Sea of Shadows

ONE

Ashyn sat by the fire, eating pork rolls while feeding meat scraps to Tova, the giant yellow hound that never left her side. She gazed out the window and watched the spring sun burn away the lace of frost.

Her twin sister, Moria, sauntered in, late for breakfast as always. Moria’s wildcat, Daigo, appeared out of nowhere and snatched a scrap from under Tova’s nose. As Ashyn scolded the wildcat, Moria whisked the pork roll from her hand.

Ashyn sighed and Tova sighed, too. Then they just helped themselves to more food and moved over to let Moria and Daigo sit with them.;

When their father came in a moment later, he said, “Moria, you’ll be pleased to know that your new dagger will arrive on the next supply wagon.”

“Finally. I lost it before the first snow fell.”

“Then perhaps, in future, you ought to be more careful with your belongings.”

“I can’t help it. I’m forgetful.”

Father shook his head. “You’ve never forgotten anything in your life, Rya. Who got your blade this time? Another woman needing protection against her husband?”

“That would be wrong. Blades are for warriors. Ash and I are the only exceptions.” She took a bite of her pork roll. “But if I did give it to some poor soul in need, it would be the spirits’ fault. They speak, and I must obey.”

Their father shared an eye roll with Ashyn. While it was true that the girls served the ancestral spirits, it was an excuse Moria used too often.

“Waiting so long for weapons isn’t reasonable,” Moria continued. “We need a smith. I’m sure there’s a strong young man who could take up the task, for the greater good.” She chewed her pork roll. “How about that Kitsune boy?”

“What’s Gavril done now that you’re volunteering him for smithing?” Ashyn asked.

“It was merely a suggestion. He’s young. He’s strong. He’s in need of a trade.”

Ashyn sputtered a laugh. “He’s a warrior, Moria, from a line of warriors stretching back to the First Age.”

“Then his ancestors have forgotten him, because he isn’t very good at it.”

Ashyn shook her head.

“Since I won’t have my dagger by morning, I’ll need a knife,” Moria said, her voice deceptively casual. “I’m going lizard hunting.”

“Are you?” Father mused. “Perhaps I’ll come along.”

“You scare the lizards.”

“No,” he said. “I’ll scare you—away from the forest. Which is where you truly plan to go.”

Moria made a face. “Why would I want to go into the forest?”

Neither Ashyn nor their father replied to that. They both knew what Moria had in mind. Tomorrow was the Seeking. Ashyn was the Seeker. Having passed her sixteenth summer, she would enter the Forest of the Dead for the first time, where she would find the bodies of the damned and put their spirits to rest.

“I don’t see why I can’t go,” Moria continued when no one answered. “I’m the Keeper. I protect the empire from unsettled spirits, so it should be my duty to help with the Seeking.”

“No,” Ashyn said. “It’s your duty to stay here and guard the village during the Seeking.” She lowered her voice and whispered to Moria. “I don’t need my little sister to protect me.”

Moria grumbled. Ashyn knew she hated the reminder that she’d been born a half day later. Twins were so rare that their mother had gone that long before realizing the ongoing labor pains weren’t merely the aftereffects of Ashyn’s birth.

“I’m trained with a blade,” Ashyn continued evenly. “Besides, I have Tova. He wouldn’t let anything happen to me.”

On cue, the hound laid his head on her knee.

“I still don’t like it,” Moria said.

Ashyn leaned against her twin. “I know.”

Tomorrow Ashyn would conduct the Seeking—her primary role as Seeker of Edgewood. There were four pairs of Seekers and Keepers in the empire. Two traveled where they were needed, and one stayed at court. The last pair was permanently stationed at the most spiritually dangerous place in the empire—Edgewood—where they guarded the only break in the box-canyon wall that surrounded the Forest of the Dead.

Their forest had always been thick with spiritual energy, from the old practice of elder abandonment. After that ended, the empire began exiling its criminals here, and the ancestral spirits had fled to the village at its mouth. That was what made Edgewood so dangerous that it needed its own Keeper and Seeker. The village was filled with ancestral spirits in constant need of appeasement, and the forest was filled with angry spirits in constant need of restraint.

Before the Seeking, there was a full day of rituals to be conducted. As they followed the rocky lane to the sanctuary, Ashyn looked at her twin sister. Two of the village children walked backward in front of Moria. A half dozen more followed behind her. The children were not coming along for the ritual, of course, but merely tagging along after Moria. If they got too close or grabbed at her cloak, she’d snap and Daigo would growl. They’d dance away, grinning, only to come right back, chattering like Healer Mabill’s pet magpie. Tell us a story, Moria. Show us a trick. Teach us something.

Moria would scowl at the younger children and lob insults at the older ones. They still adored her, still followed her through the village like stray dogs, knowing a scrap would eventually come. They’d get a story or they’d get a trick or they’d get a lesson, and they’d get smiles, too, and kind words, if they earned them.

“Better run home,” Moria called as they continued down the lane. “You know what happens if you get too close to the sanctuary and see the rituals.”

“Our eyes will pop!” a boy shouted.

“Yes. They’ll explode like dried corn in a fire, and you’ll be left with holes in your head for your brains to leak out.”

“Eww!” one of the girls said. “And then what?”

“Then you’ll be walking around with only half your wits, drooling and gaping.” She pointed at the oldest boy. “In other words, you’ll end up just like Niles over there.”

The children giggled.

Moria continued, “If you behave yourselves and stay away from the sanctuary, I might tell some stories tonight. But you must stay away. Ashyn needs complete silence outside or she’ll forget the words to all the chants.” She lowered her voice to a mock whisper. “I think she might have gotten too close to a ritual when she was little.”

Ashyn made a face at her. Moria tossed back a grin. Despite the insult, Ashyn knew Moria was doing her a favor—a quiet sanctuary would indeed help today. It was the first time she’d conduct the Seeking rituals alone.

“Now, what kind of creature do you want for tonight’s story?” Moria asked. “Thunder hawks? Sand dragons? Water horses?”

As the children called out suggestions, a small voice whispered beside Ashyn. “Are you scared?”

She looked down at the girl, walking so close Tova had to give her room. There were always a couple frightened by Moria’s stories and scowls. This one was Wenda, just past her ninth summer. Ashyn stroked the girl’s black curls.

“I’ve assisted with the rituals many times,” Ashyn said. “It’s not frightening.”

“I mean the Seeking. Finding the”—Wenda shuddered—“bodies. And the spirits. Momma says when the damned die, they become the forsaken and can hurt us.” She looked up, dark eyes glistening. “They can hurt you.”

“But they won’t. I’m there to calm them and make sure they are buried properly. That takes away their anger. They’ll go to the second world and be happy.”

Moria glanced over, her rough voice softening. “Ashyn’s been training for this since she was smaller than you. She’s ready.”

Ashyn wished she shared her sister’s confidence. It was true they’d been training most of their lives. The Seeker and Keeper from the imperial court had come every season to train them and conduct the rituals. Ashyn was not fond of the harsh old Seeker, but she wished Ellyn could be here now to guide her, even if she could not enter the forest with her tomorrow— only one Seeker was permitted in at a time.

Ashyn couldn’t even appeal to the ancestral spirits for guidance. While she often heard their wordless whispers, their actual communications were little more than a few words. From that, she had to interpret what they wanted—and it was all about what they wanted. She was their servant. They did not assist her.

“Who wants Ashyn’s fortune today?” Moria asked.

The children clamored to be chosen. Then Wenda whispered, “I think Ashyn should take it. For luck.”

Ashyn shook her head. Anyone who left an offering was welcome to a fortune, but she never took hers because there was a chance it could be a curse. It seemed an unnecessary tempting of fate. So Moria let the village children take it, which was fine, because a curse didn’t count if you weren’t the one leaving the offering.

The children ran to the offering tree. It was set just under the eaves of the sanctuary, sheltered from the rare rains. Made of metal, the tree had fortune scrolls in place of leaves and a slotted hole for the offering. The shrine caretaker replaced the scrolls with shipments from the court priests.

