Page 72 of The Wicked Lies of Habren Faire
“If I find her,” I say quietly, “I’ll have to leave her here, won’t I?”
Morgen’s eyes melt like butter. She nods.
I’ll return to Llanadwen alone, and Ceridwen will stay with Morgen, and she’ll start a new life. Childhood will end when I find her.
I love her enough to kill it.
“I thought you’d gone mad when you jumped into the water,” Morgen tells me. “You gave me no warning.”
“Sorry. The next time I’m being chased by the ellyll prince I’ve just mutilated, I’ll send a calling card. He’s the trickster you mentioned, isn’t he?”
“Yes, and youmutilatedhim?”
I pull a face. “Just a finger.”
Her wide eyes track me as I fight to stand. “He’ll be after you now.”
“I suspected as much.”
“I want to come with you,” Morgen says, “but I can’t. The water is polluted north of here.”
I glance upriver. The water looks ordinary, even with sight, but there’s one person I can trust in Eu gwlad,and that’s Morgen. She would follow Ceridwen anywhere, if she could.
“I’m close, then.”
Morgen nods. “It’s a day’s walk that way to the edge of our land. You’ll find Y Lle Tywyll there.”
I look to the forest ahead—to the blackened tree roots in the distance, so like the rot creeping up the wheat of the abandoned village. The hairs on my arms stand on end. I brush myself off, though I can’t do anything about the wet clothes or the bone-deep chill that leaves me shivering.
“Will you make it alone?” Morgen calls. “I could follow you on foot a little while—”
“I must!” I yell back. “Don’t risk leaving the water.”
“Just save your sister!”
She could be dead already. I shudder, but I cannot allow myself to think of that. My promise runs as deep as my marrow. I will find my sister, and I will save her.
22
gwaseilio
(WASSAILING)
I travel beneath the stars, following the direction of the moss northward, my hand locked on the hilt of my sword. The faint fairy shimmer I’ve grown accustomed to seeing is gone, ripped away like a blindfold. I assumed the woods would be livelier now that I have sight, but it’s quiet as a grave. Underfoot, seams of black stone crack through the forest floor, and they only grow denser as I walk further north.
My limbs are heavy, my eyelids even heavier. This is my first night in Gwlad Y Tylwyth Teg alone and exposed. There’s no soldier to shoulder the burden of night, no soft bed in a lovely manor and no room at an inn warmed by a pretty boy. I bristle at myself for the slight pang of yearning deep in my chest. I thought Neirin was a friend, or as close to one as I’ve ever had. I was wrong. I don’t think I’ll make that mistake again.
My clothes are still damp from the river, and the tips of my fingers have long gone numb. That’s Neirin’s fault, and I can’t let myself forget it. It’s also all his fault that I’m so far behind my sister.
I flex my fingers and a thousand knives of cold shoot up my arms. The night grows bitter as I head further north, and the trees are endless, thicker than I’ve ever seen them. I stumble often, tripping over my own leaden feet and the black, disease-mottled roots bursting from the ground.
The leaves are static without a breeze to riffle them, and even my footsteps make no sound. I’m alone, entirely alone, my new sightguaranteeing that nothing is hiding from me. There are no teg,and no animals—there aren’t even bugs making their homes in the bark—until I step over a bird’s nest fallen from a high branch. Three dead chicks huddle together among the twigs, their soft gray feathers dusted with coal. There are more dangerous things out here than the cold as I draw closer to Y Lle Tywyll.
I want to keep walking, to push on until this desolate stretch of Eu gwlad is behind me, but my legs are slow, and my breath comes in heavy gasps, misting in front of my face. I finally pry my hand from my sword and stuff it in my pocket, but it won’t warm up.
I think of Ceridwen, of time running once more as it should. She’s deep in Y Lle Tywyll. She needs me, but I’m falling behind, and even if I do reach her, in this state I’ll be too weak to save her.
I search for a patch of ground unmarred by the sickness spreading beneath the soil. I gather dried leaves and sticks and fumble to make a fire, fighting my own frozen hands. I could cry from relief when a flame catches. It’s not much, but I huddle close with my knees drawn up beneath my chin and hold my fingers as close to the flames as I can without them burning.
