Page 122 of Oathborn
“No. He would not be here.”
He? She was used to the monster being spoken of in far more vague terms. Zari shivered, and not from the cold.
Silently, Daeden pulled her into a hug. He towered over her, a comforting, warm presence. As her head pressed against his chest, she heard that far-too-slow heartbeat, reminding her of their differences. She wanted to trusthis friendship, but she knew at the Queen’s order, he might become her gravest threat.
“Let me tell you a story,” Daeden said. “Once upon a time, there was an Oathborn, beloved by all. Godspeakers foretold of his birth. He wielded the Crescent Blade, the only sword crafted by the divine. This fae…” Daeden fought to keep talking, straining against the magic of the Oath. “He broke his Oath,” Daeden finally managed the words.
The story was about Javen. Clever,Zari thought. Daeden was sidestepping an Oath by using a story.
“It is said that he, once broken, returned to this land beyond the moon pools. That twenty Oathborn fell in that first hour to his sword before he abandoned the blessed blade and fled.”
So that was how Javen had left the isles behind, with a bloody trail of corpses behind him. Zari shuddered. Now, she was tasked with retrieving the same sword he’d abandoned. If the task was so simple, why had no fae done so?
She thought again of Syonia’s smirk. Her stomach tightened. This had to be a trap. “In these stories,” she began, “what protection keeps the abandoned blade safe?”
“Ah, if the stories told of such things, surely, I would tell them to you. But now, you must go and complete your Oath. May the goddesses guide you.”
Chapter forty-seven
Tobias
Before he went looking for the captain, Tobias did a lap of Wesburg. He supposed it might count as searching for Javen, but he doubted the man was anywhere within the confines of the small town.
Rather, it was Tobias’s conscience he needed to clear, before he could find Javen. The town’s sole telegram office was little more than a lean-to shack, resting against the side of the general store. Once inside, Tobias took the top sheet from the pile of telegram forms, ignoring the calculating glare from the clerk. It was easy enough to fill out the top fields; his name, the address it should be delivered to. He left the recipient’s name as unknown, and hoped that it would still reach the destination.
“We close up in half an hour,” the clerk said. “Don’t take too long.’
The graphite pencil in his hand felt slick with sweat. With careful block letters, knowing he’d pay for each one, Tobias spelled out a message.
Cpt. J is a good man. Nothing to report.
The title cost him extra letters, but he couldn’t refer to Javen so casually, not even in a message that amounted to spying on him.
“Right.” The clerk grabbed the paper, skimmed it over, and turned to his desk. With one hand, he started tapping out the message. The dots and dashes that would seal Tobias’s fate.
With the last echoing taps ringing in his ears, Tobias left.
He took his motorbike into the woods, as far as it could go on the uneven terrain. Only then did he walk heading toward that same desolate burned bit of land Javen had taken him to. As Tobias neared the edge of the scorched clearing, movement flickered between the trees. He stilled, hand hovering near his pistol.
A blur of dark hair and pale limbs burst from the underbrush, sprinting through the forest toward him. The child’s face was streaked with dirt. For one stunned heartbeat, Tobias simply stared. What was a little girl doing out here in the rubble and ash?
She spotted him just as he reached her, throwing up her hands for him to lift her up. “Help!” Her bright eyes seemed to glow in the night, almost as much as the stars overhead. “They… I won’t go with them!”
“With who?”
“Up!” she commanded. “You’re taller. You can run.”
Tobias certainly could run, though he’d prefer to know just who, or what, he was running from. He studied the girl. She was muddy, but not apparently hurt, nor in any sort of physical danger. In fact, the stubborn set of her jaw almost reminded him of… Tobias shook his head. He’d spent far, far too much time with Captain Javen if he was seeing the man reflected in an obstinate little kid. Their only similarity was their dark hair and annoyed glare, though her eyes were an unearthly purple shade, almost the color of iris flowers.
“We need to go!” She tugged on his arm. “Help!”
Her panic cleared his thoughts. There was no way she’d be able to walk all the way back to Wesburg by herself. He set her on his hip, the way he used to carry his youngest sister. “Who are you running from?”
“The fae,” she mumbled. “The Oath-Oath-born.”
By the time she finished stuttering on the word, Tobias was already running, the child’s weight heavy in his arms. Oathborn. Searching for a child? To do what? Feed her to Blood Ember? He shuddered, and picked up his pace.
She clung to him, her arms tight around his neck. Her weight slowed him down but he certainly wasn’t going to abandon her.