Ashyn knelt beside the metal tree and dropped in a copper coin, hearing it clink at the bottom. Then she closed her eyes, selected a scroll, and handed it to the little boy Moria had chosen. He shoved it into his pocket to be opened later, so he wouldn’t miss the next part.

Moria waved the children away from the tree and stepped back five paces, coin in hand. She measured the distance. Then she pitched the coin. It sailed squarely through the slot and rang off the metal like a bell.

The children cheered, but the show wasn’t over. They went quiet as Moria pulled a dart from her cloak. She turned around and threw the dart over her shoulder. It flew straight through a scroll and pinned it to the wooden sanctuary wall.

The children whooped and cheered. Ashyn shot her sister a grin. Moria smiled and went to retrieve her prize.

“Leaving an offering is a sacred act, Keeper,” said a deep voice behind them. “It isn’t a child’s game.”

TWO

Ashyn winced as Gavril Kitsune stepped from behind the children, but Moria only said, “Yes, it is a sacred act, and so I honor the spirits by demonstrating the skills I have developed for the protection of my village.”

Ashyn swore she heard the whispery chuckle of the ancestors.

One of the older boys turned to Gavril. “The Keeper protects us from the spirits of the damned. Like your father—”

Moria laid her hand on the boy’s shoulder, silencing him. Gavril’s mouth tightened. One could think he was reacting to the insult, but Ashyn suspected Moria’s defense bothered him more.

When Gavril first came to Edgewood, the village had recognized the uncomfortable irony of sending a young man to guard the forest where his father had been exiled to his death. They’d tried to welcome him. But Gavril was as hard as the lava rock of the Wastes. He did his job and asked for nothing, expected nothing, gave nothing. Still, he wasn’t rude to the villagers… with one exception—the person who’d been the most outraged by his predicament and had tried most to befriend him.

Gavril goaded Moria, challenged her, and caught her when she was up to trouble. Moria forbid Ashyn to complain. “It’s practice,” she’d say. “He pokes at me and insults me and watches me, and I learn to be tougher, quicker, and stealthier.”

Now Gavril walked close enough to Moria to make Daigo growl. He towered above her by a head, his dark braids brushing her head as he leaned over to whisper to her. His muscled arms glistened with sweat, as if he’d just left his morning drill. The perspiration made the green eyes on his nine-tailed fox tattoos glitter.

“Remember what I said,” he murmured. “If you try tomorrow, I’ll do it. I swear I will.”

Moria’s hand tightened on the dart. “I don’t need to be told twice.”

“I just want to be sure we understand each other, Keeper.”

“What’s going on?” Ashyn said.

Gavril didn’t even look at her. “This is between your sister and me.”

Unrolling her fortune, Moria walked toward Ashyn. She glanced down at the paper then stopped midstep. It was only a moment’s pause before she wrapped her hand around the tiny paper, her expression neutral. But Ashyn noticed.

“It’s a curse, isn’t it?” Gavril said, striding to catch up with her.

Ashyn braced for his next words. He’d say she deserved it after disrespecting the spirits with her performance. Instead, he swung into Moria’s path and said, “Go put it on the statue behind the sanctuary.”

Moria’s brows shot up. “Is that an order?”

“Now is not the time to take a curse—” Gavril began.

“I’m not going on the Seeking. That has been made very clear.” She gave him a look. “If I accept my good fortunes, then I must also accept my curses.”

“Ashyn, tell her to put the curse on the statue.”

Ashyn jumped at the sound of her name. It was quite possibly the first time he’d ever said it. And definitely the first time he’d looked straight at her. She decided she much preferred being ignored. His eyes were discomfiting enough. Green. A rare color in the empire. Kitsune eyes, her father said, the mark of Gavril’s illustrious family. A sign of sorcery, others said, whispering old stories about how the Kitsunes first gained their power.

“You know I won’t, so don’t ask.” Moria took Ashyn’s arm. “Everyone’s waiting inside. Father keeps peeking out. We’re late.”

As they walked to the door, Moria glanced over her shoulder. Ashyn did the same and saw that the children were still there, quiet now, their faces tight with concern. They’d overheard enough to know Moria had picked a curse.

“What are you waiting for?” she called to the children. “You know what happens if you see the rituals.”

Silence answered her.

Moria reached into her pocket and pulled out a handful of coppers. “Huh. Seems I have extra. What should I do with this?”

That got a few smiles and whispers, but most of the faces stayed solemn. Moria opened her hand under the fountain water. Then she clenched her fist around the wet coins.

“Grant me a boon, oh spirits,” she said. “Twice-bless these coins for the children. May they have nothing but good fortune until the Seeking is done.”

Wind rustled through the fortune scrolls, making them whisper, as if the spirits themselves were replying. Moria kept one of the coins and threw the rest to the children. As they scrambled after them, shrieking, she tossed the remaining copper to Gavril.

He made no move to catch it, letting it fall, clinking. Then he turned on his heel and marched away.

Ashyn’s knees ached. Which was exactly the wrong thing to be thinking about in the middle of a spiritual ritual, and it only made her feel all the more ill prepared to lead the Seeking tomorrow. This was not the first ritual she’d ever done—she’d been assisting Ellyn since she was old enough to recite the words. It was not even the first one she’d conducted alone— lately, Ellyn had left the minor seasonal rituals to Ashyn, only coming back in the spring for the Seeking. And yet Ashyn was not prepared. She simply wasn’t.

The Seeking rituals took the longest by far, and her knees always ached from the cold stone floor by this point. In the past, any guilt at fussing over discomfort had been mitigated by the knowledge that her participation didn’t matter. She’d do better when Ellyn was gone.

How? she wondered now. Had she expected that her knees would miraculously toughen as she passed her sixteenth summer? That the endless chants would suddenly flow without stammers and stutters?

When something brushed her hand, she jumped, eyes flying open.

“Shhh.” Moria laid a hand on her shoulder.

Her sister held out a cloth, and Ashyn thought she’d read her mind. She was about to refuse—she wasn’t allowed a kneeling pad—but then she saw the bowl of steaming water.

“It’s time for your purification.” Moria kept her voice low. The others—the governor, their father, and the shrine caretaker—had retreated outside long ago, but might still be close enough to overhear.

Ashyn shook her head. “I need to finish the Song for the Fallen first.”

“You did,” Moria whispered. “You started it over again.”

Ashyn’s cheeks warmed and tears prickled. I can’t do this. I truly can’t.

“I’m sure no one noticed,” Moria whispered. “I only did because I woke up when you got to the interesting part.” Ashyn knew Moria hadn’t truly fallen asleep, but the thought made her smile.

As Moria helped with the ritual bath, Ashyn tried to cleanse her mind as well. She opened her mind to the spirits— all the spirits. While the ancestral ones of the village were her primary concern, there were many, many others. Spirits were everywhere, inhabiting everything—spirits of hearth and fire, of wind and rain, of plant and beast. She did not hear those. They were not the sort that spoke. There were other human spirits, though, ones she might hear, if they passed her way. The hungry dead. The lost and the angry.

Like the spirits in the forest. The forsaken. The vengeful—

She inhaled so sharply that Tova lifted his head and whined.

Moria rubbed the steaming cloth over Ashyn’s aching knees. “Did I tell you that Levi wrote me a poem? I can recite it if you like.”

“You memorized it?”

“Of course. It was truly memorable. I’ve never heard anything so terrible.”

Ashyn sputtered a laugh.

“Do you want to hear it?” Moria asked.

“Please.” Ashyn leaned back, closing her eyes and relaxing as Moria finished the purification ritual and recited Levi’s poem.

As for whether the rituals went well or not, Ashyn couldn’t say. That evening, as promised, Moria entertained the children with stories, but Ashyn knew they were truly for her. Distracting tales of legendary beasts and wild adventures.

