Page 35 of Truth's Blade

She circled the box, trying to find a way to look inside without standing directly over it. She was sure if sparkles landed in her eyes, she would forget why she was even here.

She crouched, waddling awkwardly closer and feeling the strain of muscles too long in the saddle.

The lid was almost hidden by leaves and twigs, and she reached out gingerly, got her fingers under the top of it, and flicked it with a hard, upward jerk.

It lifted, stopped halfway to closing, and then flipped back.

She chewed the inside of her cheek while she considered her next move.

The sparkles were still dancing away, flying westward, and she lay down on the east side and wriggled even closer. When she was almost close enough for her nose to touch the side, she began to blow gently, and the sparkles, instead of first rising up before being carried away, caught the breeze immediately.

She peered over the edge to look inside, and saw a glowing crystal. She backed away, keeping low to the ground, and found a rock.

While she was working her way back to the box, she heard someone blundering through the trees, and then heard them call her name.

Theo.

He was walking directly into the stream of sparkles, and the fact that she could hear him at all told her how disoriented he was—she had noticed last night when he was on guard duty just how quietly he could move.

She ignored his approach—the quicker she dealt with this, the better it would be for them both—and finally managed to reach the box.

She drew up slightly to give herself some height, blowing steadily again, but as if it felt her intent, the sparkles whiskedupward and blew straight into her face. She could feel them as tiny, hot pricks of magic, and she fell back.

Theo emerged from between the trees, leaning against one of the trunks, and blinking at her in confusion.

“How are you at throwing accurately?” she asked him, and the words were hard to get out of her mouth.

“Pretty good,” he said, after a moment’s thought.

“Come round to my side then,” she said.

He blundered through the sparkles as if he couldn’t see them, and his foot caught the pile of leaves and debris on one side of the box and scattered them in an explosion of dust.

He must have breathed some in, because he started to cough, wheezing by the time he reached her.

“Been looking for you,” he said. He crouched beside her and ran a hand over her hair in a strange, intimate caress. “Been worried.”

She tried to remember something about him, about why she should be surprised by his touch, then let her head flop back to rest in his palm. “We have to throw a rock into that box.”

“All right.” He took the rock she handed him and stared at the box for a long moment. Then he threw, and it whipped through the air, reached the box and then seemed to bounce off an invisible barrier. It landed to the side and then rolled away.

She had forgotten that the leaves couldn’t land in there. Obviously a rock couldn’t, either.

She would have to crawl back and smash it herself.

Since Theo had thrown the rock, even more sparkles had risen up, and they blew toward them.

She felt lightheaded, and when her vision cleared a little she realized they were lying in each other’s arms, in the crook of a tree root.

The sparkles were less now, whisked away by a stiffening breeze, and she squinted a little at the box, content to lie in Theo’s embrace.

“I like it here,” he said.

She nuzzled the skin of his neck through the handkerchief that was still covering her mouth and nose, and sighed. She wanted to move the handkerchief away, feel his skin against her lips, but remembered she should keep her mouth covered. She tried to remember why. “I like it here, too, but I have to close the box. Or break what’s inside it.”

“I can help you.” He ran a hand down her arm, pulling her a little closer.

She closed her eyes, and slowly found herself less lethargic.

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