” His eyes burned too bright. “Are you hurt?”
Hurt, I thought. Such an insignificant word. Hurt couldn’t begin to describe what had happened to me; hurt barely brushed the surface. My brain had been turned inside out and set on fire; my body, too.
“I’m so tired.” My voice sounded different. Thin, and distant.
Hollow.
The light in the cavern dimmed.
“Hello?” Hafthor’s voice rang down from above.
“Down here!” Rives called.
Hafthor’s face filled the skylight, completely blocking the light. “I found this opening. I think I can enlarge it, and you can lift Skye up through the hole to me. Stand back.”
Rives shielded me with his body, the warmth of his chest pressing close. Blistering fear and want seared through me with his touch.
Too much.
I closed my eyes. Around us, pebbles fell like rain; I felt the shower of dirt and rock as Hafthor pounded away at the rock above. Stop, I wanted to say. This place was sacred, a place that should not be disturbed. And yet, it also felt right. The radiance I’d felt before was gone; something had shifted.
It hurt to be awake.
* * *
I woke hours later in Hafthor’s arms. We were moving through the grayed lava field, under a scorching Nil sky. The light stung my eyes, making me shut them as quickly as I’d opened them.
Around me, everyone was talking about me.
She’s burning up.
Is she in a coma?
What did the water do to her?
It wasn’t water; it was something else.
Eyes closed, I let it all sink in. Now wasn’t the time to wake or talk. I couldn’t begin to discuss what happened until I’d sorted through it myself. I retreated, into myself; I sifted through one memory at a time, knowing it was too much to absorb at once. It was still too much. Minutes and moments played and shifted, bits of the past seeking traction in the present.
Time passed, my mind a mess, my mental walls in shambles, unable to be rebuilt. It didn’t matter; the barriers were no longer necessary. There was no need to keep out what had already poured in.
I retreated deeper, away from the past, away from the present. Away from me. I found a place deep inside me, untouched by Nil. No color, no sound, just pure white walls. Impenetrable.
Mine.
In that quiet moment, in my private room of clean white walls empty of all but me, I breathed. I rested. And then everything clicked.
The past and present merged into one; the depth and breadth of clarity was stunning. This moment, this now, was yesterday’s future.
And I needed to see tomorrow.
Flinging open the door, I stepped outside my private room. The whiteness fell away; memories roared back. Around me broken pieces tumbled together, the past reforming into a portrait of the future. The lines vanished; the pieces became one.
One future. Two paths.
I saw the path less taken.
In that clear moment, I knew exactly what to do, what had to be done.