There were some creatures that didn’t find their way into Moria’s tales that night. Monsters of the spirit world, like fiend dogs and shadow stalkers. Those would not calm Ashyn’s fears as she headed into the Forest of the Dead.

“You’ll do fine,” Moria said later as they slid onto their sleeping mats.

“What if I don’t?”

Moria sighed. “Nothing ever goes wrong, Ash. If it did, we’d hear the stories. The only thing people love more than a good story is a bad one. Tales of tragedy and woe and bloody entrails, strung like ribbons, decorating the battlefields.”

“I could do without that last bit.”

Moria grinned. “That’s the best part. You know what I mean, though. There are no bards’ tales about Seekings because they are boringly predictable. You find the bodies. You purify the bodies. You bury the bodies. No one’s ever done it wrong before.”

“What if I’m the first?”

A coin thumped off Ashyn’s forehead.

“Oww.”

“Don’t complain. That’s one of the twice-blessed coins. I kept it for you. Put it in your pocket tomorrow, and you’ll be protected from evil spirits and snakebites and Faiban.” Moria paused. “Unless you don’t want to be protected from Faiban. I hear he volunteered for the Seeking.”

Ashyn’s cheeks heated. She lay in the darkness, feeling the copper warming in her hand.

“What kind of curse was it?”she whispered finally. “A minor one?”

Moria groaned. “What does it matter? It was one of many I’ve taken. It only means I’ll suffer some small misfortune. Daigo will probably get gas tomorrow night. You’ll be thankful you missed it.”

The wildcat growled softly beside her sister.

“So it was only a minor curse?”

“Good night, Ashyn.”

Moria flipped onto her other side, ending the conversation. Ashyn waited until her sister began to snore. Then she slipped from her sleeping mat and tiptoed to Moria’s cloak, left thrown over the chair. As she reached into the pocket, Daigo watched her but did nothing. She pulled out the curse scroll. Then she tugged on her own cloak and headed for the door with Tova padding along behind her.

THREE

During the day, it was clear that spring had arrived—the sun bright, the air warm. But the nights still seemed determined to cling to winter. An icy wind blew off the north, freezing Ashyn’s nose and cheeks. As she pulled her hands under her cloak, the scroll rustled against the fur lining. She clutched it tighter.

The village was particularly dark tonight. There were always lanterns left blazing, holding off the endless black of the Wastes. Tonight they were a necessity, with the moon hidden behind clouds. When Ashyn peered up, the sky looked faintly red.

The color of blood.

She shivered, cursing her sister’s stories.

As she walked, the scent of burning wood wafted around her. She could see the lazy trails of smoke over the houses and inhaled deeply, letting the familiar smell calm her.

The sounds were familiar, too, like the lonely yips of Blackie, the carpenter’s dog, never let into the house, even on the coldest nights. Ashyn rested her hand on Tova’s head as he stiffened in sympathy with the poor beast. She could pick up the distant squawk of chickens, the low of cows, and the grunt of pigs. No horses—they produced nothing edible, so the village couldn’t afford to waste feed on them when there was so little soil for growing and so few wagon trains bringing supplies.

As she drew close to the sanctuary, she thought she heard the scuff of a boot against the lava rock. Tova confirmed it by glancing in that direction. He gave no sign of alarm, though. Other girls might need to worry about a guard who’d had too much honey wine and been too long from court. But the penalty for touching the Seeker or the Keeper without her permission was… well, it would ensure he never had any urge to touch a woman again. No amount of honey wine would addle a man’s brains enough to risk that.

Ashyn reached the sanctuary and ducked around back, where the statue waited. It was a small wooden figure, so battered by the elements that she could only make out faint grooves to show it once had a face. Instead of clothing, it wore a cloak of scrolls pinned over its entire body, some yellowed, others nearly disintegrated with time.

Ashyn bent and took out Moria’s scroll. She looked down at it, still tightly rolled.

What type of curse was it?

She didn’t want to know. She just wanted to pin it to the figure and run. But that was cowardly. After all, she was getting rid of it, so it didn’t matter what sort it was.

She unfurled it, a half roll and then…

She stopped. At her side, Tova whined.

Even in the darkness the lines on the white scroll were easy to read. The symbol seemed blacker than most, and she swore she could feel it under her finger, as if the writer had pushed the quill into the paper, hoping the ink would leach through enough to warn anyone who thought of choosing it from the tree.

Not a major curse, but a great one. The worst there was. Something terrible was about to befall her sister.

Fingers trembling, Ashyn rerolled the scroll and pinned it to the statue, in the rear, as if that could hide it from whatever powers governed fate.

As Ashyn hurried from behind the sanctuary, she could feel someone watching her. She glanced at Tova. He noticed, but was simply watching.

When Ashyn turned the corner, a boot squeaked. She glanced back. A figure stood in front of the sanctuary, his back to her. A guard’s heavy coat cloaked his figure. Then he bent, braids falling forward, and she knew who it was.

The braids didn’t give him away—many of the warrior caste wore them. Almost all warriors, though, tied theirs with bright beads. Only one used dull, black leather.

Gavril crouched, reaching for something on the ground. When he picked it up, copper glinted in the moonlight. The twice-blessed coin Moria had thrown to him. He shoved it into his pocket. Then he stood and gazed at the sanctuary.

He made a noise, like a grunt of satisfaction, and she knew he’d watched her take the curse to the statue. Had he mistaken her for Moria? Thinking she’d slunk back to discard it in private, like a coward? Ashyn was ready to stride out and disabuse him of any such notion. Then Tova brushed her hand, and she looked down at him, his pale fur glowing in the darkness.

There was no way Gavril could have mistaken her for her sister. So why did he seem pleased that the curse was discarded?

She shook off the thought. Moria always said that there was no use trying to make sense of anything the young Kitsune did.

As Gavril crept away, Ashyn took one last look at the sanctuary. She’d gotten rid of her sister’s curse. Was she too late?

She whispered her question to the spirits. They didn’t answer.

At dawn, Ashyn met with the rest of the Seeking party—the governor, the healer, four guards, and six villagers who’d volunteered. The party gathered by the first tower, a wooden structure as tall as four men, yet still not cresting the forest’s trees. The top was open to the elements, so as not to impede the vision of the warrior within as he guarded the sole break in the canyon wall.

Most people in the empire believed that the box canyon explained how the forest had survived the Age of Fire—that the lava had simply run around it. As Ashyn knew from her books, that wasn’t true.

When the volcanos erupted, everyone fled or died under the flood of lava. After it cooled and hardened, they returned and found the Forest of the Dead, now ringed by stone, as if some invisible force had shielded it and the lava had flowed upward, forming walls around the wilderness.

Ashyn had always looked on those canyon walls and seen safety. They kept the forest inside. They kept the damned and their vengeful spirits inside. And now, for the first time in her life, she was going inside.

“Everyone comes back.”

Ashyn turned to see Moria there, having snuck up unnoticed as the others milled about, preparing to go. Ashyn looked up at Gavril in the tower. Even from that distance, she could see his hawkish gaze fixed on her sister.

“I’m tempted to run into the forest, shrieking and cackling, just to see what he’d do.” Moria waggled her foot over an imaginary line. Gavril scowled and turned away to look out over the forest.

“As I was saying, everyone comes back,” Moria said. “Every Seeker. Every hound. Every volunteer. Every guard. They do their duty and they return, and all is well. You can’t tell me that every Seeker has been perfect. They must make mistakes. It doesn’t matter. I’m not even sure if the rituals matter at all. It is a kindness to the spirits of the damned, but would they truly rise up and attack? If it’s never happened before, I’ll wager it can’t.”

“Don’t be blasphemous, Rya.”

“If you don’t fret, I’ll not say scandalous things.” Moria paused. “Which would be rather difficult, but since I’m quite certain you’ll never stop fretting, I do believe I’m safe.”

