Page 73 of Cursed Shadows 4

I loosen a breath and drop my gaze from the branches above. I look down at my backpack on my lap.

My fingers itch to sneak inside and steal the last pouch of berries.

My mouth floods at the thought.

But I firm my fists, then hug my arms around myself.

The black powder will steal me back to dreams. I’ll sleep through the hunger. And maybe, if I’m lucky, when I awake, it will be bleached stone skies—and I can cook some fish from my backpack before I have to throw them away. They don’t keep fresh forever. It’s only the cold of the mountain that is keeping the fish from rotting in my bag. But that won’t last much longer.

I try not to think about it. About food.

My mouth is too wet, now. I swallow back the saliva and ignore the churning growl in my gut, the acidic burn climbing up my throat.

I turn my chin to my shoulder and look down at the bloody hole of my sweater. There, Ridge plunged a short blade into me. His aim was skewed by the white powder daze—and so he meant to stab the blade into my chest,my heart.

As though echoing my thoughts, my heart twists.

I reach for the tear in my sweater. Hooking my finger around the soft material, I tug it down and study the red line that mars my skin. An ugly, raised line, red and purple blotches all over it.

But it’s closed.

Focus on the positive, the wound is almost healed.

Knitted shut, inside and outside. The black powder will soon be finished with me.

I’ll be out of this tree in no time, building a fire in the next lot of sunlight, warming myself on the roasting heat of the flames, cooking up what I have left in my backpack.

Believe in the positive.

And still, that guttural, empty growl rumbles in my belly.

It’s an ache that’s echoed in my chest. Not of hunger, but of pain. Sorrow.

I release the sweater, then curl up against the tree trunk.

Ridge’s lilac eyes flicker in my mind. The determination that renewed in him when he yanked the blade out of me, then prepared to strike faithful.

No regret, no apologies, no pity, no hint of the friendship we shared.

Everyone at Comlar would have seen it.

The spectators would have watched Ridge turn on me the moment another litalf came and he was awake enough to attempt my murder.

The mirror would have shown Ridge’s betrayal to every watchful fae in the stands.

But not many would feel as I do. Betrayed. Shocked. Sorrowed.

To the litalves, it wouldn’t have been any of that. It would have been justified.

Ridge had their full support, I know it. He said as much.

‘I’m not doing this for the gold…’

Beyond the honour of the victory in this Sacrament, there must be a bounty on my head. Whether it’s from the Queen’sCourt or from a more personal vendetta—my mind flashes with Lord Braxis’s proud face—or even both, I don’t know.

But Ridge didn’t betray Licht in his attempt to kill me.

The betrayal would have been whatIdid. It would have been me killing Ridge, me not killing myself, not allowing my end—because the light must be protected, the dark must be vanquished.

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