Ashyn threw her arms around her sister so abruptly that Moria let out a yip of surprise. Ashyn smiled and hugged her until that rigid steel melted and Moria embraced her, whispering, “You’re ready, Ash. I know you are.”

Ashyn hung there feeling her sister’s arms around her, wishing she didn’t have to leave. Then the governor cleared his throat, and she opened her eyes to see her father, back by the path’s edge, waving that Ashyn needed to go and Moria needed to come back.

“Off with you, then,” Moria said as they parted. “Tova? Watch out for her. Or I’ll set Daigo on you.”

Ashyn wasn’t sure which beast looked more affronted. She managed a laugh, pushed her sister toward their father, and joined the party as it headed into the forest.

As a Seeker, Ashyn was as much a part of Edgewood as the village wall, and no more able to leave. Yet she read books from every part of the empire. She knew what a forest ought to be like. There ought to be burbling streams and twittering birds. Rabbit and deer tracks should crisscross every path. If you were lucky—and quiet—you might catch a glimpse of a wolf or a wildcat. The air ought to strum with the very energy of life.

There was none of that in the Forest of the Dead. No birds. No rabbits or deer. No wolves or wildcats. Even insects didn’t buzz past. She’d heard it was like this, but now, experiencing it was something different altogether.

She gazed up at the trees. They were lush and rich, covered in vibrant, green leaves and moss. Yet when she touched one, the bark was as cold and dead as the lava rock of the Wastes.

Some said there was life deep in the forest—twisted life, revealing itself only in a flash of fur or feather or scale. Even when Seeking parties spotted more, they could never quite say what they’d seen. Her sister swore those parties had seen not living things but monsters. Shadow stalkers and death worms and fiend dogs.

Today, Ashyn wouldn’t care if her twin spent the whole Seeking tormenting her with stories of monsters. She just wanted her there, at her side. Without her, Ashyn felt smaller. Weaker.

Tova bumped her hand, as if to say, I’m still here.

“Yes, you are,” Ashyn said, smiling as she patted his head.

She took a deep breath and continued into the forest.

FOUR

They were heading into the true forest now, beyond the second tower. As the trees closed in around them, Tova whined. Ashyn put her hand on his massive head. Normally that was enough to calm him, but his whine grew steadily louder until the governor glowered back at her.

“Silence your cur, girl,” he said. “Or he’ll bring the forsaken on us.”

Ashyn bristled. Tova was a Hound of the Immortals, almost as much a creature of legend as those in her sister’s tales. Raised in a secret location and given only to Seekers, a Hound of the Immortals lived as long as a human and was said to be the reincarnation of a great warrior from the First Age. Clearly not a cur.

Moria said the governor saw them as threats. He was a highborn warrior—tattoos covered him from neck to foot, leaving only a bare strip down his chest. The girls were merchant-born, which would place them in the lowest caste, except that caste laws did not apply to the Seeker and the Keeper. Moreover, Ashyn and Moria had a direct connection to the only force in Edgewood that superseded the governor—the spirits of the ancestors.

Still, Ashyn wasn’t convinced of any ill will on the governor’s behalf. Yes, he was brusque and sometimes rude. But he treated everyone that way. He was simply not a happy man, growing old and realizing he’d never be more than governor of this empire-forsaken outpost.

Ashyn was so wrapped up in her thoughts that she didn’t notice when Tova blocked her path—not until she stumbled over him, landing on all fours on hard earth. Before she could rise, the hound grabbed the hem of her cloak and yanked. Her limbs shot out and she was suddenly facedown on the ground, being dragged back along the path.

She sputtered a laugh and twisted to see the governor bearing down on them. He was not laughing.

“This isn’t the time for play,” he said.

“I know. I’m sorry. The forest is making him uneasy.”

Tova’s snort denied the charge. Legend said that bond-beasts could speak to the Seekers and Keepers, but it wasn’t true. It was simply that, having been with Tova almost since birth, Ashyn could read her Tova as well as she could read her twin sister.

When she turned back to the forest, Tova raced into her path and planted himself there again. He lowered his head and a noise bubbled up from his deep chest. It took a moment for Ashyn to realize what the noise was. Tova was growling. At her.

Something’s wrong here.

She rubbed down the goose bumps on her arms. Tova whined in apology. When she moved forward, though, he stayed in her path. She stepped left. He lunged to block.

“Bring him to heel,” the governor said.

A Hound of the Immortals did not obey commands like a common dog. Ashyn would never dream of giving him one. Instead, she knelt, coming to eye level with him.

“I need to go into the forest, Tova. No matter how horrible it feels, this is our job. Our duty. Yours and mine.”

He laid down in the path.

“Tova, please.”

Again he whined in apology. But he would not move.

“Faiban,” the governor snapped. “Help the girl move her dog along.”

The young guard looked at Tova and shook his head. “It’s a hound, sir. We aren’t to interfere.”

The governor strode forward. Tova stayed where he was, growling. The governor grasped her elbow. He only seemed to be trying to get her attention, but he startled her and she yelped. Tova sprang and his teeth clamped on the governor’s arm.

The governor reeled back. His sword arm swung up, as if in self-defense. The blade flashed. Tova let out a howl and dropped.

Ashyn saw the governor pull back his sword, his eyes wide with shock. Blood flecked from the blade and oozed from Tova’s rear leg. Ashyn crouched beside him. The sword had cut to the bone. Someone pressed a scarf into her hand. She looked up to see the village healer.

“Thank you,” Ashyn said.

Healer Mabill helped her bind Tova’s leg. Tova tried to walk but lurched and whimpered until Ashyn made him stop, and he collapsed at her feet.

“I need to take him back,” Ashyn said. “He’ll be fine tomorrow. Hounds heal quickly.” Even as she spoke the words, she knew what the others would say.

“We can’t delay the Seeking, child,” Healer Mabill whispered. “It always takes place on this day, when the veil between the worlds is thin. Someone will need to go back for help while we push on.”

Ashyn wanted to argue. Moria would snarl and spit like her wildcat. That’s why she was the Keeper, and Ashyn the Seeker. Like Tova, Ashyn’s world was ruled by duty. That duty lay with the spirits waiting for peace.

“I’ll run for help,” Faiban said. “I’ll tell them to come for the hound, then rejoin the search.”

The governor shook his head. “We need all the guards.” He turned to the bard, who’d joined the group to soothe their difficult task with music. “You go. Hurry to the village and then run back to us.”

The bard—a portly man who likely hadn’t run in twenty summers—stared at the governor.

“We can spare you,” the governor said. “If you do not go, we must bind the hound and hope someone in the village hears its howling. I know the Seeker would not want that.”

The bard nodded with some reluctance and took off back toward the village as fast as his thick legs would carry him.

Ashyn tried simply to leave Tova on the path. But as soon as she’d start walking away, he’d limp after her. So, for the first time in his life, he had to be bound. Ashyn knelt and explained it as she tied him, but he kept lunging against the rope until he collapsed in pain and exhaustion.

Even then, Ashyn looked back to see him trying to crawl after them, and it took Faiban and another guard to keep her moving forward. When he began to howl, the tears started.

“He’ll be fine,” Faiban whispered. “He’s a good, strong dog. But we can’t do this without the Seeker.”

Duty over self. The spirits over Tova. She only hoped he understood.

It wasn’t long before the forest was so thick that Faiban had to walk ahead of Ashyn and let the other guard follow her. Although they could still hear Tova’s howling, the path was nearly gone. That’s when one of the rear guards took out the spool of red ribbon and tied the end to a tree.

Without a ribbon, it would be nearly impossible to find the way out. Until now, Ashyn hadn’t fully understood that. It always had seemed odd that so few of the damned ever managed to find their way back to the village. Now, surrounded by endless trees, she understood.

Most exiles never traveled far from the marked place where they were always left. That made Ashyn’s job easier. It would take all day to reach that spot, though, even with guards at the fore, hacking through saplings and vines.

It made little sense to cut a new path each spring. They all knew that. So, too, had the first governor of Edgewood. The tale of the path was one of Moria’s favorites, and Ashyn could hear her voice telling it as she walked.

The governor had sent extra guards on a Seeking to prepare the path properly. They’d made it wider and laid out the discarded branches and vines to keep down new growth. That way, the path would last for many summers. But by the time the Seeking party headed out the next spring, the forest had swallowed the makeshift lane entirely.

The governor had not been a man accustomed to having his will thwarted, even by nature. So he’d asked his warlord to provide men to clear a path as wide as a road. The village guards watched from the tower as the passage was cut until the party could no longer be seen. The next day, one of the men came racing back along that path, gibbering nonsense.

Certain the man had swamp fever, the governor quarantined him and sent a search party after the others. But the man soon recovered and told his tale. They had been working on the road, and he’d been sent back to camp for water. When he’d returned, he’d looked ahead to see the men hacking through the forest. Then, without even a change in expression, they’d turned and begun hacking one another, as calmly and diligently as if they were still chopping trees and vines.

The man had run to his fellow workers, screaming for them to stop. They hadn’t uttered a sound, just kept chopping at one another, stone-faced.

Eventually the search party returned to report the scene exactly as the survivor had described it. The governor declared it had been a mass outbreak of swamp fever. However, in light of the tragedy, there would be no more attempts to create a permanent road. And so the forest swallowed their work, leaving only the initial stretch.

Ashyn looked out ahead, thinking of that worker and what he’d witnessed. She started to shiver.

“Are you cold, my lady?” Faiban asked.

She managed a smile for him. “Unsettled.”

“The forest does that,” he said, nodding sagely, though she knew he’d never passed the second tower himself. “Shall I tell you a tale?”

“Can you make it a happy one?”

He smiled, his plain face lighting up. “Of course. I am not your sister. Let me tell you a story of a fair maiden of the North, who tamed a snow dragon…”

At noon, the Seeking party ate and sent the signal. A few had whispered uneasily when the governor fired the green flare, which meant all was well. The bard had not yet rejoined the party.

At least Tova was fine. Ashyn would know if he wasn’t. The hound must have gotten back to Edgewood, and the bard would come panting and wheezing down the path at any moment.

When they finished the noon meal and the bard still hadn’t arrived, she did start to worry. But what could happen? Yes, there were vengeful spirits. Yes, there was swamp fever. But it took days for spirits to drive a person mad. And one could only contract swamp fever by drinking contaminated water or being bitten by the infected. The Seeking party had brought its own water, and any infected exiles would have died over the winter. The bard would come soon enough, and if he didn’t, then he must have returned with Tova and stayed in the village.

FIVE

By late afternoon, the Seeking party reached the marked site where exiles were abandoned… after their guards had led them there on a circuitous route so they’d think they were farther in. The guards left the exiles under the largest tree in the forest, but the Seeking party could not see it from the ground, and had to send a scout to scale trees as they walked.

While the village volunteers stayed to make temporary camp, the governor waved for Ashyn and the guards to follow him. It was time for the Seeker to begin her work.

With every step, Ashyn’s heart beat harder. Tova ought to be here. No matter what the governor said, the Hound of the Immortals was supposed to help the Seeker find the bodies. Now she was on her first Seeking, without her hound, and if she failed…

I won’t fail. I must not.

When the governor stopped walking, Ashyn continued past him. Twigs cracked behind her, and she turned to see Faiban following, sword in hand. She smiled at him, and he hurried to get in front of her, murmuring, “Just tell me where you want to go, my lady.”

She pointed with another smile and he tripped over his feet to cut her a swath deeper into the forest. Ashyn followed slowly, letting her mind shift to the second world. Since entering the forest, she’d heard no whispers. The spirits of the ancestors stayed out. This was the domain of the damned.

She was here to help them find peace. It sounded like an act of mercy. It was not. The unsettled dead who roamed the forest were dark, demented forces bent on blind revenge against every living thing. They drove the exiles mad, and they made the forest uninhabitable for man and beast. By giving them peace, the Seeker kept their number at bay.

When Ashyn was far enough from the others, she asked Faiban to retreat a little. Once he’d backed down the path, she lowered herself to the ground. The earth was damp beneath her fingers, and she could feel the chill of it seep through her breeches. The air down here smelled fetid as the breeze blew off a nearby bog.

Ignore that. Concentrate.

Ashyn closed her eyes and reached out to the spirits. After a moment, she could feel them pulling at the edge of her consciousness. It wasn’t like the gentle plucks of the ancestral spirits; these were harsh, like needle jabs.

She repeated the words Ellyn had taught her.

“I’m here to give you peace,” she said. “You want peace.”

No, they wanted revenge.

The empire’s laws forbade execution, and this was supposed to be a kinder alternative. It wasn’t. She stopped herself from imagining what happened to the exiles. No. That isn’t right. She took a deep breath and instead let herself imagine it. Let herself feel their pain. Feel their rage.

As she opened herself up to the spirits, she kept repeating her promises of peace. She needed to persuade them that they stood no chance of avenging themselves on those who’d exiled them here, and the best revenge would be the happiness they’d find in joining their ancestors.

She could hear them now, grumbling and muttering. Their anger flared, like flames licking her face. Then their ghostly fingers reached into her mind, and she began to see images, as Ellyn had warned she would.

She saw a man crouched by a stream, scooping water. Another came up behind him and slammed a rock down on the crouching man’s head. He fell face-first into the stream. The killer calmly took the dead man’s pack and left him there as the stream ran red with blood.

“I see,” she whispered. “I’m sorry. That shouldn’t have happened to you. Now show me where you are, and I’ll give you peace.”

She followed their wordless whispers. Faiban saw that she was moving and tried to clear the way, but she waved him back. Finding the dead was her duty. Her promise to them.

As she pushed through the thick woods, vines snagged her hands and feet. Branches poked and prodded. Once or twice, she swore the branches and vines moved, as if the forest itself was rising to stop her.

Leave us our dead.

She continued on until she reached the stream she’d seen in her vision. She walked along its edge, staying away from the murky water. But with every step, the muddy shore sucked at her boots.

Leave us our dead.

“No,” she whispered. “You have enough. This one is mine.”

The wind whipped through the trees, as though in answer. She shivered and pulled her cloak tighter.

Finally, she saw the man, still lying where he had fallen, his body nothing but bone, covered in scraps of leather and cloth. His boots were gone. So was his belt and anything else that could be used.

She walked up beside the dead man. Then she took a bright yellow sash from her pack and tied it to a nearby tree. She put her fingers in her mouth and whistled as loud as she could. That would bring the volunteers to collect the body. They would take the exiles’ corpses to the camp. When they were all collected, Ashyn would conduct the rituals to put the spirits to rest, and the bodies would be buried.

Ashyn knelt beside the dead man. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. Then she rose and went to find the next.

It was Faiban who saw the man first. He shouted, “Who’s that?” and Ashyn jumped, having been lost in the second world. Then she spotted the man—walking upright—and nearly jumped again, thinking, Shadow stalker.

The man was actually a living being, though he looked ready to pass into the second world—so gaunt his skin seemed stretched over bone. He shuffled as if the act of fluid locomotion took more energy than he possessed. Dirt encrusted his clothing, and his brown skin looked gray with it.

“Stay back,” Faiban said, flourishing his sword.

The filthy man fell to his knees, hands to the ground, stretching toward Ashyn.

“My lady,” he said. “I have survived.”

“And you will keep your distance,” Faiban said, his voice dropping. “He may have the fever, my lady. I must call for the governor.”

Ashyn nodded distractedly. She stared at the man, hearing his words again. I have survived. An exile who had lived through the winter? It happened, of course, but she’d not seen one in her lifetime. And no wonder, looking at him. She swore that by morning his spirit would have been leading her to his corpse.

“I don’t have the fever,” the man said. “My name is Cecil. I was exiled for the crime of—”

“Enough,” Faiban said. “If you are not sick, you will be freed. For now, keep your distance, or your freedom”—the young guard brandished his sword again—“will be short-lived.” He put his fingers in his mouth and whistled for the others.

“He’s mad,” Healer Mabill whispered as Ashyn watched the governor interrogate the survivor. A guard stood at either side of the man. One held a sword at his throat.

“He doesn’t look mad,” Ashyn said.

“The fever sometimes hides. But the governor can tell.”

“How?”

Healer Mabill shrugged. “The eyes. The manner of speech. Little things.”

“Are there often survivors?”

Another shrug. “Perhaps one every third Seeking. But they’re always infected. They’ve been in the forest too long.”

Something moved deep in the trees. When Ashyn turned, she thought she saw a last ray of sunshine reflecting off a blade. But all the guards were here, and when she squinted into the woods, she saw nothing.

“Ashyn?” Healer Mabill said.

“I thought I saw someone.”

“It might be the two men we left with the first body. I hope so. If the fools got themselves lost, the governor will leave them here.”

“They haven’t returned yet?” Ashyn said.

Healer Mabill shook her head.

No matter how far Ashyn had wandered with Faiban, they’d been able to see the torches at camp, burning bright in the dim forest. If the villagers somehow could not see them, all they had to do was shout for help.

The bard hadn’t returned either.

Ashyn shook off the thought. No one else seemed worried. She turned her attention back to the survivor, Cecil.

“He truly does not look mad,” she said.

“Don’t let that fool you, child. It’s a good thing Faiban was there. If you’d been alone, you might have ended up like my grandmother.”

“Your grandmother?”

“She was a healer in the Seeking party. She came across a survivor who seemed well. Being a kindly woman, she knelt to give him fresh water… and he ripped out her throat with his teeth.”

Ashyn’s gaze swung back to the survivor.

“Yes, take a better look, child. I know he seems like a poor wretch, but don’t trust your own eyes. You can’t trust anything out here.”

“What happens if the governor thinks—?”

A gasp cut her short. She turned to see the survivor kneeling there. His head seemed bowed. Then his body fell forward, and the others staggered back out of the way, and she realized that he had no head. That it was lying in the moss. That one of the guards was wiping his bloodied sword.

“He was infected,” the governor announced.

“But…” Ashyn whispered, barely able to draw breath. I’m seeing a man’s head. Sliced from his body.

My lady, I have survived.

“But…” she whispered again.

Healer Mabill put her arm around Ashyn’s shoulders and turned her away. “Let’s walk, child. That wasn’t a sight for you. The governor ought to have given warning.”

“How could they know so quickly?”

“Speed is mercy, Ashyn. And it must also be quickly because a simple bite is all it takes to pass on the fever.”

“But what if he wasn’t—?”

“Remember who these are, child. The worst criminals in the empire. If the governor suspects they are infected, he is not going to risk the life of a lawful citizen waiting to see if the fever manifests.”

“Back in the woods with you, girl,” the governor said as he walked over. “The sun is falling, and we’ll lose what little light we have. You can set this wretch’s spirit at ease with the others.” He waved Faiban to her, then turned to two of the villagers. “You go with her as well. It’ll soon be too dark to fumble in the forest, following her whistle.”

Ashyn set out to continue the Seeking, and tried not to think about the dead man in the grove, still leaking his lifeblood into the soil.

SIX

Of course Ashyn did keep thinking about the dead man. Cecil, she told herself. He had a name. Use it. Remember it. One moment, he was there, talking. And then he was lying beside his severed head. How could she stop thinking about that? How could anyone?

Yet as she looked into the forest, she wondered what sort of crimes he had committed. The empire said only the worst came here, and yet… She swallowed. And yet she knew better, didn’t she? Her own parents had nearly ended up in this forest, for a crime no greater than trying to protect their newborn daughters.

At first, their mother had told no one she’d borne twins. She’d kept the girls hidden and told the neighbors that she wished to take her newborn daughter to her own village. She’d sent a note to her husband, on a trade mission.

While most twin girls were simply ordinary children, there was the chance they could be divinely blessed. The Seeker and the Keeper. In order to learn that, though, they had to be tested. That test… it was a parent’s worst nightmare. And failure to inform their governor of the birth meant both parents would be exiled to the Forest of the Dead.

Before their mother could leave, the midwife came to call. Their mother brought out one of the girls—and the other, never separated from her wombmate, began to wail. When the twins were discovered, their mother took her own life and left a note absolving her husband from all responsibility. Their father was allowed to live.

Ashyn was quite certain Cecil had no such tragic story behind his exile. As much as Ashyn tried to hold on to what she believed, that image wouldn’t go away. Of the man who’d been there. And then was not.

It was nearly dark now. As Faiban held the lantern, Ashyn knelt beside the corpse of a man past his sixtieth summer. Too old to be exiled.

The body was better preserved than most of the others. He must have lived into the winter, frozen until spring, just beginning to rot now. He still looked human. White hair. Lined and weather-beaten face. His dark eyes stared up in shock.

This man had seen death coming, as Ashyn knew from the vision he’d sent. She knew how he’d felt teeth rip into his throat. How he’d tried to fight. How his spirit had hovered there, watching his killer tear into his flesh, devouring it. His spirit had still been watching when his killer had died, choking on a finger bone.

Ashyn looked over at the second body. It lay only steps from the first. A woman. The fever had taken her. Ashyn had seen that in her vision. Wild-haired and crazed, she’d ripped the man apart, mumbling about venison, sweet venison, thanking the spirits for their mercy, and Ashyn realized she hadn’t seen a man at all—she’d thought she’d killed a deer.

“My lady?” Faiban whispered.

She looked up at him. How am I supposed to handle this? she wanted to ask.

Ellyn had warned her that death in the forest was not pleasant. Healer Mabill had said the same. Ashyn had paid little mind. Of course it wouldn’t be pleasant. Death never was.

Moria had understood. That’s why she’d insisted on coming along. I don’t need protection, Ashyn had said. I have my dagger. But that wasn’t the kind of protection Moria had meant. She’d understood what Ashyn might find, and she’d known her sister wasn’t prepared to deal with it. Not alone.

“My lady?”

Ashyn took a deep breath and rose. “Can you take both?” she asked the two volunteers.

“We’ll try,” one said as he pulled on his thick gloves.

“Good. Stay at the camp afterward. We’ll look about a little more before joining you.”

The villagers began to wrap the first body. Ashyn motioned to Faiban, and they headed into the growing darkness.

So far, Ashyn had located eleven bodies. There had been sixteen exiled since last spring’s Seeking, plus two that hadn’t been found then. So she had seven left to find. There was also the possibility of locating the remains of long-dead exiles whose spirits haunted these woods. But if she found the seven, she would be done. She’d have one more day to do it. Then they headed home. It was too dangerous to be in the forest longer, and they had brought only enough supplies for two days.

She was calculating this as she moved away from the bodies.

“It’s growing late, my lady,” Faiban said.

“Just one more try,” she said. “There’s still light.”

He squinted into the near-darkness. “The governor expects—”

A shriek cut him short. He wheeled, sword raised.

“Night birds,” he said, but he kept the sword up, his gaze sliding from side to side.

There are no birds here.

Another shriek, this one clearly human, sounding as if it came from the direction they’d left.

Ashyn started running back. Faiban swung into the lead. When they neared the clearing where they’d left the bodies, Faiban lifted his hand for her to stay back. She waited a moment and then crept close enough to see him standing in the clearing, looking around with his sword lowered and his lantern raised.

The bodies were still there. The old man lay on the blanket the villagers used for transporting the bodies. The woman’s corpse seemed to have been lifted and dropped, crumpled now, one arm askew.

“Why did they leave them?” Ashyn asked.

“I don’t…” Faiban adjusted his grip on the sword and pointed it at the woman’s body. “I think they realized two would be too heavy to drag back. They must have gone to get help.”

“Why not take the old man and return for the woman?”

“It’s too dark,” he said. “They’d never find the way back if they weren’t quick about it.”

That wasn’t true. They’d marked the site, and the hacked path wouldn’t grow in by morning.

A twig cracked to the east. When they turned, the forest had gone silent. Eerily silent. Travelers always marveled at the silence of the Wastes, but if you’d lived out there long enough, you could hear the sounds of life—beetles and lizards and snakes and birds. In the forest, there was none of that. Even the wind had died, leaving a silence so complete she could hear Faiban’s breathing.

“We need to head for camp, my lady.”

Faiban started along the path. As Ashyn turned to follow, her hand brushed something wet and warm and she fell back with a yelp. She looked over to see a dark shape on a low tree limb. She lifted her lantern. It was a piece of meat, almost like a ball, but…

She realized what she was looking at and covered her mouth to keep from crying out again.

“It’s a heart,” she whispered.

“What?”

She pointed. “A heart.”

Faiban raised his lantern for a better look, then let out an oath. It was indeed a heart, impaled on a branch.

“How could—?” He took a deep breath and stepped back. “It came from the woman’s corpse.” He looked at it, lying just below the tree. “Yes, that’s why they dropped her. They were lifting her to the blanket and she was impaled by the branch. Her heart popped out.”

Ashyn’s dagger training had included lessons in anatomy, using a pig, and she was quite certain that a heart impaled on a branch would not “pop” out.

“Yes, that’s what happened,” Faiban continued before she could speak. “It popped out, and it startled them. That explains the cries we heard. The forest was already making them anxious. This was all it took for them to flee.”

“But it’s warm.”

“What?”

Ashyn pointed at the organ. “I brushed the heart, and it was warm.”

“You were mistaken, my lady.”

“No, feel it.” She steeled herself and reached out. “It’s—”

Faiban snatched her hand. “Do not touch it again. It could be infected.”

“But it is warm. And wet. If the heart came from that corpse, it wouldn’t be—”

“Enough.” He swallowed and softened his tone. “I’m sorry, my lady, but it’s late and it’s dark and we must return—”

Another twig cracked. Faiban went rigid. Then came the distinct sound of a murmuring voice, and some of the fear left his face.

“Who’s there?” he said.

“Who’s there?” the voice called back.

Faiban opened his mouth, but footsteps began heading away from them as the voice called, “Hello? Who’s that?”

Faiban sighed. “Wait here. I’ll be right back.”

Ashyn looked at the corpses and then the impaled heart. “No, I’ll—” She started after him, but tripped over a root. By the time she recovered, the forest had swallowed even the glow of his lantern.

“I’ll wait here,” she muttered.

She glanced at the heart, shuddered, and turned away, only to find herself looking at the old man’s partly devoured corpse. That was no better.

She backed up to a fallen tree and settled on it, lantern at her feet. She stared out into—

Pain exploded in the back of her head. The forest spun into blackness.

SEVEN

Ashyn awoke feeling cold ground under her fingers. She leaped up, only to feel another jolt of cold— this one from a blade at her neck.

“Don’t,” a voice in front of her murmured.

“You’d better be talking to her, boy,” said an older voice behind her—the man holding the blade.

Her eyes adjusted to the semidark and she saw the first speaker. He was her age, perhaps a little older. He looked like a typical Edgewood villager, with light brown skin, and dark hair curling over his ears and tumbling down his forehead. She’d never seen him in the village, though. She tried twisting to see the older man, but the blade tip pressing into her neck stopped her.

“I didn’t expect to see you out here,” the boy said.

“Who are you?” she said.

When she spoke, he frowned as if her voice sounded odd.

“You knocked me out—” she began.

“Payback.” The boy grinned. “You aren’t nearly as alert as the last time.”

She stared at him. “The last time?”

“When you…” He looked over her shoulder, presumably at the man behind her. “Um, when I got the blade.”

She blinked, clearing her head, throbbing and still fuzzy from the blow. “I don’t know what you mean.”

He only smiled. “Ah, so that’s your story.” He winked. “I’d stick to it. Something tells me you’d get in trouble for giving this away.”

He pulled a dagger from his belt. The blade shimmered in the lantern light, but it wasn’t the steel that caught her attention—it was the filigreed handle.

“That’s… that’s my sister’s dagger.” She glared up at the boy. “You stole the Keeper’s blade? Do you have any idea what the penalty is for that?”

Behind her, the man laughed, and the steel finally moved from her neck. She twisted to see her other captor and when she did, her breath seized in her chest. He was at least twice the boy’s age and almost double his size, with thickly muscled arms and a barrel chest. Scars crisscrossed his face. It wasn’t the scars that stopped her breath, though. It was the look of him—the tangled hair and beard, the dirt creasing those scars. He was bigger and healthier than poor Cecil, but seeing that filth, there was no doubt what he was. One of the exiles. One of the damned.

Ashyn turned back to the boy. He wasn’t nearly as filthy, but on closer inspection, she saw dirt on his clothing and under his nails. There was a gauntness to his cheeks, though, as if he hadn’t been quite so thin a few moons ago.

She remembered the noises she’d heard when the governor had been interrogating Cecil. She remembered seeing a blade flash, deep in the trees. These two had been watching. Seeing what happened to Cecil, they’d realized that they weren’t getting out of this forest by prancing over to the governor and saying, “I survived.”

So they’d taken a hostage. A valuable one.

“I’ll not mention the dagger,” she said quickly. “Moria told our father she lost it. That’s all that needs to be said if you treat me kindly.”

“Treat you kindly?” The man laughed again.

The boy didn’t smile. He was watching her with that same look of confusion he’d had when she spoke earlier.

He lifted the dagger. “You say this is your sister’s?”

“Yes.”

“You lie. Why?”

“What’s this?” The man lifted the blade to Ashyn’s neck again.

“It’s the same girl,” the boy said. “I swear it. She’s making her voice sound different, and she’s acting different, but it’s the girl I got the dagger from.”

“No, I’m Ashyn. You met Moria. My twin.”

“Twin?” He said the word as if it was foreign.

“Born of the same mother, at the same time. My wombmate. We look exactly alike.”

Now the man stepped around her, getting a better look at his captive. He slid the blade around, too, the tip digging into her throat. Ashyn tried not to wince.

“Boy’s right. You lie. Twins are curse-born. Not allowed to live. Unless…” He turned to the boy. “She said you stole someone’s blade.”

“The Keeper,” Ashyn said. “He stole the Keeper’s blade.” She looked down at her bare dagger sheath. “And now you’ve stolen the Seeker’s, too.”

The man stared at Ashyn. Then he shook his head sharply. “You cannot be.”

“No? A Seeker hunting for the spirits of the vengeful dead, to give them peace? Isn’t that a Seeker’s task?”

“The dog,” the man said quickly. “You don’t have a hound.”

She plucked pale hairs from her breeches. “These are his. He’s back at camp. He was injured on the way in.” She turned to the boy. “If you met my sister, I’m sure you saw her wildcat, Daigo.”

The boy nodded, still looking confused.

She turned to the man. “You’ve kidnapped a Seeker. That is not—”

Her gaze fell on the blade in his hand. She’d presumed it was her dagger, but now she could see the long, curved blade of a sword. It had a boar’s head just above the hand guard, marking it as a blade of the Inoshishi clan.

“That’s Faiban’s blade!” she blurted, startling the man. When the blade fell from her throat, she leaped forward. “What have you done with Faiban?”

“Who?” the boy said.

“The guard you took that sword from. He—” She stopped. “It was you.”

“What?”

“You killed the bard. And the volunteers who were recovering bodies. The heart.” Her knees weakened at the memory. “By the spirits,” she whispered.

“Heart? What are you talking—?”

“She’s mad, Ronan,” the older man said.

He stepped toward her, but the boy—Ronan—blocked. The man let out a low warning growl. Ronan moved closer to Ashyn. As she turned away, she spied her dagger in the moss. She aimed toward it while she backed away from Ronan.

“I don’t know what heart you’re talking about,” he said. “But that guard with you is fine. We knocked him out and bound him.”

“And the two villagers who just disappeared? Or the two by the stream earlier, collecting the first body? They never returned. First the bard, then—”

“Body by the stream? We passed that. It was still there, on a blanket. We wondered what had happened.”

“You know exactly what happened,” she said. “You killed the villagers and the guards. Picking them off so they couldn’t fight—”

“The only people killing anyone are the ones who came with you. We saw what happened to Cecil.” Ronan’s voice took on a growl, not unlike the older man’s.

“He wasn’t infected, and they knew it,” Ronan continued. “That’s why we took you hostage. To make sure we get out of here alive. So, yes, we knocked out your guard, but he’s right over there. We have no cause to kill the others.

Ashyn took another step toward her dagger.

“Don’t argue with her, boy,” the older man said. “We’re wasting time.”

“No. It’ll be easier if we’re not fighting her every step of the way. And if something is killing the villagers—”

“Nothing’s killed them. They got spooked and—”

Ashyn dove for her dagger. Ronan was closer and lunged with her. She managed to get her fingers on the handle, but he slapped his hand down on the blade, pinning it there. She looked up. Their eyes met. Then he drew his hand across the blade and fell back with a yelp, cradling his fist. She snatched the dagger and scrambled up.

As Ronan shook his hand, she could see a small line of blood on his palm. Too tiny to excuse the cursing he was doing. He clenched his fist against his chest and, grimacing, turned to the other man.

“Sorry, Uncle. I—”

The older man cuffed him hard enough to make Ashyn wince. But Ronan shook it off and looked at Ashyn.

“You have a blade, but so do we.” He waved Moria’s dagger and gestured at Faiban’s sword. “So don’t bother running. Now, bring your lantern. We’ll go find your guard, and you’ll see he’s fine.”

EIGHT

Faiban was gone.

“Where is he?” Ashyn demanded.

“Not here, obviously,” Ronan said as he prowled the clearing. “You said some of your party vanished. What—?”

His uncle cut in. “The guard escaped, boy. Vines must have been weak. Or someone freed him.”

“Then where are the vines?”

His uncle waved at the forest. “Everywhere.”

As they argued, Ashyn glanced at her hands, one holding the dagger, the other the lantern. She was armed and she had a light. She could fight or she could run.

Her sister would attack the moment she got the opportunity, whatever the odds. How many games of capture-my-lord had Ashyn lost after composing the perfect strategy, only to have her sister make some bold, mad move?

Now, watching the boy and his uncle argue, Ashyn wanted to make that bold move. They were distracted, having decided she wasn’t a threat.

As she considered it, a drop fell from the treetops, hitting a leaf with a soft plop. The droplet shone red in the lantern light.

“Blood,” she said.

The two stopped arguing.

Ronan walked over just as another drop fell from above. He touched the leaf.

“You’re right,” he murmured. “It’s blood.” He peered into the dark branches. “There must be something up there.”

Ronan took her lantern. While he lifted it overhead, the light blinded them to everything beyond its glow. His uncle snatched the lantern and held it up. It reached a little higher, but that didn’t help.

“There’s nothing there,” his uncle said.

Another drop fell, landing squarely on the lantern and dripping red down the glass.

“It’s from a dead squirrel,” he said. “Or a bird.”

He handed the lantern back to Ashyn, who stared after him as he walked away.

“Is he mad?” she whispered to Ronan. “There are no birds here. No squirrels. What’s going on?”

“I don’t know,” Ronan said. “We saw things last night, and again today. In the forest. Shadows. Noises. After the blood moon.”

“Blood moon?”

“When the moon turns red. It signifies—”

“—a breach in the spirit world. I know.” She remembered last night’s cloud-covered moon, the tinge of red in the sky. Then she shook her head. “If there was truly a blood moon, someone would have noticed. Moria and I have to perform a ritual.”

“We saw a blood moon last night. Didn’t we, Uncle?”

At first, his uncle pretended not to hear. When Ronan repeated the question, the older man shrugged.

“You said you saw it, too,” Ronan pressed.

“Then perhaps I did. It’s a nanny’s tale. Doesn’t signify.”

“I think it—”

“Doesn’t signify. We need to get the girl to her camp. Move out.”

Ashyn looked around the camp. A clearing had been cut in the forest and four small tents had been erected for the villagers. Sleeping blankets lay on the bare ground for the guards. In the middle, the campfire still smoldered; the smell of it had led them the final stretch. Packs lay against tents. But that was all she saw: objects. No people.

“Must’ve gone looking for the girl.” Ronan’s uncle stamped through the clearing. “She was late. They went searching.”

“All of them?” Ronan said.

“She’s the Seeker. Valuable.”

“They’d leave someone to guard the camp,” Ashyn said. “That’s the rule.”

“Doesn’t signify.”

Ronan turned on his uncle. “Stop saying that.”

His uncle raised a hand to cuff him, but Ronan ducked out of the way and lifted Moria’s dagger. His uncle looked at it, blinking, as if his nephew had rammed the blade into his back.

Ronan lowered the dagger. “It does signify. You know it does. Something happened to the villagers. All the villagers.”

“What do you want to do about that?” Ronan’s uncle stepped toward him. “If there’s someone—or something—out there, then there’s not a blasted thing we can do except be careful. Now grab supplies. We’ll follow the ribbon back to the village.”

Ronan’s uncle rooted through packs, grabbing food while Ronan stood at the clearing edge.

Ashyn stepped closer and lowered her voice. “You said you’ve seen things in the forest. I ought to know what I’m watching for.”

“Shadows, mostly. Sometimes a noise. It’s always gone when you look.”

Ashyn nodded and reached for her pack. That’s when she heard a sound in the woods. A soft whisper like the wind. Except she felt no wind.

Then the ground vibrated beneath her feet.

When she glanced over, she saw Ronan looking up into the trees, frowning as the noise came again, closer now.

“Do you feel that?” Ashyn whispered.

“I heard—”

“No. Feel.”

She bent and put her fingers to the ground. When she lifted them, she could still sense the vibrations strumming through the air.

“What is she—?” Ronan’s uncle began.

Ronan motioned for quiet. Ashyn closed her eyes, her fingers out as the air thrummed. The sound in the woods whistled around them, darting closer, then away.

It’s watching us, she thought. Whatever’s out there is watching us. Stalking us. But something’s keeping it back.

She was keeping it back. She had no power to banish evil spirits, as Moria did, but her very presence was supposed to keep them at bay.

“What do you sense?” Ronan’s voice startled her.

“I… don’t know. The air. It’s… vibrating. Something’s here.”

“Grab the packs. The lantern—” his uncle said.

A dark shape shot from the trees, so fast Ashyn had only time to yelp and fall back. It went straight for the lantern, swirling around it, and for a moment, she saw black smoke. And eyes. She was sure she saw eyes. Then the lantern went out, plunging them into darkness.

“Run!” Ronan’s uncle bellowed.

Ashyn looked toward him. In the dim light of the smoldering campfire, she saw his sword flash as a shadow swirled past. The blade cut through the smoke, dispersing it for a moment.

Ronan stood there, staring. He lunged toward his uncle, but she caught his elbow, yanked him back, and gave him a shove toward the marked path.

“Run!” his uncle shouted again.

Smoke encircled the man. As Ashyn dragged Ronan, he tripped and staggered, looking back as if transfixed by the sight of the sword cutting through the smoke. That’s all they could see—the occasional flash of a blade. Ronan turned, starting back for his uncle even as Ashyn yelled no, they had to go.

Then his uncle roared. A terrible roar of rage and pain. Blood sprayed from inside the smoke.

Ronan stopped. He gave a choked sob. Then he stumbled back to Ashyn, pushing her ahead of him as they fled.